events since the snow

the pictures show Boris shaking hands with the young Elvis depicted in Tupelo where he was born, at the same age as B is now (notice bib overalls), and from the museum at graceland (note changing tast in clothes).

its been a while since we updated the blog, primarily because we've been busy updating the house: painting rooms, hanging curtains, having the floor done, putting up bookshelves and the like. you can see familiar items rearranged not too differently in the photo of our new dining room. this has all required a pretty comprensive upgrade of our equipment and tools, so we've been out at the local version of mitre ten every weekend buying sanders and scrapers, brushes and sharpeners, paints and polyurethanes, as well as big items such as a new lawn mower, a bbq and a canoe (!) we've also completely renovated the vege garden and replanted it with summer salad things and 'erbs, 'erbs, 'erbs ...

it was great having kath and tony here, and the trips we went on with them were a lot of fun, especially visiting memphis tennessee. tony said he would never have though of going to gracelands, but he was very impressed by it. they also went to savannah (east) and new orleans (west). tony was handy about the place at a crucial time, and his expertise in things electronic helped a lot (eg my record player).

i have just spent ten days in the netherlands, france and belgium, mostly at a conference, but i managed to get to carnac where the prehistoric stone alignments are, and now that i'm back am settling in to the warm weather. the porch is the place to be, with home-made lemonade, mint juleps and jacqueline's wicked margueritas.

we had the landscape architecture faculty and students for a bbq a couple of weeks ago. even when they're drunk the students call you sir.as i think we've mentioned you can't get lamb here, so we bbq'd texan steaks and weenies, and the grilled squirrel went down a treat too!

carnac alignments




graceland

Snow in Auburn

Yes, well, it is very exciting. Today it snowed. Such a big event it was that all the schools and the university closed in anticipation. We had about 4 inches I'd guess. It seems to have stopped now, and I suspect that that might be it (hardly the blizzards they are having in Washington, but a big deal for Auburn.) Photos of our front and back yards in snow.

Ironically, we had the last coat of polyurethane on the bedroom floor done today so can't put the heating on till tomorrow - funny that the very day it snows we can't put on the heating.... (we took up the carpet in the master bedroom, which was a horrible aqua colour which you can see in the photo I took before we moved in (previous owners' furniture), and have had it replaced with hardwood floor). The curtains in the bedroom have also made an exit except they have done stirling duty as drop cloths. The smell of polyurethane pervades our whole living environment right now, making one quite light headed. Hope it will dissipate soon, but not holding out much hope.

We have been busy painting and generally getting organized in the new house. I have painted the lounge, the master bedroom (and walk-in closets). and made a start on the kitchen. Next on the list is the dining room. That fireplace which Boris is sitting next to is now white(ish) - we painted the brick so that it wasn't so dramatic.

The fireplace is great actually, and cunningly designed - there is a gas pipe which supplements the fire - put the gas on and you don't need any kindling - the gas flame gets the big logs going, and if the fire isn't going well, we just turn the gas up and bingo! A roaring fire sans effort. Boris loves it (of course), what boy doesn't like mucking about with fire?

It is Mardi Gras next week - don't really know what that it, but no doubt we'll find out. I'll post pictures if any eventuate.

Love from Jacqueline

PS to Christmas

As requested by Cassandra - some photos from our "Christmas Morning" (actually, the morning before we went to NY, so a few days early).

Jacqueline tries on her new apron - looks particularly good with PJ's... Impressive bit of sewing that! Is that Imogen's hand we detect? By the way, many thanks for the cards - they were all lovely!

Boris takes aim with his new gun.

This is Jacqueline's Lane Cake, an old Southern classic high cake. It's over 30cm tall and comprises three layers encased on a custard-like fruit mix. There is over a cup of Bourbon in that cake! It was a hit at the Thanksgiving party we went to. Very hard to cut as it is soooo tall, but it was structurally sound - it didn't disintergrate once people started slicing into it.

