sugaring time

there was a time when i didn't know that maple-flavored syrup wasn't really maple syrup, and didn't care.
i'll bet there are lots of people who still don't know! once my cousin cathy came to visit me and asked me "where's the maple sugar industry?"
i said more or less "say what?"
she wondered where in this rural and forested state were the factories big enough to make all that maple syrup sold worldwide -- she meant products like aunt jemima's.
she wondered was i was putting her on when i told her that for a few weeks in spring, sap gushed from holes drilled in trees, and was gathered in buckets, poured into vats often pulled on sledges by horses, and boiled down 40 to 1 to make syrup.
pretty unbelievable!
nowadays many big syrup makers use tubing through the hilly woods from tree to tree to a collection tank, but some still use horses to get up in the snowy hills. (the trees won't grow in nice rows on flat land like apple trees). many people tap just a few trees around their place and gather the sap by snowshoe. something to do when the weather is warming, but too cold and muddy for anything else outside.
once you have a tank of sap, you need an outdoor shed for the 40 to 1 boiling, unless you are tired of your kitchen wallpaper.
and that's why the stuff is wicked expensive, but tastes like nothing else!
here are some photos of local sugaring so far this spring!


http://www.vpr.net/episode/48111/

the show must go on but all things must end

     for the past 3 years at this time of year i'd be preparing for the opening of a new season of TSMGO!  practicing my unicyle riding, writing and re-writing a skit, making a set and figuring out costumes...but not this year. it feels like such a loss!
     i remember the first show ever. we were sooo nervous, we could not believe it! we hid in the dressing room (a hole beside the makeshift stage), shaking with stagefright, reminding each other it wasn't real!. the first show took place on a raised platform in the parking lot of a car dealership. for months we had been rehearsing weekly, a raucous affair attended by everyone in the show, watching and helping with each other's acts, as well as antics like rezzing herds of buffalo with the starax wand or turning into blobs of jello and anything else we could come up with! those rehearsals were so much fun!
     after the first show we played music and the audience and cast danced and were silly in the parking lot for an hour! i was dancing with my friend gigi who had borrowed her husband's avatar for the evening. someone asked me if 'he' was my boyfriend and we laughed and laughed!
     well time to move on i suppose. now there are so many entertainment choices in second life, nothing like our variety show, but the energy and commitment is no longer there. last year everyone just worked on their act alone, showed up and did it, or so it seemed to me. the audience loved it, and we did too, but it is a lot of work!

     i'm searching for a good picture from the first season. if i find one i'll post it here. we were more into doing than documenting way back then! send me one if you have one!

song sparrow

the song sparrows are back!
where do they go?
i love their little songs,
variable yet the same.
     i always recognize their voice.

     once when my sister lived in virginia

     i spent days there in the hot flat light

    listening to the song.
over and over and over

he sang the first 4 notes of beethoven's fifth,

and then a warble -

"da da de-daaa, burblewarblewarble"

     today the cardinal is competing for loudest bird.

     i wonder if the song sparrows

     stay with the cardinals?

     and don't really go away,
but like my neighbors up and down the street,

spend winter hunkered under shelter

until they have to burst out

and feel the warming sun?

xmas wreath

did something fly by my head? god i hope it isn't a bat.
from the corner of my eye i saw it, maybe a large moth.
two house finches eventually do get my attention

they're all agitated hopping and chirping in the white spruce behind me.

i look around for cats
nope
i go back to unwinding the wire holding the xmas wreath to the front door.
finally! a week of warmth has melted the ton of snow that slid from the roof and kept the front steps buried all winter.
i can get to the front door and the evergreen wreath.
but here, what's this?
bits of straw and a strip of paper, not much, but now i understand.
mr and mrs finch have chosen this wreath for their first nest of the year.
i got it just in time! looks like work had barely begun.
what a close call!  we could not have used our front door for months
and worse, would have to leave the wreath.

