L.L. Bean is offering free breakfast on Saturday (Nov. 3). Does that mean you can send your eggs back if they are not just what you wanted?

The gratis hunter's feast is part of the festivities to open the new Hunting and Fishing Store, as shown above in its "almost finished" condition last Saturday. First day of shopping is Friday (Nov. 2).

It is in Freeport, of course, on the same enlarging campus that is growing in popularity as well as commercial return.

This was a great year for L.L. Bean, with sales increasing so much that employees will get big bonuses and shoppers will get free shipping during holiday shopping.

Your Scribe posits the following for the increased success: mastery of online selling and a thirst for Americans to leave the electronic gear (temporarily) for the outdoors.

A decade ago there was a scramble to see what retailers could succeed at the new channel of Internet shopping. Bean has succeeded grandly. They have a well-known, well-respected brand plus they were aggressive from Day 1.

The belief that you can still send back purchases helped in the early days. Now the online business is thriving.

My other thought is that an increasing number of people want to get outdoors. It's true that Americans are tied to TV, wireless, video games and handheld devices, but every once in a while we rise up and say, "I want to watch a leaf fall, or hear a brook gurgle." (Actually, I'm not sure that anyone every ran out of the house declaring they had to hear the sound of a stream that day but you get the idea).

So Bean is complying, and making it easier to buy outdoor gear at their new hunting and fishing facility. Its 24-foot riverbed aquarium "teeming with trout" should be an exciting add-on for new sportsmen (or inept anglers like me who haven't seen a trout sans dinner plate for more than a decade).

I plan to go past Bean's this weekend - but not at 4:30 a.m. when its free hunter's breakfast opens to the public.

The season is ending, and Your Scribe has not seen a moose.

I always look for them when driving the back roads of central Maine (for self-presevation as well as my strong strain of naturalism).

And I went to both Moosehead and Rangeley specifically to encounter the clumsy beasts, but saw nary a one. (Greenville had a bad feeling about it, but I am very happy to have visited gorgeous Rangeley).

I haven't seen moose for more than a decade but I will keep trying.

I will say that looking for moose is more interesting than going on those cruises in search of seeing whales. You bob around for three hours, then the captain points to a distant dark speck in the distance that looks like a piece of granite. I have never seen a whale upclose, though I have been out looking several times.

Perhaps the next frontier for semi-exotic Maine creatues is the puffin. You can get boats out of Jonesport, Bar Harbor and other places but I understand it takes luck and good fortune to see the tiny puffin. They do look cute in photos, I must say.

If I can't see moose this fall, it's a certainty that I will see deer in early November. The farm store I shop at is a tagging station for (dead) deer.

I often loiter about on November weekends to watch the hunters bring in the "harvest." Dead or alive, the deer will be in view in little more than a week.

Your Scribe was playing his interloper self recently when he encountered the site of a celebration. It was on a hillock overlooking Rangeley Lake, and it appeared to be set up for a small wedding.

(An aside: Of course, it could have been in prepation for the black sheep's release by the detention center but I am a giddy optimist to the end. I say it was a wedding).

Any old way, it was a wonderful spot for a small gathering as shown above.

Here are a few other spots that I would chose for a cherished moment:

Sebasco Resort, near Bath. Actually, I did see a wedding here. I wasn't invited, as I am on few A-lists, but when I wandered past one early fall day, the bride and groom were stepping onto a glistening white motor craft, and crusing off into the sunset. It was very romantic.

The Colony Hotel, Kennebunkport. Here is another lovely spot overlooking the ocean, and you couldn't ask for a better site with a pool, outside reception facilities and bedrooms in the hotel for the wedding party. Advice to event planners - it's easier to get to than Sebasco.

Peaks Island. Actually, many couples chose Peaks if my observations of returning (and tipsy) wedding parties at the Portland boat terminal is any indication. Peaks offers many choices, as do other islands in Casco Bay.

The Samoset Hotel, Rockland. Though the Samoset markets itself as an elite resort for globetrotting golfers, there is a quiet, leafy retreat on the grounds where small parties can gather for social occasions. It is located adjacent to several fairways, however, so the parents of the betrothed better hope the duffers have headed for the 19th hole before starting the ceremony.

