North end: BRP

When we went to Graveyard Fields a couple of weeks ago, Libby pointed out that there was a section of the Parkway on which we had never traveled: the northern-most section, from the NC-VA border to Blowing Rock. Not only that, but in all our years in Richmond, we had never traveled the southern-most section of the Parkway in VA either. We decided to set that as a goal for sometime in the near future. On Thanksgiving Day, the opportunity presented itself. Since our guests were not coming until Friday, and because we didn't want to do two big meals, we decided to spend the day traveling.

We went to Statesville, and then north on I-77 through Elkin into Virginia. We got on the Parkway there, and went north about 20 miles to Mabray's Mill. It was deserted, it being a holiday and all, but what we missed in terms of closed buildings was made up for in terms of having the place to ourselves. One of the boys (Calvin) even managed to get wet!

Back in the car, south on the Parkway back into NC. We were able to lay claim to visiting a couple of NC's one hundred counties we had never before been through. There were some nice overlooks on the Parkway, and the day being remarkably clear, we could see all the way east to Hanging Rock and other sites. The music center was closed, but we made the most of Doughton Park. By that point we had enjoyed our fill. We got off the Parkway at NC-18 and traveled through North Wilkesboro, Wilkesboro and Lenoir, before finally wending our way around Morganton and home. Not a bad way to spend the day, and far superior to lying about watching TV and playing computer games.

Sadly, we didn't quite "finish up" our traverse of the Parkway. There remain about 40 miles between NC-18 and Blowing Rock that we have not seen before. Maybe at Christmas-time...

Graveyard Fields

We took a jaunt this afternoon down the Parkway to Graveyard Fields. Apparently there was a fire in the area years ago and plantlife has never fully recovered in this small area: nearly no trees.  We had heard others talk about visiting here, but had not gotten around to it until today. The weather was great: a nice warm front had raised temps throughout the area, including the upper elevations on the Parkway.

This area is on a river, with a couple of nice falls, and plenty of places to crawl around. There is a longer trail that explores area away from the river, and another that links up with the Mountain to Sea Trail. We went for the immediate gratification near the water. It was an easy walk to the lower falls. In warmer weather it might be possible to splash around in the pool at the bottom. We also walked around a bit, trying to not disturb the fishers. It was about an hour to get there using the Parkway as our main  route.

Mountain Farm trip

On a whim we set off for Mountain Farm in Burnsville last weekend. I had seen their ad in Mountain Xpress and was intrigued. The ad said they were open throughout the week, with a seeming open invitiation. Plenty of local small farms in the region are open on special ocassions (and for a price), but this was the first that seemed to offer a blanket invitation to visit for free. It was in the area near Celo, a small land trust community, so there was that added incentive to visit the area.

We had a very nice time. We were welcomed by the very nice owner, and the elderly dog. They had baby goats, lots of chickens, two cats, lots of mature goats, some alpacas, a donkey, and Lord-only- knows-what-all else. They had a nice retail shop using products/ingredients from the farm: yarn, soaps, teas, eggs. They have a big lavender garden plus blueberries. It being early fall, we missed a lot of what most folks would have prefered to encounter, but for us it was a pleasant visit nonetheless.

Come to find out the owner is also a nurse (her husband, an MD). Libby got to chat her up about home birthing and natural childbirth, etc. I walked the boys down to the pond.  They had two very cool wind turbines on the farm; I didn't get a chance to ask how much electricity they provided.

We'll be going back, for sure.

No more Scouting

Our family made a tough decision this fall: no more Scouting.  If it had been solely my decision, I probably would have gone the other way.  But Libby has been feeling ambivalent about Scouting for some time. The policy decision this summer by the national organization forced our hand.

The Boy Scouts of America this summer decided to formally reiterate its ban against participation in Scouting by homosexual persons.  It had been policy before, but various troops and other organizations were able to turn a blind eye or deaf ear as needed. The decision this summer forcibly called the hand of the whole organization. It was a decision with which our family disagrees.

