The next meeting of the
Literary Discussion Group,
sponsored by the Women’s
Club of Cooperstown, will
be held on Thursday, Dec.
17 at 2:30 p.m. in the Village
of Cooperstown Library.
The program for the
meeting will be ``Quote Me:
a sharing of favorite
quotes.’’ The meeting is
open to the public.
Sometime back in November
we decided that our
e-mail inbox was in serious
trouble in that it contained
over four hundred e-mails.
Now we will willingly admit
that we have an inclination
to be somewhat of a
pack rat. In fact, we always
find it difficult to throw
something away just in
case we might actually need
it some day. But we did decide
that we needed to weed
out and, heaven forbid, delete
some of the e-mails.
Thus far we have managed
to whittle the list
down to a mere two hundred
or so in the inbox. Of
course, we must admit that
a fair number were saved
in other mail boxes which
we have created such as
CCE and AHH, CCS9, CLE,
E-mail jokes and cards,
Health care, History, INBOX
II, ITOH, Pictures,
Quilting, Sad but true, Village
of Cooperstown and so
forth. So, how much progress
we have really made is
probably open to debate.
Nonetheless, we did discover
some rather interesting
e-mails all of which contained
links to websites,
which provided all sorts of
interesting opportunities
and information. Two of
these, which we call ``Place
the States’’ at http://www.
sheppardsoftware.com/
states—experiment—dragdrop—
Intermed—
State15s—500.html and
``Know the Presidents’’ at
http://videos.komando.
com/2009/01/20/the-uspresidents/,
can definitely
be classified as educational.
And while ``Know the Presidents’’
is simply informative,
``Place the States’’ is a
challenging exercise in putting
all fifty states in their
proper location on a map of
the United States.
Another site, the ``Birthday
Calendar’’ at http://
www.paulsadowski.com/
birthday.asp, ``...tells you
how many hours and how
many seconds you have
been alive on this earth and
when you were probably
conceived.
Then check out your
name. This is more info
than you ever knew about
yourself. After you’ve finished
reading the info, click
again, and see what the
moon looked like the nite
you were born.’’áAnd although
we found this particular
site fascinating, we
think it is perhaps not a
good sign that we share a
birthday with Mary Queen
of Scots.
We also enjoyed ``Roaming
Through Michigan,’’ a
MGM ``Traveltalks’’ movie
short featuring James A.
FitzPatrick, ``The Voice of
the Globe.’’
This gem, which can be
found at http://www.youtube.
com/
watch?v=QMR7veI78f8, is
a fabulous travelogue of
parts of Michigan as we remember
them from our
childhood. And while this
particular website might be
of more interest to those of
us from Michigan, we do
think it is an excellent example
of its genre.
We must hasten to point
out that getting rid of emails
is not our only cleaning
out goal. We are also
trying to weed out stuff in
the house that we have accumulated
over the years.
To this end, we decided, for
what we think is the first
time ever, to ``shop’’ on
Black Friday. Of course we
did our shopping in the
house, picking out a number
of items suitable, from
our perspective at least, for
Christmas giving to the
Ellsworth Ohio contingency.
And we have to say we
had a great deal of fun doing
it.
In fact, we found things
we had quite forgotten we
had. And we can but hope
that the Ohio Ellsworths
will enjoy them as much as,
if not more than, we have.
Of course, giving away
items from the house is not
limited to Christmas giving.
In fact we recently gave
away a 1986 Bicentennial
plate with the bicentennial
logo on it to a friend who, of
course, asked the proverbial
question as to the exact
meaning of the logo.
Fortunately we were
able to dig in our files,
which we note resemble our
inbox and house in many
ways, and find the explanation
of the bicentennial logo
which we wrote back in
1985. During our search for
the logo information we
also found the following
items in our then column,
``Where Nature Smiles.’’
On Sept. 4, 1985 we
wrote: ``...of all the stories
related to us about the
many questions put forth
by visitors to the village,
our favorite has to be the
one heard recently about a
tourist who after lamenting
the water shortage crisis in
New York City inquired,
``How, when it is so dry, do
you keep Otsego Lake full?’’
How indeed.’’ This was followed
on Sept. 11, 1985
with ``Due to the recent rain
fall, the Keep Otsego Lake
Full Bucket Brigade meeting
has been postponed one
week. Time and place remain
the same.’’ At a recent
gathering we shared these
two items with fellow columnist
Jim Atwell who
asked why we had not
pointed out that the buckets
for the Bucket Brigade
were to be filled from various
water taps about the
village. It was an observation
we can only wish had
been ours.
In closing, as we contemplate
reducing the clutter
in which we find ourselves,
we are reminded of a quote
by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
which comes from her book
``Gift From the Sea.’’ She
points out, quite correctly
we think, that ``For the
most part, we, who could
choose simplicity, choose
complication.’’ It is a sentiment
found on a plaque
that we have long had in
our kitchen. It quite clearly
states: ``There is no job too
simple for our staff to complicate.’’
PLEASE NOTE: Comments
regarding this column
may be made by mail
at 105 Pioneer Street, Cooperstown,
NY 13326, by
telephone at 607-547-8124
or by e-mail at
cellsworth1@stny.rr.com.
