fauxklore | Entries tagged with life list

I think this will get me caught up on everything up until this month.

I’ve been using the same format for my year in review entries for several years now. It seems to work. Note that I took off the Volksmarch category this time since it’s been a couple of years since I managed to actually do anything there.

2023 started out stressful with mail being stolen, including a check which was washed and used fraudulently and a credit card which had to be replaced. It all got resolved, but I could have lived without the stress. There was a lot of stress later in the year, with the incompetence of the person at the local Social Security office who sat on my Medicare application for over two months without doing anything. That took way too many phone calls to get resolved. And, of course, there was the whole Middle East situation to make 2023 the Age of Anxiety.

Fortunately, things were otherwise good during the year.

Books: I read 53 books over the year. 39 of those were fiction, 3 were poetry, and the rest were nonfiction. Only 3 were rereads.

Favorites included Our Ancestors Did Not Breathe This Air (a poetry collection by Muslim women at MIT), Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozu Adichie, The Ghostwriter by Alessandra Torre, and The Caxton Private Lending Library and Book Depository by John Connolly. I also read 6 novels by Dick Francis, whose books provide a reliable antidote to ones in which not enough happens to keep me satisfied. Favorite non-fiction was The Best Strangers in the World by Ari Shapiro. Least favorite book was Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen.

I got rid of 39 books and have at least another 33 ready to go out.

In addition to my longstanding book club (called READ for Read, Enjoy, And Discuss), I joined another book club, Crones and Tomes, which was started by a friend from the puzzle world.

Other book events included the Moby Dick Marathon in New Bedford, Massachusetts, which was an amazing experience, and a talk by Ari Shapiro at Sixth and I.

Ghoul Pool: I finished 4th out of 14 players, with 220 points. People I scored on were Naomi Replanski, Steve Harrell, Bob Barker, Tony Bennett, Al Jaffee, John Goodenough, Robert Solow, Daniel Ellsberg, Sandra Day O’Connor, James L. Buckley, W. Nicholas Hitchon, and David Oreck.

Travel: In January, I went to New Bedford, Massachusetts for the Moby Dick Marathon. In February, I went to Tucson, which included going to Saguaro National Park and Biosphere 2, as well as winning some money at a casino. March included a trip to New York City to go to the symphony and the theatre and visit with a high school friend. April’s travel was to Connecticut for the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament.

In May I took a river cruise, which included going to the Kentucky Derby. The Derby arrangements were kind of a fiasco, but the stops at various small towns were a lot more interesting than I expected.

June took me to Svalbard, which featured amazing scenery, though the wildlife (or, more accurately, lack thereof) was disappointing. This was somewhere I’d wanted to go to forever, so I am glad to have had the opportunity.

In July, I went to Montreal for the NPL con. That also included eating a lot of Montreal Jewish food and following in the footsteps of Leonard Cohen. Later in the month, I leveraged off a genealogy conference in London to take a trip to Ireland (including a day trip to Belfast) and the Isle of Man. That included fulfilling a life list item by having a beer at the South Pole Inn in Anascaul. After the conference, I did a few more things in London, including side trips to Canterbury and to Ipswich and Sutton Hoo. Soon after I got back, I took a quick trip to New York City for Lollapuzzoola and theatre going.

LoserFest was in Philadelphia in September. Highlights included the Masonic Temple and the Magic Gardens.

In October, I took a quick trip to San Antonio for the annular solar eclipse, which was awesome. While I was there, I also did a day trip to the Hill Country, where I saw several sites associated with Lyndon B. Johnson, as well as visiting the town of Fredericksburg. Later in the month I went to Boston, mostly to go to a concert by Jonathan Richman.

I’m not sure if taking a day trip to Harrisonburg, Virginia in November counts as travel. But my trip to French Polynesia (Austral Islands and Aranui cruise to the Marquesas) definitely does.

Virtual travel talks I went to included one on Jewish Barbados and a few Travelers’ Century Club zoom sessions. There were also a few in-person TCC meetings.

Puzzles: I participated once again in the MIT Mystery Hunt as part of Halibut That Bass. I think the team worked particularly well together, but we had some issues with the way the hunt was structured, which resulted in our seeing only about half of the puzzles.

