happy halloween

this is the pumpkin i carved for oak knoll's spooktacular celebration. it was based on a pattern that emma drew for me. together, we created quite a good-looking jack-o-lantern.

looking up (sideways)

nina in newport

ten year reunion

as none of us feel like traveling to michigan for homecoming, my ex-roommates and i gathered instead on the east coast. somehow, despite plenty of picture snapping due to the presence of two young kids and lovely fall colors, we forgot to take a picture of the three of us. well, we all look about the same as we did in 2003 and 2004 except less dressed-up.

saying goodbye to an old friend

matt and i haven't been around the horse farm all that long, but we've learned a few things already:
1. don't let the dogs run in the back field because coyotes will try to eat nina;
2. glue jokes are never funny;
3. nobody likes it when you say you can't tell the horses apart;
4. and, horses are to horse people what nina and jake are to me.

today, the oldest horse on the farm had to be put down. his official name was "goodnight cavalier," but he was generally referred to as kim. he seemed like a very nice, gentle horse and i heard that he was quite the show animal in his day. he was a five-gater, which someone told me with a sense of awe, and at first i nodded knowlingly but then finally confessed to having no idea what it means. turns out, he was a five-gaiter, which means he knew five different gaits. this is very impressive for a horse.

kim had been in pretty rough shape for a while- unable to digest fresh grass, he needed to wear a muzzle when he was out on the pasture and it was pretty sad to watch him try to graze. he also had a lot of foot troubles and was in pain whenever he was standing, which, for those of you unfamiliar with horses, is pretty much all the time. they tried all these tricks to extend his life and keep him comfortable- foam horseshoes, a stall full of sand, painkillers, etc... but finally someone- i think the vet- made the call that enough was enough, and on behalf of the horse, i said, "phew."

i didn't really realize just what a monumental process it is to get rid of a horse and i guess we should consider ourselves lucky that kim was able to walk to his grave under his own power, and even more importantly than that, that he didn't die in the barn. it's not easy to get a 1200 pound animal out of a stall when he is dead. a neighbor spent three hours digging a hole in one of the pastures last night, and today, the horse people all walked with kim out to the hole and said goodbye before the vet gave him a fatal dose of anesthetic. i admit, i was more than a little choked up as i watched. and i gave both my doggies a piece of the "cowboy country" sausage that they love so much and hoped that there would be lots of people who would come and say goodbye to them and i hoped that i will be able to let go when the time is right. and i hoped that that won't be for a very long time to come.

team building

just down the street from us, there is a ropes course in the woods. matt and i sometimes take advantage of the opportunity this provides for us to strengthen our ability to work together by attempting some of the low ropes activities. he is much better at it than i am, as matt has a very well-developed sense of balance, which i think is an inherent trait and he thinks is learned. he spent many years of his younger life riding unicycles while juggling so the question is: did he learn his ability to balance from all that time on the unicycle or did he spend all that time on the unicycle because he was able to balance the damn thing?

autumn walk

not my idea of fun

amazing close up of a real fox

so there i was, walking through the woods, while the dogs frolicked with their new coyote friend (ok, i'll confess, the dogs do not actually have a coyote friend. but the other morning, i took a chance and brought them down to the back field for a walk and i thought we were not going to have any incidents when suddenly, a coyote came streaking out of the trees and started chasing nina. they were running in circles, and i am sure nina was thinking, "ohmigod i love this game! look at me goooooooo!" and the coyote was about to kill her. thank goodness she is half greyhound or this story would have a much sadder ending. but she ran as fast and as joyfully as her little prancy legs could carry her and when jake, who often gets left out of nina-chase games when a new dog is on the scene, tried to join the fun, the coyote changed direction and headed back into the woods. that part of the story was all true. the next part is totally made up and is just an excuse for me to post a picture of this supremely hideous stuffed fox which someone donated to oak knoll a few years ago and now has to be disposed of through a hazardous waste clean-up day because many old taxidermied animals were preserved using arsenic. i brought it home from oak knoll and then we let the dogs sniff it and jake even gave it a half-hearted humping before we decided they had had enough arsenic exposure and we loaded it into the vista for matt to bring up to his office in lincoln for disposal) when all of a sudden, out from the trees sprang a vicious, blood-thirsty fox. before i turned and ran for my life, i snapped a quick close-up photo of the monstrous beast. thank goodness we all managed to escape with our lives!