you see it's fine to leave your xmas lights up year round,
and even to light them every night!
but the wreath? now that's just laziness and tacky besides.

red-wings arrived March 15

old man winter turned in early this year.
he'll be up a few times to take a piss.

march and april famed for howling blizzards, hard frosts, flood and ice storm
still the burstling flocks of male red-winged blackbirds arrive
daredevils of weather and starvation in their land rush.

faint heart ne'er won small plump dull colored warm hearted egg sitter
she's still in florida but she'll require a nice view
safe from foxes snakes jays and high water.

perching on his claimed plot he proclaims his bravery, his good looks, his daring
and gathered with companions in tree tops,
blasts us awake with the news that Spring will come soon.

a gorgeous day

    oh gorgeous March day!
the roads, deep in mud and deeper potholes,
endangering small cars and good shoes,
and all lined with mounds of dirty snow,
    we stand in boots in mud,
admiring the mangy white hills, brown patched, trees bare and bleak
no leaf nor blossom to be found,
and only still the winter birds call and chirp.
    the sun pours down on us like maple syrup
changing all to glowing gold,
and even passing strangers stop to say
"what a gorgeous day today!"

fly the flag proudly!

it is one nation, worldwide!  the nation of OPEN!  even our public library flies the nation of open flag, altho the town hall sticks with the stars and stripes.

the Sakyong's what about me?

it is not new, this video by the Sakyong Mipham, but i still go back to watch it again and again. i had not put it on my blog before because there is too much to say about the Sakyong! so i will just put this here and say nothing, but go to this link if you are curious about him.

WHAT ABOUT ME?   click the 4 arrow thing to enlarge

how does instant runoff work anyway?

three of us wanted to watch a movie together at my house.
i had 4 movies, one of which i had seen already but was willing to see again.
call it movie A.

so we decided to do an instant run-off.
each took paper and pen and listed the movies by preference.
number one was the one we most wanted to see, and number 4 that we least wanted to see.
it ended up like this:

1. A, B, C

2. A, D, D

3. B, B, C

4. A, C, D

we couldn't figure out what to do next, with no clear winner!
we added together the rankings of each movie, for example A had 1 + 2 + 4 = 7.
this gave us a tie between A and B and between C and D.
once again we were stumped.

i had put movie A last, since i'd already seen it, but i said i'd watch it again, so we did.
the movie was UP. it was just as much fun the second time around!
but we're still wondering how we could have made that work!

drama with winches and pulleys

every wednesday liz and i, like puppies, run to the window when we hear the garbage truck coming. it makes me laugh to think how entertaining we find this.
first the humped truck backs to the dumpster.
then a person, big as a bear in layers of coats and hats and gloves and boots
-- probably skinny as a rail when he strips down in the spring! --
rolls out from the cab to the muddy/icy/snowy ground.
(depending on which of our 3 seasons it is)
he trundles to the back of the truck.
he surveys the situation, returns to the cab.
the truck pulls out and backs up in a subtly different position.
*aside* - these are not called dumpsters in england. i think kumi told me what they are but i forgot already.
the inspection and repositioning goes on for a bit.
eventually things line up.
he detaches a heavy metal cable from the back of the truck. it has a wonderful huge orange hook on the end!
he drags the cable around to the far end of the dumpster,
today, fighting his way through one of last week's storm-downed trees lying against the dumpster's back-end.
there, the hook is hooked to the middle of the far end.
liz and i watching from the window smile and nod with satisfaction.
the bundled person tramps back to the cab, hoists up, and pulls the door shut.
then slowly, slowly, slowly, with a whiney winching sort of noise, the cable pulls the back of the dumpster into the air until the 6 door flaps open feebly and everything, mostly, tumbles and thumps into the truck's hump.
there. it's done.
the denoument ? -- we never stay for the last act.
unless there's a possibility of the truck getting stuck in the mud or something breaking.

the complete kitchen, and it dances!

