Monthly Archives: September 2010

Visiting Martha’s Vineyard

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A few weeks back, my parents came up to visit. One of the few surprises I had for them was a visit to Martha’s Vineyard. Visiting Martha’s Vineyard has been on my mother’s wish list for a while and since I had never been to the island either, both of us were excited.

Now, I would like to let you know that I have been to Block Island a few times, so I kind of knew what to expect. I understand that Martha’s Vineyard is a much busier place, but how different can they be? Well, as it turns out, they were different but the same.

To me, Block Island is a really nice place. I have never visited Block Island during peak months, so I always enjoyed a fairly thin crowd. There were never any waiting lines to eat and getting around was easy. During our last visit to Block Island, we rented a scooter and drove all around. It’s a pretty special place.

I was expecting something more of a party atmosphere when visiting Martha’s Vineyard. I think I was right on target. Martha’s Vineyard is more crowded and a bit more energetic. Now, I will tell you that we only visited Oak Bluffs while on the island because that’s where the ferry from Quonset Point brought us. If we visit Martha’s Vineyard again in the future, we will surely rent a scooter and visit Vineyard Haven and Edgartown. But for now, I guess it’s Oak Bluffs.

After we got off the ferry (that took 1:40 mins), we started walking around. We immediately found a small alley that we walked down. It was pretty cool because it was one of those alleys that looked like it had some interesting bars or restaurants. It set the theme for the trip. We did a lot of walking around that day. I mean a lot. So much that I took a long nap for the whole ferry ride back to Rhode Island. My feet hurt too.

So, what did we do? Well, we walked up Circuit Avenue and visited a few shops. Then, we had lunch in one of the eating establishments and then walked around the Gingerbread village. That’s a pretty cool place with something called the Camp Meeting Association Tabernacle at the center. I am not sure of the story of the place, but it sure looked interesting.

After that, we strolled over to Ocean Park and walked around a bit on the beach. We found some pretty cool rocks and shells.

So, that was about it. After a few hours of eating, discovering and walking around, we hopped back on the ferry and headed towards Rhode Island and Connecticut. Overall, it was a good, but tiring day. I guess any time you have to take a ferry somewhere for the day, it’s going to be long and tiring.

I took a few photos and have posted them below.

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A Good Measure of Virtue

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A few weeks ago, I was doing a little research on the meaning of “Virtue.” This isn’t a word I use all too often (or ever), but have been noticing its use more and more around the internet. It’s fairly common for me to investigate something’s meaning if I feel it’s important to today’s world.

Basically, virtue is a standard that some people might choose to live up to. Of course, it’s much more complex than that (if you choose it to be) and you can look up its full meaning here.

After reading and understanding what virtue is all about, I started thinking about how difficult it is for those of us to live virtuous lives. It might not be all too much of a challenge to actually identify what’s right and wrong, according to our own moral standard; I believe the challenge lies with how to identify virtuous acts in today’s complex and tightly woven world.

Let’s face it, the playing field has changed. In this day and age, attempting to gather data and make a choice on who benefits the most from a single decision is almost impossible. Just ask and business person or politician. It’s only getting more and more difficult every day. Things are so large now that the network of choices and ramifications is hard to imagine.

Here’s a silly little example I just thought of while looking out the window: Should I help that little old lady across the street? Well, that depends on much traffic there is. Will I be in danger? Should she be walking across the street at this time of day as it is? Does she even need help, or will she be offended? Did she just do something bad and is trying to get away?

Just from this short example, you can get an idea of how troublesome every decision you make can be when there are such questions to be answered.

I think I found some help. I came up with an idea after receiving an email from my mother a few days ago. She visited earlier in the month and wrote a thank you email that included something like, “…good food, good people, good memories.” After I read this, I started thinking about how memories can be used to measure virtue.

Throughout life, we become smarter. The reason we become smarter is because we learn from past successes and failures. If we continuously look back to measure the effect on others around us regarding the larger decisions we make, we can see if we made the right decision. I believe this fits with living a virtuous lifestyle. Everything we do affects others and ourselves. If we use memories to gauge how we feel after we do something, we can alter future actions. Does that make sense?


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Rod Stewart – Baby Jane

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Have you ever stayed in bed after the alarm started going off…only to listen to the radio while fading in and out of sleep? Well, that’s what happened to me this morning.

On so many occasions when I do this, I hear an awesome song. After I get up, I usually forget what the heck it was because it was pretty much a dream. This morning was different. I remembered that awesome song and it was called “Baby Jane” by Rod Stewart.

Enjoy.


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Planting Evergreen Tree Transplants

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Okay everyone, since Autumn is here, I figured that it’s just about time to plant a new batch of evergreen transplants.

