by Judy Handley | Nov 12, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 316: What a Great Wine Group
Date: Friday, November 12, 2021
Weather: Rainy, Windy, and Overcast; High Temp 61, Low Temp 40 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
The weather today was ugly. I took Shadow out for the first time at 8:30 am, an hour and a half later than normal, but neither of us woke up earlier. It was windy and overcast, but not raining. But by 9 am the rain came down for about an hour. Then it cleared a bit, so I took Shadow for his morning mile walk and then took him with me to do a little food shopping. We got home around 12:30 and shortly after that the rain started again. At 4 pm I had a Wine Group gathering at David and Diana Brassards. About the time I needed to leave, it started pouring rain. I thought I might melt if I went out in the deluge, but I just put on my raincoat and took off. Good news. I didn’t melt.
This evening’s wine gathering was an Octoberfest at David and Diana Brassard’s. 
Members were to bring their favorite German wine or beer. David and Diana went all out. They were dressed in their best Octoberfest gear. Diana was transformed into a biergarten maiden wearing a platinum blonde wig. She looked great. Others had on Octoberfest aprons, and I grabbed a pair of humongous sunglasses to complete my Octoberfest look.
What a crazy but great wine group!
We first sampled German wines and then switched to the beer.
Each presentation came with a paired food. We had sauerkraut with sausage, knockwurst with potatoes, warmed large pretzels, German cheeses, fruit, and a great cheese on rye bread topped with dates. Plenty of food to complement our German samplings. It was a great evening.
by Judy Handley | Nov 11, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 315: Veteran’s Day Parade, Beach Walk, Yard Work
Date: Thursday, November 11, 2021
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 56, Low Temp 46 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
The Falmouth Veteran’s Day parade was back today after a year’s absence due to Covid. And it was a glorious day for a parade.
What a proud mother, mother-in-law, and grandmother I was as I watched Oliver as American flag bearer for Cub Scout Pack 41,
Jed as Cub Master leading all the Cub Scouts, 
Sam marching with his Scout Troup 38, and 
Jonah from Scout Troop 38 as part of the Honor Guard leading the entire parade. Then there were Molly and Joey Keefe who lived next door to Heather and Jed before they moved last year. Molly and Joey were like two additional grandchildren and today Molly was the flag bearer for the Girl Scouts and Joey for Scout Troop 38 marched right in front of Sam.
I have watched Sam in that position in past years and it is good to see the responsibility being passed on to the younger Scouts. Heather was not in the parade, but she is the Super Mom that leads the Goldstone ‘troop’ forward. And as always, the firemen of Falmouth were flying Old Glory high above the library lawn.
It was a picture perfect Veteran’s Day observance.
I did not stay for the whole ceremony as I had told Jane Woodin I would come take her for a walk. It has been two weeks since she had her knee replacement, but the doctor is still not allowing her to drive. Bruce was off having lunch with some of his buddies, so I offered to be today’s transportation. Jane loves Falmouth’s beaches and has been walking the parking lots of the beaches as they as nice and flat. 
Today we chose Old Silver Beach and put in thirty minutes of slow walking. She is making great progress.
Then I had to hurry home as the Goldstones were coming over for an afternoon of yard work. Jed used his chainsaw to continue to cut up the downed tree from our last storm. Jonah used the lopper to trim up the branches I drug down the hill so that he could throw them into the brush pile for me. Ollie used the leaf blower to clean off my back porch and grill area and then picked up the mess of branches in the backyard. Sam cut grass for the neighbors. 
Heather raked and I ran around making sure everyone was on task! Then Oliver discovered a new use for all those branches. He started making a fort big enough for all three boys to get into. That did it. 