I was disappointed in my performance in the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament. I finished solidly in the middle of the pack and I wasn’t surprised to have trouble with Puzzle 5, but I left a blank square in Puzzle 3, which was sheer carelessness. I did worse at Lollapuzzoola 16 in August, because I failed to completely read parts of some clues in Puzzle 5 there. I blame jet lag from my trip just before that event.

As I mentioned above, I went to the National Puzzlers’ League Con in Montreal. Highlights included a couple of games by Cute Mage, as well as Rasa’s over the weekend cryptic.

Genealogy: I continued to volunteer as the Subject Matter Expert for a Jewish Genealogy Society of Greater Washington Litvak Special Interest Group. I also went to several JGSGW virtual meetings. And, of course, I went to the IAJGS conference in London at the end of July / beginning of August. Aside from several interesting talks, the highlight of that was meeting a distant cousin.

Baseball: I went to a little bit of a Nationals game in May, but it got rained out. In September I went to the new Texas Rangers stadium (Globe Life Field), putting me back at having been to a game at every Major League Ballpark. I also went to two minor league ballparks to see the Aberdeen Ironbirds and the Fredericksburg Nationals.

Culture: I’m not a big television watcher but I kept Apple TV+ long enough to watch Schmigadoon and Schmicago, both of which were tremendous fun for musical theatre geeks like me.

In terms of movies, I saw 18 overall, 4 of which were in theaters, with the rest on airplanes. Favorites were A Man Called Otto, In the Heights, Blackberry, Cocaine Bear, Searching for Sugar Man, Barbie, and Remembering Gene Wilder. Most disappointing was Weird: The Al Yancovic Story.

I went to 5 Gilbert and Sullivan operettas at the G&S International Festival in England, with the best production being of Ruddigore. I went to two other operas, both by Jeanine Tesori (Blue and Grounded). I also saw two ballets and one modern dance performance, with the ballet of The Crucible being the most satisfying. As far as classical music goes, I saw the National Symphony Orchestra twice and was privileged to see Michael Tilson Thomas conduct the New York Philharmonic. The only popular music concert I went to was one by Jonathan Richman, who is always wonderful.

I saw 14 plays and 9 musicals, assuming I counted correctly. Favorite plays were All Things Equal (about Ruth Bader Ginsburg), The Lifespan of a Fact at Keegan Theatre, Selling Kabul at Signature Theatre, and The Pillowman, which is a Martin McDonagh play I saw in London. I also loved The Enigmatist, which is a mixture of comedy. magic, and puzzles and, hence, I consider sui generis. Top musicals were In the Heights at Next Stop Theatre Company, Signature Theatre’s production of Pacific Overtures. and Shucked and Kimberly Akimbo on Broadway.

Storytelling: I went to several storytelling shows, including one by my Grimmkeepers group. I performed in two shows for Artists Standing Strong Together, and also told at the C&O Canal Visitor Center with Voices in the Glen, at the Washington Folk Festival, and in a Better Said Than Done show at the Stagecoach Theatre. Some other shows I particularly enjoyed were Ingrid Nixon’s show about Shackleton and several of the performances at the National Storytelling Festival. And, of course, the Women’s Storytelling Festival (which I also emceed at) os always a highlight of the year.

On a rather different note, the Grimmkeepers discussions about the Grimm fairy tales continue to be enlightening and enriching.

Museums and Art: I went to 32 museums over the year. Highlights included the New Bedford Glass Museum, the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, two exhibitions of miniatures (the Mini Time Machine Museum in Tucson and the Small is Beautiful exhibit in New York), the MIT Museum, the Virginia Quilt Museum, and the Museum of Failure. I also really enjoyed seeing the Book of Kells, the Manx Museum, and Sutton Hoo during my travels in July. My absolute favorite for the year was the Museum of Broadway.

Other Stuff: On New Year’s Day, my friend, Cindy, and I went to the Winter Lantern Festival at Tyson’s, which was impressive.

I went to various Loser events, including the post-Post Loser Party, the Flushes, LoserFest. I should probably count Poetry and Punchlines (a poetry reading associated with Light, which is a magazine of light verse) as a Loser event, too.

My crafting group changed to meeting on-line every other Thursday and in person at one members house on the weeks in between. I make it when I can. Similarly, I occasionally managed to get to my other (mostly) knitting group, which meets at the police station twice a month.

I went to a virtual organizing conference in September, which was moderately useful.