Schoodic Point. I don't how how people would find it, nor do I know where they would park or stand. But this narrow piece of Maine coastline (way Down East) is breathtaking. If a couple is eloping (do they do that anymore?) and has just a few friends and the Celebrant, this is the downsized, and unforgettable, choice.

Your Scribe has always been intrigued by things hydo.

So here it is, the first introduction of (low) technology to the well at the cabin. A blue bucket for dipping. The time-honored water-yielding structure was finished last month, and now I am dipping like a beatific Babylonian at the village well.

A major decision awaits - whether to install a pump or just have a basic 11th century dipping device with bucket and crank.

While waiting for the Brookings Institute report on which is advisable for my modest needs, I have "installed" the bucket.

Don't laugh. It works.

By some law of hydro science, the bucket turns on its side when lowered. I should say dropped.

I let the 8-ounce bucket fall (about 12 feet) and when it hits the water, it turns on its side. Water fills it, and Your Scribe happily pulls it up through the miracle of a hand-to-hand device called a rope.

I haven't had this much satisfaction since I learned how to manipulate tinker-toys in my childhood during the Hoover Administration.

Other hydro highlights of my life in Maine: contemplating the many mills (and lives) that were built on river banks; observing the Androscoggin and wondering if all those bubbles and slicks were natural elements as the millowners said; pondering Machias Bay and wondering if engineers would ever "tame the tides" for hydro power as they propose about every decade.

And I relish the time I spent in an apartment in Skowhegan overlooking the Kennebec. I was entranced watching the river slide swiftly past the century-old mill building. (An aside, possibly alarming: I can't remember what the mill produced.)

That being said, I am more comfortable with the technology pictured above than the hydro technology used in commerce. I don't say I can fully explain the Law of Dipping but it seems to work every time. As it has, for many centuries.

A book published by a former Portland newspaper editor has linked fly-fishing with a father-son relationship - his own.

The book is "Backcast," by Lou Ureneck, former editor of the Press Herald and now head of the journalism department at Boston University. The text is currently in bookstores.

In it, he recounts a fishing trip through Alaska (in 2000) that he designed to create closer ties with his teen-age son, Adam.

For those who find fishing a metaphor for all things natural and good, "Backcast" promises to be enjoyable reading.

I mention it because I knew Lou in my days at the Press Herald. We didn't talk fishing (it's a fly-versus-worms thing), but we were friendly as he moved his way up the corporate ladder (we don't discuss my inclination to remain stationary).

Also, I relate to the book because sports can create wonderful ties between generations.

The sport in my family was tennis. My daughter, Leslie, played for four years on the Waterville varsity. My son, Drew, was a top player at the University of New Hampshire. Whenever there is decent weather or an indoor court, we still play among each other.

More poignantly, I recall the days of playing with my father. We had more than our share of victories, because he was a very good player.

What I remember most, though, was the fortnight in which my mother was dying (at age 54). Each time the visiting nurse came to the house to give us a few hours off, we went to the local courts and hit balls.

I don't think we said a word. We certainly didn't play to win points or earn a victory. But the fresh air felt good, and the repetitive bashing of the ball gave the mind a little rest.

I don't know much about fly-fishing as Lou does. But I would agree with his thesis that sport can be a great equalizer among generations.

Your Scribe motored to Rangeley recently, and it was beautiful (as shown here). I was looking for moose - didn't see any - but I really enjoyed the town.

I had been there three decades earlier, but it was winter. Saddleback is the coldest mountain I have ever skied. Plus, there were 100 snowmobilers staying at the hotel that weekend, so there wasn't much sleep to be had.

Rangeley seems to be coping with the surge of second-home building. There are condos and new homes there but the town seems to be living with it unlike Greenville, which is struggling with the mammoth Plum Creek development.

I should have continued past Rangeley to Richardson Lake, but didn't. Sounds like a trip for "next time."

I saw Bob the Woodsman over the weekend. He is not doing well.

Bob is a logger and handyman who was going to fell trees on my land to sell as firewood. He never got around to it last year, and the idea has more or less faded amid all the excitement about the new well dug at the camp by Kevin the Well Digger.

