Our contractor called early Monday morning to postpone. We were having some rain showers. Most of our project is outdoors. So he postponed until today (Tuesday). There's no rain in today's forecast. Hope springs eternal.
I know the answer.
Answer: Cathédrale de Notre Dame, Rouen, Normandie.
When I was a kid, the only thing I knew about Mormons was that they sang. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir popped up around the holidays each year. And the Osmonds. That's still pretty much all I know about Mormons. I'm sure they prefer it that way.
I got the walk-behind mower out yesterday and did some trimming around the hedges and some other hard-to-reach places in the south forty. After I finished and put the mower away, I noticed a rather large spot that I missed. And it wasn't hard to reach. I missed it with both mowers. Sheesh.
We made it to Salt Lake City, capital of the state of Utah. I don't remember what I was trying to do here. From the looks of it, I wanted to get the capitol dome and the Temple/Tabernacle in the same photo. I emphasize the word "wanted." I mostly got the corner of what I assume is a parking garage.
Yesterday I cut the south forty. In the rain. I swear I looked outside before I started. I checked the weather radar on line. All was "go." Once I got the mower out and started it up, I felt a little mist in the air. Nothing to worry about, I thought. I started cutting. About halfway through the mowing, the mist had turned to rain. I kept going. In for a penny, in for a pound, I thought. I can tough this out. It kept raining. I kept mowing. When I was more or less done, I high-tailed it back to the garage, more or less drenched. Then the rain stopped and the sun came out.
I was using a 50mm lens on the camera so, to get a wider angle shot, I needed to physically back away from the subjects. I do have a 25mm lens for wide shots, but didn't have it with me. No matter. Here's a somewhat wider view that includes the château, the church, the bridge, the new passerelle, the old mill foundations, and the lock. No swimming allowed.
It rained on and off yesterday with some mild thunder in the late afternoon. We're still in the same pattern today, maybe with less rain. The high temperature is expected to be around 22ºC (71ºF). And it's a new moon! I wonder what its name is.
Depending on where you're standing, St.-Aignan's château and the town's church can look like parts of the same building. They are quite close, but they're separate buildings. This view, without the château, was taken from the same spot on the island as yesterday's photo.
Today is expected to be rainy. In fact, it rained before I got out of bed (about 06h20), but not much. I was able to go out for a short walk in with Tasha since I've been up. It's sprinkling out there, but I can see on the radar that heavier rain is indeed headed toward us. Thankfully, there's no electrical activity to report, nor is any predicted.
Our local "dump" is not so much a dump as it is a recycling center. We separate all our refuse before tossing it into the appropriate bins. When the bins are full, they're loaded onto the backs of large trucks and carted away to a central processing facility before being recycled and/or incinerated. I was checking on line this morning to see if our déchetterie (dump) is open on Mondays and was pleasantly surprised to see that not only was it open on Mondays, but it was open at 06h30 on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays! Summer hours! This is new.
Ken and I had loaded up the car yesterday with old bed linens, pillows, and rugs for disposal. Once I learned of the summer hours, I hopped in the car and drove across the river and, voilà, that stuff is all gone. No fuss. No muss. I have some more stuff (used deep-frying oil among other things) to take over there, maybe tomorrow.
This image is from our 2018 trip to the Vendée on the west coast of France. It's the city of Niort and one of its churches, Saint André de Niort. We had Tasha for just over a year at that point.
I've got to get out with the camera one of these days and take some new photos.
For most of us tourists and casual photographers, getting that "perfect" shot without people in it takes more effort than most of us will spend. Often, it's just impossible. So, we need to learn to work our fellow tourists into our shots as part of the scene which, after all, they are. People can add color, a sense of motion, and/or a measure of scale to a photograph. Getting that shot can mean standing around for a while until the stars align. You know it when it happens, but a lot of the time it just doesn't.
Software is getting better at removing unwanted elements in photos and I'm certainly not opposed to doing that. It's all part of the creative process. This shot is so-so in my opinion. I would remove the woman and girl walking toward the left. I wish the lone walking woman was a little more toward the left, not blocking any of the window pane. The disembodied feet in tennis shoes on the lower right would also go. I like the idea of taking a picture of a guy taking a picture. I'm not sure it works here as well as I had hoped. But it's okay.
