Dryden Is Home

me doing the quahog thing

me doing the quahog thing
Originally uploaded by dmakar

Last Sunday (August 26th), Arjan, Phil, Amy and my parents went out to the town cove in Orleans, Massachusetts (on Cape Cod). We started the afternoon with a lunch on the beach, followed by a short walk over to the Atlantic Ocean. We dipped our feet in the cold water and I picked up a handful of white quart stones.

Our second stop was along the mud flats in the canal across from the ocean sand bar. The tide was going out and the soft shell clams were making little breathing holes in the mud. All six of us left the boston whaler (my dad's seventeen foot fishing boat) and dug in the mud. We gathered about half a bushel of clams between all of us in about 30 minutes. The green head flies and sand fleas bothered us a lot until my dad trekked back across the mud for bug spray in one of the storate spaces on the boat.

Our final stop is where most of the pictures from this photo set were taken. We stopped in the shallows of the town cove and used four rakes (my dad, my mom, Phil and me) to find hard shell clams (also known as quahogs on the cape or cherry stones). Arjan and Amy photographed our work. I gathered up about 30 large quahogs, my parents gathered a mix of smaller quahogs and larger quahogs totalling in the high twenties.

It was by far the luckiest quahogging day I've ever had. As soon as I put the rake along the ground and lightly dragged it across the town cove floor I would feel (and hear) a scratch against the shell of the clam. Then I would rock the rake over and around the shell slowly getting under it until finally lifting it up out of the knee deep water.

Sunday night my parents, Phil, Amy, Arjan, my neighbor Mrs. Gill and I dined on quahogs on the halfshell (raw = yum), steam clams (also called "steamers"), clam cakes and clam chowder. It was a delicious (although not very green or vegetable rich) dinner.

Pics: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dmakar/sets/72157601736019931/

ML and Joe

ML and Joe
Originally uploaded by dmakar

Early last Friday afternoon Arjan and I departed our home in Dryden for a mini-vacation on Cape Cod. It was my third (and probably final) trip of the season to "The Cape". My good friend Joe was getting married on Saturday and my parent's invited us to stay at their place in Eastham.

I first met ML when Joe and I were working for the host committee for the 2004 convention. Sometime after the convention ended Joe and ML got together. They lived in Charlestown and worked on Boston and Massachusetts campaigns. They got jobs and got engaged. They started planning a wedding and on Saturday they invited us to share in their day.

I met Joe in 1994 and we became better friends when he started his freshman year at Northeastern in 1996. I was starting my "middler" year and for three years a friend from my high school era (and camp era) was just a few blocks away.

Arjan and I were able to make a weekend out of the trip - eating with my college roommate Joe and his wife Sandy Friday night for dinner in Providence, visiting with my travel buddy Arthur (who is recovering from cancer) Monday afternoon at his house in Charlton, and introducing Arjan to Danny, Kathy and Matt - friends from camp that I wish lived closer.

We also spent a lot of time with my buddy Phil and his girlfriend Amy including a clamming and quahogging expedition. More on that soon.

Pictures from the wedding here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dmakar/sets/72157601729510972/

A weekend of Driving and Flying

When you are 5 and you go on a trip to New Hampshire the world seems huge. You remember just enough to be able to say you remember. Maybe a sign or a tree or a person, but probably not a conversation in detail.

When you are 9 and you return to the place you remember it for the week away from home. A week at camp in a tent. A hike in a lightning storm and singing songs with your best friend.

When you are 14 and you show up to work at camp a crazy man with a condiment name glares and listens and teaches. You meet some people that will be the bridge to friends that you will keep for the rest of you life. You make mistakes, you learn, you have fun.

When you are 18 and you are in charge of a small camp department you answer a lot of questions. You teach a little and learn more about yourself than the subjects you are teaching. You find your strengths and your weaknesses. You hide and search. You get up early and swim. You get to know a few people better.

When you are 22 and return as a staff member of another camp you battle on the ballfield and you find that the home team is the one you are on. The people that have replaced you are different. The people who have stayed behind are stronger and have learned to delegate.

