Lincolnville, Maine. A drinking town with a fishing problem
My apologies on late posts are getting old by now. But I can explain!
Actually I cannot. I do not have writer’s block because I do not think I can refer to myself as being writer, yet. I have been haunted by the unforgiving face of my empty draft so here goes my recent activities in Trump town.
So three dudes drive up to Boston on a Thursday night and check in to this fancy hotel ready for meetings all Friday. Nothing to write home about. There is a lot of history to learn about the great city of Boston but when you are jumping from one meeting to another, the best you can hope for is a good lunch at a local market with a live band of one guy playing Ed Sheeran’s Thinking Out Loud.
But the weekend gets better when the three said dudes drive up to Linconville, Maine!. Hold on to your knickers.
Linconville is a little seaside town tucked away in the North easternmost part of the US in the great state of Maine. It’s population is a little over 2,000, borders Canada to the North and it feels like everyone knows everyone. It is known for lobsters (best, and only lobster I ever had!), Vacationers from around throng the town in summer to enjoy the tranquility of this gem.
I probably saw a million boats on the docks or homes when driving around Linconville and the neighboring Camden town. I have been told the waters get more action in summer when half the world moves there.
Being a lobster town, there are lots of Lobstermen around. I believe I met the gentleman that caught the lobster we had on our last night up there. I have been drinking a little more than I normally would being out here so we eventually got our way to Archer’s, a bar right on the beach. One of the bartender’s son has been fishing lobster since he was five. He got his first boat when he was nine, his second when he was a freshman in high school and recently bought a much bigger boat.
We got to Maine at around 8:30PM so I did not get to see the little paradise we were in until the next morning. There is no better feeling than waking up to the sound of the Atlantic ocean and the yellow morning sun kissing the water right outside your balcony.
We got to spend a cold weekend in a lovely beach house right on the shores of the Atlantic with the best sunrise ever, owned by Kirk’s parents, Rob and Dorothee, who own a restaurant called The Whale’s Tooth. The food was lovely all through the weekend, the ambiance was delightful and the company was lively.
The Whale’s Tooth is over a hundred years old and once served as a customs house for ships that docked in Maine. On one extreme end of the restaurant, there is a fireplace for cold nights and a live band of a few Linconville folks. On the other extreme end, there is an amazing view of the ocean. The WiFi is good and there is always some good music playing on-air, my favorite listens were Bob Marley and Passenger.
Our hosts, Rob and Dorothee, met in Switzerland, settled in West Brome, Quebec and moved to Maine where they bought the restaurant. They are the most hospitable and funny couple I had the pleasure of meeting in Maine. They have toured South America and Europe a lot but have never been to Africa so I hope my marketing will make them want to visit the continent sometime. I will be forever grateful for Rob’s lessons on eating lobster which, as it turns out, is not as straight forward as eating chicken.
Monday Night Raw
If you had a childhood that was anywhere close to the kind that I had, then you probably owned a Great Wall television in your home. Or you knew a family that had one. If the latter is your case then you probably fooled the family into thinking you are cool with them so that you’d show up on certain nights to watch specific shows.
If you do not know what a Great Wall television is, go you! I will assume you also had cereal for breakfast too and did not come to enjoy that luxury later on in life like the rest of us Great Wall folks. It was operated by an acid filled car battery if my Chemistry lessons serve me right. We’d have it ‘charged’ in a local joint all day every time there was a big show on TV that night. Sometimes you’d get away with having it sit in the sun all day and it’d be enough to tread through the shows.
I’d be happy to talk about this for two hours if you have the time.
One of the most popular shows I looked forward to was Wrestling or ‘reso’ as we’d call it. I counted days down to the next reso night. Tuesdays, if I remember correctly. I grew up worshipping Triple H, The Rock, Stone Cold and that short guy in a mask that’d move like crazy. I remember Kane and The Undertaker on Wrestle-mania so vividly.
I grew up wishing I’d be in the audience. My friends and I did not ever quite agree on whether it was all staged or it was real. So I was elated when Gavin from Andela got us tickets at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. You should have seen me, I lit up like a freaking Christmas tree.
We sat all the way up in the upper decks and had quite a view of the ring. The douchebags on the floor seats kept chanting about having floor seats and the rest of us cursed back like you wouldn’t believe (I am a nice person, New York is just rubbing off on me). It was awesome being out there but I must say the commercial breaks were quite a bummer.
It always seemed so natural and unplanned when a wrestler would walk down the aisle and they’d bring commercials on. The novelty wears off when you are in the arena. The lights are dimmed on the stage when the commercials came on the huge screens mounted above but you could still see the punks moving around the ring.
How subtle. It was an amazing experience though. At least I got to see three of my all time greats from like a mile away. haha.
Smorgasburg in Williamsburg, Brooklyn
I have been eating a lot. Probably a little too much for my own good. But that is what you get when you only have a finite number of days to take New York City all in. I have gone jogging and worked out a few times but that does not negate the calories I take in. So this weekend was no different.
I met Diane at an Andela organized event at Knotel a few weeks back. She is an Interaction Designer for x.ai, Artificial intelligence firm. She grew up in California, spent seven years in Nairobi and recently moved to New York.
We had a coffee hangout but we eventually ended up in Smorgasburg, an open-air food market in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. There is a perfect view of the Manhattan skyline across the river and over 100 food stands to check out. It’s really the best way to get broke and stuff yourself with food all in one Saturday so self control is important out here.
I tried out the chocolate waffle with maple syrup and a raindrop cake which is not exactly cake but a big jelly-like raindrop-like looking thing. I’ll be going back next weekend.
In Pictures
