The Carnegie Music Hall. Ornate, velvet, gold-leafed, ambient jazz, quite a night out.
And words of wisdom from a writer whom I admire very, very much.
Fabuloso.
(and by the way, we successfully navigated our way there and back on the port)
Monday, October 4, 2010
Mary Karr at the Carnegie Music Hall
Having spent the entire day, except for a sleep-in and 3-mile rainy run, working on an 11 page paper that only had to be 5 pages, this is where I got to spend my evening:
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Conquering the Port Authority
So, in the past 3 days I've had two significant burgh firsts.
1. On a hayride Saturday, north of Pittsburgh, I heard my first indigenous "Yinz." It was monumental.
2. Yesterday, Monday, September 27, I conquered the burgh's Port Authority bus system. By conquered, I mean, I no longer have fear of it. By that, I mean, everything I was afraid of pretty much happened and therefore I have no longer have anything to fear regarding the local bus system. Here's how it broke down:
Duquesne to Shadyside:
I jaunted over to Duquesne in downtown via der jetta and Lucas' kindness, and promised him that I would find my way back on the Port so that he needn't wait around. The Authority does not believe in posting bus schedules at the actual bus stops, preferring only to deeply embed then in a tapestry of links on a website, and so I had made sure to find out what bus to take home before leaving the house. The stop for me was in front of Mercy. My fated bus: the 500 (Highland PK 62nd St Loop - Downtown - Oakland-Outbound). Simple enough, right? Except that when I got to the bottom of the (mountainous) Duq hill, Mercy was nowhere in sight. Did Mercy mean UPMC? Did Mercy mean the Duq teaching hospital? Why are there so many damn hospitals in this town? 61% of our population must be, at any given time, convalescing.
Because I didn't even know which way on Forbes to walk in order to get to the fabled Mercy, I chose one of two bus stops within sight. The one with people at it (this would later prove key to finding an effective bus stop). I waited, like a good metropolitan, with my earbuds in, an indifferent look on my face. After a few minutes, a bus came. One of the two people at the stop got on it. The second, a man I'd decided would lead me in the right direction, did not. He wore horn-rimmed glasses, a suit, black dress shoes, a black umbrella, and a brown leather attache case with a colorful woven shoulder strap. He looked friendly. He looked like he knew what he was doing. In his resistance to step on any given bus, I found comfort. I decided to wait, too. More minutes waiting. Maybe up to 10, which seems like a long time standing by a busy street. I began to doubt my 500. Another bus came. The stranger hoisted his bag. I felt that I should follow him, even though it wasn't the 500, so I hoisted my bag too. Besides, the bus said "Negley via Oakland and Shadyside," so, since I recognized all three of those things, I thought I'd get reasonably close to my house.
I enter the bus. I don't show my student ID because I've learned in my research that when boarding a bus going away from downtown, one pays/shows bus pass when exiting the bus. When boarding a bus going toward towntown, one pays/shows ID upon entrance. I'm still working out the logic behind this, along with the question of what to do when one enters a bus one has no idea where it is going, or where it has been.
So, there I am, rejoicing in my triumph, settling into the plush seats like a real yinzer, me and the working people and the students of the burgh. I take one earbud out so I can listen to the conversations around me. We slide through Oakland where I figure out after a series of stops that in order to signal a stop, one pulls the coated wire strung over the windows. File it away. We take a street I've never been on toward Shadyside. Then, suddenly, we're in front of Market District. This is near my house. I decide, naturally, to stay on the bus, because a. there are way too many people at this bus stop and b. it can only get closer from here. Right? Wrong. Instead of veering right down Negley into Shadyside, my friend the 32 1/2J (or whatever) hangs a Louie and we're in East Liberty. Shortly thereafter another stop, and my briefcase bus-stop friend deplanes. I begin to get nervous. We pass a series of stops that I decide I am not comfortable stepping out to. Wet newspapers clinging to chain-link, etc. In fact I begin to feel overwhelmed by the comfortable-ness of the bus as compared to the unknown neighborhoods flying by the windows. Can I just ride it forever? What would happen? At last there are only two people on the bus, me and a man sitting directly behind me, a man who is talking though I'm not sure who it's to. I see a sign that says "entering Highland Park." I know where this is. I know two people who live here. I wait one stop and then pull the cord. I show my student id (like magic) and am spewed onto a residential sidewalk. Remembering that Highland Ave parallels Negley up in those parts (from map study), I successfully turn and walk in the right direction. I remember to call Lucas and tell him I'm alive, at which he's happy though puzzled as to why I'm near the North Side now.
