Upstate New York Lakehouse

I submit that there's nothing that can make you feel like more of a jerk than forgetting your mother's birthday. I actually forgot it twice too. I realized I forgot a day after the fact, but then once again forgot when I saw her in real life and prattled on until she brought it up. I remembered Julia Child's birthday for goodness sake's, and she's long dead, but forgot my own mother's birthday.

Apparently, the only one who remembered was Rain the dog, and my brother. That came out of left field. Go Danny. My dad forgot too.  At the end of the day, he reached into the cabinet to get the dog a treat, and my mom said, "Do you know what day this is?" Dad froze, hand outstretched into the Pup-Peroni container. The gears in his brain turned. He knew he had done something wrong, but what?

So we all screwed up except Dan. Hopefully a family togetherness trip to our lake cabin in upstate New York made up for it.  Joe drove six hours to visit too, that was so sweet of him.

This is one of my favorite places in the world.  It's very modest, but so peaceful.  There's nothing to do here except watch my cousin's children and the next door neighbor girls play with our puppy.

I read a few books, watched a documentary about Finnish sauna culture (few channels here), and went swimming too. I'm brave about lake swimming, but there was a humongous spider on the dock, and of course, she lived right on the ladder to get into the water. I chose to jump off the possibly broken diving board instead. Warning, crazy big dock spider pictured below, I'll hide it behind the jump for sensitive souls.

Hipstamatic

Blogging does gets in the way of my reading goal though. Especially if you can't think of anything to write and you just stare at the screen, which is the case so far this week.

So I'll just take the easy way out and post some pictures. Now I'll buy pretty much anything with "Hip" in the title, so take this with a grain of salt, but I think the Hipstamatic iPhone app is fun. Here are snapshots from this year:

View from my family's lake house in upstate New York, one of my favorite places.

Hipstamatic still life (cake with candles).

Spring seems so long ago, doesn't it?

My friend's adorable baby

Vacation Wrap-Up

Greetings From Upstate New York! Part 3

PBS is one of the three channels that we get at our lake house. I think, instead of saving for retirement, I'm just going to hope that my parents have some valuable junk in the basement that I can take on Antiques Roadshow.

Greetings From Upstate New York! Part 2

Went to the Glenn Curtiss Aviation Museum in Hammondsport, New York. Glenn Curtiss invented motorcycles and airplanes back at the turn of the century. He was one of America's aviation pioneers.

I sort of wish I had gotten one of these bikes instead of my blue one.

How memorable would I be, riding that around Washington?

Unlike institutions like the Smithsonian, this museum seemed to rely heavily on donations from members of the community to fill out its collection.

For example, perhaps museum curators would say, "Got some old rowboats? They're a form of transportation, we'll take 'em."

"Old pianos? Well, they are old."

"Some fancy dollhouses? Alright, but this is getting further and further off topic..."

"A framed collection of four-leaf clovers that represents your life's work? [Throws up hands]. Fine. OK. Sure. Whatever."

Greetings From Upstate New York!

The view from our lake house: