Fall in New England

It's not hard to find beautiful scenery in New England. Took a short drive today northwest of Hartford, visiting a few antique shops and chatting it up with the locals. The leaves haven't quite turned yet -- that will come a few weeks down the road. The scene here then should be pretty spectacular.

Also stumbled upon Canaan, Conn., the hometown of 1971 World Series hero Steve Blass of the Pittsburgh Pirates. I was a big Pirates fan growing up in suburban Pittsburgh. We listened to a couple of the '71 Series games on the radio in junior high. There were day World Series games way back then. Canaan plans to honor Blass next weekend.

Connecticut and the Civil War

It seems like every small town in Connecticut has its own Civil War monument. This one is atop a hill overlooking Winsted, a tiny town northwest of Hartford. I stumbled upon this today as I was exploring life outside Farmington, my temporary new home.

Cool, relatively unknown coffee shop!

Your humble blogger.

This week, I discovered the greatness of Mojoe, one of the coolest coffee shops in America. It's right across the street from Julia Ward Howe School in Mount Lebanon, Pa., where I spent fourth, fifth and sixth grades learning to read, write and cipher. (The ciphering came in handy later at West Virginia University.) Anyway, Mojoe has great spiced caramel apple cider, unusual green tea and music weekdays. Oh yeah, the free wireless came in handy this week, especially today on my birthday. (I turned 27. Thanks.) The weak photo was taken using my 1.3 megapixel LG cellphone camera.

Honest Abe birth cabin! Honest (sort of)

Ah, not quite.

Today, I turned a 10.5-hour drive from Tennessee to Pennsylvania into a 12-hour trip by bravely venturing into the backwoods of Kentucky to check out Abe Lincoln's "birthplace." Actually, old Abe's birth cabin is long since gone. Another one from the period is housed in a temple reminiscent of ancient Rome. Worth the side trip to Hodgenville, Ky.? Nada. Here's the Web site for more info.


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