Saturday, September 27, 2003
Can any of you guys speak Hindi? Arabic? Tagalog?
I need help. No one in the lab can speak English besides me.
I spend all night on the phone because no one can understand what anyone else is saying. And EVERYBODY is pissed off about it. If something isn't done about it soon there could be bloodshed.
The doctors have ordered pizza- but got falafels and curry instead, and they're having a conniption because we got the order wrong. So of course, I have to get on the phone and calm everbody down.
Nobody understands what they're supposed to be doing because, of course, the Indian and Syrian techs were trained by...the PHILIPINO GUY!! ...IN ENGLISH! (Picture alot of pointing and smiling and nodding.)
I need a nice, relaxed job like UN interpreter. Or bomb squad. Or hostage negotiator. I HAVE the experience!
On the bright side, a couple months ago they hired us a new supervisor. Perfect! An American guy. Allegedly, with a masters degree. Now I dont have to do it anymore. The extra $.80 an hour wasnt worth the aggravation anyway. And he speaks English! I was thrilled.
No such luck.. My hopes have been dashed to shit. The man is STONE DEAF! I'm talkin' hearing aids...both ears. So, not only can he NOT understand the members of the U.N. that we work with; He cant understand ME! (Or, he's just ignoring me.) And he doesn't answer the phone either, because he cant HEAR it even though it sounds like the escape alarm bell in a maximum security psychiatric ward...It does!
(Sadly, he's also a microcephalic idiot with a personality disorder, but we won't go into that now.)
So now, my normal speaking voice has become VE-RY-LOUD-AND-VE-RY-SLOW-AND VE-RY RE-PET-A-TIVE!!.. REPETATIVE DAMMIT!!!! HAVE YOU EVER HAD TO TALK REALLY LOUD FOR HOURS ON END??!! It takes a while to stop. You become extremely tense. My family thinks I'm mad at them all the time. Where can I buy a bullhorn?
So, at the next staff meeting, with my shiny new bullhorn, I'm going to insist that all current and future employees be trained in Esperanto Sign Language.
Maintenance is to install a red flashing ambulance light on the ceiling to indicate that the phone is ringing.
The phones will be replaced by TTDY lines that interpret Esperanto.
All lab orders must be submitted typed, double spaced, with explanatory diagrams and international symbols and faxed to the lab (the BLUE flashing light on the ceiling will indicate an incoming fax). THAT SHOULD COVER IT, DONT YOU THINK?! ......I SAID COV-ER IT!!!!
Namaste,
Chlora ben Formaldehydeous y Catastrophobia
I need help. No one in the lab can speak English besides me.
I spend all night on the phone because no one can understand what anyone else is saying. And EVERYBODY is pissed off about it. If something isn't done about it soon there could be bloodshed.
The doctors have ordered pizza- but got falafels and curry instead, and they're having a conniption because we got the order wrong. So of course, I have to get on the phone and calm everbody down.
Nobody understands what they're supposed to be doing because, of course, the Indian and Syrian techs were trained by...the PHILIPINO GUY!! ...IN ENGLISH! (Picture alot of pointing and smiling and nodding.)
I need a nice, relaxed job like UN interpreter. Or bomb squad. Or hostage negotiator. I HAVE the experience!
On the bright side, a couple months ago they hired us a new supervisor. Perfect! An American guy. Allegedly, with a masters degree. Now I dont have to do it anymore. The extra $.80 an hour wasnt worth the aggravation anyway. And he speaks English! I was thrilled.
No such luck.. My hopes have been dashed to shit. The man is STONE DEAF! I'm talkin' hearing aids...both ears. So, not only can he NOT understand the members of the U.N. that we work with; He cant understand ME! (Or, he's just ignoring me.) And he doesn't answer the phone either, because he cant HEAR it even though it sounds like the escape alarm bell in a maximum security psychiatric ward...It does!
(Sadly, he's also a microcephalic idiot with a personality disorder, but we won't go into that now.)