I played board games a few times a week, when I was home. Yes, sometimes I was home.

Goals: So how did I do on my 2023 goals? I went through maybe 10% of the photos from my parents and realized I have no idea where I put the slides, so I’ll give myself a 10% there. I did go to some sort of lecture or other formal educational event, either in person or on-line, every month, so I get 100% there. I get full credit (i.e. 100%) for taking 4 international trips. I finished only 1 craft project, so only get 33% there, though I did make progress on two others. I read 53 books, out of a goal of 75, so get 71% there. I get 100% credit for going to three new (to me) ballparks. I made it to at least one museum each month so get 100% on that goal. I only went to one national park, so get 33% on that goal. And I averaged significantly less than a half hour every day on housework, so I’ll give myself 10% there. Averaging things out, I’ll give myself a 62% on the year, which is not great but not terrible either.

Which brings me to goals for 2024:

Circumnavigate the globe going westward. The backstory is that way back in 2000, I did an eastward circumnavigation, from Los Angeles to Russia via Germany by plane, overland through Siberia to Mongolia and to China, and back to Los Angeles by plane. I’ve got ideas for how I want to do the westward circle.
Go to at least 3 national parks.
Clean out my saved files of genealogy related emails.
Read 80 books with a stretch goal of 125.
Finish organizing my bedroom.
Finish 3 afghans.
Find and sort through my parents’ slides.
Go to games at at least 4 AAA ballparks.
Exercise for at least 20 minutes at least 3 times a week, with a stretch goal of at least 30 minutes at least 4 times a week.

Let’s see what the past three months brought.

Books:

Eleven books this quarter.

Donald E. Westlake and Brian Garfield, Gangway!. This is a caper novel about a New York gangster who is sent to San Francisco after upsetting his boss. He meets various colorful characters and devises a plan to rob the mint. It’s mildly diverting, but not nearly as funny, as I think it was meant to be.
Dick Francis, Dead Cert. This was the first novel Dick Francis wrote, or at least, the first published and was included in a three-in-one volume. Even back in 1962 he was writing exciting (but violent) novels. In this case, the death of a steeplechase jockey leads another jockey to investigate - and get caught in a similar “accident,” as well as a beating. There’s a romantic subplot, but the gist is about a corrupt taxi company manipulating races for money. If you like books with lots of plot, you really can’t go wrong with Dick Francis.
Dick Francis, Nerve. This book starts off with a bang - literally, in the form of a very public suicide by a jockey. This leads another jockey to try to find out what happened to him and to other jockeys who lost their jobs or saw troubling rumors spread about them. Of course, his questions prompt the same treatment to be tried on him. If you can handle a sinister and frightening story, with a mixture of violence ad psychology, I highly recommend this novel.
Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. I read this for my Crones and Tomes book club. This is a memoir of Angelou’s early years, split between rural Mississippi, Saint Louis, and California. The most memorable incident involves her rape, at the age of eight. The bigger takeaway is that none of the adults in her life seem to know what to do with her and her brother. There really isn’t much in the story that suggests that she’ll grow up to be the famous poet and writer that she became. Presumably, that is covered in her other memoirs, but I wasn’t really left with a desire to read them.
Paul Harding, Tinkers. I read this for my longstanding book club (which is called READ for Read, Enjoy, and Discuss.) George Washington Crosby is dying and he reflects on his life, his father, and watch making. The father, Howard, is the most interesting part of this. He’s an epileptic who runs away from his family to avoid them putting him in a mental hospital. There’s an interesting episode involving his repeated encounters with a hermit who may have known Nathaniel Hawthorne. But, for the most part, nothing much happens and I found this a slog. (I also ended up missing the book club meeting, because I was in England and couldn’t handle the time zone difference.)
Carolyn Hart, From the Queen. The Mysterious Bookshop in New York publishes a series of novellas by various well-known authors. This one features Annie Darling and the Death on Demand bookshop. A thrift store owner has inherited a first edition of an Agatha Christie novel inscribed to the queen. When it’s stolen, Annie investigates. One of the hallmarks of the Death on Demand series is name dropping of mystery authors, which I find annoying, and it’s just as annoying in this shorter form. In addition, I didn’t find the solution particularly satisfying. Disappointing.
Dick Francis, Odds Against. Remember what I said about Dick Francis as a palate refresher? It was a relief to read a book with lots of action. This is actually a slightly unusual novel for him, in that the hero gets shot and doesn’t recover nearly instantaneously. And there’s a satisfying subplot involving a woman who was badly deformed by a fireworks accident in her youth. Of course, there are horses, too, as the plot involves the efforts to put a racetrack out of business in order to acquire its land for a housing development. As always, a good read.
Elizabeth Wurtzel, Prozac Nation. This was another Crones and Tomes selection. I’d expected an analysis of the popularity of antidepressants, but what I got instead was a whiny memoir about her life with depression and how nobody could do anything to help her. Along the way, she self-medicates with cocaine, ends up in the emergency room, and screws guys who are just as fucked up as she is. Astonishingly, she still has friends and manages to get through Harvard. There are some moments of humor, but I can’t really recommend this to anyone over, say, 21. As for the prozac connection, it is what finally helps her, but then she rails against how many other people use it.
Shauna J. Edwards and Alyson Richman, The Thread Collectors. And this was a selection for the RnEAD book club. The story involves a Jewish soldier from New York and a runaway slave from New Orleans, both fighting for the Union Army during the Civil War. They’re both talented musicians and bond over both music and being outsiders. The thread reference involves the women in their lives. The black man's common law wife embroiders maps to help other slaves escape. When the Jewish soldier doesn’t write to his wife for a long time, she sets out to find him. I thought this was a pretty interesting book, but it does require a lot of suspension of disbelief.
C. J. Conner, Board to Death. A mystery set in a board game store? Sounds right up my alley. A friend bought this, read it quickly, and, while he liked the characters, thought it worked better as a (gay) love story than as a mystery. He passed it on to me and I pretty much agree with his opinion. The plotting was somewhat weak. And there was one paragraph that could have been an entry in the Buller-Lytton contest. A character in a book should never reflect on what they would do if they were a character in a book.
Dick Francis, Enquiry. Yes, I needed a palate refresher. Dick Francis always excelled at bringing readers into his world, with plenty of action. In this case, a jockey and trainer are warned off, i.e. forbidden from being anywhere near race tracks after being accused of cheating. The jockey is not taking this lying down. His investigation uncovers sexual scandal, business revenge, and mental illness. Recommended.

