a note on my lunch

panzarotti = delicious

randomness

i've been thinking about a few random things:

i really like sweater vests

all things pumpkin flavored are delicious

i have been listeing to the "flight of the conchords" soundtrack basically non-stop, but i've never seen the show. i'm kind of nervous to watch-- what if i don't like it?

michael cera is either a really good or a really bad actor-- he always plays the same part, which might possibly be his actual personality. [note: i do not recomend seeing "nick and norah's infinite playlist"]

i get kind of sad when i go to trader joe's to find out they have phased out a favorite snack of mine-- does this happen to anyone else? happily, though, the last time i was there i discovered they have resurrected the tuscan white bean dip under the name "tuscan white bean hummus"! now if they would only bring back cornicopius...

weekend

it's always hard to get back to the daily routine after a trip... we finally put most of our stuff away yesterday-- still a few things to get back in the kitchen, and some stuff to stow in the basement... yesterday we got to spend some time with kevin and parini who were in town from LA! check out our silly Halloween photos... oh the other picture is from a spice store.  i found this setup of couscous particularly funny-- is there actually a difference between israeli and lebanese couscous?

WV photos

the full albums are here and here

WV

we are back. it was a fun trip. i don't want to go to work.

here's a photo of bridge day.

more weekend fun

this weekend-- tonight actually-- we're headed down to the New River Gorge for an extended weekend climbing trip! we will be driving starting tonight (yikes!) after the class i teach-- dan will drive the first leg of the trip while i sleep (i hope) and then i will start driving sometime in the middle of the night... in addition to climbing we'll be watching official bridge day! i hope it's fun and the drive doesn't kill us... now i just have to make it through work today, tying up a bunch of loose ends, and then it's off until tuesday night!

weekend adventures

this is going to be a long post.  i hope it's worth your time to read it-- i have to document this before i forget it all.

this past weekend was kind of ridiculous.  enjoyable, memorable, and ridiculous.  it was perfect climbing weather, so dan and i decided to head up to rumney, and were excited that darren would join us as well.  the original plan was to go up saturday for the day, since i had plans to see david sedaris at symphony hall sunday.  well, we had to run some errands saturday that could not be done sunday, so instead darren got the idea to drive up saturday night to camp, therefore getting an early enough start sunday so we could make it back.  sounded great! dan remembered we had heard of a place called D'Acres, and organic farm close to climbing that has camping as well as indoor sleeping accommodations and i thought it would be easier to sleep in their yoga room rather than pitch a tent, so off we went.  

seriously, the whole D'Acres experience was under 12 hours but MAN was it CRAZY!! somehow the website seemed rather unassuming and i didn't realize that the place is a commune of sorts.  we arrived around 8:30 PM, and entered a large house.  i noticed on the way in through the garage a free-standing bathtub with what looked like laundry and ice cubes in it... odd, i thought, but i didn't mention anything to dan or darren.  a guy was putting on a pair of boots by the door, and told us to go inside an talk to the guy with the goatee.  so we did.  the first thing this guy says after dan says we have a reservation to stay in the yoga room is "have you been here before?" to which we say, "no".  his immediate response is, "isn't this place great?" and we all kind of said "uh, yeah" even though we'd only been in a large garage, a hallway, and now a kitchen.  right.  then he mentions something about the yoga room being upstairs, and the composting toilet, and that we can't wear our shoes upstairs.  he shows us the yoga room, then we go back to the car to get our things.  

there's a bonfire going across the "street", so after we drop off our things, we take the 6-pack of beers we brought over there.  i think this was the point at which darren suggested asking someone what the hell was going on... interestingly i don't think we ever did.

let me try to set up the scene:  people are quietly sitting in a circle around the fire, there are 2 guitars, several bongo drums, a diggerydo (i have no idea how to spell that) and maybe a rain stick? and singing.  oh, and the fire! there was an elaborate contraption set up in a teepee form with what we later found out to be a tangerine tree suspended over top the flame.  then we see close to the fire what looks like a large paper mache head, probably 6' diameter, about 15' up.  it is right next to a real teepee with its own mailbox.  so we start to drink our beers and i feel totally out of place-- we chatted with one another an again i felt like it was inappropriate to talk with the singing!  luckily about 10-15 minutes later someone came back from town with a bunch of beers, and some of the original musical group left.  at that point it changed to a regular campfire, which was cool... we met this guy who lived there, and he was all fun...

 dancing for us, chatting us up-- then he grabbed these fire balls (i'm not sure if there's a better word to describe them?) and started slinging them around in a wild dance.  it was kind of surreal.  oh, he told us the story of the teepee fire thing, which was a remnant from their middle earth party a few weeks before, in which they lit a bunch of leaves covered in vegetable oil.  BUT my favorite comment he made was this: a bit later 2 of the residents started playing guitar.  i could not identify the song, as they were not singing.  so this guy says to us "hey, is this hotel california?" i am about 99% sure it was not, but i said "it can be if you want it to be" so he says ok cool, but i forget how it starts.  so i lead him to "on a dark desert highway" and he says "oh, ok, but i have to do it reggae style" from which point i think he sang most of hotel california with a reggae beat-- which, by the way, was totally not what the guitars were playing!  ok, so then back to the fire, good times... then a conversation starts about a pig roast.  apparently the bathtub with ice was holding a pig.  on ice.  to cook.  i mentioned having seen this, and it was noted that i was "more observant than most" to have noticed a bathtub filled with sheets and ice.  so they rally up a few guys to start setting the pig up-- it would take 1 hour at 350 degrees for each 10lb of pig... or so they say.  hm.

overall it was a good time at the fire.  then we headed in...

the yoga room floor was not comfortable, despite our sleeping pads.  the room was huge and had maybe 8-10 people in it. it was also right above where the people had started cooking the pig, so it was not that quiet.  eventually i fell asleep.  at one point, though, i thought dan had rolled over in his sleeping bag onto my legs, because i felt something pushing on my legs.  i was actually quite warm at the time so i reached my hand outside the bag and then i seriously screamed-- my hand landed on the back of a cat! A CAT! dan woke up and i told him about it... but i think he fell back asleep immediately.  well, i could not sleep.  dan is allergic to cats-- and i later found out darren is, too-- so i took it upon myself to defend us against this cat by NOT going to sleep.  i was super hot but convinced myself i had to stay entirely zipped into my bag in case the cat tried to attack me.  also, this guy across the room was snoring like a train.  or something else loud.  it didn't even bother me though because it helped me to stay up and defend against a cat attack.

in the morning we were planning to have the pancake breakfast, but that turned out to be a bust... so we left that zany place in search of a diner.  the diner was tasty.  climbing was good.  the whole experience at D'Acres lasted from 8:30 saturday night to about 7:30 sunday morning.  it was a different world.

attached are a few pictures of the fire, the yoga room, and climbing.

thank you for reading. 

for today

a case of the mondays.

i'm having one of those days where i just can't keep on top of anything-- my outlook keeps popping up reminders and i am snoozing them... not that effective. despite the fact that i cleaned my desk last week it is starting to look like a pit again.
blah.
tonight my study group is getting together to celebrate me passing my exams! hooray! i hope i can get myself together enough to get out of here, and to enjoy it!

umm...

when did it get to be october? i am panicking here. another late wednesday at work... i wish i was "making it work" instead!