On Highland, I find a bus stop. It says 500 (ah, fate). I've figured out a few things: be on the side of the street whose traffic is flowing in the direction you want to go. Look on the blue Bus Stop sign for little number stickers to tell what buses stop there. If you're supremely lucky, there will be longer stickers that even say the areas on the route (95 Bloomfield to South Side is much more helpful than an austere, mysterious 95). The one thing lacking, universally: what time that bus will arrive. So there I was, up in Highland Park on a drizzly Monday morning, standing all alone, memorizing the landscaping of the gorgeous old houses, watching the mailman across the street go up steps and down steps and up steps, from door to door. After a very long time and I am still the only person at this stop, I give up (again) on ye olde 500 and simply start walking down Highland toward my street. One person I know who lives up here swears he can walk to campus in 15-20 minutes. This is what I tell myself. He's also about 6 feet tall. With my beginner's luck, I am only a few blocks down, near enough another bus stop to sprint back to it when finally, finally, the maroon Behemoth 500 hisses down the street. I'm on! Five minutes and I'm a block away from my house! I did it! I swaggered down my street and entered my house like it was the winner's circle, punching the air. Lucas was not too impressed because it had been over an hour since I'd left downtown. But I had figured it out. Armed with my student ID, I could ride the Port all day, be anywhere I wanted to be. Still flying high, I decided to go to Target.
Fifth Ave to the Waterfront
I've got to make this part shorter. So, I look up the bus to take to Target at the waterfront. One must cross a river to get to a Target in this town, for some reason. So it's pretty far away. Again, lucky me, there's a bus that leaves from Fifth and goes straight there, no transfers. The number 64. And it's leaving in 14 minutes.
I missed it. I waited twelve minutes more. A few other buses passed me by but I remembered the steadfastness of my horn-rimmed friend and let them go. In a cruel twist of fate, another 64 did pass by, but I didn't realize it was a 64 until its exhaust was receding from me - the front electronic scrawler had been jumbled. I began then to hate the Port Authority just a little bit. Twenty more minutes passed by and another 64 came -- I couldn't figure out a pattern to the intervals and still am baffled by this. It got me to Target.
Waterfront to Shadyside
Spoiler alert: this route does not exist. I'd left my house for Target at 2:15. I'm going to lay this out there for you: I walked back in my door at 6:07. The bus ride to the Waterfront is about a half hour. So....As I'd stood on Fifth, waiting for my initial 64, I'd seen another 64 headed the other direction. Dropping people off on the opposite side of the Ave, which was exactly where I needed to end up. The number 64 was to be my savior for the day. So simple. So beatles-esque. Good thing I'd written it on my hand.
I came out of Target and went to the same stop at which I'd been dropped off, and waited for my friend 64. When it came, startlingly, the front scroller still said "Waterfront" - meaning it was not headed back into town, or at least that was my interpretation. I stepped back. Puzzling. I realized at that point I had no idea how to get back if it were not on the 64, so after waiting through a few more buses I fell back on one of my Truths of the morning, and walked to the end of the parking lot, crossed the road, and found a bus stop there where any traffic would be, by default, headed back toward the bridge. The stop said 64. I was the only one, again, standing at it. I joked with myself that I was like Julia in Julie and Julia when she explains the comfort she finds in the predictability of cooking: add this to that and it will yield a cake. I thought, even though I don't know where I am or when the next bus is coming, all I need to do is stand under a blue sign that says "64" and the number 64 bus will come. Sadly, this is where the fairy tale I'd constructed regarding public transportation came crashing down around me.
