It is the most wonderful time of the year! . I have just finished putting up several cups of blueberries in the freezer (perpetuating the myth that there will still be some left in the winter), made a pie for tomorrow's potluck after church, and have eaten more than my fair share today. As have both of the boys.

Yum

"“Remember the Battle of Thermopylae,” he thundered.
Scarlett thought and thought, and couldn’t remember that battle."
(paraphrased, I swapped the book out)

As I promised, I took Gone With the Wind with me on the airplane trip to New York and back, and finished it up earlier this week. I’d never read it before, nor have I seen the movie.

Scarlett O’Hara is one of the most unsympathetic main characters I’ve ever run across. She’s spoiled, willful, hard-hearted and intentionally not too bright. The back of my edition called the story one of the greatest love stories of all time, and I vehemently disagree. And, as I mentioned to Stacy, the attitudes and biases in the book where shocking, but I suspect historically accurate. I’ve not read a lot about the Civil War, and Reconstruction, especially not from the Southern point of view so did find that interesting. It was an absorbing epic book, I enjoyed reading it, but it certainly isn’t one of those I will savor again and again.

I am looking forward to seeing the movie, though.

(photo credit)

Where have I been? New York, baby. We just got back from a lovely week in New York City. Neither of us had ever been, so it was a fabulous treat. We stayed with a lovely friend and her family near the airport on the first night, and then came into the City on Tuesday.
That night, we saw a Yankees game, they beat the Twins . We saw our erstwhile Richie Sexon play first base late in the game (although he dropped the ball, literally, when they announced him during warm-ups). Despite their reputation, we thoroughly enjoyed the fans around us and had great conversations, and upon request, bought the X-man a Jeter t-shirt.

On Wednesday, we headed to the Cloisters a most lovely museum. I was absolutely verklempt upon seeing the Unicorn tapestries, and did very well at not spending hundreds of dollars at the gift shop, but could have easily done so. We then had real New York Pizza , and then headed to Shea Stadium to see the Mets beat the Phillies (it was payback for their dropping a five run lead in the top of the 9th the night before).


Thursday, we got up late, got bagels and coffee and ate with Alice in Central Park, and then hoofed through the park looking for Strawberry Fields. After finally finding it (note to New York – better signage might be a help in the park), we headed down to the waterfront to take the tour of the Statue of Liberty. It was absolutely incredible in person – I would have never thought. We wanted to see Ellis Island (especially since I have the immigration information on my Basque great-grandfather) but it was after four by the time we got there, so we just took photos from the deck of the ferry – it is top of my list for the next time.

We traveled back to our friends’ house, where they took amazing care of us yet again (we are forever indebted) and had Ethiopian food for the first (but I assure you not last) time, and traveled home on Friday.

I was a bit worried about the weather prior to going (I’ve never spent much time in humidity) and had a long conversation with the fabulous Michele who even checked the forecast for us. While it was warm and humid (my hair was pretty much damp the entire time, and check out my glistening face in the pics), it was not unbearable, and we got quite a storm Wednesday night on the way home from Shea. The entire city glistened with puddles on Thursday, and it was much cooler that morning.