flickr friday

green scrim, new holland, pennsylvania

Oh my holy hallelujah, people — it’s Friday.  How happy does that make me?  Pretty darn happy, let me tell you.  Even better than that ?  It’s a three-day weekend!  Hooray for Labor Day.  (Ha, it rhymes!  Sheesh, I’m easily amused…)

We have dinner plans tonight and then no other plans for the rest of the weekend.  How amazing is that?  I’m sure we’ll end up doing some work on the house — laundry room trim is still waiting to be sanded and primed/painted and kitchen work has stalled completely — but I’m hoping we’ll also take some time to just relax.  What about you?  Anything exciting going on for the long weekend?  (C’mon, I’m trying to live vicariously, ok?)

So, how about some favorites for flickr friday?

untitled – Did someone say relax?  Beer is good for relaxing.

cupcake envy

we gonna rock down to… – Man, I used to love this song.  In college, I even used it as my background music for my voice mail greeting…I’m dorky like that.

chairs – Again with the chairs.

valises oubliees

espresso machine

land’s end

Ok, that’s it for me.  I’m out.  Have a lovely weekend!

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stress

entrance, reading, pennsylvania

I’ve been trying to write this post all day.  It’s just not happening.  Instead, I have this pretty cool picture I took (above) and a thought with which to leave you:

“Stress…is the condition that results when person-environment interaction leads someone to perceive a painful discrepancy, real or imagined, between the demands of a situation on the one hand and their social, biological, or psychological resources on the other.”

Hm.  Very, very interesting.

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complainy and needy

“It’s a winning combination!” Geez, if that title is any indication, you should get out now while you still can…    At least I have a nice photo for you:

fiery tulips, ephrata, pennsylvania

I took this during a trip to Pennsylvania for a wedding way back at the end of April.  At the time, Pennsylvania was a couple weeks ahead of Maine in its development of spring, so the leaves were popping out and all the flowers were in perfect bloom — it was beautiful!  Because spring takes so long to arrive in Maine, it was just the sneak-preview I needed.

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Yikes.  The onslaught has begun — the first round of students has arrived on campus and the rest arrive this weekend.  And the city is doing major construction on the two streets bordering my office.  Let’s just say it’s a little noisy and congested out there these days…

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I have a small confession to make.  I can’t make muffins.  Of most other things, I am a pretty decent cook, but for whatever reason, I screw up muffins every time I try.  (“Muffens.  Ur doin it rong.“)  And yes, I know the trick is to not mix the batter too much.  I’ve tried that.  They still come out dry and with a density that could be fairly described as hockey puck.  In my opinion, and I hope you’ll agree, muffins are supposed to be self-contained dense little clouds of yumminess — more like dessert than breakfast, but containing fruit so you don’t have to feel guilty. But that is decidedly not what comes out of my oven.  Can you help me out here?  I have a bunch of blueberries in my freezer that I’d like to use up — do you have a basic muffin recipe that is idiot proof?

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Also, I asked for opinions last week (at the very end of this post) and ***gasp*** no one answered!  Seriously, People.  I know you have opinions.  And I know that some of you are usually all too happy to share them.  So, do me a solid here and weigh in on my dining room rug dilemma:  What do you think of this rug from West Elm?  How about the considerably less expensive version from J.C. Penney?  Be honest, ok?  I can take it.  (But do it soon, ok?  Because the J.C. Penney version isn’t going to be on sale forever, you know…)

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flickr friday

Here’s what I’m probably doing this weekend:

And here’s what I wish I was doing this weekend:

martini, Steve Forney

That gives you a pretty good idea of where I stand on this whole never-ending renovation project.

So how about some nice photos to cheer ourselves up, eh?

balloon group 2 – Lewiston just hosted this year’s Great Falls Balloon Festival.  I have to say, all those balloons were a pretty amazing sight on my morning commute!

dogtags – I don’t really know why I like this picture.  But I do.

it took me a long time… – **swoon**  One of my favorite stories as the title for a fabulously beautiful photograph.

mid-century kids brunswick – More chairs.  Apparently I have a bit of a thing for chairs.  Joel told me that recently.  I had no idea.

sunlight on the waves…

untitled – Pretty.  And gentle.  Can a picture be gentle?  I think so.  Anyway, reminds me that Fall is on its way…

cupcake – Um, yeah.  I’m going to need about three of these to go with my weekend martinis. 

Hope you have a sweet and yummy weekend, too — see you next week!

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i’m not the only dork.

This.

Thank goodness.

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And on a completely unrelated note:

traveling as fast in one direction as she can go
before she has second thoughts &
goes back to doing the same old stuff

~ Story People

See you tomorrow for flickr friday…

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more random

What’s up with me these days? It seems like every post I write is “random” — it’s like I can’t keep a coherent thought in my head for longer than half a second…

annie c. – hope cemetery, kennebunk, maine

You may remember my mentioning a while back that my department at the College has been without a Vice President for quite some time…almost a year in fact. Well, the administration hired someone earlier this summer and he started this week. We had a departmental meeting on Monday where New VP was welcomed to the College and introduced to the staff. He seems great — genuine, humble (but not so much that it makes me doubt his sincerity), relaxed but still enthusiastic, very approachable. Frankly, I’m encouraged. I have my first one-on-one meeting with him tomorrow — wish me luck!

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So, you know, just to torture myself, I visited the Anthropologie website yesterday — the New Fall Collection is out. The blouses. The blouses!! They’re all so pretty. I want the whole collection, per usual. Not that I would EVER in a million years spend that much money on clothes, even if Anthropologie carried clothes that fit me. (Would it kill them to add one more size? I mean, really. Almost half of American women wear a size 14 or larger. That’s about half of Anthropologie’s market and they only carry clothes up to size 14. But I digress.) Anyway, I’m especially loving the Buckle and Sway Skirt in gray. Oh! And the sweaters! The Santa Rosa Cardigan in pink — so adorable. And the Humbug Hoodie in slate — how cute is that? Even the name is cute. Ok. I’m done talking about clothes. And here’s my penance for being so vain as to devote the largest paragraph in this weird, rambling post to clothing. (I love her writing. She’s so cruelly honest. But whatever you do, don’t call her a genius.)

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Oh my gosh, why am I not going to this?

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Ah, The Shins. What did we ever do before The Shins?

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And this (sorry about the ad that precedes the video). I know I’ve mentioned Once (the movie) before, but I’m telling you again: if you haven’t seen it yet, go out right now and rent it. Seriously. Even just these short little clips make tears well up in my eyes. It’s so beautiful.

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Ok. Last thing. I need your opinion on something. I recently discovered this rug on the West Elm website. Normally, I’m not at all into “faux bois” (that’s the Martha Stewart way of saying wood grain… I’m sorry, when I said snooty, it sounded like Martha Stewart…), but for whatever mysterious reason, I immediately loved this rug. I think it would look really great in my dining room. What do you think? Is it just too…I don’t know…rustic? Somehow I think the deep, espresso brown color classes it up a bit. And I like that it has a pattern, but that it’s a tone-on-tone pattern — it’s not too busy. I also like the idea of the wood grain contrasted with my fancy-schmancy china (inherited from my Mom), which is a very busy Wedgwood pattern. What do you think?

Wow, this was really random. Thanks for bearing with me…

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flickr friday

flood sunset, androscoggin river, durham

Let’s start with the pictures today, shall we?

cold spring pumps

red chairs facing grass – Cute chairs, no? Hm…those might look cute with my new glider…

untitled – Wow. It’s so simple, but I love everything about this shot (as you can see by the comment I left).

snowbirds – Cool shadows. And how cool that this was taken on Peterborough Street — my old haunting grounds!

rows and rows – Huh. What’s with me and the chairs today?

green – Of course.

martini redux – It’s definitely time for a cocktail. Have a great weekend, friends!

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If you are easily offended, please do not read the next paragraph. Just stop right here with the weekend wishes and go on your merry way, ok? Presumably you’re here because you like me (at least a little bit, right?) and I don’t want you to think less of me because I have conversations about the following subject matter. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, ok?

Because of a recent vigorous debate with a friend, I was going to post a poll today — nothing like the overwhelmingly scientific method of an online poll to determine who’s right and who’s wrong, eh? Anyway, the matter in question is this:

Which of these women is older in chronological age?

• A MILF
• A Cougar

(If you don’t know what those terms mean, you really should have heeded the warning in the preceding paragraph. This is your second chance — just browse away from this post and move onto something else. And for heaven’s sake, don’t go and do a Google search.)

Some new information has come to light and I think the matter is settled — thus, no poll (plus, I’m too lazy to register at Twiigs and create the poll) but if you still care to weigh in with a comment, knock yourself out.

And now that I’ve probably alienated half of my meager readership, I’m going to go. Have a great weekend, you guys — see you next week!

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sushiesque and polyvore

Patience, my little chickens — that wacky title will become clear in good time.

I took this lovely photograph on the day that we met up with Joel’s family in Portsmouth to celebrate my birthday:

portsmouth buds, Portsmouth, NH

My birthday was way back in April. This is how backed up I am in the whole downloading / dating / naming / editing photographs department. I seriously need to get my a$$ in gear and get caught up.

Remember when I recently posted about how Joy won the Beantown Bartender Battle? Well, that picture of her that I posted was linked back to where I found it — on Bostonist. It was posted there by Bostonist contributer, C. Fernsebner, a.k.a. Sushiesque, who took the picture. She has hilarious posts on that there blog of hers — I think this is my favorite.  And this one is funny, too.  Ok, I’ll stop now.  She also has a bunch of great photos of Boston on her flickr page. In addition to Sushiesque, she contributes to Adorablog. See? It’s such a small world on the internet. Isn’t that cool?

By the way, just thought you should know that Polyvore is the new crack. Seriously. It’s pretty near the top of the list of excuses perfectly reasonable explanations for why I can’t seem to get anything done these days. You should try it. You know you want to.