I took my shoes off and stood in the wet grass. I balanced on one foot, then the other. I changed songs on my pod. I shifted my reusable shopping bag to the other shoulder. In about 30 minutes, no bus came. Finally a bus came and slowed down, but it was a 71D or some such sordid thing, and not what I wanted, and the driver opened the door and looked at me, and as I stepped back away from the door he shook his head as though I was choosing my own downfall, and he closed the door and hissed on. His expression shook me, and so after another 30 minutes of waiting or so, I thought I'd try another Truth of the morning: start walking the direction you want to go, and the bus will come. I think you know where this is headed. After a bit of a bus-less hike, I saw a different bus stop, and decided to go stand under it. (when all else fails...). This sign said 64, too. I had begun to loathe the 64. I knew deep it my heart it wasn't coming. I knew it would never come. After 30 minutes alone at this stop, I swore I'd just get on whatever bus came next. At least it would take me away from this Bermuda Triangle of transportation. Anywhere but here, I pleaded with the Port Authority gods, as people pulled up to the stoplight in traffic lines and looked at me like I was a lost granny. Eventually three more people came to the stop. This, I knew, was a very good sign. Shortly after a bus headed labeled "Murray" stopped. I stomped on it. Murray, I knew. Squirrel Hill. I figured there would have to be a Squirrel Hill to Shadyside bus, or maybe multiple buses, that would finish out this wrecked adventure for me.
Squirrel Hill to Shadyside
I got off when someone pulled the cord at Murray and Beacon. This may surprise you, but I stood at the bus stop for about 10 minutes waiting for the bus that was supposed to come next...the 64. It surprises me to report this. What was I thinking? Sometimes we just want to believe so badly in something...Naturally, it didn't come. I walked to the next bus stop, looked back. Only cars, as far as the eye could see. I hoisted my shopping bag, my tote bag of half-edited poems, my crumpled pre-conceived notions of public transportation in Pittsburgh, and flat-footed it 2 1/2 miles to my apartment. Every bus stop I passed said number 64. No 64 passed. In fact, no bus passed at all until I was back around 5th. I had enough time to change shoes, re-pack bags, and walk back out the door to class. Remember, nothing left to fear. Triumph.
And finally, ending on a high note:
1. On a hayride Saturday, north of Pittsburgh, I heard my first indigenous "Yinz." It was monumental.
2. Yesterday, Monday, September 27, I conquered the burgh's Port Authority bus system. By conquered, I mean, I no longer have fear of it. By that, I mean, everything I was afraid of pretty much happened and therefore I have no longer have anything to fear regarding the local bus system. Here's how it broke down:
Duquesne to Shadyside:
I jaunted over to Duquesne in downtown via der jetta and Lucas' kindness, and promised him that I would find my way back on the Port so that he needn't wait around. The Authority does not believe in posting bus schedules at the actual bus stops, preferring only to deeply embed then in a tapestry of links on a website, and so I had made sure to find out what bus to take home before leaving the house. The stop for me was in front of Mercy. My fated bus: the 500 (Highland PK 62nd St Loop - Downtown - Oakland-Outbound). Simple enough, right? Except that when I got to the bottom of the (mountainous) Duq hill, Mercy was nowhere in sight. Did Mercy mean UPMC? Did Mercy mean the Duq teaching hospital? Why are there so many damn hospitals in this town? 61% of our population must be, at any given time, convalescing.
Because I didn't even know which way on Forbes to walk in order to get to the fabled Mercy, I chose one of two bus stops within sight. The one with people at it (this would later prove key to finding an effective bus stop). I waited, like a good metropolitan, with my earbuds in, an indifferent look on my face. After a few minutes, a bus came. One of the two people at the stop got on it. The second, a man I'd decided would lead me in the right direction, did not. He wore horn-rimmed glasses, a suit, black dress shoes, a black umbrella, and a brown leather attache case with a colorful woven shoulder strap. He looked friendly. He looked like he knew what he was doing. In his resistance to step on any given bus, I found comfort. I decided to wait, too. More minutes waiting. Maybe up to 10, which seems like a long time standing by a busy street. I began to doubt my 500. Another bus came. The stranger hoisted his bag. I felt that I should follow him, even though it wasn't the 500, so I hoisted my bag too. Besides, the bus said "Negley via Oakland and Shadyside," so, since I recognized all three of those things, I thought I'd get reasonably close to my house.
