June 2003 Archives

Okay, just one more. See previous entry below. Now, imagine 10-year-old running into the bedroom this evening and screaming (for comic effect), "I've got blisters on my fingers!!" I almost choked I laughed so hard. Mom put her up to it . . . she knows The Beatles, but I haven't gotten her up to the white album yet....

Okay, I promise, no more Beatles-related titles. But I couldn't pass up that one. Though, of course, there's nothing golden about a slumber party from which your daughter has to be rescued because she has burned the tips of her fingers making smores, goofing around an outside fireplace at 11:30 at night. I was already asleepish, though the newly rowdy teen boys across the street, who have gotten through their entire adolescence without making a disturbing sound, have suddenly discovered the joy of teen girls, and there are suddenly long, loud conversations in the street under my window at hours of the night at which only teens would converse. Well, teens and other people who aren't trying to force themselves to get up and run at 5:30. But you get my point. Which was? Oh, yes, the slumber party. So, Lee goes and extricates Hannah, who has now learned that wood in a fire will actually heat up before it bursts into flame, and that there may not be any evidence of such heat, and that perhaps fingers are better kept away from wood so heated. Not too bad, but she was in a lot of pain last night, and, of course, exhausted from staying up hours after her bedtime. Despite her extremely nasty disposition, she was allowed to return to the party this morning because we really didn't want her to be The Girl Who Had To Go Home for the rest of her life. Of course, her not sleeping meant her parents didn't sleep, and of course I could feel every bit of her pain. We're fairly strict parents who don't generally HAVE fire, let alone let our children play with it, so she hasn't had the chance to really burn herself yet, but I understand that other folks treat fire differently, and so she may be a little bit deprived. Deprivation over -- she knows the pain of second-degree burns. Then, having not slept much of the night, we were awakened around 4:30 by The Wrath of God, in the form of a big, heavy, loud thunderstorm that lasted about four times longer than one would expect -- I mean, how can there BE that much rain in those clouds? The thunder was deafening, and the lightning was so close and low that it seemed like the house jumped with each flash. So, I didn't run. Lazy bastid.

Dead snapping turtle on the side of the road out on 151 has seen better days. Noticed this morning that the birds have pretty much picked out his innards, leaving the shell and some bones, and I thought: there should be somewhere you could take the shell and have it re-turtled. But it doesn't work that way. No deposit, no re-turtle.

Please try to throw only fresh fruit....

I had a brief flirtation (lasting for about half my shower this morning) with the idea of titling every entry with a Beatles song title. I thought of it like the blues, that out of the limitations, I could create something freeing. Then I realized it was just the endorphins talking. You'll be happy to see that that fabulously stupid idea has been discarded. Except for today.

Endorphins because I got out this morning for a quick ride. Should have run, but I have been jonesing for a bike ride all week, and it's been impossible because of my schedule and the heat. Nice and cool this morning, in the 60s, but I didn't have much fuel, so I ate breakfast before I started, and in the hills my stomach and my lungs were competing for oxygen. Stomach always wins, even in a game of rock/paper/scissors. It just swallows them all.

Anyway, the whole Beatles thing is because Bekah gave me The Beatles Anthology on DVD for Father's Day, and until the Tour de France, there's just nothing to watch on TV, so I've been immersing myself in Beatlemania all over again. It's very well done. Did you know that Jools Holland was one of the interviewers? I couldn't have been more surprised. Only complaint is that the music comes up very loud compared to the interviews, so then I have to sit ready with the remote at all times. But I'm a man, that's my job.

Took the little hole in the dining room wall that's been there for months as a result of the Great Plumbing Leak and made it into a much much bigger hole, got the drywall cut to replace it, and then declared it Too F'ing Hot to continue. We live in an old, insulated, well-shaded house that is pretty easy to keep cool most of the summer -- you just have to close the blinds on the south side, run the attic fan in the morning to change the air, etc. But when it hits the 90s for a few days in a row, there's nothing to do, and I'm not going to have air conditioning, which I hate, for the six or seven nights a year when the heat is just unbearable. Unbearable heat is part of the point of summer. I run past all these big dumb houses on treeless lots and there's never a single window open, the heat pump is humming all the time, and I can't imagine living like that, all wrapped up tight in my house forever. We have windows open all year round -- in fact, despite the cold this winter, I don't think there were five nights when our bedroom window wasn't cracked open at least a little. And in the summer, I like to open up the house and experience the summer. (Though I'll admit, it would be better experienced with a pellet gun handy, because those damn birds are noisy at 5 in the morning) (And I need something larger to deal with the backup alarms on the trucks working in the sand mine down the street).

