This and that

I'm going to catch up a bit on photos - I just downloaded photos from the iPhone on to the computer, going back a couple of weeks.

The "young folks" table at the Feinland Seder - l. to r., Jacob, Tamar, Ben and Nathan

Betsey's grave with Easter pansies

Shirley's grave with daffodils which were perfect for Easter

Historian Jill Lepore at a talk at the Brooks Memorial Library Sunday evening

 Jill Lepore is an historian of U.S. history at Harvard and a writer for the New Yorker. She has just published a one-volume history of the U.S. titled These Truths. She gave a very engaging illustrated talk at the library to a packed house. We bought the book to read on our next road trip.

New leaves on Rte. 30 today

We went to the Osher lecture this morning, which is part of the "Good Clash" series - today was on capital punishment (last week was "guns" and the week before "abortion"). Today was particularly invigorating. We are basically attempting to look at both sides of these "wedge" issues and understand why they are so polarizing in our society. We learned today that New Hampshire, which is historically a conservative state, has abolished the death penalty by a veto-proof margin in the legislature. (The legislature is controlled by Democrats; the governor is a Republican. However, many Republicans supported the bill in the legislature).

After Osher we drove north to Grandma Miller's bakery in Londonderry and got Morning Glory muffins - my favorites. It was a lovely, sunny day and the new leaves were that beautiful shade of spring green - a lovely ride.

This evening, our neighbor, Zach Grover, came to the house and reported on a hearing that was held last Tuesday at the town office concerning a permit for his home-based construction business which one of our neighbors is contesting. We were not able to attend the hearing because it fell on a rehearsal night for River Singers. There are good arguments on both sides but it sounds like he'll probably get the permit with some conditions. We basically support him because he has been very helpful to us and the activity at his property does not intrude into our lives visually or aurally. It has unquestionably changed the neighborhood, however, so it is probably not surprising that someone is upset.