I enter the bus. I don't show my student ID because I've learned in my research that when boarding a bus going away from downtown, one pays/shows bus pass when exiting the bus. When boarding a bus going toward towntown, one pays/shows ID upon entrance. I'm still working out the logic behind this, along with the question of what to do when one enters a bus one has no idea where it is going, or where it has been.
So, there I am, rejoicing in my triumph, settling into the plush seats like a real yinzer, me and the working people and the students of the burgh. I take one earbud out so I can listen to the conversations around me. We slide through Oakland where I figure out after a series of stops that in order to signal a stop, one pulls the coated wire strung over the windows. File it away. We take a street I've never been on toward Shadyside. Then, suddenly, we're in front of Market District. This is near my house. I decide, naturally, to stay on the bus, because a. there are way too many people at this bus stop and b. it can only get closer from here. Right? Wrong. Instead of veering right down Negley into Shadyside, my friend the 32 1/2J (or whatever) hangs a Louie and we're in East Liberty. Shortly thereafter another stop, and my briefcase bus-stop friend deplanes. I begin to get nervous. We pass a series of stops that I decide I am not comfortable stepping out to. Wet newspapers clinging to chain-link, etc. In fact I begin to feel overwhelmed by the comfortable-ness of the bus as compared to the unknown neighborhoods flying by the windows. Can I just ride it forever? What would happen? At last there are only two people on the bus, me and a man sitting directly behind me, a man who is talking though I'm not sure who it's to. I see a sign that says "entering Highland Park." I know where this is. I know two people who live here. I wait one stop and then pull the cord. I show my student id (like magic) and am spewed onto a residential sidewalk. Remembering that Highland Ave parallels Negley up in those parts (from map study), I successfully turn and walk in the right direction. I remember to call Lucas and tell him I'm alive, at which he's happy though puzzled as to why I'm near the North Side now.
On Highland, I find a bus stop. It says 500 (ah, fate). I've figured out a few things: be on the side of the street whose traffic is flowing in the direction you want to go. Look on the blue Bus Stop sign for little number stickers to tell what buses stop there. If you're supremely lucky, there will be longer stickers that even say the areas on the route (95 Bloomfield to South Side is much more helpful than an austere, mysterious 95). The one thing lacking, universally: what time that bus will arrive. So there I was, up in Highland Park on a drizzly Monday morning, standing all alone, memorizing the landscaping of the gorgeous old houses, watching the mailman across the street go up steps and down steps and up steps, from door to door. After a very long time and I am still the only person at this stop, I give up (again) on ye olde 500 and simply start walking down Highland toward my street. One person I know who lives up here swears he can walk to campus in 15-20 minutes. This is what I tell myself. He's also about 6 feet tall. With my beginner's luck, I am only a few blocks down, near enough another bus stop to sprint back to it when finally, finally, the maroon Behemoth 500 hisses down the street. I'm on! Five minutes and I'm a block away from my house! I did it! I swaggered down my street and entered my house like it was the winner's circle, punching the air. Lucas was not too impressed because it had been over an hour since I'd left downtown. But I had figured it out. Armed with my student ID, I could ride the Port all day, be anywhere I wanted to be. Still flying high, I decided to go to Target.
Fifth Ave to the Waterfront
I've got to make this part shorter. So, I look up the bus to take to Target at the waterfront. One must cross a river to get to a Target in this town, for some reason. So it's pretty far away. Again, lucky me, there's a bus that leaves from Fifth and goes straight there, no transfers. The number 64. And it's leaving in 14 minutes.
