Walking Across...What?

Going swimmingly

2012-01-25T11:35:00.000-05:00

Swimming knocked me out yesterday evening, and I’m still beat this morning...and sore. Lots of stroke work and kicking, not to mention the all-important breathing. I’ve made enough progress to begin putting all three elements together. I’ve made nowhere near enough progress, however, to put them together properly, smoothly, correctly, or anything close. Chop, chop, thrash, flail, gasp. Maddening. When I was young, learning most of my sports, this would have driven me to a kind of frustrated rage, usually unattractively expressed in a kind of monomaniacal obsession. Now, though, I’ve achieved the wisdom that descends when frustration becomes a constant, rage requires too much energy, and obsession is a distant memory. So I’m trying to just churn along doing my best and, I hope, improving slowly.

On the other hand, when my teacher was talking to me about the way I was lifting my arms out of the water during recovery, she said, “there’s a drill for that, but I don’t want to get you bogged down with drills.” I imagined all my old friends laughing. I got my drill. Of course, having achieved the wisdom of old age, I’ll do it reasonably. Pretty reasonably.

My “S” words

2012-01-24T07:26:00.000-05:00

I have a short list of words in a file on my computer, all starting with “S” and all tending to a similar meaning. But, despite the fact that they make up a sort of family group and some are considered synonyms, each has a slightly different connotation. Probably partly because of this (and partly because my brain has started playing that wonderful trick of keeping mental objects of desire just beyond reach), I can quickly and reliably call to mind only numbers one and three.

Here they are:

Seamy—Sordid; base, corrupt, unwholesome, morally degraded.

Seedy—Worn and shabby; unkempt, Somewhat disreputable; squalid, Showing signs of wear and tear or neglect: scrubby, scruffy, shabby, shoddy, sleazy.

Sleazy—Shabby, dirty, and vulgar; tawdry. Cheap, dishonest or corrupt; disreputable.

Sordid—Filthy or dirty; foul. Depressingly squalid; wretched. Morally degraded. Exceedingly mercenary; grasping.

Squalid—Wretched, as from poverty or lack of care. Morally repulsive; sordid.

These are pretty good definitions, I think, pulled some time ago from one on-line dictionary or another. I love the fine distinctions. Seedy is merely “somewhat disreputable,” for example, while Sleazy admits of no adjective. I’m also fond of Sordid’s “depressingly squalid,” and its “morally repulsive” as opposed to Seamy’s somewhat kinder “morally degraded.” Of course, all variations have been on my mind lately as I watch what is hilariously called the “Grand Old Party” choose its candidate.

Along those lines, I can’t resist noting that the current pace-setter, often touted by silly people as an intellectual, doesn’t know the difference between “grand” (“magnificent”) and “grandiose” (“characterized by feigned or affected grandeur”). Maybe he just needs a list

What a concept!

2012-01-23T10:41:00.000-05:00

I walk in the morning, usually with Paul, though he’s been off cosmopolizing again. Every other day, I get up early and shuffle. Tripping along slowly—my goal right now—in real cold requires more layers than actually running. A baselayer top or two under a midlayer and a windbreaker or softshell. Shorts on the bottom, maybe longjohns, and always a pair of SportHills (oddly, nearly identical to Ron Hills—I wonder if Sport and Ron are brothers). But here’s the kicker. Before I go back out to walk, most of this has to be pulled damply off and replaced if I’m not going to freeze in wet insulation while I’m walking. So yet another baselayer top, under an R1 Hoodie, under my new Mountain Hardware Compressor jacket (which is okay, by the way, but not as okay as my old Mammut Stratus). On the bottom, longjohns again, under R1 tights, under a wind layer. And I also use multiples in headgear, mitts, running flats/boots, and all that. I don’t have enough hangers or cubbies for all this stuff, so I have piles. (Well, I don’t actually have piles, thank goodness, but I do toss things into mounds. By the time I’m finished shuffling and strolling and have stripped down to enjoy breakfast, it looks like a bomb has gone off in a Siberian haberdashery.)

Hah! But now there is a drying rack in a corner of the kitchen! Brilliant. Amazing the things some people think of.

R.I.P. Etta James

2012-01-20T13:38:00.000-05:00

The first dance of how many marriages?

It’s actually uncharacteristic Etta, with the strings and all, but it’s got her wonderful bluesy twist.

Great artists transform the mundane.

Fiddle-dee-dee

2012-01-18T09:31:00.001-05:00

After a few black mornings in the single digits Fahrenheit, I thought I'd have a great shuffle today with temps in the high 30s. Instead: worst run in ages. You can usually just push through to some rhythm and comfort—sometimes even an especially great run, but today I was grumpily back inside in less than 25 minutes, tail pretty firmly tucked between legs. My fallback position at times like this is what I think of as The Full Scarlett—“Tomorrow is another day!”

Memory of a triumph

2012-01-09T23:54:00.001-05:00

I went to a Safeway supermarket today to buy some goodies for this hotel room in Phoenix. It reminded me that our standard market for three years in the early- to mid-’70s was a Safeway in Charlottesville, Virginia. This particular store kept a few bins of wine remainders near the checkout counter—the final bottle or two of cases that needed to be moved off the shelves to make room for more recent shipments. I often rooted around, looking for a decent bottle of something at a price we could then afford. Something, in fact, approaching $0. One day, I rummaged out a bottle of Chateau Carbonnieux, marked down to $3.79. I couldn’t believe it. Virtually all of my wine knowledge in those days was theoretical. I knew everything a book could tell you, but nothing I would have liked to learn from my nose and tongue. I knew, for example, that Carbonnieux was a Grave, and considered perhaps Bordeaux’s best white (not quite damning with faint praise, though I’ve heard it said to be so). I also knew it was selling in the U.S. for something astronomical ... approaching $10. Therefore, I was certain it had been marked at this price, and had found its way into this bin, by mistake. I overrode any scruples on this question and was out of the Safeway in a flash, waving my treasure over my head and crowing. Hugh Johnson had nothing on me.

We drank this bottle, I think, with friends back in Connecticut. I do remember that we liked it very much. Dry and crisp, and, of course, French and fancy. A few years later ... I think it was for Paul’s birthday (or was it my birthday at Paul’s house?), we had a party on a January evening, and we chilled our half-dozen bottles of by-then $12 Carbonnieux (we were all more or less gainfully employed by then) in the snow outside his door.

Since then, we’ve enjoyed the stuff a few times, but there are now so many more wines available from all over the world, and such decent quality at moderate prices, that we seldom turn to France anymore. I just checked, and a bottle of 2007 Carbonnieux is about $40. Maybe we should give another go, just for old-times sake. I’ll see if I can scrounge it at Safeway for, say, $10.

There’s good news and there’s bad news

2012-01-06T09:35:00.000-05:00

Had a checkup yesterday: resting pulse 60, blood pressure 120/60. So pretty good. (I warned you about this.)

On the other hand...

I went out for a run in the dark of early morning. Put on my reflective vest, my red blinking rear light (I actually wear it snugged around my neck over my Buff), my headlamp, bundled up and took off. Safety first. Nobody’s going to fail to see me chugging along that long dark stretch of Washington Avenue. Good easy shuffle. Come home, pull off the lights, unzip my jacket ... and discover my reflective vest beneath.

Thursday’s score: Body 1, Brain 0.

“But Mommy, I thought they were on the same team.”
“Hush, hush, sweetheart. He’s a very old man.”

Splish Splash ...

2012-01-04T12:37:00.000-05:00

... I was takin’ a bath....

Wait, wait. I was actually takin’ a swim. But all the same I was a-splishin’ and a’splashin’, reelin’ with the feelin’, movin’ and a’groovin’. In short, my first lesson was Tuesday evening, and it was terrific. As you can tell by the great legs, that’s me on the far right. I can’t remember if we were reelin’ or groovin’ at the time.

I’m still, of course, a terrible swimmer, but I learned a lot, got a great workout, and confirmed that I will eventually be able to do something that roughly resembles this, if slowly and with little grace.

Our teacher (there are four of us grown-up students (the others are easily young enough to be my children) asked me if I had a problem putting my face underwater. “Not unless I try to breath at the same time,” I told her. Which actually wasn’t a joke. She did a double take and handed me one of those little foam boards. Soon, though, I tossed the prop and was submerging, blowing bubbles, kicking, and waving my arms around. In the past, this has usually meant I was headed down for the third time, but this time it meant, delightfully, that I was engaged in some facsimile of swimming.

I bought some goggles. (As with backpacking, style is everything in natation. One of those elastic hats is next. It’ll look good on the hills, as well.) I learned about taking a shower before you get into the pool. (Incredulous look meets obvious explanation.) I was reminded by nature that my trunks would fall down if I didn’t tie the waist string.

I learned two or three basic but vital tips no one had ever bothered to tell me and I’d never managed to notice. The most helpful to me was, “Don’t take a super deep breath before you submerge. Just relax, breathe in normally, remember to blow out under water, and come up for air when you need to.” This had the effect of making me feel more easy and comfortable in the water. (The coming up for air is still inelegant, and clearly will remain so for awhile, but when I get that head-turn coordinated, I think I’ll be off to the races.)

And I got a really good workout. That wonderful feeling of muscles (the few I have left) well-used.

Great stuff, really good teacher(s), fun classmates. A cool and useful new thing to learn. And a challenging goal that’s still within the realm of possibility. I really do want to swim that mile.

Ice might not be nice

2012-01-04T09:20:00.000-05:00

There’s an article in the New York Times this morning that furthers doubt about the efficacy of icing sore muscles. I wrote about this a little over a year ago when an earlier study came out.

Basically, this study says ice is good at numbing pain, but that it also reduces a muscle’s strength and power for up to 15 minutes after icing is ended. So using an ice pack on a strain in hopes of getting back in the game may well be counterproductive.

Getting some sort of handle on this is particularly important for those coaching kids, I think. And also for us old duffers who never know day to day if what we laughingly call our muscles are going to be friend or foe. Those prime-of-life characters can fend for themselves.

Schuss

2012-01-02T17:33:00.001-05:00

My swimming adventure begins tomorrow, and I’ve posted on Facebook about ramping up my shuffles and grudgingly returning to the regular pumping of iron. I’ve done this, obviously, to put myself on the spot. Now it wouldn’t be merely lazy, pusillanimous, and self-destructive to quit on fitness, but much, much worse: embarrassing.

But there’s one more sporting goal on the list, and this will be pure fun. (I hope: it didn’t get off to a very good start last winter.) Skiing with sweet B. I’d been thinking I might put this off until next winter, but no. She’s been pronouncing for a few weeks now that she’s planning to ski “down the hill all all by myself” this year. And who would want to miss miss that? So after some early January travels, it’s off to New Hampshire for some prime sliding. I’ll stay close so it’ll be easy for her to help me up.

If you crawl before you walk, do you swim before you crawl?

2011-12-30T12:32:00.000-05:00

Paul and I are still walking our three miles almost every morning, a very good thing, as confirmed by this YouTube, which I posted on my Facebook account a couple of weeks ago. So right now, I would say, I’m fit for someone my age. Which is a pathetic standard in the age of obese, you’ll agree, and not a satisfactory one to somebody who actually wants to do stuff.

But this past November (always, always, and this year especially, my least favorite month, the bastard) broke off a good curveball, which didn’t strike me out, but which did make me flinch. I’ve had to step out of the batter’s box, tap my spikes with my Louisville Slugger, and try to reestablish the psychic order of my own personal universe. For me that means regaining a sort of physical self-respect.

So I’ve decided to learn how to swim.

I mean really swim. I can paddle around OK, and float on my back, and tread water for a while. But I want to get more comfortable in the water, learn an efficient crawl, and eventually be able to natate a full mile. H is floating the idea of triathlons (wouldn’t that be cool?) but right now, my goal is just to nail that mile. (I have a friend who regularly swims a kilometer, but I think he might be French.)

I’m also re-committing to my old strength and flexibility program, a really good thing for creaky old guys, and possibly a way to regain some of the lost leg power that has me crawling up hills.

And I’m working my way back on the roads. Here, obviously, a mile is no big deal, but right now a slow and ponderous one every other morning is my limit, though there seems to be no reason I can’t work my way back up to something useful. Yesterday’s shuffle was actually pretty good

What this means is that, along with the prize-winning reports on the sweet B, you happy few will have to put up with frequent and somewhat less scintillating complaints of sore muscles and endless lists of times, distances, and weights.

But it will be worth it. Next November I’m going to show that SOB who’s boss. Maybe we can fill a few lanes with people swimming a mile. Or a kilometer, if you’re French.

Transition

2011-12-29T11:21:00.000-05:00

The Mammut Stratus I wrote about back in March, 2009, has died.

It was getting pretty ratty anyway, but “Massive zipper failure” is what the doctor wrote on the certificate. (This was always the worst part of this unattractive but excellent jacket.) Naturally, I went looking for another, preferably on sale. Gone, gone, gone. In the U.S., anyway. Still apparently available, in a variety of slightly different versions, mostly hooded, in the U.K. and on the continent.

