Truths and Half Truths

Making Some Changes ...

... and I've come to the conclusion that this blog doesn't have a place in the larger plan.

Thank you all for coming by.  I've made some great new friendships.  And as I've said before, my friendships are enduring. 

I'll be around, throwing in my two cents where it's needed.  And often where it isn't.  But by and large, I'll be less of an online presence.

The future - well, even the Wise and Powerful Nilbo has his limitations.  I never say never.

But for now, I think I have to be away for a bit.

Daring “Devil’s Dip”

    Across Canada, kids are getting ready to head back to school after summer vacation.

    On the first day back, many will show up in the classrooms with brand new, never-before-worn clothes.  Everyone will have notebooks and scribblers and binders with their names neatly printed on the covers; pencil cases and geometry sets (are they still sold in those metal boxes, so useful for nudging slowly towards the front of your desk until they tip over the edge and land with a clatter that startles  Louise Olsen so much she pees her pants?  They should be.  Maybe Louise is now a teacher.  Making your teacher pee her pants would be the best first day of school EVER.).

    And a few students will show up with bandages, casts, and brand new scars.

    That was me.  I always started school in September with some new injury or another. A  “last week of summer vacation” injury.

    One year it was a cast on my right wrist.  All my friends signed it.  I wore that cast proudly for six weeks, my badge of honour.  It proclaimed to the world that I had dared “Devil’s Dip”.

    Devil’s Dip was the name of a large, steep, bowl-like depression deep within the bowels of Assiniboine Park near the river in my hometown.  There were paths leading to Devil’s Dip - narrow dirt paths negotiable only by walking or by the most daring bike riders.

    We never walked to Devil’s Dip.

    We would ride to this natural bowl on our bikes almost every day in the summer.  We’d roll our front wheels to the edge of the precipice and lean forward to look over.  And every time we did, our knees would turn to Jell-o.

    Oh, it was steep. 

    In fact, it was close to a vertical drop, fifty feet straight down, or at least it seemed that way to us.  The sides were smooth.  You could almost imagine edging further forward, and further, until you could allow gravity to take over as you hurtled down one side of the dip, across the bottom at breakneck speed, and counted on your momentum to carry you up the far side.

    You could almost imagine it.  And that was scary enough.  But only the bravest of the brave would ever really challenge “Devil’s Dip”.  And one summer, I decided I would join those ranks. 

    Now, I rode a red CCM Flyer.  No fancy-schmancy mountain bikes back then, with your handlebar brakes and your twenty-four speeds.  No, sir.  Back then, if you wanted a faster speed you goddamn well pedalled harder.  And if you wanted to stop, you jammed the pedals backward and screeched to a halt.

    Every morning that summer I would ride with my pals out to Devil’s Dip, and with every visit I became more and more determined.  This was my Everest, my Moby Dick, my chance to prove my mettle to a widening circle of doubters who scoffed and sniggered as I would roll up to the edge, stare down into the bowels of the dip, then ruefully roll back.

    But there was a method to what appeared to be cowardice.  With every visit, I surveyed the terrain, looking for the smoothest possible path down. Because while the sides were smooth, the bottom was littered with weeds, shrubs, roots, and other obstacles.

Finally, I knew I had it.  It was a Monday afternoon, Labour Day.  School was scheduled to start Tuesday morning.  If ever I was going to conquer Devil’s Dip, it was this afternoon.

    My friends watched in awe and respect as I inched towards the edge.  I rolled my front tire out into space.  I drew a deep breath, and pushed off the edge with a whoop ...

    ... and within the first six feet, I had reached terminal velocity.  I kicked my heels back on the brakes to slow myself down, to no avail.  I screamed - what I thought was a brave, manly scream but which, in retrospect, must have sounded like the Vienna Boy’s Choir with squirrels up their robes.

