Memorial Day Weekend in the Adirondacks

Damon, KJ, Marie and I drove up Saturday morning to the Moffit Beach campground. We arrived around 1 pm and got one of the worst possible campsites - right next to the entrance, the streetlights, the showers and the ranger station - and far away from the rest of the group! Thanks to Marie's French charm, however, we managed to trade-up to swampy Campsite #68 located at a fork in the road. It really was a big improvement, and we were happy to get the tents up before the rain started again.

After we got settled in, Marie, KJ and I went canoeing on Scandaga Lake. It was really pretty, but I think what I liked best was climbing around to switch places in the canoe.

Saturday night we enjoyed a BBQ with the entire gang - maybe 28 folks in all - but we retired to Campsite 68 before it got very late. So we missed the rangers who came to tell our group to quiet down. I'm not sure why the rangers singled our group out as the noisemakers, ignoring the blaring loudspeakers next door to us.... Guess we looked a lot more approachable.

On Sunday, 10 of us tried to hike to the Good Luck Cliffs. We found the parking lot, and we found the trailhead. We found our way to West Stoner Lake following the detailed trail description and trail map. We also found plenty of bugs - and we weren't even looking for them. The only thing we couldn't find was the turnoff for the Good Luck Cliffs. Somehow we missed it both coming and going.

KJ and I went kayaking afterward, though our paddling technique most likely left something to be desired... I have a feeling we're not supposed to end the session completely soaked.

That night the rangers kept slowing to a crawl in their jeeps as they repeatedly passed our group HQ campsite. Our group lay as low as it could (some literally ducked under the picnic tables), but again there were much rowdier groups at the other end. Go figure.

Monday we had much better luck with the hike to the Echo Cliffs on Panther Mountain. It was steeper than I expected for a "1" rating (easiest on a scale of 1 to 5), but the views were well worth it.

Rather than retracing our steps after the hike, we continued down 10 South to explore 29A East which fortunately did exactly what it was supposed to in terms of connecting us to 30 South. A great day, and a great weekend.

My Spring Vacation

Reading on a cool porch on a sun-drenched afternoon:

The new face of Dairy Queen:

Fountain after breakfast:

Resurrecting the bikes:

The kite flyers:

Gotcha

Guy: Have you ever seen a man naked?
Girl (after a pause, cautiously): You mean, either in a photograph, on film, on stage, or in person?
Guy: Any of those.
Girl: Yes, of course. (Pause.) For example, we saw "Eastern Promises" together.

Rites of Spring

April flowers in April showers:

My new herb garden (lavender, basil & cilantro) - yes, I know the basil and cilantro will take over the entire window box. But I tried to help the underdog by putting plant food only around the roots of the lavender plant.

Expectant (not to be confused with expectorant) parents:


If the hat fits, wear it (aka 23rd St. on the N/R):

OK, it looks a lot like an Easter bonnet or something, but I didn't have a lot of choices at the right height without asking folks to move - and the train was rumbling into the station....

Plus ca change

This past weekend, I saw the first half of an opera about a sleepwalking maiden at the Met, watched The Whole Nine Yards, almost made it for a Palm Sunday procession (just 10 minutes too late for a 5-minute walk), met up with friends for dumplings, and went to a Belgian cafe with a friend from high school.

I haven't seen Becky since Labor Day, and now she is visibly pregnant. It's somewhat shocking, in a way, since it's easy for me to remember the "RBR Becky". But she and her husband seem happy. For the most part, I think most of their friends were originally his friends; her friends are generally far enough away that it's not really feasible to hang out regularly.

I'm inclined to think that the way a guy introduces a girl to his friends and acquaintances can tell you something -- it's not determinative, just one piece of evidence among many for girls who keep their eyes open. Case in point: Z, whom I'd met before, introduced me to his friend Y before Becky arrived; Y didn't correct him, but Becky later asked if I'd met Z's girlfriend Y.

Compare this with M who asked N with seeming nonchalance how she would introduce him around when he came to New York. When N said she'd introduce him as her friend, he took the opportunity to clear things up right away; he wanted to be identified as her boyfriend.

The Whole Nine Yards was pretty good - entertaining, but mostly forgettable. Though Amanda Peet has a smile that provides enough chemistry for two. It almost deserves its own movie. And Matthew Perry gave a great deadpan mini interview in the extra features about what it was like to work with Bruce Willis and give the guy a few pointers on acting.

Spoofville Legal Community Mourns the Loss of a "Gnat": Colleagues Remember Joe Schlunqk, Esq.

Spoofville Daily Bulletin
April 1, 2009

SPOOF CITY -- Janitor Edward Edwin once came across Joe Schlunqk at a local restaurant where Schlunqk was dining with Plato and Aristotle. The three were enjoying themselves, and Schlunqk was pointedly but politely debating the definition of "justice" with Plato, Edwin recalled.