I had a tough time with this one. It’s been a really hot and dry Summer, so I wasn’t sure when to have these trees shipped. On one hand, I wanted to get them fairly early in Autumn so they would have a chance to get acclimated in their new surroundings, but on the other hand, I needed the soil to be moist enough as to not shock the tree roots. I chose the middle of September as a compromise. I figured that the rains would return soon and until then, I could keep the trees watered.

I have been watering. I will tell you though, it’s not much fun trying to find 150 young trees. I know that the water isn’t really penetrating the soil, but I know that keeping things as moist as I can is better than doing nothing. Also, I am fairly confident that many trees with survive; the ones that don’t can be replaced next year. They don’t cost much to purchase and have shipped.

With that in mind, I would like to give a big thanks to a new tree nursery with really great prices I found online. They are called Needlefast Evergrees and are located way out there in Michigan. The owners seem like nice people and I am happy to give them my business. It has become sort of a hobby of mine to locate various seedling and transplant nurseries that offer good product for a great price.

Anyway, I have written about transplanting trees a few times before. In one post, I told you about my new garden auger and in another post, I told you about this Spring’s evergreen transplant activities.

Let’s talk about the garden auger first. There are a few things I would like to express. First, the tool works very well. It’s strong and does exactly what it says it would do. I used it with an 18 volt cordless drill and everything was good. The only problem is that using this tool takes a bit longer to plant the trees than the faster “shovel in dirt” method. Also, when you drill the hole in the ground, the dirt that you bring up kind of disappears. It gets spread out to the sides and when you are ready to fill the hole back in, there isn’t much material to work with.

My father keeps asking me how the tree planting project went. For some reason, he wanted me to buy a really strong corded drill. He likes tools. He also wanted me to use the garden auger for all 150 trees. I had to break his heart when I told him that my existing cordless drill worked fine and that I only used the auger for about 25 trees due to the reasons I just described above. I explained to him last night that if I only had 50 trees waiting to be planted, I would have used the drill and auger method. I also told him that I would have picked up some top soil to fill in the holes as well.

Okay, so now at the time of this writing, all 150 trees have been planted and have been watered twice. It is supposed to rain for the next few days, so I am hoping that this will aid in the moisture aspect. I really don’t want to keep watering. You can well imagine how long that takes.

Here are some photos of the project…beginning to end. If you have any questions, please leave a comment.

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Chester Museum at the Mill, Chester, Connecticut

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This is the last short post for today, I promise.

As I mentioned in a previous post, we walked by the Chester Museum at the Mill this morning while visiting the Sunday market in the town of Chester, CT. We were walking up West Main Street and happened to stop at the museum. The reason we stopped there was because you simply don’t come across a structure as beautiful as the Chester Museum at the Mill very often. The leaves were falling and the age and architecture of the building complimented what was going on outside.

Now, I have to make a confession. I was never one for local history. Then again, I don’t know anyone my age who is. But, after reading the Chester Historical Society’s page on the Chester Museum at the Mill, I think I may take a trip back to learn a bit about the Chester area. I guess I was never interested in local history because I was never interested in locality in general. Things have changed ever since my better half and I decided that we really like Chester. If the day ever comes when we want to make Chester something more than just a place to visit, it would be nice to know what it’s about. Also, when the people of Chester put such time and care into something like this, it deserves some respect.

Here is an Autumn photo of the Chester Museum at the Mill located in Chester, CT.

Chester Museum at the Mill in Chester, CT

Chester Museum at the Mill in Chester, CT


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Nice Pictures of Some Purple Clematis

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Now, I am 99.9% sure this is Purple Clematis. We have some at the house here, so it wasn’t difficult to identify.

This is the second to last post about random stuff we saw today in Chester, CT. This Purple Clematis was located right after where Goose Hill Road and North Main Street merge. We took a quick walk up this road before we left to move onto other things.

This Purple Clematis was mixed in with another flower. I am not sure what it was, but it was white and looked kind of like Baby’s Breath. I am not good at these things, so feel free to tell me what this white flower is if you happen to know.

Purple Clematis Mixed With White Flower - Close View

Purple Clematis Mixed With White Flower - Close View

Purple Clematis Mixed With White Flower - Far View

Purple Clematis Mixed With White Flower - Far View


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Huge Sycamore Tree in Chester, CT

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I know these are some really short posts, but they kind of don’t have anything to do with anything. They are simply about some neat stuff we saw today.

This post is about a really, really big Sycamore tree we walked by in Chester, CT this morning.

After browsing the fine items at the Chester Sunday market, we decided to stroll up West Main Street. We got as far as the “Chester Museum at the Mill” and stopped. We stood for a while and looked at the museum and then started walking back to where the action is. On the way back, I commented, “Hey, look how big that tree is.” Then, I really looked at it. It took a while to let my brain process the size of the tree.

It took two photos pasted together to get the whole thing. Now, of course the picture doesn’t show how big the tree really is, but trust me, it’s big. I should have stood in front of it.

