hooray! i reached my goal of riding a full century ride in 2007. i am proud of myself. i rarely feel pride in myself without reservations or caveats of some sort, but this time it's pure and true.
the course was actually 102 miles, and yes, i was counting. very closely. the ride started and finished at hampton beach, and went south to dip into massachusetts before circling back round north along the new hampshire coast and peeking into maine before heading back. there were a few hills towards maine which winded me, but the most difficult part, as i imagined, was the headwind coming back south. almost the entire route was right along the coast. gorgeous vistas and glimpses at some pretty spectacular beachside properties.
nate was a fantastic support system to me: coach, pack mule, and cheering squad all rolled into one. he also was documentarian, and has put pictures up here. i couldn't have done it without him. i may have never even set this as a goal for myself if it weren't for him. he's had my thanks a few times, and i plan to thank him a few more before the day is through.
before leaving the area we treated ourselves to pizza from a beachside vendor. we leaned against his parked car in the fading light, munching slices and watching the crashing waves, the kids pedaling past rocking back and forth on training wheels, and the die-hard sunbathers still camped out. it was a lovely, exhausting, satisfying day. a beautiful way to cap the summer and begin our vacation.
tommorow is all about packing our most quick-drying belongings and then being off to turkey!
Sep 22, 2007
Sep 21, 2007
pictures
hyggelig hen til på gensyn
i hope that translated correctly, i used this website to get the danish version of "nice to see you."
after lapsed communication on my part, i owed a response to a letter sent to me over a year ago, i have been reconnecting with my first au pair, lone, who has also very recently created a small web presence.
i am so pleased that we have been able to rekindle a relationship. it makes me feel all warm and happy to hear about the growth of and changes in her career and two beautiful children. lone was a teenager and i was still in grade school when we first met, and we were both figuring out a lot of things for ourselves. we've seen each other once since then, when i was close to the age she was when she came to america. there will be business trips that bring lone back to the states. i'll be hatching and scheming plans to see her...
after lapsed communication on my part, i owed a response to a letter sent to me over a year ago, i have been reconnecting with my first au pair, lone, who has also very recently created a small web presence.
i am so pleased that we have been able to rekindle a relationship. it makes me feel all warm and happy to hear about the growth of and changes in her career and two beautiful children. lone was a teenager and i was still in grade school when we first met, and we were both figuring out a lot of things for ourselves. we've seen each other once since then, when i was close to the age she was when she came to america. there will be business trips that bring lone back to the states. i'll be hatching and scheming plans to see her...
Sep 20, 2007
my dreams tell me things
i dreamt i was poking around the sample size bins at the drug store, and i picked up and contemplated purchasing a pair of toenail clippers.
Sep 19, 2007
sore shanks
about a week before i did the 70-mile ride i decided it would be a good idea to cross-train, and i used all sorts of muscles that were decidedly sore until a day or two before the ride. of course, limiting the comfort of riding and doing real training before that big day. i thought, how silly. and i thought, that's surely a lesson that i should put more time between using oft-ignored muscles and a long ride.
which must be why come monday i decided the weather was so beautiful that i shouldn't go to the gym - that i should, instead, jog. i, who haven't touched a track, a field, a fast pace on foot for more than a few seconds since 1999...yes, i put some headphones on and went out in the neighborhood to alternate jogging and walking until everything was sore. that took about 18 minutes. i really don't need to go into detail about how very un-sojo this act was, or how unlikely it is that anyone will believe that i did anything close to running.
and so, about a week before before i do another big ride, i decided it would be just fine to cross-train and make all sorts of leggy, knee-y, and shanky muscles decidedly sore. noted: riding to work this morning felt nice, but after a few hours large portions of the lower half of my body are reluctant and angry.
i have fielded a request to not run again before riding this weekend. i will happily oblige.