Christmas in Manhattan

In an effort to distract ourselves from the fact that we had no family to celebrate Christmas with, we took ourselves off to New York for 7 days. The day before we arrived there was a massive snow storm, much to Boris' delight.

The buildings had on their best livery- Sax 5th Ave went for the snowflake look, but others had exquisite window displays.

We did a great deal of walking, but it was difficult to prevent the icy blast penetrating our numerous layers of wool. The only problem we really had though was that once we went inside we roasted. We spent lots of time dressing and then undressing as we moved between cosy inside and Artic outside.

We did many of the usual tourist type things, including a boat trip on the river, which gave Boris the opportunity to see the Statue of Liberty up close and to also get a good look at the Manhattan skyline. They are only allowing 10 people up the statue at a time these days (selected by lottery) we we didn't attempt to get lucky - the odds are too great given the number of people. We did, however, make it up the Empire State Building and got a great view of the city under snow.

There were skaters in both Central Park (particularly picturesque) and Bryant Park. Very Christmassy. Boris, of course, was mostly interested having in snowball fights.

The museums were wonderful. The Natural History Museum had the best dioramas I have ever seen , and their dinosaur exhibits were also remarkable.

Boris enjoyed the Andy Warhol pieces at the Museum of Modern Art, and has started to show an appreciation of Roy Lichtenstein.

The Metropolitan Museum was astounding - the stuff they have! I particularly enjoyed the impressionist collection, but also the early Italian masters - of which they had an abundance. W hardly scratched the surface in the three hours we were there - it would take weeks to get around it all.

One late afternoon we left Boris watching TV in the hotel (he'd done his dash looking at cultural masterpieces) and Rod & I went to a Kandinsky exhibition at the Guggenheim.

On Christmas Day we went to the movies on 42nd St. It was packed! We were at the opening night of "Sherlock Holmes" - very enjoyable it was too. Perfect Boris-type movie - lots of action and an easy story to follow...

On the last day Boris and Rod both picked up food poisoning - we think Rod got his from the place we had breakfast - (surprisingly, as it was a nice little restaurant which looked clean enough), and Boris later on in the day from a kebab roadside cart (which wasn't surprising at all). Both had a really rough night and the next day we had to get up early to head for the airport. Thanks to that scare on Christmas Day when that Nigerian tried to set off explosives on the flight from Holland, we had to be super early at the airport to deal with security. We managed all that, then about an hour before our flight was due to depart, it got cancelled. We ended up waiting hours before getting on an indirect flight to Atlanta (via North Carolina). You can imagine the state both Rod and Boris were in by the time we got home -poor things. It took days for them to recover. Anyway, they are both fit and well now, ready to take on the New Year!

Santas take over neighbouthood

It must be near Christmas because houses and lawns all over our neighbourhood have sprouted fairy lights, illuminated deer (in profusion) and other sundry Christmas icons, such as that well know Christmas character, Poo Bear (see left). Houses and bushes are groaning under the weight of fairy lights.

Some people only decorate their shrubs, others only their house eves. Some tend towards the tableau with deer and/or polar bear and/or Santa (with or without his sleigh). Folk with a more refined taste simply pick out a curving path in coloured lights. Others push the boat out and do the lot... its like Franklin Road on acid.

The best one is over the road from us. It is a large inflatable chimney with a Santa who rises periodically from the centre to wave, then disappears down the chimney again.... My photo isn't very good but you get the general idea.

Boris is really wanting us to have some sort of decoration, just to show that we 'believe' in Christmas. I'll have to look out the Christmas decoration box although I greatly fear it is destined to be a very poor showing next to the enthusiastic displays of our neighbours.

