Absence makes the heart grow fungus

We've been off the blog for a few days here due to a bout with sinus issues. Jon is congested and I've had a sinus headache for several days. I'm feeling better, but Jon is still pumping the vitamin C.

We had a great date on Friday despite a lack luster dinner experience. We ate at Newick's, which is a local favorite, and we were not impressed. Now, we shared a cup of the thick and creamy chowder, which was really tasty...probably because it's made with cream, thus is not so good for you. I had a haddock sandwich and Jon had haddock nuggets. We left feeling greasy and too full though neither of us finished our meal. It was just a fried oily meal. If you're going to eat at Newick's, make it a part of a progressive supper and just get the chowder.

After dinner we went to Hampton beach and walked while the sun set. Being on the east coast, this just means the ocean gets dark, but it was so relaxing and the waves were pretty. The water is still very cold, 64 degrees. (SIDENOTE: Jon was looking at a survival guide at the bookstore today that said in 64 degree water you lose feeling in your extremities in 15 minutes and can only survive swimming in water that temp for about 1-4 hours.) We walked back to the car on the boardwalk, enjoying the summer vacationers, henna tattoos, and ice cream stands.

The sites at the beach made us wonder if we're tourists. We do live here, but we do a lot of tourist stuff. Plus, we live live in North Carolina. But I take a lot of pictures, but neither of us own Bermuda shorts. Thoughts?

Before we take our first breath

As mentioned below, Amanda recorded my open mic performance last night, and I think this particular clip is pretty good. It's a cover of BNL's "What a Good Boy," and I feel like I sang it pretty well.

Amanda says I should be more specific in my blog entries, so: this was shot at Top of the Chop in Dover, NH on 7/16/07. Enjoy!

People here are nice, and my former roommate is both talented and diligent

1. I played again last night! Same place I've played the last couple of times, but this time the crowd just really seemed to love it. I got some genuine-sounding compliments, and it was nice. I see it less as a reflection of my playing and more as a reflection of the supportive atmosphere musicians have for each other here. That's one thing I really wish was around at home. In a dream world, I'd talk Snuzz into hosting an open mic at a decent hour in Winston, and there would be a lot of nice, talented songwriters that would come out and do their thing. And I could find someone to come up and do "Yankee Bayonet" with me.

Amanda, wife and friend extraordinaire, once again filmed the performance, so I'll but a song or two up soon.

2. If you read this and aren't Brendan, take a minute to check out Anacrusis, Brendan's constrained-writing project he's been doing for quite a while now. Every day, he writes a story with exactly 101 words, and today he posted his 1,001th entry. Pretty awesome. The milestone entry is actually an audio story read by a bunch of folks, myself and Amanda included (we're the bookends). But yeah, check it out and celebrate the milestone. You should read the archives too. My favorites are the celebrity stories.

Pics from York, Maine

Not old or new just York

We took a little trip up to York, Maine last night to check out the beach that many of the locals go to. We arrived after dinner and parked along what we thought was the main drag. There were silver shops, ice cream shops, candy stores, and the weirdo t-shirt shop that all the teens like to hang out in to buy hemp necklaces and incense.

We walked along the shore and enjoyed a beautiful setting sun, but our walk only took about 5 minutes, and we couldn't figure out why all the Dover-ites were so crazy about York Beach. On the way back to NH, we took 1A South, which led us to the actual beach. As it turned out, we were at a little access point in an inlet and not at York Beach proper. The differences were striking, and we will be going back to York soon to enjoy what we now call the real beach.

Though unintentional, we took an alternate route down the shore on 1A-S to 103W and then to 236W. It was a beautiful drive. We would round corners and see the ocean between beautiful seaside cottages. We crossed the Piscataqua bridge back into NH just as it got dark, and we could see all the lights from the harbor and downtown Portsmouth. We really fell in love with Maine last night.

I've got blue hair, and I talk like a puppet! I'm a freaking blueberry!

Apparently Maine is famous for blueberries, but who needs Maine blueberries when you can have New Hampshire blueberries?