    I jounced along the base of the bowl, still maintaining a constant speed as I wove through the shrubs, roots, and flowers.  I began fighting the handlebars, using brute force to manoeuver my red CCM Flyer across the flat plain. 

I felt, rather than saw, my escape path up the other side and at the last possible moment heaved on the handlebars, hitting that exit spot with a precision that would impress any NASA egghead.  And before you - or even I - knew it, I was near the top of the far slope.

    (I say “near” as in “not quite there, so stop being so cocky, you little twerp”.) 

  My front wheel touched the far top of the bowl ...

    ... and gravity reared its ugly head.  Essentially, I stopped.  I remained there, hovering in mid-air.  I’d love a picture of it, in fact.  I’m sure it would be a thing of beauty.  Because now the story takes a decidedly unpleasant turn.

    I began falling slowly backwards, still clutching my bike.  My bike and I had always been close.  Over the next few seconds we would kick our relationship up a notch.

    I fell down the unscalable height that was the far edge of Devil’s Dip.  Debate continues to rage over how many cartwheels and end-over-end rolls I took before I fetched up against a tree  root.

    My wrist was broken in two places.  My face was scraped and I had no skin left on either knee. 

  But I was “The Boy Who Dared Devil’s Dip and Lived to Talk About It.”

    I haven’t done many heroic things since that day in late August.  I don’t need to.

    I took on Devil’s Dip and won, hands (and face, actually) down.  I am The Legend.  My place in history is assured.

   What's YOUR most heroic act?

What the Hail?

This afternoon I was out on the golf course (quel surprise, I know), and as we were approaching the ninth green - the halfway point - a few little sprinkles started and the skies were threatening ... and then came a rumble in the distance. 

Now, when I'm on a golf course and I hear thunder, I always think of it as God whispering in my ear, "Hey ... do you want to be one of those guys people read about in their newspaper, then call out to their wife, "Hey, Marge.  You'll never believe what this asshole was doing in a thunderstorm!"?  No?  Then maybe you better get back to the clubhouse, because I'm fixing to fry your ass if you stay out."  (When my God talks to me, it sounds just the way I talk.)

Anyway, I cleared off, got home, and was just settling down in front of a roaring computer screen when the skies opened up.  I shut down - there was lots of lightning around - and when the hiss of falling rain turned into the thunk of hailstones, I got out my camera.  This is what I captured from my back door:

The video doesn't do it justice.  In just over five minutes, the deck was coated with an inch of hail.  So I took some pics from around the yard both during and immediately apres-storm:

This is at the height of the action.  The diagonal bit of decking is the hatch to my cellar.  The grey covered object in the background is my hot tub.

This next pic shows the relative size of the stones - approximately pea sized, but pelting down at terminal velocity, they stung.

My footprint in the hail on my deck.  I have large feet.  No, really, I do.

I also have stumpy legs. 

Within minutes after the hail stopped, the sun was shining.  Although having a quick snooze in the hammock wasn't an option.

The flowers didn't seem damaged (or even concerned) by all the excitement ...

Looking east, down my driveway to the road, you can see just how ugly the skies got.  By now I'm taking this picture, standing in sunlight ..

Another part of the yard - I love the juxtaposition of the hail and the dark sky against the lily.  Foreground is the old wood stove that used to heat the house.  It's now a garden decoration ...

My deck.  My office is set apart from the main house, which is to the right of the blue door.  One of my office windows is behind the patio furniture, to the left of the door.  A mudroom separates me from whatever's going on in the house.

And finally, the field behind my house.  I'm not sure this picture captures the mist beginning to roil up out of the ground amidst the haybales.

It was a wild few minutes ...

Some Ideas Are So Damn Smart ...

... you just wonder why nobody came up with them before.

I look at this and go "Wow.  Now THAT is good use of space."

Eight Random Things About Me

It's a meme.  I'm in the mood.  Shut it.

This meme usually comes with a whole bunch of rules, and one of the rules is that you must post the stinkin' rules.  Well, Bossy McRulemaker, bite me arse. 

