Back already

So that was a short road trip:  All the way to Watervliet, Mich., which is all of 70 miles from Grand Rapids.  

And even that took two whole days.

But at least we're being all positive about it, as in:  New year, new car  :)  and, since we are back, I'll post some Shakespeare for the rest of this year.  Here, to start the series, is Gertrude's account of Ophelia's death:
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From Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 7

By William Shakespeare

There is a willow grows aslant a brook,

That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream;

There with fantastic garlands did she come

Of crowflowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples,

That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,

But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them.

There, on the pendant boughs her coronet weeds

Clamb'ring to hang, an envious sliver broke;

When down her weedy trophies and herself

Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide;

And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up;

Which time she chaunted snatches of old tunes;

As one incapable of her own distress,

Or like a creature native and indu'd

Unto that element: but long it could not be

Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,

Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay

To muddy death.