![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7via http://ift.tt/2bhBc5k:
Dude came out and visited me for the weekend, which meant I looked at my computer for a matter of minutes over the course of the entire weekend, instead of like, an hour, which is more my usual speed lately (as opposed to the like twenty hours I normally spend on my computer on a weekend!!!).
Anyway. I’ve written nothing, I’ve thought about almost nothing, I’ve been running around. At least I’m sort of healthy; I survived the awful heat/humidity thing we’ve been having lately.
I left my camera in Dude’s car and he just left to drive back to Buffalo, though, so – none of my photos of this weekend will be showing up anytime soon. We went to Bennington VT and discovered that it’s the anniversary of the Battle of Bennington. I was rather proud of myself that off the top of my head I was able to tell Dude the short version of not only the conflict but also its longer-term outcomes for the conflict overall– 1777, late summer, Burgoyne is on his way down from Canada trying to split New York in half and meet up with the troops occupying NYC, and he stalls out in northern NY and sends off a sizable raiding party, mostly Hessian mercenaries, to go seize supplies and weapons from a supply depot in Bennington VT. The raid fails; they are headed off about 10 miles away in Wallomsac (Hoosick Falls), in NY, by a larger US/Continental/NH force (and some Vermonters fighting under their own flag because this was the wild frontier). Not only did they not get the supplies, but they lost the Hessians, either killed or captured. It was a devastating blow to Burgoyne, not least because his Native American allies mostly took it as a sign that this war was not going to be the easy reconquest the British had promised, so they mostly fucked off to go back to handling their own concerns, leaving Burgoyne without local allies. This set him up for defeat in October at the Battle of Saratoga.
In turn, that defeat was a major turning point for the US gaining international recognition, and is largely why France sent aid, and why the US eventually won the war.
I knew all that off the top of my head (except I couldn’t remember when the battle of saratoga was; a couple of months later, but I had thought the battle of Bennington was much earlier in the year so I was astonished to discover that the whole town was basically shut down to celebrate the anniversary of it; as a kid I mostly visited Saratoga’s battlefield in summer so in my head the battle must have been in the summer, and it absolutely was not) so I was very very smug about all this the entire time we were at the monument. I am a delight, I promise you. But, I mean. This stuff all happened like ten miles from where I grew up and my mom was a huge nerd about it– actually both parents were huge nerds about it, I exist because they met doing re-enactments for the Bicentennial– so like. It makes sense. I’ve just been so dumb lately that it sort of blew my mind that I Still Know Stuff OMG.
Anyway. So, there’s that tiny shaft of light. All else is sort of dark; I’m behind on everything, there’s correspondence in scattered piles all around that i haven’t answered, I’m sure that there’s even more that I read and said “oh hm yes” and was delighted by or interested in or whatever and formulated a response only in my head and so have never answered but believe i have. Etcetera.
I haven’t forgotten about Poe and Finn and Kes, and the Internet, I just haven’t had time to do anything about it.
Dude came out and visited me for the weekend, which meant I looked at my computer for a matter of minutes over the course of the entire weekend, instead of like, an hour, which is more my usual speed lately (as opposed to the like twenty hours I normally spend on my computer on a weekend!!!).
Anyway. I’ve written nothing, I’ve thought about almost nothing, I’ve been running around. At least I’m sort of healthy; I survived the awful heat/humidity thing we’ve been having lately.
I left my camera in Dude’s car and he just left to drive back to Buffalo, though, so – none of my photos of this weekend will be showing up anytime soon. We went to Bennington VT and discovered that it’s the anniversary of the Battle of Bennington. I was rather proud of myself that off the top of my head I was able to tell Dude the short version of not only the conflict but also its longer-term outcomes for the conflict overall– 1777, late summer, Burgoyne is on his way down from Canada trying to split New York in half and meet up with the troops occupying NYC, and he stalls out in northern NY and sends off a sizable raiding party, mostly Hessian mercenaries, to go seize supplies and weapons from a supply depot in Bennington VT. The raid fails; they are headed off about 10 miles away in Wallomsac (Hoosick Falls), in NY, by a larger US/Continental/NH force (and some Vermonters fighting under their own flag because this was the wild frontier). Not only did they not get the supplies, but they lost the Hessians, either killed or captured. It was a devastating blow to Burgoyne, not least because his Native American allies mostly took it as a sign that this war was not going to be the easy reconquest the British had promised, so they mostly fucked off to go back to handling their own concerns, leaving Burgoyne without local allies. This set him up for defeat in October at the Battle of Saratoga.
In turn, that defeat was a major turning point for the US gaining international recognition, and is largely why France sent aid, and why the US eventually won the war.
I knew all that off the top of my head (except I couldn’t remember when the battle of saratoga was; a couple of months later, but I had thought the battle of Bennington was much earlier in the year so I was astonished to discover that the whole town was basically shut down to celebrate the anniversary of it; as a kid I mostly visited Saratoga’s battlefield in summer so in my head the battle must have been in the summer, and it absolutely was not) so I was very very smug about all this the entire time we were at the monument. I am a delight, I promise you. But, I mean. This stuff all happened like ten miles from where I grew up and my mom was a huge nerd about it– actually both parents were huge nerds about it, I exist because they met doing re-enactments for the Bicentennial– so like. It makes sense. I’ve just been so dumb lately that it sort of blew my mind that I Still Know Stuff OMG.
Anyway. So, there’s that tiny shaft of light. All else is sort of dark; I’m behind on everything, there’s correspondence in scattered piles all around that i haven’t answered, I’m sure that there’s even more that I read and said “oh hm yes” and was delighted by or interested in or whatever and formulated a response only in my head and so have never answered but believe i have. Etcetera.
I haven’t forgotten about Poe and Finn and Kes, and the Internet, I just haven’t had time to do anything about it.