which must be why come monday i decided the weather was so beautiful that i shouldn't go to the gym - that i should, instead, jog. i, who haven't touched a track, a field, a fast pace on foot for more than a few seconds since 1999...yes, i put some headphones on and went out in the neighborhood to alternate jogging and walking until everything was sore. that took about 18 minutes. i really don't need to go into detail about how very un-sojo this act was, or how unlikely it is that anyone will believe that i did anything close to running.
and so, about a week before before i do another big ride, i decided it would be just fine to cross-train and make all sorts of leggy, knee-y, and shanky muscles decidedly sore. noted: riding to work this morning felt nice, but after a few hours large portions of the lower half of my body are reluctant and angry.
i have fielded a request to not run again before riding this weekend. i will happily oblige.
Sep 18, 2007
100 miles with viola and nate
did i mention i'll be on my bicycle for one hundred miles this coming saturday? indeed. i have signed up for what is touted as the flattest 100-mile organized ride on the east coast. i can only hope. using a modest and likely estimate of my average speed, i should be able to stop pedaling sometime after six and a half or seven hours. i'll be thinking endurancey thoughts and looking to nate for moral support if ever my eyes wander to the sag wagon. he has considered bringing bungee cords in case i need to be towed. i am considering kicking my own ass up and down the coast.
Sep 14, 2007
fault lines
by the Reverend Robert Walsh
Did you ever think there might be a fault line
Passing underneath your living room:
A place in which your life is lived
In meeting and in separating, wondering and telling,
Unaware that just beneath you
Is the unseen seam of great plates that strain through time?
And that your life, already spilling over the brim,
Could be invaded, sent off in a new direction,
Turned aside by forces that you were warned about but never prepared for?
Shelves could be spilled out,
The level floor set at an angle in some seconds' shaking.
You would have to take your losses, do whatever must be done next.
When the great plates slip and the earth shivers
And the flaw is seen to lie in what you trusted most,
Look not to more solidity, to weighty slabs of concrete poured
Or strength of cantilevered beam to save the fractured order.
Trust more the tensile strands of love that bend and stretch
To hold you in the web of life that's often torn but always healing.
There's your strength.
The shifting plates, the restive earth, your room, your precious life,
They all proceed from love, the ground on which we walk together.
Did you ever think there might be a fault line
Passing underneath your living room:
A place in which your life is lived
In meeting and in separating, wondering and telling,
Unaware that just beneath you
Is the unseen seam of great plates that strain through time?
And that your life, already spilling over the brim,
Could be invaded, sent off in a new direction,
Turned aside by forces that you were warned about but never prepared for?
Shelves could be spilled out,
The level floor set at an angle in some seconds' shaking.
You would have to take your losses, do whatever must be done next.
When the great plates slip and the earth shivers
And the flaw is seen to lie in what you trusted most,
Look not to more solidity, to weighty slabs of concrete poured
Or strength of cantilevered beam to save the fractured order.
Trust more the tensile strands of love that bend and stretch
To hold you in the web of life that's often torn but always healing.
There's your strength.
The shifting plates, the restive earth, your room, your precious life,
They all proceed from love, the ground on which we walk together.
thank poo to you, amazon.com
the campus bookstore wants $104 for a used text i need. upward of $150 or so for it new. i had to see it in person. an employee told me it was 6th edition, but the only version i found online was 1st edition. fortunately, the employee was wrong - it was published in 2006, and is clearly the only edition that exists. with shipping from an amazon vendor it runs about $70. that makes $30 i can put to good use elsewhere, right? money i would've spent otherwise... perhaps it will go towards an appropriate autumn wedding outfit, say, that i'll be shopping for this evening. or, maybe for extra maza, "small dishes" ...like tapas, one night in turkey. So, Amazon didn't process my credit card and now I have to go buy the more expensive copy in person if I want to have the book in time to read before classes start and then upon my return over the holiday weekend. boo. hiss. grumble. but hey...(turkey! in ninefive days!)
