A whirlwind trip to Franconia and back. And today? First, Paul's piano recital; then, family-plus-poodle folds itself into the clown car and hits the road yet again, this time for a week with my parents and my sister's family on Mount Desert Island. It's a retirement party for my father, thrown by my father; and since the cottage we're staying in has wonky Internet, you may or may not hear from me very regularly. Sometimes, if you sit at one particular corner of the kitchen table and kind of lean back toward the wall, you can get a signal. But odds are that James will already be hogging that seat.

Since we never go to MDI during tourist season, this will be a strange new land. When I think of Bar Harbor, I think of February fog and the Thirsty Whale, the only place open for lunch. It's a fine place to drink beer during an ice storm while the boys play AC/DC on the jukebox, but I imagine things will be different in August.

Fortunately the cottage is not a strange new land. I already know about the view of Goose Cove from the bed.