Seven Degrees off Bubble
[Recent Entries][Archive][Friends][User Info]
Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in the "Misha" journal:[<< Previous 20 entries]
|
10:21 am
[Link] |
Musings on the Life of a Me
I've been steadily been going to bed earlier and earlier, trying to make myself wake up and soak up more of the ever-shrinking daylight. Today is my high-water mark: feet on the floor at 8:30, out the door before 9:00. Today it's misty and foggy on my island. Sunlight is more of a suggestion of illumination than any kind of concrete reality. So it goes.
Contrary to supposition, I'm alive and well and doing fairly well for myself. Since last posting, I trekked back to Cleveland for the Wedding Gala of ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) justbeast and yuki_onna, came back to the island and went about cozy domesticity. justbeast and I just polished off a web-app for a local client and the Beastly-One is grooming me up to sub-out some of his web programming projects to me. I couldn't have asked for a better introduction to the wild world of Professional Programming. Well, maybe I could, but Josh's company still isn't hiring. :-P
Mostly, though, I find myself thinking. I wonder when the weather is going to break here and when Winter is going to roll in in force. I wonder if I'm mentally and materially ready for it. I wonder if I'm ever going to stop craving cigarettes. I wonder if I'm some brave iconoclast, living the life I prefer in the face of passive social opposition or if I'm some overly individualistic man-child who simply can't r won't grow up. I wonder if I'm inherently a good person. I wonder if there is any good, objective way to know. I wonder if I really care to know or if I really just enjoy wondering for the sake of wondering.
I sometimes wish there were better answers than "Maybe" to find.
Largely, I don't sweat it, though. "Maybe" is an old friend of mine. And sometimes, it's best to attack these questions obliquely. For instance, I have a wife and friends who love me and - perhaps more importantly - tolerate me. Hunger - real, helpless, hopeless hunger - is nothing but a distant memory of a different life. I have air, food, water, shelter, sex, companionship, coffee and easy access to an unobstructed view of open water. The top 8 human requirements for life are covered. After that, everything else is pure gravy. And my plate is MORE than sufficiently gravied to be comfortable and then some.
So, perhaps a better question is "Am I happy?" To which question, the answer is definitely NOT maybe. It's an overwhelming "Yes." Which makes all the maybes fade on the periphery.
Now I'll head home, make coffee, and sip it quietly while T. and I plan our day. Then there will be more programming, a bit of writing, some dishwashing and other domestic obligations, and maybe a local Open Mic at the Methodist Church tonight. And, most likely, more thinking.
|
|
07:24 pm
[Link] |
Personal HealthCare Reform
I know I've said this here before, and here I am saying it again: I don't get sick much.
So I guess I need to just write a SERIOUS of articles about how much it SUCKS when someone who doesn't get sick gets sick. Because suck it does!
Of course, part of what I was going to write about here-and-now was how it's so hard to tell when your DONE with being sick, right? Only I realized with a quick glance-over that that was what 90% of my previous "I don't get sick" entry was all about.
So, yeah, I've already covered that. Go me. I'm ahead of the game.
Anyway, yeah. I've come to another conclusion about being sick in the world of Misha: I'm tired of doing it. And to that end, I have reached a resolution. From now on, if I feel sick, have a Big Sleep (a Big Sleep being defined as any sleep of duration longer than 6 hours or any combination of Small Sleeps equalling 6 hours or less which, combined, total more than 70% of a given 10 hour period), and then STILL feel sick? It is STRAIGHT off to the Doctor I go! Because I am convinced that any of the lesser, mundane germs of the world take one good look at my freakish, mutant immune system and simply run away in fear. Tougher, meaner germs - the kind of germs that hang out on street corners in dirty t-shirts and push other germs around for the their lunch money - might actually try to make a go at it in my body and run headlong into my immune system, which does some of it's dirtiest fighting when I'm asleep, mugging those germs in dark alleys and sending them packing.
But germs that can stick around in my system, even AFTER a Big Sleep? Those are dark and scary germs. Those are CRAZY scary germs. Those are wild, psychopathic germs from ANOTHER FREAKIN' DIMENSION, MAN! And I want a trained, medical professional to have a look at those bastards. And then, of course, to immediately write me a scrip for something starting with "anti-" or ending in "-cyllin." Possibly both. OR, better yet, something in a military drip bag with CDC and Army Medical Corps warnings all over it and "In Case of OutBreak, Follow Protocols Below Seal" stickers on it. Because I am tired of screwing around with this crap!