When you are 30 and return as a guest you find that the people that were campers are now in charge. The people that taught you almost everything are long gone. The few in between, John and Dan, bridge a gap between generations. You wonder if there is a way to do it all - and then you drive home realizing that the world is still a huge place and there are a lot of things to do.

A couple days ago I showed up on the doorstep of Camp Wanocksett and relived a few moments of my camp days - tonight I will be attending the Dryden Democratic Caucus where I will be nominated for a four year term on the Dryden Town Board. Everything I've learned so far prepares me for what I will do next.

(The guy floating above is now in charge)

Cornell's Ride Board / Easter in New England

My cousin Deanna (sitting in the middle), with her son James on her lap and James' cousin Max (my cousin Sandra's son) standing at left.

I went to New England this past weekend to spend Easter Sunday with my dad's side of the family. Fifteen members of the Makar family gathered at my grandmother's Sunday afternoon for Easter. My two cousins with children were there, as well as two other cousins and my sister, my aunt and uncle and their spouses and my grandmother. It was probably the coldest Easter I can remember. It was good to see everyone. I missed Christmas with the family this year - I went to Buffalo to spend the holiday with Arjan's family. I caught up on what my cousins were doing (shopping for antiques on Craig's List, hanging out at the new cafe in town, creating custom made invitations and greeting cards, learning about raising a baby) and on how my grandmother (now 87) was doing.

I carpooled to New England and back with a group of Cornell students. I posted an ad on Tuesday night at about 6:30pm on Cornell's "Student Ride Board" website (http://www.cuinfo.cornell.edu/Student/RideBoard/). By 7:30pm I had recieved two phone calls and two emails requesting seats in the car. Felix, my Jetta, only comfortably holds four total people. The two emailers were looking for roundtrip rides and the two callers were looking for one-way rides. It all worked out and by 7:30 the plan was set.

For the next two and a half days I received calls and emails requesting information on availability of seats. I had to say no to everyone else, but at one point, I thought about renting a 10 person van and taking everyone with me. I don't know if all of those other people ever made it to Boston this past weekend.

The Pros and Cons for the Ride Board:

• Pro: Helping the Environment by cutting down on number of cars
• Pro: Helping the Environment by filling a car instead of driving alone
• Pro: The passengers help to pay for gas, tolls, and other expenses the driver sets
• Pro: You have someone to talk to if you want, which might be better than driving alone
• Con: You might have to go slightly out of your way to pick people up in Ithaca (I had to drive 10 minutes to Collegetown and then back by my house  - both on the way to Boston and on the way home. This added about 40 minutes to my total driving time).
• Con: You might have to go way out of your way to pick people up in Boston/DC/NYC/etc (I had to drive from Blackstone, Mass - near RI - to Newton to pick up the return riders. This added about 60 minutes or so to the trip home.
• Con: Your passengers might have to stop to go to the bathroom every hour (mine didn't)
• Con: Your passengers might talk on the phone for five hours (one of mine talked for about 30 minutes, but it was an entertaining conversation about college admissions)
• Pro: You leave on time. Usually when I travel by car and don't have a set departure I am 15 minutes to 3 hours behind as I rationalize about doing more work before going. Knowing that 3 perfectly good strangers are waiting helps you to be much more on time.
• Con: They might not like your music (though they might have an ipod)
• Pro: You might meet someone new!

Finally, the Student Ride Board group is its own community. I drove east with three people. One of them had been a rider with each of the other two - so they already knew a little bit about each other. It seems likely if you are going on a common ride (Boston, NYC, Philly or DC) you will probably get riders who know each other.

I didn't profit from the trip, but the gas and tolls were paid for. I told my friend Joe about the Ride Board and since he has an alternative fuel car he might be able to make a small profit on his longer distance trips from Ithaca.

