Maggie's Farm

The Berkshire Hills, once snow-capped mountains and, in recent millennia, glacier-covered and glacier-scoured, run from northwestern CT up through western MA. They are contiguous with the Green Mountains of Vermont.

Today, tourism, skiing, and second homes form the economic foundation of this chronically economically-depressed but charming rural region which was once dynamic with farming, lumbering, paper mills, woolen mills, and quarries. It has become the sort of area now where locals cannot afford to dine in the upscale restaurants filled with Bostonians and New Yorkers.

Image is the Hoosac Tunnel, about which Walking the Berkshires has written, and which first connected western and eastern MA by rail.

Just east of Berkshire County are the Hidden Hills.

One of the great songs of all time, but this time with Cab Calloway as Keko the Clown:

A re-post from our archives -

I was amused to see Megan McArdle having problems positioning her stereo speakers because I once spent a frustrating year fiddling with that issue in our parlor with my ridiculously high quality but handsome 5 1/2', 175 lb. Legacy Focus speakers, which would be better suited for an auditorium, a barn - or outdoors. You cannot crank them up or it could remove my house from its foundation.

Good stereo speakers need to be at least 3' from the wall, away from direct sunlight, and 6-10' apart, depending on room size. Even so, there will only be one relatively small area in the room where the sound will converge properly. What if you want to sit somewhere else? You cannot sit in front of one speaker. (And don't even talk to me about that stupid "surround sound" fad of the 1980s.)

I finally gave up on doing it right, because it wouldn't work in the room, given the windows, fireplace, piano, and other necessary furniture. I even called Legacy and sent them a floor plan, and they were kind and helpful, but it just didn't work for the space. That marked the end of my pursuit of maximum recorded sound. It's a fool's errand unless you have a dedicated "listening room" like fanatic audiophiles do. Now, I'd just rather spend my money on hearing live music, and I mostly listen to music via my crummy old computer speakers.

My big Focus speakers ended up 24' apart, in corners, about 18" from the wall. Totally wrong, unless you are listening from the adjacent room. Makes me want to return to good old monaural and to heck with this stereo nonsense. I remember when my Dad bought our first mono cabinet "record player." Man, did that sound good. I even remember my kid sister playing "Meet the Beatles" on the thing, when the record came out. (I thought it was dumb music...at first.)

Here's a good how-to on speaker placement.

Photo is a Legacy Focus speaker with the cover off to show the components. Mine are with the gleaming Rosewood.

Transit

A woman I have never seen before
Steps from the darkness of her town-house door
Just at that crux of time when she is made
So beautiful that she or time must fade.

What use to claim that as she tugs her gloves
A phantom heraldry of all the loves
Blares from the lintel? That the staggered sun
Forgets, in his confusion, how to run?

Still, nothing changes as her perfect feet
Click down the walk that issues in the street,
Leaving the stations of her body there
Like whips that map the countries of the air.

A re-post from last summer -

The old town of Lucca, still circled by the medieval defensive walls, is like a Disney Medieval Italy. Like San Gimignano but with many fewer tourists (they all go to Pisa instead, to see that dumb church tower, or to Siena or Firenze for the 10th time). Plenty of towers - if not as many as San G. but who cares? A tower is a tower.

The modern city surrounds the old town which is now preserved in amber (heavily regulated re historical preservation - and rightly so, I think).

This lovely Italian gal ducked, as if I had not wanted her in my photo. She was wrong. Her gladiator sandals are perfect for the location: this is an entry to the Roman arena in Lucca. Its walls are integrated with the walls of medieval houses built into and against the Roman ruins. (Lucca is full of charming northern Italian women. All of them know how to dress, and many of them are blondes.)  

More doors and entries below -

Abrash is a good thing in a hand-knotted rug.

From Terry Pratchett's Making Money:

"How did you find out they were down there?"

"The usual way. One of our golems heard one singing. Imagine that. It's been underground for sixty thousand years..."

In the night under the world, in the pressure of the depth, in the crushing of the dark...a golem sang. There were no words. The song was older than words; it was older than tongues. It was the call of the common clay, and it carried for miles. It traveled along fault lines, made crystals sing in harmony in dark, unmeasured caverns, followed rivers that never saw the sun...

...and out of the ground and up the legs of a golem from the Golem Trust, who was pulling a wagon loaded with coal along the region's one road. When he arrived in Ankh-Morpork, he told the Trust. That was what the Trust did: it found golems.

Rock climbers and boulderers refer to those rocky hills/cliffs/mountains as "the Gunks." Famous challenges for climbers, but, since we are on the topic of family places with the de Medicis and the von Trapp family, we should not omit the Mohonk Mountain House. I have a good photo somewhere of my Grandpa fly-fishing on the lake.

