It could be a while before the snow covering the fern garden melts, though: not only is it on the north side of the house, but on Thursday, with a low rumble, all the snow from the roof avalanched down onto it.
Saturday, February 22, 2014
Living up to their name
The temperature got up to 55 degrees this afternoon (Feb. 22), and enough snow melted that I actually saw the first snowdrops poking up. A wonderful sight! Perhaps the hellebores next?
It could be a while before the snow covering the fern garden melts, though: not only is it on the north side of the house, but on Thursday, with a low rumble, all the snow from the roof avalanched down onto it.
It could be a while before the snow covering the fern garden melts, though: not only is it on the north side of the house, but on Thursday, with a low rumble, all the snow from the roof avalanched down onto it.
Friday, February 21, 2014
Shaking my head
This week's reckless motorist award goes to the driver of a white work van who passed me in Friday morning's dense fog on southbound Route 82. If you were out in that fog, you remember how limited your visibility suddenly was in the spots where the thick fog rolled across the road. It was scary.
This driver had been tailgating me since Doe Run. I stopped at the Newark Road stop sign, which you couldn't seen until you were about 10 feet away from it. Unbelievably, the driver honked at me for coming to a full stop and then passed me. On a double-yellow line. In the dense fog. I caught only the first three letters of the license plate before he or she disappeared into the fog in front of Plantation Field.
Later in the day, after the fog had cleared, a driver almost pulled out in front of me from a Line Road driveway, stopping with a jerk only at the last moment. I couldn't help but notice that the hood of his car was secured with a bungee cord; perhaps experience has taught him to be more cautious?
This driver had been tailgating me since Doe Run. I stopped at the Newark Road stop sign, which you couldn't seen until you were about 10 feet away from it. Unbelievably, the driver honked at me for coming to a full stop and then passed me. On a double-yellow line. In the dense fog. I caught only the first three letters of the license plate before he or she disappeared into the fog in front of Plantation Field.
Later in the day, after the fog had cleared, a driver almost pulled out in front of me from a Line Road driveway, stopping with a jerk only at the last moment. I couldn't help but notice that the hood of his car was secured with a bungee cord; perhaps experience has taught him to be more cautious?
Thursday, February 20, 2014
Fig Party
On Thursday evening, Feb. 21, after Pilates class I stopped at the Kennett Square Inn for the launch party of Fig Kennett Magazine's Art & Culture Issue. It's a very attractive and well-organized magazine, full of nice graphics and lovely photos.
It was great to get out and see some different faces after this long stretch of bad winter weather: friend and neighbor Claire Murray of Inverbrook Farm and the Kennett Farmers Market; Kristin Pronto, executive director of the Garage Community and Youth Center; K.C. Kulp of The Whip Tavern; Lynn Esdale of Lynn Victoria Skincare in Chadds Ford; Matt Grieco of Grieco Funeral Homes; Francine Covelli of Nourish Juice Bar & Café in the Market at Liberty Place; and host Steve Warner of the Kennett Square Inn.
I sat down with a plate of appetizers and chatted with my pal Dave Dickens, whose business, Drowning Trout Outfitters, is featured in the magazine. The strikingly handsome photo shows him in mid-stream and mid-cast.
Mary Hutchins of Historic Kennett Square was also at the party, talking up an "Evening of the Arts" art show and sale that's going to be held from 5 to 8:30 p.m. Friday, April 4 at the Genesis Building at State and Union Streets.
It was great to get out and see some different faces after this long stretch of bad winter weather: friend and neighbor Claire Murray of Inverbrook Farm and the Kennett Farmers Market; Kristin Pronto, executive director of the Garage Community and Youth Center; K.C. Kulp of The Whip Tavern; Lynn Esdale of Lynn Victoria Skincare in Chadds Ford; Matt Grieco of Grieco Funeral Homes; Francine Covelli of Nourish Juice Bar & Café in the Market at Liberty Place; and host Steve Warner of the Kennett Square Inn.
I sat down with a plate of appetizers and chatted with my pal Dave Dickens, whose business, Drowning Trout Outfitters, is featured in the magazine. The strikingly handsome photo shows him in mid-stream and mid-cast.
Mary Hutchins of Historic Kennett Square was also at the party, talking up an "Evening of the Arts" art show and sale that's going to be held from 5 to 8:30 p.m. Friday, April 4 at the Genesis Building at State and Union Streets.
Typecasting
At a shindig tonight I was introduced to a fellow, and when he found out I live in Unionville he asked if I knew an acquaintance of his, a "tall, skinny, horsey girl" who also lives out here.
I laughed and told him he'd really need to narrow it down a little -- and please don't tell me she's blonde, too.
"Yeah! She is!" he said.
I laughed and told him he'd really need to narrow it down a little -- and please don't tell me she's blonde, too.
"Yeah! She is!" he said.
Heart and sole
My friend was running late for our dinner date at Perkins the other night, so I waited in the lobby. After a while I looked outside -- and there he was, waiting outside the glass door.