Sep 13, 2007
speaking of food...
it rosh hashanah today, the jewish new year. one should eat apples dipped in honey to symbolize the wish for a sweet new year. also, bread dipped in honey. or, anything else made with apples and/or honey. in my opinion, these are much more pleasant and comforting food traditions by which to herald the start of another cycle than by getting shit-faced drunk some extremely cold night in the middle of winter.
new culinary adventures
last night i tried three dishes i've never made before, and used beets for the first time. i don't yet have a good vegetable scrubber, so i used the rough side of a fresh double-duty sponge. once the beets cooled from roasting, peeling and grating them gave way to the bright magenta juice explosion i had been expecting. with the help of some homegirls i made: watercress, beet, grapefruit and blue cheese salad; corn and peach salsa; and thyme-roasted sweet potatoes (made even more delicious with red pepper flakes and garlic). another wonderful thing about autumn is this reawakening desire to use the oven to and stove for making hearty and warming dishes after a long day...
Sep 10, 2007
limes
instead of a cocktail with dinner the other night at the west side lounge, i asked for some lemon or lime for my tap water. i almost never ask for garnish, unless i think i can get away with scoring extra maraschino cherries with a shirley temple, so i'm not sure what inspired me.
various food pursuits for this week required the acquisition of a stash of limes at the store last night, and halfway through last night's prep of black bean and portobello mushroom burgers with a corn salsa i was left with part of a lime. refrigerate it for later? that's how i end up with shriveled bits of citrus emaciating away in plastic-wrap shrouds. i quickly joined it with the water glasses. nate told of an ex who limed her water to get more vitamin c and make more palatable the pursuit of hydration. and today, i saw this waterlogged entry at 'married ...with dinner.' boosted by all this timely background info, i'm now officially on a limekick.
various food pursuits for this week required the acquisition of a stash of limes at the store last night, and halfway through last night's prep of black bean and portobello mushroom burgers with a corn salsa i was left with part of a lime. refrigerate it for later? that's how i end up with shriveled bits of citrus emaciating away in plastic-wrap shrouds. i quickly joined it with the water glasses. nate told of an ex who limed her water to get more vitamin c and make more palatable the pursuit of hydration. and today, i saw this waterlogged entry at 'married ...with dinner.' boosted by all this timely background info, i'm now officially on a limekick.
unfamiliar things about myself
erin got in touch with me from japan to show me how my presence is worldwide. according to my rusty japanese, "sojo" is an auto and technology school. maybe they'd give me free tuition to be their mascot.
i haven't been sleeping through the night. i get up sometime around 4 or 6am, and am awake briefly, and then return to a less-than-satisfying slumber. i'm hoping to break the cycle. should i: completely wear myself at the end of the night by climbing the stairs a bunch of times? have warm milk before bed? stop eating dinner as late as 10pm?
nate has informed me that once i fall asleep my prefered position is oogled down below the blanketline, head off pillow, and on my back. how odd. i've never liked to sleep on my back. what other patterns of behavior have i been taking for granted about myself that aren't true?
Sep 8, 2007
peak into dojo sojo
mom has asked me about the paint job in my place, and i have been negligent about snapping a shot and posting it. finally got my act together and took a pictures of the one corner of the living room i'm not entirely mortified to show. the rest of the space needs some t.l.c.
the color is called 'indian turnip.'
Sep 7, 2007
well hello, good lookin'
oh, hello color combination clothing layer of my dreams. nice to see you here. have you been here long? no? wonderful, perhaps you and i should become friends.
Sep 6, 2007
mummery + schnelle
wolfram's (and andrew's) gallery is now open - congratulations! and, glückwünsche!
if you're in london, stop by and say hello to wolfram for me.