Today, a wedding! Hoo ha! Much fun.

Just for the record, I have voluminous reunions to attend this year, and none of them are the result of my very vague undergraduate graduation date (but, take your pick: 1982, 1983, 1985, any of these have claims to legitimacy). For starters, there are not one, but TWO reunions of the Scotia-Glenville High School Class of 1978 (more information at the school's page at Classmates.com and the alumni page at the S-G Schools website. First in July, the second in November. Then, sharing the weekend with International Talk Like a Pirate Day is the 100th anniversary celebration of The Daily Orange, and frankly I can easily see a lot of arrrrhhh! going on there even there weren't an official day. We always had a fondness for bad Long John Silver imitations, we did. And on top of all that (and this in spite of my possessing the ankles of a 20-year-old and the blood pressure of a teenage girl), this November it will have been 20 years since we decided to get in over our heads and see what it was like to be young, broke and married. So, now we're one out of three - - that's not bad!

If you can put a variation of that phrase together with Dick Whittington's cat, your mind is officially as scary as mine. Blogger has been updating, so I've been unable to post. God only knows if this will work.

Summer is officially here! Not because it's sweltering (though it is), not because I come home every night to find a tribe of kids in my driveway playing with the hose (though I do), but because last night we had supper at the pool. We belong to a little pool club that's been around since the '50s at least, just about 10 minutes away. It is always on the verge of being sold for development, but every year it opens up again and we spend four or five nights a week lounging around the pools. Something of a delightful throwback to a time when everyone wasn't expected to put a pool in their own yard (membership costs less than the chemicals for my own pool would). Our area has several drive-in movie theaters, as well, so laugh at little Albany if you wish, but in the summer this area kicks ass. Summer, unfortunately, lasts eight weeks.

Too hot to bike. Too hot to do anything but lounge by the pool. Need to run out and find new pants for a wedding tomorrow, and then a-swimming we will go.

Everybody wants prosthetic foreheads on their real heads . . . .

Or perhaps dishwear, the jury is still out. Bizarre search term of the week, and apparently a lot of people are coming to this site from a posting at Disturbing Search Requests. Welcome. You'll come for the pansy dishware, but you'll stay for the glycerol ester of wood rosin. (I am so going to regret that.)

Well, finally, it's beautiful and hot. Got in a quick 18 mile bike ride after work, and I was just dripping by the end. Important rule to remember when using the aerobar: don't change handlebars when a car is passing you. You change handlebars when a car is passing you, you're gonna make a mistake, you're gonna have a bad time. (Sorry, I've had that South Park skiing episode jammed in my head for several days. That and a number of lines from They Might Be Giants, such as "She doesn't have to have / her dB's record back now....").

Say a little prayer to whoever is the patron saint of turboprop aircraft, as I'm off to Rochester tomorrow. I so don't want to go. The people are making me go. I really don't want to do this. Arrgh. The only thing worse than driving to Rochester and back is flying to Rochester and back. Nothing against the Flower City (or the Flour City, for you non-revisionists), but it's just far enough away to be annoying, and not far enough away to justify an overnight. Great bike path, though. Won't get to play on it tomorrow. I don't even get frequent flyer miles for this debacle.

Hey, somebody remind me, I've got to write about a slew of reunions coming up. Plus, that whole eating-pizza-at-the-Varsity-with-my-little-girls thing. But first, I need to get a new keyboard for this thing, as the right shift key is becoming less and less sporadic in its operation, and not in favor of shifting things. I know the younger generation isn't all worked up over capitalization and spelling and those niceties in this, the computer age. But, even though I remember well pleading with our Personal Use Typing teacher to PLEASE let us take our tests without having to capitalize (this was back in the day, son, on heavy manual typewriters -- when hitting the shift key was Man's Work, and carbon paper was treated like gold leaf), I've grown fond of capital letters, largely correct spelling, and any number of the special characters sitting up above the digits, reachable only with that darned shift key.

By the way, if you're looking for photos, click on the Fotolog button to the left. It's much easier than posting them on this site. Go on, click it; you know you want to.

-- Mr. Johnson, returning to this pretentious sign-off device, remembers when typewriters had no numeral "1". You do, too, but you won't admit it.

The sun is just fucking with us, now. I mean it. More than 72 hours of nothing but rain in varying intensities, the sun comes out at 5:30 on Sunday afternoon. Arrggghhh. ....