Two and a half WEEKS ago, I got a little tickle in the back of my throat. And the intervening time has been spent dealing with cough, stuffy nose, some GI problems I do NOT care to recall, and low grade fever. OH! Except for the two days that were REGULAR fever. I swear, this thing started in my nose, went down to my throat, down to my lungs, back up to my throat, then went on Holiday in my stomach for a bit. It's like that thing from Alien got lost trying to figure out how to burst out of my chest. I've spent the last three days "recovering," and I could never tell if I was better or not, because I couldn't remember what "better" felt like!
(I'm fairly certain I have a handle on "better" now, though. Today, I can a) stand and do light activity for an hour without having to collapse, b) sometimes go THIRTY WHOLE MINUTES between coughts, and c) can hold a single thought in my head long enough to compose an LJ entry about it.)
But next time (which is tomorrow, if I wake up feeling the LEAST bit like a relapse), NEXT TIME I will have someone with advanced degrees pop and Endoscope down my pie-hole FIRST OFF and we'll get this thing SORTED!
I mean, if nothing else, my ego needs a man of science to look at my throat and be all "My God... it's full of stars!" so I can be all "I KNOW, right?!?!"
|
|
06:55 pm
[Link] |
Back in the Real World
So, back from the honeymoon and wanted make a few base-touching announcements:
1) I R MARRIEDZ! And while I was kinda blaise leading up to the whole thing... it's pretty damned cool!
2) Thanks to everyone who came out/came through for said wedding. Especially... THE WEATHER! 55 degrees and sunny for the ceremony and 91 and sunny for a week of honeymoon in Miami Beach. The weather forecast for all 6 of those days? LOTSA RAIN! This wedding seems to have the approval of DEITIES!
3) South Beach is hella cool.
(4 and 5 temporarily redacted)
6) The best restaurants are invariably those that you find while getting lost trying to find something else. There might be a full-length LJ post on this topic at some point, but... ya know, it's me. Don't hold your breath.
7) The worst "sick" I ever experienced was a sinus/throat infection in HS that started with a trip to Panama City Beach. When I came back from St. Thomas a few years back, I struggled to breath and coughed up crazy-colored phlem for MONTHS. While in South Beach, I started a similar reaction. Coincidence, or am I allergic to the tropics? Or does it have something to do with smoking cigarettes in high humidity?
8) After seeing the "Southernmost House," "Southernmost Gift Shop," "Southernmost Hotel" et cetera, ad nauseum in Key West this week, I want to plant a metal post in the water, just south of the Southernmost Point monument thing and hang on it one of those giant green traffic signs which reads "Southernmost Sign in the Contiguous United States." The Meta-ness of it all just appeals to me.
9) I also want to petition the Maine Legislature to put a road sign somewhere on US-1 right around the state line saying "Southernmost Key West Reference in the State of Maine."
10) If you are embroilled in road construction and have already passed the sign saying that your lane in ending, but keep going anyway, in hopes of bypassing the traffic... not only will I not let you in, but I will try very VERY hard to kill you with my mind.
11) I have lost ALL of the heat-tolerance that I carefully developed over the first 26 years of my life. It was only 91 and humid in Miami this weekend and I nearly passed out a couple of times.
|
|
09:58 am
[Link] |
Never Trust the Internets
So, T. and I booked our honeymoon pretty last minute. We're both beach bums at heart and all of our beachtime so far this year has involved either rain (on our annual camping pilgrimage to Ocean City, NJ) or REALLY cold water (living on PI, Maine). So we meandered around Travelocity and found this REALLY great deal on a flight and Hotel to South Beach, Miami. We booked it immediately.
*THEN* we got around to checking the review sites for the hotel.
Oh. Shit.
Fully 3/4 of the reviews were negative. The few positive lights were damning in their faint praise. "Great place to go if all you need is a bed after you hit the clubs," they opined. "Great for the price," others read, with lackluster enthusiasm. "I liked the rooftop breakfast place," others ventured.
Then I started reading the negative ones. "There's no ROOM SERVICE!" some complained. HORRORS! "There's a musty smell in the lobby," others typed, the upturned nose clearly communicated through text. "When I had a complaint, the staff suddenly seemed to speak little English," another user wailed... a user from Germany, I might add. "There wasn't enough room for all four of us *AND* our bags in the elevator, and then it got stuck between floors!" someone else moaned. "For what I'm paying, I expected alot more," some ventured.
We were PETRIFIED.
Now we're here. And I say:
Fuck.
That.
Shit.