Yesterday I was invited on a tour of houses which had been decorated for Christmas - the "Lakeview Ladies Christmas Fellowship of Homes" to be exact. There were three groups of 25 ladies (75 of us in all), and we visited three homes (in rotation), all of them rather grand affairs. There was 'entertainment' at each - carols, a Christmas reading and a luncheon. Each 'homemaker' had gone to enormous trouble to decorate their home for Christmas, very tasteful... not a scrap of tinsel in sight! It was all gilt pine cones, pointsettiers, gold ribbon, candles and sprays of imitation pine. I was feeling quite a failure as a housewife until I overheard some of the ladies commenting they their own homes were far from being as immaculate or as well decorated. Well, that's a relief!

Love Jacqueline

Savannah & Charleston

While everyone else was eating turkey and doing the big family reunion thing we decided to hit the road and go to Savannah (as you do). It's about 5.5hrs drive from Auburn, mostly through woodlands. This is a typical shot of the road.

Savannah is in Georgia, the state to the right of Alabama, and is built on the Savannah River estuary. While the Biblo people inhabited the area as far back as 3500 BC, when the Europeans arrived it was settled by the Yamacraws who lived on the high cliffs overlooking the river plain.

This is a view (not usually seen in the brochures) of the fancy new suspension bridge (Talmadge Memorial Bridge) over the Savannah river. One side is in Georgia, the other in South Carolina.



Savannah is famous for its layout. The town plan was laid out by James Oglethorp in 1733, to a design he had devised before he left England (it reminds one of those cooking shows where they pull a pie out of the oven saying "and here is one I prepared earlier"). Lucky Savannah was flat and could accommodate his plan without the need for modification.

The plan became famous and made Savannah famous. It is based on a grid regularly interspersed with squares, planted with Live Oak (a tree which is now the State tree of Georgia) and festooned with Spanish Moss (which you will know, of course, as Tillandsia, an epiphitic bromeliad). These squares are now mature and exceedingly beautiful.

The architecture is a treat. Before the civil war the town was swimming in money, mostly the riches garnered from cotton plantations and slave labour. Rich and prosperous, antebellum Savannah was quite something. It managed to survive the war due to the fact that Colonel Olmstead surrendered the town when he saw the modern rifled cannons used by the Yankees. He declared "I yield my sword, but I trust I have not disgraced it." Later on General Sherman offered Savannah to President Lincoln as a Christmas present.
The surrounding district still has a number of surviving antebellum mansions - this is one on the way between Savannah and Charleston. Note all the Spanish moss.
Note the palms - there were lots all over the city, even though it is further North than Auburn, the coastal location means it doesn't get the frosts so palms do well.

From Savannah we decided to drive up the coast to Charleston, about 100 miles north, as the two cities are always linked - both are surviving examples of the antebellum South.

It was a lovely drive to Charleston through the productive landscapes of Georgia and South Carolina. We passed cotton fields, pecan groves and peach orchards. This is a cotton field.

Pecan trees surrounding a cotton field (the cotton plants have been harvested and the stalks are showing brown)

Charleston wasn't laid out on a grid but is well endowed with charm (exceedingly quaint in fact). It too is located on a river flood plain, and is close to the sea. It was established in 1670, so it is older than Savannah. Like Savannah it is an important port.



A lane in Charleston.
On the waterfront is a large park and promenade. The pineapple fountain shown here is on the water front. You can see the river estuary in the background.





More cotton fields!

Back in Savannah.

Savannah. Live Oak draped with Spanish Moss.

We booked our Thanksgiving dinner in Savannah in advance of our going as there were very few places open for dinner that night. We chose an historic house called the Pirate's House - a restaurant (originally an inn) which dates from 1753. It sounded good on the web, but, in fact, was an extremely busy 'family restaurant' - there were hundreds of people and even though we'd booked we still had to wait for a table for over an hour (think Valentines with a Johnny Depp impersonator dressed as Keith Richard dressed as Jack Sparrow....). Oh well, the buffet was OK and we got to eat some turkey along with everyone else so you can't say we didn't have a proper Thanksgiving! Love Jacqueline