I missed it. I waited twelve minutes more. A few other buses passed me by but I remembered the steadfastness of my horn-rimmed friend and let them go. In a cruel twist of fate, another 64 did pass by, but I didn't realize it was a 64 until its exhaust was receding from me - the front electronic scrawler had been jumbled. I began then to hate the Port Authority just a little bit. Twenty more minutes passed by and another 64 came -- I couldn't figure out a pattern to the intervals and still am baffled by this. It got me to Target.
Waterfront to Shadyside
Spoiler alert: this route does not exist. I'd left my house for Target at 2:15. I'm going to lay this out there for you: I walked back in my door at 6:07. The bus ride to the Waterfront is about a half hour. So....As I'd stood on Fifth, waiting for my initial 64, I'd seen another 64 headed the other direction. Dropping people off on the opposite side of the Ave, which was exactly where I needed to end up. The number 64 was to be my savior for the day. So simple. So beatles-esque. Good thing I'd written it on my hand.
I came out of Target and went to the same stop at which I'd been dropped off, and waited for my friend 64. When it came, startlingly, the front scroller still said "Waterfront" - meaning it was not headed back into town, or at least that was my interpretation. I stepped back. Puzzling. I realized at that point I had no idea how to get back if it were not on the 64, so after waiting through a few more buses I fell back on one of my Truths of the morning, and walked to the end of the parking lot, crossed the road, and found a bus stop there where any traffic would be, by default, headed back toward the bridge. The stop said 64. I was the only one, again, standing at it. I joked with myself that I was like Julia in Julie and Julia when she explains the comfort she finds in the predictability of cooking: add this to that and it will yield a cake. I thought, even though I don't know where I am or when the next bus is coming, all I need to do is stand under a blue sign that says "64" and the number 64 bus will come. Sadly, this is where the fairy tale I'd constructed regarding public transportation came crashing down around me.
I took my shoes off and stood in the wet grass. I balanced on one foot, then the other. I changed songs on my pod. I shifted my reusable shopping bag to the other shoulder. In about 30 minutes, no bus came. Finally a bus came and slowed down, but it was a 71D or some such sordid thing, and not what I wanted, and the driver opened the door and looked at me, and as I stepped back away from the door he shook his head as though I was choosing my own downfall, and he closed the door and hissed on. His expression shook me, and so after another 30 minutes of waiting or so, I thought I'd try another Truth of the morning: start walking the direction you want to go, and the bus will come. I think you know where this is headed. After a bit of a bus-less hike, I saw a different bus stop, and decided to go stand under it. (when all else fails...). This sign said 64, too. I had begun to loathe the 64. I knew deep it my heart it wasn't coming. I knew it would never come. After 30 minutes alone at this stop, I swore I'd just get on whatever bus came next. At least it would take me away from this Bermuda Triangle of transportation. Anywhere but here, I pleaded with the Port Authority gods, as people pulled up to the stoplight in traffic lines and looked at me like I was a lost granny. Eventually three more people came to the stop. This, I knew, was a very good sign. Shortly after a bus headed labeled "Murray" stopped. I stomped on it. Murray, I knew. Squirrel Hill. I figured there would have to be a Squirrel Hill to Shadyside bus, or maybe multiple buses, that would finish out this wrecked adventure for me.
Squirrel Hill to Shadyside
I got off when someone pulled the cord at Murray and Beacon. This may surprise you, but I stood at the bus stop for about 10 minutes waiting for the bus that was supposed to come next...the 64. It surprises me to report this. What was I thinking? Sometimes we just want to believe so badly in something...Naturally, it didn't come. I walked to the next bus stop, looked back. Only cars, as far as the eye could see. I hoisted my shopping bag, my tote bag of half-edited poems, my crumpled pre-conceived notions of public transportation in Pittsburgh, and flat-footed it 2 1/2 miles to my apartment. Every bus stop I passed said number 64. No 64 passed. In fact, no bus passed at all until I was back around 5th. I had enough time to change shoes, re-pack bags, and walk back out the door to class. Remember, nothing left to fear. Triumph.
And finally, ending on a high note:
Kai Soleil, 6 months old this week.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
The Carnegie Library
So, we decided to go to the Carnegie Library main branch today, in Oakland.
