jimpretzer

We planned a big family trip to celebrate Z graduating from High School and X graduating from college.  However, it took a while (i.e. a year) to get our act together.  After quite a bit of debate and indecision, we finally planned a week in Belize planned and now we're back.

It was quite an adventure.  Think Indiana Jones without the head-hunters.  The high point was Actun Tunichil Muknal, former entrance to the Mayan underworld, where you ford the river three times hiking to the entrance and have to swim to get into the cave. You then climb, swim, and wade to get to beautiful formations and the remains of hundreds of Mayan sacrifices (including a number of human sacrifices).  It is hard to believe that they let tourists in.

Other cool experiences included the Mayan ruins at Cahal Pech and Xunantunich, a velvety black tarantula that got into our room somehow, wandering around San Ignacio and Hopkins Village, riding Belizean buses, and playing "Contact" in the evening as beetles and moths dive-bombed us. 

The Belizean people were very friendly.  How often do you have a car-load guys pull up along side you as you're walking down the road to ask if you're enjoying your stay in their village?  They have many distinct cultural groups (Mayan, creole, mestizo, hispanic, garifuna, and immigrants of all sorts) but there seems to be very little tension between groups.

Of course coming back means dealing with all the work that piled up while we were gone, helping Z get her armor finished, and getting ready for NOWM but for once the hassle of coming back doesn't overwhelm the fun of the trip.

So I'm carrying a box from my office out to the car this morning and as I'm walking across the parking lot I glance over into the woods.  There's a six-foot palm tree standing there in the woods in Ohio!  OK, when I looked closely, it turned out to be growing in a big pot, but still it's strange to see a palm tree in the woods in Ohio.

I've heard of people abandoning unwanted pets in the woods, but unwanted palm trees?

A pox upon my halting tongue. It doth no justice to the bard of bards on this Talk Like Shakespeare Day.  Shouldst thou require assistance, prithee get thee to http://www.talklikeshakespeare.org/ or to the Shakespeare Insult Kit, thou artless, beef-witted barnacle.

I caught up with my email during lunch and LJ during afternoon snack.  Now all I have to do is catch up with my to-do lists (don't hold your breath).

We had a great weekend visiting X and Z in Boston (Z took the bus up to join us).  Tapas, museums, shopping, seafood, karaoke, games, a Girlyman concert, Peruvian food, and great icecream.  It was lots of fun hanging with the kids and the drive wasn't bad.  It was really strange driving through heavy snow on the way back.  With big, wet blowing straight towards the car in the headlights it looked like we were going into warp drive.

Our upcoming family trip to Belize looks like it will be quite an adventure (think Indiana Jones without the rolling boulder).  Now, back to work.

Warm, rainy, Snowdrops blooming, cold, rainy, seeds ordered (even a few planted), rainy, an enormous possum walking up the driveway, Z home for Spring Break, sunny, rainy, cool stuff at the What On Earth sale, rainy, thrifting, rainy.

Besides that, it's great to have Z home for a week.  We've been hanging out and talking, playing a text adventure, shopping for cool stuff, and went to a good high school production of Hair with her and two friends.  In addition to trying to figure out how to finish Z's armor, I finished my hardened leather gauntlets.  Tomorrow I'll find out if I can actually handle a sword while wearing gauntlets

It will be great to go visit X in a few weeks.  We're planning tapas, karaoke, a trip to Salem, and a Girlyman concert.

Speaking of Girlyman, they'll be performing at the Oberlin Folk Festival, May 1.  Stay tuned for details when the Folk Festival gets this year's web page up.

Having to work half a day on Saturday isn't great, but teaching went well and in the other half of the day I was able to work out a pattern for hardened leather gauntlets (for cut-and-thrust swordplay) and I got the first one made.  It fits well, looks cool, and I think I'll be able to handle a sword while wearing it.  We'll see once it dries completely and I get the other one made.