Yes, there is a SLIGHT mustiness to the lobby. No, there is no room service. I have had NO problems communicating with the staff, especially not when they are offering to carry my bags, holding the door for me, feeding me breakfast or answering any and all questions I have about the place. As for getting more for the price? Dude, you're paying less than $100 a night for a hotel two blocks from South Beach. If you get a bed, a shower and a blanket, you're coming out ahead. And here, you get a clean room, a comfortable bed, HOT AND COLD running water (in the shower *AND* the sink!), and a groovy, funky art-deco hotel that's older than the blue-hairs who parade down Collins Avenue on their way to Steve Madden's and the GAP.
For my money? Give me a little mustiness (which the staff is valiantly fighting with a stick of incense and open windows) and a lack of room service. I'll take the stuco walls and the hardwood floors, the vintage details (and the "3 people MAXIMUM" sign) in the cramped elevator - leftovers from an age when Americans were smaller, I guess, the gorgeous cut-glass mirrors and the replica Bakelite phones. I will happily sit on the front porch under the palm-bladed ceiling fans and watch the world go by.
I plan on spending most of my time two-blocks over on the beach, anyway.
Well... maybe not MOST of my time. This is our honeymoon after all. For which consideration, I think that the faux-fur rug and the knee-deep bathtub are FANTASTIC accent notes. :-D
(P.S. In case I was too subtle, I can't recommend the South Beach Plaza Hotel enough. Book your stay today!)
|
|
10:59 pm
[Link] |
Notes from the Above Ground
Safely ensconced in an Art Deco hotel in South Beach. It's muggy, warm and breezy outside where the fashion parade walks back and forth from the clubs. There's an odd weight on my left hand, probably from the band of brushed titanium making its home on my ring finger.
Life is good.
|
|
10:37 am
[Link] |
The past 26 hours of me...
So, after getting up at 8 yesterday, making the trash run, catching the first afternoon ferry, driving 13 hours and finally getting into Cleveland at 4am to crash out mightily...
I woke up at 8am with a toothache. And now can't get back to sleep.
>.<
Oh well. I wasn't exactly planning to do anything requiring high level cognition today, anyway.
|
|
10:44 am
[Link] |
Reason to Love My Island, Part Elebenty-Billion Four
Finally got around to taking the truck-load of trash to the transfer station in preparation of my hasty departure back to the land of Cleves. Once there, I popped out of the cab with my $62 in hand, ready to just shovel everything into a hopper for transport to the mainland. The guy working the dump site looked at the bed of my truck with that universal lip pucker of honest consideration.
"Is all of this cardboard?" he asked.
"Most of it," I told him, "There's also some books, old clothes, that sorta thing."
"Wheeeeeeelp," he said, "Throw the entertainment center and the wood in hopper two, throw that old grill in hopper 3 for the metal and put the rest in hopper four for the cardboard and plastic. Since it's all recyclable, it's no charge."
I love my island!
|
09:18 am
[Link] |
Road Trip, Part... what part are we up to now?
So, I'm about to make a run to the trash transfer station, then it's pack, shower, catch the 12:15 car ferry and I'm off to Cleveland for last-minute wedding planning and such. I will miss my magical, beautiful island of wonder, but...
I'm coming BACK to it, bitches! That's right, this shit is HOME now! Woo-WOOT! I live here. BOOYAH!
My life? She is pretty good sometimes, no?
|
|
05:32 pm
[Link] |
Oh, the Crueling Work-a-day world
So today, I caught the 12:45 ferry to the mainland, noshed on a pork steamed bun for lunch, met with a recruiter, then parked myself at the bar of a coffee shop for several hours to do some work on a project D. and I have percolating. Tonight, we're hitting the house of a local entrepreneur to see how to best make our software mesh with his hardware.
THIS is the kind of work-day I can get used to!
(P.S. It seems that roughly 15% of the poplation of Portland is comprised of short, adorable women. I AM NOT MAKING THIS STATISTIC UP!)
(P.P.S. Okay, actually, I *AM* making that statistic up, but it's ALOT!)
|
|
09:18 am
[Link] |
Thought of the morning
The "Babel Language" idea - where sign and signifier hold a non-arbitrary relationship - as a modern, linguistic of the old Shamanic idea that "in the olden days, shamans could do all these things we can't do now."
Also, what would that even entail? What sounds and phonemes would hold non-arbitrary relationships with real-world objects? And how does the three-tiered psycho-linguistic model come into play? Does the sign hold a non-arbitrary relationship with the signifier itself or with the mental concept of the signifier? And - if so - with WHOSE mental concept of the signifier?
|
12:15 am
[Link] |
Island living gives rise to navel gazing.
