Scarecrow and Dragon #blogboost #RMF2019

Today is the last day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge and it is also Halloween.

The weather has been giving nothing but tricks to most of our country - Santa Ana winds and terrible fires in California, lots of snow in Colorado, unexpected early snow in many other places.  For us, we'll get rain and wind.  Fortunate, as things go.  The rain has already arrived.

But that doesn't mean we can't do a little Halloween decorating on my blog.  Many of these are courtesy of a scarecrow contest earlier this month at a local park.

A grim reaper scarecrow.

Owego, New York

A black cat.

A Halloween garden

Time to feed the dinosaurs. (The late Johnny Hart, who wrote the B.C.and Wizard of Id comics, was local and, in fact, worked (before his days of fame) at one time in my neighborhood.)

And one with a broomhead.

But most of all, don't forget to feed your dragon.

With that, I say goodbye to October and fall, as it seems winter always starts in November.  It is time for the gales and snows of November. 

We'll end it with a song - from 1958, Purple People Eater.   Linking with Mary at Jingle Jangle Jungle for the last day of her Rockober Music Festival.

Day 31 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge #blogboost.

The World's on Fire #blogboost #RMF2019

Living on the East Coast of the United States, I watch the fires in California in horror.  I am used to seeing red skies for sunrises and sunsets, but I am almost afraid to ever post such a picture again.

About as red as I want to post - Skaneateles Lake, New York

The numbers are staggering, hard to imagine.
Over 200,000 evacuated.  People fleeing as fire approaches the major highways they are fleeing on.

My spouse was reminded of the lyrics of the Doors song "LA Woman", a song about Los Angeles.

It contains these lyrics:
"I see your hair is burnin'/Hills are filled with fire..."

But Jim Morrison didn't live long enough to see this, or to experience a modern California which is on fire or is without electricity.

Only time will tell what will end up happening - this is only the beginning of the California fire season.

Is this our future?  Horror?  Something that you wish was a Halloween horror movie but is too real, for some bloggers I have interacted with?


Posting as part of Jingle Jangle Jungle's Rocktober Music Fest 2019.

Day 29 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge #blogboost

Forever Young 2020 #RMF2019 #blogtboost

High School Reunions.  Have you ever gone to any of yours?

I blogged, a couple of days ago, about being invited to my 50th high school reunion, which will take place in June of 2020.

It brought back memories of the one reunion I ever went to - my husband's 40th.

I originally wrote this post on October 16, 2010 - nine years and a few days ago.  Today, I rerun it, with some music and  editing.

I called it "Forever Young".

The Dancing Queen.  No longer 17.

The administrator for a children's hospital on the West Coast.  The merger and acquisitions lawyer up from Washington DC.  The school psychologist practicing in Virginia.  The financial consultant.  The grandmother of three fresh from a trip to Hawaii.  The produce clerk.  The man taking constant phone calls because his father was in the hospital, a thousand miles away.

What did we all have in common?   Six hours of dancing, talking, sharing email addresses, and looking at old photos.

A 40th high school reunion.

Not mine, but my husband's.  One of his friends organized it.  Before last night I had only met one of these people, and to my amazement, I recognized him the minute I saw him.  My husband was already in college when I met him so this was a part of his life that I was never able to share.

Until now.

There was the woman who, surveying the room, said to me "This is surreal".  Yes it was and I bet everyone who goes to a reunion (especially the 30th, the 40th, and beyond) thinks the same thing.  When you age, the people you knew in your childhood (if you don't see them as adults) are frozen in time.  The people you went to high school with are, in your mind, forever 17 and 18.  Even if they are really 58 or 60.

Until you go to the reunion, that is, and this is the surreal part.  You walk into the room and see a bunch of middle aged people just like you.  Some look like their yearbook photos.  Many do not. Many of us grey, all of us wrinkled, some of us in shape, others not so much.  Some of us have achieved great things.  Some have lived the lives they had planned to live but for many of us our lives have taken many unexpected directions.  Some good, some not.