So now, my normal speaking voice has become VE-RY-LOUD-AND-VE-RY-SLOW-AND VE-RY RE-PET-A-TIVE!!.. REPETATIVE DAMMIT!!!! HAVE YOU EVER HAD TO TALK REALLY LOUD FOR HOURS ON END??!! It takes a while to stop. You become extremely tense. My family thinks I'm mad at them all the time. Where can I buy a bullhorn?
So, at the next staff meeting, with my shiny new bullhorn, I'm going to insist that all current and future employees be trained in Esperanto Sign Language.
Maintenance is to install a red flashing ambulance light on the ceiling to indicate that the phone is ringing.
The phones will be replaced by TTDY lines that interpret Esperanto.
All lab orders must be submitted typed, double spaced, with explanatory diagrams and international symbols and faxed to the lab (the BLUE flashing light on the ceiling will indicate an incoming fax). THAT SHOULD COVER IT, DONT YOU THINK?! ......I SAID COV-ER IT!!!!
Namaste,
Chlora ben Formaldehydeous y Catastrophobia
Friday, September 26, 2003
MWHAHAHAHA!!! got comment?
The promised help from a certain individual (I wont say whom, but he claims to be "easy" ) was taking too long to arrive so I had to figure it out with my own little brain. How do ya like me now?!! Hey, In the sage wisdom of Ricky Nelson "You cant please everyone. So you gotta please yourself."
I'm so pleased with myself, I can't stand me.
The promised help from a certain individual (I wont say whom, but he claims to be "easy" ) was taking too long to arrive so I had to figure it out with my own little brain. How do ya like me now?!! Hey, In the sage wisdom of Ricky Nelson "You cant please everyone. So you gotta please yourself."
I'm so pleased with myself, I can't stand me.
Thursday, September 25, 2003
The Dalai Lama, Tom Waits, Gambian griots, Shankar sitar, 10 foot Tibetan horns and Tantric choir jam session.
I didn't dream this.. My dreams aren't THIS cool!
I have a picture from a performance I went to last year of Tibetan monks. If I can find it I'll post it at Sleepy Kitty.
Star Starts a Show; Tom Waits Ends It
by JON PARELES
New York Times Music Review
The star isn't usually the opening act at a concert, but things work differently with the Dalai Lama, who begins his daily spiritual practices at 3:30 a.m. Since he had to be in bed early, he spoke at the beginning of the concert on Sunday night at Avery Fisher Hall to benefit Healing the Divide, an American organization that tries to use technology to preserve and provide access to ancient cultures like that of Tibet.
The Dalai Lama warned that technology alone could "give us false hope that every problem can be solved by technology," and he urged a fusion of cultures. "Western science and ancient philosophy meet where mind and matter meet," he said.
Tom Waits, who closed the show in his usual guise as a lowlife sage, wisecracked: "So his holiness goes to bed at 7:30? That's not the holiness I used to know."
Mr. Waits was the welcome, indecorous oddball in what had been a concert of richly meditative music. Playing to a hall with many Buddhists, Mr. Waits started his miniset singing about Jesus and Satan. "Gotta help me keep the Devil way down in the hole," he sang in his slurred growl.
Earlier in the day the Dalai Lama spoke to 65,000 people in Central Park as part of a 20-day national tour. At Lincoln Center he was introduced by Philip Glass and Richard Gere.
In a concert filled with genre-straddling collaborations, Mr. Waits was accompanied by the Kronos String Quartet and Greg Cohen on bass. The quartet arrangements worked ingenious variations on Mr. Waits's waltzes and hymnlike tunes, skewing the oom-pah-pah to various places around the beat and applying dissonances that brought out Mr. Waits's Kurt Weill connections.
The quartet was most effective in "What's He Building?," a paranoid recitation that the quartet accompanied with eerie atonal creaks and scrapes. Mr. Waits's set moved through songs about death, greed, loss, love and finally faith and hope. "Always keep a diamond in your mind," he sang.
Kronos also played a piece by and with the Nubian musician Hamza el-Din, playing tar (hand drum). With sliding, unharmonized melodies over pizzicato vamps, it transformed the quartet into a miniature Arabic string orchestra.
Two musicians who play wooden flutes — the Tibetan composer Nawang Khechog and the Navajo-Ute composer R. Carlos Nakai — collaborated on a luminously introspective duet. Mr. Khechog opened the piece with the deep tones of a long Tibetan horn below Mr. Nakai's hovering flute phrases, and he recited the bodhisattva vow to work for the enlightenment of all sentient beings.