Dark night on my island, the foghorns call to each other across the bay, commenting on the weather. Nola is snoozing on the porch, curled up head-down in a box of stuffed animals. No light in the shadows but the flare of my cigarette. No movement but my smoke mingling with the fog.
|
|
10:26 pm
[Link] |
The Lessons I've Learned
When grilling out, the amount of time it takes a German Shepherd to smell a steak, circle the house, climb onto the porch, find and devour said steak is roughly two seconds LESS than the time it takes to hurry inside and grab a fresh beer. >.
|
|
01:33 pm
[Link] |
The Closed Ecology of Island Living
So I'm still settling into living on my island. Which is a little odd, since I've been here for...
*blinks*
*thinks*
Uhm... a while now, I guess. More than a day, less than a year. But yeah, it still feels like settling in. T. and I take walks around the island, exploring all the little nooks and crannies and unpaved side streets. It is... different. A very different place.
First off, while many of the Maine coastal islands sneer at Peaks because of its "dozen a day ferry schedule" and its "grocery store," the fact is that it's still isolated. Not as isolated as Mantinicus, obviously- 20 miles off the coast and with a MONTHLY ferry in the winter. I mean, here on Peaks, we call ahead to the grocery store so they'll have our pizza order ready when we walk down. On Mantinicus, they fax their grocery orders to the mainland so the ferry will bring them food for next month. Nevertheless, there's enough distance - spatial, temporal and mental - that it makes a difference. If you find yourself hankering for some good or service that can't be provided by the grocery store, the coffee shop, the pub or the laundromat, then you have to make a trip "into town." And a trip into town means a walk to the ferry docks, waiting for the next ferry (and gods help you if you miss the ferry! Because it's an hour at the pub waiting on the next one) and another 15 minutes to cross the bay and disembark. And that's just assuming that what you need is on Portland's waterfront. If it's not, then it's a walk to the car park, then the normal drive. Then repeat the preceding steps to get yourself and your purchases back. Adding in the surcharge and the hassle of ferry freight if your items are bigger than the allowed carry-on.
I noticed immediately that this made one very selective about what one is willing to go off the island to get. What I did NOT consider immediately is that it makes you mindful of what you are going to be willing to KEEP. Before we moved, T. and I went through a MAELSTROM of throwing stuff away and donating to Goodwill to pare our meager possessions down enough to move the rest here. I am well acquainted with landfills, garbage collection and the loading bays of charity thrift shops.
Here? Nothing. Nada. Zip. You wanna get rid of it? You are going to pay for the privilege. Sure, there is regular trash collection. Including a single-source recycling effort that is the best of anywhere I've ever lived. But the actual trash collection itself? They will only collect trash in specially marked blue trash bags. Which you can buy for a few bucks each at the island grocery store. Of course, that ratty old sofa won't fit in ANY of those bags (I checked), so there is also a trash transfer station on the island that will take car-, truck- and bicycle-loads of trash. For a fee. Which is a about twice the cost of even the most EXPENSIVE landfills I've ever run into on the mainland - though still SLIGHTLY less than cost of taking the car ferry with it all back to the land. And hiring a private cargo boat for it? Don't even get me STARTED! Plus, what are you going to do with it once you GET it there?
Long story short, things on the island tend to STAY on the island. And people are mindful of that fact. Yard sales crop up towards Labor Day like mushrooms after a rain. Any "for sale" house is almost guaranteed to have a sign out front saying "Free Stuff on the Porch. More to Come!" The island bulletin boards occasionally have a series of notices from people offering various pieces of "stuff," first for sell, then for trade and then a desperate plea for someone to just come TAKE IT, finally capped off after a few days with a request to hire a pickup truck to take away what they couldn't otherwise be rid of.
Those of the latter seem rare, though, as the island inhabitants seem to be quite used to the closed circle of their own consumerism. On our various peregrinations, T. and I have seen porch furniture straight out of a 1950's magazine spread and a high-backed wheelchair that FDR could have used being recycled as planter. We even passed a mostly-rusted bit of metal which, on closer examination, I still swear is the upper/rear 1/3 of a Model T Ford. At one recent yard sale we passed, there were two - TWO! - old cabinet radio/turntable setups that looked straight out of an episode of Leave It To Beaver. I checked the back and, sure enough: Vacuum Tubes. In perfect shape. I was fairly certain I could make them work with a little soldering and dusting, but I didn't even ask the price. After all, what would we DO with them?!