On the sword-fighting front, B is giving rapier a try and is having fun with it.  Watch out kids, Mom's armed and dangerous.

We're also getting costumes together for a murder mystery set in 1900's Paris.  I found a tuxedo in a thrift shop cheap and B found a black lace dress with a fringe that goes great with her red feather boa.

Too bad we have to spend time earning a living, playing is more fun.

See Coraline.
See it in 3-D.
Watch the credits all the way to the end.
Allow some time for your brain to readjust to reality afterwards.

Even though I'm a big fan of Neil Gaiman I hadn't gotten around to reading Coraline yet and I went into the movie without a clear idea of what to expect.  It was really good (and strange, and creepy) and they used 3-D well.

It was also strange because when we walked out of the theater the snow was falling in enormous postage-stamp-sized flakes that recapitulated a scene in the movie.

Round One - Wake up, look out window, go out and shovel dog run (they're short dogs, they can't pee in 6" of snow), shovel driveway and sidewalk, dig car out of snowdrift, shovel dog run again, shower and have breakfast.

Round Two - Dress for work, slog through snow-covered city streets, pull onto freeway, drive to the west-side on snow-covered freeway (35 mph max) until I-480 comes to a complete stop.  Get off at exit and cut over to Brookpark in the hopes of still making it to office, Brookpark is moving at 5 mph max, call B at home, get phone numbers for clients, call and cancel appointments, turn around and head home.

Round Three - Dodge two different drivers who just stop in the middle of the road to scrape their windshields (one of them was on I-480 in the right lane not on the shoulder), pull into driveway and discover that the snowplow has deposited a nice pile of snow across the driveway, make it up the driveway on third try.

Next - Shovel dog run and driveway again.

Actually, I'm in a surprisingly good mood.  Now I get a snow day!

I've finally started reading Endless Blue by Wen Spencer and it is off to a really good start. Complex characters, an interesting world, and a fast-paced, engaging story.  I know, I know, I should have gotten to it long ago but I've been busy and it got buried on my nightstand.  If you aren't  familiar with Wen you should definitely give her a read.  The hard question is which to start with, Tinker (Pittsburgh transits to faerie, adventure ensues) or Alien Taste (a foundling raised by wolves and working for a private investigator gets involved in investigating a bizarre murder, adventure ensues).  If Endless Blue continues the way it has started, it will be up there with Wen's best.

Life's way too busy, but good.  it was great to have the kids home for Thanksgiving.  We had our traditional Thanksgiving - Peking Duck with all the trimmings, playing games together, and the kids' friends coming over.  The food at the 100th Bomb Group was really good and dancing was lots of fun.  We bought 4 bags full of cool stuff at the What On Earth sale including prizes for the rapier tourneys at the January Event, now all I need to do is plan the tournaments.  Between work, getting ready for the holidays, and the rest of life there isn't much spare time.  With the snow coming down and Xmas songs on the radio it is feeling very Christmasy.

And now WKSU is playing a Girlyman  song.  Very nice.

Is it only me or is the idea of a war-themed restaurant a strange concept (http://www.100thbgrestaurant.com/)? ; However, B and I are getting back into ballroom dance after 20+ years away from it and the restaurant reportedly has good food and a live band for dancing on Tuesday evenings.  We were all set to go tonight with friends from work when they foresight to check and make sure tonight was the night with the band.  Oops, the schedule has changed.  We'll have to wait a couple of weeks.  Instead we went to a swing class, so we got some dancing in anyway.

My other new project is trying to learn to fight sword and buckler in the style of the i.33 manuscript (http://freywild.ch/i33/i33en.html). ; I took a class on it at the Known World Academy of the Rapier last weekend and I borrowed a DVD on it from Wulfgar. It is an interesting style designed for unarmored combat and would be period for my persona.  Now all I have to do is figure it out and practice a lot.

If it wasn't for work, I'd get a lot more dancing, fencing, and writing done.