So I went looking for a duplicate. Here’s what I came up with: The Mountain Hardware Compressor.

Very similar: windproof/water repellent shell (which I can confirm is exactly that and no more), synthetic fill, high collar, no hood, handwarmer pockets and a napoleon, very light, easily stuffable. But no thumb loops. And I loved my thumb loops. And not on sale, though I applied my substantial REI dividend, which comes to the same thing, I suppose.

It does have a much better zipper — right handed, unlike the goofball Stratus thing, and smooth-working without a lot of fiddling, also unlike the goofball Stratus thing.

And it’s black, so I look dashing and fashionable, with a whiff of mystery and a soupçon of danger, both lumbering through the hills and staggering out the back doors of selected dives in town.

So far, so good.

Happy Christmas!

2011-12-24T19:03:00.000-05:00

Christmas Eve, and the Concordians should be just about starting their trek south to us. We hope to see them before midnight.

This is the first Christmas sweet B at least partially understands. Considerable excitement — mostly, it seems, less to do with gifts than with standing in her learning tower baking holiday goodies with mommy and daddy.

“Let’s make cookies!,” she exclaimed to H the other day. “I haven’t picked my nose today!” (Sent off to soap and water despite admirable naso-digital restraint.)

And she’s apparently looking forward to more of the same (baking, not nose-picking) this weekend. “I’m going to make gingerbread with Deen, maybe,” she told her mom. “I hope she has all the ingredients.”

I think she does, Sweetness, but there might not be time between the hugs.

Peace, kindness, generosity, and understanding to all.

Cheers.

That’s all

2011-12-22T06:36:00.006-05:00

Some decades ago, one of us attended a fashion show at a no-longer-extant, moderately fancy department store. The ludicrously pretentious presenter insisted on introducing items and accessories as being perfect “for that of spring.” We, of course, stole the locution. Surfing, for example, is the perfect sport for that of summer.

And expanded upon it. A good session bitter is all I really want for that of England.

All this to explain how I can be looking so happily forward to the deep snows, frigid temps, and blustery gales of a New England winter. It’s because I am so profoundly glad to be done with that of fall.

Reserve? What Reserve?

2011-12-21T06:14:00.006-05:00

Sweet B’s precocious language use and the various manifestations of her outgoing personality (anything but the norm in this family) make us laugh and smile whenever we see her. They also make us wonder where all this came from.

Just after her third birthday during the summer, she initiated a conversation with a town crew replacing some drainage at the end of her street. Big trucks, a backhoe (Nirvana!), all sorts of deep holes, and piles of dirt.

“Why you dig hole?” “Why you turn back hoe around?” And many other queries and comments, utterly open and unconcerned she might be rebuffed. (H never would have done this. Neither would H’s parents.) The guys were great, answering her questions (and calling her—short-haired and not dressed in pink —“Little Buddy.”)

A few weekends ago, she shouted from her porch in her now improved English, “I had a lovely time with you,” as we began to drive away. Needless to say, we felt the same.

This past weekend, she was present for a preconstruction meeting with a local New Hampshire contractor we'll call ... Fred. Lots of talk about moving walls, raising roofs, proper insulation, plumbing and electrical, cost comparisons, and all the usual. B was present with her mommy and daddy, dancing around the chilly rooms and pointing out favorite (and not-so-favorite) areas. And as we wound it up and the contractor started down the stairs, she waved, gave a big smile, and said without prompting, “Good-bye Mr. Fred!” Charmed him, I think. Charmed me, anyway (though that’s pretty easy, I must say).

We’ll have them all here in Connecticut for Christmas this year. I think we’ll let her speak for us at the festivities.

What was that?

2011-12-20T05:50:00.001-05:00

I've been seeing delightfully more of a great good friend lately, and that’s inevitably reminded me of a trip he and I took into the Sierra in, I think, the late ’80s. I have no idea all these years later exactly where we were, but we’d stopped in a small town to buy some food, then driven to a trailhead and climbed into the those gorgeous mountains for a few hours to a granite ringed lake we had all to ourselves. Nothing to do but alternately splash in the frigid water and lounge on the warm rock. This remains my personal version of California Dreamin’.

After dinner and a long twilight, we tossed our bags down onto ensolite pads and turned in on a clear spot between the lake and the brush. Clear sky, a million stars, predictable profundities, drowsiness, sleep.

CRASH!

Eyes snap open. P struggles to sit up. I just lie, eyes wide, frozen. Brush being shoved aside, branches snapping, heavy movement.

My first befuddled thought was: Moose. Then, atavistically: Bear. Then, within seconds, as the brain actually started to process what my ears were hearing: Horse. Hoof-like thuds back in the undergrowth. More crashing. More snapping, more loud rhythmic beats. Gradually, over a minute or two, the cacophony moved away and faded out of hearing.

What the HELL was that? Yes, possibly a horse or mule, but how and why loose out here in the middle of the night? Possibly, we decided, a big ruminant. They might make hoof sounds like that. We were clearly under no real threat. Our guesses degenerated. Wolf wearing hiking boots. Cougar in tap shoes. Escaped convict. Yeti. And so to sleep.

In the morning, nothing. We could find no evidence whatsoever of anything crashing around in the bushes. We still debate what woke us up. These days I lean toward Boris Karloff on walking holiday.

I agree, so Outside must be right

2011-12-19T06:42:00.005-05:00

Many decades ago, when I was, I suppose, a senior in high school, a slightly younger boy came up to me one day and asked, “How can I get to be a good runner?”

“Well, you could hop in with us and see how it goes,” I said.

“No, no, I mean I want to try it on my own.”

“Well, then I guess you could start running a few miles, gradually try to increase your speed, and see how that goes.”

Long pause.

“But don’t you think I could just walk on weekends?”

This came to mind when I saw that Outside is running a feature entitled “The 10 Biggest Fitness Myths”.

Myth # 8 is “Long and slow is the best way to burn calories.” This idea has always driven me nuts. It flies in the face of experience, common sense, and science. A slow 10 will burn more than a quick set of quarters, maybe, but won’t even come close to a strong 10. Over time, you can simply feel it. And if you track your training and your weight, your training diary will tell the tale. (Of course, if you’re old and creaky and stupid, you will hurt yourself trying to run hard. But we don’t know anybody like that.)

I’ve also got strong feelings about Myth # 1 (Stretching prevents injuries and improves performance) and Myth #2 (Running barefoot is better for the body), and from a runner’s perspective agree absolutely with Outside that we need to toss these dopey concepts into the trash.

Stretching a cold body is a terrible idea. Want to get warm for a race or strong workout? Just run. Start easy, build up, get sweaty. You’re warm. Stretching? Maybe. But afterward. When you’re warm.

Running barefoot I’ve already ranted about. Twice. Which will suffice. (Well, maybe not. Strained achilles! Strained achilles! Strained achilles! There. That will suffice.)

But where’s the tractor?

2011-12-18T09:19:00.000-05:00

Sweet B helped set up a little crèche yesterday.

She calls it “the Jesus farm.”

R.I.P. Césaria Évora

2011-12-17T19:20:00.000-05:00

She died today, at home in Mindelo, on her native Cape Verde island of Sao Vicente. I wrote a little about her here a few years ago. What a singer.

Le gros cochon à la Grande Jatte

2011-11-22T16:51:00.001-05:00

åa

Snow way to run an electric company

2011-11-06T11:55:00.001-05:00

New England was hammered by a freak snowstorm last week. Connecticut was particularly hard-hit. Very wet, very heavy snow weighed down tree branches, snapped them, damaged houses, cut off whole areas from emergency services, and knocked out power. Intense, ferocious anger at seemingly unprepared Connecticut Light and Power, which at least gave the impression of being way too laid back about the whole situation. Ninety percent of Woodbury households lost power, many until this weekend. We were among the lucky 10 percent. M and B, not so fortunate, came to stay, and we had what for me, at least, was a rolling party all week, which included lots of good cooking by them.

Today, we’re having a more formal do. Not actually formal, mind you. Just formal in the sense that it was, you know, planned.

I’ve put the remaining snow to good use. Will will not be toasting the CL&P.

Play ball!

2011-10-26T14:08:00.004-04:00

Somebody named Zooey Deschanel sang the U.S. National Anthem before the fourth game of the World Series the other day. (Great Series, by the way.) Many people were angered that she went for a softer, dare I say gentler, version than the jingoistic bombastia usually presented at these moments. Zooey, according to her critics, must be deeply unpatriotic. (Her version, unfortunately and bizarrely, has been pulled from YouTube and every other source I can think of.)

The dispute reminded me of the greatest triumphalist performance of a National Anthem I’ve ever heard.

Of course, Mireille had much better material to work with. Truly blood-thirsty stuff. The real deal. And it was the 200th anniversary of the storming of the Bastille, not the opening of a baseball game.

At the other end of the spectrum, I’ve always wished our anthem was “America the Beautiful.”

O beautiful for spacious skies,

For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

It’s a tune a normal person can sing. (I’ve always especially loved “purple mountains majesty.”) But I suppose it is sort of unpatriotic in its emphasis on beauty and grace. No rockets. And that very suspicious brotherhood stuff. All the same, let’s hand it off to Keb’ Mo’.

2011-10-21T15:24:00.000-04:00

When I was studying English and American Lit eons ago, we could trace over eras shifting tastes for Fielding v. Richardson. Or Fitzgerald v. Hemingway. Or name your two favorite natural rivals.

My own taste has lately shifted strongly toward Billie Holiday v. her only real competition. But Ta-Nehisi Coates posted this on his blog yesterday. Isn’t Ella, here with a Duke Ellington-led trio, about as good as it gets?

A truth fundamental

2011-10-17T11:39:00.000-04:00

Sweet B, crunching away in the back seat as we drive along: “Out and about is good for apples.”

Here we go

2011-10-17T09:09:00.000-04:00

New York Times:

Amazon Signs Up Authors, Writing Publishers Out of Deal

Poster boy results

2011-10-11T13:07:00.001-04:00

I forgot to note that this event, superbly organized by committed volunteers, went off like clockwork, and despite very heavy rains early in the morning, made a fair amount of money for its cause. I had been planning to do my duty and shuffle through it, but had managed to step in a hole dodging a car on a morning run. I strained a ligament or tendon or something having to do with my left great toe. (And it is a great toe—handsome, intelligent, good-humored, and almost always trustworthy. Not like that skiving, paunchy and intellectually dishonest right one.) That got me on the gimp and off the hook. H and A, however, were in town, and they each won their age groups. Next year, with someone else’s phiz on the poster, maybe I can stay healthy we’ll attempt a trifecta.

We’ll try to remember, lovey

2011-10-10T22:42:00.000-04:00

Sweet B, saying goodbye to grandparents Sunday afternoon: “Drive safely. And don’t spit in the car ... Ever!”

Le Chemin de la Mâture

2011-10-10T11:58:00.003-04:00

Still thoroughly dysfunctional, I grabbed onto A’s ice-axe loop and he pulled me up the remarkable Chemin de la Mâture (usually translated “way of the masts,” though I think “mast path” or “mast road” is more idiomatic). This is a trail essentially blown and carved out of a cliff face so the 18th century French navy could roll masts for King Louis' navy down from high forests. That’s the Chemin, about a fifth of the way down from the top of the photo. Hardly looks like something you could walk across, does it? The chasm off to the right is known as les Gorges d’Enfer, (gorge or gorges of Hell).

It’s not quite so bad once you’re on it.

But, partly due to my whimpering and whining, we got a late start, and hit the cliff in full, direct sun. Dragging and moaning, I steamed my way slowly up. I don’t remember ever feeling so awful in the hills.

We were, in fact, about 90 percent of the way along the Chemin proper. Afterward, things got cooler and easier as we carried on to complete a loop back to the road.

This is a view of the ridge A had walked over the day before.

The Chemin de la Mâture is a famous and interesting walk and we enjoyed it—A thoroughly and I provisionally. As usual, and despite my turtle’s pace up, we were much faster than the books and signs suggested, so we were sitting in the local cafe when our chauffeur drove by on her way to collect us at the trailhead, and we waved her in for a beer. It was good.

Un. Seulement.

2011-10-06T11:09:00.003-04:00

The cold that had begun to take hold of my breathing apparatus during the walk up to the Col de Pétragème really knocked me for a loop, and I spent most of the next day dozing, blowing my nose, and moaning loudly for sympathy. The sleek and healthy A headed over the ridge on the GR10 and had a great and eventful solo walk to Borce. We all drove over late in the day to pick him up “near the bridge” to Estaut, across the N134 and the Gave d'Aspe. In Borce, we parked and I staggered dopily around looking for same. I finally came upon a local and asked where the bridge was. He directed me back to the one at the turn-off from the main road.

This didn't seem right to me. The map clearly showed a bridge from roughly the center of the the village. “C’est là peut-être un autre pont?”

“Non,” he declared, holding up his right thumb. “Un.” Thumb wave. “Seulement.”