It was a favorite of my grandfather, and remains a family favorite. Nowadays, they even serve alcohol which the Quaker Smiley family never used to permit (you had to sneak in your own, and secretly imbibe in the privacy of your room before dinner).

I have a friend who is a bit of a watch collecter and amateur expert. He showed me the Vacheron Constantin watch he was wearing the other day.

It's the oldest surviving watch company in the world. Est. 1755. They make unostentatious fine watches, or "timepieces" as watch snobs term them. You have to wind them every morning which, if I understand it right, all very fine watches require.

I am a Timex guy - a watch I wear routinely needs to take plenty of abuse and needs to be disposable - but I have a couple of somewhat fancier watches which I rarely use. Consumption is not one of my hobbies (I don't own a lot, but I have enough of everything), but I can appreciate fine hand-made things.

My friend tells me that Obama wears a flashy and expensive IWC, assembled from innards made by other companies. "Typical Obama," said he.

Photo is a Vacheron Constantin Jubilee.

My urbanologist friend tells me that we can thank the gays of NYC for being frequent pioneers of gentrification. He says they have plenty of spare cash and like to spend it, they like interesting restaurants, and they like to make things look pleasant.

A generation ago, the gays moved into the West Village. Recently, moving into  Chelsea, which was once a neighborhood which many conflated with Hell's Kitchen. Today, it is known as a semi-gay neighborhood (nothing in your face, though), but with plenty of young families with kids (strollers and moms everywhere), and lots of young straight professionals too (including a BD pupette, which is why I have become so familiar with the area. She is in a new Chelsea high-rise, with doorman, a business center, a gym and a cool roof-top garden overlooking the Hudson for parties - all you have to do is sign up for the roof-top).

Chelsea is full of old brownstones, and peppered with new high-rises. It's a short walk to Chelsea Piers, the Intrepid Museum, and the 12-mile Westside Greenway (for biking, running, and hiking) which runs along the Hudson River from the Staten Island Ferry to the George Washington Bridge. Now there is the High Line "park" too, which will run all the way to the Meat Packing District.

(The Upper West Side, where I dwelled for a while, has come a long way too in the baby stroller department, but it never quite needed gentrification. It was always a mixed area with all of its grand pre-war buildings and brownstones. Its SROs are gone now, though, along with the street crime.)

One could spend a lifetime studying the changing neighborhoods of NYC. Curtis Sliwa knows it all.

Brownstones like these in Chelsea now go for 2-4 million:

Since we have our signs up, we do not forgive your trespasses. Plus we have the fully operational services of the He Marks The Sparrow's Fall Security System in place at the farm.

Great tool for the places wheere you cannot take a tractor. It's the 17 HP, and it will shred a 2" sapling with ease. Here's the DR site.

Can you name year and make of the truck?

Ten years ago we sat with a good pal, now deceased, and his wife on the porch of his golf club, sipping after-dinner single malts and smoking Cubans. And watching the Hummingbird Moths who were all over the solid planting of pink Cleome below the porch.

One of those magical moments. There are other reasons to plant annuals like Cleome, but those moths at dusk are the best reason. Here's a pic of one from Gardener's Index hovering over a Cleome:

Luke 12:49-56. Tough words from the Prince of Peace.

12:49 "I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!

12:50 I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed!

12:51 Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!

12:52 From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three;

12:53 they will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law."

12:54 He also said to the crowds, "When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, 'It is going to rain'; and so it happens.

12:55 And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, 'There will be scorching heat'; and it happens.

12:56 You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?

2-3 large garlic cloves
1/2 cup virgin olive oil
1/2 cup wine vinegar
4 heaping tablespoons of fresh-grated Parmesan
Juice of 1/2 lemon
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
4-5 anchovies
salt and pepper to taste

Throw it all into the blender and mix at low/med. speed.

We posted this long ago, but Tiger reminded me of it. No man-made machine is like this:

Entry drive, early morning, August.

At Pajamas, "Bob Dylan’s Great Travel Song, "When I Paint My Masterpiece" is a great summer vacation song—particularly if you’re heading to Europe, as right about now, a lot of Americans are." Touching base with their cultural roots and with history.

Since SONY has been removing Bob's things from YouTube - and I cannot find The Band's version - I can only offer good old Jerry with his pickin' version:

It takes all kinds. Man lives as TV dog. Good for him. A world without eccentrics would be a dull as Singapore.

How advertising genius Albert Lasker transformed America

San Francisco proposal would limit toys in kids' meals. Will these cranks ban the toy in Crackerjacks too? Which is worse: Bloomberg or San Francisco?