It's amazing, huh? When I looked up the address, I discovered it is housed right next to (in the same massive building with) the Carnegie Museum of Art. Which had a show I wanted to see. And, when we got there, we discovered the Carnegie Music Hall and Carnegie Museum of Natural History are also there. This is one of the entrances:
It's amazing, huh? When I looked up the address, I discovered it is housed right next to (in the same massive building with) the Carnegie Museum of Art. Which had a show I wanted to see. And, when we got there, we discovered the Carnegie Music Hall and Carnegie Museum of Natural History are also there. This is one of the entrances:
Worth the price of admission, I said, which at this point was zero. There was a sculpture of a tightrope walker above our heads. We shortly learned that to go much farther, it would cost each of us significantly. Plus, with so much art and history to see, we decided we'd be better off to slate a whole day for it. And by luck, there is a free day next Sunday - hooray! So, we went a door over to the library. It is enormous, marble steps, iron-and-glass floors, soaring arches.
I had to tell myself not to look around too much or I'd end up checking out an armload of books. I'd gone to get two books (Push by Sapphire and Another Bullshit Night in Suck City by Nick Flynn), which is about my limit in addition to the hundreds of pages I'm supposed to be reading weekly...not to mention the hundreds of pages I'm supposed to be writing. So it was kind of like going into Target on a Friday that's not payday. Just steer clear of the clearance racks, or bad things will happen. (So, this was earlier today, and as I write this, I'm almost done with Push and it is amazing, and I need to tell you if you are reading this you should shut the computer and go get that instead and read it.) The DVD/multimedia section alone was an entire room.
One of the most captivating things about the library was its architecture. So much of the architecture here is fascinating, it makes me wish I knew more about it. Maybe I'll check a book out of the library... Anyway, here is what the floors looked like in the stacks:
The panes are some kind of composite, very thick glass. And the library is three floors and a basement. It took me two floors before I discovered this:
Not only is the glass semi- translucent (meaning you can see light and shadows from above and make out shapes below your feet)...if you look down by the bookshelves, you can see ALL THE WAY DOWN! In this picture you're looking down through the floor to two more floors' bookshelves. I can only imagine that this is some kind of showcase of the mastery of metal in Steel City. At any rate, for four floors to be constructed this way amazes me. While we walked aisle after aisle looking up and then down, we also discovered this:
That's right, a --free-- view of some dinosaur bones. Lucas was pretty proud we did not have to drop any Lincolns for this. Definitely looking forward to going back for a museum day and walking through there...though I must say, we had a rare view of the tiny bones at the brontosaurus' tail-tip, and how they were suspended from the wall. Also, the tree is fake.
Time for a parting shot of some real trees, outside the main entrance of the library:
Oh, for a picnic! Bellissimo! Wish you were here!
Oh What a Joyous Day
when the peanut butter jar goes empty:
...and a dedicated dog is needed to lick it clean before it can go to the recycling bin.
...and a dedicated dog is needed to lick it clean before it can go to the recycling bin.
the sleep of the contented
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Ode to the Pittsburgh Left:
A quartet of Haiku.