"Didn't you see me?" I asked. He said he had glanced in but could see only the lower part of somebody's legs. And since those legs weren't clad in the knee-high sturdy brown leather boots that he's seen me wearing all but continuously this winter, he didn't bother to investigate any farther. We had a good laugh: as it happened, I was wearing my low Bean gumshoes for a change.
I do take my boots off occasionally, honest I do, but when merely refilling the backyard bird feeders means tromping over downed branches and through a good six inches or more of snow, tall boots really do come in handy!
"Didn't you see me?" I asked. He said he had glanced in but could see only the lower part of somebody's legs. And since those legs weren't clad in the knee-high sturdy brown leather boots that he's seen me wearing all but continuously this winter, he didn't bother to investigate any farther. We had a good laugh: as it happened, I was wearing my low Bean gumshoes for a change.
I do take my boots off occasionally, honest I do, but when merely refilling the backyard bird feeders means tromping over downed branches and through a good six inches or more of snow, tall boots really do come in handy!
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Love in bloom
My Valentine's Day flowers arrived on Monday, Feb. 17, and the poor things were frozen solid. The drooping buds and frostbitten leaves would have delighted Morticia Addams (well, they delighted me, too, but for sentimental rather than aesthetic reasons). The flowers, which given the globalized floral trade came from Colombia, sat in a cold warehouse over the weekend because the snowed-in delivery trucks couldn't get them delivered in time for the big day itself. The company, realizing that time was of the essence, emailed an abject apology to everyone who had ordered flowers, promised to send a replacement bouquet and even enclosed a discount coupon.
The instruction booklet that came with the flowers said they'd perk up after an hour or so in water. I'm sure that's true in most cases, but in this situation it reminded me strongly of Monty Python's classic Dead Parrot sketch, in which the deceitful shopkeeper (Michael Palin) tries to convince the outraged customer (John Cleese) that the Norwegian blue parrot he just purchased isn't really dead; it's just stunned, "having a kip," or "pining for the fjords."
My Valentine and I speculated whether any couples might have broken up over the tardy delivery. We agreed that a romance with anyone shallow enough to get upset over something so minor probably would not have a long shelf-life, anyway, and better to discover it sooner rather than later.
Update: The company, ProFlowers, was as good as its word -- in fact, better. On Wednesday, Feb. 19, TWO long boxes of flowers arrived, containing three dozen of the most spectacularly beautiful pastel roses that I've ever seen. They were impeccably wrapped and in perfect condition. And best of all, each box also contained a love note from my Valentine -- yes, they're all identical, but that doesn't matter one bit.
Between these roses and the victims of the earlier shipment I was able to salvage, every vase in my home has been deployed.
The instruction booklet that came with the flowers said they'd perk up after an hour or so in water. I'm sure that's true in most cases, but in this situation it reminded me strongly of Monty Python's classic Dead Parrot sketch, in which the deceitful shopkeeper (Michael Palin) tries to convince the outraged customer (John Cleese) that the Norwegian blue parrot he just purchased isn't really dead; it's just stunned, "having a kip," or "pining for the fjords."
My Valentine and I speculated whether any couples might have broken up over the tardy delivery. We agreed that a romance with anyone shallow enough to get upset over something so minor probably would not have a long shelf-life, anyway, and better to discover it sooner rather than later.
Update: The company, ProFlowers, was as good as its word -- in fact, better. On Wednesday, Feb. 19, TWO long boxes of flowers arrived, containing three dozen of the most spectacularly beautiful pastel roses that I've ever seen. They were impeccably wrapped and in perfect condition. And best of all, each box also contained a love note from my Valentine -- yes, they're all identical, but that doesn't matter one bit.
Between these roses and the victims of the earlier shipment I was able to salvage, every vase in my home has been deployed.
Sunday, February 16, 2014
Snow days
What a surprise: snow featured prominently in our activities this weekend, which seemed to center on the Chadds Ford area.
1. Have you noticed the potholes in the Route 52 bridge at Lenape? Not that potholes are really newsworthy at this time of the year, but these are numerous and deep.
2. On Saturday afternoon kids were taking advantage of the massive sledding hill on the east side of Pocopson Elementary School. That hill is so long, they could really use a tow rope to haul them back up.
3. We picked up yet another 25-lb bag of Purina Bird Luvver's Blend at the Brandywine Ace Hardware store, and we were far from the only customers stocking up. I love the whimsical birdseed names, like "Finch Feast," "Cardinal's Cuisine" and "Woodpecker's Wish." By the way, the birdseed bag illustration features a Rufous-Sided Towhee, and I saw two of them on Friday at a West Grove feeder.
4. On Sunday we stopped off at the River Museum -- they just changed their official name to the Brandywine River Museum of Art, did you notice? -- and couldn't help but notice the many snow paintings on display. In one, some hardy souls were shoveling their way out of a snowed-in mountain road. Reminded me of some Unionville friends with an extremely steep driveway. The calendar art exhibition is worth a visit, not only to see the Wyeth, Pyle, Parrish and Rockwell paintings that were used as illustrations, but also the actual calendars themselves. I was fascinated to see that people used to mark the birthdays of Thomas Edison, FDR, Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee. Outside the museum, the Brandywine looked especially beautiful and serene, flowing between its two snow-defined banks.
1. Have you noticed the potholes in the Route 52 bridge at Lenape? Not that potholes are really newsworthy at this time of the year, but these are numerous and deep.
2. On Saturday afternoon kids were taking advantage of the massive sledding hill on the east side of Pocopson Elementary School. That hill is so long, they could really use a tow rope to haul them back up.
3. We picked up yet another 25-lb bag of Purina Bird Luvver's Blend at the Brandywine Ace Hardware store, and we were far from the only customers stocking up. I love the whimsical birdseed names, like "Finch Feast," "Cardinal's Cuisine" and "Woodpecker's Wish." By the way, the birdseed bag illustration features a Rufous-Sided Towhee, and I saw two of them on Friday at a West Grove feeder.
4. On Sunday we stopped off at the River Museum -- they just changed their official name to the Brandywine River Museum of Art, did you notice? -- and couldn't help but notice the many snow paintings on display. In one, some hardy souls were shoveling their way out of a snowed-in mountain road. Reminded me of some Unionville friends with an extremely steep driveway. The calendar art exhibition is worth a visit, not only to see the Wyeth, Pyle, Parrish and Rockwell paintings that were used as illustrations, but also the actual calendars themselves. I was fascinated to see that people used to mark the birthdays of Thomas Edison, FDR, Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee. Outside the museum, the Brandywine looked especially beautiful and serene, flowing between its two snow-defined banks.
Red Sombrero
The Red Sombrero "Fresh Mexican Taqueria" in the Dilworthtown Crossing shopping center on Route 202 is opening a branch in the Longwood Crossing shopping center on Baltimore Pike, next to the Starbucks. There's a banner up in the window, and it looks like some work is being done inside to revamp the space formerly occupied by the Paradocx Winery's shop -- which moved to the Market at Liberty Place in downtown Kennett last year.
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Workaround
A kind "Unionville in the News" reader shared his "all's-well-that-ends-well" Verizon experience during the recent power outage:
"We did not lose power for more than 6 hours from the recent Ice storm – but we potentially lost our Verizon service ( Computer – Phone – TV ) for up to 9 days. But, we didn’t due to the intervention of our neighbor’s son who is a genius when it comes to most things.
So, then to plan “B.” Not understanding all things electronic / computerwise we sat down to figure out who would be able to figure the situation out, and we figured who else but some one of the younger generation persuasion. So, I put in a call to Greg Jr.
He said he knew what the problem was and there was no doubt that he could fix it. WOW!
Shortly he came over and went to the basement and within 5 minutes had us up and running. And, he handed me a handwritten paper on how to fix it in the future.
Simply put, the battery had to also be disconnected – not just the power supply to everything. I.e., the battery kept the system partially working and thus it could not be rebooted until everything was disconnected. So, what he did was to disconnect the router – the main power source to the system -- AND - the battery back-up, and then reconnect everything.
So then, I called Verizon to tell them that “we” had fixed the problem. When I told the new Customer Service person he said with considerable surprise, “You mean he was not a Verizon Technician?" I said, "No – just a neighbor kid." And, by the way I was then told that the original Verizon customer service person neglected to tell me was to disconnect the battery as is the protocol. Apology – Apology – Apology.
So the 9 + day wait wound up being a 4-hour wait."
"We did not lose power for more than 6 hours from the recent Ice storm – but we potentially lost our Verizon service ( Computer – Phone – TV ) for up to 9 days. But, we didn’t due to the intervention of our neighbor’s son who is a genius when it comes to most things.
After the power came back on and we were out of all Verizon
services, we called on our
(charged-up) cell phone and after an understandable wait
were connected to a Customer Service rep.
After explaining the situation and disconnecting /
reconnecting the power supply line in the basement per his instructions, we
were told that a service person would have to come out – in 9 days. So, then to plan “B.” Not understanding all things electronic / computerwise we sat down to figure out who would be able to figure the situation out, and we figured who else but some one of the younger generation persuasion. So, I put in a call to Greg Jr.
He said he knew what the problem was and there was no doubt that he could fix it. WOW!
Shortly he came over and went to the basement and within 5 minutes had us up and running. And, he handed me a handwritten paper on how to fix it in the future.
Simply put, the battery had to also be disconnected – not just the power supply to everything. I.e., the battery kept the system partially working and thus it could not be rebooted until everything was disconnected. So, what he did was to disconnect the router – the main power source to the system -- AND - the battery back-up, and then reconnect everything.
So then, I called Verizon to tell them that “we” had fixed the problem. When I told the new Customer Service person he said with considerable surprise, “You mean he was not a Verizon Technician?" I said, "No – just a neighbor kid." And, by the way I was then told that the original Verizon customer service person neglected to tell me was to disconnect the battery as is the protocol. Apology – Apology – Apology.
So the 9 + day wait wound up being a 4-hour wait."
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