Moving
Before the Plunge
07/07/2012 16:10
“an incredibly riveting read”! (that’s what she said…)
Got an unexpected email a couple of mornings ago, from Jasmine at onlinecolleges.net. She was writing to let me know she’d included this blog in her article, “The 50 Best American History Blogs.” I’m very happy to be included – you’ll find me at #16 in the alphabetical list – especially after looking at some of the other blogs Jasmine picked. Really good stuff! And the list itself is a great resource; I found a bunch of blogs I didn’t know about, which I’ll probably follow regularly. So thanks for including me, Jasmine, and thanks for the list! Online colleges also looks like an interesting concept and website, which I’ll be looking into more closely as well.
For people who may be coming here for the first time, I should mention that I recently archived my posts from the last few years, and started fresh. So the new stuff is here, and you can find everything before this summer here.
Still preparing for the move.
We’re down to the last few days of our stay in Keene. It’s the deep breath before the plunge, as Gandalf would say (we’ve been watching the extended versions of The Lord of the Rings to help the time pass). Today I’m taking it easy. Tomorrow, the trampoline comes down, the computers get packed, and the kitchen and everything else that’s not staying. Monday we finish packing. Tuesday we load the truck. Wednesday we clean and the buyer walks through. Thursday morning we close and drive.
Blueberries
As part of the finishing-up-with-New-England project, we picked blueberries today at our favorite spot, Monadnock Berries. This was their opening day, and we got there early in the morning and beat the rain. Next time we pick blueberries, with luck, it will be on our own spot. 
I’m really looking forward to getting started on the little farm – we’re thinking of calling it a Gardenagerie. But, just to prove this back-to-the-land idea isn’t something we just pulled out of thin air, here’s a photo of me with one of my “projects” for animal science when I was an undergrad at UMass. So, nothing new here. The surprise is that it took me this long to make the big circle and end up where I began.
For people who may be coming here for the first time, I should mention that I recently archived my posts from the last few years, and started fresh. So the new stuff is here, and you can find everything before this summer here.
Still preparing for the move.
We’re down to the last few days of our stay in Keene. It’s the deep breath before the plunge, as Gandalf would say (we’ve been watching the extended versions of The Lord of the Rings to help the time pass). Today I’m taking it easy. Tomorrow, the trampoline comes down, the computers get packed, and the kitchen and everything else that’s not staying. Monday we finish packing. Tuesday we load the truck. Wednesday we clean and the buyer walks through. Thursday morning we close and drive.
Blueberries
Getting ready to move
06/13/2012 09:38
I’m spending a lot of time in a coffee-shop, writing. But we’re also preparing to move halfway across the country in just about a month. So last night I transferred my school books from the shelves in my study into boxes. An even dozen bankers boxes – because that was the biggest box full of books I wanted to carry. A dozen (the two on the left are from the kids’ room).
When we arrived in New England
a little over four years ago, I had about as many books as I could fit in a backpack (okay, I did keep my original boxed set of The Lord of the Rings that I read as a kid). My previous collection had been liquidated when we went to Chile, through selling on Amazon and giving books away. So this pile of books is the result of just four years of acquisition. Dang!
In my defense, most of the books on these shelves are history, and I have been getting a PhD, which involves a little reading. It could have been much worse: I’d have accumulated twice as many if I had actually bought every volume I read. And lately, I’ve read dozens of books on Kindle. Those don’t take up shelf-space, either.
I should probably get rid of some of these, but I suspect there’s material in them that I haven’t dealt with yet. As I recently found, rereading a text I’d powered through for my Comps, there’s a lot more to find when you have more time and a wider focus than preparing for Oral Exams. And more recently, I’ve added some books that are background to the writing projects I’m doing. And others that are practical, how-to books for the move to the farm.
So I’m going to consider myself lucky they all fit into just a dozen medium-sized boxes. That will be more than enough to lug onto the truck and off again on the other end. Then there are those three big boxes of clothes…
In my defense, most of the books on these shelves are history, and I have been getting a PhD, which involves a little reading. It could have been much worse: I’d have accumulated twice as many if I had actually bought every volume I read. And lately, I’ve read dozens of books on Kindle. Those don’t take up shelf-space, either.
I should probably get rid of some of these, but I suspect there’s material in them that I haven’t dealt with yet. As I recently found, rereading a text I’d powered through for my Comps, there’s a lot more to find when you have more time and a wider focus than preparing for Oral Exams. And more recently, I’ve added some books that are background to the writing projects I’m doing. And others that are practical, how-to books for the move to the farm.
So I’m going to consider myself lucky they all fit into just a dozen medium-sized boxes. That will be more than enough to lug onto the truck and off again on the other end. Then there are those three big boxes of clothes…