Well, at least he’d understood what I was trying to say. And he seemed pretty sure. But I wasn’t convinced. Maybe it was just a pedestrian bridge?

“Pour marcher à Etsaut....”

“Non, non.” Shaking the thumb at me. “Un. Seulement.”

“Pas un autre?” Moving two fingers to indicate walking. “Peut être....”

“NON, NON, NON.” Fed up with this cloddish, mouth-breathing American and his execrable French. “UN.” Thumb thrust in my face. “SEULEMENT.”

We moved haltingly to a plan B, eventually found A strolling toward the café in Estaut for a well-deserved beer, and discovered, naturally, that there is, indeed, a second bridge across road and river.

Col de Pétragème

2011-10-04T18:30:00.003-04:00

This was an odd one, in a way. We had planned to walk to the Cabane d’Ansabère, then head south and east past the Lac d’Ansabère, and up and over the ridge into Spain. Then we’d head down to the lake of Ibón de Acherito for lunch. But we’d gotten a ride from one of our party to the trailhead (a good thing—I’m not complaining!) and I had miscalculated the time I told the driver when to return for us. “Miscalculated” is an understatement. I had somehow applied my arithmetical genius so precisely that the car would have been waiting two hours for us to return. This had partly sunk in when I made this first video, so I talk about just getting to the ridge. But I still thought we’d at least be heading toward the Ibón de Acherito.

Which, in the event, we didn’t.

At this stage, I was still thinking east. But no matter your ultimate destination, it is a lovely walk.

By the time we reached the Cabane, I’d not only decided that we should head toward the Col de Pétragème to the west, but that we should probably not shoot for anything beyond the col and the Spanish border.

I, in fact, wasn’t sure I’d even get that far. I’d developed a bear of a cold (this must have cause the problem with my arithmetic, don’t you think? Why not!?). I wasn’t moving especially well and we agreed A, young and very fit ...

... should move on ahead, as I staggered along behind, trying to keep him in sight.

But I did make it. This is the col, with the trail continuing down to Spain’s Hecho Valley.

In celebration, I savored an elegant meal. As all hillwalkers know, nothing beats a profoundly melted Nestle’s Crunch bar.

We eased our way back down to the Cabane, now confident that we had a little time in hand.

We even had a few minutes to cool off in a pool of the stream back at the Pont Massousa. I was fried.
.

“Ah-choo” ...

2011-10-01T18:09:00.000-04:00

... expressed one of sweet B’s grandmothers.

B, playing on the kitchen floor: Bless you, Deen.

Grandmother, gratified: Thank you, B.

B, reabsorbed in play: You’re welcome, Sweetie.

Rescue on Yosemite’s El Capitan

2011-09-30T09:32:00.000-04:00

If you haven’t seen them already, take a look at these amazing photos by Tom Evans.

News flash!

2011-09-21T15:22:00.001-04:00

According to the New York Times, a study has just demonstrated the obvious ... that the “talk test” is not for people who are training, as opposed to out-of-shape people looking for basic fitness (like me). The talk test is fine for warming up, cooling down, or a long, slow recovery run after a tough race, but it’s not going to get anyone into good shape or keep anyone there. This is a concept known to every runner. To get better and stay good, you have to work up against your lactate threshold, which happens to be pretty much the same thing as Arthur Lydiard’s aerobic threshold. Very old news. Why does the Times treat it as a surprise, a turning over of established beliefs?

Of course, these days, I do try to shuffle along with the talk test in mind because I want to complete my tours of the cemetery without actually requiring space there. But I run alone, so I wind up gasping my little mantra over and over: “Jeez. How did you. Ever. Get so fat and. Slow.”

It was probably because I stopped running at my lactate threshold.

Lac de Lhurs

2011-09-20T14:27:00.000-04:00

Counting the little Belvédère ramble, I had five walks in mind when I arrived in Lescun, thanks to my readings in Andy Howell’s blog and Kev Reynolds’ Cicerone guidebook. None of them looked like a terrible slog. All looked like attractive and moderately challenging day walks. Reynolds calls this one “quite strenuous, but ... an entertaining day out.”

And away we go...!

The weather still hadn’t cleared up on this Sunday morning, but we were confronted by a misty moodiness we found quite attractive.

I always fuss and fiddle with my gear for a while after a start. You’d think I’d remember those little comfort and efficiency factors, but I never do, even day to day. Here, I’m deciding whether to buckle the pack’s waist belt above or beneath the reversed bumbag I’m wearing (bellybag?). (Below, of course.) I think I’m also considering trying the tube of the water bladder under my arm instead of over my shoulder. (Wrong, wrong, wrong.) P, meanwhile, just gets on with it.

Soon after the start, we got this great view back into the pastures near Lescun. Hobbiton? What are the right words? Pastoral? Verdant? Something along those lines. A gentle and homely beauty.

Gaining some altitude, we came to this notable feature. It’s a bit of a transitional area between forest walking and more open and mountainous terrain.

A little farther along, on rougher ground. You may be able to see my red shorts doddering toward the camera. (A took most of these photos.)

Along this stretch, I shot this video. I did a lot of this (you’ll see more), entirely with my iPhone, and I’m pretty happy with the results.

The path toward the notch. (Col, I suppose, would be more correct, but I do most of my walking in New Hampshire. So notch.) This stretch is quite attractive, with green, green grass and shrubs in contrast with rough gray rock.

Odd rough gray rock.

And finally we arrive. Unfortunately underwhelming. Two of us have walked together in California’s Sierra, where mountain lakes invariably are are swimmingly freezingly gorgeous. Lac de Lhurs? Not so much.

But P did make a new friend.

We descended and finished happy, nonetheless. Portrait of triathloner and two chubs.

A little on Lescun

2011-09-19T13:01:00.002-04:00

Five of us arrived at the Maison Willert on a Saturday. It’s a lovely place in a great location, just on the outskirts of the village of Lescun. It’s the second house along the distant row.

Three floors: one is essentially a great room, combining a kitchen with a sitting area and the desk with the stereo and internet modem (there’s wifi!). One flight up is another sitting area in front of a big fireplace; two bedrooms, and a bath. The top floor had room for two more bedrooms and another bath. Outside, the patio that lots of sun during the day, and terrific view. Of course, there are terrific views from all over Lescun. This, from just up the road a few yards, is the church.

Two of us were here primarily to walk. One more was willing. I really wanted to start the proceedings with a short jaunt around le Belvédère, a walk that starts a few yards from the Maison Willert’s doorstep and takes you on a high loop behind and above the village, yielding terrific views for a moderate effort. It sounded like a great intro walk.

And, despite uncooperative weather, it was. From early along the path, you get this view of the village. Maison Willert is the farthest house to the right..

We strolled along.

The mist was hanging low, but we still got a good idea of the local topography: valleys, high meadows, and higher mountains.

Le Belvédère is easy walking, much of it through forest, and the dark and misty weather lent the wooded areas a feeling of enchantment ... or, I suppose, apprehension, depending on your personality.

The grand view from the top was entirely obscured, but we were perfectly happy. It’s a very pleasant walk. As the path completed its circuit and we came back down, we got another good view of the village.

And we had a week’s walking before us.

Yo!

2011-09-15T11:04:00.002-04:00

I’m back, and will be posting on wonderful Pyrenean walking soon, but while I was in Europe I got some interesting news. An article in USA Today has named the project I’ve been working on one of the 10 coolest book apps for fall. Despite the technical fact that it’s a book, not a book app, my partners and I are chuffed.

Twenty-some years ago, I had a little imprint that published Yo, Millard Fillmore!, a children’s book based on a friend’s idea to teach kids all the American presidents, using funny (okay, silly) mnemonics. He did the memorable hints, another partner did the art, and I did the more-or-less straight bios and most of the incidental writing meant to create a light tone. (I always write with a smart 10-year-old in mind ... a fairly tough audience, actually, but I have an ace up my sleeve: I have the instincts and sense of humor of a smart 10-year-old.)

Over the years, Millard was updated several times and sold a quarter-million copies. A second book, Yo, Sacramento!, using the same techniques to help kids remember all the states and capitals, sold another 150,000 or so (and we’re currently working on its iBook, version).

Over the last few months, we’ve taken on a fourth partner to tackle the Apple iBook market. It’s been fascinating experience, and since Millard lends itself to an electronic treatment (and Sacramento even more so), we’ve created something actually better than a set of pages. Movement, sound, video.... In five years this may seem old hat, or even old-fashioned, but right now it’s near the cutting edge of iBook concept and production.

The books are both targeted toward late elementary-school children, but of course, are marketed to the parents and grandparents of these young geniuses. We’ve also found that teachers in droves buy both titles, and we’re hoping that electronic availability will make it easier for more of them to use.

It will be available at $7.99 from Apple’s iBookstore soon ... probably next week. And, of course, it comes with our no-nonsense iron-clad guarantee:

Watch the videos, read the book, and you'll soon be able to AMAZE your friends, DAZZLE your teachers, and GUARANTEE yourself a life of SUCCESS and HAPPINESS!

And now, having tooted the horn of the Yo! iBooks in the hopes that my dozens of readers around the world will buy it and make my fortune, I slide gently back into my standard occupation of struggling to get a decent page a day of plain, old-fashioned, paper-based prose. Not for 10-year-olds. Which may be the problem.

Lescun, Day 2

2011-09-05T17:30:00.001-04:00

Trouble posting. Here's a placeholder.

YouTube Video

- Mobile posting.

Cirque de Soliel, take a back seat to the Cirque de Lescun

2011-09-04T12:25:00.000-04:00

So we're here in Lescun, in the French Pyrenees. Got here late Saturday afternoon, but didn't get out for a walk until Sunday -- the Belvedere, a stroll around behind the village that took us from Lescun's 1,000 or so meters to about 1,200 and back down again over a pretty leisurely two hours. Sensational views at first, eventually subsumed in the mist. Good wine and great food, followed, of course.

Today, three of us wandered up to Lac de Lhurs, which we found underwhelming, though we did have a good chat with the cabane's resident(the shepard?).

YouTube Video

The other views, both up toward the peaks and back down to the green and bucolic pastures of Lescun, were wonderful. And the walk, as a walk, lived up to its billing as strenuous but an entertaining day out.

Who is this guy?

2011-08-30T13:41:00.001-04:00

I went out to breakfast with my father this morning, briefly escaping the depressingly dark and powerless house, and a woman I'd never seen before stopped briefly next to his chair to say "Hi, Henry." I was surprised, because his name is Dick.

"She calls me Henry Fonda," he said, taking this as his due, and continuing to peruse his menu.

My mother told me the girls used to call him Robert Taylor, so he's morphed.

- Mobile posting.

Manitas de Plata

2011-08-26T06:17:00.003-04:00

I was looking for a particular Django Reinhardt piece on YouTube yesterday. (Found it.) And got sidetracked. To this:

Bios always say that Manitas first played in the United States at Carnegie Hall in December of 1965. But I attended his true first American performance—at Spalding Auditorium at Dartmouth, the night before. I think his agents or handlers or whatever wanted to let him warm up for what was likely to be the biggest moment of his young career. The place was packed, 800 or so strong, and we went nuts for the next hour plus. And when he was done, we wouldn't let him go. I have no idea how many encores he took, but it wasn’t enough. It remains perhaps the greatest concert performance I’ve ever attended.

If West Virgina is almost heaven, what’s this going to be?

2011-08-25T14:13:00.000-04:00

Thanks to a mention in Andy Howell’s blog, I’ll soon be spending time here...

...at the Maison Willert, in Lescun, on the French side of the Pyrenees. I’ve got my Kev Reynolds. I’ve got my Carte de Randonnées. I’ve got my little, light rucksack in training here on the floor of my office. (I find that a well-exercised and at least moderately fit pack complains less than a flabby one.)

I am, in short, ready to roll. Not everyone on this trip is a walker, which is too bad for them, but otherwise pretty handy. A and I, and sometimes P, can stroll off in the morning, wander along our route, appreciating gorgeous lakes, impressive summits, and stunning views, fighting off bears and marmots, then return to elegantly prepared repasts and flagons of local wines carefully chosen. A Floc de Gascogne, of course, either to start or finish. Or both. We can do this, if we like, every day for a week. I’m pretty sure we’re not going to want to come back.

The Divine Jane

2011-08-22T21:42:00.001-04:00

Thanks to MR for letting me know about this:

More here about A Woman's Wit: Jane Austen's Life and Legacy at the Morgan Library.

Auteur

2011-08-18T14:41:00.001-04:00

I’ve been wasting time (and nearly missing a business call), playing with Xtranormal, a site that lets you make your own “movies.”

Yesterday, I finished Randall Fuller’s superb From Battlefields Rising: How The Civil War Transformed American Literature. There is a lot of Emily Dickinson in it. Oddly, Fuller never mentions her interest in Ferlinghetti.

iPad “sheet” music

2011-08-18T07:05:00.000-04:00

How cool is this? Cheap, yes. Easy to carry around, yes. But it’s the access, stupid.