Sycamore Tree in Chester, CT

Sycamore Tree in Chester, CT


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Railroad Tracks in Chester, CT

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We went down to Chester, CT this morning for the market on Main Street. After that, we went to brunch. After that, we drove around a bit.

I am going to write a separate post about the market, but I wanted to quickly show you a really cool picture I got of the train tracks that go North / South near the water. I pulled over after we passed the tracks and got out of the car. I’ll tell you, it was tempting to just stop the car on the tracks and take the picture. Nah…

Train Tracks in Chester, CT

Train Tracks in Chester, CT

What a cool picture though.


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Picture of a Stick Bug

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My better half was sitting outside on the front step this afternoon when she asked me if I wanted to see a Stick Bug. I said no. Then, I said okay. I guess my curiosity got the better of me.

When I got outside, I said, “Oh cool. I am going to get a picture of this.” Now, you know why I wanted a picture of the Stick Bug, don’t you? To show you!!!

Here it is.

Stick Bug - #1

Stick Bug - #1

Stick Bug - #2

Stick Bug - #2


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Self-Defeating Statements

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A few days ago, I took a trip out to Martha’s Vineyard. We left Rhode Island on a ferry and arrived at the Vineyard about an hour and forty minutes later. It was a nice day.

On the ferry, there were all sorts of characters. I’m sure you can imagine the bunch. From the golfers to the strange lady with the Golden Retriever…they were all there. Needless to say, practically everyone on the boat was more wealthy than I. An eccentric group, if you will.

As I sat on the center deck, leaning over with my head in my hands, trying to grab some shuteye, a small group of semi-rowdy middle aged men were discussing the origins of the universe. I thought this was apropos because we were all getting a little loose by the thought of going somewhere so exciting.

As I sat there, listening, my ears perked up. I had my eyes closed as to not give them any indication I was in fact attuned to their conversation. Now, let me tell you, when anyone begins a conversation regarding the beginning of space’s great expanse, it’s difficult not to salivate over the soon-to-be learned theories. Unfortunately, the first few sentences is basically where the intelligence of this conversation began and ended.

The louder and more outgoing of the group gave his theory. He said that god made the universe. Not one god in particular, but any god would do. Okay. That’s one theory. Now, from what I have gathered throughout my life, there is only one other available theory about how the universe was born…”it was alway here.” This is where things got slippery.

As the conversation progressed and theories flew in from left field, the group of men became more subdued in their vocalism. They began to engage in “groupthink.” By this I mean they started to realize there were no real answers and they wanted to get back on the same playing field so they could move on with their day. Also, after a while, the conversation was pretty much beat.

Towards the end of the discussion, the leader of the group said something along the lines of, “Well, there is nothing that has always been in existence. Nothing can just be. A god had to have created the universe.” Of course, this is the point a small smile formed from my lips.

If you have ever heard the term, Self-Defeating Statement before, you will know that it means: A self-defeating (or self-refuting) statement is a statement that fails to meet its own standard. In other words, it kind of cancels itself out.

This is a very interesting tidbit of education because once you learn what self-defeating statements are, you begin to recognize them almost everywhere. You can poke holes in people’s logic and become a much more effective conversationalist and debater.

A famous example of a self defeating statement is: There is no truth. (Thank you Apologetic Junkie) As you can see, if there was no truth, the statement, “There is no truth” would be false. The statement cancelled itself out by what it said.

So, back to what was said on the boat – “Well, there is nothing that has always been in existence. Nothing can just be. A god had to have created the universe.”

Let’s take this statement apart. When this fella said, “Well, there is nothing that has always been in existence.” he may have been correct. We haven’t a clue if there is or isn’t anything that has existed forever. It’s a very debatable point (actually it’s not since we have no evidence). After that, he said, “Nothing can just be.” He may have been correct about that as well. While this is nothing more than a wild guess, I couldn’t offer anything that would have convinced him that he was wrong. He got into trouble when he said, “A god had to have created the universe.”

Now, the statement “A god had to have created the universe.” isn’t self-defeating by itself. It’s actually quite similar to this gentleman’s first two statements. It’s the connectedness of the statements that made the last one self-defeating. Does that make sense? If nothing has been in existence forever and if nothing can just be, where did these gods come from?

As a side note, this is what has always made me wonder about the big bang theory. If the universe was created by a chunk of mass exploding, where did that chunk of mass come from? The chain of questions goes on and on.

It’s a tough world out there. So many of us try to mix logic with faith with emotion with everyday life. It’s challenging to say the least. I think the safest thing to say is that we are all wrong a good percentage of the time. That’s okay, because we are nothing more than human and as we all know, “to err is human…”

I hope you enjoyed my post about self-defeating statements. If you are a philosophy buff and would like to add or correct anything, I surely would welcome your comment.


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