Later he used his wooden flute to waft high, ethereal overtones and to trade serene, overlapping phrases with Mr. Nakai as the two musicians found modes shared by Asian and American music.
Mr. Glass and the Gambian griot Foday Musa Suso played a preview of their most recent collaboration. A basic, almost waltzing ostinato (played by Michael Riesman on keyboard) supported plaintive melodies from Jon Gibson on soprano saxophone, quick arpeggios from Mr. Glass on piano and, best of all, the flickering, glittering syncopations from Mr. Suso's kora (21-stringed harp).
The back of Mr. Suso's kora, the traditional instrument of African griots, was emblazoned with the address of his Web site, www.fmsuso .com.
Anoushka Shankar performed the premiere of "The Offering," a piece by her father, Ravi Shankar, based on a raga originally used for prayers.
It was a short performance by Indian classical standards, only about 10 minutes, which gave Ms. Shankar (with Tanmoy Bose on tabla) time to outline its major mode and melodies and offer some hints about where improvisations on them might lead.
The night's music began with the Gyuto Tantric Choir, 10 monks who chanted with the subterranean bass tones and simultaneous ethereal overtones of Buddhist sacred tradition. Technology had come to them, too; like Madonna or Britney Spears, they wore wireless headset microphones.
I didn't dream this.. My dreams aren't THIS cool!
I have a picture from a performance I went to last year of Tibetan monks. If I can find it I'll post it at Sleepy Kitty.
Star Starts a Show; Tom Waits Ends It
by JON PARELES
New York Times Music Review
The star isn't usually the opening act at a concert, but things work differently with the Dalai Lama, who begins his daily spiritual practices at 3:30 a.m. Since he had to be in bed early, he spoke at the beginning of the concert on Sunday night at Avery Fisher Hall to benefit Healing the Divide, an American organization that tries to use technology to preserve and provide access to ancient cultures like that of Tibet.
The Dalai Lama warned that technology alone could "give us false hope that every problem can be solved by technology," and he urged a fusion of cultures. "Western science and ancient philosophy meet where mind and matter meet," he said.
Tom Waits, who closed the show in his usual guise as a lowlife sage, wisecracked: "So his holiness goes to bed at 7:30? That's not the holiness I used to know."
Mr. Waits was the welcome, indecorous oddball in what had been a concert of richly meditative music. Playing to a hall with many Buddhists, Mr. Waits started his miniset singing about Jesus and Satan. "Gotta help me keep the Devil way down in the hole," he sang in his slurred growl.
Earlier in the day the Dalai Lama spoke to 65,000 people in Central Park as part of a 20-day national tour. At Lincoln Center he was introduced by Philip Glass and Richard Gere.
In a concert filled with genre-straddling collaborations, Mr. Waits was accompanied by the Kronos String Quartet and Greg Cohen on bass. The quartet arrangements worked ingenious variations on Mr. Waits's waltzes and hymnlike tunes, skewing the oom-pah-pah to various places around the beat and applying dissonances that brought out Mr. Waits's Kurt Weill connections.
The quartet was most effective in "What's He Building?," a paranoid recitation that the quartet accompanied with eerie atonal creaks and scrapes. Mr. Waits's set moved through songs about death, greed, loss, love and finally faith and hope. "Always keep a diamond in your mind," he sang.
Kronos also played a piece by and with the Nubian musician Hamza el-Din, playing tar (hand drum). With sliding, unharmonized melodies over pizzicato vamps, it transformed the quartet into a miniature Arabic string orchestra.
Two musicians who play wooden flutes — the Tibetan composer Nawang Khechog and the Navajo-Ute composer R. Carlos Nakai — collaborated on a luminously introspective duet. Mr. Khechog opened the piece with the deep tones of a long Tibetan horn below Mr. Nakai's hovering flute phrases, and he recited the bodhisattva vow to work for the enlightenment of all sentient beings.
Later he used his wooden flute to waft high, ethereal overtones and to trade serene, overlapping phrases with Mr. Nakai as the two musicians found modes shared by Asian and American music.