And this house? This house in which we're living? ABSOLUTELY no exception. As far as we can tell, the landlord bought it as an estate when the previous owner passed away, probably a dozen years or more ago. Though there have obviously been tenants since, but the remnants of the older estate still fill the basement and most of the available closet space. Which is PLENTIFUL, by the way, as the island inhabitants have obviously known for QUITE SOME TIME about their closed ecosystem. Today, T. and I broke down and started re-Tetrising one such closet: a monstrous thing tucked under the eaves that looks for all the world like a Luxury Suite for a homesick Harry Potter. Besides the usual detritus of old tenants, throw pillows from the 80's and dust, there was also furniture that would make the people on Antiques Roadshow salivate uncontrollably and begin to surreptitiously fondle themselves. Like the vanity with the candle-holders by the mirror. The crystal liquor decanters. The rock-solid, hardwood Captain's chair (which now graces my desk and in which I'm sitting to write this entry). And the crowning achievement of the lot, the signature at the end of the art work that was that collection: a diploma from the City of Portland, certifying that Mary Eleanor Cleveland complete the Course of Study prescribe for Portland High School, present on the eighteenth day of June in the year of our Lord, 1927.
Nineteen.
Twenty.
Seven.
82 years ago, someone moved the tassel on her cap, came home, and put her diploma behind glass in a wooden frame. 82 years later, it's still sitting, dusty but otherwise pristine, in a closet behind the walls that house my mediocre, plastic crap.
It makes me wonder what of mine will still be around 82 years from now. Before, living out on the Dispos-All, landfill-laden mainland, I've always assumed that my "stuff," like my mortal corpus, would be used up, shoved in a box, buried in the ground and forgotten. But here? Here I can imagine it lasting, if for no other reason than that it would be too expensive to get rid of it. And on that day, late in the 21st century, when some young person makes the arduous jet-pack journey over the waters of Casco Bay to inhabit this house, will he rummage through the same closets and think "Whoa! This must be what they called an 'Em-Peh-Threh player!' How neat!" Will he (or she... or it) even know what the paper with the crude markings on it - as I'm sure the diploma will still be here - even signifies? And what will this supposed future inhabitant think of the detritus of my life? Will he see in it the aesthetic craftsmanship of a bygone age? Or will he simply see old junk?
I don't know. But honestly? That future judgment of my present stuff is making me even more conscious of my purchasing decisions than the ferry rates.
|
|
08:55 pm
[Link] |
General Thoughts on Island Living
So, I knocked two things off my To-Do list today. Now, granted, the two items in question were "Move the Bookcase upstairs" and "Bang on the Bathroom Door with a Hammer" (long story), so it's not like they were Herculean tasks, but still... my To-Do list has sat lonely and long neglected for a while, and there are NOW TWO THINGS MISSING FROM IT! So, yeah. Red Letter Day for productivity, in my book.
As yuki_onna said, "Island time, man. I tell ya."
Generally speaking, though, I think it's agreeing with me. I stepped on the scale a few days ago and was dismayed to see it read "236.5".
"Two thirty SIX and a half?!" thought I, "I was at two thirty ONE and a half when I left Cincinnati! I've gained five freakin' POUNDS?! How?!?!"
Then I remembered that, no, the second digit when I weighed in back in Cinci was, in fact, a four. So I've actually LOST five pounds since leaving Cinci. Perhaps it's the fresh sea air. Perhaps it's the daily walks around the island. Perhaps it's those little pills I purchased from the Adipose corporation and the strange sounds in the middle of the night. Most likely, though, it's the lack of ready access to any fast food of any description.
Do you have ANY idea where the nearest McDonalds to me is? I DON'T EITHER! That's the beauty of it! But the first steps of the directions would be "Walk down to Island Ave, wait a half hour or so for the ferry, take the ferry across the Bay for another quarter hour, then walk another 15 minutes or so to the parking lot..."
The island does, however, have fairly decent pizza at the grocery store. Not badly priced, either. Unfortunately, everything ELSE at the grocery store IS prohibitively priced - something about lack of competition, coupled with the cost of shipping stuff over from the mainland - so we haven't been tempted to abuse that particular privilege yet.
So, yeah... I live on an island now. It's pretty freakin' sweet. I'll take some pictures at some point and post them, or something. Seriously. It's on my To-Do list.
