Almost Heaven (2)

28Feb09

The second in a series of posts of good things about West Virginia.
West Virginia, like most of Europe, but only 13 other states, has abolished the death penalty.  The last execution in West Virginia was in 1959 and the death penalty was abolished in 1965.
One in every 198 U.S. residents was in prison in 2007; [...]

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Almost Heaven (1)

27Feb09

This is a first of a series of posts of good things about West Virginia, beyond the obvious beautiful scenery and friendly way of life.  When I announced my retirement and where we were going, my Texas friends and colleagues (and a few WV natives) started sending me emails of bad-news items about West Virginia.  [...]

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President Obama

20Feb09

We decided to go down to the county Democratic headquarters to watch the inauguration and meet some of our new Democratic neighbors.  We’re glad we did.  Somehow this was an event to be shared (even when watched on television.)
We were pleased to meet a bunch of local progressives from Harrison County Democracy for America.

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Friday the 13th, Indeed

13Feb09

Today the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a 2007 decision in a suit by the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which was issuing valley fill permits without environmental reviews.
This will immediately allow as many as 90 mining permits to proceed without stringent reviews of the damage and [...]

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The Zen of Wallpaper Stripping

05Feb09

I have been stripping wallpaper from the room that we are referring to as the library.  Before we can put up bookcases, the walls and woodwork need to be painted.  To do that, we need to put down new shoe molding, which was removed when the room was carpeted, sometime in the 1950s from the [...]

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Red Squirrels

04Feb09

When we first moved in, we noticed what seemed to us to be chipmunks in the line of Norway spruce and hemlocks along the back of our yard.  In Austin, we were at the western edge of many species, including the fox squirrel, which has a black variety common on the Texas Capitol lawn.  Our [...]

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Sweet Gums and Bluebirds

04Feb09

Sunday was warm and sunny (well, for January in north central West Virginia) and so we took a walk around the trail in Veterans Park, down the hill and across the river from our house.  Most of the path was free of ice and snow.  There was a fine paper-wasp nest on a sycamore branch [...]

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Moving: An Adventure in Four Parts (4)

01Feb09

Tuesday morning, sunrise on the prairie – even if we can’t see it.  It is raining but not freezing.  We pull out, me in the lead, keeping an eye on the truck in the rear view so I don’t get too far ahead.  Four days on the road and we have hours yet to the [...]

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