Ramble On

At the summit - 3,940'

A few Saturdays ago, I had the opportunity to climb up Blackhead (in the Catskills) with my girlfriend Sarah, her father, and a high school chum of her father's. I do love a good hike through the forest, but this was quite a different experience from my usual: much more vertical travel than I've done before.

We started at 10:15am, at roughly 2,200 feet. I should also point out that at that elevation it was still early Autumn, slightly overcast but still warm enough to make us reconsider bringing our jackets. The forest was almost entirely deciduous (lots of birch and maple) so the scenery, while not unattractive, consisted mainly of the browns of bark and shed leaves, occasionally punctuated by the bright green of moss. Our path followed and occasionally intersected a stream. (Sarah's father was quite keen on looking for swimming holes for the summer, and we did find one or two.)



There was also a spring from which we all drank cold, clean mountain water. I can happily report that none of us got dysentery. My favorite part of the hike however was the sudden climate change after around 3,400 feet. There was literally a stark division in the flora and.. well, to be perfectly honest there was hardly any fauna around except for a lone raven cackling in the distance. The warm--if monotone--browns of fallen leaves turned into dark verdant conifers under which a thin carpet of snow refused to melt. The trees were short, but very dense, and so the trail was very tunnel-like.

This weekend I went on two mushroom forays with my mother and members of the Mid-Hudson Mycological Association (MHMA). Here are some photos I took of some of our findings.

WARNING: Identifying mushrooms is a SCIENCE, and I am only an amateur. Any identification notes that I make here range from somewhat confident to fairly speculative, and I make NO CLAIMS WHATSOEVER that any of the information below is accurate. (After all, this is a blog, not a peer-reviewed mycological journal..) Many species of mushrooms are LETHAL if ingested, and many edible mushrooms have toxic counterparts that are superficially similar. Having said that, enjoy the photos!

Albrecht Dürer is without a doubt my favorite artist of the Northern Renaissance, and I go out of my way to see as much work of his as possible. I've even been to his still-standing house in Nürnberg. Imagine my surprise when I found out that Vassar College's Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center owns an amazing collection of his engravings—and they're on display right now. Since I live barely a five minute's drive away from Vassar, I've already been there twice and will probably go a few more times before the exhibition closes on December 24.

Even better than my proximity to these works (which include some of my personal favorites, including St. Eustace and Knight, Death, and the Devil), I was allowed to take pictures to my heart's content! Here is just a small selection; I focused on some of the smaller details that one can rarely see clearly in facsimiles, and never in online reproductions.

From Melencolia I, 1514


A pouch suspended from the angel's girdle


Detail of the coastline


The greyhound(?) curled up at the angel's feet

From Erasmus of Rotterdam, 1526




Erasmus' hands

From Adam and Eve, aka The Fall of Man, 1504


Perhaps the first time I've ever wanted to pet an engraving...


Mountain goat in the extreme top-right corner of the page

More to come..

Today I was on the DCC campus registering for a class and just tying up some loose ends. On exiting the building, I noticed a tiny bird sitting on the edge of the walkway. It looked up at me as I walked past; I'm not kidding, it actually turned its head to watch me pass. I passed it again, curious as to why it was just sitting there. I bent down with the intention of moving it to a safer place, but mostly just expecting it to freak out and flutter off. But, it didn't. So I scooped it up, and walked back to my car with paperwork in one hand and this tiny ball of feathers perched on my finger.

It looked to be pretty healthy; no broken wings or legs, nor any other obvious damage. I'm no vet by any stretch of the imagination, but since it pooped on me a few times and I didn't see any blood or anything else weird (weirder than the fact that this wild bird was pretty content just sitting on my hand), I suppose there couldn't have been any grievous internal damage either.

Not knowing what else to do, I brought him to my parents' house and try to figure out what he'd eat, since there's a plethora of edible berries, bugs and other things to be found in mom's gardens. Unfortunately I didn't figure out what the little guy wanted. Although he had stared at me with mouth agape a few times before this, he wasn't having any of it now. But in the shady garden, he seemed to be finding some energy anyway; he was flapping around more, and also started cheeping for the first time since we met. Eventually he hopped off into one of the flower beds, and I lost him. I hope he finds something to his taste there. Or at least doesn't become something else's meal, which is always likely. But such is life. Here are some pictures and a video clip:




- identified after the fact as a juvenile Cedar Waxwing, Bombycilla cedrorum -

..for now.

I'm sitting in the Dublin airport (local time 12:40am), waiting for my flight to JFK. I have about 10 hours to go, so I'll soon be sleeping - most likely on top of my luggage.

Good night, and I hope you all stay tuned for whatever my next adventure abroad is!

While I was teaching English, I often had to travel just outside Prague to some businesses in Čestlice. On the way, I'd always see this neo-gothic tower sticking up over the town. I later found out that this was part of the château gardens in Průhonice, which is an UNESCO-protected area. Here are some pictures of the park.