suns along the Mohawk

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It took a John Deere backhoe under my bay window at 7 AM this morning to remind me that there are many things far more annoying than a noisy cricket behind the refrigerator.

My friends can tell you that I’ve been a bit obsessed this week about a perennial sign of summer’s end at my Stockade home: the arrival, and 24/7 chirping, of a love-starved, refuge-seeking cricket in the inaccessible (and sound-amplifying) kitchen space behind my refrigerator.  In recent years, I’ve memorialized this autumn invasion, and attempted to sublimate my frustration, in haiku poems posted at my other weblogs (collected today at dagosan’s haiku diary).  This year, despite being reminded by a few bleeding hearts that crickets bring luck, and in spite of empathy toward his plight, I’ve been feeling even less charitable than usual toward the raucous chirping of the female-seeking cricket in my kitchen (only the males can chirp).

After a night of teeth clenching that I blamed on that damnable cricket, I sat at my desk with a big mug of coffee first thing this morning, planning to follow Frasier’s example by finding a gecko to end my cricket misery.   All thoughts of cricket-hunting were immediately dispelled, however, when an intolerable racket began outside the window located just a couple feet from my desk (see the photo above).  I immediately knew the source of the audio assault — the return to Washington Ave. of the utility crew we told you about in June and July, in “my NiMo sunset” and “a different orange glow.”   More precisely, the return to the corner of Cucumber Alley and Washington Ave. — and thus directly under my bay window — of the gas-pipe-laying men and machines of National Grid.

– here are a few shots from early this summer at Cucumber Alley –

. .  . .

Yes, it does seem far-fetched that a mere two blocks of Washington Avenue here in the Stockade have required an entire season of digging and laying and ripping and pouring, but it’s true.  I cannot duplicate the sound of their “street maintenance” activities around 7 A.M. this morning, but I can show you the scene out my window and at the corner [also note the backhoe at the top of this posting; and click on each picture for a larger version, or scroll over it for a brief description]:

. . . .

– new asphalt being laid at Cucumber Alley and Washington Ave. –

The end may soon be near for this well-intentioned and overdue infrasture-improvement project.  The piles of brick removed for the project along the curb might even be restored to their original patterns before the Walkabout next weekend.  None too soon, and hallelujah.

But, I won’t set my expectations too high and will accept our fate as it unfolds along Washington Avenue.  What I want to do this evening — especially if the street repair noise is finally over at my corner — is to thank the men from National Grid for distracting me from my week-long thoughts of insecticide.  Indeed, I don’t want to jinx myself, but all that racket this morning might have persuaded my horny cricket friend to seek a setting more conducive to gryllidae courting and romance.  If I haven’t been that lucky, and my chirpy friend returns this evening, I’ll be complaining again with an Update in the morning.

update (9 AM Saturday, Sept. 19, 2009): No chirping for at least 15 hours.  Frankly, I almost miss the pesky little guy and really could use some good luck.  Something tells me he’s been playing Alley Cricket overnight looking to get lucky and he’ll soon return to my safe and warm kitchen.

afterthought (Sept. 20, 2009):  What do you do with an annoying pest? Swat it?  Put it outside? There’s a timely Sunday comic strip today from The Middletons.

. . . .   

It looked like an historic moment, around 1 PM this afternoon, at the corner of Washington Avenue and Cucumber Alley.   There stood Beth Petta with the much-anticipated Cucumber Alley – Stockade Historic District sign.  Although running late for a lunch date, I hurried inside to fetch my Canon camera, hoping to capture the event digitally.   After taking a few shots, I headed to lunch, thinking I’d find the new signs duly affixed to the pole on my return, and that I’d post the results here for all to see.

Beth and the new signs were gone, however, when I got back home at 3 PM.   My faulty assumptions left me a little disappointed, with only half a tale to tell.   When I downloaded the 1 P.M. photos to my computer, I noticed that the second sign brought by Beth was not Washington Avenue.  That should have been my first clue.

I’ll update this post with the information, as soon as Beth lets me know just what they were doing today with the signs, and the anticipated schedule for installation of the Historic District street signs, .  If you would like to learn more about the history and details of this “adopt a sign,” self-paid project, see Beth’s article on page 3 of the January Stockade Spy, “Stockade Street Sign Project Finally a Go!” (pdf.).  After all her work on this project, I’m certain Beth will be even more excited than I when the signs are finally in place.

update (Sept. 11, 2009):  Beth writes this morning that “yes, there’s activity again…finally.  still some details to be worked out…but i promise you it’s worth the wait to get it right. also, the city is doing the installation. yesterday was a fact finding day.”

follow-up (May 14, 2010): You’ll find lots of photos at our post “historic district signs arrive along Front St.”

afterword (Sept. 10, 2010):  It took exactly a year, but the Cucumber Alley and Washington Ave. sign went up today.  Read about it and see the pictures here.