A DIY Hobbit House January 26, 2023
Posted by nrhatch in Home & Garden, Humor, People, Sustainable Living.21 comments
Stewart Grant, now 89, moved into a cottage he bought as a wreck (no roof, no windows, and no doors). He found it so satisfying doing DIY on the quirky outbuilding (which dated back 200 years and used to house a pig) that he decided to make it his home.
Now tourists from all over the world, especially France, stop by to check it out.
One suggested he have a collection box. Since then, all donations have been passed on to charities.
Another wee glimpse when Stewart was in his 70’s:
Aah . . . Bilbo Baggins would love this!
A Day At The Beach August 15, 2022
Posted by nrhatch in Art & Photography, Nature, People, Travel & Leisure.comments closed
The beaches of Anna Maria Island have been popular for over a century.
Each weekend, throngs of tourists crowd the beaches looking for sun, fun, sand, surf, seashells . . . and cocktails.
While fashions have changed over the years, growing skimpier and skimpier, the scenery remains much the same.
Are you, perchance, in the mood for a bit of time travel?
Want to enjoy a brief blast from the past?
Complete with lots of black and white photos to peruse?
If so, here’s a recent article from the Bradenton Herald with archival photos taken on our beaches 100+ years ago . . . when sleeping and camping on the beach were still allowed, and clothing was NOT optional:
Anna Maria Island in the 1900’s and Roaring Twenties
And now, back to the present . . .
Aah . . . that’s beachy!
Lawyer Jokes Never Get Old August 13, 2022
Posted by nrhatch in Humor, Joke, People, Word Play.comments closed
Lawyer jokes have been around for eons ~ some date way way back to the works of Shakespeare.
The reason lawyer jokes have staying power is because they are FUNNY.
Forsooth, it’s fun to make fun of attorneys.
Especially the staid and stuffy ones. And the paunchy pompous ones. And the . . .
In truth, even attorneys enjoy poking fun at attorneys.
And that’s why lawyer jokes never get old.
First off, despite what “they” say, some questions ARE stupid:
Attorney: “How was your first marriage terminated?”
Witness: “By death.”
Attorney: “And by whose death was it terminated?”
Witness: “Guess.”
* * *
Attorney: “Doctor, how many of your autopsies have you performed on dead people?”
Witness: “All of them. The live ones put up too much of a fight.”
* * *
Judge (to young witness): Do you know what would happen to you if you told a lie?
Witness: Yes. I would go to hell.
Judge: Is that all?
Witness: Isn’t that enough?
Sometimes questions require a bit of clarification . . . in order to avoid speculation:
Q: Have you ever heard about taking the Fifth?
A: A fifth of wine?
Q: No, the Fifth Amendment.
* * *
Q: What did your sister die of?
A: You would have to ask her. I would be speculating if I told you.
But let us not forget that attorneys are not the only vehicle for levity in the legal arena.
Some defendants aren’t too bright either:
Q: Isn’t it a fact that you have been running around with another woman?
A: Yes, it is, but you can’t prove it!
* * *
I was in juvenile court, prosecuting a teen suspected of burglary, when the judge asked everyone to stand and state his or her name and role for the court reporter.
“Leah Rauch, deputy prosecutor,” I said.
“Linda Jones, probation officer.”
“Sam Clark, public defender.”
“John,” said the teen who was on trial. “I’m the one who stole the truck.”
* * *
Arrested on a robbery charge, our law firm’s client denied the allegations. So when the victim pointed him out in a lineup as one of four men who had attacked him, our client reacted vociferously.
“He’s lying!” he yelled. “There were only three of us.”
As every litigator knows, you win some, you lose some:
An investment banker decides she needs in-house counsel, so she interviews a young lawyer. “Mr. Peterson,” she says. “Would you say you’re honest?”
“Honest?” replies Peterson. “Let me tell you something about honesty. My father lent me $85,000 for my education, and I paid back every penny the minute I tried my first case.”
“Impressive. And what sort of case was that?”
“Dad sued me for the money.”
* * *
Sidewalks were treacherous after a heavy snowstorm blanketed the University of Idaho campus. Watching people slip and slide, I gingerly made my way to class.
Suddenly I found myself on a clean, snow-free section of walkway. This is weird, I thought—until I noticed that it was directly in front of the College of Law building.
* * *
As a judge, I was sentencing criminal defendants when I saw a vaguely familiar face. I reviewed his record and found that the man was a career criminal, except for a five-year period in which there were no convictions.
“Milton,” I asked, puzzled, “how is it you were able to stay out of trouble for those five years?”
