Candle on the water

Magnet #926 - Lighthouses of Maine

As I type this, I'm sitting on the slowest moving train known to man (I could seriously run faster, ya'll), on the last leg of my three-week sabbatical home.

Looks like that layoff was some damned good timing, since I ended up having to chauffeur my parents up and down the east coast for my dad's eye surgery. First the surgery, then the week-after follow-up. And, in another two weeks another follow-up roadtrip.

So this trip included:

• One train trip from NYC to NC
• One roadtrip from NC to Boston, with an overnight stopover in NYC
• One roadtrip from Boston to NC, with an overnight stopover in NYC
• One "roadtrip" to Raleigh to have some fun with a former client and friend
  
• One roadtrip from NC to Boston, with an hour stopover in NYC and a rather profitable side trip to Mohegan Sun
• One roadtrip from Boston to NC, with a detour through New Hampshire, Vermont, and an overnight stopover in NYC
• One train trip from NC to NYC
  

Whew. I Tweeted it, but dang, did I make the 85/95 corridor my bitka!

I picked up this magnet at a Hannaford's in York, Maine, when it was becoming clear that I wouldn't be able to see any lighthouses of Maine. In fact, I'd mentally written up the whole lighthouse magnetpost to be how of course I went to Maine and didn't see a lighthouse.

The next morning, though, we decided to take a quick oceanside jaunt, and just before a fabulous breakfast at Sandy's Purple Palace, we stumbled to Nubble Lighthouse. It's on an island, next to a look-out promontory - so gorgeous. Hurricane Earl helped us out with a strong surf, so it was very cool to see it with busy waves hitting the shores.

The lighthouse and its outerbuildings were very much like a Hopper painting and I couldn't stop taking pictures, just trying to capture the right shadows of the towers on the lawn.

Or, you know, waiting for the gift shop to open.

eta:
I have this strange urge to see Pete's Dragon now. And I haven't been able to stop singing It's Not Easy or Candle on the Water, ever since. And I can't stop trying to say Passamaquaddy, either.

"If one must have Maine...

Magnet #474 - Bar Harbor, Maine

...why not Bar Harbor?"

- Cousin Julia, Summer Magic

Right at this moment, my sisters (who unpacked the DVD out of moving boxes) are now re-watching Moon-Spinners for the thousandth time, and I've hit pause on Summer Magic, to write this post.

I certainly didn't intend for this to be a Hayley Mills mini-marathon, but who can resist the call of Beautiful Beulah, Maine, and the wonderful, oh so cheesy Carey family of Summer Magic?

There's the ever-so-put upon widowed matriarch, Margaret, placed in reduced circumstances, mother of willful daughter and consummate dreamer Nancy, ragtime pianist son, Gilly, and impish son, Peter, who sleeps every night with the Shaggy DA dog.

Nancy (who has the cutest dresses, with the wrongest hairwear) has convinced the affable Osham (?) Popham (played by the affable Burl Ives) to let them live in the gorgeous abandoned yellow house in the outskirts of Beulah, and it's all about how the Bostonian Careys get used to living in the countryside (because really, who needs money, in the land of milk and honey)?

And then horrendously prissy and snobby Cousin Julia, who is the Pink of Perfection, comes to live with them, and turns their lives topsy-turvy....

And then a hot teacher shows up to create a love triangle...

And then the hot owner of the house comes back and...

Ok, ok, the story's way too complicated to get into, but suffice to say that there's a happy ending. Of course. Hello, it's Disney!

(Actually, in point of fact, Summer Magic was based on a book called Mother Carey's Chickens, written all the way back in 1911 and already downloaded to my BlackBerry. It was written by Kate Douglas Wiggin...who, in addition to pioneering Kindergartens in the U.S., also wrote Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.)

Also? Being Disney, it has several musical numbers that won't leave your head - apparently ever. For serious, yo. I'm seeing tonight that on top of quoting scenes, I can still sing along for every freakin' number... Good. Grief.

Overall the movie tends to hold up ok - mostly because even though it was released in 1963, it's set in the early 1900s. I won't lie, some of the songs are pretty FF-worthy - particularly when they're just montages of the countryside and the flora and fauna of said countryside. Some of them are just toe-tappin' fun. Yeah, you read that right - I said toe-tappin' fun.

You'll see below by the lyrics of Femininity, some of the songs are pretty darn offensive to our modern-day feminist sensibilities. But, scored right, and yeah, I'll be singing this song all the way to work today.

You must walk feminine
Talk feminine
Smile and beguile feminine
Utilize your femininity
That's what every girl should know, if she wants to catch a beau

Dance feminine
Glance feminine
Act shy and sigh feminine
Compliment his masculinity
That's what every girl should know, if she wants to catch a beau

Let him do the talking
Med adore good listeners
Laugh, but not too loudly (Haha)
If he should choose to tell a joke
Be radiant, but delicate
Memorize the rules of etiquette
Be demure, sweet and pure
Hide the real you

You must look feminine
Dress feminine
You're at your best feminine
Emphasize your femininity
That's what every girl should know
Femininity, femininity
That's the way to catch a beau

Heh. You're still here. Go. Watch!


eta:
Oh! I forgot! I've never been to Maine, either! Save the World Sister got me this magnet while hiking in Maine. Huh. Now there's a question. I wonder why comes it's "trekking" when you're in Nepal, but it's just plain old "hiking" Stateside.

eta2:
You know what's funny? Reading comments on the YouTube installments. So funny to see how people react to this movie...