Tuesday, October 18, 2016

West Lafayette, Indiana

This was the view from my window Saturday.

In the summer, all we see are trees.  As fall proceeds, a view across the Wabash River valley is revealed.  In the winter, we actually have glimpses of the river.  Life is good.

“May you live in interesting times” is a curse often attributed to the Chinese, although there is controversy about the origins.  We certainly live in interesting times.

It’s 73 degrees at 10 am in mid October and yet we are supposed to have a colder than normal winter.  We have the first woman from a major party running for president against a reality TV star.  (Steve and I have already voted, as we will be on grandparent duty on election day.)

And Bob Dylan has been awarded a Nobel Prize.  I’m sure Sheldon (Big Bang Theory) is having a fit.

His award immediately brought to mind this song.

The Times They Are a-Changin'

Bob Dylan

Come gather around people

Wherever you roam

And admit that the waters

Around you have grown

And accept it that soon

You'll be drenched to the bone

And if your breath to you is worth saving

Then you better start swimming or you'll sink like a stone

For the times they are a-changing

Come writers and critics

Who prophesize with your pen

And keep your eyes wide

The chance won't come again

And don't speak too soon

For the wheel's still in spin

And there's no telling who that it's naming

For the loser now will be later to win

Cause the times they are a-changing

Come senators, congressmen

Please heed the call

Don't stand in the doorway

Don't block up the hall

For he that gets hurt

Will be he who has stalled

There's the battle outside raging

It'll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls

For the times they are a-changing

Come mothers and fathers

Throughout the land

And don't criticize

What you can't understand

Your sons and your daughters

Are beyond your command

Your old road is rapidly aging

Please get out of the new one if you can't lend your hand

Cause the times they are a-changing

The line it is drawn

The curse it is cast

The slowest now

Will later be fast

As the present now

Will later be past

The order is rapidly fading

And the first one now will later be last

Cause the times they are a-changing

Songwriters: Bob Dylan

The Times They Are a-Changin' lyrics © Bob Dylan Music Co.

Written in 1964, it just shows that as much as things are changing, they are staying the same.  The only constant is change.

Have a great day and don’t forget to vote this year!

Deb

Sunday, September 11, 2016

15 years ago today, 4 planes were hijacked and used to kill over 3000 people.  It was an attack worse than Pearl Harbor.  

A Russian college student was staying with us at the time and she and I watched the resulting horrors together, after calling her mom and assuring her we were OK.  At one point she turned to me and said, “I still feel safer here.”  Please let that sink in.  This nation had just endured the most vicious attack in it’s history and yet a foreigner felt safer here than in her own country.

But in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, the best came out in people.  First responders from all over rushed to New York to help.  School children in New York made peanut butter sandwiches for the rescue volunteers.  And a small town in Newfoundland played host to 7000 airline passengers.  The town’s population is only 10,000, but has acted as a airport refueling station since WWII, so had the tarmac to hold 38 planes flying transatlantic routes.  

Gander, Newfoundland, did not have restaurants and hotels to house the passengers, so schools, churches, community centers, and homes were opened.  For 3 days, while all flights were cancelled in the US, the people of Gander and the surrounding villages cheerfully hosted the passengers.  They refused compensation and the passengers have set up a scholarship fund for the local children.  It has already produced at least one doctor for the area.

We drove through Gander this summer and it is a small town with a big airport.  Newfoundland has one big city, St. John, several small towns, and many tiny fishing villages.  The people are still friendly and helpful.  

Those are some of my memories of that time.  But one that has remained was the monologue on the Daily Show on it’s first broadcast after the attack.  The Daily Show is a satirical look at the news, particularly good at skewering politicians.  I had never watched the show, but stumbled on it that particular night.  It touched me and I found a text copy of it to keep.

I quote it in its entirety here:

“Good evening and welcome to The Daily Show. We are back. This is our first show since the tragedy in New York City.  And uh – there is no other way really to start this show than to ask you at home the question that we’ve asked the audience here tonight and that we’ve asked everybody that we know here in New York since September 11th, and that is, “Are you okay?”  And we pray that you are and that your family is.

I’m sorry to do this to you.  It’s another entertainment show beginning with an overwrought speech of a shaken host.  And television is nothing, if not redundant.  So, I apologize for that.  It’s something that unfortunately, we do for ourselves so that we can drain whatever abscess is in our hearts and move onto the business of making you laugh, which we haven’t been able to do very effectively lately.  Everyone’s checked in already, I know we’re late.  I’m sure we’re getting in right under the wire before the cast of Survivor offers their insight into what to do in these situations.