the light is changing
your laws do not apply here
I turn before you
audi, shuttle, bike
a port authority bus
we all pittsburgh left
the first one to go
it not who you would expect
when the light turns green
red light gridlock cars
engines revving glances shared
will he do it -- yes
the light is changing
your laws do not apply here
I turn before you
audi, shuttle, bike
a port authority bus
we all pittsburgh left
the first one to go
it not who you would expect
when the light turns green
red light gridlock cars
engines revving glances shared
will he do it -- yes
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Frick Park
I'd like to paint a picture for you. You are in the OLEA (Off Leash Exercise Area) at Frick Park in the East Burgh enjoying/sweating through a balmy Saturday and exercising your canine companion. His fur ripples in happy wind as he cavorts around the hilltop park, this fenced-in doggie haven. Maybe ten other dogs are running around, switching companions, smelling noses-then-butts. Joyful barking echoes over the trees. You're on the shaded end of the dog park, which in total is about the size of a pewee football field. It is completely fenced in with 10-foot high chain-link fencing, and there are some trees and undergrowth lining it on the inside, while just on the other side of the fence the Frick Forest takes over, with thick briars and copious trees beyond which you can barely see the far away river valley (think Fangorn). See, the OLEA is at the summit of Frick Park - supposedly to help the dog lungs grow strong as they run about in the thin air. It is rumored that the wind chill there at night reaches -50F. Anyway, back to you. You're watching your dog tumble and curl about in the grass (which really should be all lichen at this elevation) when all of a sudden there is a disturbance on the far side of the fence. It sounds like an arthritic bear is bashing its way up the hill, which is so steep and overgrown you can't see anything but the foliage right up against the chain-link. The dogs' gaits miss a beat. Other people turn. The crashing and threshing continue. All of a sudden - my god - it's a dog, bounding to the top covered in microscopic burrs and excited to see fellow beasts except to discover she is on the -whine- wrong side of the fence. You've just had the thought arise "I bet that dog would be soft, perhaps the softest dog in Shadyside, if she were not covered in microscopic burrs and foaming at the mouth," when all of a sudden two more figures emerge at the top of the hill, parting the jungle of plants behind the dog. You know the geography of the park. That informs your knowledge that these pair have inexplicably just climbed hand over foot up a precipice, through the brush, to an impenetrable fenced area when a path just about 50 yards to the left would have led them to the door of the dog park, sans burrs. The man stops instantly (he has no choice, hello, chain link) and the girl, who is further-ly inexplicably on a cell phone, looks at him in frustration. They both peer past the hot metal fence into the dog park, visibly registering their error, then throw their hands up at each other, turn around, and disappear back down over the precipice, calling their mangy beast after them.
Dogs have a short attention span. So do you - after all, it is the facebook era. They return to cavorting and slobbering. You think, huh, I wonder if Frick has started a mountain climbing club for challenged people, and flip the lid off of your tepid water bottle.
Yes, friend, if you figured out who the intrepid climbers were, you guessed right. Suffice it to say that on our first trip to Frick Park, not only did we find the OLEA, but we got the "unofficial" trail tour as well, including that climb, which was short compared to the one we took right before that which was exactly vertical necessitating us to pull ourselves up by roots, which was shortly after Olive wallowed in a mud pit that must have been a river at some point, before she found the burr-patch, and about 20 minutes after we were all nearly flattened by a mountain biker speeding around a corner through the wilderness we'd thought were foot paths...which was almost immediately before said "foot path" vanished. This because we wanted to get off the gravel path, proud to use the inner compass we've both developed so well since arriving in this topsy turvy city.
Came across some good views, though:
Dogs have a short attention span. So do you - after all, it is the facebook era. They return to cavorting and slobbering. You think, huh, I wonder if Frick has started a mountain climbing club for challenged people, and flip the lid off of your tepid water bottle.
Yes, friend, if you figured out who the intrepid climbers were, you guessed right. Suffice it to say that on our first trip to Frick Park, not only did we find the OLEA, but we got the "unofficial" trail tour as well, including that climb, which was short compared to the one we took right before that which was exactly vertical necessitating us to pull ourselves up by roots, which was shortly after Olive wallowed in a mud pit that must have been a river at some point, before she found the burr-patch, and about 20 minutes after we were all nearly flattened by a mountain biker speeding around a corner through the wilderness we'd thought were foot paths...which was almost immediately before said "foot path" vanished. This because we wanted to get off the gravel path, proud to use the inner compass we've both developed so well since arriving in this topsy turvy city.
Came across some good views, though:
It Has Begun
Finally, the moment we have all been waiting for: classes started on Monday. Orientation was Sunday. I'm noticing that I'm more reticent to go near my computer, because I feel guilt that when I do, it should be to write one of my four essays due next week. Tonight I made a list just so all of the assignments would stop rattling around in my brain:
Booyah. So that question of what am I going to do with no job and only the commitment of the fellowship, and three night classes? Answered.
I have to say, for all of this: it is a pretty cool thing that what I have to do 8-10 hours a day is read, and write. Copiously.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)