Holiday tales

Christmas night we went to see "Avatar" in 3D at Cinemark in Hadley. Trouble is, if your vision is not 100 percent, the glasses may not work, we discovered. Nicky, who hasn't filled his new glasses prescription, and Brian couldn't see the 3D effects. I'd have to give "Avatar" a thumbs up, although I usually don't like fantasy or action movies. The 3D forest scenes are enchanting.


Christmas Eve with friends before we did a little salsa dancing.

Lucy, our instructor, (seen here) teaches salsa on Tuesdays at Dance Northampton.

Who's that under the tree?


Paul and many other people, no doubt, got a Snuggy.

Tiger Woods walking through the tall grass at Chicago O'Hare on our long journey home from Boise. The pre-holiday snowstorm closed Dulles International Airport in D.C. where we were to have flown on Saturday. Happy holidays all!

Greetings from Colorado

We're wrapping up our trip to Boise -- I think -- in a few hours, when we fly out of Denver, where we've been since Saturday. Many eastbound passengers like us have had to make other arrangements after Dulles airport, where we were headed, and others closed due to snow. Luckily for us, Brian's childhood friend Jeff Jefferson and wife Carol live outside Denver with their Newfoundland dog and three cats.

We ate Carol's outstanding holiday food and visited the Rocky Mountains, where we saw the Stanley Hotel, in Estes Park, the inspiration for Stephen King's "The Shining." The classic Stanley Kubrick version of the movie was shot at a different hotel the Timberline lodge in Mount Hood, Oregon in 1980, but King didn't approve of it and produced a 1996 version set at the Stanley Hotel.

Before leaving Boise, we had met up with Dan Guild, a longtime family friend from Pittsfield, who owns a great pizzeria called Casanova. I highly recommend it if you're ever in Boise. We got the Idahoan, which has sausage, hot peppers and potatoes and another pizza with figs, blue cheese and pineapple.


Dan said a lot of Easterners come into Casanova, including Billy Buckner, a former pro baseball player. According to Wikipedia, Buckner's playing career "lasted over twenty years and he accumulated over 2,700 career hits. However, despite his productive career, he has gained infamy for his crucial fielding error during Game Six of the 1986 World Series, a play that has since been prominently entrenched into American sports lore."
I wonder if Tiger Woods will similarly be remembered for his Thanksgiving fender bender and what happened next.
Isn't this a cute gargoyle-in-a-suitcase in the Denver airport?

Not quite lost in Boise

Brian and I went for a hike in back of my brother's house in Boise today. It was about 36 degrees and sunny.

Brian did some bird watching along the way and saw some goldfinches, magpies and a kestrel.

When we got to the top of the hill, Table Rock, where a large cross looks over Boise, fog started rising up from the valley.

It made for some otherworldly scenery.



And then the sun started to set and we couldn't see the trail. We joked about some movies we have seen about people getting lost. The one that is never far from my mind at times like these is "Blair Witch Project" about the would-be filmmakers who get horribly lost in the woods and end up walking in circles for days.



We also discussed "Open Water," about the couple who get left behind on a group snorkeling trip. The boyfriend makes a few bad choices and let's just say things don't end well. And of course "Gerry," by my favorite director Gus Van Sant, about two friends who get lost hiking in the desert, although they're only a few hundred yards from their car at the (bitter) end.
Long story short, Brian and I got back to Mike's house without too much ado.

We're visiting Mike's family, including the most recent addition to the extended family, Alanis, seen here with her mom Clare.



More later!

Snow day

First snow day of the season today.


The snow turned to rain and by the time I went to the last journalism class of the semester, there was thunder and lightning.

Students seemed to be in high spirits.

And our friend Ramari's wife Sabita and son Ruchon have arrived from Nepal. Just in time to enjoy the snow!

Who won the cookies?

I won Amherst Bulletin columnist Phyllis Lehrer's annual postcard contest for having been the one whose card was sent from the farthest point from the place we don't pronounce the "h." My wonderful trip to Thailand this summer just keeps giving. Here I am with my prized cookies -- seven different kinds -- in front of Town Hall. (You can see my "going gray" hair is really going.)

The day has gone gray too, but it was 66 degrees earlier, as noted on the Amherst Cinema marquee.


An excellent day to eat cookies and read the last batch of papers from journalism class. The semester wraps up next week. And thank God the primary election for U.S. senator to succeed the great Ted Kennedy finally transpires on Tuesday. NEVER have I received so many automated calls -- from the Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, U.S. Rep. Michael Capuano and Celtics owner Steve Pagliuca campaigns. Enough already!!! I'm tempted not to vote at all in protest.