They said to get back to work.  And there were no jobs available for a man in the fetal position under his desk crying which I would have gladly taken.  So I came back here.

Tonight’s show is obviously not a regular show.  We looked through the vaults, we found some clips that we thought might make you smile, which is really what’s necessary, I think, right about now.  A lot of folks have asked me, "What are you going to do when you get back?  What are you going to say?  I mean, jeez, what a terrible thing to have to do."  I don’t see it as a burden at all.  I see it as a privilege.  I see it as a privilege and everyone here does see it that way.

The show in general, we feel like it's a privilege.  Just even - even the idea that we can sit in the back of the country and make wise cracks, which is really what we do.  We sit in the back and we – we throw spitballs, and uh – but never forgetting the fact that it's a luxury in this country that it – that allows us to do that.  This is a country that allows for open satire, and I know that sounds basic and it sounds as though it goes without saying – but that’s really what this whole situation is about.  It’s the difference between closed and open.  It’s the difference between free and - and burden and we don’t take that for granted here by any stretch of the imagination and our show has changed.  I don’t – I don’t doubt that.  What it’s become, I don’t know.  “Subliminable” is not a punch line anymore.  One day it will become that again, and - and Lord willing, it will become that again because that means we have ridden out the storm.

But the main reason that - that I wanted to speak tonight is - is not to tell you what the show is going to be.  Not to tell you about all the incredibly brave people that are here in New York and in Washington and around the country.  Uh, but - but we’ve had an unenduring pain here – an unendurable pain.  And I just – I wanted to tell you why I grieve, but why I don’t despair...(crying) I’m sorry.

Luckily we can edit this.  One of my first memories is of Martin Luther King being shot.  I was five and if you wonder if this feeling will pass...Uh, when I was five, he was shot.  Here’s what I remember about it.  I was in a school in Trenton.  They shut the lights off and we got to sit under our desks and we thought that was really cool and they gave us cottage cheese, which was a cold lunch because there was rioting, but we didn’t know that.  We just thought that “My God. We get to sit under our desks and eat cottage cheese.”  And what if – that’s what I remember about it.  That was a tremendous test of this country’s fabric and this country’s had many tests before that and after that.

And the reason I don’t despair is because this attack happened.  It’s not a dream.  But the aftermath of it, the recovery is a dream realized.  And that is Martin Luther King’s dream.  Whatever barriers we’ve put up are gone even if it’s momentary.  And we’re judging people by not the color of their skin but the content of their character.  And you know, all this talk about “These guys are criminal masterminds.  They’ve – they’ve gotten together and their extraordinary guile...and their wit and their skill.”  It’s a lie.  Any fool can blow something up.  Any fool can destroy.  But to see these guys, these firefighters, these policemen and people from all over the country, literally, with buckets rebuilding.  That, that – that is – that’s extraordinary.  That’s why we’ve already won.  It’s light.  It’s democracy.  We’ve already won.  They can’t shut that down.  They live in chaos and chaos...it can’t sustain itself.  It never could.  It’s too easy and it’s too unsatisfying.

The view from my apartment was the World Trade Center and now it’s gone.  They attacked it.  This symbol of American ingenuity and strength and labor and imagination and commerce and it is gone.  But you know what the view is now?  The Statue of Liberty.  The view from the south of Manhattan is now the Statue of Liberty.  You can’t beat that.

So we’re going to take a break and I’m going to stop slobbering on myself and on the desk and we’re going to get back to this.  It’s going to be fun and funny and it’s going to be the same as it was and I thank you. We’ll be right back.”  http://genius.com/Jon-stewart-9-11-monologue-annotated


As we remember the horror of those attacks, we also need to remember what is accomplished when we work together.  We have our differences and we stumble along the way, but this IS a great country.  We have freedoms unknown and unheard of in other areas of the world.

We will never be able to completely guard against terrorist attacks.  An individual set on harm will usually find a way.  But they can’t destroy us unless we let them.   We must continue to tear down barriers that divide us and continue to build this country together, all of us, regardless of race or creed.  

Take care,
Deb

Sunday, August 28, 2016

We are in Fort Wayne, Indiana, our last stop before home.  Fort Wayne has the third best genealogical library in the country, after the National Archives and the Mormon sources in Salt Lake City, Utah.  Someone left their fortune to develop it and it has been put to good use.  We’ll spend a day there before heading home.