And, after today, it's two steps closer to the top.
|
|
02:09 pm
[Link] |
Paradise Reconsidered
Woke up this morning and walked to the island store for a pack of smokes. It was 65 and sunny out - much cooler in the shade - and I was wishing I'd thought to pick up my sweatshirt before I left. But the walk was keeping me warm and I could see the sun glinting on Casco Bay as soon as I left the front yard, so I wasn't about to complain. Peaks has an almost morbid dearth of sidewalks, so I was walking in the street most of the way, but traffic was light. Which is to say traffic was very HEAVY, given the streets I was walking. In a 20 minute or so round trip, I was passed by one car, a golf cart and a scooter. What can I say? It's Sunday and the Catholic church down the street was just kicking off. Anyway, I mosied down Central to Island Avenue and was immediately barraged by a dozen or more cyclists coming the other way: it was 10:30am and the ferry had just disembarked and the day-trippers were off to trip the day away. Through the throng of slower, pedestrian ferry traffic, child Misha to Hannigan's Island Market came. I grabbed a Coke from the cooler and got in line and waited to check out and ask them for my cigs. The queue shifted forward one spot and I realized I was actually standing behind two girls checking out the candy rack and wasn't in line at all. I pardon-me'd my way around the "crowd" and got in the appropriate spot - a gentleman with a case of the local brew under his arm kindly acknowledging that I was theoretically in line before him - and considered the cigarette case. They were still sold out of my preferred Marlboro Milds. Still sold out of my second-fave Marlboro Menthol Lights, as well. And the supply of regular Marlboro Menthols was getting a bit thin. I had brief wishes of a more obvious queuing system and a more regular cigarette supply, but I banished them to the dark depths from which they came. The little Korean woman who owned the restaurant next door hustled in like her world was on fire, grabbed a bag of some unknowable grocery item and waved it at the cashier as she hustled back out. The cashier waved back an acknowledgment and called after her, "Go ahead! We know where to find you!"
I purchased my dear vices and walked outside, past the Korean woman's restaurant, "The Cockeyed Gull," and sat down on a grassy hill overlooking the bay. The ferry was just pulling out again, lightly ladened, for the return trip to Portland and the lobster boats were quiet, their captains and sternmen doing whatever captains and sternmen do when they're not pulling lobsters from the depths. Two freighters were sitting at their ease by the unloading docks in the bay. Behind me, I heard the kitchen of the Cockeyed Gull bustle into full swing (presumably since they had been waiting on their mystery ingredient from next door) and tried not to eavesdrop as the walking tourists gossiped about the biking tourists. I watched the bay and let the morning unfold around me. I wouldn't change it for the world.
yuki_onna said something the other day that stopped me short. I was complaining about not getting anything ACCOMPLISHED since T. and I moved out here a few weeks back. I talked about all the grand plans I had had, all the stories I would write, the business I would attend to. But I just seemed to wake up in the morning, some things would happen without much actual input or involvement from me, and then it would be bedtime. I was never aware of the day of the week, and only vaguely of the time of day. She nodded, smiling and said "Island Time, man. I tell ya." Now, I'm familiar with the concept of island time. Heck, I'm VERY familiar with it. LOVE it, in fact. But I couldn't reconcile "island time" with this particular island. To me, islands are a microcosm of heat, mosquitoes, sand and salt. Scrub pines and sea oats figure into the equation and, occasionally, iguanas. I couldn't make that jive with this place of towering hardwoods and inland swamps. And don't even get me started on ROCKY beaches. I mean, ROCKS? On the beach? It's just not part of my mental map of shorelines. But - unexpected as the Spanish Inquisition - she was right. I was suffering an attack of island time. Well, suffering probably isn't the right word...
Anyway, I've recently had to re-examine my definitions of islands, beaches and paradise. Because this place is much too chilly, much too rocky, much too New England-y to fit those definitions that I had previously held for any of them. But it fits. I haven't given up my fondness for the sandy strands and blood-warm waters of previous days, but... my definitions have at least expanded. Because later today, T. and I will probably walk the opposite way down Central Avenue, away from the ferry dock and the island businesses, until the pavement ends. We'll follow the sandy, gravelly, tree-crowded extension, past the WWII military bunkers and the swamps and the houses buried in the woods, to Spar Cove on the far side of the island. We'll brave the unsteady rocks down into the water and brace ourselves to dive under the 61 degree water and swim around, gulls and loons, kayakers and tourists staring at us as though we're out of our minds for swimming so late in the year. But we'll have the cove all to ourselves as we swim and wade and laugh at ourselves for our insane dedication, as the boats go by in the bay, the only waves coming from the wake of their passing. And then we'll dry off and walk home to a warm house full of friends, good friends and cold beer.
Empty beaches, cold beer, a warm home and friends.
Paradises don't come much better than that.
|
|
04:21 pm
[Link] |
Afternoon Quicky
So, it seems I've been a little out of touch. Perhaps not filling the world in on all the details going on in my life. To the point that the last time I was going to see one particular friend of mine in a VERY long while (what with because I was moving, and such), he told me "Why is this the first I'm hearing about this?"