Gothic vaulted ceilings are constructed with columns, arches, and butresses that work together to channel the forces of the loads they carry, thus creating a usable space below them.
We're expecting a contractor to come by this week to look at our automatic garage door. They (brothers) installed the door back in 2018, and it's been great. The problem is that it has recently developed a rather annoying tick that causes it to reverse itself before it closes. We can't identify the problem, so we're hoping the guys who installed it can do so and fix it easily. We're also going to ask them to work up estimates the replacement or installation of new shutters on various windows around the house.
This is probably the last of the arches photos from the Mont Saint-Michel. I took all of them back in 2006 and decided to re-work them a little. The originals are what they are: taken with my old Panasonic bridge camera, my first digital camera. I was just learning to use Photoshop for the most basic of post-processing, mostly cropping and straightening. But now, except for the smartphone camera, I use a full-frame DSLR camera and Lightroom for "developing."
I successfully placed our order for a chapon de pintade (Guinea fowl capon) yesterday. I was lucky that the rain moved out just as I was heading out to the market. Soon after, the wind picked up and it's been blowin' a gale, calming down a little over night. I'll pick up the bird on Christmas Eve at Saint-Aignan's special Christmas market.
More views inside the abbey at the Mont Saint-Michel.
The wind and rain seems to be moving off. At least the rain. I think we're going to have wind most of the day. And dropping temperatures. I still plan to go out this morning, mostly because I need to get a prescription renewal.
This is the abbey cloister at the Mont Saint-Michel in Normandy. I don't know the identity of the woman posing for a photo.
Mother Nature is going to try to meddle in my weekend plans to go to the market and order our holiday bird. I may have to put it off for a week if the weather gets ugly.
This is one of the few photos that I took of the Sées cathedral's exterior. It seems this cathedral has burned, partially collapsed, and been rebuilt numerous times over the centuries.
The weather forecast is now revised. It seems that it might not get as cold as originally predicted this week. We'll still see single digits, but won't get very close to freezing.
Still in the cathedral at Sées. The paint job certainly livens things up. I don't know if this is a reproduction of what it originally looked like or something new. It sure makes a big difference from those old cathedrals and churches whose walls are darkened by centuries of smoke (from candles, etc.) and other air pollution.
Today's our last "warm" day before a cold spell sets in. We may get down to or below freezing by the end of the week. It's Decemburrr.
This is another view inside the cathedral at Sées.Not much to "say" about it. Sées rhymes with the English word "say."
No leftovers photo today. We took a break from lamb on Saturday and had an Asian-style chicken stir-fry. We'll get back to the lamb today.
I snapped this photo in June 2006 while visiting the abbey at the Mont Saint-Michel on the Normandy coast.
I'm waiting for that part I ordered for the wood stove. The delivery date was estimated for the 27th, which is today. It's not here, yet.
Or a couple hundred. These were in the cathedral at Sées up in Normandy, again back in the summer of 2006. The cathedral is an impressive sight, inside and out, and worth a stop if you're in the area.
I was hopeful that the recent winds we've had would help to dry things out. But, no. It's still soggy outside. Not much fun for waking with Tasha and not very practical for getting yard work done. I know I could just buck up, bundle up, and get something done out there, but I'm not motivated. I am, however, looking forward to our Thanksgiving feast on Thursday. Priorities.
This is a view of the organ at the church of Saint-Pierre in the Loire Valley city of Saumur. We visited a few places in that area with our late friend CHM that summer in 2006.
The warm-up has come. Temperatures are in the mid-teens (celsius), but not for long. The wind has died down, and rain is predicted to move in as the temperatures start to drop again (probably not below zero). Our yard is covered with dead leaves and downed branches (nothing serious) around the bases of trees and in the driveway and the garden path. I'd like to deal with those one of these days. Maybe today, if it's dry enough.
The forecasters say it will be warm today with a high of around 18ºC (about 64ºF). We'll be out of the single digits, at least for now. I'll take it. It's been pretty cold these past few days.
We're making plans for our annual Thanksgiving meal. Not that there's much to do. We have most of the fixin's on hand. One of us will head across the river on Monday or Tuesday to order our traditional gigot d'agneau (leg of lamb). We've decided to ask the butcher to bone the leg, then roll it and tie it into a roast. It's something we've had done before because it makes the leg easier to roast and carve. Stay tuned!