Mr. Glass and the Gambian griot Foday Musa Suso played a preview of their most recent collaboration. A basic, almost waltzing ostinato (played by Michael Riesman on keyboard) supported plaintive melodies from Jon Gibson on soprano saxophone, quick arpeggios from Mr. Glass on piano and, best of all, the flickering, glittering syncopations from Mr. Suso's kora (21-stringed harp).
The back of Mr. Suso's kora, the traditional instrument of African griots, was emblazoned with the address of his Web site, www.fmsuso .com.
Anoushka Shankar performed the premiere of "The Offering," a piece by her father, Ravi Shankar, based on a raga originally used for prayers.
It was a short performance by Indian classical standards, only about 10 minutes, which gave Ms. Shankar (with Tanmoy Bose on tabla) time to outline its major mode and melodies and offer some hints about where improvisations on them might lead.
The night's music began with the Gyuto Tantric Choir, 10 monks who chanted with the subterranean bass tones and simultaneous ethereal overtones of Buddhist sacred tradition. Technology had come to them, too; like Madonna or Britney Spears, they wore wireless headset microphones.
Im back.
Camp's all closed up for winter. I'm almost too bummed to blog. But I took notes for 6 days so I gotta write something.
Day 1: The big ride. Six hours on the road. (Chlora's helpful long ride hint: 3 Advils will shut down your kidneys comfortably for 6 hours... Even after 2 cups of coffee.) Brother Jim is shotgun, working imaginary brake and gas pedals the whole way. He's not a happy passenger. (He says it's a control issue.) But doesn't want to drive either.
Rt 128 around Boston sucks as always, but after that it's a good, but long, drive thru NH and Maine.
About 10 miles from camp stopped for a moose on the shoulder of the road eyeing a horse across the street with carnal intent. (It's that time of year.) Really cool, it was no more than 10 ft from the car. Been going up there all my life, my first actual moose sighting.
Got to camp about 7pm. Brother Ed and his 4 year old Rachael pulled in not 5 minutes after us. Went down to the shore to check out the stars and have a drink. Talked til 9:30 went to bed early.
Day 2: Dave the Tree Guy. Dave shows up at 7:30 with his "crew" (One skinny kid named Jeremy), a dump truck, chainsaws and other curious implements of destruction. And the BIGGEST GODDAMN CHIPPER IV'E EVER SEEN! Dave told us right off the bat we couldnt touch it. Takes 12" logs. I go over again with Dave which 4 dead trees are the priority. I explain again I need them gone because of a stubborn carpenter ant problem. Dave keeps cutting down different trees anyway, keeps telling me they're dead and gonna fall on my camp. I keep telling him I dont care. I'm insured for falling trees. I'm only paying him for ONE DAY. I need THESE trees down and gone. And if he keeps cutting down every dead tree he sees, he's gonna cut his way to the other end of the lake.
Suddenly, music from the pond. Kathy and Glen have paddled over with the guitar and sing from the canoe something like "Good morning, youre drowsy. You sure do look lousy! Good morning to you!" They had a quick cup of coffee and left after harassing us a bit. They're so funny.
Well.. I got 3 of the 4 trees I hired him for down anyway. If not for me and Jim and Ed thay'd still be laying there on the ground, too. Dave WAS impressive though, scampering up those trees with chainsaws hanging from his belt, cutting them down from the top.
I worked so hard! I figured if the guys saw an old woman like me humping 6 foot logs up the hill on my shoulders THEY couldn't slow down out of sheer masculine pride. It worked! I turned on my old Zen mind tricks and went into The Zone. At one point Eddie ran over and told me the logs I was carrying were too big for me. I explained it was just a matter of balance. (If I could get my shoulder under it, I could carry it.)
Ed just kinda smiles and tells me the story of the old bull and the young bull. The young bull says to the old bull, "Hey! Why dont we run down the hill and fuck a cow?" The old bull says, "Son, why don't we WALK down the hill and fuck ALL the cows?" So for the rest of the day whenever a log was too big for me to handle I'd yell over to Ed, "Hey Ed! I cant fuck this cow!" And he'd come a-runnin' with the chainsaw!