Silver linings

2011-08-17T12:31:00.000-04:00

No walking this past weekend. My broken toe was pretty good, but H decided to emulate her father (historically unwise), and she matched me with a tender tootsie of her own. As far as we can remember, these are the first broken bones either of us has suffered. Togetherness is nice...

... but we can think of better iterations.

My lower back had also started acting up ... increasingly common, and probably a defense mechanism to the pile on the floor featured in the previous post.

So my checklist remains the same and we merely had a great weekend.

A minor league baseball game got things rolling Saturday night. The home team Manchester (New Hampshire) FisherCats beat the Akron (Ohio) Aeros, 5-3, surviving a late-innings scare after shutting the visitors out for seven. We were all there, including sweet B’s best friend, K, and her dad, P. B was very interested in why people were swinging and missing, and urgently needed to know why number 7 threw his bat. Deep discussion of frustration and sportsmanship.

Sunday was damp, but there was a bit of riding on the pushbike, and a rather elegant tea party, also with K and P, and some favorite dollies.

Monday morning was pouring, but there was time for a little engineering ...

... before heading out, not forgetting the dragon wellies and tiaras that a fashionable young person just doesn’t leave home without.

A crew of us leaves for Lescun in less than two weeks, so there will be plenty of mountain blogging soon.

Beauty and grace

2011-08-12T07:07:00.004-04:00

The other thing, beside making music, that I most regret not being able to do. Marginally less impossible to manage in the time available, I suppose. Then again, I get seasick.

A shot from our glorious days in Maine.

High (mountain) hopes

2011-08-11T17:48:00.001-04:00

I’ll be heading north this weekend for what I hope will be a couple of days on this route, which weather kept me off three years ago. This time I won’t be solo, but one of a trio, with H and A on hand to drag me up the steep bits. Of course, the weather report is iffy again, but it looks like standard-issue rain, not thunder, lighting, and hail. Views might be limited on what many consider this most beautiful of White Mountain walks, but that will just give us motivation to return.

It’s been so long since I was out for more than a day that my floor looks to me as if I’m preparing for an expedition to deepest Nobedestan. Sleeping mat? Tent? Stove? What is this stuff? Maybe I should take a satellite phone and a machete if I’m going this extreme.

I’m making some adjustments to my McHale pack, based on how things worked out in New Zealand. Different hipbelt pockets. A little pocket on my left shoulder strap for my glasses. A new arrangement for the water bladders. A different top flap. Just dinks, really. This pack, once called a 0-SARC and now apparently called an LBP (Little Big Pack), is old-fashioned in its ruggedness. (It’s now available in new-fangled, much lighter and maybe even tougher Dyneema.) But it’s still notably lighter than most commercial 50L packs, and carries exceptionally well. It’s also flexibly sized, with Dan’s excellent P&G Bayonet frame extension system. I doubt I’ll ever need anything larger. Even with that big box of rescue flares.

∞

I was in New Hampshire for 10 days or so until last Sunday, and while I was there, we went out a few times with sweet B on her little pushbike. She’s beginning to get the hang of this balance thing.

We took her to the local park for a swim, too ...

... and while we were drying her off afterward and changing her out of wet and into dry, she effected an escape. A little naked person in tiny Keen water sandals running around trees and through the playground. We were laughing too hard to be especially effective in pursuit. Fortunately, she took a gentle spill and her mommy was able to grab her up, wrap her up, and kiss her up.

Big day in Boston

2011-08-06T15:50:00.003-04:00

I’ve been in Concord for a week or so, shuttling sweet B and coddling a broken toe. (Dramatic and sensational circumstances ... a Pyrex container fell out of the fridge and zeroed on on the unoffending appendage, turning its elegant, slender, yet macho pinkness into the purple piggie of pain. I can confirm that my command of basic Anglo Saxon remains fluent. So can the neighbors.)

Yesterday H, B, and I headed for Boston to meet some family and friends and take in the Chihuly exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts. We had a high old time. B loves the T,

and we wandered through the Public Garden to check out the ducklings. We even had a ride on the Swan Boats. Lovably familiar material to three generations of Robert McCloskey fans.

B squealingly enjoyed the carousel on the Common with her Aunt D ...

She and mommy tested the waters in the Frog Pond ...

and a slightly manic B showed herself to be a surprisingly agile and aggressive climber at the Tadpole Playground.

The whole crew enjoyed a great outdoor dinner.

Then the three of us went off to the Chihuly exhibit. Which we couldn’t get into. Sold out.

Not quite Down East

2011-07-30T15:27:00.000-04:00

Maine was spectacular and the visit too short. Terrific friends. Gorgeous weather. Boothbay Harbor dancing in the sun. Top-notch boat-watching for this frustrated sailor. Lobstah! And a rockbound reading picnic. Wicked good.

Now we’re in New Hampshire with sweet B and her family. B, who, it has been noticed, can be a bit, mmm, other-directive, was just looking through some photos with one of us, who apparently wasn’t making quick enough progress. “Let’s move along,” she said. Well, it’s a phrase I’ve uttered at innumerable meetings, and it’s almost always excellent advice—even when uttered by a near-three-year-old. I’ll take it personally, and close out now.

Rounding into form

2011-07-26T18:32:00.000-04:00

I had a difficult time settling back in after the New Zealand trip back in February and early March. Great holidays always want to keep on rolling (Newton has a law about this, I think), and this was one of the very greatest. Combine that with my lifelong disinclination to get in the groove, and my aging brain’s ongoing wrestling match with the word-pile, and you get a kind of petulant dissatisfaction.

But there were bright spots.

Among other places, I’ve spent time in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and Charlottesville, Virginia. Of course, plenty of time up north in New Hampshire. And soon, off to Boothbay Harbor, Maine.

I was in Charlottesville as a hanger-on during a reunion. I spent a lot of time there in an earlier life, and I’ve never liked it. (It’s the world center of Thomas Jefferson worship, a religion of which I’m not a communicant.) But it’s undeniably beautiful, and it was beautiful during the visit, clear, warm, and sunny, with views as long as the curvature of the earth allows. Jefferson’s Monticello overlooks the city. I’d been here often, and twice had a chance to see parts of the house that aren’t on the regular tours. I was astonished to see how vastly the presentation of the house has changed. Less Saint Thomas and more real history, including a long overdue coming to grips with the writer of the Declaration of Independence as slaveholder, including keeping as slaves some of his own children.

Here’s the “nickel” view.

In Coeur d’Alene, I wandered over Tubbs Hill a bit and had a wonderful chance encounter with a very cool man, probably in his 80s, originally from Switzerland. He was looking fit as a fiddle in his triathlon T-shirt and we talked a bit about the Alps and other mountainous parts of the world. He’d obviously spent time in some beautiful high places. We only chatted for 20 minutes or so, but it was one of those memorable passings.

Of course, there was sweet B. We’ll all celebrate her third birthday this weekend, and I'll be in Concord for a week and a bit afterward to fill in some blank spots in the parental schedule. Here are a few more shots from our walk up Waumbek.

Ritual imparting of flawed wisdom at the trailhead.

“These Pacer Poles are a trip!”

At luncheon just off the summit. Change of clothes necessitated by the usual. It’s harder in the woods.

On the summit cairn. Jasper the Wonderdog occupies the shadow between H and me.

Personal Sherpa gently carries relaxed client back down the hill.

Happy mountain time

2011-07-24T17:09:00.000-04:00

Last weekend, almost the whole brigade— H, A, sweet B, Jasper the Wonderdog, and I — wandered up Mt. Waumbek, the third-lowest of the 48 New Hampshire 4,000-footers, at 4,006 feet. It’s an inclined walk in the woods, with little of the rock-scrambling so common in the Whites. A great day for B to have a real go at a mountain. She walked a good bit of the 3.6-mile ascent, defaulting to the Kelty on daddy’s back when she needed a break. She maintained high spirits until she conked out after lunch at the summit and slept for most of the ride down.

It was very hot, very humid, and, with the entire crew, a long round-trip from Concord (almost two hours each way up and back, a little over six hours on the trail). Even the very fit H and A were fatigued by the time we got back to the car. I was several notches beyond fatigued, lost a borrowed water bottle, broke a strap on my not-great old Stratos 32, and even with a jar-opener couldn’t unscrew and collapse my walking poles. (The trick: two jar openers!)

None of that mattered. It was spectacular to be out together, laughing and playing with B, and watching her lead out, marching uphill and turning to us every few seconds to say, “I take you right to the top of the mountain.”

I still feel like a silly ass, checking off mountains, but It’s one of those geriatric compulsions and I’m committed now, with only 10 to go. An overnight Bonds traverse in a few weeks with with H and A (north-south, over the Twins, reasonable Google Earth Illustration here) will let me tick off four more summits. I may get one or two more later in the fall, but completion will probably have to wait until 2012.

After all, it’s the Pyrenees in September!

Fine and Mellow

2011-07-23T06:23:00.009-04:00

I’ve winnowed my “Now” playlist gradually down over the last few months, tossing almost everything that isn’t Billie Holiday. (A little Count Basie remains.) Billie’s pretty much telling me all I need to hear these days.

This clip, posted in multiple forms on YouTube, is from 1957, very late in her career. You can see that she is frail in body and spirit, and to me she seems to sing this blues, which she wrote in the late ’30s, with both yearning and acceptance.

The musicians supporting her are, like the clip itself, famously famous. You can check their names on YouTube if you're interested, but maybe the best indication of their greatness is that the first two solos are Ben Webster handing off to Lester Young. You can see Billie, in close-up, receive Lester’s communication, and even if you don't know the back story (radio piece below), it goes straight to the heart.

Here’s an old but excellent NPR segment on this performance:

The blueberries are coming in...

2011-07-22T11:20:00.001-04:00

...so breakfast is more berries than Wheaties. A good time of year.

On the other hand, it’s 92°F (34°C) out there, headed to 96° (36°), with humidity due to push the heat index to 105° (41°). But I can take it. All I have to do is remember this past !@#$% winter.

Update: At 2:30pm, it’s 97° with a heat index of 106°. I imagine it will be all downhill from there, and we’ll have a nice balmy 80° evening.

Make your kid a writer

2011-07-15T06:16:00.002-04:00

I enjoyed this. Of course, the post isn’t really about making your kid a writer—that would have given me the willies. It’s more about getting out of the way if she’s so inclined.

I think you know pretty fast. If she hasn’t got her nose permanently stuck in a book at a pretty early age, she won’t be a writer. There’s more to it than that, of course. Reading is necessary but not sufficient. She might, for example, prefer to make a decent living.

Thanks to Ta-Nehisi Coates’s great blog, in my book the finest one on the web. Best writing. Most thoughtful. Most interesting community. And a fascinating, ongoing personal journey.

Poster boy, senescent chubboid division

2011-07-14T17:03:00.000-04:00

The last time anyone in Woodbury cared about my running was in 1965. But then I think they were serious. This is clearly some sort of joke. (Not the cause, which is vital—just the come-on.)

Busy B

2011-07-03T17:04:00.002-04:00

The B and her parents have been in Woodbury for a few days, to celebrate H’s birthday, and the nation’s. B has had a busy time.

We’ve done doctoring,

a picnic at the beach,

a new tutu (much coveted),

horseback riding,

and all sorts of other fun things. Yesterday, fatigue resulted in a brief but spectacular meltdown,

and we all wanted very much to avoid the same thing today.

A little over an hour ago, sweet B agreed to a much-needed nap. “I will sleep,” she told me as I snuggled her down, “for eight minutes.” Fortunately, her internal clock is malfunctioning, and she still slumbers. This evening is a party for her mama, and the fascinating conversation and witty ripostes demanded of all who attend events here require quick wits.

What Books Will Become

2011-07-03T07:07:00.002-04:00

What do you think of this?

It’s easy to see, or perhaps more accurately feel, that the traditional book will in many cases be supplemented or superseded in the not too distant future. Amazon is now selling more Kindle books than traditional ones. Even I—ancient and doddering—have been working lately on a group project that involves the integration of traditional books, a website, and Apple iBooks.

I’ve been straining away on other ideas, too, for a long time, and despite my love for paper, ink, and local bookshops, I’m intrigued and excited about the possibilities of what books might become. Or what they might be made to become. But despite my love affair with my Kindle, my usual thinking on all this is as a book creator. Here is a particular idea from the linked article that excites me as a book reader:

... We can share not just the titles of books we are reading, but our reactions and notes as we read them ... we will be able to link passages. We can add a link from a phrase in the book we are reading to a contrasting phrase in another book we’ve read; from a word in a passage to an obscure dictionary, from a scene in a book to a similar scene in a movie. We might subscribe to the marginalia feed from someone we respect, so we get not only their reading list, but their marginalia—highlights, notes, questions, musings.

... dense hyperlinking among books would make every book a networked event ... when we can link deeply into documents at the resolution of a sentence, and have those links go two ways, we'll have networked books.

