Any Pleasure So Lasting

Reading

"No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting."

~ Lady M.W. Montague (1689 - 1762) English aristocrat and writer.

Solar Energy ~ Caledonia Mill

The Caledonia Mill continues to amaze! As environmentally conscious citizens, the guardians of the old mill have installed solar panels.

Attracting hundreds of visitors at Christmas with their light display, the mill folks are forging ahead with twenty-first century technology. Congratulations.

Managed by a non-profit organization established to preserve the mill and promote the arts, the Caledonia Mill sits stoically on the bank of the Grand River, southwest of the Hwy. #6 bridge.

Originally known as the Balmoral Mill this flour mill opened in 1857. The name was changed to the Grand River Mill in 1873, then to the Caledonia Milling Company in 1892.*

Also, see blog posts Dec. 20/09 and Jan. 9/10 for Christmas lights. For larger images, please click on photos.

*Ontario's Historic Mills, The Boston Mills Press, 2007. George Fischer and Mark Harris.

"All Over the Place"

A telephone-book sales-rep recently offered to list The Neat Little Bookshop in their publication. (They had already designed an appropriate profile for promotion on their website.) The rep hesitantly suggested that contrary to our blog which was I quote, "all over the place," their profile would focus only on the bookshop. We could submit monthly updates. We are pleased that someone noticed that we are all over the place.

One of the great pleasures of being in the book business is that there is not a subject that doesn't fall under BOOKS!

Visit The Neat Little Bookshop and be carried away "all over the place."

Neighbouring Norfolk

Tomatoes

Cherries

Ginseng Tobacco

Ginseng is replacing tobacco in our neighbouring Norfolk. A striking difference between Norfolk and Haldimand is attributable, I suppose, to the difference in soil. Haldimand clay does not grow exotic crops. Noticable in the beautiful agricultural acreage of Norfolk, in addition to ginseng, is the vast variety of successful fruit and vegetable crops. There remains the decades-successful tobacco ~ apparently on the come-back! ~ and now the alternatives. Field after field of the most prosperous, colourful July crops one can imagine.

(For larger image, click on photo ~ Lorna)

Your Smile for Today:

"If you are going to throw a club, it is important to throw it ahead of you, down the fairway, so you don't waste energy going back to pick it up."

~ Tommy Bolt, American Professional Golfer (1916 - 2008)
A Round of Golf Jokes, Exley

Haldimand & Area Woodlot Owners Association

"In school they told a story about Johnny Appleseed walking across America planting apple trees." Well, he was doing more..."planting oaks, elm and maples, every kind of tree, aspens, deotars and chestnuts. Instead of making just fruit for the stomach, I am making oxygen for the lungs."

Ray Bradbury's Benjamin Driscoll in The Martian Chronicles, Doubleday, 1950

Habitat Haldimand Inc. and Haldimand & Area Woodlot Owners Association are located next door to The Neat Little Bookshop. This spring our family planted fifty native trees on location of our farm and cottage on Lake Erie. Inquire about Haldimand's reforestation projects for next year. (SOLD OUT FOR 2010.)

http://www.hawoa.com/ also visit, http://www.habitathaldimand.ca/ ~ organizations partnering with the Haldimand Stewardship Council. http://www.ontariostewardship.org/

Modern Postal Service

Renovations are almost complete on the Cayuga Post Office. One now enters a neat, spotless dry-walled room. There is a splashy new door separating the business of mail from the public. (Presumably staff can tell if anyone is waiting in the outer room.)

The staff is the same ~ friendly, small-town, ready-to-assist. However, modern planning challenges the cordial, interactive atmosphere! Somehow, it feels like we have lost something.