Anyway, once they were gone I got to survey the damage... to MYSELF. My right arm is a mass of the loveliest colored bruises from neck to wrist and minor scrapes. Just a little stiff the next day. I was surprised. I was sure I wouldn't be able to walk. But the SAWDUST! I breathed sawdust. I ate sawdust. I had sawdust in my ears. I will be picking sawdust out of my hair for weeks. And my bra held enough sawdust to manufacture several large sheets of particle-board.
Dave wanted to fire Jeremy and hire me.
Made dinner, cleaned up and went to bed. I dont get it. Up at 7am, worked like a draft horse all day. It's 2am I still cant sleep. Started pouring at around 1am. I guess we dodged Isabel. It sounds fantastic though, and the breeze from the window over my bed smells like wet pine needles... heavenly.
Day 3: Slept late. Jim took the canoe. Ed and Rachael had left early to go "geocaching" (his latest obsession with the GPS). Overcast but not raining yet. Lit a fire to keep the damp out. Spent most of the day by myself on the porch rockin' and readin', listening to music, and my FAVORITE camp activity... staring into space. Can never get enough "space time". Ed came back in the afternoon and split alot of wood. After dinner we all spent a quiet night reading. We put in "Wizard of Oz" for Rachael.
Began to pour again around 11:30pm. Funny, I noticed when I was here in July and Aug it rains mostly at night. Like a rain forest. And, also like a rain forest, you stay mostly dry running to the privy because of the tree canopy. After it STOPS raining is when you get wet. The fat drops work their way down through the trees and splat down your neck. But that glorious pine and cedar smell!
Day 4: Probably about the same as day 3. I didnt write anything down because I thought I'd remember.
I dont. (Musta drank?) I think that's when we took pictures. Ed's gonna send them to me. When I get them I'll post them at The Litterbox.
Day 5: Eddie and Rachael left this morning, boo hoo. I love my time with them. Eds truck kept getting stuck trying to back up the hill. Dug big holes in the driveway. We'll have to fix them before we can use it again.
Heard alot of splashing down down at the lake. Sounds like dolphins. Went down with my coffee. Huge school of bass feeding make all the splashing. Sat there for a while. Fresh moose tracks all over the beach.
It's closing day.. sniff. Lot's of cleaning and sweeping. Cover the beds. Clean out the fridge. Pull the pump out of the spring and drain the pipes. But this year is better than usual. Jim and I are gonna close camp and stay at "Grammies Camp" with Kathy and Glen tonight instead of doing all that work then taking the long ride home.
Finally finished and made it over there around 6pm. Kathy made us an awesome dinner of ribs and chicken from our freezer and baked potatoes. I made up Glens plate so it looked like a naked woman. (A couple olives and viola... tater tits!) Sat around the table drinking and playing guitars and singing. Glen maked up hysterical songs off the top of his head. Jimmy went skinny-dipping... brrr. Played Scrabble till 3am. I kicked butt! (It helped that Glen intentionally played 2 letter words so his score would end up 69.)
Day 6: Last day. Sitting on the dock with my coffee, like so many mornings for so many years here. It's overcast and windy but I love it anyway. If it was raining I'd sit in the Cedar Building (the cedar log gazebo on the big boulder on the shore, my grandmother built herself when my father was a kid). Nothing beats mornings at camp... nothing.
My grandparents built this camp with a couple friends from wood they milled themselves from blowndown trees from the Hurricane of '38. They trucked it up here and carried it through the woods (The road wasn't built until the 60's) and put it together. It's one large room with a smaller back bedroom that was added later for my great-grandmother. My grandparents had 6 kids, where they put them all I cant imagine. There are five kids in MY family. They put all of US somewhere, every summer when I was little. They have the same mission furniture and beds now that have always been there.
I remember the dark, so dark you couldnt see your hand in front of your face, literally. I remember the cold, wet, trips to the privy 50 feet from the camp in my pajamas with a flashlight . (They've strung lights now.) And every day, into the lake with the Ivory soap whether you wanted to or not. There's an outdoor shower now with hot water that they put up a few years ago when Grammy got too fragile to go down to the pond at 6am, like she used to, with her "bathing suit" (the little rubber band she tied her hair back with). Until a then we still washed the dishes with water heated in a kettle on the stove.
