Rolling to Climax

TANKS TO ROLL? According to unconfirmed reports, the Peckham Materials oil tanks that currently inhabit a piece of the riverbank on the north end of Athens are going to be moved. No longer are they needed for getting fuel from or two water-borne tankers. They will be shifted to a site along the Conrail tracks.  In the words of a neighbor, this thrilling prospect means the removal of “horrible carbuncular objects that mar the banks of the Hudson,” thereby enhancing the qualify of life for local residents.

Could the tanks that repose at Catskill Point be next to go? That would be so excellent.

ALLIED, at a sun-drenched, balmy ceremony last Saturday on Maude Adams Road in Tannersville: the Thomas Cole National Historic Site in Catskill with the Mountain Top Arboretum. The Arboretum will contribute expertise and materials to the TCNHS’s gardens at Cedar Grove, in aid of representing there what existed there 150 years ago. The ambitious restoration effort already is under way, thanks to grants procured by the Cole Site board, plans drawn up by eminent landscape artist Robert Toole, and implementation supervised by Cole Site Trustee Robin Smith. On behalf of the Arboretum, Larry McCaffrey and Joan Kutcher dilated on the natural affinity of Thomas Cole’s art with the beauty of the mountain scenery that he lovingly explored and painted. In hailing the partnership, Cedar Grove chairman Lisa Fox Martin recalled that Thomas Cole “regularly traveled on foot or carriage from his Catskill home to experience the majesty of your mountains with sketchbook in hand, returning to his studio, where…he forged a new approach to painting a quintessentially American landscape…. Cole said ‘All nature is new to art,” and it still is.” A Seeing Greene reporter attended the party, and returned with this advice for GreeneLanders: GO SEE THE ARBORETUM.  www.mtarbor.org mtarbor@mhonline.net 589-3903

“FOR RESCUING me, he got a 30-day suspension.” That quote could be one way of launching a long, zig-zagging story about a boat mishap on the Hudson, 911 calls, clashes among firefighters, booze, mediation efforts, assaults, cover-ups, nasty blogs, State agency shake-ups, consolidation without conciliation, and and.

9=number of grandchildren who, along with 10 parents and sundry friends, will congregate this weekend to mark a certain GreeneLander's descent into geezerhood.  Or codgerdom.    

SATURDAY (8/18)

Hunter Mountain: Celtic Festival (bands, bagpipers, caber tossing, authentic products). And again on Sunday. www.huntermtn.com

Tannersville: "Great Perennials for Mixed Borders" identified by nurseryman Bob Hyland, former vice president of Horticulture & Operations at Brooklyn Botanic Garden, at Mountain Top Arboretum, 11am.  www.mtarbor.org

Catskill: “Saturday Studios”=debut of a new promotional drive by the new Gallery Owners’ Association. Most shops and restaurants will be open. Among special events, starting at about 5pm: a tasting reception at DREAM, with Naima and her belly-dancing students performing on the street. “Uncovered: Nude But Not Rude” works at M (www.mgallery-online.com ; we had a preview; they are excellent). “Flashpoint”=photos, encaustics & collages by Gail Greg, at Gallery 384. . “Playing Outside”=interpretations of local landscape, by Dina Burstyn and Julie Chase, at The Open Studio. A new show, plus wine and “lovelies,” at Beginner’s Mind; “Changing Landscape”=works by Henry Snell, Howard Gay, Seymour Remenick, Charles Shearer and Edwin Brent, at Terenchin Fine Art. “Cowgirls 2”=works by many female artist, continuing at BRIK (with music?).  And poetry, declaimed up & down Main Street, as well as at the All Arts Matter competition in Books & More (347 Main). Live music at Catskill Point (Tequila Mockingbirds; Bobby Farris Band) and The Creekside (Watt 4; from 10pm). And don’t forget the cats.

DIRTY TRICKS DEPT. Newspapers sell classified advertisements by the column inch, and the columns containing the ads often are narrower than the columns in the rest of the newspaper. In The Daily Mail, for example, page 1 offers news across 6 columns; but in the classified pages there are 9 columns. To this practice The Daily Mail adds text-stretching, , so that a whole line is devoted to “the” or to

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 A line saying “Name of Limited Liabili-“ is followed by a line consisting entirely of

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Another line is apt to consist wholly of

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NIMBY NEWS

• ”It’s always an amazing thing for our family,” said his granddaughter to The Houston Chronicle, “whenever we are out among [John Wayne’s] fans, because he’s almost been dead for 30 years.”
• ”Boyfriend Of Slain Woman Found in NYU Building Charged With Murder” says headline on Web site of station New York 1.
• ”When the water rises, as it does year after year to varying degrees,” according to a recent New York Times article, “Indian peasants are ritually stranded.”
• The adult film “Debbie Does Dallas” is being adapted for a musical performed at the Edinburgh Festival. The producer’s “main concern,” according to The Guardian, “is whether Debbie should be seen having sex. ‘I don’t want it to be offensive,’ he said, ‘but we need a bigger climax’.”

 --from World Wide Words.