It’s been a glorious few days up in the Berkshires. The weather has been perfect. We took a great walk in a city park in Pittsfield, though you wouldn’t know it’s urban: fields galore and wooded trails. Springside Park.

Nice walk yesterday before our concert at Music Mountain, near Falls Village, CT. Ran into this old fella. Hi Buddy. Hang in there!

The concert was terrific. The Penderecki String Quartet (that’s a soft c, so the pronunciation ends in “ski”). Phil got a little artsy with this shot — the place will do that to you.

It’s been sawing away for 40 years, 15 with these four members. The violinist on the right has been a member for 39 of the 40. Here’s a 2-minute taste.

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Solid burgers at the Water Street Grill on the first night with a fine pilsner, and a terrific Chicken Francese with an excellent specialty pizza at the Roasted Garlic last night, which was packed: we were lucky to get a table. A fine Fiddleheads Ale was on tap. (Burp!) Here’s the still-to-be-eaten half. Nestled under the arugula atop the excellent crust are figs, goat cheese, prosciutto, and red onions. SRSLY.

Our activity upon arrival on Saturday was a terrific end-of-summer outdoor party out back at the Clark Art Institute. A thirteen-piece mostly strings ensemble played an excellent selection of pieces for an hour, loosely connected to exhibits inside. Apparently, it’s an annual event and the group, The Knights, are regulars. They’re a NY-based usually larger group.

Before we move on, a special shout out to a nice little coffee place in North Canaan, CT, called Ilse. We were lucky to arrive before closing, and had a good cup and a nice chat with the owner. One thing he said was that he always takes leftover brewed coffee home, and that it gets better over a day or two. He locked the door at 2 but let us linger and offered us free pastry which was otherwise going to waste. An excellent croissant.

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Watched the Gnats throw one away to the Dodgers last night. That’s 36 blown saves now, one shy of the all-time season record. Arggggggh. They blew it early on a miscommunication I had never seen before. There was a grounder between first and second. The first baseman made a move towards it, but left it to the second baseman to field and retreated to first to take the throw. But the pitcher was also headed to first to cover. They arrived together. The pitcher took the throw, but the first baseman’s presence at the bag prevented the pitcher from stepping on it. Franny’s analysis: The first baseman should have called the pitcher off clearly and loudly: it’s his play. Two runs scored as a result and we lost by one in the end.

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Keeping it short today, but here’s some wordplay I’m pleased with from today’s NYTXW. I was working with KIMONO, TRUCE, REPAST, ICESAW, and ATLAS. Here’s what I came up with:

John Lennon’s sister-in-law: KIMONO

Trump’s daily feckless threats to Iran: TRUCE or consequences

Historian’s memo heading: REPAST

Caesar’s postcard home to Mrs. C from his winter fishing trip to northern Minnesota: I came, ICESAW, I fished.

Collection of maps offered gratis by MLK, Jr., for his marches: Free ATLAS.

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See you next time! Thanks for popping by.