Be honest. Am I losing my street cred? 'Cause if I am, I can get some more, I'm sure.

You can tell me.

Hey, I've been Blogshared! I thought I had to sign up for that, but apparently not . . . Oddly enough, some people have bought my stock, too, even though I'm NOT the linky type. Not permanently linky, anyway...

Courtesy of Rob's Amazing Poem Generator, a poem based on my blog. The best one yet, I think: My bones just nothing, better to draft on in sky! Oh, you down. some goofy photo that I was nice, and drivers were a lot of other giveaways . . . Jesus, help me.... average speed, so many other giveaways . . . Jesus, help me....

Look out! Giant ball of fire in sky!

Oh, never mind. Just the sun. I forgot.

Don't worry, it's gone.

Wife: "Would you start the dishwasher?" Me: "I will, but I warn you, once started, I cannot stop it. No man can."

That gives you some idea what living with me is like.

Did you ever get to work and suddenly have the odd sensation that perhaps you had worn Tevas instead of dress shoes, but knew that was ridiculous? And then to show how ridiculous, you refused to look at your feet, instead trying to figure out by how they felt whether you were wearing sandals or not? But without wiggling the toes or any other giveaways . . .

Jesus, help me....

I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing when I'm working with concrete, and every time I do it, I think that maybe I'll get a little better. Maybe I am, but it seems there are just some things that I would be better off leaving to the pros, and concrete might be one of those things. But here I am, playing with concrete. I now have three of four decrepit cellar windows replaced and properly framed in, and last night I embarked on the project of refacing the foundation block on the south side. We'll see if I have any idea what I'm doing. I do know that this is not work for even the moderately tall, and that mosquitoes are a problem when you've got a trowel in your hand. I blame all this on my father and his brothers, who (in my estimation, colored by the fact that I was about eight years old) used to borrow cement mixers and lay down new sidewalks just for lack of anything better to do.

More new photos at my Fotolog site, for those who care. I've got to get all this stuff under one roof someday, but I'm not sure I can bring myself to use the same webhost as Wil Wheaton.

There is nothing, just nothing, better than being awakened by two princesses, fully dressed in tutus, tights, and tiaras, proclaiming, "Thanks for making the rent!" (Okay, I admit I requested that particular greeting . . . but still, I got it.) Presents in bed. Hannah saying, "Wait'll you see this one! You're gonna scream like a woman!" (It was The Beatles Anthology, so quite right she was). Lovely abundance of cards and a painted rock paperweight adorned with felt so it won't scratch my desk (it occurred to me looking at a colleague's profusion of hockey-puck paperweights: there is no breeze in our tightly sealed green building). And since I explained that I dislike the entire concept of breakfast in bed, instead my breakfast was served in a bed -- a heaping bowl of grape nuts, wheat germ and blueberries, all nestled down in a bed-shaped aluminum tin. All this and "Buffy" season three, too!

I was just wondering, why are young girls coming to the canyon? Why in the mornings can I see them walking? How has this affected my feelings about keeping my blinds drawn, and increased my loquaciousness?

My brain is a scary place sometimes, I've been told.

I know, I promised not to complain about the weather, but really . . . . It's like living in a world where everything smells like wet dog. It was sunny (and downright HOT) on Tuesday, but that's it. Before then, since then . . . rain, rain, rain. This is the first time (and it had better be the last) that I can ever remember having the heat on in June. Today wasn't bad if you don't mind gray skies all day, and it actually hasn't rained since early morning, but it's going to soon, and then all through tomorrow.

Hello?!! I left Syracuse! Years ago! I want dry feet again!

Favorite waste of time this week? Fotolog.net. Browse around, you're bound to find some goofy photo that was worth the trip.