Movies:

No, I never managed to make it to either Oppenheimer or Barbie. But I did see 5 movies.

Cocaine Bear: This is exactly the right sort of movie to watch on an airplane. It doesn’t take much (if any) thinking but there was enough happening to keep me awake. Admittedly, it’s pretty gory, but it’s just outlandish enough for that not to bother me. I was actually disappointed to learn that the real cocaine bear died of an overdose, rather than still being out there roaming the forest.
Searching for Sugar Man: Sixto Rodriguez died just a few days before my flight home from London, so I couldn’t resist watching this documentary about two South African men who set out to discover what had become of him. They found a story worth telling, both for the music and the man. There’s a reason this movie won a lot of awards, including a Best Documentary Oscar. Highly recommended.
The Whale: I watched this largely because it was so controversial. The basic plot is that an obese and depressed gay man tries to reconnect with his daughter, who is, frankly, an evil psychopath. Yes, Brendan Fraser did his best with what he was given, but self-loathing doesn’t make for an interesting movie. I’m reminded of Tom Lehrer’s line that people who can’t relate should just shut up. In case you can’t tell, I hated this movie.
Golda: I went to see this because a friend wanted to take advantage of $4 movie day. The movie is somewhat mistitled, as it is really limited to the Yom Kippur war, while I expected somewhat more background about Golda Meir’s life. In particular, I thought her relationship with her assistant, Lou Kaddar, came across as strange. Still, Helen Mirren is a great actress and I found the movie interesting, though hard to watch.
El Método Tangalanga: American Airlines had a selection of movies in Spanish for Hispanic Heritage Month. My Spanish is not yet up to watching them on their own, but subtitles let me enjoy this Argentinian film. The basic plot involves a painfully shy man who is transformed by hypnosis, turning him into a different personality when he gets on the telephone. He makes a series of prank phone calls that cheer up his dying friend - and gets famous for them under the name “Doctor Tangalanga.” The outcome is somewhat predictable, but I still found this entertaining. What I didn’t know is that Doctor Tangalanga was a real Argentinian comedian (real name Julio Victorio De Rissio), who released over 40 albums of prank calls starting in the late 1980’s. This isn’t exactly a great movie, but it was diverting enough for a couple of hours.