So here goes - eight random and eccentric things about me:

1.  Most days, I have crackers and cheese for lunch.  Not so odd.  But consider:  I have Ritz Whole Wheat Crackers, each with a piece of Extra-Old Cheddar Cheese on top.  I have 21 crackers, and 21 (small) pieces of cheese.  The crackers are whole - unbroken, uncracked, not chipped or flaked or scarred or marred in any way.  If I find a cracker with a defect, I set it aside.  It is not acceptable for lunch.  Snacking later, sure.  But not for lunch.

2.  I almost never go to bed before 2 o'clock in the morning.  Most often, I go to bed at around 3AM.  I'm most often up and operational at 7:25, although some days I will roll over and sleep till 8:30.  I don't like to sleep.  It's a total waste of time.

3.  I often forget to eat, sometimes for a full day.  I'll be sitting here in my office at 1AM, and suddenly realize that the last meal I had was supper - the day before.

4.  I have a lot of acquaintances but few very good friends.   It may be because my standard for "very good friend" is unreasonably high. I demand that my friends be as kind and considerate and thoughtful and generous as ... well ... me.  Both my kids and I have complained at one time or another that we don't have very many friends that are as good to us as we are to our friends.

And my friends are friends for life.  I am as loyal as any Golden Retriever you have ever met. And just as likely to hump your leg.

5.   When I go away from home for any longer than a day, I have a weird need to touch stuff on my return.  I don't even know I'm doing it. 

My mother first noticed this when I was a kid.  We'd go away on holidays, and when I got back to the house, I'd walk around, idly running my hand over the chairs, the countertops, the TV, any and all surfaces.  It was totally unconscious - subtly reconnecting with my environment.  I still do that, I am told.

6.  I would far rather be cold than hot.  No contest.  Not even close.  I despise hot, muggy days.  That said, every night of the year (barring blizzards or torrential downpours), I end my day in the hot tub on my deck.  My favourite part?  When I finally say "That's it - I am gonna die if I stay in here one moment longer!" and get out, and the air against my body is cold and envigorating and energizing and every nerve ending in my body is tingling.  It is particularly wonderful in mid-winter, when I can actually watch the steam come off my arms and legs as I stand there in -20 air and slowly towel off.

7.  If I am talking to you, and you glance over my shoulder to see who else might be more interesting to talk to, our conversation will end within 30 seconds.  You will be poorer for it, although you may not realize that immediately. 

If I am chatting online with someone, and I suspect he or she is chatting to someone else at the same time, I will become slightly to moderately rankled.  I will generally give them the benefit of the doubt, because I don't know what's happening at their end - kids needing attention, phones ringing, dogs barfing on their new carpet, whatever.   But if, after a while, their responses are taking too long, I will conclude they have looked over my shoulder, found someone far more interesting than I, and I will relieve them of the tiresome burden that I have become.

It's completely unfair of me to be this way, because many times I've been happily chatting away to a friend and all of a sudden gotten an unexpected message from a different friend. I  am too polite not to respond, so until I can extract myself from the situation with grace, I find myself juggling two conversations and doing to both people exactly what I hate when it's done to me. I cringe uncomfortably the whole time, both from fear that my rudeness will be discovered and guilt about my utterly unfair double standard.

8.   I hate horses.  Hate.  Do not like to be around them.  Don't like riding them.  I am not open to being persuaded on this topic.  I am sure there are things I love that you hate, and I'm cool with that.  So don't hate me because I loathe horses, that I find them cranky and unpredictable and scary and smelly and awful. 

That's just one more weird thing about me.

There.  I know at least one person I would like to tag (using TKW's definition), but that would be following the rules.  Screw that.

What Do You Do?

I started the day one off the lead in the golf tournament I was in - one of the largest on the Island.

