My View of Life on the Dock
Just a reminder- the Cape Ann YMCA’s Youth Basketball League sign-ups are going on now. League starts next Saturday!
Game times are as follows:
Dyno-Mites (ages 3.5-5)- 11:30am
Mites (kindergarten)- 10:30am
Rookies (grades 1-3)- 9:30am
In addition to Saturday morning games, this year we will be having optional additional weekly practices and a family movie night! Please contact the Cape Ann YMCA for registration or more information 978-283-0470.
Hi, Joey:
Here we are in our FINAL WEEK… Just four more performances: Thurs, Fri, Sat & Sun at 7pm. (No matinee Sunday). Catch our last show of the season! It’s a doozie!
Also, we’re enrolling now for NEW CLASSES AT THE ANNIE for ALL AGES, starting Tuesday, January 3rd. Check it out: www.TheAnnie.org
I’ll be happy to post them for you here so people can come to your joint if you have anything special going on. Feel free to send in a copy of your menu or price fixe menu, whatever.
Our readership has been emailing like crazy asking what there is to do.
Rockport will be having a grand celebration, you can read about that here
From the Rockport NYE website-
Welcome to NEW YEAR’S ROCKPORT EVE: the web site that is dedicated to celebration. We celebrate the future, the joy of sharing a special evening with family, friends and neighbors and our hope that a New Year will bring good health, happiness and new opportunities.
We will entertain you with clowns, cowboys, magicians, musicians – classical, pop, jazz, Dixieland, folk, country, gospel swing and rock and roll – ventriloquists, dance, drama, puppets, and MUCH, MUCH MORE! And, we have planned a spectacular midnight event that will be a truly memorable welcome to the beginning of a new millennium.
Our buttons ($15 adults, $6 children 12 & under, 3 & under, free–no button needed) are now available.
Cinematographer Extraordinaire Craig Kimberley Is In the Hizzy Y’all
Here’s the thing. There has been a long time Gloucester bar/restaurant that I’d long ago given up on. Not because the food was terrible. Not because the ambiance was nasty. Not because the prices were high. Quite the contrary actually. They served some of the best chowder in town. The prices were reasonable and it’s one of the greatest rooms in town.
The reason I stopped going there over ten years ago and hadn’t gone back was because every single time I went in there I didn’t feel welcome at the bar.
I consider myself a “bar” person. When I say this I don’t mean barfly type of person. What I mean is that if the Mrs and I are out for dinner at a place that has a bar and table seating we will 90% of the time sit at the bar because we enjoy the social aspects of interacting with the bartenders, servers and other patrons. It’s not that we are there to get hammered and as I get older I find myself drinking booze less and less. It truly is all about the social aspects of it.
This particular place which will go unnamed was open last night and as the Mrs told me as I was leaving work that she wouldn’t have any dinner for me, she asked that I pick something up. So I ordered take out and told Ed to meet me for a beer while I waited for my take out to be ready for pick up.
Well we went to this joint that I had long ago sworn off and wouldn’t you know that same vibe that existed ten and twenty years ago still was right there same as it ever was. Not very busy and it took about five minutes to get a beer, whatever no big deal but asking what I’d like to drink was about the extent of the interaction I had with the entire staff despite sitting right at the end of the bar where the waitresses were passing by to pick up drinks one after another.
Let me just explain it for the owners of these places. I may be the exception and not the rule but I can deal with so –so food. I can deal with slightly above average prices IF you just go a little teeny tiny out of your way and make me feel welcome.
I’m not asking for a hand crank. I’m not asking for a blowjob. Just make me feel the slightest bit like you appreciate my business or want me there. Because you know what?
THERE ARE WAY TOO MANY GREAT FUCKING RESTAURANTS IN THIS TOWN THAT DO JUST THAT.
It’s part of the hospitality game. I don’t care if you’ve been tending bar for 30 years and am burn out. Act like a professional or get another job. Or if you are the owner of this type of place and notice your staff isn’t interested in making your guests feel welcome, you might want to do a little motivational speaking and if that doesn’t work replace them.
This place should be doing at least double the business they are doing.
