Hello!

Welcome to The Epic! I am launching this blog as a manifesto for and a guide to living well. The title and motto of the blog are taken from the Epicureans, at least some of whom believed in the notion that not one minute of the future was guaranteed to them and that as a result they had the duty to live life to its fullest every moment.

I believe in discovering fun and pleasurable things wherever I find myself each day and I am told I have a knack for unearthing them. My hope is that by sharing in my pleasures and some of my ways of finding them you will begin to collect all the riches that lie in the moments of your life. They are there. Take them! All our lives should be.....Epic.

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Autumn!

The thermometer dropped into the fifties here yesterday afternoon, announcing the arrival of my favorite season. Autumn has always been special to me, foreshadowing County Fairs, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. Where I grew up, Autumn was a several month celebration. Here, it lasts......oh.......about a week. But I revel in it just the same. As I attempted to show in the lead photo, the sky looks different when it gets "cold". The sun is at a more oblique angle, so the light is different also. Leaves fall, such as they do fall here...


My outside dog, Skippy, who has several impenetrable layers of fur armor, loves it when the subtropical weather leaves us...


Even thought the season has been going on since early September, it is finally the real time for football. Not just for watching the games on television, but for the best football...tossing it about with the Future Rock Star. Yes football is in the chair...


Grilling out has become vastly more fun now that it does not feel that you are part of what is being cooked. And, it has become perfect weather for seasonal beer...

I am always a Wisconsin boy at heart, so I can say that a Marzen style beer like Leinenkugel's Oktoberfest is a fine choice. As it happened, this carton was empty. Shocking. Nothing like a grilled Bratwurst with real German potato salad and sauerkraut to go along with your Oktoberfest mood...


And there may even be room left for one of these...


Ah, the glories of the Autumn season. I read a story long ago, perhaps by Robert Service, in which a wolf had wandered widely from its home in the Northern woods. It survived well enough. But every year when summer passed and the air turned crisp and clear, the wolf would turn its muzzle northward, scent the coming of the season, and feel rejuvenated. As do I.

3 comments:

The Daily Connoisseur said...

I love Autumn. It is not so visible in Southern California- the leaves pretty much remain the same (particularly because we mainly have palm trees here). But there is a perceptible change in the air. It becomes crisp and sharp and I love it. I am roasting a chicken today to celebrate the coming of Fall. Your dog is adorable, btw.

M.Lane said...

Thanks! Old Skippy is a story in himself. He was abandoned at the vet, where we met him.

I had one of the coolest Holiday trips ever when I spent most of a week at the Beverly Hilton just before Christmas. Man, I would like to do that again!

ML

Turling said...

There is always room for "one of those."

Autumn is fantastic. I can't wait to get to it. Hotter then the depths of you-know-where this past weekend. Our autumn doesn't last a week, luckily, it lasts about four months replacing winter.

To get winter, we go to our cabin in the mountains. Just enjoyed Oktoberfest up there. There is something about watching pretty ladies haul around 22 steins of beer in one trip. I choose to lift one at least 22 times. Six of one, half a dozen of another I say.