My sincere sympathies to those of you who have had to endure this heat all summer.  I’m not good with heat at the best of times and after spending the summer as far north as we were, I wasn’t ready for this.  And, yes, I know that this is actually cooler than it has been.  We will head north again next summer.

I also want to remember to stay out of Direct TV satellite range in 4 years.  We were far enough north and east that we couldn’t get satellite TV during the conventions.  While the Internet kept us informed, I didn’t have to listen to all the talking heads drivel on.  Maybe we can plan an overseas trip for that summer.

The last adventure in Canada that I wrote about was coming back from Newfoundland.  We accomplished the ferry journey without incident and drove to a nearby campground for the night.  Which is where the fun began.

We had supper and then Steve decided to head out and try to make some satellite amateur radio contacts.  He’s done a lot of that on this trip and has a nice stable tripod that he can mount his antenna on.  What I didn’t realize was that he sometimes doesn’t use that and ends up waving the antenna around in the air by hand to find the satellite.  Ok, fine.

But it’s dark and he said he was going out to an overlook.  About an hour later he comes rushing back in, grabs two flashlights and says he needs my help.  This is not good.

We hop into the truck and he heads back to the “overlook” and explains the problem:  while waving his antenna around and trying to broadcast, he set his phone on the truck where he could see the information about where the satellite was.  You can see what’s coming.  He packed up his antenna and his radio and jumped into the truck and headed back to the trailer.  Getting out of the truck he checked for his phone.  He doesn’t swear very often.

So back to the overlook we went, which was in reality a wide spot in the road, and we’re hunting for the phone with flashlights.  My phone is turned off; we only use one phone in Canada to cut down on international costs.  But I turn mine on to call his phone, hoping to hear it ring.  Silence (at least when the 18 wheelers weren’t whizzing by).  Later I realized that we wouldn’t hear it ring, as it only rings in his hearing aids and was too far away for that.

Panic.  But Steve remembered that he had the Find My Phone App on his phone and he used that to locate the phone – about 100 yards down the road from where we were looking.  It stayed on the truck way longer than it should have!

Only a few dings on its case and one scratch on the screen.  We were very lucky!

Now, stop what you are doing and check your phone.  Do you have the Find My Phone App?  If not, get it, install it and Google how to use it.  You won’t regret it.

Steve won’t be doing any more nighttime beside-the-road satellite communications.

The next day we headed north on our way to Quebec City. 

The drive through Nova Scotia and New Brunswick was interesting, as the landscape changed from rocky hills to river valley farmland.  Quebec City sits on the St. Lawrence River, which over the millennia has left relatively flat land for farming.

 By the time we reached the St. Laurence River, it almost felt like the mid-west.

Both last year and this year, as we have traveled around Canada, we have noticed that most signs, directional, informational and advertising, are in at least two languages.

The languages are usually French and English, but in the Yukon were frequently English and a First Nation Language (or occasionally all three). 

In New Brunswick, we saw signs that were in English and Gaelic (Scottish) (we think).  

So as we are headed toward Quebec, I’m expecting to see signs in French, as that’s the official language in Quebec, with the English below.

Not exactly.  Stop sign.

Road sign.

Hmm.  Even New Hampshire had a dual language welcome sign when we reached there.

We really enjoyed touring old Quebec, but I’ll leave that for another day.

Take care,  

Deb

Friday, August 26, 2016

We are outside of Cleveland today, after visiting Niagara Falls.  It is spectacular!  The sheer power of the water is awesome.

This is the American Falls to the left with the much smaller Bridal Veil Falls to the right.  Farther to the right, out of sight, is the Canadian Horseshoe Falls.

We decided to take two tours, one on the American side and then one on the Canadian side.

The Falls are on the Niagara River, which connects Lake Erie with Lake Ontario and allows water from the Great Lakes to flow to the Atlantic Ocean.  According to Wikipedia, the average flow of water is 4 million cubic feet of water per minute.  The amount of flow depends on many things, including snow and rainfall in the Midwest and how much water is being diverted for hydroelectric power.  90% of the water flows over the falls most of the time, with that decreasing to 50% after midnight and during the winter months.  The diversion of water has slowed erosion of the falls from 3 feet per year to one foot per year. 

Part of the Horseshoe Falls on the right with the American and Bridal Veil Falls on the left.

Our Cave of the Winds tour took us next to Bridal Veil Falls.  They gave us ponchos to try and keep us dry.  And sandals so we could keep our regular shoes dry and to give us some relatively non-slip shoes.   The decking we are standing on gets torn down every fall and rebuilt every spring.  Winter would totally destroy it.

