New York, in pieces

I spent last week in New York State for Thanksgiving, as I usually do. I didn't really do anything exciting, but it was nice to have a quiet trip where I hung out with family, read books, and played with the dogs.

Here are some random shots of the trip in chronological order:

The Old Port Ewen Bridge

When my grandfather turned the corner and started driving us across the old bridge into Port Ewen, NY, my first question was, "Are you sure this bridge is still open?"

Look at it:



See the rust? The peeling paint? The cracks? According to my mom, this bridge was supposed to come down when she was a teenager and the new Port Ewen bridge was constructed, but apparently they're just going to wait for it to fall down instead.

Books

I wanted to remember to put a book that I looked at on my amazon wish list (linked here in case random people want to send me presents), but I don't have a smart phone, so I do this instead:



I have so many photos of books in bookstores.

Pickens General Store, Heuvelton, NY

Rather than braving the big box stores on Black Friday, my mom drove me into Amish country to go to Picken's General Store in nearby Heuvelton. The building is a former vaudeville hall, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places:



Inside, the store is on the first floor:









and the second floor is a performance venue:





with a small collection of antiques and historical objects:



It was a nice trip, and got us out of the house without taking us anywhere near the crazy rioting people.

Sad Santa



Something about that Santa decoration seemed more bleak than festive to me.

The Globe Mall

Mom and I tried to spend part of Small Business Saturday at the Globe Mall, where there is an indoor flea market and antique mall, or, rather, where there was an indoor flea market and antique mall.

They picked Small Business Saturday to be the weekend when they closed and moved to another building to re-open next week, leaving behind only peeling paint and a collection of broken dolls:







The Globe Mall, like a lot of Northern New York, has seen better days.

Carved Turkey

I found it momentarily amusing that my mom was carefully carving one of the solid milk chocolate turkeys that my grandparents gave us for Thanksgiving into tiny slivers:



It never occurred to me to slice it up. Every year I just gnaw mine, slowly and messily.

The Frosty North

It snowed the day that I was supposed to leave, enough to delay my flight out.



Everything turned out ok, though, and I had a really nice mini-vacation and trip home.