Goals:

Believe it or not, I actually started going through my parents photos. I tossed a lot of my mother’s travel photos, because I really don’t need pictures of places (most of which I’ve been to and have my own pictures of) or of people I don’t know eating dinner on cruise ships and the like.
I’m going to count the IAJGS (Jewish genealogy) conference as my formal educational activity for both July and August. And the Get Organized conference counts for September. I’ve also continued studying Spanish with Duolingo and am now at a 336 day streak.
I’ve taken 3 international trips. In June, I went to Svalbard. In July, I had a trip to Montreal, Canada. Then in July and August, I was in Ireland, Northern Ireland, Isle of Man, and England. I have plans for a major trip in December.
I’ve finished one crafts project. I am not sure whether or not I will finish the afghan I’m working on. I need to find something small that I can do in a couple of days.
I’ve only read 36 books so far this year. So reaching 75 is likely to be challenging.
I did go to 3 new ballparks this year. I went to Leidos Field at Ripken Stadium (Aberdeen Ironbirds, High-A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles) in May. This quarter, I added Virginia Credit Union Stadium (Fredericksburg Nationals, Single-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals), and Globe Life Field (Texas Rangers, MLB).
As for museum exhibitions, I went to the museums in Longyearben and Ny Alesund on my Svalbard cruise in June. In July, I went to the see the Book of Kells and went to the Chester Beatty in Dublin, the Titanic Museum in Belfast, and the Manx Museum in Douglas, Isle of Man. In August, I went to the Tate Modern, the British Library, and the V&A in London and the Small is Beautiful exhibit in New York. In September, I went to the Eastern State Penitentiary, the Mutter Museum, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art on my trip to Philadelphia.
I didn’t add any national parks this quarter, so I still stand at one for the year.
As for spending half an hour a day on housecleaning, ha ha ha!

On a related note, I checked off a life list item by having a beer at the South Pole Inn in Anascaul, Ireland.

I think I've figured out how to do these, since I've been using the same format for a few years.

( Behind a cut due to length )

Current Mood: tired

I have a bunch of catching up to do, but will start with a quarterly update, especially since I pretty much blew that off at the beginning of April. Things are going a lot better now. I am never as focused as I’d like to be, but I do think I am moving forward.

I haven’t gotten any travelogues finished, but I have done some work. Of course, I also took yet another trip, so I am even further behind, but I see some hope of finding time to write.

I’ve also made (slow) progress on finishing the Apocrypha and on knitting projects. I’d had to restart the socks as they were turning out yeti-sized, but they are going well now, at least until I have to turn the heels and figure out short rows. I do need time at home to work on the two sweaters that take concentration, as only Frankensweater (so called because of its odd construction) is suitable for social knitting. In the meantime, I did make an amigurumi uterus and that should surely count for something, n’est ce pas?

I found a storage box to put the postcard collection in, but I need to make or find appropriate category dividers. I may attempt that on my way home tonight. I haven’t done anything about the map drawer, other than glaring at it. But I have cleaned out a box of files from the Black Hole of Vienna, a.k.a. my den.

I did okay on dance classes, but am taking a few weeks off, as the summer is crazy with travel. I will probably still do some drop-ins. As for walking, the weather has hampered that. I’ll have more to write on that subject in another entry.

I should also note having kept up on life list maintenance thanks to my Miami baseball excursion. And I have only one Gilbert and Sullivan opera left to see. (No, I don’t count Thespis.) If nothing else, there’s a company in Delaware doing Yeoman of the Guard in the spring.

I will try to get some of the rest of the catching up done in the next day or so.

My usual lengthy format works for me. It's behind a cut to keep from annoying the rest of the world.

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This is in my usual, lengthy format. So I am putting it behind a cut on Live Journal.

( click here to read on )

I went up to Niagara Falls for the weekend. There were two reasons for the trip. First, it was a life list item. But it was also a good way to finish off the Volksmarch riverwalk special event program. (That program should have been easy, but then I noticed that you could count any given river only once. So I had to do a few more events to make up for the multiple walks along the Potomac and the James.)

