D-day

Due date: March 12th. 15 days and counting.

With 14 response papers, 1 term paper, an annotated bibliography, a portfolio, and 50 sentences left to diagram, I am busy doing what any sensible person in my situation would be doing...namely, making lists of things I would rather be doing. I've never been one to make New Years resolutions, but I lately I've unconsciously been making "end of quarter" resolutions, and the list of things I've resolved to do after this quarter ends has gotten so big I think it might help to write it down.

Things I would be doing if I weren't in the process of committing suicide by academics, and things I am resolved to do after I am finished committing suicide by academics:
1. Read a novel. For fun.
2. Subscribe to a photo-assignment group on Flickr and maybe sync the escapade with my blog.
3. Write a short story. Or, better yet, write and actually finish a short story.
4. Visit the Grand Canyon (it's been years since I've been there and it's more than time to visit it again)
5. Drive to Moro bay. With my bike.
6. Visit Cal Poly San Louis Obispo. Probably while doing the above.
7. Camp on the beach. See the two above.
8. Make a frisbee golf course at Lane Park and not get arrested for it.
9. Become more artistic.
10. Visit the Huntington.
11. Go skiing again
12. Clean my apartment. (...yeah)
13. Swing dance...alot.
14. Win the lotto.......................
15. Finish filling out my grad-school apps.
16. Finish filling out my passport app.

There are more that will come to me as soon as my head hits the pillow...or as soon as I resolve to write those response papers.

Nocturnal Oblique

10pm, I'm at Denny's again. Breakfast for dinner. There has to be a better place to study. I can't wait to move someplace that has a little more respect for itself - I hate it when I sound young and naive. I know there is more to life than pie at 1am and pretty waitresses, but is it too much to ask for some place that can accommodate me some of the time? I've got to quit reading stream-of-consciousness novels.

Two eggs, bacon, hashbrowns and toast - $7.99. I could get the same at Alice's for $3.50, and it would taste better too, but they aren't open this late, and if they were I doubt they'd be serving breakfast.

Sometimes you get tired of being alone in the same apartment, listening to the same music and staring at the same walls, and you just have to get out. You pick a secluded booth in the back- or the region of the restaurant farthest from where you came in. You haven't been there five minutes before a young couple lurches in, clinging to each other like Siamese twins. They too seek out the alleged "back" of the restaurant, and as luck would have it, they take the booth in front of you. At first glance you might think they're just out for a casual date, but the girl plops down on the guy's lap and they begin to put on a display that could make any trollop blush. In fact, you're not entirely convinced that they aren't in the midst of some nefarious act of harlotry, and that money won't be changing hands afterwards. Apparently a booth at Denny's is cheaper than a hotel room. On the wall to the right is a black and white photo of a navy sailor kissing a girl. For some reason the photo seems romantic, while what is taking place in front of you is nauseating. As you attempt to focus on the books in front of you, two very portly fellows also find their way to the back. They take the booth behind you. They sit down heavily with a disturbance that is undoubtedly recorded by seismometers across the county. For some reason just sitting down isn't good enough for the guy on the opposite side of your bench and he seems to sit down several times and even then he can't sit still. The other one decides that now is the most opportune time to phone his deaf mother and very noisily discuss his various gastro-intestinal conditions. Between the constant, wave-like motion of the bench beneath you, -instigated by the avoirdupois beta noire behind you- and the frivolous fornication unfolding in front of you, you're not able to get much done.You watch the rain out the window. Your stomach churns to the tune of "Your Body is a Wonderland" by John Meyer and you look to the sailor and his girl for sympathy, but you don't really get any. Maybe you were better off at home, but after all, you're diagramming sentences, so what difference does it really make?

