A couple of weeks ago, I ran into a neighbor of mine at the grocery store. When I asked her how things were going, she replied, “It’s cold on the creek.”  Compared to recent winters, I guess that’s a fairly accurate statement. My brother Michael, who lives in Galax, arrived in this area in 1988. [...]

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We’ve been in Columbia, MD for the last week or so making arrangements for the care of Anne’s ailing mother. It doesn’t take long to remember why we moved to Wythe County in the first place. The DC metropolitan area is maddening enough to make a Baptist preacher take up drinkin’ and cussin’. Thank goodness [...]

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I don’t know about you, but I’ve been as entertained by winter as I care to be. I’m thinking of changing Chestnut Ridge’s name to Par Mountain because right now, dern near everything around here is below par.

Our humble little cottage is semi-ice bound because I didn’t get the snow guards installed on our nifty [...]

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I’d like to thank all the people Anne and I have heard from in the past ten months for their love and support. Considering everything we’ve been through, to say that this has been an awful year gives new meaning to the word “understatement”. We will never get over the loss of our beloved Beth. [...]

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I’m pretty sure Anne didn’t set out to string the lights on the fir tree in the front yard to resemble a maniacal horror movie killer-clown, I figure she just got lucky. It seems that no one has any chili pepper lights this year, and we need more than the five strands we have. So [...]

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The tough put on wool socks and long johns underneath their jammies. Man oh man has the weather been rough here on the Creek lately. The days have alternated between sunny and cold, overcast and cold, and windy and cold. The nights have just been freezing cold… colder than a witch’s breaststisties. But hey, it’s [...]

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There is something bittersweet about derelict old houses. They evoke a nostalgic curiosity of bygone eras. Who were the people who built these places? What kind of life did they lead? What caused these houses to be abandoned? Was it some kind of tragedy, or worse, the end of a family’s lineage? Maybe it was [...]

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So far, it’s showered about 3 inches worth, and the shower is supposed to last all day. I could take a couple of shots at the folks at the National Weather Service, but that would be like picking on a cripple. Despite all the science, and Viper Radars, and the voodoo hoodoo, weather forecasting is [...]

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Yesterday, I set out to do a little toodling around the backroads and take a few pictures. I slapped Bernie Coveney’s Whispering Pines CD into the player and drove down Red Hollow Road to see what I could see. The weather was turning out to be much better than had been predicted and I [...]

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There’s an old expression I’m sure you’ve heard, “I’d rather be lucky than good.” When it comes to photography, I’m not all that good, but sometimes I’m pretty lucky. I took this photo on my way back from Floyd Saturday afternoon just as the sun was dipping behind the mountain. For just a few seconds, [...]

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