Now, to be clear, I was one off the lead in my division.  I'm not a pro - my future son-in-law (!) was playing in the Pro Division.  But still, on Saturday I shot a more-than-respectable score and was one back of the leader.  We teed off together this morning, along with the fellow in third place, who trailed me by two strokes.

I played well in the first nine holes, but so did the front runner, and by the midway point of our round he had stretched his lead to three. Leading off the second nine holes, I canned a birdie putt - but he countered with one of his own.  Things didn't change with the next hole, and we stepped onto the following tee with him still leading by three strokes.

It was a par three over water - not a terribly difficult hole (the green is larger than any house any of us have ever lived in) but ... did I mention the water?  The hole was tucked neatly into the far right corner of the green, just past the pond.

My opponent got up to hit his shot, and bailed out far to the left, well away from the hole (and the water).  It was a safe, smart play, protecting a three-shot lead.  "Just don't make mistakes," he was clearly saying to himself.  "Par is your friend."

I stood up to the tee and ran through the position I was in.  Three strokes behind the leader with seven holes to play.  Do I go over the water, trying to get closer to the hole and perhaps gain a stroke or two at the risk of falling short, splashing, and taking a high score on the hole?  Because the reward, if I'm successful, is a gain of one, two, or more strokes.  The penalty for failure is not just missing a chance at first place, but slipping from second into third.

My decision tells you a lot about who I am.

I aimed dead at the pin.  I hit what may be one of the sweetest, truest shots of my life.

"That's going in," said one of my playing partners.

"It's straight at it," agreed the other.

"Be the right club," was all I could mutter as the shot flew with laser precision towards the hole ... landed safely on the far bank ...

... and trickled back into the hazard.

I took a two stroke penalty, and my chance at first place was gone.

I'm still replaying that shot, how close it was to being perfect, how different things might have been had I chosen to play it safe.  I'd have gained at least a stroke on that hole (he'd played it almost too safe, and ended up taking an extra stroke).  And it's possible he'd have been shaken enough to fold like a cheap lawn chair.

But I didn't play it safe.  I made the decision that first place was all that mattered.  I tried, and failed, and in doing so allowed the guy trailing me to catch up and pass me.  I ended the tournament in a respectable - but deeply unsatisfying - third place.

It was all or nothing, and today it was nothing.  And as many times as I've run that moment of decision over in my head, I come to the same conclusion.

I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

What about you?  Safe ... or go for it?

My Second Favourite Thing

On Tuesday, I did a round of golf at Dundarave Golf Course in Roseneath, PEI.  Last year, Jack Nicklaus played this course.  I'm sure he scored better than I.  But I can't imagine he enjoyed it more.

Note on the pics:  just as the camera adds ten pounds, it also shortens the legs.  I really do have half-decent pins.  They only look stumpy because of the camera angle.  Well, and the short inseam thing.

A Conversation With My Dog

"Excuse me?"

"What?"

"What, what?  You just climbed into my lap, is what."

"Yeah, I'm gonna want to be here for a bit.  That's OK, right?"

"Uh, no.  You weigh 75 pounds.  You are not a lap dog."

"Yeah, the thing is, I don't know if you noticed ..."

" ... the thunder and lightning?"

"Yeah, that.  I'm not real comfortable with it.  I find it .. loud.  And sort of ... thundery."

"Well, it is thunder."

"Yeah, it really, really is.  So if it's OK, I will just stay here for, you know, however long it takes for the storm to pass."

"That could be hours."

"Oh, that's OK.  You're comfortable.  Pillowy, almost."

"Must you drool on me, as well?"

"I'm panting.  That's what we do when we feel stress.  That, and shed hair.  And pee."

"There's hair all over this shirt."

"Yeah, it's mine."

"I figured.  Well, at least you didn't pee."

"Nope.  Not yet.  Check with me in a bit.  Oh, well, you won't have to, will you?"

"Why don't you hide under the bed like a normal dog?"

