New England's Narrow Road

Antrim’s Home and Harvest Day Parade

Official seal of Antrim, New Hampshire — Image via Wikipedia

Last weekend we attended the home town fun in Antrim, New Hampshire. The weather was nice, even a bit cool when the sun went behind the many clouds, but that made the day very comfortable.

Fire trucks in a parade — The Parade Begins

I went downtown with my daughter and her boyfriend and his daughter and my youngest son. We parked by the schools and walked down into town where the sidewalks were crowded with people waiting for the parade to begin.

I love parades, even very small ones like this one. We saw some kids in the high school band that we knew and all the people on the floats threw candy to us and I never realized that Antrim had so many fire trucks!

I have more photos but don’t have the time right now to add them all so I will later on this week – hopefully.

I’ve only lived in Antrim for a little over 5 years, but I am impressed with all the activities and the dedicated natives who take pride in their home town.

Antrim, NH town hall — Antrim's Town Hall

The Artist’s Conk Mushroom

I recently purchased a good mushroom book and found out that this set of mushrooms I had found last Fall is called the “Artist’s Conk” (Ganoderma applanatum).

I almost spelled it “conch” since I am so used to doing seashell research on the conch (pronounced the same as conk).

It can be etched or painted and will stand up on a table for display. Sounds interesting, but they are very much attached to the trees they grow on and very difficult to remove. I half tried to do so without luck. I guess I need a knife. Or better yet, just take a photo!

See more photos and a picture of a carved drawing at Mushroom-Collecting.com

Update on My Stair Climbing

I know you have been wondering how I am doing at my “Brilliant Idea for Getting In Shape“… No?

Well, I thought I’d be doing a lot more stair climbing than I ended up doing, but I am doing it. I had hoped to get up from the computer once an hour and do the stair thing for 3 minutes. Doesn’t sound too difficult does it?

The trouble I’m having is that I set the timer, get busy working on something in one of my Zazzle stores and when the timer goes off I think, “Okay, just let me finish posting this product for sale” , or “I’ll just finish up this drawing first”, and then I totally forget – for hours – that the timer was calling me to walk!

So I end up climbing my stairs only about 2 or 3 times a day instead of the hoped for 6.

But I am doing it, and I am convinced that it is doing some good – even if it’s a tiny bit. I’m not too worried because with the cooler Fall air comes the lugging of firewood, which is plenty of exercise.

My Son’s Dragon and Koi Tattoo

When the kids came to visit this summer, my oldest son showed up with a huge tattoo on his leg. The artwork was quite amazing. It shows Koi fish and a dragon swimming through bands of black (the water?) on a hairy calf……It has some sort of story to it.

I imagine it was quite expensive – he didn’t say – and it took quite a few visit with the tattoo artist to get it finished.

I don’t have any tattoos. My other son has a couple and so far my daughter is tattoo free.
Just thought I’d share this amazing artwork.

And if you are interested, I have been looking for a story to go with the tattoo and found one about 9 Koi fish that take a perilous journey and turn into dragons. Read it here.