Overheard this morning at the gym, a conversation between a 70-something woman and a 40-ish staff member:
Woman: You're walking around an awful lot.
Man: That's all I ever do.
Woman: Don't you ever work hard?
Man: I try not to.
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Front page story of The Weekly World News, spied at a supermarket checkout stand:
It's Alive! 3000-Year-Old Mummy Pregnant! Janitor Admits: "I'm the Father!"
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Mama, it's beautiful here. I mean, spectacularly so – temperature near 80, autumn colors coming into their own, a slight breeze tickling the wind chimes that hang outside the kitchen door, butterflies cavorting all around house and yard. Clothes on the line swinging gently in the wind. A gorgeous day, the genuine article -- an exceptionally user-friendly way for October to shuffle in.
Driving into Montpelier this morning on what's called the County Road -- a two-lane that extends northeast from the town out into country, country and more country -– the autumn morning stretched itself out everywhere the eye could see. And just as the road gathered itself to bank to the right and head down in to the natural bowl that encompasses the village, I passed an oak tree that had begun letting go in earnest, a slow, steady of rain of reddish-brown leaves swirling around in a stately way, collecting in a wide ring on the grass below the tree. Got me remembering a morning at my family's place on the Hudson in early October upstate New York, the morning sun coming up after the season's first hard frost. In the wake of the night's intense cold, the leaves of a tall ash had begun coming down in the same steady way as this morning's oak. The leaves were a strong, pure yellow, the tree three or four times higher than the oak I saw today, so that the steady shedding happened like a long, quiet, graceful cascade, gradually blanketing the grass below with yellow. Within three or four hours, the tree went from full-foliage to bare branches.
As it does many folks, autumn tends to stir up emotions/memories in me. The transient show of beauty, giving way to more austere displays as the land settles into its winter self.
Wasps have been flying around the house, looking for access points that might lead to shelter from the cold weather they know will be coming. They built a nest where the roof peaks over the garage doors. One of these cold mornings I'll get out the extension ladder and knock the bugger down, then head up into the second floor of the barn and clear out the nests that got built up along the roof line there during the past warm season.
In the meantime, I intend to enjoy the show outside.