Holiday Meander

In the bleak midwinter

frosty wind made moan,

earth stood hard as iron,

water like a stone:

snow had fallen,

snow on snow, snow on snow,

in the bleak midwinter,

long ago.

-Christina Rossetti

A six-day hiatus from all this. Probably best. Still sort of reeling from the professional losses that piled up over the last few weeks, and what they say about where I am in my career and my loss of connection with the people I'm paid to persuade.

No post on Wednesday because they gave Peg the day off, and so on Tuesday night we raced up to the lake to relax for a bit. And to buy a truck, because of course we bought a truck.

Peg's never much liked the 2022 Ram, and with the changes wrought by the OBBB the tax code basically begs a small business owner to buy a new vehicle and take the tax write off against ordinary income. That $70,000 pickup now costs maybe $45,000. It's free money.

The Code requires the vehicle to weigh at least 6,000 pounds for whatever reason, so I'd set out in search of a very big truck after deciding that the Rivian people just make it too hard to navigate buying one of their vehicles. I'd settled on an F250 King Ranch, a monster truck that had us sitting as tall as if we'd been back in the F-15. But when we drove up to Rochester to take it on a test drive, P declared it simply too massive for our little condo parking lot, or any other parking lot come to think of it. So the King Ranch was out.

Undeterred, our salesman, Ricky Bobby (no kidding), searched to lot for a smaller truck that met the weight requirement. As it turned out they had an F150 Lariat with a tow package that ballooned the weight up to 7,200. P liked this one much better, and we bought it on the spot. Or, to be more accurate, we spent the next five-and-a-half hours at the dealership doing paperwork. New York makes all things involving a car purchase difficult, particularly if you're trading a Florida registered vehicle and trying to register the new ride there as well.

Finally as it approached 4 p.m. we drove off in our new truck, swung through Canandaigua to pick up a few things, and started on the New York Thruway for the long drive to Andover for Thanksgiving.

The roadside signs warned of a winter storm coming, but we didn't see much of that. We did, however, start to grow weary as we passed through Albany, and ultimately decided to stop for the night at the Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge, Mass.

You all know Stockbridge from the James Taylor song, most likely.

Now the first of December was covered with snow,

And so was the turnpike from Stockbridge to Boston,

Though the Berkshires seemed dreamlike on account of that frostin',

With ten miles behind me and ten thousand more to go.

It is in fact one of the most beautiful places we've ever seen, a storybook town tucked in a quiet valley. You also know the place if you've ever seen a Norman Rockwell print--he lived in Stockbridge for years, and one can still catch glimpses of the scenes he depicted on its broad main street.

The Red Lion Inn has been there in one form or another since 1773, and is definitely our kind of place--no TVs anywhere, eclectic old furnishings and a restaurant with a wonderfully slow cadence and eye for detail. We'll be back one of these days, in sh'allah.

Geez, I'm starting to look like Uncle Fester in the Addams Family. Trying too hard to look happy, I guess. And getting a bit stout.

We drove on to Andover Thanksgiving morning, and spent some time with the kids before heading down to Winchester for the Reeves's annual feast. Only fourteen around the table this year, with kids and grandkids moving away to start their adult lives. Still, the vibe was warm and welcoming, as always.

Peg has this tradition of cooking Issac and Olivia a mashup of Eggs Benedict and Eggs Florentine whenever we're in town, and Friday was the latest installment. From there it was off in our new pickup toward Newport for the balance of the weekend, jumping off the interstate south of Boston to wander through the hinterlands and see some things.

This, of course, meant stretching a relatively short drive into well over two hours, although on the upside we saw some lovely farms.

Newport, Rhode Island on Black Friday was an anthill of humanity as folks sought food, drink, and bargains in one of the nation's oldest ports. The town really is beautiful and friendly, although the tourist vibe can be a little off-putting.

We tried to stop into the White Horse Tavern, touted as America's oldest, for supper and maybe a cocktail, but it's booked solid with the next opening sometime after the mortality tables say I can expect to be on the other side of the sod.

I look somewhat less miserable here.

We spent Saturday wandering up the hill for breakfast, then to a bookstore where Oliver Hazard Perry once lived. Finding a couple interesting used books, we adjourned to the hotel parlor to read for a bit, then restarted our peregrinations around the waterfront before settling in our room to watch the Christmas Boat Parade right outside our window. We were expecting something spectacular, given the wealth and nautical heritage of the place, but instead got a lame procession of maybe a dozen boats. They'd rescheduled the event from Friday due to high winds, and we figured a lot of vessels just couldn't be there Saturday.

Sunday we were motivated to get back to Corning and cats, and we hit the road before 8, stopping in Newburgh at a family diner that boasted both moussaka and fried clams on the menu--how could we not stop there? Later we wound through the Catskills in driving snow, only to find Corning with almost none of the white stuff on the ground and forty degree temperatures.

Realizing we still had a couple hours until the Bills kicked off against the Steelers, we packed in our sixth installment of visiting the Christmas tree farm in Erwin to pick out a tree. We then spent the rest of the evening decorating while the Bills pounded Pittsburgh, bemoaning the fact that most of our Christmas decorations disappeared in the move.

Still, the end result was acceptable, if a tad crooked.

Time to dive back into real life. My first final is in nine days, a mass of writing projects for work keep me up at night worrying (but not writing, which would be more productive), and unhappy clients are already piling up in my in-basket.