Well, Thom, it's because I'm a git, I haven't been around Triumph in a while, and when I was I was EXTREMELY preoccupied. I know, I told you all that at the party, but I repeated the question, so I thought I'd repeat the answer as well.
Okay, so let's get the big one out of the way first: I just moved to Maine. Yes, the state. For those of you who have trouble with Geography, start somewhere on the Eastern Seaboard, turn north, start driving but keep the ocean in sight. RIGHT before you get to Canadia, STOP. Maine.
Technically, I'm not THAT close to Canadia. In fact, I'm just kinda BARELY in Maine. One toe still in New Hampshire, another toe in Massachusetts. Yes, I stretched out before trying it.
BUT NOT JUST ANYWHERE IN SOUTHERN MAINE! I live on an island. BOOYAH! On the downside, I have to take a 15 minute ferry ride to get OFF the island. And that 15 minute ferry ride costs about 2.5 hours of my last bill rate if I want to take my car with me. On the upside... suckahs, I just walked to the beach today. In fact, I kinda can't avoid the ocean. No matter which direction I turn, I will eventually REACH the ocean if I walk long enough. Granted this is true in MOST places in the United States (with "north" being the notable exception to directions), but here, the length of the walk that will get me to the ocean is much, MUCH shorter here. MUCH.
Anyway, it's been a long couple of days, what with the driving and the packing and the unpacking and the heat and the new living space, but I'm safe and I'm happy and I'm healthy and all that rot.
In Maine.
(Hopefully, there will be more details and pictures soon, including long songs of praise unto the friends we're staying with, but for now, this is all you get. I have to walk down to the island store to get us all pizzas for dinner. :-D )
|
|
08:14 pm
[Link] |
E-mail address change
Hey, folks! I heard one too many complaints about bouncing e-mail this weekend and decided I've HAD it with my current website hosts. So, until further notice, my e-mail address is mishamikeymonk h-at gmail d00t com. If you send anything to misha h-at cheshire-grin d00t com, it will be forwarded, but you'll also get an autoreponder, and those are kind of a pain.
Anyway, I'm still not sure what I'm going to be doing with the domain "Cheshire-Grin.Net." If nothing else, I'll be moving it to another host. But that's another story for another day.
The important thing right now? E-mail has MOVED.
Misha
|
|
05:54 pm
[Link] |
Da Code En Buh Node.
So, it's worth noting... I don't get sick. This is a factoid that I've long vacillated on, reconsidered, backpedalled on about and finally come back to the conclusion I've had since I was about 12: I don't get sick. Now, this requires clarification, of course. I've long worried that this is just some testosterone-laden refusal to admit weakness that so many men fall prey to. However, I've seen some of those guys when they ARE sick, and it is NOT pretty. Besides, T. is usually my litmus test on those things and she recently had to explain to her mother "No, he just doesn't get sick." Even I came out to defend the much maligned Rhinovirus at that point and mentioned that I do, on occaision, get sick.
She rolled her eyes around to glare at me. "No, remember when I was sick and in bed for almost two weeks and you caught it from me? And you said you 'felt bad' and took a three hour nap and were all better? THAT is *NOT* sick!"
So, in order to maintain peace in the household, I will keep it simple and merely say "I do not get sick." I have seen experienced the elusive creature known as a DOCTOR (in a professional capacity) exactly... *thinks*... nine times in my life. That may sound like a high number to some of you, but let me explain. One was for pneumonia, age two. But THAT hardly counts. Two were for stitches and stitch removal, age 5. THREE were for a broken arm (cast, cast removal/re-setting/RE-casting, and final cast removal), one was for a month-or-so long sinus infection (the doc told me it was already on the mend and sent me home with a lollipop), one was for a physical before my ill-considered football debut, and one was for someone else entirely. So injuries, yes. Sick? Not so much.
This puts me in an awkward position for when the little nasties DO rise up and rebel. Because I *DO* occasionally get sick. Which is difficult to fathom, given how I don't get sick, but nevertheless. It's like Zen, I think.
Anyway, usually my sickness of habit is the classic lower sinus infection. Could NOT tell you why. Starting with that first one in high school that the doctors were OH SO terribly helpful about and continuing to this present day. Like, LITERALLY, this present day. Today. I won't go into detail, but suffice to say it involves surprisingly small amounts of oddly colored, textured and weighted mucus. Relatedly, it also feels like my lungs are trying to expel bricks when I cough. And sometimes a fever. Often not.