Just a kick-ass great ride, didn't feel even a little fatigue until 42 miles, and just kept pouring it on. The day was cloudy and cool, just perfect for long-distance riding. Lots of fun to be among so many other cyclists, everybody checking out everybody else's gear, comparing pedals and computers and everything else. There were a number of other bikes with aerobars, so I felt a little less pretentious about them -- and then I put them to excellent use, just punishing the course without punishing myself. There were a couple of hundred riders in the 50 mile, which started off a little late, and for the first couple of miles we completely took over one lane of Route 4, but slowly people spread out and we got over to the side of the road. Not much traffic at all, which was nice, and drivers were pretty respectful, which was also nice. There was one moment when I perfectly timed my approach to a hill with a tractor-trailer going by so that I was pretty much sucked up the hill, excellent use of superdrafting. Otherwise, I mostly stayed to myself on the road because 1) it's not polite to draft on someone without permission, and 2) I was passing pretty much everybody I came upon. For the first 25 miles, I had an amazing (for me) average speed of 18.9mph. That slowed down some as we hit the rolling hills (but nothing like what I'm used to here in Rensselaer County), and I started to feel a little fatigue at mile 42, but I was damned if I was going to take it easy and cut into an amazing average speed, so I kept pushing on it and ended up the 52.3 mile ride with an average speed of 17.8mph, finishing in 2:55 ride time (not counting quick rest stops). The volunteers were fantastic, the food and water at the rest stops were great, everybody was in good spirits, and it was a lot of fun. It was NOT a race. But I still kicked ass. More than made up for my lousy footrace a couple of weeks back. The girls came up to greet me at the finish line, which was really nice, and we all had lunch and ice cream together. The whole thing was so great, and I was really wondering what it would take to get me through a century. Hmmmm.... Best of all, raised $1195 for the American Diabetes Association, which was very cool.

-- Mr. Johnson isn't even a little bit sore.

I don't know what ad you're seeing above (and Blogger does have some nice text-referenced ad placements), but for some reason I'm being offered the chance to learn more about "New York Harbor Cruises" -- so far so good. The subtext is: "All occasions, dancing, DJ, catered Private parties - NYC or Weehawken". Hmm.... where to have my private party, NYC or Weehawken?

Weehawken?!!! Slowly I turned . . . .

As I said not long ago, sometimes a song that's been at the edge of your consciousness just comes up and hits you with a bat. This week, it's Elvis Costello and Burt Bacharach, "Toledo": But do people living in Toledo Know that their name hasn't travelled very well? And does anybody in Ohio Dream of that Spanish citadel? But it's no use saying that I love you And how that girl really didn't mean a thing to me For if anyone should look into your eyes It's not forgiveness that they're gonna see You hear her voice - "How could you do that?" You hear her voice - "How could you do that?"

The longest day of the year is soon to be upon us, and it's barely possible to notice, since it's been raining pretty much nonstop since it stopped snowing. Mornings have been rainy, and I've completely given up the morning-run regimen that I was so dedicated to last year. Afternoons have also been rainy, but sometimes in the evening there's a burst of sunshine just as the sun descends below the horizon line -- something Lileks described as a "deathbed erection -- thanks, now what the fuck am I supposed to do with that?" Every year I come upon the solstice with regret that I haven't gotten more enjoyment out of the longer days, except for last year, when I was up at 5:30 every morning and enjoying the dawn. But this year there's no sun to enjoy. And after yesterday's brazen beauty, today is, again, a misery. It sets up some murderous moods. A little shocked to find my page Googled by someone looking for the phrase "Parisian whores", particularly by someone looking through a Norwegian search engine. But apparently, yes, I DID use that phrase back in December, and even predicted that it would cause me to be Googled by pr0n-seeking freaks. I have a long view but a short memory, apparently. The usual searches for "glycerol ester of wood rosin" keep pouring in -- at first it was funny, then it was annoying, and now I have to keep up the links just as a public service because I get so many hits. Perhaps there's a career for me at the Glycerol Ester of Wood Rosin Council (actually, I'll be surprised if it doesn't already exist under some name or another). Happy to get a hit for "West Glenville Cemetery," because if that's what you're looking for, I'm the guy who's got it. Or at least pictures of it. some of it.

Pleased, however, that some people think it's rollerblading season, and my blading page is getting hits from all over the country. Now that I've got some more biking miles under my belt (well, actually, bike shorts don't have a belt), I should put up some Rensselaer county bike routes. All in good time, my pretty....

Had an alternative title that I thought was a bit obscure. Like a reference to a flop Go-Go's album isn't, but apparently that song has seen some commercial resurgence OH JUST SHUT UP!!

Somehow my comment to the girls, "got grapes if you want them," segued into singing "I'm the face if you want it. . . all the others are third-class tickets by me, baby, is that clear?" Very old Who number. Which led to Rebekah asking if those were the real words. I told her they were. Then she asked if I would please stop singing.

