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[APRIL 18, 2010] WITH THE END OF THE SCHOOL YEAR RAPIDLY APPROACHING, IT SEEMED THE RIGHT TIME TO TAKE A BOYS TRIP TO SOMEWHERE, BUT WHERE SHOULD THAT BE? Rishikesh seemed to be what we needed: close, at a bit of elevation and away from the big cities. So Gene, Troy, Chris, Kevin and I headed up on the early Saturday morning train. We skipped the camps on the river and headed to an air conditioned lodge.
A few days of guitar, bird watching from our porch, a hike and a bit of rafting was just what the doctor ordered! |
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[APRIL 10, 2010] A BIG WILDERNESS AREA ON THE EDGE OF DELHI WITH FIVE LAKES THAT ARE SO CLEAN YOU CAN SWIM? IMPOSSIBLE! BUT TRUE! With temperatures recently hovering around 110 degrees, we had to meet at 5am to head out to the Kant Enclave area, where we left our cars and headed into a surprisingly large wilderness area. We ran on the main trail through the middle to the other side and back, taking us past five clean lakes while running 21kms! On the way back we stopped at one of the lakes and had a swim, it was hard to believe we were in Delhi. No trash, no pollution and only a few people on the fringes of the area. In the future I'll definitely be spending more time there! |
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[APRIL 3, 2010] ROBYN HAD SIX DAYS OF LITERACY WORKSHOPS IN BANGKOK FOR SPRING BREAK, SO ZOë AND I WENT WITH HER. We saved money by eschewing the fancy conference hotel and staying around the corner in $30 a night jobber. I attended a simultaneous conference that coincided with the first few days of Robyn's training. Since I was taking care of Zoë (and childcare wasn't as convenient as we'd hoped), I wasn't able to make as many sessions as I'd wanted, but I made a few, including a very thought provoking keynote by Alan November on 21st Century Learning.
Since Robyn was in session most of the week, Zoë and I got tons of quality time together. We snuck into the pool at the conference hotel (the Sheraton) each day and rode the fancy Sheraton boat each day to the Skytrain, which whisked us above Bangkok's famous traffic jams to Starbucks coffee shops, glitzy malls and Ocean World.
We had fun eating thai street food and getting a family massage. Zoë got her nails painted and had a ball being fussed over for an hour - she didn't shut up! Our favorite restaurant was "The Deck", which was on the river and had great views of the Indian inspired Wat (temple) Arun. |
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[MARCH 10, 2010] A MIDLIFE CRISIS IS A HELL OF A THING TO WASTE. THAT'S WHY MY 40TH YEAR HAS SEEN ME EXPANDING MY HOMEBREWING, TAKING UP GUITAR AND ORGANIC GARDENING AND GIVING UP MEAT AND THE USE OF SHOES WHILE RUNNING. I can't wait to see what my 50th birthday brings!
My magazine subscriptions say it all; they have gotten a bit out of control: Zymurgy, Brew Your Own, Runners World, Acoustic Guitar, Organic Gardening , Cooking Illustrated, the Atlantic, Harpers and the Economist.
I've brewed more in the last year than in a long time and some of the results have been pretty good! It's always been challenging to get ingredients overseas, but last year we found a local supplier of liquid malt extract, which is the most difficult (and heavy!) ingredient to get, so that's been hugely helpful!
Guitar started as an idea at a party Christmas, 2008. Since then a group of friends has been meeting most Mondays in our apartment to learn guitar from my friend Gene, who has generously donated his time to hone his patience by trying to help us! It's been lots of fun!
Gene also helped us to start gardening, which has been lots of fun! I've been trying to see how much produce we can grow on the oasis of our balcony. So far, we've produced lots of tomatoes, basil, spinach and a variety of lettuces. Before it got very cold, we were just about producing all our own salad ingredients. Now that it's warming up again, the garden is picking up once again. I just ordered some great balcony furniture, so we're looking forward to spending even more time on the balcony when it arrives.
Running "barefoot" is an exaggeration, I've bought three pairs of "minimalist" running shoes. Each attempts to reproduce the experience of running barefoot by offering no support or help at all, beyond a millimeter or two protective layer on the bottom. The most eye-catching are my Vibram Five-Fingers, which fit each toe like a sock. Barefoot running it a bit of a fad at the moment, mostly fueled by the popular running book "Born to Run", which makes a bit of an indirect case for running as natural as possible. I'm not sure it's beneficial or that I'll even stick with it in the long run, but I've been enjoying it so far. I recently ran the Mumbai Half-Marathon in my five-fingers, and that worked well.
The last meat I ate was half-pound burger topped with a bratwurst and bacon at a brew pub in Madison on the last day of our summer vacation - what a way to go out! :) I originally stopped because it seemed like an easy and concrete way to reduce my carbon footprint. I have read that you can reduce your footprint by as much as 30%! That probably doesn't apply to everyone, but it probably does to me since I generally eat so much meat. Since then, however, I've also been been appalled by everything I've read about industrial food (particularly meat) in books such as the "The Omnivore's Dilemma", "Food, Inc" and "In Defense of Food" (all recommended). |
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[JANUARY 15, 2010] WE DIDN'T EXPECT TO SEE A TIGER, BUT WERE THRILLED WHEN WE DID. We had a three day weekend for President's Day, so we took the overnight train to India's oldest National Park, Corbett National Park. The train was perfectly timed such that we slept on the train overnight and woke up at the station near Corbett. We loved our accommodation at Camp Forktail, which was a charming camp consisting of 8 tasteful cabins and some very knowledgeable and friendly owners and staff. NIghts at the camp were particularly fun, as the stars were amazing and everyone socialized around a campfire.
Our second day we woke up early to do a full day safari in the park. After a few hours of tracking tigers, we were rewarded when a beautiful tiger walked right by our jeep and up the road. We followed him at a distance for about 20 minutes. In addition to the tiger, we had fun spotting and watching the more common animals, such as deer, monkey and Hornbills. |
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