Snow Day

DSC_2555
Originally uploaded by empyrean_squire

Last Thursday ten of us went up to Mountain High to go skiing. The trip had been planned for two weeks and we weren't going to be stopped by the stormy conditions we woke to. The snow levels had dropped to about 3,000ft the night before, and the white frosting nearly touched the valley floor. I checked the snow conditions online, and the resort's website reported that they'd received 18 inches of fresh powder the night before and were expecting another ten inches to fall during the day. Perfect. I arrived at the D's around 8am, and after testing out a pair of snow chains we loaded the fifteen passenger van and headed up the mountain. The drive up was absolutely amazing. The snow lay lightly in the branches of trees and delicately covered the other desert plants. The way the sun hit the embalmed plants made it seem like they were covered in tiny pieces of glass. About halfway up we had to stop and put the chains on the van, and before we reached the top the sky had clouded over and more snow was coming down in big thick flakes. The wind on top of the mountain was blowing about thirty miles per hour, making the 28 degree temperature feel more like 5. We were all dressed for it though. The wind whipped over the summit and carried the powder snow with it in thick clouds. In the mid afternoon Mario and I took the tram over to the East resort and found it all but abandoned. There were only half a dozen other skiers up there, which meant we had the 1.3 mile run all to ourselves. It was quite an experience, as the wind was blowing even harder up there, and sometimes the powder clouds would completely envelope everything, reducing visibility to about 5 feet. It also made it impossible to tell how fast I was going. There were a few times I was blasting along at almost the same speed as the flying snow, and watching the eddies swirl in slow motion around my feet like an affectionate house cat. All of a sudden a pinecone would appear on the ground some feet in front of me, and just as quickly it would be lost in the mist behind like it had been fired from a catapult. The brief reference point would give me an idea of how fast I was actually going. Fortunately no one got hurt. I was sitting at the lodge later that afternoon watching a tractor clear the snow away from the picnic area. Mario had gone inside to get a drink, and as I waited for him to come back out the deep resonating sound of the tractor suddenly made me think of the Discovery channel programs I'd watched on avalanches. I remembered the big avalanche that happened above Devil's Punchbowl a few years ago. I hiked up there with Jed and Levi a couple of weeks afterward, and we were all amazed at the field of rubble that lay all around us. Big chunks of snow and ice interspersed with tree branches and logs over forty feet deep and more than a half mile long. The whole mess was permeated with sawdust. A reminder of the trees that had been ground to pulp beneath the weight of it all. I reassured myself that if there ever had been avalanches at the resort I would have heard about it. It wasn't worth worrying about. The rest of the day was wonderful. The next day on the news they reported that there had been two avalanches up there and three people had been killed.

A New Year

I’m discovering just how much can be fit into a week. I’ll just hope this last week doesn’t characterize the year to come. School started again on the 2nd, and I’m already bogged down by upcoming due dates. Modern British Lit is going to kill me. Not only do I have more assigned reading than I’ve ever had in any one class, but it’s authors like Joyce and Woolf. 20 units this quarter, then burn-out.

Does the sentence “I ran a marathon” contain a transitive verb or is it prepositional? The proposition is implied. Where did you run? I ran in a marathon. Apparently “marathon” can be used to describe a distance as well. What did you run? I ran a marathon. Context. Stupid descriptive grammar.

Work has been slow, which is nice. The manager is out of town and there hasn’t really been anything to do anyway. We tested out the new projector system and laptop by watching I’m Reed Fish in its entirety. It seems to be working well, but I think we should watch a few more movies on it just to be sure. Meanwhile I’ve been spending most of my time in the back playing Jin and reading Crome Yellow. It’s difficult getting back into the 9-5 groove after the holidays.

I filed my grad app yesterday. I can’t believe I’ll actually be finished in June. It’s been too many years coming. Everything is lined up…well, except for grad school. It’s a little late in the year to be filling out grad school apps, but I think I’m going to try anyway. For the past month or so I’ve been thinking about what to do next- grad school aboard, grad school out of state, grad school at home- or no grad school at all. I’m entering another of those “major transitional periods.” Ironically, we’re reading The Road Not Taken in Modern American Lit this week.

A couple of days ago I built a lightbox for doing still life photography. Now I just need to find something to photograph other than Campbell’s soup cans.

Thanks to Kritter, Colby, the Jimminks and the Pedersons I’m steadily becoming not only more interested, but noticeably better at both Volleyball and Ping Pong- both games I’ve always been terrible at, and consequently, uninterested in playing.

Last night I received an anonymous comment on one of my entries, and so I logged into sitemeter to see who it might possibly have been. I was surprised to see that I’d already received nearly 50 hits that day. (I usually average around 2 or 3 per day) Looking at the referrals page it appears that almost every single viewer had been googleing the lyrics to Broken by Lifehouse and google had been sending them to the Broken Clock entry on my blog. It’s really nice to suddenly get so much traffic. It would be even nicer if more people stuck around and read some of the other entries. Thank you to those of you who do.

