Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Doesn't this look like Dracula's carriage from Nosferatu? It's at the Shelburne Museum.

Day Six: Shelburne Revisited (Thursday, Sept. 25)

Dad and I went back to the Shelburne Museum to finish up with the things we hadn't seen. The nice thing about their pricey admission is that it's actually a two-day admission, so if you don't have time for everything you can do what we did.

On our return trip, we saw demonstrations of blacksmithing, printing and weaving. In the print shop, they gave us some samples, including this paragraph. Read it and see if you can figure out what's unusual about it.

How quickly can you find what is so unusual about this paragraph? It looks so ordinary that you would think nothing was wrong with it at all and, in fact, nothing is. But it is unusual. Why? If you study it, and think about it, you may find out, but I am not going to assist you in any way... you must do it without coaching. No doubt, if you work on it long it will dawn on you. Why knows? Go to work now and try your skill. Par is about a half an hour.

Give up?

We also saw a schoolhouse and a covered bridge on the museum grounds, as well as a lighthouse that used to be housed on a rock island in Lake Champlain. The wind was blowing and it made eerie sounds around the lighthouse. It made me wonder what it was like to be the lighthouse keeper's family and hear those sounds all year round.

By this time, it had started to rain, but we were ready to leave, anyway.

From there, we drove into Montpelier to do more shopping. I wanted to stop in at a thrift shop we hadn't had time to check out earlier in the week. I got two more "hippie" skirts, so now I really feel better about getting rid of the ones that were too big. I also bought a Hawaiian garment which could serve as a long jacket, long shirt or even a dress. It's tan with brown designs and was in the vintage section.

In a New Age store, I bought some incense and my dad found a beautiful Maxfield Parish print for his apartment. My sister and I are helping him to redecorate, after a weekend where we all watched a Trading Spaces marathon.

We stopped in and said, "Hi" to my brother's wife, who works for a nonprofit in an office in a quaint old house. She was thrilled to give us the tour, and I was happy to see what a friendly looking office she has. She gave us one of my brother's gifts to take home with us, since he was coming to pick her up at the office.

When we returned to the house, my dog, Una, had gone to town on the good dress shoes of my brother's wife. Una had eaten the insoles and scratched the leather. She had no idea that my dad and I had gone to two different pet stores trying to find some anti-itch stuff for her and also buying her some new, expensive food in case it was a food-related allergy that was making her belly pink.

Andy's wife and I went to the mall to buy shoe repair materials later that evening. It was a nice, relaxing, girls night out. We did a little shopping at the JCPenney clearance sale, and picked up a couple things in Bed, Bath and Beyond and Claire's Boutique (namely, I got some pumpkin earrings that flash a light when you put watch batteries in them).

As a group, we all watched Anger Management, a very silly movie. My brother and I loved it, which was cool because it was the first part of his birthday celebration.

Dad tries out the jail at the Shelburne Museum and finds it wanting.

Copyright 2003 by Alyce Wilson

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