Frofidor Niekerk often has a new avatar to present at Show & Tell. usually something so terrifying and dangerous looking, i mostly hide under the bleachers.  he often wins the biggest portion of the pot, as his creations are ingenious and imaginative, and can dance, even if they don't always come in pink. (the most frequent question at Show & Tell is "does it come in pink?") 

on sunday, he presented an avatar i could use!  i wanted one the minute i saw it....and not only that, he gave them away to everyone present...mr. pots, a kitchen robot!  and here i am dancing up a storm as ms pots.

see the waffle iron arm and cheese grater calf?

karuna's book

click to enlarge pictures

these are snapshots i took (shhh don't tell) of a little known book by Jung, as in Carl Jung, hand written and painted and illustrated by him.  Jung's Red Book had been kept hidden in a vault by his descendants who did not want the public to see this beautiful display of genius and madness.
the story of the history and publication of this book reads like a spy adventure tale!  read the story here!
my photos don't do justice to the colors. as you can see the book has now been published and translated, and thanks to my good friend karuna, i get to see it for a short time!  even if i never read a word of it, it is an object of amazing power and beauty.

did HBA write this story?

A friend of mine has a voice-over part in Dead or Alive Extreme Beach Volleyball 3 - the sequel!
So as not to be totally you know DUMB i looked it up on wikipedia.
Here's a LITTLE BIT of what is there...

According to the game premise, Zack gambles winnings from the Dead or Alive 3 tournament at a casino. He hits the jackpot, earning a ginormous sum of money, and buys himself a private island, which he names after himself ("Zack Island"). He invites the women from the previous tournament (along with his girlfriend) to his island under the pretense that the next Dead or Alive tournament will be held there. The women arrive and after discovering the hoax, decide to make the best of the situation and spend two weeks vacationing on the island.
At the end of the two week time period, the ladies depart, leaving only Zack and his girlfriend Niki on the island. Shortly thereafter, a volcano, thought to be inactive, erupts, threatening to destroy Zack's island. In the chaos, Niki escapes using Zack's jetpack. Zack survives the volcanic eruption, but the island is completely destroyed. While not part of the game itself, Zack's later Dead or Alive 4 ending shows the pair robbing an ancient tomb and escaping with a truck filled with gold, suggesting a possible financing source for a sequel. In the sequel, it is confirmed that this is indeed the source for financing "New Zack Island".

For unexplained reasons, the Dead or Alive characters' previous rivalries were reduced to a general dislike in this title. As a result, even characters who would normally try to kill each other (such as Ayane and Kasumi) can become fast friends through a brief exchange of gifts.

a bit more...

many reviewers were impressed at the depth of the volleyball game,

In its review, Edge focused on the game's unusual social, rather than adversarial, focus.

Dead Or Alive Xtreme 2 improvements: the female characters' individual breasts now have their own "physics."[3] This allows each breast to behave differently, although this has been criticized for making the breasts move in an exaggerated fashion (i.e., they often continue moving for an unnaturally long time after a character has stopped moving;and sometimes one or both breasts will freeze in mid-bounce.).

The Malted Bunneh comes to the small screen!

Enjah finished her machinima - whew! what a job, finding or making all those wonderful props and sets and animations, herding the actors, changing the plot daily!  it came out great especially considering she is new to this art.  i just hope i don't get type-cast as the hamster girl-friday armed with a heavy pocketbook!

global warming

stop global warming!
makes the days warmer, skies blue,
birds sing, snow melt. oh!
 