Now I've built another camp a little way up the shore. The privy is only 10 feet from the camp and there's a shower with hot water, but it's outside too. I have a big round table with lots of chairs. It has 2 big lofts connected with a catwalk and lots of beds, but no walls. And all the furniture and appliances are set up the same as Grammies camp. My brother asked me why I did it that way. Until he asked me I honestly hadn't noticed the similarity. But now that I do, what other way COULD I have done it?
Camp's all closed up for winter. I'm almost too bummed to blog. But I took notes for 6 days so I gotta write something.
Day 1: The big ride. Six hours on the road. (Chlora's helpful long ride hint: 3 Advils will shut down your kidneys comfortably for 6 hours... Even after 2 cups of coffee.) Brother Jim is shotgun, working imaginary brake and gas pedals the whole way. He's not a happy passenger. (He says it's a control issue.) But doesn't want to drive either.
Rt 128 around Boston sucks as always, but after that it's a good, but long, drive thru NH and Maine.
About 10 miles from camp stopped for a moose on the shoulder of the road eyeing a horse across the street with carnal intent. (It's that time of year.) Really cool, it was no more than 10 ft from the car. Been going up there all my life, my first actual moose sighting.
Got to camp about 7pm. Brother Ed and his 4 year old Rachael pulled in not 5 minutes after us. Went down to the shore to check out the stars and have a drink. Talked til 9:30 went to bed early.
Day 2: Dave the Tree Guy. Dave shows up at 7:30 with his "crew" (One skinny kid named Jeremy), a dump truck, chainsaws and other curious implements of destruction. And the BIGGEST GODDAMN CHIPPER IV'E EVER SEEN! Dave told us right off the bat we couldnt touch it. Takes 12" logs. I go over again with Dave which 4 dead trees are the priority. I explain again I need them gone because of a stubborn carpenter ant problem. Dave keeps cutting down different trees anyway, keeps telling me they're dead and gonna fall on my camp. I keep telling him I dont care. I'm insured for falling trees. I'm only paying him for ONE DAY. I need THESE trees down and gone. And if he keeps cutting down every dead tree he sees, he's gonna cut his way to the other end of the lake.
Suddenly, music from the pond. Kathy and Glen have paddled over with the guitar and sing from the canoe something like "Good morning, youre drowsy. You sure do look lousy! Good morning to you!" They had a quick cup of coffee and left after harassing us a bit. They're so funny.
Well.. I got 3 of the 4 trees I hired him for down anyway. If not for me and Jim and Ed thay'd still be laying there on the ground, too. Dave WAS impressive though, scampering up those trees with chainsaws hanging from his belt, cutting them down from the top.
I worked so hard! I figured if the guys saw an old woman like me humping 6 foot logs up the hill on my shoulders THEY couldn't slow down out of sheer masculine pride. It worked! I turned on my old Zen mind tricks and went into The Zone. At one point Eddie ran over and told me the logs I was carrying were too big for me. I explained it was just a matter of balance. (If I could get my shoulder under it, I could carry it.)
Ed just kinda smiles and tells me the story of the old bull and the young bull. The young bull says to the old bull, "Hey! Why dont we run down the hill and fuck a cow?" The old bull says, "Son, why don't we WALK down the hill and fuck ALL the cows?" So for the rest of the day whenever a log was too big for me to handle I'd yell over to Ed, "Hey Ed! I cant fuck this cow!" And he'd come a-runnin' with the chainsaw!
Anyway, once they were gone I got to survey the damage... to MYSELF. My right arm is a mass of the loveliest colored bruises from neck to wrist and minor scrapes. Just a little stiff the next day. I was surprised. I was sure I wouldn't be able to walk. But the SAWDUST! I breathed sawdust. I ate sawdust. I had sawdust in my ears. I will be picking sawdust out of my hair for weeks. And my bra held enough sawdust to manufacture several large sheets of particle-board.
Dave wanted to fire Jeremy and hire me.
