The webcam is cursed. How else to explain the total blackness (loss) of the picture and the unusual shot of Roseledge’s ceiling corner? Okay flicking one’s one useful (left) hand across the keyboard and hitting random keys that require a click before continuing is a possible explanation, but I say the machine makers should have foreseen the problem. And surely I heard the camera complaining about the same view all the time as it fell to the floor and viewed the (handsome) ceiling beams. The very good news is that son Charlie was raised to figure out what to do. A long time ago, a friend at Underwriter’s Lab (UL) figured I was the reason UL was born. I give Charlie and UL purpose.
Lobster buoys on the dock before they mark a pot. No webcam near.
Book news: Lee Vance’s Restitution has a classy reference to a Wyeth painting that at first read might be “Christina’s World,” but I think is the painting of Betsy asleep in the grass with blueberries. I didn’t double check because I want to think I’m right. I liked the book no matter what, but his reference to a Wyeth makes it a RB neighborhood treasure. I ordered Lee Vance’s Garden of Betrayal, the second in what I hope is a series.
Few things are more fun than having a RBR look at the shelves and suddenly exclaim, “Oh, you have (Robert Finch’s) The Iambics of Newfoundland! I have that on my to-read list and even tried to buy it, but the bookstore person had trouble with iambics.” We’ve just the book for she who looks (iambic tetrameter alert), like a personal bookseller who interprets a literature-map, of related authors. Personal trainer? Personal chef? Personal bodyguard? Small “body-treat” potatoes compared to a personal bookseller, who caters to the mind.
Two excellent book suggestions from RB people: Eva Murray’s Well Out to Sea: Year Round on Matinicus Island, always fun for summer visitors who find it harder and harder to leave, and Kitty Pilgrim’s The Explorer Code, which will be a great addition to the North Atlantic adventure novels — when it comes out in paperback! Until then, Dan Brown’s Deception Point, Peter Hoeg’s Smilla’s Sense of Snow, and Andrea Barrett’s Voyage of the Narwhal will have to do.
Painters add spirit and make a memory possible to many.
Harbor highlight: Painter parked across Sea Street, set up easel and water-colored away. Either knew or was especially cordial to walkers and drivers-by, some of whom stopped to talk at him and watch. He never slowed, but did respond sometimes. Could he be the world’s first male multi-tasker?
It’s nearly that time of day when the boats are aglow with the light of the setting sun.It’s pizza-on-the-porch and try-a-new-wine night. Maybe the General Store pizza lady will have the basil dough. Yum.