Cornell's Ride Board: http://www.cuinfo.cornell.edu/Student/RideBoard/

Ithaca Craig's List Ride Board: http://ithaca.craigslist.org/rid/

My Flickr pictures of Easter Sunday: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dmakar/sets/72157600062105141/

My cousin Deanna's son James (my second cousin) looking serious and me smiling:

Cross-posted at Ithaca-Blog

Steely Dan: Surprise Concert

Steely Dan: Dave and Phil
Originally uploaded by dmakar.

When your best friend calls from Maine at 6 o'clock on Saturday telling you he has tickets to see Steely Dan you get in your car and drive. Well, the concert wasn't until Sunday night so...

You finish off the social engagement you are attending, go home, sleep and then get up and drive.

Sunday night Phil and I saw Steely Dan at Mansfield, Massachusetts' Tweeter Center. Monday I drove home to Dryden. It made for a great weekend.

The show was incredible! We stood in the rain the entire three hour show and it took quite a while to dry off and feel warm again. I took a bunch of pictures, but haven't found the set list just yet. I'm sure its around the internet somewhere. Take a look at the whole set of pictures.

Where I have been

I haven't been kidnapped. I haven't given up blogging. I haven't gotten too busy for you. I went to a wedding in Boston Saturday afternoon and I took advantage of my trip east by visiting friends in Jaffrey/Dublin, NH; Berlin, MA; Somerville, MA; East Boston, MA; Pawtucket, RI; Blackstone, MA; Eastham (Cape Cod!), MA; Newburyport, MA; and finally Portsmouth, NH. There will be selected pictures and stories later this week. For now I must get to sleep!

Congratulations to Tara and Larry!

Blog-Sabatical

Sablogatical - When I left the blog for 10 days and did some other things. Here is a quick recap:

May 3rd: Ginger's going away party at the Chapter House (with Dragon Boat Club friends)

May 4th: View of the Sagamore Bridge (which connects Cape Cod to the mainland)

May 5th: The first of three great nights of sunsets

May 6th: Walking around Provincetown with kirsten, jenn, and phil

May 7th: The world famous Welfleet Drive-In Theater Flea Market

May 8th: Phil's dog Keva (Chieva?) chilling at the cottage

May 8th: Mini-golf at Pirate Cove in Hyannis

May 8th: Crappy picture at Skull Island Mini-Golf

May 9th: A stop in (final final time!) at my parent's house in Berlin which will no longer be in the family on May 24th! (This picture is actually from my April 12th visit - note the lack of green leaves)

May 10th: NWAEG Theatre at the byway in Ithaca

As for yesterday and today - - I worked! I can't be on vacation all the time! More details of these adventures may or may not come soon.

Florida Recap

I got back last night from my trip to Florida. I left last Tuesday morning from Ithaca, drove to Binghamton for a meeting and then to Blackstone, Massachusetts (near Providence, RI) to my sister's and then grandmother's house. Wednesday my sister dropped my grandmother (Baba or Babca) off at T.F. Green Airport in Warwick, Rhode Island (Providence Airport) and we traveled on an 8:30am flight to Fort Myers. It was probably about my 100th or 200th flight (who keeps track?) and it was my grandmother's first time on an airplane (she's 86!).

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dmakar/tags/floridatrip/

All kinds of pictures are on the flickr pages, here's a few notes (I hope to add more later):

• We watched movies just about every night: Pirates of the Carribean, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, The Incredibles and King Kong
• My dad and my mom's cousin Frank and I went to the Devil Rays / Orioles game Monday night in Tampa
• I went boating three times
• I went fishing two of those three times
• I caught six fish (and tossed them back)
• We went to a Ukrainian Bazaar, Polish Deli and European Deli
• We (mom, dad and me) played three complete rounds of Disc Golf (frisbee golf)
• I wrote a couple business proposals
• I took about 700MB of pictures with my camera
• My mom and grandmother made about 140 perogies!
• I attended a BNI meeting in Venice, Florida
• I went for a bike ride

We had a busy and restful week and I look forward to returning next winter!

Seeing My Sister in Her House

I just returned to Ithaca this evening. I was away since Thursday afternoon. I managed to see a few people this time around while on my tour.

