All posts by johncohn

Wednesday night – Max is 21 !

Today my Max turned 21 !.. That is just so cool and amazing to me. I can remember the day he was born so vividly.. it was about 30 degrees warmer than it is now.. one of the hottest Junes on record.  That day transformed our lives.. we were parents !.. I remember how wonderful and strange it felt to be holding our own baby.. I actually hadn’t ever looked at one closely before that.. and now I had to help take care of one…

Luckily.. now he takes care of us sometimes… Tonight he decided to cook us dinner in honor of his birthday. Max is an excellent vegetarian cook. Tonight he showed us how to make seitan kabobs from powdered wheat gluten. They were amazing.. you start witht he gluten.. add a bunch of savory glop, knead it like crazy…

cut into strips… then simmer it in broth for a while…

Taking time out for a now legal wine toast to the legal drinkign age…

thenbarbeque them over charcol. They were so amazing !.. and all it is is wheat protien.


Gabe and Max entertained us during dinner 

That ended well .. no ?


Later on we went inside for presents.. I gave Max a ‘Hail Sietan’ hoodie.. very appropriate tonight !

Here’s Max opening a gift from my folks.. it’s max’s great-grandfather’s lighter .. It’s so cool. it has his initials.. Max E? Ettlinger (Mom.. what does the E stand for ?)  Max loves having it I can tell !

Diane made another cool gift.. a home garden for max to take back to Brooklyn this weekend.. tomatoes, basil, cilantro, mint, etc.. Max loved it !

Finally time for cake.. Diane had found these cool multi color flame candles…Right after this shot, my camera ran out of batteries.. I got the cake moemnt on the other camera.. You’ll just have to imagine Max blowing these out..

Max and Gabe both got lotterie tickets in liu of a real college savings plan.. Max won $25 and Gabe won $2.. Now I can retire !!!

Then we all retired to the living room..

It was a great evening.. Max is such a good kid.. well.. I guess he’ not a kid anymore.. He’s such a good man.. I’m so proud of him..

OK.. time for bed.. more tomorrow.. nite all. nite Sam !
-me

Tuesday evening -Summertime

I came home today around 6PM and absolutely nothing was happening at home… no crises, no parties, no big projects, no homework, no yard work… no visitors   The weather was perfect.. not cold, not hot…   Gabe, Diane and Kristen were hanging out at home not doing much

Help !

I think  in the month or so since I’ve come back from the TV adventure…I’ve forgotten how to relax !.. My brain is not working on zero input..   Maybe this is what I’m supposed to be doing. When I came back I felt so open and ready for inspiration .. I felt like something was just about to come to me about where to focus my life’s energy. .. Now… I’m not so sure. if I’m tuned in correctly  ???

The day to day crush at work , cell phones, email, etc. are starting to creep back into my brain…   I don’t want to fall back into old patterns.. I want to find a way to add more to the world

Universe… I’m awaiting your suggestions….

nite folks.. nite Sam..
-me

ps.. There’s a great article about baby brother billy in Texas Innovator magazine.. check this out. !  Isn’t he cute ?

Sunday night – power failure

First of all.. Sorry to anyone who couldn’t read yesterday’s post.. For some reason Myspace is marking some of my posts as ‘preferred readers only’ ,. You’re all preferred to me..  so not sure what the distinction is. I went back and cleared it up… I think

I’m definitely feeling much better today. My fever broke last night.. I just felt washed out today… Whatever I had, it was a doozy..   I started getting serious cabin fever after som many days laying low. The dogs decided to take me on a walk   they were pretty happy to get out.. .

The beuty of this almost summer day helped clear my head of the fog that had settled there…   It reminded me of the Wendell Berry powem that so many folks sent us after Sam’s passing.. It’s on our fridge right now..

The

Peace of Wild Things

When despair for the world grows in me

and I wake in the night at the least sound

in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief. I come into the presence of still water.

And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time

I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

— Wendell Berry

One cool thing about today, all of the cotttoonwood (do we even have cottonwood here ?) trees were launchjing their seeds today. Alll day long it looked as though it were snowing… all you had to do was wave your hands and you could catch tufts of these light downy seeds

It was hard to capture the snow effect on camera .. but it was pretty amazing in real life. !

Late afternoon I paid a quick visit to our freind Dan’s new home and work project. The Long trail Community Market. Dan is opening up a community market and communal kitchen in the old Jonesville Store. He’s got some great ideas.. He also has a GREAT blog that you can read here. Do check it out !

THere are some really creepy things still hanging around that store..

Late afternoon dDiane and I droopped in on a graduation party for several of our friends.. It was a beitiful evening.. .. It was great congratulating the kids and seeing some of our firriends. Graduation is always an interesting time.. it reminds you
how quickly time passes…

We got home to find the power off on our whole road.. Diane quickly lit some candles …It was kind of cozy… except that all of our frozen food from the grocery store was starting to melt.. It eventually came back on.

Right befor ebed, gabe helped me make a better header picture for my Rainbow Headband Instructables contest entry.. This LED contest is for anything with a blinking LED.. go check the contest  out.. there are some really cool things there..  You can even vote for the ones you like !.

OK folks.. gotta run.. for the next 3 nights I have work meetings from 11:45PM till 3AM with some freinds who are in India..  Gnite folks.. Gnite Sam
–me

Saturday eveing – the day flu by

Grrrrr. myspace just ate my blog again.. so I’ll have to trype.. Not in the mood for it at all…

Well folks.. I’m not 100% sure, but I think I have the flu.. I mean THE flu . It’s been going through our area for the last week. They actually closed the schools in a neighboring town because of it. There asking folks not to come in to the doctor to be checked because it only aids the spread.  I’m not completely sure.. but now I think I have all the symptoms. I woke last night with a high fever, chills aches and cough.. and that’s kept up mostly though the day. That said.. I don’t feel any worse than any other flu I’ve had.I’ve heard that the strain we have up here is not so bad. I’ve even heard a few folks say that it’s better to get it now than when it comes back tr. Evidently there’s a prediction that it will come back with a vengeance this winter.

All in all.. I’m feeling only sort of lousy during the day.. We had a bunch of stuff planned for the day.. but I just hung out on the couch for most of the day. Diane took gabe to middlebury for a post season lacrosse tournement.. it’s tomorrow too.. hope I feel up to going.. I also missed hannah b’s graduation party and David K’s barbeque..   It’s ok though.. I don’t feel like moving or talking right now..

I did make pretty good use of the downtime, though. I wrote a ‘how to’ guide for making the kind of Rainbow headbands that I wear to my shows for Instructables.com. Instructables is an awesome website run by a guy I know (Eric W) that is helpign spread the DIY ethos.  I decided to put in the hatband because their currently having a contest for the best LED project. Mine won’t likely win, but it’s fun to try…  

The cool thing is that the prize is a set of lights made by Xander H. the guy who I told you about a few days back who I helped create  the arduino code to drive the light strips 
I also finally got around to posting a video of the ‘get more kids interested in engineering‘ talk that I did back on my birthday. I’ve been watching it. It’s weird to watch yourself talk 
Yikes.. I’m feeling pretty yucky.. I’ve got to crawl back into bed.. Talk to ya’ll tomorrow.. Gnite folks. Gnite Sam
-me