Let’s see, what else? Oh, a new word worth mentioning:

Widdershins – I believe is Scottish Gaelic for counterclockwise.

That’s all for now.

Home For Christmas

I woke up early on Saturday morning, threw a change of clothes and my toothbrush in a bag, and started the trek across the desert to my Mom's. It's a four hour drive across some of the most beautiful desert in the world. Much of the way follows old route 66 through abandoned towns, and valleys of cactus and creosote that fall away as far as the eye can see. I've made this same journey maybe thirty five times over the past seven years. This time would be the last. I'll most likely drive up I-40 again, but I'll never have the same destination in mind. I'll never pull up in the same driveway again, expecting to be greeted by same smiling faces. I'll never again sit on that porch in the evening, talking with my family over dinner while the sun sets behind us.

I arrived around noon and helped them pack the garage. All of the remnants of memories and dreams that made my family who they were and are. The half-empty scuba tanks, the old red flag my Dad had made for paintballing, the hammers and saws that had built many a backyard project and assisted in countless home improvements, the ski-rope that towed my brothers and I behind the boat on our river adventures. So many little odds and ends that spoke of daring summers long past. They tug to the surface memories that would otherwise be forgotten. All of these things covered in dust, undisturbed for the past two years.

I never lived there, but it has still come to feel like home. It even carries those familiar scents which I associate with my childhood. So much has happened over the past seven or so years since my family left California, and today my Mom and my youngest brother left Arizona for good. They've left that house where we spent Christmases and Thanksgivings together, where my father died and my brothers became men.

Finished

Snow Trip
Originally uploaded by empyrean_squire

With finals bearing down on me, and projects due which had been put off until the last possible minute, every other leisure activity, including blogging, faded into the background. Actually, they didn't really fade into the background. Instead, as I attempted to banish them from my mind and focus the whole of my attention on my studies, the things that were not my studies became much more pronounced. I was actually kind of worried that the sheer amount of writing I had to do for my classes would so tax the wellspring of my mind that I'd never feel like blogging again. But here I am, as of last night I'm officially 24 credits closer to my BA. It's really nice to have this little bit of respite to catch my breath.

Some of the highlights of this last week have included:

Reading - It's been along time, maybe a year or more, since I've really gotten into a good book. It's easy to find things to read that are interesting, or informative, but once in along while a book comes along that is utterly captivating. I've had to read so much for my classes, and while it's usually good material that I enjoy reading, most of it isn't exactly enamoring. A friend of mine (Natalie) gave me The Princess Bride for my brithday last week (after a year of pestering me to read it) and the day before yesterday I pulled it off the shelf and started in. I'm already half-way through it. I can hardly put it down. I even took it to work with me today so that I could get a few pages read while driving between pool inspections. (I want to clarify that Tony was the one doing the actual driving, just in case anyone had developed mental images of me reading behind the wheel. I've tried it before and it's just a bit beyond my multitasking ability) It's nice to be able to read something so enjoyable without deadlines, or expectations, or the need to analyze and develop an opinion worthy of a college paper.

Hiking - A bunch of my friends and I decided to hike Mt Baden Powell last weekend. We'd planned the whole thing out, and on Friday a cold front moved in, complete with rain, wind and ice. On Saturday morning when I woke up I checked the weather report for Wrightwood, and the forecasted high for the day was 36 degrees with the windchill dropping it another 10 or so. We went anyway. When we got there, we discovered that it had snowed the night before, and the icy wind coming off the snow had an edge on it that would cut through the heaviest jacket. Instead of heading for the summit we decided to take the more sheltered trail around the mountain to Big Horn Mine, where I took the above picture. (I'll admit that this whole section is just an excuse to show off this picture which I've very proud of)