I lost my workers to the fort, but all the batteries for the mower, leaf blower, and chain saw had run out of power and had to be charged. Besides, most of the work was done anyway. Sam has to return to finish mowing Shirley’s yard next door. And as Heather pointed out, after tomorrow’s rain and wind, there will be more leaves to clean up.
by Judy Handley | Nov 10, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 314: Enjoying a Beautiful Day
Date: Wednesday, November 10, 2021
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 61, Low Temp 35 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
Quiet mornings at home can be delightful, but my quiet morning today was a necessity. I was recovering from a mostly sleepless night. The sleepless night was due to a strong reaction to my Covid Moderna booster vaccine yesterday. I was fine until bedtime and then the chills and aches started. I thought maybe it was from the hard work I did yesterday afternoon dragging all of those tree branches down over the hill, but once I went to bed and closed my eyes, the memories of my reaction to my first vaccine came filtering back through my mind. This was the same reaction, just not nearly as bad. I thought it would pass, but at 3:30 am I got up and took Ibuprofen. I had hardly slept up to that point, so it was time to take action. The next time I looked at the clock it was 7:30 am. I had slept like a baby for four hours. I took Shadow out for a morning potty break, and then we went back to bed until 9 am. When I got up, I felt great. Even the soreness in my arm was gone.
In the early afternoon, Shadow and I drove into town to Heather and Jed’s to do a laundry. While the clothes were washing, we went for a walk in Beebee Woods with friend Kate Eldred. We both had 4 pm commitments and had to do things before that, so we limited our walk to 30 minutes. Then we stood by our cars and talked for another 30 minutes. We should have kept walking!
I went back to Heather and Jed’s, put my washer load of clothes in the dryer and then headed home to drop off Shadow. I returned to pick up the laundry on my way to Ollie’s school, Mullen-Hall, for a ‘public’ after school band lesson. The fourth grade band practices after school on Wednesdays, and today the band teacher invited family to come watch an outside practice and performance. She has enlisted some middle and high school band students and a couple of adults to help with the after-school practice. Jonah helps with the trombone players, and then he plays his bass when they ‘perform’. 
Ollie is one six or seven saxophone players and Sam’s good friend Sebastian helps with that group. Another of Sam’s good friends, Robert, helps with the clarinet players and then plays drums for the group. 
At the end of the practice, the fourth grade band and their middle and high school and adult helpers performed Ghost Busters in the front of the school. It was great fun to watch. I got home in time to get in on the last few minutes of my Public Policy group Zoom discussion. The topic today was immigration. I hated to miss it, but I real wouldn’t have missed the opportunity of seeing Ollie playing that saxophone for anything.
I am going to see Jane Woodin tomorrow. She is a member of the Public Policy group and I’m hoping she can fill me in on what I missed.
by Judy Handley | Nov 9, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 313: Robbing Peter to Pay Paul
Date: Tuesday, November 9, 2021
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 63, Low Temp 47 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
The fabulous sunshine and warmth continued today. I started my day by getting my Covid 19 Booster shot. My arm is a little sore tonight, but otherwise, no other reactions as yet. I had an appointment but still had to wait a bit, so by the time I got home I had just enough time to take Shadow for a walk and head to my book club meeting. We met outside and it was actually hot in the sun. Two members were out of town, so we connected with them via Zoom on a tablet. About 50 minutes in, the tablet that was set up on the table shut down saying it was too hot. It is November. Right?
I spent the afternoon outside cleaning up more tree limbs and branches. Yesterday, and for part of this afternoon, I was lopping off all the branches on each limb, stacking the limbs, and dragging the branches down the hill to throw into the brush pile. But about half-way through this afternoon, I decided to drag each big limb down the hill and do the branch clean-up later. This enabled me clear the entire side yard this afternoon. Hurray!!!
I must say the before and after photos showing today’s progress are quite impressive. But taking this short cut made me feel a little like I was just robbing Peter to pay Paul. I just moved the mess from the yard down the hill and out of sight. And there are plenty more branches still attached to the fallen tree in the woods right next to the yard.
