adventures of a canoelover

How weird is that? Yemen?

A few days ago we were skiing in gorgeous 25-30 degree sunshine. Today it was 40 plus, sloppy garbage everywhere, snow disappearing faster than a frozen pizza in front of my son.

The good news — the biking was excellent. Brad and I went out for an hour or so and had a great ride, even the ice slicks were fun, since we were both on cyclecross bikes. Anyway, snowbanks make excellent bikeracks.

I picked up the paper yesterday and was perusing the comic strips (it was the best thing in the Wisconsin State Journal, a really lousy newspaper). The thing that first caught my eye was this comic strip…telemark turns! Cool!

I never thought that a comic strip author would show anyone skiing like this. It gives a guy hope.

This little guy was walking along the roadside at Gov. Dodge State Park. He was not moving with urgency.

…so we did. The kids (and kid’s friend Kirsten) went over to Monona Bay, where the ice resembles swiss cheese, it is so riddled with holes. The wind was blowing and there was a sub-zero wind chill, but that didn’t stop the intrepid ice anglers from stalking and capturing their quarry — four very small sunfish.

This was a win-win-win deal: the kids got to catch fish, I didn’t have to clean them, and the fish lived. 🙂

Since our state park stickers expire tomorrow night at midnight, we figured we’d make the best of it and use ’em up before the new year. I waxed the family skis a few days ago and had them scraped and ready to go, so we tossed them in the Thule box and headed southwest.

It was fun. We took the Meadow Valley Trail, a 6.8 mile loop that goes through some lovely woods, fields, and meadows, with wonderful views of Twin Valley Lake. There were some really nice climbs and at least one wicked downhill. Whitney had a friend along, Kirsten, who had never been on skis before. She was amazing…never on skis before and she was bombing down hills like she was born wearing them. Ian did a great job his first time on his “grown-up” skis. Whitney and Stephanie did great, of course…though Stephanie had a glorious wipe-out that put snow in places that snow normally doesn’t end up.

The best part of the adventure was, of course, the post-ski trip to the Red Rooster in Mineral Point. This is an old restaurant famous for Cornish food, specifically, the venerable pasty. We ate well, and enjoyed a quiet, digestive ride back to Madison.

I’ve spent the last few hours going back in time.

I was a missionary in Italy from 1981 to 1983. During that time I lived in six different cities, visited a dozen more, none of which are particularly interesting to the average tourist, though Palermo comes close. Anyway, I shot about twenty-five rolls of Kodachrome 64 with an old Olympus XA2, which had a fantastic lens but not much else to brag about. It was a sweet little camera, and fit nicely in a pocket.

Now I am digging through the slides and digitizing them. They’re dusty, have some color stability issues, but they’re still good enough, so I’ll be scanning, sorting, cleaning, and cataloging them over the next few months.

It really is taking me back in time. When I scanned a particular picture of a market, I could remember exactly what it smelled like, the weather, everything was as if it were a few hours ago.

This shot was taken in Alberobello, a village known for its trulli, a type of dry-stacked stone building that is fairly unique in Italy. The design is of Etruscan origin, most likely, but no one really knows.

Trulli are really cool. I used to love to visit Alberobello for many reasons. One was the funny little bar where we would buy ice cream…the most horrid little prepackaged drumsticks and popsicles, all in the land of gelato. I also loved the rapido train that went from Bari and stopped at every cow path to pick up anything that waved it down.

P.S. Rapido, though it means “quick,” really means slow in the parlance of the Ferrovie Statale (or state railway). There is no train slower than a rapido. I think it’s sort of like the big box stores, which have nicely marketed categories like “performance line” or “elite line” or “economy line.” They never have a category called “This is a piece of crap made to make everything else look good.”

…and a problem.

I need a new pillow. How does one adequately test drive a pillow? Lay down on the floor of the store and fluff one up? Go by the diagrams that have different pillows for stomach sleepers, side sleepers, etc.? I am an omni-sleeper, and they don’t make a pillow for me.

So this AM I am off to see Dr. Paul, my chiropractor par excellance, and get my head put back on properly. Then I am going to buy a pillow the same way I buy a loaf of bread.

Wish me luck.

P.S. I am opting out of the Japanese boyfriend pillow. The arm vibrates to gently wake you. No kidding.

The great Chicago architect Louis Sullivan said that “form ever follows function.” Most people think Frank Lloyd Wright said that, but his forms followed his fashion, not function. Beautiful stuff, Frank’s, but functional? Ask anyone who owns one of his places and tries to keep it dry and climate-controlled.

I was at a local ski shop a few days ago and by chance there was a waxing clinic going on, taught by Yuriy Gusev, a local ski coach who runs this great event called Capitol Square Sprints. He had an elaborate waxing set up, a fancy clamping table and a super-cool waxing iron. He wasn’t trying to make it rocket science; actually, he was trying to keep it simple. Some of the sycophantic crowd wanted to discuss the intricacies of waxing. ZZzzzZZzzzzzZzzzz….

My waxing set up ain’t much of a set-up…it’s a workmate knock-off that Jodie from Turtle Paddleworks left in my basement a few years ago after Canoecopia, and an iron that I bought for a dollar from a garage sale because the “steam burst” button was busted off. Combine that with a $6.00 tackle box full of various waxes, scrapers, and green pads and I’ve got a total of $20.00 invested, max.

The Toko T-12 waxing iron boasts that “precise digital temperature control and a powerful 1200 watt heating element makes this a favorite by techs on World Cup. Structure grooves in thick heat plate ensures maximum wax distribution on entire ski base.” All for a bargain price of $109.95. The optional cover is $18.95, and the holding rack to attach to your waxing table is another $29.95.

Anyone who knows me knows that I am not know for my frugality when it comes to gear. If there’s a lighter, better, stronger, faster, more expensive outdoor toy, I probably have two of them in my garage. So why am I such a smug, low-tech Luddite, poking fun at the waxing elite who use high-tech stuff?

Because I’m a hypocrite, I guess. Smugness is a Madisonian illness, feeling greener-than-thou because you are reusing your bread bags to scoop dog poop. I succumb once in a while, and I imagine this is one of those cases.

To those of you who use waxing irons, please mock my thirty-two canoe paddles and the canoes that go with them. I would be just fine with an aluminum Grumman, right?

So we took the kids to the Star Wars exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. Whitney enjoyed the stormtroopers and Boba Fett. “Thank you, Mr. Fett…” Sheesh.
There was also a cool exhibit on farming. Whitney and Ian sat on a cow and mooooed. They also took a ride in the John Deere tractor. It was a good day for museuming.