View from the Mountain

Bright New Year's Eve

Who needs an expensive ball dropping in Times Square when you have a view like Roanoke tonight.?

We may not be going out to a party, but the scenery and company is outstanding since Glenda and I are enjoying a quiet night at home.

Actually I prefer sitting in my easy chair to standing for hours with a drink in my hand waiting for the new year to arrive.

I enjoy parties but unfortunately the New Year comes after it is time for me to go to bed.  We did have an excellent New Year's Eve dinner.  It was Turkey Soup from our twenty plus pounds Christmas Turkey.  The really good new is that even after a couple of bowls for dinner, there was lots left.

Bring on the cold weather.  With this kind of stockpile of Turkey Soup, I can shovel snow off the driveway for days.

This is the first time in long time that our really large soup pot has been called into duty, but I am pleased to say the results were exceptional, and did I mention that we have five quarts left over?

Don't bother asking for a recipe, I think it is one of those cook, taste, add some stuff, cook some more, and add some more stuff until it tastes right recipes.  Only a true Southern cook like Glenda, my wife,  could turn a scary turkey carcass into a delicious meal.

The Depot at Cody Creek

We're suckers for a meal with family members.  The trouble is that we don't have any family in Roanoke.  We had gotten a call earlier in the week about a breakfast with my late mother's extended family.  The trouble was that the breakfast was at 8:00 am a little over two hours away from us so it was a non-starter from the beginning.  Getting on the road at 5:30 am during the holidays is a choice I would not willingly make.

Since we stilled needed to get down for a visit, we planned a trip down the day after the family breakfast.  We thought we would just drive around and visit as many families at possible.  That triggered another event.  These days it takes almost nothing to get everyone interested in eating out, so the suggestion was made that we meet at The Depot at Cody Creek, which is just a few miles south of Dobson, NC on US 601.

We had heard of the Depot for a while.  It has the reputation of being one of the best restaurants in that corner of North Carolina.  You enter off of the highway and follow a small lane through a covered bridge into a beautiful park like area.  We were there early as is a tradition with our family.  Getting to a meal fifteen to thirty minutes late might might be okay in the big city, but in Yadkin and Surry Counties, down in North Carolina, you are supposed to be there fifteen minutes early, and we were.  We were even the next to last to arrive.

The lobby is impressive, with a rustic and functional water wheel with a supporting cast of  stuffed wild animals.  The restaurant has two large dining halls, one with booths and one with tables which easily handle large groups.  I think we had thirteen at our table.  Both Glenda, my wife and I had steaks, my Sirloin was very tender and cooked to perfection.  It was accompanied by an excellent salad, a baked potato,  and  a roll.  The beverage of choice was the wine of the South, sweetened Ice Tea.  It was exceptional.  Our two meals complete with tip was under forty dollars so the meal was also a good value.  As far as I could tell everyone enjoyed their meals which ranged from ribs to chicken.

I was also pleased to hear that at least some of the wood in the tables and the building came from the old wooden buildings of the National Furniture factory in Mount Airy where my father worked for years.

We had eaten early at 5:00 pm but by the time we left at 6:30 pm there were huge crowds of people waiting to be seated.  The Depot looks to be a great place to relax and wait to be called for dinner when the weather is a little warmer.  They have a lot of rocking chairs along their porch.

A short walk away from the Depot there is a country store that runs in the summer.   There is also a chapel which is available for weddings.  Not far from the main dining building, a banquet hall is also being built.

We may get to the point that no one cooks, based on the number of people I see waiting to get into restaurants.  Actually I suspect  that is unlikely to happen in our rural South, but going out to eat is still a great way to get together without a lot of work on someone's part.

I snapped this picture of our extended family. As is often the case, the person who went to the trouble to organize the event, my cousin Jane, ended up being the only person whose face was covered in the picture.

I'll have to make certain that doesn't happen again.  If you're interested in dining at the Depot, the phone number is (336) 386-8222 and the address is 112 Old Depot Lane, Dobson, NC 27017.

The Depot at Cody Creek now has its own website.  http://www.codycreek.net/

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Update 7/10/2006

Another more recent visit to the Depot is chronicled at "The Depot at Cody Creek, Dobson, NC revisited."

 

Pileated Woodpecker

  Pileated Woodpecker 
  Originally uploaded by ocracokewaves.

One of the advantages of living on the side of a mountain is that you get to meet some interesting neighbors.  Perhaps the neighbor whom we often hear but only occasionally see is the Pileated Woodpecker.  I still remember the first time I saw one.  I thought it had flown directly from another time into our world.

A visit from a Pileated Woodpecker doesn't usually last long, but I always feel like something special has happened when I do get to see one.

There was a very good opinion piece in the Roanoke Times this morning by Robert Schultz, a professor at Roanoke College.  I haven't found it on line yet, but it is certainly worth chasing down a paper to read it.  The last paragraph sums up nicely the situation we face today in our government.

