We decided on Friday to drive across the border to have dinner in Niagara Falls–the American Side. It is an hour drive and we wanted to pick up some mail at our post office box. We have been traveling and using Trip Advisor to pick restaurants and have found it to work fairly well. We wanted to try it out near home as well. We try to eat in a restaurant that is in the top 20 restaurants on Tripadvisor and although we are sometimes disappointed, our hit rate is much higher using this strategy than just looking around and picking a restaurant. I have a corn allergy which is making it harder to eat out, so I have to try to find restaurants that can help me get a meal that will work for me. On Friday we decided to try the Red Coach Inn. It had some good reviews and I looked at their menu online. It looked good and very reasonable in terms of price. We got there and it is lovely. The location is great. The waitress did an amazing job of taking care of us and of managing my corn allergy. She went to the kitchen to ask questions, looked at labels and generally was kind and helpful. We ordered a shrimp cocktail, a Caesar salad, and a house salad that comes with almonds, blue cheese, and strawberries. Our kids ordered a lobster trio and we each ordered the surf and turf. While the service was outstanding, our meal just wasn’t up to the standards we expect when we spend $180 for dinner with tip. We want something better than average. My frustration was with the amount of food the kitchen was serving that they don’t make on-site. They don’t make their salad dressings, they don’t make their wings, and they use cornstarch to “hold” their Bearnaise sauce. We had an opportunity to speak to the manager. He came to our table to apologize for a very small error with my meal (this error was really...
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They all come together to the “bush” as they call it, to collect the sap and boil it down in specially made pans over the fire. They are all strong and carry the sap, and they all work together to do it.
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My family has a cabin that my great-grandparents built in the pine forest in New Mexico. It has a beautiful rock fireplace with a large, deep place to build a fire. We keep a fire going in the evenings for both the beauty and the heat—and occasionally to roast hot dogs and marshmallows. I was at the cabin recently and I noticed that building and maintaining a fire is a lot like creating and sustaining a project. There is some skill needed to figure out the best way to start the fire and keep it going, and different people have different approaches with varying degrees of success. The same could be said of visualizing and sustaining a new endeavor. My husband, Mel, used to be a firefighter and, ironically, he can reliably start a fire with one match. He knows exactly what to do, has the patience to make it happen and makes it look easy. Mel enjoys the tasks of the fire. He is perfectly happy sitting for hours reading by the fireside, watching it flicker and change and periodically tending its needs. My 16-year-old daughter has much less experience and skill as a fire starter. She spends close to half an hour scavenging different kinds of debris to use as kindling and trying to coax the fire to life. Sometimes it seems like it is going to catch, only to falter and flicker out. She has an air of panic and frustration so palpable I almost have to leave the cabin. But, like any responsible mother, I stick around to help her cope with the ensuing pain (both emotional and physical). My fire starting skills fall somewhere between these two extremes. My family wouldn’t freeze if I had unlimited time, matches and tinder, but I admit I’m a bit impatient and want the fire to be immediately blazing and beautiful. I find it boring to nurture it to greatness so I often give up before I achieve the results I crave. It’s...
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Emerson drew this picture and brought it home. I thought it should be on my bookii. It is just great...
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I felt so incredibly free. I can’t tell you the last time I was on vacation by myself in a city other than my own. It was an explorer’s dream.
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