Everything is worth a sniff

Buddy can't take five steps without sniffing something. It doesn't matter if it is grass, another dog's handiwork, old bubble gum, garbage, everything gets sniffed.

Yet more of those big old houses

Below are a few more of the beautiful homes that appear all over the place in Kew Gardens. Now that Buddy and I are walking around the neighborhood regularly, I'm admiring these houses more and more. Why can't the builders of today's cookie-cutter mc'mansions make houses as nicely as these. Are they really that much more costly to build? I have a feeling that well-to-do buyers would pay the difference in return for a well made home. They are all 80 to 100 years old.

The evening constitutional walk

Now that Buddy has joined the family, I'm walking around my neighborhood a lot these days. I used to like to take long walks here years ago but life seemed to get in the way of that lately. Its good to get to stretch my legs again every evening, weather permitting.

Kew Gardens is filled with beautiful old homes. The neighborhood was founded as a planned community about one hundred-twenty years ago by a wealthy NY lawyer who wanted a country style atmosphere to live in. The idea was to recreate the English garden suburb here in the USA. That way, people could still be close to their jobs without being shoehorned into cramped urban housing. This is a small sample of the sort of houses you see around here. Some date from the ninteenth century and I believe that none are much newer than the twenties. The odds that I will ever be able to afford one of these beauties is close to zero but its still nice to admire them.





















Pretty nice for New York City, I think.


Well, time to get home now.





Not quite the palace that the others are but I love the old place just the same.

Another Great Game at Shea Stadium

And lastly, through the bull pen



Past the dugout on the way out.



Behind home plate


And off Jordan goes!



After the game, the Mets let the kids run the bases. They do this a few times every season. Never fails to get a big turnout.


Man Shea was packed. Over 48,000 in attendance. Almost a full load. Then again, the Mets are in first place for a change and are playing incredibly well.






Our seats were way up in the bones of the mezzanine section. Haven't sat here for years.





The New Yorker's way of getting to the stadium

Wow! What a game. Mets beat the Braves 6-5 in a ninth inning squeaker. Home runs all over the place, a double steal at one point. Really good play. One potentially disturbing note, Mets starter Zambrano started the second inning with a K and then abruptly left the game. Looked like an injury to me. Hopefully he's all right.

Off to Shea! :-D Looks like a great day in the works. Zambrano is starting which could be trouble. Who knows? Maybe he'll get it together.