Most of this, of course, would be drivel. But imagine being able to read and integrate the notes of people you know to be interesting, expert, perceptive, or witty. Scrumptious.

Not for you? Fine. But it’s coming. And lots more, besides.

The ump’s hot corner: not third, but first

2011-07-01T05:26:00.002-04:00

This article from the New York Times sports page about the difficulty big league umps have with making the call at first base reminded of something I hadn’t thought of in years...decades.

I was probably in my early 30s, out for a spring-time run. An old schoolmate of mine was coaching junior high school baseball, and the assigned umpires hadn’t shown up. So he snagged me off the road and asked me to do the honors. For seven innings, I stationed myself behind the pitcher’s mound and called both balls and strikes and all the plays on the bases. Real umpires use a special little counter called an “indicator” to keep track of balls, strikes, and outs. I just scratched lines in the dirt with my shoe. Really pro.

The last out of the game was a dribbler up the first base line by one of the visiting team’s batters. The pitcher came off the mound to field it, bobbled it slightly, then flipped it to first, where it arrived at roughly the same time as the runner. Bang-bang. My arm went up. “Out.” Game over. Home team wins. But I knew immediately that I had blown the call, and I think everybody else did, too.

No arguments, though. I think the visiting coach figured it was about what he could expect from an ump in a ratty crop-top and bright red nylon short-shorts.

Besides, I just would have run away.

Going to the dogs

2011-06-30T10:28:00.000-04:00

I was in New Hampshire too long ago, communing with the Concordians and getting in my B snuggles.

I spent some time one evening at Hot Hole Pond, with B in her little Farmer John wet suit and Jasper the Wonderdog in his natural swim togs, paddling about in the shallows while A and H swam their workout, a triangular course into the far distance, across the pond, and back. On Saturday morning, they both did very well indeed in their second triathlon of the year.

On Friday evening I joined B and her parents at an elementary school fair, at which she was transformed into... a Dalmatian. Which was quite fun. Until bath time.

This weekend, they’ll all be here for the Fourth, and a birthday celebration. High times.

I’ve often asked myself the same thing

2011-06-23T12:55:00.000-04:00

I’ve been watching Gandhi on Turner Classic Movies, and it inevitably reminded me of something I read somewhere long ago.

“Why did the sahibs ever go to India,” a fastidious Maharajah once asked Lord Curzon, “when they could stay at home on their English lawns playing flutes and watching the rabbits.”

The Kindle’s only problem

2011-06-16T09:59:00.000-04:00

When frustration with what you’re reading feeds anger feeds a naturally bad temper (I’m not talking about all you even-keeled people out there), you can’t soothe your savage beast by firing the pulsating lump of pustulating rubbish against the wall. I’ve been known to leap up and add a few kicks as well. The S.O.B. deserved it. Needless to say that’s out, too. At least until Amazon brings the price way down.

An arrow from the current book quiver

2011-06-15T08:00:00.000-04:00

One of the books I’ve got going right now is Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s fifth and final volume of her diaries and letters, War Within and Without, first published in 1980, and concerning the late 1930s and early ’40s. Her books, highly personal and internal even when describing public events, are favorites of many women I know.

At one point very early in this volume, she travels to New York City from Long Island to collect Antoine Saint-Exupéry, and on the train back to Long Island, talks to him about their common craft. “He talks about the rhythm in writing,” she notes, “which he thinks is almost the most important thing in a book—as I understand it. That only the conscious gets across in words, the unconscious in the rhythm.

Yowza. If it ain’t got that swing....

She also tells us that “[t]alking in French about ideas that are so deeply rooted in me in English, ideas that are barely communicable in your own language, to say them in a foreign language you are not the master of, was really a kind of anguish.”

I do think it’s endearing that she makes conversations between Saint-Exupéry and her husband, the two best-known male aviators of the era, sound extraordinarily...what? I hesitate to say ladylike. Artistic? Aesthetic? Something like that, anyway.

Then again, maybe they were.

On the roads

2011-06-14T10:58:00.002-04:00

Sweet running weather this morning. Cool, with a lovely mist gentling down. I’m still staggering unsmoothly along, but I’m out there, and beginning to feel a little more comfortable. Mornings like this really help.

I’ve been asked by a friend involved with the admirable local scholarship fund to supply a photo of myself running to be used on a poster or in a mailer—I’m not sure which—to encourage others to participate this fall in a fund-raising road race. I can’t imagine that either my anti-matter personal magnetism or the image of me pudgily rumbling along will be of much help, but, yes, of course they can use one of these if they like. Naturally, they chose one in which I am, as my friend described it, “sucking wind.” Guaranteed, I think, to have opposite the desired effect. The universal natural reaction will be roughly, “Oh, Yuk!” I may have to increase my donation this year.

Maybe it’s the carburator

2011-06-08T18:50:00.002-04:00

I’ve been reading a lot (what’s new?), writing a lot (some of it actually hasn’t been binned), running a lot (if oh so short and daintily), and seeing almost enough of the Concordians. What I can’t seem to bring myself to do is blog. There is no shortage of topics—things I would normally pass on to both you loyal readers—but I just can’t get the blogomotor to turn over. So no proclamations, no attempts at funny stories or theoretically interesting memories, no rants occasioned by ongoing outrages, no trip reports. Not even an urge to commit book review.

Instead, here are the inevitable but nonetheless irresistible pix of sweet B in her last couple of months of twoness. First, from, I think, her father’s birthday.

Then a couple from Easter.

And one from last weekend, with her dad, Jasper the Wonderdog, and my feet, just before bedtime.

Okay, one short story: Over the weekend, B told an adult who was asking her to do something that “it isn’t convenient right now.” She got points for vocabularistic precositude, but no relief.

Sweet B brightens a weekend

2011-05-31T21:01:00.001-04:00

The B was in Woodbury for a few days, so all was ecstatic here.

B, late one evening: “I am having difficulty sleeping.” (Yes, she really talks this way.)

Related adult: “Why?”

B: “I sleeped yesterday.” (She talks this way, too.)

Monday, friends watched the Memorial Day parade from our front yard. B and Dolly decided to dress alike. I have no idea who that fat old out-of-uniform guy is.

Whoever he may be, sweet B flipped for his company.

He, of course, flipped for hers long ago.

Re-achieving the splendour of the grass

2011-05-26T12:46:00.003-04:00

I’ve been participating in a metaphor this morning.

It's been raining so frequently and so hard for most of the last month that it’s been impossible to mow the lawn when I’ve been around here. The house was beginning to look as if it stood in a field of ~~wheat~~ weeds. But the downpours are taking a break (they’ll apparently be back just in time to ruin the Memorial Day parade on Sunday) and I’ve been out pushing the old Toro.

For about the same length of time, a few of life’s little rain showers (nothing dangerous or dramatic) have given me excuses to ignore other regular rounds, but I’m declaring that back to normal, too. So. Grass clippings outside. Fertilizer here. Metaphorically, of course.

This is getting serious

2011-04-21T17:36:00.001-04:00

Now I’ve lost my catcher’s mitt, a 1958 MacGregor Joe Astroth model.

I found the hat, the longjohns, and even the original Photon. (Now I’ve got three, no doubt soon to be two. Then one. Then….)

Never did find the sun glasses.

But my mitt. How can this be? It lives primarily in my office these days, an artifact of my own personal Paleozoic. It’s not a mere unbelievably expensive necessity I have to replace. It’s memory and all the senses. The deep pop, the feel and smell of sweaty leather, the salt-dirt taste of playing behind the mask.

My fielder’s glove,* usually snuggled up against the mitt, still sits here attempting to entice me outside for a catch.

Something, as Miss Clavel would say, is not right!

*Something over 25 years ago, I played briefly on a company softball team. (I don’t like softball, but American men no longer play real baseball unless they are paid for it.) In my late 30s, I was our oldest player. I was unsettled, though, to realize that my glove, born in 1962 (a MacGregor GF20
Johnny Temple model), was even then older than all but three of my teammates.

Grete Waitz, R.I.P.

2011-04-19T15:20:00.002-04:00

Barrier breaker, great champion, class act. When she crossed the line to win her first NYC Marathon, no one knew who she was.

“When she ran that first New York race, she had never run more than 13 miles. She and Jack ate a most unusual dinner on the eve of the race: shrimp cocktail, filet mignon, baked potato and ice cream, with a bottle of red wine. Waitz later told the story that she felt as if she were flying through the first 16 miles, but the final 10 miles felt as if she had a bag of cement strapped to her back. She considered abandoning the race somewhere in the Bronx, but, as she recalled, ‘I didn’t know where I was, and I had to get back to Jack.’

“When she crossed the finish line, exhausted, and setting a world record, she took off her shoes and threw them at her husband. ‘I’ll never do this stupid thing again!’ she yelled at him.”

She was only 57.

Little skiers

2011-04-12T14:40:00.002-04:00

About 25 years ago, we went downhill skiing with (then childless) friends at a Vermont resort, and we parked a dubious four-year-old H in the nursery/ski school for a few hours while we went off to taste the mountain. She hadn’t yet skied downhill, though she’d shuffled around with me on her little touring skis. We were hoping that the elementary lesson she was supposed to get would give her a solid start on this different form of the sport.
It didn’t. We returned to a teary and unhappy little person who wanted more than anything else to blow this stalag, with its fence and its rules and its unfamiliar faces. Away we went, comforting our lovey and carrying her tiny rental skis and boots with us.

We headed straight to the bunny slope in the hopes that we could manufacture a good taste to wash out the bad. The hill happened to have a comical lift as a prop. It looked like a standard chair lift of the era—two seats, attached to an overhead pulley system—but it rode us along the ground.
With my knees near my ears, my skis stayed in the two tracks below, and H’s dangled just off the snow. This in itself gave rise to much merriment and laughter.

At the top of the tiny hill, we jitterbugged around for a while, getting a feel for the snow and these weird stiff boots, gradually working into a star turn or two, and a few experimental uphill snowplows on a very shallow traverse. Then I got H between my firmly wedged skis, and we headed down. She fell, gently but immediately and unhappily, when her skis got ahead of her body. I caught her, and we shifted to parents’ Standard Plan B. I turned around, wedged the tails of my skis, and faced her, holding her hips over her skis. She thought this was very funny, Daddy skiing backward, but she got the right feel of things almost immediately. We did this two or three times, laughing and riding back up on the comical lift, and then she was on her own, stemming in that wonderfully sturdy way small people have. We both have the happiest memories of all this.

So H and I thought it would be a great idea, shortly after I got back from New Zealand, if I took B off for a little time on the local bunny hill. The two of them had had a terrific time a few days before, and I think both H and I envisioned a sort of reprise of some great fun.

But no.

First of all, B is two-and-a-half—very, very young to be sailing downhill. Second, I’m five or six years older than I was in 1980-whatever, and I haven’t been on downhill skis in over a decade—I had no idea how short and fat they’d become (rather like me). And third, I think we may have hit the poor baby at the wrong part of the fatigue cycle. Excited chatter going up (a more modern surface lift that was essentially a moving walkway), but tears galore going down. I tried frontwards, backwards, a shallower traverse—everything I could think of. No go, and I delivered a profoundly unhappy little person to the bottom of the hill. One run and done. I felt terrible inflicting something so unpleasant on her. Fortunately, chocolate exists in the world and calm was restored, complements of Mr. Hershey.

She floored me, though, when at home she turned to me and said, “We go skiing again tomorrow, M, but this time you no hold my neck so tight.”

Her neck? Needless to say (I hope), I had not been strangling her. I’d held my poles horizontally in front of us for her to hold onto, until I’d turned around and held her by her hips. The best I can figure is that her jacked rucked up in a way that was uncomfortable under her chin. Nonetheless, I sense the birth of a family joke that won’t quit.

To B, “tomorrow” means sometime in the indefinite future, so yes, indeed, we’ll be out there when the New Hampshire hills turn white again. She’ll be three, and able to say, “Grandfather, my outmoded clothing is not suitable for this active pastime, but I noticed the shop carries Patagonia for Kids.” And I’ll be the chubby old guy on the chubby new skis, asking, “What color parka would you like, sweetheart?”

There’s at least something I can still manage on a ski slope.

Residuum

2011-04-11T18:57:00.001-04:00

I think I’m safe in saying that this is the last of winter’s snow. The high ridge of white mountains that had taken over the driveway has dwindled, finally, in mid-April, to this dirty, pathetic lump. Good riddance.

It wasn’t all plodding along

2011-04-07T13:56:00.002-04:00

Around the first of December, I was sidelined (from running, not walking) by a not very painful left metatarsal stress fracture (or maybe a stress reaction), a pretty common injury among runners, but the first one I’d ever had. I got it by feeling my oats and running too many miles beyond normal one day. A classic. A stupid. Unfortunately, a typical for me.

