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One hundred twenty one years ago today, President William McKinley was shot by an anarchist while visiting the World’s Fair in Buffalo, NY. Eight days later, President McKinley died of his injuries, and Vice President Theodore Roosevelt became President. Being the scene of a Presidential assassin certainly colors a city’s local lore. Years ago the Buffalo News ran an annual short fiction contest, and in 2007 the contest theme was a story surrounding the events of the assassination. This is the story I submitted. And…it won! *** Ernest Knight tried to conceal his wheezing as he pushed Hilda’s wheelchair up ontoDown the rabbit hole….

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So, the NFL season kicks off next Thursday! And playing in the 2022 season’s very first game are the Buffalo Bills, taking on the defending Super Bowl Champion LA Rams! Wow! It’s been an interesting ride with the Bills in the last five years or so. The fifteen or so years before that were pretty much of an unending era of bad football. Somehow every year the team would manage to do something in the offseason to make fans think “Hey, maybe they’re turning the corner, maybe they finally won’t be crappy this year,” and yet…every year another terrible season. Records like 6-10 andDown the rabbit hole….

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Our summers often pivot on two fairs: the Sterling Renaissance Festival, and the Erie County Fair, which we attended on Friday the 12th. (I would have posted about it sooner, but then that dumbassed virus showed up and put its feet on the furniture and drank from coasterless glasses and got crumbs over everything and was basically just a big asshole.) While The Wife was unable to attend Sterling because of her recent foot surgery, she was able to attend the County Fair, by virtue of a day-long scooter rental. This year we were graced with probably the most perfect weatherDown the rabbit hole….

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One of the things that sticks in my memory most strongly from our trip last December to Oahu is the rainbows. Every day, at least one rainbow. It just became this thing I did every morning: Get up, make the coffee, go out to our balcony, look off to the right, and see a rainbow. I even saw my first moonbow there. Western New York is not nearly so prolific in the rainbow department. But the other night, our WNY skies put on a show. A series of thunderstorms rolled in from Lake Erie, and in their wake, the sunlight did itsDown the rabbit hole….

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Some photos from a recent trek to Knox Farm…. One of my favorite things about walking in the woods is the way the sunlight breaks through in spots, dappling the forest floor in pools of golden light while other spots remain shrouded. Here are several shots of just that: Two shots of the Dumas Bridge, first from the southeast end, and then from the northwest. Same place, same camera, but two different vantage points make for very different moods in the photos!   Share This PostDown the rabbit hole….

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Until yesterday, I had never walked through Delaware Park. In Buffalo, this is almost a kind of heresy. Delaware Park is Buffalo’s equivalent to New York City’s Central Park: it is the biggest of Buffalo’s public parks, the one with the most variety in terms of things to do and see, all of it tucked into an energized urban environment. I’ve driven through or around Delaware Park many times (among other things, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery is on the park’s western edge), but somehow, in all my years of living in The 716, I’ve never actually stopped to spend aDown the rabbit hole….

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Twice in recent weeks I have taken The Dee-oh-gee to Chestnut Ridge on our Sunday adventure-nature walks. Late spring and early summer are great times to go to this particular park, when things haven’t really started to heat up or dry out just yet. From the top of the sledding hill, you have a wonderful view–if it’s clear–of Buffalo and Niagara Falls, ON in the distance. (You can see the full-size version here.) These are from a few weeks ago:   Share This PostDown the rabbit hole….

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Last Sunday, Cane (the Dee-oh-gee) and I went out for a Sunday walk in the park for the first time since December. Why no outings since then? Well, we got back from Oahu just in time for the weather to shift into a much colder and snowier pattern; where the WNY winter until the end of December had been very mild, it pivoted hard in January to being snowy enough and cold enough for Buffalo to take this year’s title as Snowiest City In America. Oof. Plus, there’s the fact that Cane isn’t a spring chicken anymore. He’s 9-and-a-half as IDown the rabbit hole….

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Here’s the scene in my back yard, Sunday, March 27: Ayup. It’s funny about this area: we always get snow this late in the year. One recent year we actually got snow on Mother’s Day, which is still six or seven weeks away. This is not unusual. Granted, snows this late in the year don’t generally pile much on (unless you live in the hillier climes downwind of Lake Erie, areas which are ten to twenty miles south of Casa Jaquandor), but as much as I really do like snow, generally by St. Patrick’s Day I’m emotionally done with the stuff. BeingDown the rabbit hole….

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Two giants of my early eating and drinking life, Tony Marra and Patsy Collins, died in 2021. Patsy ran a bar. Tony ran a restaurant. Patsy’s bar was called The Burton Hotel, or The Burton for short. It’s located on a street corner in Allegany, NY, and it was one of my parents’ favorite watering holes for much of the time they lived down there. I spent quite a lot of time sitting in The Burton with my parents as they quaffed beers and I quaffed grapefruit soda right along with them (at least until I turned 21). I supposeDown the rabbit hole….