Much like the fact of “gays in the military,” homosexuals have been participating in Scouting for ages, as youth participants and leaders (men and women). Scouting is not an explicitly Christian organization but religious values, and more directly conservative Christian values pervade Scouting culture, abiding hand-in-hand with a strong patriotic value system. Though my experience in Scouting was usually in the context of units that were more conservative than my personal views, I managed to dodge the worst expressions of such and focus on the traditional, core Scouting values and instructional content. More recently I had been able to help my two older boys to do the same.  Earlier, in Richmond, we were fortunate to be part of a unit that, while sponsored by a church, was not overtly dogmatic in its leadership and focused more on the traditional content of Scouting than on indoctrinating participants with (conservative) Christian values.  Our unit in Black Mountain was sponsored by a conservative church and meetings opened with prayer (“…in Jesus’ name…”) as well as the Scout oath and promise.

After the decision was publicized this summer, I read several stories online of Scouts who were severing their ties with the organization, and in extreme cases, returning Scouting’s highest award, their Eagle rank.  Too, I read of plenty of folks who heartily concurred with the decision. I had hoped we might be able to sidestep the issue and let Scouting be for our boys about knots, campfires and safety. But upon honest reflection we knew the core beliefs we wished to instill in our boys were compromised by the decision and we needed to take a stand in order to model and live out what we talk about at home.

So, no Scout meetings this fall.  No popcorn sales.  No merit badges nor beads.  We’ll try to do some camping.  I think what I’ll miss most is the “village” of men and women (with some of whom I disagreed on important issues, but for whom I was extremely thankful and respectful) helping to raise my boys. I feel my job is to be a parent, loving, stern, didactic and strict. The boys, through Scouting, got to meet and work with other men and women who could be their pals. It was a pretty good set-up for us all. Truth be told we’re not missing juggling meetings and other events.  And I don’t think it’s quite dawned on Eli and Briggs what we have done.  So it’s probably hardest on me at the moment. The decision is made, but we’re (maybe I’m) still wrestling with the fallout in greater or lesser ways.

Creeper, redux

Today, as part of the last hurrah of summer, I took Eli and Briggs back to the Virginia Creeper Trail. It's a rail roadbed that's been converted into a biking/hiking trail. We went back in April with Scouts, but that was a cold and rainy day. Today we had much better weather. The boys had a nice time. We sprang for shuttle service to the top of the trail ($40), but it was worth it in terms of no-hassle. Back in April we saw this pool in the river that tracks the trail, but it was way too cold to go near it. Briggs had no such worries today.

Briggs says, "I slipped and fell in, honest!"  "Accidentally-on-purpose," no doubt!

Roanoke, VA

Buncombe County schools have this thing about beginning the school year with a two-day week.  Three last days of summer vacation, then school begins on a Thursday.  This irks me no end, but this year we did something about it.

I took Briggs and Calvin to Roanoke, VA for an overnight trip.  We saw the star on Mill Mountain and the Virginia Transportation Museum.  Libby, Eli and I had been there several years ago, but it's been a while.  A hurricane in 2006 trashed the aviation wing at the museum, but we were able to see the cars, model trains and ALL the vehicles outside.

Everything was a big hit.  From climbing on the pseudo-rocks at the mountain park, to everything at the museum.  It was a great way to end up summer.

The oven saga of 2012

It started Easter Day this year.  I had put a turkey breast in the oven on timed cook, to do its thing while we were at church.  When we came home, the clock on the oven was flashing, and the temperature inside was not nearly what it should have been.  A simple push of the clock button got things going again.  But lunch was delayed.  I didn’t think too much about it, until it happened again a few days later.  There was no discernible pattern to when the oven would shut off.  But we could tell when it happened by a flashing clock.

Finally in late-May it did this one last time, but when I pushed the button to restart everything, it didn’t work. (The re-start technique worked about 30 minutes later.) But I figured it was time to tease out what was going on.  I called the folks who had helped with our appliances before, but the technician said it would be best to call Sears, because of the brand of the oven, Kenmore.  They made things tough for independent repair people to do their job on their machines, he said, and it would be easier for me just to deal with them.  A&E (whom I now know is a front for Sears) was willing to come right away, but tried to pressure me into a $270 “contract” that would provide for either fixing the oven or giving us $500 toward a new oven.  I hemmed and hawed, opted out of that, in favor of a flat fee for the service call.  I got off that call. But then thought better of it.  I called them back, got the contract and got (by all good and holy things) the same service appointment for that afternoon.  The technician did comment that he was puzzled by the series of notes he had received about the call prior to his arrival.  But he diagnosed a faulty control panel, which was itself $250.  That plus the cost of the service call, plus whatever follow-up was going to be needed, would be covered by my contract.  I thought I was safe in my smugness!

