Tag: Essex on Lake Champlain
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Adirondack Birding and Squirreling
Rather than whining through another verse of the Bali Blues on my harmonica, I awoke on my first morning back at Rosslyn in a fever to jump-start autumn/winter rituals. Top of the list was setting up the bird feeders in anticipation of Adirondack birding. A recent radio report on Vermont Public Radio had mentioned that…
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Leaf Peeping in the High Peaks
On Wednesday afternoon my bride and I departed Essex and headed south on Interstate 87. Driving one of the Adirondack highway’s most handsome stretches always affords decadent views, but yesterday spoiled us with near peak Adirondack fall foliage. It was breathtaking despite overcast conditions. The flat light desaturated autumn’s cacophonous palette, rendering a landscape more nuanced…
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Paris, Rome, New York City and Essex
Early in the millennium I lived in Paris and Rome for a little while. Twin hardship posts! I shuffled back and forth on a roughly two week cycle with frequent detours to New York City to visit my then-girlfriend-now-bride. I lived out of a suitcase and a briefcase. I collected frequent flyer miles and passport…
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Rosslyn Roundup, May 4
It’s time for another Rosslyn Roundup to share everything Rosslyn-related that I didn’t get a chance to post over the last few weeks. Champlain Valleysprings are unpredictable and exciting, sometimes arriving early (this year) and other times hiding behind rain, rain, rain (last year). We’ve been celebrating our good fortune (quietly, with fingers crossed, while…
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Remembering Essex Cartoonist, Sid Couchey
On a gray November afternoon back in 2010, Ruth and Sid Couchey rang my doorbell to present this playful rendering of Rosslyn’s boathouse. We sat in the living room and talked and laughed until the dreary afternoon yielded to technicolor levity. Sid Couchey’s Legacy of Laughter [pullquote]With a perennial twinkle in his eye and a…
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Hickory Hill and Homeport
Rosslyn artifacts continue to emerge, and sometimes they’re not even even Rosslyn artifacts at all but Ross family artifacts. For example, I just discovered this antique postcard of the Ross Mansion (aka Hickory Hill) which was built in the early 1820s by the brother of W.D. Ross, the original owner of Rosslyn. Here’s the description provided…
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Totally Incompatible
My fixer-upper forays with Bruce Ware and other local realtors evolved when Susan joined the search. She shared my dream of an old farmhouse surrounded by open meadows with views and sunlight. She liked barns and was even receptive to my occasional flights of fancy about converting an old barn into a home. But our notions…
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Recovering from Irene
Much of the North Country is still recovering from the devastation wrought by Hurricane/Tropical Storm Irene. Four weeks on, I return to the notes I jotted during and shortly after Irene passed through Essex, New York. A sheet of water cascades in front of the parlor windows. I’ve sunk into an armchair to watch the…
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See you at Depot Theatre
Adirondack storyteller and writer, George Davis, needs you to help him kill a few stories on Wednesday, August 3 at The Depot Theatre in Westport, NY. Prepare for a pell-mell parade of vignettes, monologues and readings ranging from a wader-wearing Amazon named Rosslyn to a perennially pickled bathtub yachtsman… This solo performance pokes fun at…
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Redacting Rosslyn Redux
What happens when a storyteller writes a book? When a talker becomes a typer? When the audience’s laughter, sighs, snoring, heckling and applause vanish? When margins and page count provide only the most porous parameters? I’ll tell you what. Story glut. Plot inflation. Unchecked character sprawl… What: Redacting Rosslyn Redux When: 8:00pm, Wednesday, August 3,…