Oh! I recently uploaded some new pictures to my flickr page if you want to check them out. Hm, I guess I’m not a total slacker…just mostly.

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monday miscellany

wise, Hope Cemetery, Kennebunk

Life has been a little crazy lately…so crazy, in fact, that I’m forced to resort to bullet points:

• I’m having quite a bit of trouble with Leo the laptop these days. (What? You don’t name your computer?) He is slower than cold molasses in January works at his own pace and doesn’t seem to think it’s important for me to access the internet. Fortunately, my friend Matthew is a computer genius and is very graciously and generously helping me clean up Leo’s act. (Thank you, thank you, thank you, Matt!) He’s also planning to install some new memory soon — with any luck, that should take care of the most pressing problems.
• Last week, I attended a work-related event at which the granddaughter of my all-time favorite painter, Andrew Wyeth, gave a slide presentation on her grandfather’s work and told some of the stories behind the paintings. It was amazing. At one point, she talked about his final painting of a dear life-long friend — the painter’s response to the friend’s death and the painting that resulted from it — and it made me cry, right there, during the presentation. It was a great evening.
• The next night, Joel and I had dinner with Kim and Tim (Kim is a.k.a. The Recovering Protestant). They were vacationing in Wells with Tim’s family and took an afternoon detour to Portland to meet us at The Great Lost Bear. Um, of course. Because get-togethers with Kim and Tim always involve good beer. I think between the four of us, we sampled six different brews. Good stuff. (Thanks again, you two!) This is the first time we’ve seen them since their wedding back in January, so it was great to catch up and visit with them!
• After I blogged last week about Joy’s big win in the Hendrick’s Gin Beantown Bartender Battle, LUPEC Boston did an even better write-up. I’m still so excited for her — yay, Joy!
• Not much going on in the way of renovation lately. I think we may be a bit burned out… But. BUT. Joel moved the dryer into the laundry room last week and I got to use it over the weekend. Woo, hoo! (Oy. I’m excited about using the dryer. How sad is that?) The washer is still in the kitchen, but I got a little taste of what it’s going to be like to have a laundry room and, let me tell you, it was pretty frickin’ amazing. We’re hoping to get the washer moved next weekend and then we should be able to continue work on the kitchen.
• Holy crap, the sun actually came out over the weekend. Seriously folks, it’s been, like, three weeks straight since we’ve had sun for any appreciable amount of time. It was really nice.
• We took Saturday off (off? what’s that?) and continued the Wyeth extravaganza with a trip to the Farnsworth in Rockland. The aforementioned Wyeth granddaughter gives three tours there daily. We took a stroll around the museum and then headed out to the Olson House (site of the famed Christina’s World) for her last tour of the day. Just like her slide presentation earlier in the week, the tour was amazing. Seriously, you can’t do much better for insight (and inside information) than the painter’s beloved only granddaughter. We even took a walk down to the Olson family cemetery after the tour — it was such a gloriously beautiful day.
• And then after the loveliness of Saturday, I spent Sunday doing, like, a zillion (okay, just seven) loads of laundry. But, hey, now I have a linen closet full of clean sheets and towels and tons and tons of clean clothes. It’s a beautiful thing.

Ok, when I start talking about laundry, it’s time to go…

P.S. Has anyone seen last week’s flickr friday? She’s usually very reliable and punctual… I can’t imagine why she didn’t show up. Well, we’ll see what happens this week — I’m sure she’ll be back on schedule.

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nobody’s darling

Ok, I admit it: I read Bostonist.  No, I don’t live in Boston anymore.  And yes, I read Bostonist anyway.  What?  I’m not ashamed.  It may seem a little wanna-be-city-girl, but I miss it and I have to counteract the Maine isolation somehow.  Aaanyhoodle.  I was reading Bostonist yesterday when I came across this little tidbit:

“A Hendrick’s-sponsored bartender battle goes down at Central Square’s Green Street tonight. Twenty bucks gets you four gin-based drinks and the opportunity to witness the birth of some new cocktails. Recipes for the latter will be presented as limericks by the five finalists. 280 Green St., Cambridge, 7 pm. $20.”

The Hendrick’s Gin Beantown Bartender Battle?  That can only mean good things, right?  And those finalists mentioned above?  Oh yeah, my sister-in-law, Joy, was one of them.  In addition to being a bada$s with a jigsaw, she is pretty serious about cocktails (founding member of LUPEC Boston, which you can read about on their blog and on MySpace) and she’s somewhat of a genius behind the bar.  Girl knows how to make a fierce cocktail, is all I’m saying.  Here she is working her magic:

And so it wasn’t really that surprising when she took FIRST PLACE in this bartending battle!  Woo, hoo!!  Hm, we should probably get down there to Boston to try one of these new-fangled Nobody’s Darling cocktails before they get to be too exclusive…  You think when she’s rich and famous she’ll remember the little people whose kitchen she helped spackle?

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