The Taste of Amherst Goes On, Taste of Northampton, Not So Much

It’s June 18, and yet it feels like we’re in the midst of July. On the radio, I heard Tim Nourse of the strawberry farms say that all of the berries were a week early.  And that he expected to be seeing sweet corn at farmstands a few weeks early this year.  A balmy night like this deserves outdoor music and a beer tent. Voila!  The Taste of Amherst.

I was involved with getting this event going, back in the stone-age when I worked as an ad rep for the Gazette and was a Chamber of Commerce officer. We always wanted to compete with the Taste of Northampton, but nobody wanted to use those damn tokens.  Funny how the bigger Northampton event has been retired, yet the frisky little brother from Amherst just gets better every year.  What I remember about Noho’s event was that it was always too crowded and it began to be a drag. Having on the bigger common is a much better venue.

Musical acts I know are performing; my pal Joe and the Reprobates; Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers (met him once, really good guy) and the Primate Fiasco, one of whom I shared a beer with and like a lot.  So there’s just part of the line up, and soon I’ll go see what’s going on down there.

It’s a treat and a funny empty feeling having my big extended family gone, they’ve left for a shortened week at Eagle’s Mere, a family house in rural Pennsylvania. So when I get home, it’s just me, the cats and the chickens. I think I’ll be ok.