I'm off to the St. John Valley (the French part) in Northern Maine to get some much needed R&R at my parents lakeside house. They have some cool roads which I'll check out and maybe take loads of pictures of Moose. If anyone is going to Northern Maine over the fourth of July look me up.

 

Did I see my name?
Take pictures, I need to see something green.

 

bon voyage et bonne chance avec votre transmission

 

I love Maine this time of year..................

 

Happy Motoring Krutty! Jay and I will keep the club to a minium roar while you are gone.

 

There was a catalog a while back called "Some items from our Catalog" which featured, among other things, a shoe boat (a boat that looked like a docksider, complete with outboard motor) and Maine, a nice state in the northeastern part of the US, lightly inhabited and forested heavily with a large moose population... heh!

Be careful, MINIs and Moose don't play well together... take photos, we can all meet at Cassats one quiet evening to see them...

 

bon voyage mon amis

 

It was 99 degrees in Portsmouth NH as I was coming through.. going to be 64 degrees tonight in Eagle Lake Maine! Yikes!!

I'm currently at the Embassy Suites in Portland Maine - it's pretty bad when you're having a beer at the bar and they come find you... "Are you Mr. Collins? Cooper misses you!"

So I race up to the room and of course he's all whiny - as soon as I get into the room (figuring it was going to be all redecorated) he calmed down. Fortunately the curtains are still attached to the rods, the bed has sheets and the couch has cushions. :-)

 

Aww, poor puppy!! Funny though!

Good luck with the MINI up yonder!!


-Paul!

 

pauvre chien

 

AAW, poor Coop. Glad you guys will have alittle break from this HEANOUS weather! And I am SURE Cooper will be happy to go swimming every chance he gets once you are up there!

 

Practically the first thing Coopy did (after he was done performing his duty as a MINI-sausage factory) was go retrieve a tennis ball out of the lake and then go check out the fake ducks my parents have tethered to the bottom of the lake. Cooper was pretty funny - didn't know they were Fake Ducks (you make up a word) until he paddled out to each one of them (with the tennis ball in his mouth) and nosed them as imposter mallards.

****UPDATE****

Someone decided that he needed to retrieve one of the imposters.. 10 lb weight and all. :-)

 

OMG!! Of course Cooper would do that! It was what he was bred for! WAY TO GO COOPER!!
Enjoying relaxing at the lake house with your computer? Can't get the city out of the guy!

 

Apprécier une tasse de café de Krutty pour moi par le lac !

 

It truly is KruttyKoffee up here - my mother is of another generation raised on overburnt, percolated coffee. She's got on of those newfangled pod (Krutty Koffee Kanisters????) devices were you put in a little puck and out comes coffee.. something seems to be lost in the translation. But it's better than decaf.

The weather here today is truly beautiful - the sun is glistening off the lake, there's a nice breeze at 8 am and not a cloud in the sky. I have to go to MalWart and get a Krate for Kooper (since we're on the K Kick).

My five year nephew got bit by a dog a few weeks ago and is now petrified of ALL dogs. So the dog and I are banished to the front porch - and my parents do have DSL (all the way up here in practically Canada!) with a WiFi hookup.

The citronella candle on the porch helps keep the black flys away - although I learned to not spray the OFF! anywhere near the citronella candle lest you want to lose a few arm hairs!

I'll do some lake kayaking tonight - also have a PWC (personal water craft) and a Boston Whaler type boat - maybe go scout some camps for sale.

 

Would be a great night for an almost full moon paddle... A neat opportunity as it is a rare "BLUE MOON" month.

Have done numerous trips down the Potomac calling in as many as 3 owl species. The best trip EVER was July 4th - paddled into G-town to watch the fireworks show and listened to the NSO 1812 Overture on my little Grundig. I LOVE THE CANNONS!

Have you ever tried the fly tape on the back of a hat? Works wonders. Have caught as many as 30 in 2 hours.

Hope that Cooper is OK... Is he social? He would be welcome to stay out in the stinky suburbs with the girls. Meli's little boyfriend Norman is here for 10 days.

Have fun!

 

ahh...black flies...I hope you don't get bitten too much.

If you're going to malwart, get those Off lanterns...they work like a charm...at least on skeeters.

too bad about the nephew..it always saddens me when kids are afraid of dogs. too bad CtD is so huge or you could work on that...

Be safe on the lake...wear a PFD.

Have fun...

 

Put a couple of pics up on my blog. Even managed to catch a rainbow.

 

you have a blog?

 

I am back in DC as of 22:30 this evening - left my parents at 07:30 this morning. Stopped three times for Coop the Dog. Hit three nasty storms on the way down - slowed down to a crawl each time on the interstate in Maine, Connecticut and New York. Only used 2 tanks of gas coming back - my range on this MINI appears to be approximately 475 miles. Pretty impressive.

The red hot dogs and creton are chilling in my fridge. :-)

Cooper is a very happy but tired dog.

 

Looks, and sounds like you had a well deserved vacation. But, I am glad you are back! Control is NOW back to you!

 

Of course, don't forget about responsibility and blame. Want to hang on to credit?