Here’s a close-up of the sandals. 

And here’s a picture from the Maid of the Mist (name of the boat) where we were at Bridal Veil Falls.

It’s probably hard to see, but there are people on the decking, getting soaked!  The Maid of the Mist has been operating for years from the American side and there is a different company that operates from the Canadian side.  The ponchos on the American boat are blue, the Canadian, red.  Both boats travel into the mist created by the Horseshoe Falls far enough that you feel like you’ve been in a storm.  And then it’s back to the dock.  It’s a short trip.

On the Canadian side we took a tour “Behind the Falls” which takes you into some tunnels with openings near and behind the falls.  This shot is of the western end of the Horseshoe Falls.

The American Falls from the top, with Horseshoe Falls in the background.

American and Bridal Veil Falls from part way down.

And the falls at night.

We took two bus tours, the American side tour, which included the Cave of the Winds (Bridal Veil Falls) tour and the Maid of the Mist boat ride and the Canadian side tour, which included the “Behind the Falls” tour and the trip up the Skylon Tower to the observation deck.  We enjoyed our tours, but it would be a very expensive way to take a family to the falls.

The American side of the falls is all in a state park.  Parking in the park is $10 a day (the commercial lots are more expensive.) and the views are free.  The Cave of the Winds tour is $11 for adults.  (The cave no longer exists, but the name lingers!)  The Maid of the Mist boat ride is $18.   None of that requires crossing into Canada.

The Canadian side is very commercial and to get there you need a passport.  If you like to party, this is the side for you!  The observation tower is on the Canadian side.

So, if I were taking a family, I’d stay on the American side and probably just view the falls and take the Cave of the Winds tour.  It gives you a chance to feel some of the power of the falls.

That’s all for now.  We’ll be home on Tuesday, which is rather hard to believe!

Take care,

Deb

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

I’m writing as we ferry back to Nova Scotia from Newfoundland.  I won’t be able to post this until we get to our campsite in Nova Scotia where I think we’ll have Internet access.  But I have 4 hours on the ferry, so I should be able to get something written.

This should be our last ferry crossing for this trip.  It’s our fourth.  We did one last year in Canada across the Yukon River at Dawson City, but the river was only a few hundred yards across. 

Loading onto a ferry is quite interesting.  This ship appears to be a marriage between a cruise ship and a cargo ship.

They loaded 18 wheelers on the open deck of the cargo ship part and most of the rest of us in the level below that.  All kinds of vehicles are loaded on board: cars, trucks, trailers, buses, buses on flatbed trucks, and I’m not sure what to call this one:

Truck is a bit big for that camper.  I’ll bet there is an interesting story to that.

We drove into the stern (back) of the boat and they very carefully guide you in.  The side of our trailer wasn’t 6 inches from the mirror of the truck next to us.  But these people are pros.  They know how to pack them in.  Entering the boat.

Getting parked inside:

Adirondack chairs in bright colors are either a trend in Canada or a trend everywhere this summer.  These were at our campground in Gros Morne National Park, but a lot of homes have them and the Canadian national parks system has placed two red ones at most scenic overlooks to enjoy the view.  Makes me want some for home.

Our drive from Gros Morne National Park to Port au Basques, where we caught the ferry was all about scenery. 

It was along the west coast of Newfoundland.  So if it was on my side, we weren’t always sure if we were looking at a lake or an arm of the ocean.  Newfoundland has lots of lakes.

We did find a ski slope.

The scenery here can be very rugged.

And towns get nestled in between hills and the shore.

There are lots of creeks, many that resemble quintessential mountains streams and others more like this.  But all are rocky!

Wherever we go, we occasionally find unusual folk art and Newfoundland was no exception.

Since these were across from a septic company, I assume they are septic tanks painted with cartoon characters.  Made us smile.

 I noticed that the farther south we got, the more meadows we saw.

 Not fields, although I did see one. 

Farming is not a big thing on Newfoundland.  There are few areas where the topsoil is good enough or deep enough.  I saw one dairy farm and they had gone to great lengths to establish some flat fields to grow hay.  I never saw the dairy cows; the only livestock we saw was one herd of sheep.

I thought these were sheep, then rocks, but they were sheep!

One last scenery shot:

We’re heading out for Quebec City from Nova Scotia, but it will take us several days to get there.  If I don’t blog, it’s either because there wasn’t much to blog about or I’m tired after a long day of driving.  Or no internet!

Take care,

Deb