“I was in prison,” he answered. “You should know that—you were the one who sent me there.”
“That’s not possible,” I said. “I wasn’t even a judge then.”
“No, you weren’t the judge,” the defendant countered, smiling mischievously. “You were my lawyer.”
Even Voir Dire (the jury selection process) can offer up moments of levity:
As a potential juror in an assault-and-battery case, I was sitting in a courtroom, answering questions from both sides. The assistant district attorney asked such questions as: Had I ever been mugged? Did I know the victim or the defendant?
The defence attorney took a different approach, however. “I see you are a teacher,” he said. “What do you teach?”
“English and theatre,” I responded.
“Then I guess I better watch my grammar,” the defence attorney quipped.
“No,” I shot back. “You better watch your acting.”
When the laughter in the courtroom died down, I was excused from the case.
Aah . . . that’s better!
Champ Jaxon May 13, 2022
Posted by nrhatch in Life Balance, Mindfulness, Music & Dance, People.comments closed
Champ Jaxon has been playing guitar for a couple of years and has gained a degree of proficiency rarely seen in pre-teens.
He’s already appeared on stage with the Marshall Tucker Band and on national television on the Ellen Degeneres show.
He doesn’t know where he’s going . . . but he’s knows where he was grown:
Aah . . . that’s better!
Friendships May 9, 2022
Posted by nrhatch in Life Balance, People.comments closed
I read an article by Julie Beck in The Atlantic this weekend that got me thinking:
How Friendships Change Over Time.
The author addressed how our childhood friendships evolve as we head off to college, graduate, get married, have kids, start work, move across the country, care for parents, etc.
Increased responsibilities and demands on our time coupled with the lack of contiguity often mean that friendships, even longstanding friendships, fade.
We no longer see our companions on a daily basis to hang out, listen to records, play Frisbee, pop popcorn, and chat about anything and everything.
Instead, we make plans to get together . . . in two weeks time.
Friendships, like ships, diverge as we chart our life course.
Years ago, we “stayed in touch” with our compadres with annual missives at Yuletide which recounted the highlights (or low lights) of the year. Now, with the advent of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, we are able keep tabs on each other year round . . . without ever really connecting:
If you never see your friends in person, you’re not really sharing experiences so much as just keeping each other updated on your separate lives. It becomes a relationship based on storytelling rather than shared living—not bad, just not the same.
Via social media, we give our followers a “heads up” on the happenings in our life and they give us a “thumbs up” to acknowledge that they saw what we said.
But is that enough to maintain ties?
Probably not.
Friendships based solely on storytelling aren’t apt to have the same depth and dimension as those based on getting together on a regular basis to do something . . . together.
“If we only have the Facebook tie, that’s probably a friendship that’s in greater jeopardy of not surviving into the future,” Ledbetter says.
* * *
Social media makes it possible to maintain more friendships, but more shallowly. And it can also keep relationships on life support that would (and maybe should) otherwise have died out.
Oh, for the days when we “hung out” with our friends every day.
Not in chat rooms, but in person.
Without having to “tidy up” first.
Aah . . . that’s better!
Stay Curious May 5, 2022
Posted by nrhatch in Humor, Magick & Mystery, Mindfulness, People.comments closed
I think, at a child’s birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity.
— Eleanor Roosevelt, former First Lady of the United States
Like Pooh, I’m just curious . . . what do you think?
Would inventors, like Edison and Ford, have invented anything without curiosity?
Would explorers, like Columbus and Magellan, have explored without curiosity?
Would cooks, like Andrew Zimmern, experiment in the kitchen without curiosity?
Would anyone have eaten a lobster without curiosity?
Aah . . . stay curious!
The Casements & Mala Compra March 27, 2022
Posted by nrhatch in Home & Garden, Life Balance, People, Travel & Leisure.comments closed
After a delicious breakfast at the hotel, we drove up A1A from Port Orange to Ormond Beach.
In Ormond, we toured The Casements ~ John D. Rockefeller’s winter home in Ormond Beach.
The Casements, named for the large hand-cut casement windows that adorn the mansion, has been beautifully restored to function as the Cultural Center for the City of Ormond Beach, Florida. Set on the shore of the Halifax River, and just two blocks from the Atlantic Ocean, the late John D. Rockefeller’s winter home is known as “The Jewel of Ormond Beach.” The Casements has been officially listed on the National Register of Historic Places and has been designated as a Florida Heritage Site.
Our tour guide informed us that John D. Rockefeller, the richest man in America and the world’s first billionaire, told his doctor that he wanted to live to be 100.