But walking, which I limited myself to, was no problem. No pain, no issues, no concerns. I might have had a problem if I’d followed Googled advice to wear grotesque protective footwear: “a stiff-soled shoe, a wooden-soled sandal, or a removable short-leg fracture brace shoe.” (On the other hand, I had been looking for the right pair of boots.) Tramping in New Zealand was fine, and I’m about to try to start my sun-up staggers again, gasping and moaning and once again bitterly envying that corps of ladies elegantly gliding their way along the roads while I look at months and months to get back up to speed. (Well, not speed, but....)

All this is to explain why I didn’t run a mile at Wanganui, as I had at Oxford. I did, though, make a pilgrimage.

I wanted to pay my respects to Peter Snell, whose statue went up at Cook’s Gardens, I think at the same time the old grass track was replaced by a modern all-weather surface. Doing this was harder than I’d expected. I couldn’t find Pete. I wandered down along one grandstand, watched some young people playing soccer on the infield, exited the grounds thinking perhaps the statue was just out front, and decided to start asking around.

A lovely retired plumber who had emigrated from Nottingham in the early 1950s had a foggy general memory that such a statue existed, but was eventually forced to refer me to the good people at the St. Paul’s Church Community Centre Citizen’s Advice Bureau (otherwise wonderfully known as Te Pokapū Whakahiki Pātai mai i te Iwi Whānui). They, just across the street from the park, had not the foggiest clue, and sent me along the road to the Wanganui District Council, where, thankfully, explicit directions included everything but a GPS coordinate. Unfortunately, I still couldn’t find Pete (bodes well for walking across Scotland, eh?). Scannings, wanderings, wonderings. Finally, there he was, tucked in halfway up the stands at the end of the back straight.

Here I am, explaining to Sir Peter that his arm action could use a little work. He hardly blinked an eye. I think he was chuffed to learn that a young Wellington bartender and I had several days earlier agreed that he (Snell, not the bartender) was the greatest miler of all time.

(I also went to the Waitakeres, north of Auckland, where Arthur Lydiard trained Snell, Halberg, Barry Magee and others on the hilly winding roads and trails. It was easy to see what wonderful and challenging training terrain this is. And there were lots of runners and cyclists out doing their things.)

Lots of dissolute living during these second two weeks. There were palm trees. (Here at Rotarua).

There was good food in lovely places, as here in Blenheim at the lovely outdoor bistro at the Hans Herzog winery.

And there was utter dissipation, here with a nice Sauvignon Blanc in the spa at Blenheim’s terrific Argrove Lodge.

And, as the ads say, MUCH, MUCH more!

I loved New Zealand. I’d go back in a flash. Or on Air New Zealand. Either way. But soon, please.

Wowser

2011-04-01T10:36:00.000-04:00

Continuing the Routeburn, and cresting Harris Saddle, we dropped down toward Harris Lake and the most profoundly beautiful view of the trip. No photo (of mine, at least) could begin to replicate what we saw looking across Harris, toward the Valley of the Trolls. A distant ribbon of water fell from the heights at the other side of a great cirque, dropping from Lake Wilson, the headwaters of the Routeburn itself. The Hobbits meet the Nordic gods. We all ratcheted our jaws up from the ground and snapped away. Others may have captured some vague sense of the sight, but as far as I’m concerned, you had to be there. (So go!)

The Routeburn Falls Hut, the last trail accommodation of this great trip, sits, oddly enough, next to Routeburn Falls.

It was was the newest and grandest hut we stayed at.

The final walk out took us over swaying suspension bridges, across the magical, turquoise Bridal Veil Stream, and through an old forest of mountain beech.

We finished our trip with a day in Queenstown, during which others did interesting and adventurous things and I wandered around sampling beer. The next day, we were off to Auckland, where the rest of the group headed home, and I ... didn’t. Another side of New Zealand was calling.

What? It rains here?

2011-03-24T17:45:00.005-04:00

I didn’t realize until I got to New Zealand that many native walkers consider the Routeburn Track a finer walk than the infinitely better known Milford. I’ve never walked the Milford, and comparisons interest me less and less as I get older, but the three days of the Routeburn are pretty fine.

It offers more sustained challenge as a walk, because, unlike the Tasman and the Kepler, the track was built and is maintained by muscle and hand tools. So it was a little more familiar feeling to most of us. (Not that we didn’t appreciate being able to waltz along the other trails gaping at flora and fauna with no chance of a pratfall).

The Routeburn also offers terrific scenery and views. Climbing up from Divide on the first day, we had magnificent alpine scenery off our left shoulders, and steep terrain off our right. We eventually achieved the base of Earland Falls.

More ups, then a steepish down to Mackenzie Hut. The water at MacKenzie Lake was the coldest of the trip. It was dive in fast or not at all, and I think I now have permanent goose bumps on various parts of my body. It was summer there, wasn’t it?

We set out the next morning sullenly, in rain gear. We’d been amazingly fortunate with the weather, and had come to feel we deserved sunshine and blue skies. View potential is high on this walk, but we missed out, because this was the only day of our entire trip when the weather closed in on us a bit. Predictions called for steady rain, though all we got was drizzle and mist. Most of us stripped off to one extent or another, some of us down to our usual shorts and tees. It was a very fine walk across the Hollyford face toward Harris Saddle, almost all above treeline, and we knew Martins Bay and the Tasman Sea were out there somewhere. Gave ’em a wave.

At windy Harris Saddle, we stopped for lunch and got some wind layers back on.

The shelter on the left is for independent walkers. It’s a very nice version of what it is—a place to get safely out of the wind, rain, cold, snow, sleet, or whatever else the universe is hurling at you. The other is for guided groups. “Tea, madam?” “May I press your anorak, sir?” Behind the shelters is Conical Hill, which has a famed 360° view. Unfortunately, there was no chance of seeing anything from there on this day, so we passed it by. Not sure if its naming is connected in any way to the eminence of similar title near Loch Lomond.

At Harris Saddle, we crossed from Fiordland National Park to Mount Aspiring National Park. I’ll drop you here for awhile and let you wander around. Just don’t try to sneak your plebean self into that palace on the right!

Superficial critique

2011-03-23T18:44:00.002-04:00

Just in case you didn’t know:

OK, so my Brasher boots didn’t work out so well.

One or two other items were not so hot, but most of my kit was fine. Some of it was terrific. Here’s a little rundown, based on notes I (ominously) don’t remember making after returning to Queenstown after the Routeburn.

I just don’t like REI Adventure Pants. I’ve tried. They’re more oriented to traveling than to trekking. A little baggy, a fraction heavy. Now I’m going back to my rufty-tufty RailRider Weatherpants, which are near-ludicrous for general travel, but perform admirably in the hills.

The Kindle was superb, just as I thought it would be. I read on the plane down and back, of course, and a fair amount on the ground. Perhaps five or six books. In close to a month, I used about 80 percent of the original charge (and, of course, could have recharged it any any hostel wall outlet). I was concerned about how best to carry it. The natural first instinct for anyone, I think, would be to simply slide it vertically down along the side or the back of the pack as you might a stiff envelope. It would be well-padded and safe from rattling around. But I was afraid of putting edge pressure on it from above (especially when cramming the food bag down) and buckling it. Instead I laid it flat and horizontal, on top of one soft stuffsack (sleeping bag) and below another (hut clothes). It rode well there and was out of the way during the day. (It was also in its little protective envelope, of course.) I would advise even my Luddite friends (and they are legion) that this is a must-have for travelers who read. As in read.

As always, my ancient Patagonia Zephur (similar to a Marmot DriClime) saw a lot of use. It’s light, packs small, sheds wind and light rain, and takes the chill off before the sun comes up and after it goes down. The Napoleon pocket is actually big enough to be of use (glasses, mostly, but sometimes an iPod or even a camera). Stuffed in a small sack at night, it also makes a decent pillow.

I brought a redundant fleece—a Rab 100 pullover. I made it unredundant by wearing it on the plane, in huts, and around town. What can I say? Simple, light, warm, decent breast pocket. And tuck-wrapped into that small sack with the Zephur? L’oreiller de luxe.

I’m getting fond of Ex Officio Boxer Briefs for travel, but for walking I stick with Patagonia Baggies which supply their own liner. They are quick drying, they have useful pockets (seldom used on the trail, but I appreciate them nonetheless), and are excellent bathing trunks. And I’m old enough (as you can tell by my use of the term bathing trunks) to prefer my shorts...short. These aren’t those nasty flapping knee-dusters. They come with a natty 5-inch inseam.

The Western Mountaineering HighLite sleeping bag weighs a pound, compresses to a tiny package, and will keep me cozy in temps 10° or 15°F colder than I’m likely to experience from late spring through early fall. Spectacular.

Finally, the Petzl Tikka XP² headlamp was brilliant. Even set at half-power (yielding 10 hours of regulated light—four hours more than I needed in two weeks), it was—by far—the brightest lamp on the walk. I used it primarily on power-saving Lo for cooking and in red mode in the bunkrooms (on the theory it would be less likely to disturb sleepers), but when I needed light, I got light. (And, as with the Kindle, I could have recharged it in town.)

I was interested in the rather elegant Snow Peak 450 double-wall titanium mugs some of my group were using. On the other hand, the determinedly inelegant insulated plastic mug, pictured above with the HighLite, continues to the the job just fine.

Oh, and a bit on packs. I carried my usual excellent McHale 0-SARC, volume about 50L. Six of our number carried Ospreys, mostly the Aether/Ariel model at about 60L. Two carried Gregorys, one a Deuter, one an REI, and one something large and tagless that I didn’t recognize. We were not a cutting-edge or ultra-light group, to say the least. Everyone seemed to be reasonably comfy toting their loads, though. I certainly was.

This leaves the iPhone. A post of its own.

Well-formed and easy to follow

2011-03-21T14:35:00.003-04:00

The Kepler Track was the second of the three we walked. It starts and ends across Lake Te Anau from the town of the same name (where I would now be living if there weren’t a few people in this neck of the woods I rather like to see). And although the area had been walked (and even skiied) for many years, the current Great Walk was only opened in the summer of 1988, explicitly to ease strain on the Milford (the so-called “finest walk in the world”) and the Routeburn (which many New Zealanders believe is finer).

There are several types of formal tracks in New Zealand. The best known are what we were on—the Great Walks. These are described by the Department of Conservation as “Easier Tramping Tracks ... well-formed and easy to follow with plenty of direction signs. All major streams and rivers have bridges. These are the best sort of tracks for people with limited multi-day tramping experience ... Moderate fitness required.” So, lovely but unchallenging. And this was absolutely accurate.

Tramping Tracks “... offer challenging tramping on mostly unformed surfaces. Moderate to high level backcountry skills and experience are required, including navigation, river crossing and survival skills. Trampers need to be completely self sufficient ... Good fitness required ....” So, Mark’s TGO Challenge.

Routes are “unformed, and may be rough and steep ... Suitable for highly experienced trampers only.” So, Martin’s TGO Challenge.

As you would expect from these definitions, the Kepler is beautifully built and maintained—almost unbelievably so to people used to negotiating the rocky and boulder-strewn trails in New Hampshire’s White Mountains.

The treadway was apparently constructed by machinery airlifted in by helicopter, and machines are still used for serious maintenance. (I’m imagining a sort of even-more-miniature Bobcat, but I’m not sure) It’s not exactly a wilderness experience or a challenge. What it is, for much of the second day (that big bump, below) and occasionally before and after, is stunningly beautiful.

That second day is well above tree line, and also well above the deep blue Lake TeAnau and its South Arm. Above, along a great sweep of the horizon, are jagged Sierra-style peaks, showing off twinkling waterfalls and bright patches of snow and ice, all of which you get a quick glimpse of in the little video two posts ago. Quite beautiful, and a very fine walk by just about anyone’s standards.

After a steep descent, we spent the night at Iris Burn Hut. (I kept imagining a hearty local woman who lived along the stream and gave it her name, but, of course, the hut is named after a brook—a burn.) The ranger here gave us a bit of a talking to about watching our steps up above, since, he joked, he and his colleagues were not paid enough to come out and rescue us—only enough to feel some distant concern. (The DOC rangers do come out as needed, of course, though they rely to a much greater extent than our Northeastern U.S. Search and Rescue people on helicopters.)

On the third day, we wandered further down Iris Burn to the Moturau Hut, where most of us dove into the lake, which is overlooked by more impressive and lofty eminences. Certainly one of the prettiest places I’ve ever instantly, and happily, acquired goosebumps.

Groupie

2011-03-18T16:14:00.001-04:00

I think most of us left from Boston, but I met our mostly New England group met at Los Angeles Airport. We eventually made our way to Nelson, on the South Island, for a night in the Youth Hostel, where we got organizied.

More or less.

We are all reasonably experienced walkers, and almost all of a certain age. We understand teamwork, but we’ve developed our own styles, and, for want of a better term, our own physicalities.

I’m definitely a social walker. I really like having someone to appreciate the landscape and chat with. On my aborted TGO Challenge in 2008, I also enjoyed the more elastic fellowship of others going more or less our way at more or less our speed. At home, I love walking with old friends and, especially, my daughter and son-in-law.