Where was I? Oh YES! Awkward position. (I think? Whatever... PLOUGH ON!) I find all of this very odd. Because, as I said, I don't get sick. So why do I feel the overwhelming need to cough all the time? Yeah, I smoke, but my smoker's rattle isn't past the "polite throat clearing" at this stage in my life. This is great, hacking, whooping COUGHS. And why does it hurt so much when I *DO* cough?
Hmph. Interesting. Must remember to look into that. ON WITH MY DAY!
Needless to say, this is NOT the world's best prescription for getting better. Luckily, I've got T. hovering nearby, pointing out to me CONSTANTLY that "Baby, you're sick. Go lie down." And I can put it off with hems and haws and "But I's...," but she's relentless. 30 seconds later when I'm staring at the computer blankly, fingers poised above the keyboard, trying to remember what I was about to type (and why) while simultaneously keeping myself from breathing deeply least my lungs hurl another brick at my bronchials, there she is.
But that was all yesterday. I got a good nap (most of the day) and then slept soundly through the night, got up this morning ready to take on the world. I showered, packed up the compy, kissed a sleeping T. good morning and headed to Starbux, the better to concentrate on the packed can of productivity I was ready to crack open. I got my Pike's Place (black, natch) and settled in, fired up the compy and got a good 1000 words in before my hands got tired.
... and my eyes got tired.
... and my shoulders got tired.
... and I could only barely remember what I was writing, nevertheless what I was suppose to add to it next.
Yeah. I felt *GREAT*. Relatively speaking, I guess. For morning, ya know. Before coffee. OH YEAH... I'd just had coffee. I staggered in the front door looking confused, gazing around the apartment - honest to DAWG! - trying to figure out why I felt so confused.
Yes, I was confused about what I was confused about.
And T. was in the living room, watching me with a caring, loving, but largely AMUSED smile and waited for me to finally let my eyes focus on her before saying, "Baby, you're sick. Go lie down." At which point a very dim light bulb slowly begins to glow above my head, flickers uncertainly for a moment, and finally explodes and I make an ungainly 15-yard collapse in the general direction of "back to bed."
This being sick stuff? UTTER crap, I tell ya. I want NONE of it. I mean, how the heck are you supposed to know when you're DONE with it, after all?
Lucky, I have T. to constantly push me in the direction of sleep every time my brow furrows or I cough-and-ow-and-cough-and-ow. Dawg knows *I* wouldn't figure it out. And everytime she does, I collapse for a while and my body marshals it's defenses to eradicate the icky invaders from outer-space.
So far, this has gone on about 30 hours (a kind of a nasty one for me!), so - taking past experience into account - I figure I'll nap after dinner and wake up whole and ready-to-go around 10pm. Tomorrow morning if I REALLY pushed myself too hard this morning. I'm sure T. will let me know. And then I'll be whole and hardy and ready to face the world.
Until the NEXT time I don't get sick.
|
|
10:52 am
[Link] |
Queen Mab is one twisted Chickie.
As many of you may remember, I'm the world's worst at remembering my dreams. As far as hindsight is concerned, I just put my head on the pillow at night, close my eyes, and then open them again the next morning with 6-10 hours of oblivion in between. I'm sure SOMETHING happens behind my eyelids during the intervening hours, because I remember SOME snatches of dream SOMETIMES (3 fragments survived into wakefulness in the past 33 years), but generally? Nada.
However, an experience with a Melatonin tab left me remembering a fairly large fragment of dream two weeks ago, and it's like it opened a door and I'm remembering more and more of my dreams when I wake up. I've "dreamt" (pun intended) about this for YEARS! Now I'll finally know what I've been missing! Now I'll finally realize what's been going on in my head during those "lost hours" all of my life!
Last night? I dreamt a live-action Jack Chick tract. No, I'm not kidding. Terrible dialogue, crappy story line, mustaches and bad suits... it was a Jack Chick tract. Live.
...
If this is par for the course, I'm starting to realize why my mind has been blocking the experience out for so long.
|
|
12:11 am
[Link] |
The Wisdom of Teh Misha
So, here are just a couple of random tidbits I've added to my personal mottoes of late.
First off, for all you budget conscious people out there:
"Dinner out is cheaper than therapy, whiskey is cheaper than prescriptions."
And from a recent conversation with T. where we were discussing someone NOT ONLY stealing ALL of a fast-food place's free condiments, but then complaining to management to that they needed to refill the condiment bar.
T: "Well... that takes balls."
Me: "No, that doesn't take balls. That takes a dick."
You may now return to your regularly scheduled blog-reading, already in progress. :-D
|
[<< Previous 20 entries] |