                                        ~mudpie
 

from page 81

the days above freezing have melted quite alot of the snow. 

the ground is still too frozen to absorb it, so we are in mud.

thus i looked carefully before stepping out of the car.

the truck-stop parking lot was full as usual. 

my eye was drawn to a small bright blue button there on the ground between the passenger side of our car and the driver's side of a large SUV. 

something in my Nature urged me to pick it up, but my Nurture talked me out of it.

i put my boot down in the wetness, then noticed another button.
once made aware of them, i saw 3 more.

five small bright blue buttons in the mud. 

it was like finding a scrap torn from a book (page 81) that said only "...she realized when all five blue buttons had fallen into the mud, someone might see them there and  ..."

crow light

bright morning sun lights
the snow-limned branch and twig
finial crow announcing
 
                                       ~mudpie
 
 

pizza!

i love the smell of pizza.
is it the perfect food?
contains every food group, and belongs to the round.
the round group of donuts, grapes, chocolate chip cookies, swedish meatballs,...a wonderful group!

all the lunchtime diners in pizza chef are men.
large men.  with their winter jackets on.
no wait.  in that booth, the white haired people sunk into their down jackets, eating pizza.
a couple? male and female. so completely overlookable.
what are they doing eating lunch in pizza chef on a weekday?

my eyes blur as i watch them until, omg! her hair is a smooth brown pony tail and her smile is bright red lipstick!
her sweater is buttoned up the back, and, honest-to-god, a poodle skirt??
and he -- whoa, a hunk in a t-shirt, sleeve rolled up to hold a softpack, hair combed back like a young elvis. is it the same couple?
she grins at him, her toe taps his foot under the table, in time to -- where'd that music come from? -- "gonna make a chain of paper clips, and chain us together as i kiss your lips..."

what a strange vision.

POP! it's gone. and there are two old whitehaired people hunkered in their down jackets sitting in a booth eating pizza. her toe is tapping on his foot under the table...and LOL see them grin at each other?

haiku from mars and venus

i told Al i had condensed his poem into a haiku as follows:

our tracks up the hill -
my long sweet life with deb
even as new snow falls
 
he responded that it might be more like this:
 
Rabbit ripped from life
Fox dripping blood
My love is not like that

this reminds me of trying to create a skit with HBA, best described in this:

http://xkcd.com/611/

Valentine poem

every year my friend Al writes a valentine's day poem for his wife, Deb.  he graciously gave me permission to blog it.  like me, he walks the same trails hills fields near his house year after year always finding things to be interested in.

For Deb
       by Al Alessi

The prints are legion on the fresh few flakes
That dropped unbeknownst in the night
To the coyotes' delight
For the clean clear tracks will help their task
Of returning the owner to their maker
Taker wins all
In the call of the wilderness behind our home
It is the way of all time
This reading of lines on the white canvas
To know what chances are there to live or die
A storyboard screed for all to read
The grouse the turkey the hare
Their trails lay bare for the predator
Or tourist to decipher
The wild ridge where men can not easily live
Giveth and taketh away
Deer moose mouse and owl
Painting their lines of whence they came
And to where they would hope to go.

I do not look back to see our own trail
as we climb as we are able
To the lichen-lathered picnic table placed so long ago
By old Mr. Apple when his then spry prints
Of Vermont boot tread crisscrossed the ridge to be read
As surely as ours do today.
Do we in any way make sense
Of where we have been and what we seek
In this meander on our home hill
Where we must neither kill or be killed
We have not seen the risk of each step
As though it was our last
We are afforded contemplation
And the temptations that from there derive
As we drive on nearly to the top
With but our precipitous decline in line
To fall back untouched and unscathed
To the valley floor to our humble door and the hearth within

We have traveled many such paths together
And we know this small valley well
We know where the deer herd dwells
We know where we are headed
And if we turned about we'd see our prints in the snow.
We were there! And there!
We can see it stretch past the stoney ruins of the shepherd's hut
Our presence is as proven as calligraphy on linen
We were here
But it's clear that time will soon wash this sign of our boots
Down into the roots of maple trees and June's wild flowers.
How is it we can feel so lost and yet know our path so well?
Did we forget to choose something along the way?
Though if I chose nothing much ever very well
I am blessed that it is with thee I journey and dwell.

♥