My flight was timed well to allow me to take the cheap public bus from the Buffalo airport up to Niagara Falls, where I stayed at the Hampton Inn on the New York side. The hotel was perfectly adequate, though the breakfast room got too crowded, especially as there was a high school cross country team from Ohio there for a meet. About all I did Friday night was walk down to Prospect Point (in the state park) to look at the American Falls, which are illuminated nightly. Then I walked over to the Seneca Casino, where I had dinner at their Asian noodle bar and played the slot machines for a little while. Interestingly, this was probably the most crowded casino I've been to in ages.

In the morning, I set out to do a 15 km route that covers both sides of the falls. This was slightly complicated by my banging my left foot against a table in the room coming back from my morning shower. I was still able to walk the entire route, but my little toe was aching off and on throughout it.

The route went around all of Goat Island (very pretty and peaceful), across the bridges to the Three Sisters Islands, and on through various viewpoints in the state park. Horseshoe Falls was particularly impressive. Interestingly, because of the curve of the river, Canada is simultaneously north, south, and west of the U.S. at that point. The route continued past the Cave of the Winds, on to Luna Island (views of Bridal Veil and American Falls), back past Prospect Point and across the Rainbow Bridge to Canada.

The Canadian side is definitely more built up with tourist attractions. The views of the falls are more dramatic in one way, as you can see the entire flow, but you are also further from the water. The route went all the way past the falls and on to the Floral Showcase. The msot impressive part of that was the topiary maple leaf outside the greenhouse.

There are also any number of ways available to separate people from their money - wax museums and theme restaurants and two casinos. At any rate, it was pretty easy to spend the better part of the day seeing the sights. I was glad to cross back to the U.S. after dark, as the view of the illuminated falls from the bridge is nicely dramatic.

My foot had begun to hurt more as the day wore on and, when I took off my shoes, I saw it was impressively bruised. That slowed me down quite a bit on Sunday and I just checked out a few of the tackier things on the U.S. side (e.g. the Daredevil Museum, which has the barrels used by a few of the people who went over the falls). I also, er, contributed to the Seneca economy. In the early evening, I went back to the Buffalo airport, where I stayed overnight at the Hilton Garden Inn. Flying back early in the morning is convenient for getting to work, but it is exhausting. It's still worth it to get a life list item checked off.

I made a quick trip to Minneapolis this weekend. I was not in the best of moods, largely out of continued sleep deprivation. That moodiness is my excuse for this being a sort of whiny and boring entry. But the trip was a success as it let me complete a life list item.

Because of schedules and fares, I flew Delta. It's weird flying an airline I have no status on, but it was tolerable. (I put the miles on my Alaska Air account. Delta has a reputation for poor redemption rates and Alaska Air has better partners for my purposes.) The leg room sucked and I had a screaming child behind me who kept kicking my seat. (His father did stop the kicking, but not the screaming. Kids nowadays are not taught the concept of an indoor voice, apparently.) At least I had an empty seat next to me. On the plus side, they still have snacks, of sorts, on a 2 1/2 hour flight. They gave out pretzels, peanuts, and biscotti.

One of my gripes about airports is poor signage and MSP qualified in that regard. I did eventually find the area for hotel shuttles and waited and waited for the Hilton shuttle. After 20 minutes I called them. It took 42 rings for the front desk to answer and tell me the shuttle was on the way. (I know how many rings it was because it sends you back to the "choose your extension" prompt after every 12.) It turns out that they run the shuttle every half hour, which might have been useful information to put on the hotel website. When I did (finally!) get to the hotel, it was fine and they gave me a nice upgraded room.

In the morning, I took the bus to Saint Paul to do the capital volksmarch there. (I'm now up to 24 capitals, should someone care.) The walk started in the Crocus Hill neighborhood (interesting shops and restaurants) and continued along Summit Avenue, with its upscale historic homes, including some associated with F. Scott Fitzgerald. That was definitely the highlight of the walk, which continued past the Cathedral and on to downtown St. Paul, which is fairly deserted on the weekend. Even the Capitol had fairly few people around. I also checked out part of the Minnesota History Center, which is typical of its genre. The local touch showed up best in a gallery devoted to how Minnesotans deal with weather.

