Fall seems to be officially here. Temperatures have settled squarely into the low- to mid-70s, and the air is starting to get that delicious crisp edge. Some evenings you can smell fireplace smoke, cutting its way through the chill to find your nose. The weather is that odd combination of brisk and balmy, so you can wear shorts as you work in the yard, but still need a sweatshirt, preferably with the sleeves pushed up to your elbows. It’s my favorite time of year.
Fall also means Halloween is just around the corner, as hard as that is to believe. My wife is an absolute Halloween Junkie. While she’s not a fan of the horrifying, she does delight in the goofy fake-scary decorations, from signs that say “EEK!” to life-size plastic skeletons we do all sorts of terrible things to. And at the end of the season, we’re always very careful to pack the skeletons up again with their upper bodies in one box and their legs in another. That way, if they come to life and want to go on a killing spree, we’ve at least made them easier to outrun. Because you can never be too sure.
We’ll also be heading up to Sleepy Hollow in mid-October, which is getting to be a habit with us. We’ll be taking part in the nighttime Legend Celebration over at Philipsburg Manor (for the fainter of heart, there’s also a daylight version of events over at Washington Irving’s Sunnyside) and the spectacular Blaze at Van Cortlandt Manor.
If you’ve never been to either event, try like heck to make it. I’ll try to do a better job taking pictures this year so I can put up a few to give you an idea of just how neat these events can be. Plus, I’m working with Historic Hudson Valley to see if we can come up with something fun and Washington Irvingish to do when I’m there. I’ll keep you posted.
Finally, I’m working hard on some sample chapters for my latest project, to see if I can make anything come of it. I’m pleased with what I have so far — and Barb gave me some spectacularly good edits on the first chapter — but we’ll see what happens. If this comes together, I really will explain everything that’s been going on for the last 18 months. Hopefully, all will become clear at that time.
Brian Jay Jones 