I will have to wait for Jed to return with the chain saw to work on that. There is no school on Thursday, so Sam will come in the afternoon to do lawn work. Hopefully Jed, Jonah, and Ollie will come along and help with the clean-up. However, if nothing else gets done until later, it will be fine.
by Judy Handley | Nov 8, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 312: Storm Clean Up
Date: Monday, November 8, 2021
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 58, Low Temp 38 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
It has been almost two weeks since we were clobbered by a nor’easter that managed to fell a tree in the wooded area next to The Cottage. It was a big oak tree with lots of limbs and branches still laden with leaves. In other words, a major job to clean up. Thank you, thank you, thank you to Jed for getting the job started yesterday. When he and Sam and Ollie stopped here on their way home from Scout camp to give Shadow a mid-day potty break, Jed went to work with his chain saw. He got all of the limbs cut away from the tree trunk and pulled the branches off the raspberries that had been covered by the felled tree. But that left all those branches in the side yard.
He apologized for not having the time to clean up the branches, but it is a time-consuming job and he and the boys were exhausted after a weekend of camping. The boys wanted to get home and take a shower. I didn’t even know he was going to do anything with the tree yesterday, so I was elated when I got home and saw that he gotten so much done. I am totally capable of cleaning up the tree limb mess, but I don’t have a chain saw and even if I did, I’m not sure I would tackle such a big job. But he has been so busy, I had not even asked him to help with the clean. Again, thank you to Jed.
Today I made a lot of progress in cleaning up the limbs. I have a lopper that will easily cut through 2-inch limbs, so I started lopping off the limbs and dragging them down to my brush pile. I probably got about a third of the limbs cleaned up and will continue the job over the next three days.
Today was beautiful and this same weather is supposed to continue until Friday when we get rain. I hope all those branches will be gone by then. Tomorrow morning, I go to get my Covid booster shot and then go to a book club meeting. I will be home in time for a late lunch and then get busy lopping limbs.
by Judy Handley | Nov 7, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 311: Day Trip to New Hampshire
Date: Sunday, November 7, 2021
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 54, Low Temp 41 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
At Jonah’s level, a soccer game is divided into two 35-minute halves. With a 10-minute halftime and a few delays in the game, the total time is usually about an hour and a half. But when you have to drive two and a half hours each way to a game, the total time ends to be same as a work day, 9 to 5. Heather picked me up at 9 am and we drove to Yarmouth to pick Jonah up at Greenough Scout Camp where he had been since Friday evening. We then drove north to New Hampshire, getting there in time to stop and get some lunch for Jonah before heading to the soccer field at Derryfield School. It was a beautiful afternoon but our team lost this last game of the season. 
After the game, we drove into Manchester to get Jonah a burger at Five Guys. Heather and I ordered something a tad healthier from Panera, and we were on the road home. By the time we got to the Bourne Bridge to cross over to the Cape, it was just about 5 o’clock and almost dark. Sunset today was at 4:30 pm, but as we crossed the bridge we got a great view of a western horizon that looked like it was on fire. It was incredible. I took a quick photo through the window as we drove. Not a great photo, but it captured the beauty of the colors.
Thanks to Sam, Jed, and Ollie who stopped on their way home from camp to walk and play with Shadow for a bit. Still, it was a long day at home alone for Shadow, so he was really happy to see me when I got home.
This evening’s wine gathering was an Octoberfest at David and Diana Brassard’s. 
Members were to bring their favorite German wine or beer. David and Diana went all out. They were dressed in their best Octoberfest gear. Diana was transformed into a biergarten maiden wearing a platinum blonde wig. She looked great. Others had on Octoberfest aprons, and I grabbed a pair of humongous sunglasses to complete my Octoberfest look.
What a crazy but great wine group!
Each presentation came with a paired food. We had sauerkraut with sausage, knockwurst with potatoes, warmed large pretzels, German cheeses, fruit, and a great cheese on rye bread topped with dates. Plenty of food to complement our German samplings. It was a great evening.