"Pillowy soft.  All I'm saying."

Memos From The Supermarket

   

To the guy who pulled his car into the well-marked handicapped parking space, jumped out, and dashed into the supermarket before I got a chance to berate him:

Lack of concern for your fellow human beings does not constitute an acceptable “handicap”.  I will be waiting for you when you come out.  Expect me to point at you and loudly shout out “It’s a miracle!  He walks!  Praise the Lord!”  Your embarrassment and/or annoyance will be my only reward.  Your reward, my friend, is coming later.

   

To the woman who hasn’t quite grasped the concept that the aisles in a Supermarket are almost like little streets, and our carts are cars:

Seriously.  Pick a lane.  Don’t drive down the middle of the aisle, and if you do, for chrissake don’t just stop and leave your cart stranded in mid-aisle because you suddenly remembered you didn’t get a can of cream of chicken soup, which is in the previous aisle and since you don’t want to roll your cart all the way back there, you’ll leave it here "for just a second" while you dash back.  Who is kidding whom: you don’t so much “dash” as “trudge”. I’m going to guess the last time you “dashed” anywhere was the mid-80's.  Move your cart.  And by "cart", I mean your fat ass.

   

To the woman of considerable girth with the three loud and chunky children begging her for Sugar Pops and Frosted Flakes:   

I have battled with weight issues most of my life.  I sympathize.  I know it’s hard to lose weight and harder still to keep it off.  But ma’am, and I say this with the greatest respect: you are poisoning your children.  I glance into your cart, and it’s all I can do to hold my tongue and not report you to child care authorities.

    White bread, sugar cereals, “fruit treats”, fruit-flavoured drinks, processed cheese "food"?  Really?  In 2007?  These are poisons, and you have allowed your children to become addicted to them.  This is not new information.  You have no excuse for not knowing this.  And less excuse for spending the extra money that these poisons cost, perfectly good money you could use for cigarettes and scratch-and-dent lottery tickets.

“But my kids like this stuff!” is not a valid reason to inflict this toxic crap on them.  Be a parent.  Make choices for your kids that will allow them to grow up without having to battle diabetes and morbid obesity and heart disease.  If I suggested you should feed your children strychnine, you would (probably) be appalled.  Well, guess what?  The garbage you’re stuffing into them just works a little slower and guarantees that between now and the time it finally does kill them, as it surely will, they will hate their bodies and themselves.  Good job, Mom.    

To the guy who passed me and gave me a sympathetic smile and said “Looks like the men drew the short straw today!”:   

Hey, pal.  I do this all the time.  My wife has not shopped for groceries in years.  If it helps you to think of it as hunting and gathering, if it makes it a more studly, testosterone-fueled, "guy-type" job, then whatever works for you.  For my part, a man who can’t negotiate his way around a grocery store - who is bewildered by the task of finding clearly labelled products with which to feed himself and his family - isn’t much of a man.  Now, move.  I have some Tampons to buy.  With wings or something.  They’re not for me.

   

To the woman at the very front of the overly long “8 Items or Less” Express Checkout  line:   

It’s not complicated, and it’s not higher math.  Count the items in your cart, and ask yourself this question: "Is 14 more than 8?"  "Is 17 more than 8?"  Is 21 more than freaking 8???"  I bet with just a little bit of thought you can come up with the right answer.

    But you know what?  I think you’ve already come up with the right answer, and have just said to yourself “Well, nobody will mind.”  Can I just say that, our impassive faces and our oh-so-Canadian aversion to confrontation notwithstanding,  all of us behind you in line most emphatically do mind?  We mind very much, and that muttering you hear is us, calling you all sorts of names.  We settle on "expresshole".

   

To the woman behind me in the “8 Items or Less” line at the checkout:

Six bottles of soft drinks in one case is one item.  Don’t even think of scowling at me.  Just go back to reading your National Enquirer.

    There.  I feel much better.