Author Archives: Ron Haines

Today was a day of firsts for granddaughter Margeaux. We tallied them up as we drove from the house in West Hartford over to quiet and small Lower Bolton Pond in Bolton, CT, for our first paddle outing together since … Continue reading →

Another byway with a warning sign, this one in Exeter, Rhode Island. An appropriate signpost I guess, given that this small settlement of 6,000 or so is the site of one of the best documented cases of vampire exhumation.  No, … Continue reading →

The nice kind of strings, fortunately…the melodic kind. July 4, as always, was brought to me by the kindly folks of Contoocook, NH, who annually stage a very nice children’s parade and a longer adult one, always on July 4, … Continue reading →

Another generation of paddlers Third-Gen.  I guess that’s what I’ll call granddaughter Margeaux now, the third generation of paddlers in my family.  She had been out once before, but that was three years ago on a short excursion with her … Continue reading →

As a journalist in the late 1970s I developed a fondness for Plains, Georgia. It was the hometown of our peanut-farmer president, Jimmy Carter, and a place where I could get a quote out of his mother Lillian; sister Ruth, … Continue reading →

It was a real treat for me today to see my two granddaughters all decked out in the Ethiopian dresses my daughter and I brought back for them on our recent trip there. The trip was a revisit to Ethiopia, … Continue reading →

It’s nice when there are street signs that actually let you know that it’s a place you just don’t want to go:

Recently I was driving along the empty rolling hills and mountains of rural southwest Pennsylvania when I saw a sign and an arrow: “Johnstown Flood Memorial,” the sign said. I know about the flood, having interviewed an actual survivor of … Continue reading →

I have been taking photos of repurposed gas stations and posting them here since about 2013. My favorite remains the first one that caught my eye and got me started: Goobers Laundromat in Lucedale, Mississippi. As a structure, it’s not … Continue reading →

Three-quarters of a century! I feel like an elephant! I’ve never paid a whole lot of attention to my birthdays. Or anyone’s for that matter. Usually when asked how old I am I have to do the math. And when … Continue reading →