We are older, wiser.  We accept the class clown, we reminise about old antics,  we laugh with and hug the classmate who had too much to drink and is now trying to cry on everyone's shoulder.  We know this moment isn't going to be forever.  We know when we have the next reunion we will be near 70.  Maybe we should have these more often.

Will we do that?

Or will we be reabsorbed into our daily lives?  Only time will tell.

But for that one night we were....forever young.

Joining Mary at Jingle Jangle Jungle and her Rocktober Music Festival.

Day 22 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge #blogboost

The Player Piano #RMF2019 #blogboost

This piano is a long ago memory for me, of a place I visited overnight when I was 17 years old and living in New York City.

I never dreamed I would run into it again in October of 2019.  Nor did I know that I would eventually move to the area where I saw this piano and live there for over 30 years.  But life is like that.

My spouse and I took a tour yesterday of a historic mansion on the edge of downtown Binghamton, New York.  It's a teaching museum now, with the mansion part normally closed to the public.  These tours aren't given that often, but New York State held a Pathways of History event yesterday and today and tours of normally closed parts was offered.

After the tour, I saw this piano on display.  The maker was "Link" and there is an interesting history surrounding Link player pianos that I should blog more about one of these days.  There was a sign (you can see it on the right side of the piano) asking that people not touch it.  It's a part of history, now, possibly too fragile to be played.  I wonder.

 A woman and a child were examining it.  The woman was explaining that when she was growing up, you could put a quarter in the machine and the piano would play.  She then turned to me, and said "do you remember doing that?"

I started to tell her "no, I didn't grow up here" but suddenly the memory came back, of a day I was with my childhood best friend, and her mother had driven us both up to Binghamton to pick up some artwork her uncle had on display in a Binghamton gallery.  We stayed overnight, and we visited a museum.  We were both fascinated by the automatic piano.  We fed it quarters and it played.

It took me years after I moved here to realize where I had been. I've seen the piano since (it is sometimes on display) but never remembered about being able to play it.

So, I quickly added, "but when I was 17, I visited Binghamton, and was able to play it, too."

I hope this woman's daughter gets the chance to play it one day.

I love player pianos, and I love Billy Joel, the Piano Man.

Linking with Mary of Jingle Jangle Jungle and her Rocktober Music Fest.

Day 13 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge #blogboost

Waiting For The Sun #blogboost #RMF2019

In upstate New York, fall and winter is a game of waiting for the sun.

In the past few days, fall has kicked in, as sun has (mostly) disappeared.  The days are mainly dreary (with some exceptions) and the trees are finally getting the message that the sun isn't coming back strong anytime soon. They'd better start preparing for winter.

Everywhere you go, you are reminded of fall.  Cauliflower abounds.

Broome County Farmers Market, Binghamton, New York

Decorations are everywhere.

Right now, our kitchen is scented with fennel we bought today.  On the right is local celery.

Grapes.   I love eating concord grapes, but not that crazy about the seeds.  The small grapes on the right are so delicious - they have real flavor.  I wish I knew what variety they were.

Frog Pond Market, late September, 2019

It's so wonderful living near grape country.

But soon the outdoor markets will all close for the year.  The foliage will have turned color and dropped, and the first snows will have arrived.  And still it will be dreary.

We'll be Waiting For the Sun.

 I was reading the blog of Mary at Jingle Jangle Jungle today.  She is featuring rock music every day in October, which she calls the Rocktober Music Fest, and her post today was on a group called the Doors.  She asked what our favorite Doors song was and I was immediately reminded of our signature dreary days and Waiting for the Sun.  This song is about spring, but it's now an earworm, and I am going to end with that song.  If you only know the Door's greatest hits, you will be pleasantly surprised.

Waiting for the sun....and participating today in the Rocktober Music Fest.

Day 12 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge #blogboost