WAaM fest

this past wednesday, as i was procrastinating at work, i checked the website of my new second favorite band, red molly. matt, mom, dad, and i saw them play at falcon ridge folk festival and we all agreed that they were almost as good as eddie from ohio (not matt's exact opinion but let's pretend he agrees with us). they sing in beautiful harmony (and believe me, as someone with perfect pitch, i know from harmony) and they play some great music. i thought i would see if they would be performing anywhere in our area so i could take matt to a show for his birthday (not until november 20 but i was planning ahead. that's what i am really good at- planning ahead for his birthday but yet here i am working on a grant application on a sunday night that needs to be postmarked by tomorrow because i was too busy checking on red molly's tour schedule to get it done this past week). much to my delight, i discovered that they were scheduled to perform locally- in fact, the only way they could have been more local is if they played in our actual back yard. they headlined the fourth annual walpole arts and music fest, which despite perfect weather and beautiful harmonies, was attending by only 150 or so people. and there were probably only 20 of them listening raptly to the music. i didn't shoot any video with my little camera, but i did take a few pictures and then i found this youtube footage for everyone to enjoy.

name that town

in case you were wondering who could shop there

butterflies before they're beautiful

and the blogosphere comes alive with chatter

the question is, now that al has won himself a nobel peace prize, is the presidency of the united states so far beneath him that he wouldn't even consider it?

the next post in my ground-breaking nobel prize series

this morning, i heard the news that doris lessing had won the nobel prize for literature. "why, that's great news!' i thought to myself, having read the excellent book she wrote called wait till next year. but then the radio announcer said that doris lessing is from england and that didn't jive with her authoring a book about baseball and brooklyn. at that point, i remembered that wait till next year was written by doris kearns goodwin.

so why did the name doris lessing sound so familiar? could it be that my knowledge of literary masters was just that extensive as a result of the effectiveness of my eleventh grade language arts teacher? and i had thought the only thing i remembered from that class was the time she criticized "dead poets society" because of the limited role of women in the movie and i got so mad i finally yelled, "it wasn't about that!" but really i was just wondering why she didn't notice how cute robert sean leonard was and why she didn't cry when ethan hawke stood up on his desk and said, "oh captain my captain," which i'm getting a little choked up now just thinking about.

and then it finally hit me: chris mancini singing a moxy fruvous song. you can listen to the song from this youtube video without actually watching it, because the video quality is poor and frankly a little nauseating, but the music is great.



"i spilled some dressing on doris lessing, these writer types are a scream!"

will it be al?

Announcements of the 2007 Nobel Prizes will be held on the following dates:
Physiology or Medicine - Monday, October 8, 11:30 a.m. CET (at the earliest)
Physics - Tuesday, October 9, 11:45 a.m. CET (at the earliest)
Chemistry - Wednesday, October 10, 11:45 a.m. CET (at the earliest)
Literature - Thursday, October 11, 1:00 p.m. CET (at the earliest)
Peace - Friday, October 12, 11:00 a.m. CET
Economics - Monday, October 15, 1:00 p.m. CET (at the earliest)

butterfly world

matt and i went to hershey gardens in pennsylvania this weekend. my favorite part was the butterfly house.

NaBloPoMo

i am considering taking part in national blog posting month. i feel like i can really do a blog post per day for the entire month of november, especially if i:
a. only post photographs for 70% of the days
b. start stockpiling things now and not post again for the rest of october
c. plan some sort of really exciting vacation or scenic journey or extreme weather event between now and the end of november
d. what do you mean i can't control the weather?
e. plan to get a third dog on november 1. don't tell matt.

wish me luck!

nina amongst the ferns with a inexplicable car door leaning against a tree behnd her

matt in the morning fog

what i asked matt to get me for christmas

the nina totin' bag, available at the npr shop.

two dogs in the morning fog

tractor in the morning fog

what is matt doing?