Sep 5, 2007
what's been up
i am feeling a very holistic happiness these days. i just came off of the most lovely and well-rounded holiday weekend i've had in some time, my physical being is being looked after nicely, and my workplace is starting to tingle with the excitement of the new season.
viola and i went on a few lovely bicycle rides this weekend, both with friends and alone. we joined a large group at critical mass on friday, which stretched on into the late and warm summer night air, until tummies started to growl in protestation. it was the perfect way to end a series of CM rides - i'll be busy every friday night between now and the end of the calendar year with class, so this was my (temporary) last hurrah. i got up and out early on saturday, reluctanctly turning my back on very tempting tangle of nate-limbs and sheets, for a ride along my local bike path. and then on monday, nate and i rode 25 miles in the rolling hills around stow, massachusetts, starting and ending at the honey pot hill orchard. all in all, i got in about 75 miles. so, i just need to do 133% of that all in one day. hoo boy.
the rest of the weekend was full of little errands and chores around the house, dinner with nate's high school buddy and his girlfriend, vacation research, leisure reading, and of course, dinner on monday to celebrate two fantastic years with my partner in crime.
yesterday i finally went to have my hair trimmed. casey had offered to do it for me, but i couldn't resist treating myself to the joy of a salon shampooing. my scalp was in heaven. and, they threw in a mini neck massage. i said thank you. a lot. once again i have moderately well-behaved hair, and visibly present bangs, thanks to pyara salon in harvard square. (something in the water at pyara - most of the stylists are doing vastly dramatic thing with angles, color, and extensions. my stylist was rocking pink and purple and black hair. it must kill them a little bit to do such conservative cuts as mine.)
work is getting busy. i had about seventeen things to do this morning. i think i managed about sixteen of them. it's nice to have some work i need to sink my teeth into. although i enjoyed the low-key spirit of the summer, i need more oomph to feel productive. so, now i have it. and am about to feel overwhelmed. my office looks like a manilla file monster pooped on every surface. ah, the joys of autumn in a university.
i'm working in shelving for the apartment, and eating my way through incredibly delicious tomatoes and peaches from the orchard. nate and i are talking about the possibility of joining a CSA for next year, and working out travel plans for now through november. it's a full, busy, wonderful time. hooray for autumn!
viola and i went on a few lovely bicycle rides this weekend, both with friends and alone. we joined a large group at critical mass on friday, which stretched on into the late and warm summer night air, until tummies started to growl in protestation. it was the perfect way to end a series of CM rides - i'll be busy every friday night between now and the end of the calendar year with class, so this was my (temporary) last hurrah. i got up and out early on saturday, reluctanctly turning my back on very tempting tangle of nate-limbs and sheets, for a ride along my local bike path. and then on monday, nate and i rode 25 miles in the rolling hills around stow, massachusetts, starting and ending at the honey pot hill orchard. all in all, i got in about 75 miles. so, i just need to do 133% of that all in one day. hoo boy.
the rest of the weekend was full of little errands and chores around the house, dinner with nate's high school buddy and his girlfriend, vacation research, leisure reading, and of course, dinner on monday to celebrate two fantastic years with my partner in crime.
yesterday i finally went to have my hair trimmed. casey had offered to do it for me, but i couldn't resist treating myself to the joy of a salon shampooing. my scalp was in heaven. and, they threw in a mini neck massage. i said thank you. a lot. once again i have moderately well-behaved hair, and visibly present bangs, thanks to pyara salon in harvard square. (something in the water at pyara - most of the stylists are doing vastly dramatic thing with angles, color, and extensions. my stylist was rocking pink and purple and black hair. it must kill them a little bit to do such conservative cuts as mine.)
work is getting busy. i had about seventeen things to do this morning. i think i managed about sixteen of them. it's nice to have some work i need to sink my teeth into. although i enjoyed the low-key spirit of the summer, i need more oomph to feel productive. so, now i have it. and am about to feel overwhelmed. my office looks like a manilla file monster pooped on every surface. ah, the joys of autumn in a university.
i'm working in shelving for the apartment, and eating my way through incredibly delicious tomatoes and peaches from the orchard. nate and i are talking about the possibility of joining a CSA for next year, and working out travel plans for now through november. it's a full, busy, wonderful time. hooray for autumn!
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