"Time goes by so slowly..."

It's been awhile. The first thing I thought of to write was to quote a line from the mid 1950's song 'Unchained Melody'; "Time goes by, so slowly, and time can do so much...."

The song was composed by Alex North, who composed scores for Hollywood movies. In this case, the movie was 'Unchained'. The lyrics were by Hy Zaret, who refused the movie producer's request to put the film title in the lyrics, which is how that title came about. 'Unchained' is a little known (and little seen) 1955 film about a man in an experimental 'prison without walls' who struggles with a decision to escape and reunite with his family, or to finish out his sentence. Among the cast is Todd Duncan, the baritone who was hand picked by George Gershwin to perform the role of Porgy in 'Porgy and Bess'. Mr. Duncan was the first to record the song, by the way. In once scene, filmed at the experimental prison in Chino, California, Dexter Gordon can be seen playing his saxophone. He was incarcerated there at the time, for possession of heroin. His playing was dubbed by Georgie Auld.



The shoreline by our campsite at Little Tupper Lake.
It really is a lovely spot.

There were a number of loons about, including 13 of them
together. That's not a common occurrence, by the way.

I'd been thinking often about getting back to this blog, without doing so. Today, as I was looking something up, this page opened of its own accord. Perhaps I hit a shortcut button, I don't know. It seemed like a good suggestion, so here I am. Since the last entry here, I've managed to keep myself busy, as usual. This year, it took forever to put the garden to bed, as the season extended into November. (I made a ton of pesto which I froze and am happily consuming.) I went off on another adventure camping/canoeing trip to a wilderness area of the Adirondacks (a bit stressful this year, as the old friend with whom I go camping spent the entire week being most disagreeable). And I started up my radio show again after almost a year and a half's sabbatical, etcetera. Christmas was a bit of a bust; the largest dinner I think I ever made was cancelled when friends declined to travel due to snow. Extreme cold a few days later ended up freezing the pipes, which translated into losing heat and hot water. The loss of essential services was not an auspicious start to the new year. What was possibly my personal all time best Christmas tree, and decorating job, was destroyed, destroyed again, and yet again while being moved for the accessing of heating pipes. I could go on with a litany of slights and challenges from the universe, but I've little desire to do so, and I doubt that anyone cares - including myself.

Here's a few of my garden photos, all taken in mid to late October.

I was about to go on about the state of the world, my country, my friends, movies in general, watching a Fred Astaire movie last night, the projected Stephen Spielberg remake of 'West Side Story', spinning this or that fantastical tale along the way (all too true, however), tying it all in with concepts of time, and life as an open air prison; but I've just noticed the hour, and I've already spent too long choosing which photos to post and getting this far. I probably won't be able to get back here for a couple of days, but I do intend to do so. There's so much to note as we sink into the abyss.