It had been ten years since I’d stepped foot in there and it will be a whole lot longer til I go back. I can assure you.
Thank you.
On my walk thru Seine Field this morning I stumbled across someone’s
electric candle lit path from the night before. The dogs and I
followed it, and found that it led just off the trail to a small
opening. Someone had planted a Christmas Tree and adorned it with
battery powered lights. Next to it lay an engraved stone marking the
person’s tree and the date. There were rose petals and the remains of
a little ambience which got me thinking about the ceremony which must
have accompanied this scene. As a former arborist of 12 years, I
completely encourage this kind of Christmas Tree Tradition. Anyway,…
A Christmas Blessing: May Steph’s Tree Grow Tall and Strong and Greet
Many Sun Rises on the Back Shore.
Tyler Knight
Cape Ann SUP
At age 15 Tuffy was on his own, supporting himself fishing-
Tuffy Now
Mamie’s Kitchen is located across from St Ann’s Church. Alicia, the owner told me to let people know if they want a buttload of the world’s greatest coffee rolls, to call ahead and she can prepare them and have ‘em all ready for your office.
When we posted that picture of the world’s greatest coffee roll last week she got swamped!
The World’s Greatest Coffee Roll (not even debatable)-
Joey,
Jenn just showed me your new GMG sticker, which has a black and white homie. It reminded me of the attached photo I took this spring in Jensen Beach, FL. The best looking gull I’ve ever seen. It’s a Laughing Gull in summer plumage.
Bob Cullen
Coming up on my first time off in 8 months and I’m looking for some book recommendations.
Let me tell you what I’m not interested in reading-
Murder mysteries, true crime mafia books, how-to books, I’m not interested in any history books or anything like that.
In the past my favorite books were mafia books, but I’d read about Whitey and Sammy The Bull and Gotti and I’d lose a little bit of faith in humanity every time I read those true crime books. Not exactly feel good stories.
I’m looking for the male versions of Chelsea Handler- comedy. Last year the Mrs had one of Chelsea’s books and I couldn’t put it down and literally busted out laughing every time I turned the page.
So does anyone have any suggestions for some humorous books for light reading?
What, you thought I was gonna waste time getting a camera into her hands?
See there’s always an ulterior motive. Get her a camera for a Christmas present and put her to work right away. Boom. That just happened.
The City’s Website is much much improved over what it was a couple of years ago.
here is the info directly from the site found here
click the photo to see it larger.
Know how tough it is to get the detail in those clouds with the sun bearing down the barrel of your lens? Not many do it better than Brian.
Check out Brian’s Site Here
The timelapse I did the other day was performed differently. I took video footage, imported it into windows live movie maker and sped it up 32 times.
Molly set her camera up using an intervalometer, taking lots and lots of still photos taken at a specific time apart, imported those into iMovie, stitched them together to make a timelapse of photos.
Very cool.
My clouds one below, Molly’s lobster boats leaving the harbor one above.
Shot with the new Camera. On a tripod. 24mm f/1.8 24p 1080.
Banged this out quick. Looking forward to doing more!
Hi Joey,
I thought some of your readers might be interested in following the travels and adventures of my son, Corey Wrinn, a junior at Rockport High School, who is an exchange student in Potsdam, Germany. (Some might know him from RHS JV basketball and baseball.) He has been in Potsdam attending Leibniz-Gymnasium school (http://www.leibniz-gymnasium.de/de/home/index.html) since August and will return back to Cape Ann in June 2012. He’s put together a blog to chronicle his experience. His exchange program is run by the Rotary International Club, which has provided tremendous support for him and the other exchange students in that region. They also organize side trips, which has given Corey the opportunity to explore some of the neighboring countries.
As you can imagine, taking science, math and Spanish classes in German can be quite challenging, but he has picked up the language very well and is able to speak and understand much better these days. I’ve attached his photo. The link to his blog is: http://meineabenteuerindeutschland.blogspot.com.
Lots of L O V E to you this Christmas Eve!
Blessings from Thailand, hoping you are enjoying good health, good love and all the goodness life has to offer.
Enjoy the good moments of each day.
Much love and PEACE!
Good Morning Gloucester 