What I’ve never liked is walking with any sort of formal group. I’m too shy, too set in my ways, too resentful of being told what to do. For example, I don’t like to stop more than a few minutes for lunch. I prefer the common American approach of snacking from breakfast to supper. But our group stopped not only for a leisurely lunch, but for relatively frequent rest breaks that seemed perfectly timed to keep me from getting inside a good rhythm. Milling about eating or “resting,” I always wanted to run screaming into the bush and emulate Charlie Brown: “Arrrrgh!”

There were other issues, too. Some minor acrimony over food, a gentle rebuke for exceeding the approved pace up a long rise and bringing “social pressure” to bear on less hyper walkers....

But here’s the thing: I enjoyed this trip, these walks, and this group of people enormously. Yes, I’d rather walk my own walk, in my own time, at my own speed, with my own food in my own stomach.

But I would have missed so much. Blister company, of course, but also the kidding and stories we traded as we cleaned and taped. Running (well, moderate walking) jokes. Never getting up so early that J didn’t already have water on the boil. Never wanting tea so late that J didn’t still have water on the boil. Being accepted into the Keen sisterhood. Dinner out with the boys in Te Anau and Queenstown (who knows why the women chose those elegant places?) Losing loud games of “Bones”—a game with five dice and rules I never fully understood. Laughing company in cold water in stunning locations.

AMC leaders are trained volunteers. They get a free trip for doing the work of organization, but they don’t get a dime of pay—more “first among equals” than “Leaders.” J (a different J) and C did a fine job. They handled our travel logistics without a flaw, and they employed a usually effective light hand in dealing with individual oddities and faux pas.

So, no, I won’t be joining a lot of these AMC trips. I don't really like my oddities and faux pas dealt with at all. But if the right trip, to the right place, with a bunch of these people comes up....

Sole man

2011-03-16T11:38:00.000-04:00

I brought my Brasher boots to New Zealand because my old Keens had lost their waterproof qualities, and I assumed we would have significant rain. In the event, we had only a few light showers on one day. The Keens would have been fine. But the Brashers really didn’t work out.

Our first Great Walk was the Abel Tasman Coast Track. It’s the most popular of New Zealand’s Great Walks—about 200,000 people use it every year.

It’s easy walking. The profile above is misleading. Imagine stretching it out to maybe double length for a better sense of its (lack of) steepness. And we walked easy, too. Over four days, we strolled about 50 kilometers (30 miles or so), completing all but the last wee bit of the trail—the 5.5 kilometers past Whariwharangi Hut.

Nonetheless, on our very first day of the trip, half of us found ourselves dealing with blistering problems. Not one of us was a chronic blisterer, though my limping gait during the first few days of 2008 TGO Challenge had raised up a few beauts. The other folks attributed their difficulties—mostly on and between toes—to sand we picked up periodically walking along gorgeous (and mostly empty) beaches. I never progressed to actual blisters, but I had significant hot spots on the heels and balls of both feet. Not a sand problem, I thought and still think, but a boot problem.The treadway on the Tasman Track is, when it's not down on a beach or crossing an inlet or estuary, wide, flat and packed as hard as any paving. I think this contributed, too.

For the next three days, duct tape was energetically deployed by all sufferers, and some of us, me included, laid a foundation of Moleskin. I also walked the rest of the Tasman in Keen Newport H2 sandals, which turned out to be very good. Don’t get me going on how well trainers would have worked for the whole trip. (Very well indeed.)

The Anchorage Hut was right on the beach—it was only a few enthusiastic steps to the turquoise water of Anchorage Bay. The area was bustling with walkers, campers, kayakers, and boaters, and we learned that you could hire a water taxi to carry your gear for you from hut to hut while you wander comfortably along under a daypack alone. We, however, saddled up fully the next morning and began our walk by squelching across the Torrent Bay estuary.

This second day, about 14 miles of beautiful walking, and more great, empty beaches, began toward the end to feel like a real slog to most of us—the only time this happened during the two weeks. I think our travel fatigue had caught up with us. And for some of us, of course, our feet hurt.

The third day, to the wonderfully euphonious Whariwharangi Hut, began with a crossing of the muddy Awaroa inlet. At the other side, we dried our feet and enjoyed another jolly foot-taping break. I can confirm that misery does, indeed, love company. Actually, by this time we all had our problems under control and the worry that we had all felt—privately at first, publicly as it waned—that we might not be able to continue on to the other walks, had faded. The day’s walk was lovely ... more spectacular beaches and stunning, quasi-tropical scenery. The next, last, day was a short walk, essentially backtracking to Mutton Cove, where we were met by one of those water taxis for an hour-long joyride back to our starting point—and one mighty fine beer.

Returning to Nelson before flying down to Te Anau, I headed out to Mountain Designs, bought a new pair of Keen Targhee Mids, which served very well for the rest of the trip, and then quartered the town, searching for more Moleskin to replace what I’d used up. It turns out they don’t really do Moleskin in New Zealand. (I’ve had the same problem in the UK. This strikes me as taking that stiff upper lip business a bit far.) I finally turned up two packages in a large pharmacy and took them to the counter. In my neck of the woods, similar packages hold three 4-5/8-inch x 3-3/8-inch rectangles of the stuff and cost $3.95 or so. I was gobsmacked to be asked for $25. Right: $12.50 (NZ) per packet. And I also discovered that each held only one pad. And that was the only Moleskin in Nelson, aside from that riding, I assume, in the packs of smarter Americans than I.

Stutter-step

2011-03-15T14:29:00.000-04:00

I’ve been listening to Melvyn Bragg’s wonderful book, The Adventure of English. He’s just called Dr. Johnson (and, in passing, Isaac Newton) an “effortless eccentric.” A lovely turn of phrase I thought I’d just pass along. I know a few self-conscious iconoclasts (mostly pains in the ass), and some self-congratulatory oddballs (don’t we all), not to mention the occasional utter loon, but the pure Johnsonian ... well, I can only hope to encounter it in the future.

•

I’m trying to figure out how to write about my fabulous month in New Zealand. Mere chronology, I can attest from my efforts, feels too dogged and ... cardinal sin ... boring. So I’m going to try to organize a few posts around riveting subjects instead. I’ll start tomorrow. With blisters.

I’m back

2011-03-09T17:00:00.001-05:00

But I don’t really know where to start, beyond saying I had a spectacular, sensational, superb, splendid, stupendous, and snowless time, and want to go back the day after tomorrow with all my favorite people.

So here’s a tiny first taste:

The gorgeous Abel Tasman Coastal Track

A minute or two on the Kepler’s Mount Luxmore, well above treeline, as was much of the Routeburn.

The only problem was that this squalid character kept turning up.

The calm after the storm

2011-02-04T19:00:00.000-05:00

I’m off tomorrow morning. I’ve had my usual freak-out planning and packing, but that’s all done now, and I’ve been wandering thoughtfully around town all day telling freezing, snow-shocked friends that I’m headed for New Zealand, which is in the Southern Hemisphere, which happens to be enjoying summer right now. They become a little less furious at me when they discover I’m going to be plodding about with 25 pounds on my back, but they’re all still fulminacious. So that’s all good.

Weather, touch wood, looks okay for flying SouthWest out of Bradley tomorrow at 9:50am, EST—possible snow showers. Denver, where I have to change to a different SW flight at 1:50pm, MST, looks similar. Then it’s Air New Zealand from LA, lifting off at 10pm, PST (1 day, 3 hours, 24 minutes, 35 seconds).

There have been some wrinkles. Our leaders headed down early to take care of some details before the rest of us arrive, but got stuck in the grinding machine that has been New England weather this year. I think they are in California now (re-routed through San Francisco) and will be boarding Air NZ later this evening. And it turns out that our group of 15 is now, due to injuries, a group of 12. I feel for our three friends, who must be devastated to miss out on this trip we’ve all been looking forward to for so long.

Nonetheless, I’m floating, hoping to maintain this zen-like state through at least one airport and, if I’m sufficiently worthy, all the way through LAX, where I will fall blissfully asleep on Air New Zealand Flight 0005 and awake...

In summer.

4 days, 6 hours, 10 minutes, 58 seconds

2011-02-01T16:14:00.001-05:00

This winter wonderland is getting old. We apparently got over 70 inches of snow in January...the most on record. It’s also been unusually cold. Paul and I have often been walking in negative Fahrenheit temps. Single digit positives have been normal. This morning was a balmy (and, I must admit, rather beautiful) 16°F (-9°C) in more snowfall. We’ve all been looking forward to a change in the weather. Tomorrow we’re going to get it. A vicious ice storm.

But I rise above all this. The groaning roof rafters, the ice dams along the eaves, the magical shrinking driveway, the slippery roads, the terrible footing, the canceled parties, the malfunctioning furnaces. I philosophically snap my fingers at all this. Because assuming an open airport Saturday morning (mere contemptible “snow showers” currently predicted), I’m finally hauling my fat, pasty, frostbitten, chilblained New England self off to New Zealand.

Where it is summer.

Have you noticed it’s winter?

2011-01-24T11:52:00.001-05:00

Negative 12°F (-24°C) this morning, according to the thermometer outside the kitchen window.

The key is these situations is always wind, of course, and there wasn’t any to speak of, so Paul and I were reasonably cozy for our hour out, though I may not look it. Eyelashes frozen, of course.

Lake Placid, NY reported in this morning at -37° (-38°), so Woodbury’s in the tropical part of the Northeast today.

--

On the other hand, maybe not so much. Paul got back home to find that his furnace wasn’t working. He has an outside tank, and fuel oil can gel up in really cold weather (even, apparently, with multiple applications of the special additive that costs $17 a quart). In the meantime, I’ve suggested he leave his fridge open to warm the place up. [7pm: Just back from E’s red barn in the back. Her furnace conked out too, but I think (knock, knock, knock on wood) I got it going again. A nice new condo is looking pretty good right now. Or maybe a trip to New Zealand. 12 days, 2 hours, 43 minutes, 53 seconds.]

More frozen lashes

2011-01-23T14:25:00.001-05:00

It was -8°F (-22°C) this morning. My eyelashes got fairly welded together. But my feet were cozy. No Brashers today, but my Sorels with their felt insoles and two pairs of wool socks. Multiple layers all over, of course, with the excellent Patagonia R1 Hoody coming into its own under my joyously rediscovered OR Peruvian hat. Turtle Fur neck gaiter, of course, or my manly chin would have fallen off, along with my aristocratic nose. It’s supposed to be -16° (-27°) tomorrow. With wind.

New Zealand summer is looking extra-good. 13 days, 7 hours 8 minutes, 14 seconds to take-off. I’m ready.

J’ai Deux Amours

2011-01-18T16:47:00.003-05:00

It’s not particularly my beloved Paris, as Bogart says to Conrad Veidt in “Casablanca.” But we were talking about favorite cities last Friday evening, and one thing led to another—I’ve been listening to various performances of this ever since. It’s associated most closely with Josephene Baker, who either wrote it or had it written for her. DeeDee Bridgewater named an album after it. But this easygoing Madeleine Peyroux version is probably best known at the moment.

Not surprisingly, it’s most affecting in French. English translations lose a certain, uh, je ne sais quoi. It would be a compliment to call my French truly lousy, but this is my version, which attempts to get the meaning, not necessarily the individual words or idioms, right. I’m not all that happy with the big black trees or “my ravished heart,” but I don’t do this for a living. And nobody in his right mind (I know, I know, it’s inevitable) would try to sing this song in English.

(I have seen a few performances—in French, but by Americans—that move the song from Paris music hall toward western swing: clippity clop, clippity clop, twang, twang. There are a few on YouTube. Weirdly wonderful. This is, after all, clearly a song written from the point of view of an American yearning to come to France.)

They say that over the sea,

Over there under the clear sky,

There’s a city where it’s enchanting to be.

And under the big black trees,

Every evening,

My spirit turns that way.

I have two loves—

My country and Paris.

By both of them

My heart is ravished.

Manhattan is beautiful,

But why deny it,

What puts a spell on me is Paris—

Paris in all its wonder.

Seeing it someday

Is my fondest dream.

I have two loves,

My country and Paris.

A good old-fashioned New England winter

2011-01-15T21:22:00.002-05:00

I know it’s pretty cold out when my eyelashes freeze together. Happened this morning. My thermometer read about ~~6°F (-15 °C)~~ -6°F (-21°C). The only parts of me that felt uncomfortable, though, were my feet. Brashers aren’t cut out for this.

The snow here remains, and we’re all having trouble finding somewhere to put it. This is my driveway, now perhaps two-thirds its normal size.

And this is the Main Street sidewalk, nicely plowed.

January!

Olden days

2011-01-15T07:17:00.001-05:00

One of the “regrets” emails I got for the Boxing Day do came from a classmate who lived down the road when we were young children. She included this photo, which dates from 1957 or so. That’s her sister’s bike I’m riding for some reason.

It’s odd to see one’s self looking, not old, obviously, but what one can only call antique.

