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It’s time to carve the pumpkins!! Halloween is getting close.
I plan on moving the
LivingroomCam
onto the front porch so you can see the trick-or-treater’s
as they come to the door.

Happy Halloween!!

Nearly two weeks ago I blogged about a
bird that is pecking at our windows
.
Well, it’s two weeks later and he’s still at it!!
He is either sitting on the tree at the front of the house and
flying up to the front window and pecking at it
(tap, tap, tap on the window)
or he’s sitting on the fence and flying up to the windows
at the side of the house.

I’m amazed he’s still doing it.
How long will this go on?

With autumn leaves falling outside, you should have leaves on your desktop. One of the coolest programs around is
AutumnLeaves
which causes leaves to tumble down and collected on the tops of your windows.
The occasional falling nut and growing mushroom adds to the
wet and cool feeling of a chilly autumn morning.
It’s shareware and worth paying for.

And, to add to the autumn effect, use one of
these images (
2048×1536
,
1600×1200
,
1024×768
)
to complete your leafy desktop.

By the way, the AutumnLeaves author also has
Snow for Windows
and
Hanami
(falling cherry blossoms)
so you can enjoy all of the seasons.

I made it back.
Now I have to catch up with my work and my household chores.
Time away would be even more relaxing if it didn’t mean even more work
when you got back.

The conference I am at is
SOSP2003
that was held at the
Sagamore Hotel
that is situated on an island in beautiful
Lake George
.
The Sagamore is an resort for people from New York who come north
to lie by the lake or otherwise enjoy the countryside.
A definite tourist resort area.

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I spent a day driving around upstate New York, Vermont and New Hampshire.
This year was not an award winning year for autumn colors –
rather than a “snap” the brought all of the trees to color
at the same time, the change was more gradual.
Some areas had beautiful, bright trees while others would have
winter ready bare trees.
I, of course, took
pictures
.

Vermont seemed to have more farms and less small businesses.
It could have been the route I took, but things changed as I drove
from New York into Vermont.
The NY side had stores and shops while in Vermont, there were
farmer’s markets. The towns in Vermont seemed more upscale,
less rundown and more relating to the colonial past.
NY seemed to be more aligned with the industrial growth of
the early 1900s.
I have no clue what was different in the two states — taxes?
land use planning?
It would be an interesting study.

Driving through the little towns of New England is a very quaint
experience for this west coast guy.
Peterstown, Hoosick Falls, Bremmington, Hollinsburg — all towns
laid out before the car had taken over the land.
On the west coast, we were mostly laid out after the automobile
and that has changed the scale and number of towns.

Driving through the little towns of New England is a very quaint
experience for this west coast guy.
Peterstown, Hoosick Falls, Bremmington, Hollinsburg — all towns
laid out before the car had taken over the land.
On the west coast, we were mostly laid out after the automobile
and that has changed the scale and number of towns.

State route number change as you drive across state lines.
Route 7 in NY turns into 9 in Vermont and then you take a
different 7 south into New Hampshire.
All a local naming scheme.

Vermont has a lot of stone fences.

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The old houses are either immaculately kept up or they are
falling apart with paint peeling off and overgrown plants
around.

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Now, I know why stores would advertize “cold beer”, but why would
they have a section labeled “warm beer”?

I’m travelling to the East Coast for a few days to attend
a few business meetings.
I’ve taken an extra day off so I can drive around and see
the autumn leaves.
It looks like I’ll luck out and the leaves will be good.
Here is Portland and Mount Hood as I fly away.

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One of the many things I did this weekend was varnish wood.
The windows in the bathrooms needed to be varnished to keep the
wet out and there are some cabinets on the back deck that needed
weatherizing.

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I also did the ceiling of the
porch.
A little architectural detail added by the architect.
The porch is starting to look really good.

I was cleaning up some of the remodel yesterday when I heard this odd knocking sound in the master bedroom.
It kept happening intermittantly so I want to investigate.
What I found was a small bird flying from the tree and pecking at one of the windows.
Odd, I thought.

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The next day I’m working on the porch and, “peck, peck”, I hear it again.
The bird is now pecking at the window and at the mirrors on the cars parked in the driveway.
I can only figure that his instincts are to beat up other birds of his type to clear the territory for winter.
The poor little guy is getting carried away.

I
finished
the
Portland Marathon
yesterday.
It took this old guy 6 hours of running and walking but I made it.
I can check that off my list of
things to do before I die
.

Last Tuesday I took a one day business trip to
Berkeley, California.
It’s hard to describe how I think of the Bay Area
whenever I fly in and out of it.
I lived here for 10 years and, from the air, it’s always
made me think of infestations.

The beauty of the area from a distance is undeniable.
As I flew out of Oakland, there was a thin layer of clouds
at about 1000 feet.
Once the plane was above them, the orange glow of the city illuminated
the clouds from underneath making them fluffy, orange glowing cotton.
The clusters and masses of lights in lines and bunches
show the energy consuming bustle of each town.

Have you ever had that experience where you take the
bag of flour out of the cubbard and inside it you find
all these webs? “Ick”, you say as you throw the flour away.
But these webs were the bug’s cities –
they weren’t just trying to ruin your flour.
They were trying to live a decent bug life.

That’s what I see looking down on Oakland, San Jose,
San Francisco, Pleasenton, Alameda and all the other
towns where people are going about their business
of living decent lives.
But the houses spill over the hills and fill the
valleys. The cities advance and the trees give way.
Our building spread out and cover the land.
We infest the earth.

I just hope the owner doesn’t come along and throw
away the bag.