His doctor recommended that he winter in Florida or Egypt.
Following his doctor’s advice, Rockefeller wintered in Florida and made it to age 97, playing golf every day well into his 90’s!
Located on the eastern bank of the Halifax River, John D. Rockefeller purchased [The Casements] in 1918 and lived in the house during the winters until his death in 1937 at the age of ninety-seven. While a resident of Ormond Beach, “Neighbor John,” as he preferred to be called, enjoyed taking part in community activities: playing golf, participating in the sing-along at the Ormond Hotel each Sunday, and entertaining friends such as Thomas Edison, Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone.
After the tour, we continued north on A1A, stopping to have a picnic (in the car) while overlooking the Atlantic Ocean amid drizzling rain and fog.
Quite atmospheric, no?
After lunch, we checked out the ruins of the Mala Compra Plantation.
In the early 19th century, the plantation was home to Joseph Hernandez, who served as everything from a brigadier general in the U.S. Army to a committee member who helped select Tallahassee as the state capital. The site is part of Bing’s Landing, an eight-acre county park that also includes a boat launch, fishing pier, and picnic and playground facilities.
Flagler County pursued archaeological grants to study the physical evidence of Hernandez’ plantation, and then more grants to create a permanent display at the site.
“Normally when archaeologists dig, they take the artifacts and then cover the site back up,” says Sisco Deen, the archive curator for the Flagler County Historical Society. “With this one, we got the artifacts, but they left the dig.”
Today, visitors can walk on an elevated boardwalk around the perimeter of the plantation remains and read interpretive displays that explain the site’s historical and cultural value.
The archeological site is protected with a roof overhead to preserve the site including the old coquina well.
Located on the Halifax, Mala Compra (which translates to “Bad Bargain”) has excellent views.
And some crazy vines!
Just made for swinging!
Aah . . . that’s better!
World Kindness Day . . . Pass It On! November 3, 2021
Posted by nrhatch in Gratitude, Happiness, Life Balance, Mindfulness, People.comments closed
Just a quick heads up that World Kindness Day is right around the corner . . . on November 13th to be exact.
And it’s a Saturday.
But, of course, we should be kind to each other every day.
Why? Because Kindness echoes!
World Kindness Day is a global day that promotes the importance of being kind to each other, to yourself, and to the world.
The purpose of this day celebrated on November 13 of each year is to help everyone understand that compassion for others is what binds us all together.
This understanding has the power to bridge the gap between nations.
Aah . . . that’s better!
Mission San Luis October 29, 2021
Posted by nrhatch in Home & Garden, Humor, People, Travel & Leisure.comments closed
On our last morning in the Panhandle, we visited Mission San Luis, a recreated 17th century Mission and Appalachee Village, which over 1500 souls called “home” in the late 1600’s. The Spaniards burned it down in 1704 to prevent it from being captured by the British.
The Council House (used by the Appalachee for gatherings and meetings) provided insight into its interior construction since it’s being re-thatched.
Although the building appears circular, it has 80 sides, which creates the illusion of a rounded facade.
The supporting posts are straight and true and L-O-N-G! They go UP and UP and UP.
Inside the Council House are benches for reclining dignitaries.
Appalachee Indians spent most of the day outside, using their homes for sleeping and storage. This is the footprint of an Appalachee abode which would have been thatched.
Unlike the Appalachee, most of the Spaniards preferred indoor cooking.
And indoor dining. (Of course, this was pre-pandemic.)
The Friary also boasted a home office.
Here’s a glimpse of the spartan sleeping arrangements in one of the Spanish homes. Notice the low tech, wall mounted air conditioning unit . . . perfect for hot summer nights.
When folks got ill, they relied on Medicinal Herbs to revive themselves. We learned that Rosemary relieves headaches AND enhances memory and concentration ~ a handy herb indeed for seniors in need of all the help they can get!
This shot reveals the interior of the wall allowing visitors to see the construction methods used 300+ years ago.
Also in the Mission is a Blacksmith’s Shop, a Church (which rivaled the Church in St. Augustine), the rest of the Friary, a Fort (complete with ramparts and palisade), and a perfect-for-us picnic area.
Aah . . . that’s better!
How To Tie Your Own Laces October 3, 2021
Posted by nrhatch in Happiness, Life Balance, Mindfulness, People.comments closed
How can you know what’s best
for someone you don’t know as well
as you know yourself?
Answer: Chances are . . . you don’t.
And (of course) . . . vice versa.
Aah . . . that’s better!
Spirit Lights The Way 