New Filter - I got a polarized filter for my camera on Tuesday. It's interesting how some cheap little accessory can completely revitalize one's enthusiasm. I haven't had a chance to use it yet, but coupled with the photography guidebook that Stephen gave me for my Birthday it should prompt several exciting adventures in the very near future. I was riding my bike up on the aqueduct on Tuesday, shortly after purchasing the new filter, and as I rode along, feeling quite pleased with myself, I started to think of all the wonderful (and not so wonderful) pictures I would now be able to take. (as if simply owning a polarizing filter would greatly improve my standing as an amature photographer) Suddenly I was jerked from my daydreaming by the silhouette of a man about a half mile down the road. He was standing perfectly still, and had this strange protrusion coming from his face. He stood there, very straight and concentrated on whatever it was he was looking at. As I got closer I realized that the protrusion was actually a camera. He was taking pictures of the ducks and other aquatic fowl that were paddling around in the aqueduct. He was in his late 60s, a little stooped, and wearing a khaki safari outfit. His camera was a Nikon D80, and he was sporting this beast of a telephoto lens that could easily have been confused for a rocket propelled grenade launcher. (It probably cost more than my truck) I greeted him and commented on his camera. He responded in broken English laced with a bit of German. He was very friendly, and even let me snap a couple photos with his lens. Needless to say the excitement I had been feeling earlier disappeared entirely.

The Best of Europe

The Best of Europe

I'm sitting here in my apartment again. I have at least a dozen assignments due in the next two weeks, and my list of legitimate excuses to put off my assignments is growing thin. Out of desperation I've decided it's time to blog again.

Autumn is always a very emotional time for me. I don't normally consider myself a very emotional person, and so I blame the diminishing daylight (isn't ultra-violet light somehow connected with the production of serotonin?), the departure of summer, and the annual death and dormancy of everything green. Add to all of that the stress of a full time job and a double load of classes, and well, it's enough to make one either completely succumb to madness, or worse yet, wax poetic. (utilizing very poor poetical abilities at that) I've never dealt with stress very well, in fact, I don't usually deal with it at all. I just ignore it and hope it goes away. My efforts to avoid my assignments over the past two weeks have included but not been limited to: Bike riding, Swing Dancing, watching really crummy movies at the dollar theater, watching really crummy movies at the more expensive theaters, vandalism of city property (don't ask), mountain climbing, and shopping-cart racing.

The weather this week has been divine. November has always been one of the best months weather-wise. This year has been slightly warmer than normal, with temperatures ranging from 75-80 to 45-50 at night. The wind has calmed for the year, and the sky is ever the deepest colors of blue, offsetting the tawny desert colors and the brighter, more traditional autumn tones. Walking outside in the late afternoon the air is so still, almost as if the whole world is holding its breath. It's the interim between summer and winter, and like that moment of hesitation one experiences before leaping into a pool, nothing is happening. It's the quiet between happenings. I rode my bike down the street past the empty baseball diamond, past the vacant YMCA, and turned the corner and passed the lonely elementary school. Ultimately I had no destination in mind. I was just riding to get out and away and hopefully clear my head. I was also hungry. As I rode I casually watched the criss-cross pattern of cracks in the sidewalk as they went zooming under my bike's tires, and listened to the arhythmic sound of leaves crackling like cellophane as I sailed over them.

I was getting really hungry, and when I'm hungry it's difficult to think of anything else. I remembered that a friend of mine had told me about some deli near the laundromat, and claimed they had some of the best sandwiches she'd ever had. Being the fan of sandwiches that I am I figured I should give this place a try. I rode over there and was very surprised to find the place tucked away in a little shopping center between two stores I frequent quite often (is that a redundant statement? It sounds good at least). Sometimes it's amazing what you can overlook. The sign over the door read "The Best of Europe," and above that was a bright colored banner which announced to passers-by that they now proudly feature Boar's Head. On the other side of the door was a tiny little shop with all sorts of interesting food items packed on the narrow shelves which lined the wall to the right. There were cans of pickled herring, exotic candies, and colorful drinks. They also had a variety of German and Belgian chocolates. (Now I won't have to bug my German friend to send chocolate through the mail) After looking briefly at the selections on the shelves I turned around and asked the girl behind the counter about their sandwiches. "You'll never eat at Subway again" she said. As she made my sandwich I marveled at how I'd managed to remain ignorant of this store's existence until now. "How long has this place been here?" I asked, thinking perhaps it had only recently opened, and that maybe then my ignorance could be justified. "Oh, seven years or so" she said. Apparently there are still doors opening to magical worlds overlooked by most. A sandwich shop may not be all that exciting, but it sure is a good temporary escape from coursework.