Then I took a bus to connect to the light rail and it was off to Target Field for the real reason for the trip. I have now been to a game at every major league ballpark! Target Field is okay and a notable improvement over the Metrodome, but really nothing special. It did have the shortest walk from transit stop to entrance gate that I've ever experienced. My seat was not wonderful - outfield, along the 3rd base line, with an obstructed view of the scoreboard. I could see the field fine, though, which is what really matters. The game was a reasonably good one and the fans were decently enthusiastic. It was also a pretty short game - about 2 hours and 20 minutes for the Twins to beat the A's. Minnesota has a reputation for high social capital and that was reflected in almost everybody singing along to "Take Me Out to the Ball Game."

It started to rain while I was waiting in line for the light rail back. A canopy over the platform would have been helpful, especially as the rain got pretty heavy just before the train came. I'll note also that the Hilton was a longer walk from the American Boulevard station than I'd realized and either the Embassy Suites or the Holiday Inn Express would have been a better choice in that respect.

The flight back did highlight one of the good things on Delta - at least on a 737. Namely, that plane had their interactive entertainment system. Which let me play their trivia game. It goes a bit slowly, but it still amused me to compete against other passengers. The metro was decently efficient and I got home a little after noon. After a few errands, I squandered much of the day napping.

I have a format that works, so I'm going to keep to it. This is long enough that I'm putting it behind a cut on LJ. ( Click here to read more. )

I've been fascinated by glass blowing as far back as I can remember, so it's not surprising that I put "take a glass blowing class" on my life list. Not long ago, I was flipping through the catalogue of classes at Glen Echo Park and discovered that they have a one-day "Discover Glassblowing" class. This seemed like a good way to see if I'd like doing it, without making too big a time commitment. I debated between the June class and the August class (July not being feasible due to other commitments). Sooner is always better than later when it comes to trying things out, so I spent today playing with hot glass.

The first thing you learn is just how hot it is. The furnace is kept at 2000 degrees Fahrenheit. You really feel the blast of heat when you gather the glass onto the end of the pipe (either a blow pipe or, initially, a puntie). The instructor, Paul, had us all practice going back and forth between the glory hole (another furnace, used to reheat the glass) to the bench so we would learn to hold the puntie correctly. Then he demonstrated the first object each of the five students would make.

This was basically a little caterpillar shape. You gathered glass on the puntie, marvered it to elongate the shape (i.e. rolled it on a cooling table), then worked it on the bench to mark off three segments. The thing that is tricky is that you have to keep turning the puntie constantly (with your left hand) as you work with the tools (in this case, mostly the jack) with your right hand. It takes both strength and coordination - neither of which come instantly. Paul was patient as he corrected our numerous mistakes.

After all five of us had made a caterpillar, we broke for lunch. When we got back, it was time to use the blow pipe and make a cylinder, i.e. a drinking glass. Paul drew a diagram on the floor, which had about a dozen steps. (In practice, one ends up repeating some of the steps.) After gathering glass and marvering it, you blow into the pipe to make a small bubble. More heating and more gathering both expand the amount of glass and give you something hot to keep blowing into. I found it hard to remember to keep turning the pipe as I was blowing into it - but, if you don't, the glass sort of flops into odd shapes. Also, when you are blowing the initial bubble, you can't really see what you're doing. Later on, you can see the shoulder of the shape growing. Eventually, you get to a point where you are just elongating the cylinder, which is somewhat easier. You make a neck, which will get cut off to form the rim of the glass. Eventually, you transfer the cylinder from the blow pipe to a puntie and cut off the neck. That doesn't look like it should work, but it does. Then you open up the neck and, after some more shaping with the jack, voila! a tumbler!

All of our pieces are in the annealing oven, cooling at a slow temperature to keep them from cracking. I'm not exactly sure when I'll pick them up - maybe Thursday evening.

Overall, this was a very interesting experience and mostly fun. It was somewhat frustrating at times, since there is a lot to keep track of. But that is always the case with new skills. I did come away with a feeling of accomplishment.

I'm going to have to think about whether or not I want to pursue glass blowing any further. Paul's multi-session classes meet on weeknights from 6-10 p.m., which would make for an awfully long day. I have time to think about it since my upcoming vacation would get in the way of his July class.

I'm using the formula I've used on Areas of Unrest for the past few years. By the way, I have officially decided I am no longer updating that site and have officially announced that.

( 2008 summarized behind the cut )