We started out this morning for Emery Farm in Durham, NH. Established in 1655, you just can't get much more family farm than this place. We picked a pint of blueberries from several bushes and several different rows. Jon nearly picked a chipmunk! The store on the farm had a variety of fresh vegetables--potatoes, sweet corn(picked this morning in western Mass. NH corn won't be ready until August), squash, zucchini, raspberries, and lettuce. I also saw a hothouse full of tomatoes that were nearly ready.

We left w/ the blueberries and one squash and a zucchini and promised to return for all our vegetable needs. Our total bill $2.41. Fortunately we were not charged for the berries Jon ate while we were in the field. :)

Our goat friend

Before I arrived in NH, Jon told me about a goat he often saw at the park with its owner. He said the lady treated the goat a lot like a dog. The park is about a block from our house and the goat lives between our house and the park. Until this weekend, I had not seen the goat. I told Jon he was a goat story teller, specializing in tall tales about goats. Then I saw it--riding in the front seat of the lady's old Ford truck.

I have since apologized.

We would like to identify the type of goat, but I've only seen its head. Jon said it's short and has a long beard and it has a huge head and big horns. We will be scouring the internet to determine the species. Right now, I'm thinking mountain goat.

UPDATE: The Goat is already a Dover celebrity! His name is Binx, and he has a web site. I'll add some pictures, and he is not a mountain goat.

Seafood is A+ Food

We had a celebration of the sea this weekend with leisure-filled overtones. We started out Friday at Bob's Clam Hut in Kittery, Maine. Maine is very close to where we are, and Kittery is locally know for it's outlet shopping. At Bob's, I had the fried clam strip roll as recommended by the Phantom Gourmet. Jon had the famous fish and chips. Little more than a roadside stand, Bob's serves up some of the best fried seafood in the region.

We tried to outlet shop. We really did, but we're just not into brands and couldn't figure our where we wanted to go or what we wanted. The only store we really enjoyed was the Trading Post that is a lot like a Bass Pro Shop that features a huge Maine section with all things Maine for sale. We came back to Dover in time to hear a few songs at the Cocheco Arts Festival Summer Concert Series. Friday was the United States Air Force band accompanied by the American Belles, three singers from New York.

The real highlight of the weekend was our Saturday night date at Jumpin' Jay's in Portsmouth. We started the meal with the house specialty Steamed PEI Mussels with jalapeños, tomatoes, and garlic in a ginger saffron creme. I'll include a photo.

For the main course, Jon went with a house specialty again in the Haddock Picatta baked in breadcrumbs with a lemon, white wine butter sauce. I had a special of the night, Parmesan and Crab encrusted Blue Trout. All entrees come with lightly steamed green beans, vegetables, and lemon grass rice.
For dessert, "Portsmouth's Best Key Lime Pie," with fresh whipped cream and blueberries. It made for the perfect ending to a great meal.

After dinner we took in a local band with a New Orleans, blues sound that was playing as a part of the Portsmouth summer music series.

It was a wonderful evening.

The microphone was not actually open

Here are some videos from the last open mic I played a couple of weeks back. Sorry about the quality of the video, it was really dark in there, but I think the sound is pretty good.

Here's Ghost:



Here's Wait:

Flatbread

I must take a moment to blog about the Flatbread Company in Portsmouth. With a huge brick oven in the dining room where you can watch the grillman on duty shift your dinner around an open fire, the atmosphere of Flatbread is fantastic. Everything they serve is organic, free-range, local, made from scratch, nitrate free, etc. They keep it simple with three basic things on the menu:
1. A mesclun and sweet lettuce salad with an option for cheese and a house vinaigrette.
2. Flatbreads with garlic and herbs and toppings.
3. Flatbreads with wood-fired cauldron tomato sauce and toppings.

Simple and yummy. We shared a #1 (no cheese) and #2 with free-range, fire roasted chicken, black beans, corn, tomatoes, mozzarella,a sour cream dollop, and a lime.

We will be going back because they make their own sausage...