He ordered parts and they arrived.  A different technician arrived (you may have seen my status update about begin the guy’s first call of the morning), who worked hard but announced that the sent parts would not work.  He ordered different parts and left.  The new set of parts arrived; the second technician came back and concluded that these were again the wrong parts.  He fussed with his parts representative (much the way I might have sounded at this point). He even spoke to a supervisor!  They decided the correct parts were no longer available.  The tech suggested filing under the provisions of our home warranty policy, noting that Sears would refund the contract price since the oven couldn’t be fixed or replaced satisfactorily.  I called Cross Country; they wanted to send a technician to confirm that the oven was indeed caput.  It was the same guy who had already been twice before!  He didn’t even come in the third time, filing his report from his van.  He requested a huge list of parts, which he said would punt the problem into a “replacement” issue instead of a repair job under the terms of the warranty.  But no: Cross Country wanted to attempt the repair, even though the tech had explained that the replacement parts he was requesting were not available. So more parts came, four boxes worth, and I talked with the repair folks at A&E again about sending someone to fix the old oven.  They however had very clear notes from the tech that the oven could not be repaired, because the correct parts were no longer available.  They spoke with the warranty people and finally convinced them of the same.  The warranty folks then offered us two choices:  to put in a specific make and model (a nice GE that retails for $1200) for free or else give us $504 (exactly) to purchase the model we would prefer.  Since I already knew ovens started at around $800, I knew I was kind of stuck with the oven they wanted to give us.  I hesitated about the thing fitting into the existing opening, but the warranty folks assured me that the technician had provided exact specifications; but, they said, if it didn’t fit, it would be my fault and I would have to pay to have the replacement oven returned.  So I took a day or so measuring and researching the size specifications ad nauseum.  Ultimately I was convinced we would be okay.  We ordered the replacement.

I should say that through all of this the oven usually worked okay.  Very often though it would click off, especially if I was running it for a relatively long time, or at anything over 375 degrees.  And even if it clicked off, it was easy enough to restart generally.  It would have been a whole lot worse if the thing was not working at all.  But I did have to adapt my meal planning for the duration.

The replacement oven arrived in Greenville SC and I got a call saying they wanted to deliver it on Monday afternoon and that the driver would call 30 minutes before he arrived.  He called when he was sitting in front of the house (I was at work).  The nice lady working to phones at church said, “Well if it’s a package, just bring it to Mike here at his office.”  The driver didn’t explain it was an OVEN!  He arrived at the church and tried (yes, he tried) to deliver it to my office. I asked him to just drive back to the house and we could be done.  I asked him why he hadn’t called 30 minutes earlier to avoid this problem, to which he had no answer.  But he said he could not in any circumstance return to the house (a mile away).  So I had to reschedule the delivery for the next Monday, the only day of the week they came to this area.  No call or anything from the delivery folks ahead of the day; I called Monday asking about the plan for delivery and was told because I had not confirmed the date, it was not coming!  I yelled at three different people for all I was worth to no avail.  It would be another week.  Finally it arrived and the thing was placed in the entry hall. (The delivery guy managed to look a little sheepish when he was here.)  In the midst of this portion of the saga, I called the warranty folks a couple of times to fuss about their delivery service provider and was told they would speak to them and see if there was anything to be done to get a special delivery arranged, but that never happened over the two week delivery delay.

Once the new oven was sitting in the house, I then had to contact the warranty people to schedule installation.  After four days, I finally had the name of the firm they wanted to use.  They said, “Call them and set your appointment.”  I asked, “You have communicated to them to expect me?” “Yes,” I was told.  You guessed it: the install company had no idea who I was.  That took two days to straighten out.  Then the only day they could get to it was 6 days hence, today, August  1, a little more than two months since I began trying to get the oven repaired or replaced.  The nice thing is, the new oven slid into the opening like a glove.  One of the other nice moments was the warranty firm waiving their initial tech call fee because I had already had a company come out and do some diagnosis.  Sears did ultimately refund my $270 for the contract because they were not able to repair or replaced the oven satisfactorily, but that took two phone calls. (Oh, they wanted, at one point, to take the old oven into their shop to see if they could fix it, leaving me without an oven at all for at least two weeks.  I declined that gracious offer.)

Tonight I used the new oven for the first time, serving up my version of chicken divan, which is always a big hit.  Guess it finally turned out okay, but man, what a saga.

Photos: up top: install this morning; below: dinner, before and after.