Day 4 : Treasure in the Basement

15 July 2014

Sounds like a Nancy Drew title :)

Due to the weather change, Luv decided to postpone his day-off to the following week since it would be a bit pointless for us to sightsee NYC in the rain. So today is my independent exploration of Morristown day.

Behind the apartment is a Century21 which fulfilled all my discounted shopping needs, but that wasn't the highlight. Further down the road is the Post Office, where I mail my postcards. It's $1.15 for stamps, by the way :)

The grand ol' post office

Well, since I am at it, let me show you some cool sights around the little historical town. First, we have the Morristown Green. According to Wikipedia, it has in the past served as a military base, a militia training ground, and an area for public executions. It is now a public park in which many community events are held. 

"On September 6, 1833, Le Blanc became the last person hanged on the Morristown Green." - Wikimapia

Ulp. Public executions. I'm glad I didn't know about that when I was there. 

My memory and knowledge of the American History is quite stale, but if I'm not wrong, during the American Revolution, General George Washington and his troops wintered in Morristown and restrategised their military plans. There is a statue in the Green commemorating the meeting of George Washington, the Marquis de Lafayette, and Alexander Hamilton, discussing aid of French tall ships and troops being sent by King Louis XVI of France as support for the budding nation. 

Them historically important dudes

Since Morristown is also the home to The Seeing Eye program, across the Green, there is a statue honouring Morris Frank, the founder of The Seeing Eye, and his guide dog, Buddy. And since the town is the home of this program, dogs in training are a common sight. I saw one being trained in Century21 store!

So last but not least, my basement treasure story! I decided to go to the Public Library because, apart from museums, I love libraries. And Morristown has such a pretty one!

How can one not love this?

And lucky me, Tuesdays is Book Sale day! Second hand books donated by the community, but still in pretty awesome condition and even more awesome prices. Took me a while to find the Sale though, which turned out to be in the basement of the library. And after browsing the whole place for hours, I found two books that I've been looking for...and such a bargain!

I got these for $1.50!!! Treasure!

Also I came across some nostalgia while going through the shelves, especially in the Kids' section :)

Flavia de Luce! (how did I get the sixth book in the basement?)

Gaiman, and my all-time favourite: Good Omens :)

The Baby-Sitters Club, oh my!

Yellow jacket Nancy Drew!

I ended my evening at the Green with an apple crumble ice cream from Coldstone Creamery, and my new old book. Luv will be back in a bit, and he is cooking dinner for us tonight! Is this the good life, or what?

Up next: Broadway and a couple of automatons!

♥,

Reusing is Recycling

Like printing on not only both sides of the paper, but also over the previous stuff (especially when it involves drafts of graphs), I like to think that I have put a piece of paper to its full use before transferring it to the recycle pile.

So, remember I have this totally awesome field notebook (photo here) which was in this irreversible disgusting condition since the day I got soaked in the rain in Batu Putih last year during one of my sampling escapades? It has deteriorated since, what with more notes and thumbing through its pages to refer to the data. About a month ago, its back cover fell off, and it had to be held together by a flimsy piece of tape. Recently, part of the book came off its cover.

*sigh*

Although I do rather take pride of its state of deconstruction, I knew I had to do something before I start losing vital pieces of information. And then I had this brilliant idea with an old Starbucks paper bag I found wedged between some books in the shelf!

Voila! Good as new!

My green answer to "What else can I do with a Starbucks paper bag?" :)

And I didn't need to ply myself with drinks to collect stamps for a "Starbucks organiser".

American Gods

One of Neil Gaiman's many masterpieces (I would say my second favourite, after Good Omens which he wrote with Terry Pratchett) in which he spins the tale of long-forgotten gods and goddesses, trying to survive in modern America, competing and battling for worship and belief from the contemporary 'deities' of Technology, Television, and Credit Card.

It is always an interesting read when old-world myths are smoothly blended with modernity. (Of course, if you favour the myth+sci-fi combo, check out Eoin Colfer's And Another Thing... the finale to the ever-popular The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series.)

It is also extremely challenging to guess who the deities are from Mr. Gaiman's descriptions before he reveals their names since his deities came from a broad spectrum of pantheons -- Norse, African, Celtic, Hinduism, etc.

And then, there's The Forgotten God. The one who tweaks every reader's curiousity to the max, pondering "Who could this god be?". The one who is found prominently from pages 281 to 286 of the paperback. Mr. Gaiman wouldn't reveal him. There are forums online discussing who he could be, with curious souls pitting their two cents worth of deductions and theories.

Such irony.

The Forgotten God. The one whom no one recalls.

But everyone remembers.


Any CHANCE per se?