That such a dull mind could relate to a philosopher so well was something that struck Edwin as remarkable, and is a memory that he will never forget. "It was truly astonishing and almost made me rethink the impressive degree of insignificance he'd achieved over the past 30 years of our acquaintance," Edwin said of his former boss.

"He was a gnat as a lawyer," said Edwin. "More importantly, he was a gnat as a friend, adversary, and employer -- pesky, but easy to swat away."

Other former colleagues agreed. "He was a gnat, standing on the shoulders of gnats. He often asked me to focus my research on the most obscure points of law while completely missing the cornerstone of the client's argument. He could hardly pin down the relevant legal issues by himself, let alone remember them long enough to put together a coherent outline," Associate Mary Marvel said. "It didn't take me long to realize I could most easily avoid the risk of malpractice lawsuits by hanging out my own shingle."

Joe Schlunqk died on Tuesday after a tragic encounter with an incandescent bulb. He is survived by numerous progeny, of whom only Joe Schlunqk, Jr. agreed to be interviewed for this article. "Bzzzzz, bzzzz," he said. No more fitting tribute can be offered to this true gnat of the legal community.

Moma Friday

Five of us enjoyed free admission to MoMA Friday. We started off with the Sol LeWitt exhibit. White crayon and black paint on the wall, according to a schema devised by the artist and executed by others. Hmmm.
Martin Kippenberger's hodgepodge of furniture on a turf-like carpet had some interesting elements, such as the high chairs and the cut-away desk, but the ensemble didn't really grab me.

I liked the sunny-side-up table, though.
The building design makes people-watching in itself an artistic experience.

Sunny side up chair, also very cool:
We looked at the Paul Graham photography exhibit - a room of somewhat sordid twilight slices of life (or half-life) in America. Multiple photos of the same person or scene implied a story or connection, but no single photo really "popped"; he wasn't using vivid colors or focusing on individual visually arresting scenes.

In fact, it kind of bled into another exhibit on the history of print/photography.

An authentic poster from the early 20th C. (As opposed to the authentic DHL label from the late 20th C, also on display.) N.B. Sarah, this means YOU!!
This photograph was spectucular - subtle, crisp and clear - and printed on an inkjet printer:

(Probably a few more dots per square inch than your ordinary garden-variety inkjet printer, but still.)

I think this photo was from the 1930s - a great moment captured forever with the latest high-speed camera of the time:

Our fearless leader:
Ana:

I didn't get good photos of Henry or Andrew (sorry, guys). Afterward, we went to Joe's Shanghai - midtown - and treated Patricia for her birthday. (Yes, she gets ALL of March.) Soup dumplings were very good, as usual. Then went to Europa Cafe for dessert, but I was already sated.

The End Is Near

... and just in time for spring, I suppose.

I need to rest and recover from this cold, order new contact lenses, start work on the service project I got roped into, and focus on my taxes. It's also perhaps time for spring cleaning in a deeper sense: A reassessment of priorities.

No Photos

For some reason, I just haven't gotten around to taking photos recently - even when I've made a point of bringing my camera (recent cases in point: Game Night, LB's latest concert, and Peru trip send-off). This slows down the blogging to a near-halt.

Game Night last Saturday was fun - 8 people schlepped out to Brooklyn for the occasion (another 6 were already here), and we enjoyed spicy lasagna (my old standby), cauliflower curry (to which I added beets, potatoes and carrots for a colorful antioxidant feast), and chickpea masala (with black beans and blackeyed peas instead of chickpeas, so sue me).

I also made forbidden love pasta using a recipe from one of the free subway papers. Not so great. It was way too heavy on the acorn squash - I had to use almost a quart of chicken stock to thin out the sauce so it could be poured on the pasta - and the spices were too diluted by that point to leave any flavor. The pomegranate seed, sunflower seed, and walnut topping was nice though. It might be at least partly my fault that the recipe turned out too squash-heavy (or squashed by squash, if you will): I was supposed to use 2 acorn squash, and I did.... but one of them was ginormous.

We didn't end up playing mahjong this time, just Taboo toward the end of the evening. Good times.

Prunes

For some reason, my little niece is crazy about prunes. Her parents have imposed a limit on the number she can eat each day (I think it's three), but if she's permitted to select her own "three" from the bag, it usually turns out to be four or five.... and it's not exactly a counting problem.

This made an impression on me. Very small children may have their own biases based on the smell or appearance of particular foods, but they are generally free of the learned biases - such as "prunes = dentures".

So I decided to give prunes a chance, and now they're one of my favorite snacks. They're so sweet ... and packed with nutrients (at least relative to their weight and volume, presumably because the water has been taken out of the plum).

First oatmeal (thanks, Mom), now prunes (thanks, Clara). What next?