Photos of opera houses. h/t, Thompson

Understanding your husband's sexual needs

More evidence that 'Recovery Summer' is a cruel hoax

Model corruption - The truth about the GM 'rescue'

The Dem strategy for November is in place. It's dishonest, but it's everyday politics.

Via NYM:

A thought experiment: I am grieved by Saudi policies — for example, Saudi religious discrimination, oppression of women, and persecution of homosexuals. If I were to express these grievances by blowing up a Saudi kindergarten, do you think Imam Feisal would say (1) the Saudi Royal family must share responsibility for the carnage, and (2) whether or not I had committed an act of terrorism is a “very complex question”?

Your daily dose of good wholesome sarcasm: Why Can’t You Selfish Ingrates Feel the First Couple’s Pain?

Says it all: Buchanan's Putting Government First. Quote:

...we have a situation where private sector workers in Middle America are being taxed, their children being driven ever deeper into debt to China, so government employees who have greater job security than they do, and earn more in pay and benefits than they will ever earn, can stay in Fat City.

And folks wonder why so many Americans detest government.

Related: Why people aren't hiring-

Finally, somebody remembered to give me this book for my birthday.

Just need to finish reading my Baroque book first.

Does it seem to you that they keep making books with smaller and smaller print these days...?

Vanderleun is right: these 1940s color pics are fascinating slices of American life. I have seen some of them at Dr X, in the past. Part of the message for me is how soft and luxurious our lives have become over the past 60-70 years. Women had muscles then, but not from working out at the health club. 

Here's one of the pics:

Lucy’s Kin Carved Up a Meaty Meal, Scientists Say. h/t, Dr X. I think they were cannibals. They look like cannibals.

Energy crisis and peak wood

Obama: Slaves on the Government Plantation. All persons of skin tone must return to their barracks immediately.

Weather liars. Flat, outright lies, and fully-deliberate.

I heard last night that an estimated 1 in 8 babies born in America last year were born to illegals.

How Pres. Hoover damaged the economy: raised spending and raised taxes

Home Ownership: American Dream or American Headache?  It's natural for people to want to own stuff. Not always sensible, though.

Related: Feds rethink policies that encourage home ownership. I want to see federal policy to encourage boat ownership. Boatie Mac, or something. No money down.

Stimulus Pushers -The latest bailout for public unions and spendthrift states. The irresponsible and the unions get the dough.

Q&O: Is the US bankrupt? Well, we are just pwned by China.

Harry Reid is sane? Harry Reid ad: Sharron Angle 'dangerous,' 'crazy'. She seems just like an ordinary citizen to me.

Public favors Tea Party over top Dems

Juan Williams: White Votes Are Irrelevant

The threat of the 'fake fishermen': How BP may be paying out millions in oil spill compensation to fraudsters. Hey, I go fishing every chance I get.

Wow. A Dem won a Dem primary

Some thoughts about how liberals are made

American Conservatives have "new ideas"? No, they don't. They have 1776 ideas. Liberals have 1912 ideas.

Sports feminists want space on the sports pages. h/t, Insty. Are they talking about newspapers? They should quit bitching and just create some good women's sports websites, and make some money. Or not.

Fla. AG McCollum Pushes New Immigration Law Tougher Than Arizona's. We are looking at the unfolding of a rebellion.

...I'd buy this W. 12th St. townhouse as a pied a terre. I'd let all my millions of best friends use it, too, when they visited NYC. There would be a maid and a cook who lived on the top floor, and three reserved parking spots at the garage down the street.

All day long I'd biddy biddy bum...

With the lousy economy, and the closing of so many Wall St. firms, prices are coming down a bit, but such places remain pricey from my humble standpoint. They are asking $29 million for this typical and rather ordinary one (see photos at link). I guess lots of people want to have places in Manhattan these days.

People who are not familiar with 19th century NY townhouses do not know that they all have pleasant little gardens in the back. Lots of landcaping businesses in NY specialize in townhouse mini-gardens. Little fountains, mini-patios, quiet lighting, pots, plants that like the city, etc. I once knew somebody whose Mom kept her pet tortoise in her NY garden for many years. Animal probably outlived her. It fed on bugs, worms, weeds and grass in the garden, and vegetables left-over from Chinese take-out. Crunched up those skinny dried hot peppers without batting an eye. It lived in the kitchen in the winter.

I think it was a Greek Tortoise (Testudo graeca) that she snuck home in her luggage from a trip to Corfu in the late 1950s. Gerald Durrell, brother of  Lawrence Durrell, loved those tortoises when he summered in the Greek islands. Those animals can live well over 60 years. They become precious living heirlooms, like parrots.

Photo of T. graeca in its natural spartan habitat: