Carved ornament #2: 8-point star.

Carved ornament #1: snowflake rosette pattern. Practicing detail carving by making lots of these for holiday sales.

Consider livening up your Hallowe’en party: “As to apples, there is an old custom, perhaps still observed in some localities on this merry night, of hanging up a stick horizontally by a string from the ceiling, and putting a candle on the one end, and an apple on the other. The stick being made to twirl rapidly, the merry makers in succession leap up and snatch at the apple with their teeth (no use of the hands being allowed), but it very frequently happens that the candle comes round before they are aware, and scorches them in the face, or anoints them with grease. The disappointments and misadventures occasion, of course, abundance of laughter.”

Today in headlines I won’t be bothered to click on: “I Can Hear You Fine. Is It Rude That I’m Still Wearing AirPods?” Yes. Yes, it is rude. You actually have to make the gesture that says “I give a rat’s ass about what you are saying.” Even if you don’t.

New on the Mountains-to-Sea Trail ‘stack: Hidden gems of Guilford County, in which I pause on the trail to loiter by streams and glean a snack from the (former) prison farm.

On the Banks of Plum Creek… in Alamance County, North Carolina.

What is it called when you need two letters to represent a single consonant sound, like ch or th? Like a diphthong, but for consonants. (It ought to be a diphthong, because the word has two of them, but I don’t think it is.)

Everyone is all upset about the effect that Twitter’s decline is going to have on journalism, but really, it’s been all downhill since the Weekly World News shut down.

In Martinsburg, West Virginia, the on-street parking is all metered, but the meters are still coin operated, and a quarter buys you an hour.