At this astonishing moment, when we are witnessing public debated on secret prisons, the definition of torture, and the justification for unrestrained spying on American citizens, it is more important than ever to tell our representatives in Washington what we think.

I was pleased to recently get a letter back from Senator John Warner on an issue that I recently raised.  This is our government, no matter what your opinion is, our leaders need to hear from you.  Now whether or not they listen and how well they listen is something we can express our opinions on the next time we vote.

One issue that keeps coming up is the unrestrained influence of money in our politics.  We're worried about terrorist harming our country, but more and more people are realizing that the real power in this country is unfortunately being centralized in the hands of those who have the connections and money to buy it.

I enjoying reading a number of opinion pieces each day.  The nice thing about opinion pieces is that you can read the ones you like and skim the ones which don't present a good argument for their case.  It's most enjoyable though to see someone just state the facts as they are.  Paul Krugman doesn't pull any punches in this article in the NY Times.

A year ago, we didn't know for sure that almost all the politicians and pundits who thundered, during the Lewinsky affair, that even the president isn't above the law have changed their minds. But now we know when it comes to presidents who break the law, it's O.K. if you're a Republican.

Perhaps it not quite that simple, but it's not far off.

King Kong

We did it, we went to see King Kong.  There should be a rule that movies which are three hours long are not allowed to have twenty minutes of previews.

This movie is full of amazing special effects including a number of graphic spots which some may not like, but it is certainly well done.

The digital animation has gotten so good that it is hard to tell what is real and what has been created digitally.

Kong is an impressive creature.  The mystery island people are pretty scary, and there are plenty of creatures to amuse everyone.

King Kong is a little like Jurassic Park and Raiders of the Lost Ark rolled up together.  This is destined to be a classic.  It's the kitchen sink of the action, adventure movie.

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Update

For a different opinion on "King Kong" try "Surviving King Kong" in Achenblog.

Some will argue it's all great fun, a "popcorn" movie, but popcorn is supposed to be a snack and not the sustenance you require when trapped for much of the day in a dark theater. This is less a movie than an exhibition of film technology..

Well Joel Achenbach's, the author of Achenblog, first mistake was going to the movie during the day.  "King Kong" is definitely a night movie.  I still think it was a nice change from the non-existent television schedule that seems to have settled on the end of December.

The second mistake might be expecting character development in an action thriller more focused on overwhelming us with unbelievable scenes than with showing us the depths of human character development.

I do have to agree with Joel that "King Kong" is an exhibition of film technology, but maybe that's a good enough reason to like it.

Sweet Briar College

The value of an education at a small liberal arts college is often under appreciated.  There's no hiding in the back of the room in a class with 400 students.  You can't be anonymous, you have to participate or die.

I'm sure there's a flip side where everyone knows what you are doing almost all of the time.  Yet I suspect that you make some pretty special friends in a small school where your experience is so intertwined with others.

I first visited Sweet Briar College in 1988.  Technologically it was ahead of many schools.  Computers were even then used by most of the students and faculty members. The computers were also networked at a time when few schools had thought about doing that.

We're proud to have a graduate of Sweet Briar among our children.  You can get a great education in lots of places, I just think the odds of you getting that education increases as the size of the school decreases.  I'm not an expert on "single sex" education, but anecdotal information suggests to me that "single sex" college is not a bad thing and may even be a great thing.

While all schools are businesses, I think scale matters.  Just as many large corporations lose their focus and end up disappointing both customers and employees because of their unmanageable size, I think there is a similar risk of large schools disappointing their faculty and students.  Many will agree that in Division I schools the focus on athletic programs has changed the nature of the collegiate experience.

There are no simple answers in business and education.  Perhaps my experiences with Sweet Briar have colored my views because I know I've also worked with some great employees who have gotten their education from large state schools like Va. Tech.

In the end it may be that an education is what you make of it.  Yet all institutions large and small, business and education, have personalities driven by their culture and their leaders.  Certainly in the world of education some of that personality comes from the success at meeting the needs of students. 

I sure some of the young ladies who pass through the gates at "Checkpoint Charley" at Sweet Briar end up going on to larger schools which offer a difference experience.

I also know from first hand experience that some students from larger schools end up being happier and more successful in an environment like Sweet Briar.

The good news is that colleges like Sweet Briar have made the decision to keep their size at a certain level and the current financial model of higher education allows them to do that as long as the experience they provide is of sufficient quality to attract their target number of students.  The business world isn't often that wise.  Growth is almost always assumed to be good.  The truth could perhaps be somewhat different.  Beyond a certain size a business loses its personal touch with customers unless they have exceptional management.  Mergers and acquisitions often create some not so great stateless ships of the corporate world which really have few rules other than their own survival.

I hope our current higher education model survives.  The variety of higher education institutions from which students can choose from in this country is undeniably one of our remaining strategic assets.