Day 12.294: Halloween

Halloween 2019, featuring: Exile #2 as crazy pumpkin-carving lady, E5N1 as Drew Drechsel our house as not-the-least-Halloween house in the neighborhood and Exile #4 as Roman Sanders in a costume she constructed herself!

Day 12.293: The power outlet twins

They are looking both shocked and dismayed.

I can't blame them - they see a lot.

Day 12.292: Pine tree anatomy

Exile #2 and I were rather surprised by the sight of this recently broken pine tree. It turns out that those little thin branches that stick out just a little way near the bottom of the tree come right through the outer layers of the trunk from - presumably - the size the tree was when they stopped growing. Who knew? Not us!

So strange to see it revealed like this.

Day 12.291: Short walk to mushrooms

After two previous encounters, the shaggy ink caps on the trail behind the school have become almost an October legend. So, when our normal weekend walk on the weekend before Halloween was not possible because one of the bridges was closed, we had to go and see if we could find them.

And find them we did!

Actual length of walk was 4.8 miles, but the post title was more literary than literal.

Day 12.290: Exile #2's Sunday Column #271

Exile #2 writes...

The young Exiles all had places to be yesterday. E5N1 had a Saturday rehearsal for his upcoming school play, Exile #4, a leadership training event at her karate school, and Exile #3, supervising duties at her dance school Halloween party. Exile #1 and I inevitably found ourselves not out for a leisurely child-free lunch, but at the DIY store.

Over the last few weeks, we’ve had a couple of power cuts. This being Maine, outages can last a while, and so we have a generator that we can use it to power essentials like the freezer and the emergency basement pump. Anyway, the last time Exile #1 wheeled the generator out of the shed, the shed ramp decided it had had enough and gave way.

Never afraid to take on a woodworking project, Exile #1 readied his circular saw and we went to get some lumber. There was a brief flurry of activity and now we have a brand new and very spiffy ramp to the shed. So, whatever the fall and winter throw at us, we should be able to roll out the emergency power.

Day 12.289: Horton Woods

We didn't go to Horton Woods today - it was last weekend. Not sure why it took until another busy day to post these pictures from the walk that Exile #2 and I squeezed in between all the other activities last Sunday:

Day 12.288: Another classic "Then & Now"

Google Photos algorithms do it again - this time generating this "Then & Now" creation:

Day 12.287: Bunhead and waders

The strange goings-on from Exile #3's student dance company wardrobe department this year!

Day 12.286: Smokin'

Sometimes all the yard-work is smokin'

Sometimes, tipping the shop-vac acorns into the bin causes a cloud of dust to rise.

Day 12.285: A very long pole

So did you work out why Exile #4 was doing this? Last chance to guess!

She's holding our roof rake - since it was designed to reach the roof - which was what we wanted to do.



Ready?



Sure?




There is a GoPro taped to the top - so we could see the roof tiles on this - rather shallowly pitched bit of roof because we found a stray shingle on our grass after the storm. This is what it saw:

No detectable damage - so it probably blew in from further away.

Day 12.284: Friendly neighborhood acorn-man

With great tree:

comes great responsibility*:

Exile #2 vacuumed another vac-full of acorns this morning. We love the tree, but enough with the acorns!

*with apologies :)

Day 12.283: Exile #2's Sunday Column #270

Exile #2 writes...

After our gargantuan leaf clearing/acorn vacuuming efforts yesterday, the yard still looked like we had paid it some attention this morning. We have shifted 4 or 5 shop vacs worth of acorns already. There surely can’t be many more to come - can there?! Where are the squirrels when you need them?

Exile #4 arrived home late morning (still in her pajamas) having slept over with some friends after the Homecoming dance and both she and Exile #3 had a relaxing day. Exile #1 and I, meanwhile, went for a walk in the woods, which were smelling delightfully of pine.

To round things off, this evening we went to the local open mic again. It was a fun evening with lots of great local talent and good company.

Day 12.282: First dance, homecoming dance

Today was the pumpkin festival - the first dance performance for the Exile #3's student company for the last few years -  they had to follow the spectacle of competitive eating of donuts hanging from a string. They took it in their stride:

This evening both the girls were out at the Homecoming dance at their school. Exile #3 came home a little while ago, but Exile #4 is staying at a friend's house. Sadly, since they both got ready elsewhere, I don't have any of the traditional off-to-homecoming photos to show you.

Day 12.281: To The Middle East; what?

Our trip to Boston was to see a band called The Collection at a venue called The Middle East. Here are a couple more pictures from the very dynamic performance:

We first saw them play when we visited their home state of North Carolina, but many years later took the opportunity to catch them at the nearest point to us on the tour. We also enjoyed the two support acts (and the amazingly efficient ten minute band change-overs!)

This is a bit of the song that The Collection ended their encore with:



It was nearly midnight by the time they finished and - as a result - we got home very late indeed!

Earlier in the day we had just got power back when I went home for lunch. During lunchtime this happened - any guesses what exactly?

Day 12.280: Crazy night, mad evening

We had an impressive storm - high winds and heavy rain that knocked out power to many thousands of homes including ours. We were fortunate to not only have the stop-gap of a generator, but to regain power before lunchtime.

After all that, we settled down for a calm relaxing evening.

Nope.

Exile #2 and I left the kids after dinner to go down to Boston (well Cambridge technically) to see a gig which ended with this wonderful moment, but I'll tell you more tomorrow!

Day 12.279: Crabs expansion

While Exile #3 was at her sleepover last Friday night, the rest of us had a game of You've Got Crabs - with the Imitation Crab expansion. It was quite silly.

Day 12.278: Peak sumac

We may not have done much leaf peeping this weekend, but thanks to Two Lights State Park, I did capture at least forty shades of sumac.

Day 12.277: Peak leaf

I feel like - for my taste - the best of the fall foliage was around the middle of last week. I took this on our Saturday walk - still looking pretty good despite the rainy night and cloudy morning:

We saw lots more good foliage on our wave-peeping trip later on Saturday but mostly by the roadside while I was driving. Can't win them all!

Day 12.276: Exile #2's Sunday Column #269

Exile #2 writes...

We found lots of other people out watching the high surf yesterday. Some had brought chairs to sit and enjoy the show but most just stood and watched in awe.



There was also a wedding party. The bride had a flowing white dress, cowboy boots and a plaid shirt. The groom and his men were dressed very elegantly but had brought their firefighters’ helmets with them. Various emergency vehicles began to arrive as we were leaving, presumably to join in the festivities. We’ve become a little blasé about seeing wedding parties - coastal Maine is a popular venue - but this one was definitely unique!

Day 12.275: Two Lights - lots of waves

Exile #3 was at a sleepover with her dance company last night, so - although she got a decent night's sleep by her current standards, she was happy for some down-time this morning while the rest of us went out to see if the rumors of high surf were true.

We chose a trip to Two Lights State Park:

We were there just before high tide and the waves were impressive for sure:

Day 12.274: Saco River sunset

Yesterday's sunset over the Saco River as seen our evening walk:

Day 12.273: Clock towers

Yesterday evening, the local news had a story about the Biddeford clock tower - it has been renovated and they said the hands would be going back on the clock faces and the woodwork would be painted over the next week. This evening - Exile #2 and I went out for a walk at the opposite end of the day to usual and we saw the work in progress (some hands, some paint) at Biddeford City Hall:

And, a little later, caught up with the seasonal changes at the Saco City Hall clock tower: