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May 29, 2004
I'm in London, and just
I'm in London, and just attended the cast and crew screening of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. A few (non-spoiler) notes:
1. David Thewlis (Lupin) is a genius actor.
2. It was cool to hear people clap for the credits.
3. I got to shake Alfonso Cuaron's hand and tell him how brilliant I thought Y Tu Mama Tambien was - and how much I loved PoA.
4. David Thewlis is a genius actor.
5. Jamie Waylett is the nicest guy ever.
More after the jetlag wears off.
Posted by Kristin at 1:23 PM
May 26, 2004
So, recent virus, killed my
So, recent virus, killed my software. I had to start from scratch, which means I lost everything not backed up.
One thing to go was the splash page of this site. Right now it shows an inactive version of this blog. I've put in a redirect request to send 'www.lostgeographer.net' to 'www.lostgeographer.net/mainindex.html' for now; it should show up in a day or two.
I had backed up London, as well as anything taken from January 2004 on. But I lost all of my photos from New Jersey, Maryland, and Salem, as well as everything after I got my camera.
I very much regret the loss, and I won't fail to back up my digital photos again.
Posted by Kristin at 1:09 PM
I found out last week
I found out last week that Della has hypertrophic cardiomyapathy. I started researching it; this is typically immediately fatal. It's been a huge blow. I've had pets all my life, but Della is the first to regard me as her person, and I love her very much.
My regular vet (we went to an animal cardiologist for the diagnosis) resassured me at a recent checkup; she told me so many cats die of it because it's frequently not detected until the final stages, but she believes this was caught early enough that we can treat it (it's not a curable condition, though). She told me she couldn't guarantee anything, but that she had a good feeling, and that cats can live out their full lifespan on the daily medicine that she's now taking ('taking' being a loose useage of the word, but she's actually quite good about it, considering).
I'm so thankful she detected the heart murmur and sent us out for a checkup.
Marie told me that Della's brother, who lives with Marie's sister's family, was discovered to have a heart murmur; they're going to a cardiologist. I hope that visit goes well.
I'm trying to think positive thoughts about Della; I want more than anything I can think of for her to live to be old and crotchety.
Posted by Kristin at 12:59 PM | Comments (1)
May 22, 2004
I SHOPPED! I ACTUALLY BOUGHT
I SHOPPED! I ACTUALLY BOUGHT CLOTHES!
Here's one of the things I bought. Monique said she thought it was ugly until I put it on, at which point she insisted I buy it. It's very comfortable:
Ugly Wrap Dress
Posted by Kristin at 3:17 PM | Comments (2)
May 15, 2004
This is BRILLIANT. And she
This is BRILLIANT.
And she wrote it all herself.
J.K. Rowling's Website
Posted by Kristin at 2:47 PM | Comments (1)
May 13, 2004
Check out Will's page -
Check out Will's page - this kid is great.
Posted by Kristin at 9:57 PM | Comments (1)
A woman was walking the
A woman was walking the beach after a terrible storm. She noticed a young man ahead of her picking up starfish and throwing them into the surf. When she reached the man, she asked him why he was returning the starfish back into the ocean. She asked, "With millions of starfish on the beach, what difference can you make?"
The young man smiled at the woman, reached down and picked up a starfish. Throwing into the sea he said, "It makes a difference to this one."
Adapted from The Star Thrower by Loren Eiseley
Posted by Kristin at 9:20 PM
Whether you support Kerry or
Whether you support Kerry or not, I like to see people volunteering their time and money for causes they believe in - and this is an interesting way to go about it -
Fan the Vote - in support of the Kerry Campaign and MoveOn.org.
They've raised over a $1000 so far, and the LJ community is only a few days old.
Posted by Kristin at 6:01 PM | Comments (1)
May 12, 2004
Fixed me blog problem So
Fixed me blog problem
So now all you people just dying to comment can do so.
Posted by Kristin at 9:59 PM | Comments (3)
May 7, 2004
Today was Bike to Work
Today was Bike to Work Day. As I live two blocks from work and it's actually faster to walk than ride, I generally don't participate. Mostly because people make fun of me if I do.
But my boss, who lives on the other side of town, wanted to join in and ride, so I hauled out my bike, untouched since Dad got sick late last summer, pumped up the tires - half hoping they wouldn't hold air, and that I'd have an excuse for bowing out (they did, so I didn't), and made a test run, riding west. I rode it five miles before I thought I might collapse - not the ten I once easily managed, but still quite good, especially as I have a mountain bike (nobbly big tires: good off road, harder pedaling on pavement), and the path to the west is a subtle yet insidiously consistent upgrade. I rode back to town and returned to my patio for a glass of water and to formulate my plan: I would let my boss, who regularly puts in 20 miles two or three times a week, start ahead of me, and I'd ride out to the small park around where I'd just stopped, wait for him and my other officemates (they all met up eight or nine miles further west to ride in together), and then ride back with them. This sounded ideal, as it would allow ten or fifteen minutes for lovely countryside reflection, and would give me time to cool out and not look like - well, someone who doesn't exercise much and then decided to ride five miles up hill.
But nooooo, nooooo (insert Eddie Izzard voice) - when I called my boss to tell him my plan, and to say that he shouldn't wait for me the next morning, he sounded disappointed. He didn't mind riding slowly, he said. "But I'm not in very good shape," I said. "No, no - we'll go at your pace", he said. "I'll hold you up - you have a road bike," I said. "It's not a race," he said.
So I set my alarm, found a T-shirt and shorts I wouldn't be too embarrassed to be seen in at work, and met him at the trail, 7:00am.
We rode. And it wasn't too bad, although we talked most of the way, so it was more work than it had been the night before. I was grateful to see the little park, five miles out. I said "I'm going to stop here, I think - don't let me hold you up."
And he said "Oh, but you have to finish the last little stretch, to the road."
And I heard myself say "Okay". It is now my belief that if you return to that exact spot on the trail and look very carefully, you'll find the lost points of my I.Q., scattered and ground into the asphalt like granules of coarse sand.
And I rode up the hill. As I did so, it occurred to me that I felt rather suddenly overworked, and that after previously thinking maybe I shouldn't overdo things, that it would be embarrassing to go and get sick.
I got to the top of the hill, stopped the bike, and fell over.
I didn't actually black out; I just got really dizzy, and then when I tried to stand, I couldn't, so I had to sit there until my head cleared and the muscles in my legs stopped twitching, with nice blood bruises popping up on both shins, the right sheared-off handle bar end to my bike in my hand, and my boss, looking like - I'm not sure like what, as I couldn't focus there for a moment, but I'm guessing "What the-?" probably covered it. He pulled my bike up, and I got up, and he suggested that I not get up, and I said "No, no - I'm fine, I can coast, I'm fine", and I got on to find that my chain was a mess and I had to sort that out, and then we rode back the 1/13" of a mile or whatever it was that had done me in, back to the park where I should have stopped in the first place, to find the trash bin and the bench pointing and laughing at me (or maybe that was in my head, but I'm sure if they didn't actually they wanted to). We chatted, I rested, and then we rode back and separated; he went to work, and I returned home to shower and change, the bits of my handlebar in my back pocket. A co-worker later very generously offered a new handlebar from his pile of spare bike parks, but I'm considering leaving it as is.
The thing that always puzzles me - why does it never occur to me that it's a bad idea to exercise too much early in the morning until it's too late? I'd like to think it's because I'm so preoccupied with matters of the universe or so overwhelmed in my own creativity that I haven't the thought to spare for my own well-being, but I'm afraid it's actually just because I'm an idiot.
~*~
After changing to jeans and sandals and before going to work, I rode to another little park (this one in town), where the Bike to Work Day organizers had set up with water, snacks, free T-shirts, and a raffle, to see if my co-workers had made it in yet from the west. Two were there, wondering about a third, who had planned to leave his house in West Virginia before dark and ride the 45 miles into town.
As I slowed to get off my bike, a man dressed in cycling nylon crossed the path in front of me. He glanced at my face before his eyes slide down, his attention drawn elsewhere. "Nice bike," he said, drawing out the 'nice' in a tone that was part longing and part reverence.
"Thanks," I said. It's been so long since I rode regularly that I'd forgotten - my bike is sort of a legend.
I have an off road bike that my brother bought new in Nashville, Tennessee, and sold to me a couple of years ago when in a fit of turning thirty angst he spend three grand on a custom one. While he knew the one I now own didn't fit him the way it should (it was a late year model and deeply discounted; he couldn't pass it up even though the frame was a bit too small), he was reluctant to part with it to a stranger, and as I was looking for a bicycle, he decided to sell it to me, providing I abide by a long list of rules which included never selling it to anyone else, never putting it on a rear car bike rack for fear of rock dings, wiping it down with 500 thread count cloth after each ride, and a bunch of other regulations I've forgotten or ignored.
Chris Chance opened Fat City Cycle in a small northeast town and started designing and building bikes in the late 70s. I have the Buck Shaver model (how's that for a name - it's a 'Chris Chance Fat City Cycle Fat Chance Buck Shaver'). It's not that my model is thought to be comparatively outstanding (it was actually one of their more affordable models), it's that a lot of people thought (and seem to still) that Chris Chance designed the most brilliant bikes ever made. Me owning a Fat City is sort of like me buying this year's Kentucky Derby winner because I want a nice pony to climb on and mosey down the trail a piece.
I slid off and pushed the bike toward the snacks table to help myself, then braced myself sideways against the frame in a makeshift seat as I started on breakfast.
"Niiiice bike." A helmeted woman with calves like solid steel stopped in front of me, hands on her hips as she studied my ride.
"Frskanks," I said around my second Dunkin Donut.
She spared a brief glance for me before her eyes returned to The Bike. "Friend bought a Yo Betty 'bout a year ago."
This sparked. I remembered that from my brother as another Fat City model. "Really?"
We talked about possible upgrades (she thought I'd benefit from a handlebar stem with a 15% upward tilt, as opposed to the one on the bike now), and she asked if I'd heard of the guy trying to ride in from Sheperdstown (my office mate made it safely five minutes later, earning himself a place in the annals of Bike to Work Day history as 'that guy who rode in from Sheperdstown'. (Total time: 4 hours 24 minutes)), and then it was time for me to head work.
"Nice talking to you," I said, chucking my used napkin into the trash bag.
"You too," she said. She looked down at my bike one last time and sighed. "Nice bike."
Yeah, I've been told that.
~*~
*My brother's new bike came from Independent Fabrications, a small company started by the people who worked for Chris Chance before Fat City closed.
Posted by Kristin at 12:42 PM