Month: November 2014

Mark O’Connor with wife Maggie Dixon O’Connor and Gary Mazzaroppi, Frank Vignola and (not in photo) vocalist Tamar Korn. This concert was part of Music Worcester’s Tickets to Opportunity program, which provides tix to area nonprofits and schools. Two student jazz combos performed for us before the concert.

Started early Friday afternoon with a visit with Peter at Tobey Hospital, then the Salem Cross Inn evening wedding of Mariah and Sandra, where we had the honor of being seated with Mariah’s parents, Ron’s friends of 30+ years Chris and Jan.

After a night’s stay at the Publick House Historic Inn in Sturbridge, we enjoyed a brief visit with the couple and Chris and Jan’s other daughter, Josie, and a splendid brunch thereafter.

From there, we visited our friend Elaine in Williamsburg. After a delicious soup and bread lunch, Elaine brought us to Snow Farms’ Annual Seconds Sale, where we purchased a beautiful casserole and cookie jar.

We got to our next destination, Greg and Irene’s hillside house in New Lebanon, NY, just in time for sunset. They treated us to a splendid dinner and made us a fine breakfast the next morning.

They brought us to the Clark Museum in Williamstown so we could see the famous Impressionist collection: a real treat and in the spirit of the weekend. I was especially drawn to the Corots.

We stopped at Guido’s Fresh Marketplace in Lenox for lunch of salad and soup, then on to the Worcester Mechanics Hall for a fabulous concert by Mark O’Connor’s Hot Swing Trio. We got home around 7:15.

The weather held for us all weekend; rain started here only last night, which gave us dry roads while we were traveling and time to retrieve our Friday and Sunday newspapers. Traffic was light to moderate as well, even at the Pike tollbooths.

This morning, we roused ourselves early enough to score bagels and bread at the Senior Center. This afternoon we managed to do a transfer station run and talk with Peter, who looks great!

Peter emailed that his surgery went well and we can see him tomorrow. Relief.

We transplanted the big grass from Edgewater and put down two bags of mulch. It was good to have a gardening project to keep one or maybe two minds off the goings-on at Tobey Hospital.

Ron did a great job cleaning the tarp that I’d completely forgotten about at Edgewater.

We also put away the remaining Halloween decorations that had been in the shed.

It was so warm that we had lunch on the deck – no jackets.

I took a look at a mostly useless SEO report from NEPS.

Ron and I have done a couple of days worth of branch trimming this week, and we made a second trip to the transfer station with today’s load.

We gave James a hand with mowing and while Ron was working in the front yard, I dug up one of the big grasses in the back.

Ron made a great supper – spaghetti and last night’s salad.

Ron did his stagehand thing in Woods Hole last night and got to see a pretty sunset.

I visited the Organic Farmers’ Market and bought a gorgeous bunch of kale, from which I made soup and roasted chips.

I picked up bagels and bread at the Senior Center this morning.

Ron and I cleared the branches in the side yard. We saved a bunch for building things like teepees to hold burlap around the more vulnerable bushes.

I got the winter drapes up last evening.

We signed up for a Comcast TV special deal. The box arrived today and I was able to set it up. Ron is in heaven!