Made dinner, cleaned up and went to bed. I dont get it. Up at 7am, worked like a draft horse all day. It's 2am I still cant sleep. Started pouring at around 1am. I guess we dodged Isabel. It sounds fantastic though, and the breeze from the window over my bed smells like wet pine needles... heavenly.
Day 3: Slept late. Jim took the canoe. Ed and Rachael had left early to go "geocaching" (his latest obsession with the GPS). Overcast but not raining yet. Lit a fire to keep the damp out. Spent most of the day by myself on the porch rockin' and readin', listening to music, and my FAVORITE camp activity... staring into space. Can never get enough "space time". Ed came back in the afternoon and split alot of wood. After dinner we all spent a quiet night reading. We put in "Wizard of Oz" for Rachael.
Began to pour again around 11:30pm. Funny, I noticed when I was here in July and Aug it rains mostly at night. Like a rain forest. And, also like a rain forest, you stay mostly dry running to the privy because of the tree canopy. After it STOPS raining is when you get wet. The fat drops work their way down through the trees and splat down your neck. But that glorious pine and cedar smell!
Day 4: Probably about the same as day 3. I didnt write anything down because I thought I'd remember.
I dont. (Musta drank?) I think that's when we took pictures. Ed's gonna send them to me. When I get them I'll post them at The Litterbox.
Day 5: Eddie and Rachael left this morning, boo hoo. I love my time with them. Eds truck kept getting stuck trying to back up the hill. Dug big holes in the driveway. We'll have to fix them before we can use it again.
Heard alot of splashing down down at the lake. Sounds like dolphins. Went down with my coffee. Huge school of bass feeding make all the splashing. Sat there for a while. Fresh moose tracks all over the beach.
It's closing day.. sniff. Lot's of cleaning and sweeping. Cover the beds. Clean out the fridge. Pull the pump out of the spring and drain the pipes. But this year is better than usual. Jim and I are gonna close camp and stay at "Grammies Camp" with Kathy and Glen tonight instead of doing all that work then taking the long ride home.
Finally finished and made it over there around 6pm. Kathy made us an awesome dinner of ribs and chicken from our freezer and baked potatoes. I made up Glens plate so it looked like a naked woman. (A couple olives and viola... tater tits!) Sat around the table drinking and playing guitars and singing. Glen maked up hysterical songs off the top of his head. Jimmy went skinny-dipping... brrr. Played Scrabble till 3am. I kicked butt! (It helped that Glen intentionally played 2 letter words so his score would end up 69.)
Day 6: Last day. Sitting on the dock with my coffee, like so many mornings for so many years here. It's overcast and windy but I love it anyway. If it was raining I'd sit in the Cedar Building (the cedar log gazebo on the big boulder on the shore, my grandmother built herself when my father was a kid). Nothing beats mornings at camp... nothing.
My grandparents built this camp with a couple friends from wood they milled themselves from blowndown trees from the Hurricane of '38. They trucked it up here and carried it through the woods (The road wasn't built until the 60's) and put it together. It's one large room with a smaller back bedroom that was added later for my great-grandmother. My grandparents had 6 kids, where they put them all I cant imagine. There are five kids in MY family. They put all of US somewhere, every summer when I was little. They have the same mission furniture and beds now that have always been there.
I remember the dark, so dark you couldnt see your hand in front of your face, literally. I remember the cold, wet, trips to the privy 50 feet from the camp in my pajamas with a flashlight . (They've strung lights now.) And every day, into the lake with the Ivory soap whether you wanted to or not. There's an outdoor shower now with hot water that they put up a few years ago when Grammy got too fragile to go down to the pond at 6am, like she used to, with her "bathing suit" (the little rubber band she tied her hair back with). Until a then we still washed the dishes with water heated in a kettle on the stove.
Now I've built another camp a little way up the shore. The privy is only 10 feet from the camp and there's a shower with hot water, but it's outside too. I have a big round table with lots of chairs. It has 2 big lofts connected with a catwalk and lots of beds, but no walls. And all the furniture and appliances are set up the same as Grammies camp. My brother asked me why I did it that way. Until he asked me I honestly hadn't noticed the similarity. But now that I do, what other way COULD I have done it?