Anyway, I saw Bob and in answer to my softball question - "How are you?" - he reported that he has a bad ticker. Irregular rhythm of the heart, which can be serious. The number of beats per minute drops so low that he almost falls asleep.

He does not have health insurance, and two days in the hospital for tests and treatment has cost about $10,000, he said.

"A self-employed working man can't afford $500 or $600 a month for insurance," he said. "But with the bills I just ran up, it will take me years to pay.

"The doctors don't know exactly what is wrong with me. But now they don't want to see me again, because I don't have insurance. I don't know what's going to happen."

Bob, about 50, has lived a "full" life. He was a real drinker until about a decade ago when he was finally able to quit, he said. He's always been a smoker.

In the last year, his wrists have been bound up as he fights carpal-tunnel syndome. That's probably why he didn't get going on my lumber project.

With a bad heart and hands that don't function very well, he's not doing much working at all.

Among other things, this is where the rubber meets the road in healthcare. We keep reading about uninsured Mainers, and here is one.

I don't know his finances, but it sounds like he could be facing a ruinous situation - getting behind on bills, unable to work and now facing a cardiac condition that could be made worse by stress.

Your Scribe is not an expert on state-supported health care, such as the Dirigo program. (I do know that a similar program failed miserably in Tennessee, and now Massachusetts is confronting unexpected complexity in putting its "mandatory" health insurance system into play).

Bob the Woodsman, a very hardworking and terrific guy, is up against the wall because the bills are mounting and his ability to work in the woods is diminishing. I hope he finds a solution to this potentially ruinous dilemma.

Although I am not a hunter, I will not post my land prohibiting it.

From my front porch, shown here, there are 18 acres of land bordering pastures, streams and rivers. Soon it will deer season.

But hunting has been a tradition in Maine since it was a state. Actually, a lot earlier as Maine didn't become a state until 1820. So I let it happen.

One of my neighbors, though, is posting big time. He just bought about 100 acres, and actually built a fence that prohibits hunters from parking near the hunting areas. And he has put up many No Hunting signs.

He is a dentist in Lewiston, and evidently struck gold in those gums of the Twin Cities. He is buying up every woodlot in the area. And to my distaste, he is clear-cutting acre after acre.

What a guy, eh?

Actually, if I were posting I would put up signs saying "No Deer Here." I haven't seen a deer in three years, nor have the neighbors, not since Nick the 'Chuck Hunter stopped growing beans on one of the lower pastures.

No beans, no deer, is what they are saying.

Hunters sometimes park in my driveway without permission. That makes my cranky.

But all in all, I say let the deer hunters have their day - or month - and November is coming up fast.

It has come to the attention of Your Scribe that hunting season on Canada geese begins Oct. 1. I don't understand hunting but this fall I've wondered if golfers shouldn't be given a bag limit as well.

For years Canada geese have fouled up courses throughout New England with their remarkable ability to defacate. Golfers throughout the region have cursed them for years, yet now hunters will be able to shoot the semi-domesticated bird with greater license.

They say the geese are relucant to fly back to Canada because life is so good on the proverbial 19th hole. That reminds me of a problem that pond tenders of Colby College have had over the years with (once) migratory birds.

They'd eat like swine all spring and summer, and couldn't fly back to the old country because they were too fat. Signs marked the Colby ponds: "Do not feed the ducks - they won't be able to fly."

The bag limit on these geese is close to a half-dozen, I believe. I wonder if that will be a challenge, since most of us drive by the birds all the time and they do not fly off in fear. They hardly look up.

Here are a couple factoids that I did not know:

Coyotes, red squirrel and porcupine have no closed season; raccon, skunk and opossum season goes from Oct. 1 to Dec. 31.

Fox season runs from Oct. 15 to Feb. 28. Deer season, of course, starts Oct. 29.

Hunting for wild turkey has been expanded this year. It had been primarily an archery endeavor but now that they are expanding in numbers, a shotgun season will open in mid-October.

I guess that proves I don't understand the sport. Now that turkeys are coming back, permits are given for more efficient methods of "harvesting" them.