Where've I been all week? Well, a few things. Some training for tomorrow's 50-mile bike ride. Did a 50 on Monday, beautiful ride to Chatham and back. That, of course, left me with nothing the next day, when I went up north to scout the route for tomorrow. I ended up not riding any of it, but instead went into the Saratoga National Battlefield, which is a one-way well-paved loop of just under 11 miles, but the hills are formidable and that was EXACTLY as much as I had in me. Wednesday was a rest day, and then on Thursday I took a quick 17-miler around town. Decided to stick with the plan of total bike rest yesterday and today. In between all that, I have been struggling new cellar windows into place, screwing around with concrete and belgian pavers and generally getting in over my head. One entire room is ripped out and awaiting some layout decisions that will let me proceed to wire it, and the basement window wells (newly created) are in a state of experimentation. I've also been on a fruitless search for a portable stereo to use around the basement and garage (which means ONE PIECE, something that seems to have gone the way of buttonhooks, except for these gargantuan devices that seem aimed, design-wise, at teenage boys who like big dials and numbered apertures). I was going to go see the exhibit of Steinmetz photos at the Schenectady Museum yesterday afternoon, but it turned out to just be too beautiful a day to do that, so I came back home and thoroughly cleaned my bicycle.

Nothing that puts you in touch with your inner teenage boy quite like lolling around and cleaning your bike. I used to spend entire summer days taking my bike entirely apart, right down to the sprocket bearings (you need a special tool, a cone wrench. I still have mine), greasing it all back up, putting it back together. In this case I didn't go that far, but it was a fun time anyway.

Finally satisfied my "Wonder Boys" jones by buying the damn thing, since I couldn't find it to rent. Glad I did. Watched it last night, and it is so very very good. The script, the acting, the cinematography, all the little details -- just killer. Better than I remembered. We had watched "Sand Lot" with the girls earlier in the evening, one of the great movies that I would probably never have seen if I didn't have kids, but which turns out to be one of the best, truest baseball movies ever made, and a damn good movie about growing up boy, too. So it turns out that we had a "Don't Take Things that Don't Belong to You That Have Some Relation To Baseball" theme night -- in Sand Lot, it's a Babe Ruth-autographed baseball; in Wonder Boys, it's the jacket Marilyn Monroe wore when she married Joe DiMaggio. I LOVE theme nights, especially when they're accidental.

Best shopping find of my vacation week? Deeply discounted DVD of "Beat the Devil," which I will use to replace my deeply discounted VHS copy. It's an incredibly great movie that is impossible to understand, rarely shown, barely heard of. Who decided, "Hey, the videotape went straight to the bargain bin -- let's put it on DVD and see if it does any better"? $5.00. (Commenter at IMDB says the DVD transfer is awful -- but really, it couldn't be MUCH worse than the VHS transfer which was quite poor.)

Well, off to deal with ballet class, etc. Early to bed, early to rise, 50 miles to crank away at tomorrow. A last-week push by my amazing secretary brought our fundraising for this little event up to $1,175 for the American Diabetes Association. Incredible.

Mr. Johnson will be going with the gel shorts tomorrow...

There have really only been a couple of moments in my life when my heart has just opened up with joy, when there has been literally a lifting, a lightness in my chest , and I have just been consumed with the joy of that moment, and the tears just flowed right out. I don't mean "happy feet this is so cool," I mean Spike finally feeling his soul. One of them was when Hannah was born. Another was on Saturday, when I saw my little girl coming up on the three mile mark in the Freihofer's -- healthy, happy, running hard and doing well, smiling and waving at me as she went on down the hill toward the finish. I just cried. A little 10-year-old with asthma who decided on her own she was going to do this thing, did all the training and the intramurals to get ready for it, running down the road with her running partner and with plenty left to give -- it was heartbreakingly wonderful. Her final time: 36:26, in a field of more than 3600 women ("a river of fit women," as the announcer put it at one point). No single thing she has done has ever made me so proud as her entering and finishing that race. Now she truly knows what she can do, how she can challenge herself. She's already talking about next year. Plus, she patiently waited in line and got the winner, Marla Runyan, to sign her bib. Very cool.

As for me, took the weekend off from training, but got back on yesterday and rode a half-century, down to Chatham and back. I've decided to quit my job and become a proselytizer for Aerobars, the handlebar extensions that let you lean forward over your wheel and maintain an aerodynamic tuck while keeping control of the bike. Made huge improvements in my game, and my average speed in to Chatham, at 25 miles, was 16.3mph, phenomenally fast for me. Then, and I'm not making this up, enormous gusts of wind kicked up and stayed up throughout the afternoon, so the push back was much slower, though I managed to stay on the bike and came in at the end of 50.5 miles with a 14.6mph average speed. Just about normal for me.

The coyote's head is still where it was, and that dead raccoon on Red Mill Road isn't smelling any better....