More fall walks in the woods this week have gotten me thinking about one of my favorite fall poems (that’s the downside - or the upside - depending on how you look at it - of walking in the woods with me. I tend to randomly quote lines of poetry when inspired by the beauty of nature or a particular season. Or when, for no particular reason, I’m just feeling poetic).

ANYway, I thought I’d share it with you - it really is entirely reciteable anytime you’re gazing at the beauty of fall in the NW - the leaves of the trees on Mt Scott, the pumpkins on Suavie’s Island, the apples in Hood River….whatever.

A Vagabond Song

by Bliss Carman

There is something in the autum that is native to my blood - touch of manner, hint of mood; and my heart is like a rhyme, with the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.

The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry of bugles going by. And my lonely spirit thrills to see the frosty asters like a smoke upon the hills.

There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir; we must rise and follow her, when from every hill of flame she calls and calls each vagabond by name.

My mom and my little sister and I went for a fall walk in the woods today around our house in the Gorge. It was so gorgeous! (Gorge-ous?) All the leaves are just coming into the peak of their color, although they’re not quite there yet - reds, yellows, purples, oranges, and the ones that come out half red and half yellow. My mom and I came to the conclusion that it must be the sun that turns the Vine Maple leaves red, because the ones in our woods (higher up on the mountain and in the shade) are always only yellow, or even kind of a whiteish shade, whereas the ones further down the mountain, and the ones that are in the sun, are red.

OH, and not to get off the subject, but my family also carved about 15 pumpkins Sunday!!!! They were so great - we got them fresh from a neighbor’s pumpkin patch in Corbett this year, and they were some of the best we’ve ever had! They were really easy to carve, for one, and they had a TON of seeds!!! Especially the little ones - those little suckers were STUFFED with seeds! And they fried up really good too - nice and crispy and crunchy and easy to chew. The only bad thing was that the rain set in right after we carved them, and since we always set our pumpkins out on our back porch, I think the rain and the moisture kinda made them turn soft a little early, so the tops are already falling in on some of them, especially the little ones. MAN I hate that.

My family and I have been watching our usual slew of “Halloween” movies this week. We have a variety of these on DVD/VHS, most of which I have literally watched every single year of my life since I was like 4. My dad taped them off TV back in the mid-80’s and they’ve been a part of our Halloween tradition ever since!

Most of them are Disney - Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman, all the old Halloween Donald Duck cartoons, etc. And then there’s this one really cool special that was only on one year, in like ‘87 or something, and it’s a mix of all these clips from the old Disney cartoons and animated movies spliced together with rock and roll “Halloween-themed” music, like “Bad Moon Rising” by CCR, “The Monster Mash,” etc. It’s WAY cool and we love it to death.

And then there’s “It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown” and an old Halloween Garfield cartoon.

And of course all the classic full-length movies like “Arsenic and Old Lace” with Cary Grant, “Blackbeard’s Ghost” with Peter Ustinov and Dean Jones, and “The Ghost and Mr Chicken” with Don Knotts.

And it goes without saying that none of the above can be properly watched without a mug of hot spiced cider and plenty of roasted pumpkin seeds, popcorn, and candy corn to go around!

~sigh~ I love fall…..

AAAAHHHH, fall in the gorgeous Northwest!! And what a great weekend we have in store…..chilly and sunny….

I think I might love the mornings in the fall the best, when all the mist is just rising off the fields in spots like Canby and Ridgefield, and the sun is breaking through it, and maybe there’s a little frost on the ground….

My neighbor Dave in Corbett was generous enough to donate a ton of pumpkins and squash and those cute little gourds with all the stripes from one of his fields to my family, so right now our front porch looks like a pumpkin patch! Ha! I can’t wait to carve them (the pumpkins, I mean!) - my family always carves up about 10 of them and we light them up every night leading up to Halloween, while we watch our “Halloween movies,” like Disney’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” I’ve been watching that one every year since I was about 3 years old!

What are your fall traditions? Call me tonight and let me know!

503-733-5000 or 1-800-533-KUPL

Well, what did you think of the first and only vice presidential debate?

I realized again tonight how much I respect Sarah Palin for her down-home, no-frills, no-big-words, straight-to-the-point views on the issues. She’s so common sense and down to earth about everything, and I love her for it. I felt like it could be me up there answering those same questions the same way.

I did think though that tonight she could have gone into more specific detail when answering some of the questions, it kind of seemed like she kept using the “retoric” about Joe Biden looking to the past instead of to the future as a bit of a crutch when she COULD have fought back with some more specific and factual arguments.

But I honestly feel that what Sarah may lack in eloquence and experience, she more than makes up for in intelligence, grit, courage, and solid, straight-forward values and beliefs.

Mack from Portland called me tonight on the air and compared Sarah Palin to Ronald Reagan in that he was also inexperienced when he took over the White House, but surrounded himself with seasoned staff to ensure good leadership.

I agree completely - I think that, like Reagan, even though she obviously doesn’t have the experience of some, Sarah Palin has a strong moral code, and a strong, healthy, working ”common sense” to her credit that will be totally sufficient for her in her role as Vice President, or even as President were it to come to that, and that experience in the White House will only enhance.

What did you think of the debate? Call or email me or visit the chat page and let me know!