Saturday I woke up in Dedham at my friends Danny and Kathy's house. Kamran, who I traveled with, and I had a quick breakfast and then I dropped him off at the test center at Mount Ida College. From there I drove to Blackstone, Massachusetts (near the Rhode Island border) to see my paternal grandmother for a little 1 hour chat. She was off to church and then a few birthday parties so I had to schedule some time in early in the morning to be able to see her on this tour. We talked a little about what had been going on since I last talked to her (Thanksgiving I think) and about budgets and money and growing up and living.

From grandma Baba's (or Babcha's) house I drove 2 miles down the street to see my sister and brother in law for about an hour. This was the first time I got to see her house and her yard not covered with snow. My sister Julie and her husband Tim just bought a cute little house in June of last year that is right on the Blackstone River. I spent a few minutes trying to shake loose some debris that was clogged in their river bank from the river flooding of October. Once I climbed back up the hill I took a picture of my sister and her house.

Julie and I talked briefly and mostly watched episodes of the Discovery Channel's Myth Busters. I departed from her house around 11:55am and drove 11 minutes south to North Smithfield, Rhode Island to see my aunt and uncle (my mom's brother). When I arrived my cousin Pamela was there, though she departed right after I arrived. My aunt made some sandwiches and my uncle and I talked for about having our own businesses. My uncle had a construction business for almost 8 years. During lunch we talked more about businesses (my cousin Jimmy has his own business of delivering dumpsters to construction sites), about family heritage, about possible Florida retirements and about their upcoming trip to see my parents. Around 3pm I departed their house and headed back to Newton to pick up Kamran.

It was just 7 hours, but I did get to see my dad's mom, my sister and brother in law and my mom's brother and wife. I would say we had some good quality time and I made plans to see each of them on my next visit from New York.

Christmas Tour: Day 4

On the fourth day of the trip...

I had those waffles I mentioned in a previous post, a little later I headed to Davis Square and sat at the Someday Cafe and did a little work for one of my customers. It felt good to get something accomplished. I'm going to try to redesign a site while I'm on this tour (maybe tomorrow before / after skiing) and the redesign hopefully will help one of my customers sell a lot more products for their website.

After the Someday I went back to Justin and Wendy's condo and Justin and I headed up to Reading to watch the Polar Express on the Jordan's Furniture IMAX. I kept calling it the Omni IMAX or just the omni since the first IMAX I had ever seen was at the Boston Museum of Science and Omni IMAX at the Mugar Omni IMAX Theatre just got drilled into my head. Justin had to keep telling me it isn't an omni theatre at Jordan's it is an IMAX theatre. It was good to hear fellow Bostonian Wendy did the same mix and match with "omni" and "imax."

The Polar Express was reworked for 3-D and it really was an amazing movie. From the start all the children (we went to a matinee on the day after Christmas during school vacation week, of course there would be tons of children) we jabbering. Within 2 minutes of the movie starting they were awestruck into silence. I saw a few people reaching out with their hands to try to touch the magic of 3-D annimation.

Wally the green monster eating an anonymous Yankee (at Jordan's Furniture)

A Giant Indoor Trapeze at Jordan's Furniture Store in Reading

So if you are unfamiliar with the Jordan's Furniture concept, they are open late on Saturday nights (10 or 11 at night), they have movie theatres, Motion Odyssey Movie Rides, Trapeze Schools, and giant cities made out of jelly beans (for beantown of course!). All so they can sell you furniture. It is an amazing place that I've been visiting since 1994 when I first went to see M.O.M. in high school.

Post movie I headed to Copley Square for dinner with members of the ihop-7. The story of the ihop-7 is here: http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/paulg/ihop.html

We went to Legal Seafoods, the food was good, the service wasn't too good, no one had the chocolate chip pancakes. The picture above has George, me, Jeff (taking the place of DaveB), Paulg, Todd and Josh. We only missed DaveB and Karen. I'm sure paulg will post a full report on the ihop page, until then here are some pictures from the dinner:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dmakar/tags/ihop/