Many happy returns

2011-01-14T06:14:00.004-05:00

I used to meet ladies occasionally who knew my father when they were all in their late teens. They would recognize my last name and ask me if I was my father’s son. When they got confirmation, ancient crushes would rise to the surface. It was always a breathy variation on the same theme: “Oh, he was so handsome ... and such a gentleman.”

I’ve seen the pictures, and he was handsome. (My late mother was extremely attractive, too, which tells you genetics doesn’t always work in a straight line. Mom herself once made a admiring comment to her mother-in-law about dad’s deportment was tartly told, “Of course he has good manners. He was raised at my table.”)

He’s 87 today. Still handsome. Still a gentleman (when he wants to be—he’s grown up, after all). Still virtually incapable of seeing anything but good in his friends and family. Still utterly, permanently, loudly, and forever unforgiving of anyone who has done any of us dirt. Still too cheap to hire someone to plow his driveway after a heavy snow (oh, my aching back!) But also still generous to a fault to others.

Happy birthday, Dad!

Shaggy B gets ears lowered

2011-01-13T06:51:00.005-05:00

H was, I think, in med school before she got her hair cut by anyone but C. I’ve been a regular for 35 years or so, with only a few traveling exceptions and a once-a-decade nostalgic trim at Walt and Ernie’s No Shaves in Hanover. B, who got clipped while she was in town at Christmastime, may not be as faithful a client, but I’m sure the zebra sheet will remain available for her.

Bigger than I thought

2011-01-12T17:16:00.002-05:00

According to The Hartford Courant:

The swift and ferocious storm had dumped 28 inches of snow in
Woodbury by 12:30 p.m. which was the highest snow total in the state at that time, according to the National Weather Service.

That’s us! And this evening my back has that 28-inches feeling.

Love and actually

2011-01-12T13:09:00.003-05:00

I spent last week with H, A, and sweet B. It’s been cold in New Hampshire lately (what a surprise!), but I got out for one nice, if frigid, walk with daughter, granddaughter, and Jasper the Wonderdog.

B has, for some reason—possibly clunky boots—stopped wanting to walk on these outings, and now insists on being carried, either on mama’s back in the Ergo, or in arms. I, of course, mind terribly when I have to carry her, with all the hugging and kissing that entails.

She seems to have a quick ear, and experiencing her verbal development is a special delight. One evening, A headed downstairs to dig out a bottle for dinner. B asked me, “Where Dada go?”—a perfectly respectable two-year-old query. I took her over near the open door and pointed, “He went into the cellar to get some wine.” Pause. Wheels turning. Then a correction. “He go into basement, actually.”

Of course, most of all she likes to be turned upside down and swung between your legs.

Weather report

2011-01-12T10:09:00.000-05:00

We’ve been having a bit of snow overnight and on through the day, blanketing the unmelted stuff from last week. Everything’s closed. No traffic. No walkers, even. Kind of pretty.

North side...

And south side...

I foresee some shoveling in my future. Hope I can find my snorkel.

Kindlemania!

2011-01-04T17:36:00.002-05:00

There was a surprise Kindle 3 under the tree this Christmas. I’ve built it a little protective sleeve.

There have been lots of reviews and reports about K3 on other walking blogs, but here’s the stuff I care about.

The device is astonishingly compact, light and thin—far easier to carry and pack than a single book, let alone many.
Its battery life is weeks and weeks.
It holds enough reading material for a lifetime of vacations, business trips, waits at doctors’ offices, and afternoon tea-sipping. (Not to mention those tooth-brushing sessions during which turning the pages of a self-closing book with one hand while manipulating a vibrating Oral-B with the other is the closest I get to calisthenics these days.)
Downloading is essentially instantaneous—and I really appreciate that you can download your own .pdf documents if you’ve created, say, lists or itineraries or notes for a remote conference call.
Prices are fine, though it’s true I rarely quibble over the cost of book I really want.
The reading experience is excellent—just like a book, really (Treasure Island, my first download—it’s free—was a treat, as usual)—though I prefer jotting notes (if any) in margins to doing the same thing electronically on a tiny keyboard
As yet, no way to borrow library books for Kindle, though our library does lend ebooks for other formats. As a big lib-user, this is a drawback.

The overriding obvious for me is that K3 is an elegant alternative to the book duffel that usually accompanies the family on holiday (one 12x12x24 for each traveler, plus one more—jammed to bursting and weighing like gold ingots—for the books essential for loafing enjoyment), or those two or three tomes dropped heavily into the briefcase. For the constant, voracious reader who often travels with books, it’s a dream. New Zealand? Absolutely. And undoubtedly just about everywhere else.

24 days, 10 hours, 51 minutes, 6 seconds.

I’ve got the powa!

2011-01-02T14:20:00.000-05:00

I’m slightly obsessed with my new Petzl Headlamp. It’s a Tikka XP², which replaces a beloved old Zipka. It’s symbolically meaningful that the two lights were designed in different centuries. I loved my Zipka, with its cool little retractable headband, but it’s lost its (limited) oomph, is essentially worthless on the early-morning roads, and I thought it was probably time for something over one candlepower.

Tikka and Zipka lamps are identical, and I went for the Tikka configuration this time for two reasons: its traditional headband offers greater stability and comfort on the run, and it gives me the ability to pull the whole deal down around my neck as a temporary storage option. (I can pull the Zipka’s retractable string down around my neck, too, but it makes me feel like an Ottoman sultan struggling through his last few depressing seconds.)

Configured either way, the XP² is a nice up-to-date headlamp, with multiple settings (Hi, Lo, Blink), a red-beam option for maintaining night vision as you grope for your pee bottle, and a little fresnel lense you can slide over the light to create a wider beam. Pretty cool, but not likely to excite my electrons.

It’s Petzl’s Core Rechargeable Battery that does that. More accurately, what I’ve been admiring for the last few days is Petzl’s OS, the free downloadable software that lets me control the Core. Using OS and the Core, you can create a regulated headlamp, one in which you specify the intensity of the beam the lamp puts out, which it holds for a known, inversely related, period of time, instead of gradually dimming to failure, which is what regulary batteries do. You can see roughly how this works on this screen shot.

This shows you that at full intensity, you get a beam that illuminates 40 meters ahead (about as far as the distance from home plate to second base, straight across the pitcher’s mound—a real boon to catchers trying to throw out runners in the dark) and the battery will need to be recharged after 4:30. As you adjust either the vertical output slider or the horizontal time to failure slider, the red line on the graph changes to illustrate the new reality, while the boxes at upper left and bottom center change to yield the new readings. You can create as many pre-set profiles for specific needs as you like. (As best I can tell, though you can recharge at any time by way of a USB cable, you can’t change to a different profile until you get back to the computer with your software on it.)

It’s presets I’m fiddling with at the moment. At 50 percent output, the values change to 28 meters and 9:45. At 25 percent, 20 meters and 19:00. At the minimum 4 percent, you get an 8 meter beam good for better than four days. (Petzl says the Core has been designed to be recharged 300 times, a lifetime it claims saves the use of 900 AAA alkaline batteries—a very good thing for multiple reasons.)

For running in the dark at my short distances, 100 percent is best, but for two weeks of hut-to-hutting in New Zealand’s summer, I’m pre-setting 60 percent, which gives me a more-than-adequate 31 meters (think from home to first) at an acceptable 7:45. Of course, I can always switch to battery-saving Lo at any time. And in a real pinch, I can remove the Core and go to three AAAs (these Petzls accept lithiums, unlike earlier models).

Here’s my quick chart of the Petzl power/time continuum:

100%/40m/4:30

90%/38m/5:00

80%/36m/6:35

70%/34m/6.35

60%/31m/7:45

50%/28m/9:45

40%/25m/12:15

30%/22m/15:55

20%/18m/23:30

10%/13m/46:00

Test 2

2011-01-01T12:23:00.002-05:00

Another mobile blog test. Here's a video from last week.

YouTube Video

And a photo.

35 days, 9 hours, 53 minutes, 10 seconds.

I'd better get this stuff figured out.

- Mobile posting.

A little Billie for the holidays

2010-12-31T12:49:00.004-05:00

I’ve posted this song before, but only its simply sophisticated Edgar Leslie lyrics. Here’s the definitive performance (music by Joe Burke). The easy swing behind Billie is from superb Count Basie players. Drummer Jo Jones, guitarist Freddie Green and bass player Walter Page were, with the Count himself on piano, the great rhythm section of the swing era. (Here, the very hip Claude Thornhill, who had a great band of his own, is on piano.) The sax is the nonpareil Lester Young. Trumpeter Buck Clayton (at first muted behind the singer, then on an open horn in his breaks and between her phrases) and clarinetist Buster Bailey were pre-eminent Basie standouts. Together, they all catch exactly the right mood.

The song isn’t really about a holiday—Billie, after all, sings, “When we want to work, we work”—but about a state of being, an attitude.

Maybe we do the right things
Maybe we do the wrong
Spending each day

Just wending our way along

For me, uptight New Englander, it’s aspirational.

Happy New Year! And hopes that, in a happy setting, you’re getting, some fun out of life.

Boxing Day

2010-12-28T12:47:00.000-05:00

We’ve had some snow! A fairly good Nor’easter blew through the day after Christmas and laid a cold and viciously windy foot of white on us. Officially, it was a Severe Winter Storm, but areas not far away suffered the technical Blizzard experience. It was pretty nasty out during our annual Open House. Police warnings to stay home, and all that. Only two dozen or so deeply committed scofflaws showed up, as opposed to the usual cast of thousands. A totally different dynamic, of course, and quite pleasant, because we were all able to hold real conversations rather than circulating through the din. (On the other hand, I’ve always rather enjoyed the circulating, and the din, too.)

Special perks: Lots of left-over beer and wine, which Paul, A, and I began to make a dent in yesterday evening. And bags of uneaten potato chips, which I reserve unto myself.

Christmas musick

2010-12-25T10:34:00.000-05:00

Christmas day is beginning gently here this year. Listening lazily to the Bach Christmas Oratorio reminded me that sweet B got her first taste of it last weekend. She especially liked the rousing opening Chorus, and asked to hear it over and over. She called it “The Parade Drum Song.”

A nearly complete non sequitur: I was reading something last week in which an Oxford personage of the 18th century was quoted as complaining that “Handel and his lousy musicians” were coming to town. I think he was using “lousy” literally.

Boots redux

2010-12-23T13:53:00.001-05:00

A decade or so ago, I bought a pair of non-GoreTex Brasher Hillmasters at Tiso’s in Edinburgh. (For my American reader, long A in Brasher.) I used them quite a bit for a while, and had them on my feet during my worst-ever fall, in the Lakes. I was then seduced by the lightness of trail runners, and tucked the stodgy old Brashers away.

I literally stumbled over them last week, as I was hauling out my ’70s-vintage Sorel boots in preparation for a snowstorm that never materialized. Tried ’em on. Swapped out destroyed old footbeds for Superfeet, ongoing experiments with sock combos. Not bad. Possibly New Zealand bound.*

I’ve always had a weak spot for Brashers, because of Chris Brasher, who was, well, Chris Brasher, an amazing and admirable man. I especially cherish this semi-famous story from the linked obit. Brasher won the 1956 Olympic Steeplechase Gold Medal in Melbourne, but:

was initially disqualified for interfering with another runner as he made his burst for home, and he had to wait three agonising hours for the judges’ decision to be overturned—so long that his medal ceremony was postponed to the following day. The much relieved Brasher, and a dozen British sportswriters, celebrated through the night, ensuring that he entered the annals as one of the few Olympic champions to have received their gold medal “blind drunk, totally blotto, with an asinine grin on my face.”

*Which will be in 44 day, 8 hours, 25 minutes, and 27 seconds. If anybody’s counting.

Search and rescue

2010-12-15T11:44:00.000-05:00

I found my Dartmouth Green longjohns today. They had been lurking in the bottom of a laundry basket otherwise full of sheets and pillowcases that had been leering, unfolded, at me for way too long. This morning I wiped those smirks off their faces, snapped ’em and wrapped ’em...and there were my undies!

As a special bonus, I found something else, which I hadn’t yet realized I’d lost: the red Baggies shorts I intend to wear for morning hakas during February. (52 days, 10 hours, 22 minutes, 30 seconds.)

Still can’t find that darned Peruvian hat, though. Maddening, because I remember folding it with unusual care and thoughtfully tucking it away...somewhere. Maybe I should go fold some more laundry.

Have a dood day, yadies

2010-12-14T14:09:00.002-05:00

When H was a little girl, the letter she had the hardest time coming to pronounce was “L”. Our favorite iteration of this was in the title of the Sandra Boynton book, Moo, Baa, La La La!, which in our family will forever be known as, “Moo, Baa, Ya Ya Ya!”

Sweet B’s most adorable issue is with the hard expression of the letter “G”. For many years to come, we will all delight every Thanksgiving in making that well-known turkey sound: “dobble-dobble.”

B might characteristically say to that, “Why you laffing?” Which would put her one yaff up on her mom.