Happy Star Wars Day

May the fourth be with you.

And with you.

And you...

Maybe too much sushi is getting to me. But I like this new store I have located: Trader Joe's. It is kind of like a smaller, crunchier Whole Foods. I have eaten sushi almost every day in case anyone missed that point.

As further evidence of my full awareness of surroundings, I offer are a few of the things which have been encountered today (on my way to and from a college fair in Kent, CT -- it is almost as amusing as driving through Arkansas). I really suppose I need to take some people's advice and start on a book...

Today started out equally as gloomy as the past two days, but the sun showed fortitude and mosied forth just as the college fair started. This allowed me to take some reasonable (mostly non-driving) shots to share.

Sharing is caring.

I did not go to the Pet Cemetery, as it seemed inappropriate to take Bear there. (The most annoying name of a pet cemetery listed on the link above is: Heavens to Petsy. Oh, heavens to Betsy!)

Squash Hollow Road sign was merely a bonus in this shot (had seen the other end of it farther back down the road, but decided against u-turning to get a silly pic). Key item in this photo may be a bit difficult to spy, but getting a good photo was tricksy -- notice the mailbox, which is on a see-saw and which has a rope, presumably so the postman can pull it down??? Not too sure...

Not that I am obsessed with mailboxes today, but in my sundry turns to get the physics project mailbox, this just made me snicker. (I need to also try to get a pic of the building supply place here in White Plains, which is along the train line in: C.G. Thwackhammer -- I swear!).

And I really ought to have gone back to take a photo of the very elaborate John Deere tractor mailbox... maybe I can make amends on Thursday when another trip up Rt 7 is anticipated.

And finally, if you find yourself in a word duel with someone, you might be on Hardscrabble Road.

Some other amusements:
Bully Muck Brook (a brook)
Lime Kill Brook (another brook)
The Barn Yard (selling small backyard barns)

And a cringe:
The Garden of Bead In (a bead store)

Mayday, May Day!

Although the telephone help-line girl was just entirely too nice to be effective, she did just manage to get my IP address renewed so that my short-bus computer would connect to the Residence Inn network. I am so impressed that I had actually done all the stuff she tried first, but I have now learnt how to use ipconfig for my own nefarious purposes. What those purposes may be, even I have not discovered yet.

My computer appears to be under the impression that it has had a hard day and therefore is unable to function without extreme assistance. Maybe it needs a cup o' caffeine poured over its motherboard.

It is late. It took me an hour and a half to get 35 miles this evening from Tarrytown to Danbury (after din dins with my looovely cousine Lindsey -- we went for Vitamin G, aka guacamole). It was rainy. It was dark. I drive like a mawmaw when it is rainy and dark. And it is a good thing that I was 2 cars and 17 seconds behind the car on the Saw Mill Parkway. I noticed some wierd lights ahead that looked like a lunatic cyclist on the parkway, and then heard screeching and saw swerving. The car, I think, veered off and hit a tree on the left side of the road, which then fell in its entirety on top of the back of the car, swinging it back around and jamming it into the side of the rocky mountain. I made my first 911 call.

The lady inside appeared not to be seriously injured, but was completely in shock.

Fortunately, none of the rest of the mass of traffic managed to form into a car pile-up. Although the tree across the road prevented any movement until they got the lady off to the hospital and got the chainsaws out. People are like moths to flame at the sight of flashing lights. We are all such voyeurs (since my car was the first in line on the left side of the road, my voyeurism was not as obvious as the flocks of people migrating 1/2 mile down to record everything with their cell phone cameras). My picture was taken after the lady was finally evacuated and they were cutting up the tree trunk. (the hood of the car is up, after they extinguished the smoke origin and the snapped tree is the paler short thing to left of the car)

Other luck of the day (besides being protected from involvement in a wreck on my third day of driving in 5 months) included:
* having good school visits
* scheduling a family pedicure outing with the Auntie and the Oma and the Mama
* navigating my way north from Princeton and onto the Jersey Turnpike using mostly my nose
* having helpful toll-booth people help me find my way when signage was inadequate
* not crying when I ended up going over the George Washington Bridge into NYC at 178th St instead of hitting Palisades Parkway (Bear enjoyed the $8.00 detour)
* finding a lone $20 bill in the street!
* and finally, going to sleep now...