24 December 2006
Crystal Coast | 31 December 2006 | 17 December 2006

The steel is up for the Cape Carteret Lowes home improvement store

30-Dec-2006 19:28
Lowes
I've been away from the local scenery for a few days. The first thing I noticed after coming back into town the other day was that the Lowes now has a steel skelton. I'm looking forward to having a Lowe's home center that close, but I sure hope our local hardware and building supply places can find a niche to help them survive. Part of what has attracted me to this area is the number of small businesses. While having a Lowe's close by is very convenient, it does not beat the friendly helpful service that you get in your local hardware store. The challenge is achieving a balance of growth and keeping services that have helped the area to grow to what it is today.

This was another stellar day for weather here on the Crystal Coast. The temperatures were at least in the mid-sixties by mid-day, and kids were outside playing like it was srping. It was the first time since my blogging injury that I took the gamble of going for a bike ride. It was great to get out of the house again and back onto my bike. It's pretty hard to complain about weather like this. Later in the day after watching Boston College slip by Navy on a last second field goal, we went for a walk. While walking, we came up a group of kids being trailed by a neighborhood mom. She told us the kids were on a cat tracking expecittion. Now that's a profitable way to spend a warm winter afternoon.

Anytime we are thrity degrrees warmer than my friends in Canada, it is a day to celebrate. Now if they would just get some snow, the picture would be perfect.
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Don't you miss the mountains and the view?

28-Dec-2006 19:14 Filed in: Roanoke
Valley View
It's funny how you find people at the beach who have a mountain place and people in the mountains who have a place at the beach. We have lived on the side of a mountain in Roanoke County, Virginia for over seventeen years. The view of the city of Roanoke and the mountains surrounding it is spectacular. You can even see more shots taken from my deck by clicking on this link to my mountain sunrise prints.

I absolutely love having a mountain view, but I find it hard to fault the coastal view that we have. I actually love driving around capturing some of the coastal scenery which as far as I am concerned does a a very good job standing up to the competition of the mountain prints.

Drop by my Picasa web albums site to have a look at some of the shots that I have captured just in the last few months.

Most of our life we have lived with a view of something besides the trees around us. Only when we lived in Columbia, Maryland were we so surrounded by poplar trees that we couldn't see anything. It felt claustrophobic.

Living on the North Carolina coast is totally different. The views are almost unlimited. In fact some of my favorite shots are of views where the scenery seems to fade into infinity. This shot of the beach at Cape Lookout is of a view that it is so big that it makes you feel small. I absolutely love those shots where the water and sky combine to dwarf you.

So I guess the answer is no I don't miss the mountain scenery. I still get to see plenty of it. However, right now I am enjoying the impressive scenery that the Southern Outer Banks has to offer. When I ride across the bridge to Emerald Isle and cross over the Intercoastal Waterway, it still almost takes my breath away it's so beautiful early in the morning or late in the afternoon. I don't think the mountain scenery is any better than the coastal scenery. They both stand on their own merits. There is plenty of room for enjoyment of both. In my case I'll just stick some mountain prints in our coastal house and some coastal prints in our mountain house. We may not have two houses for long, but as long as we do, we'll keep the wall filled with prints which I enjoy creating. If you're interested in purchasing any visit my print site.

Today over at View from the Mountain I talked about a trip we made to Mount Airy, NC or Mayberry as it is often called. It's our homeplace. I also did a post on my Applepeels blog about the atmosphere at Apple which probably contributed to the deepening Apple options backdating scandal.

On my blogger site, Ocracokewaves, I did a write-up about corporate ethics in America.
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