A Minute-by-Minute Glance at Tuesday, April 24.
11:58 AM - Eat another stale tortilla chip. By my count, they're at least four weeks old.
11:59 AM - Think a lot about the word "buttress". This is actually a work-related thought.
1:33 PM - Despite a lunch of free pizza and crossword puzzles and a brief foray into Powell's, I'm still thinking about buttresses.
2:29 PM - Finish reading an article about "Bucolic Blacksburg, Virginia". Realized that I'm trying to forge some sort of connection to that university town, even though I didn't go to school there. Didn’t even consider it. My memories there mainly consist of regional cross country invitationals, late high-school shows in decrepit second floor apartments, a place to stop and get gas before continuing on over the New River to West Virginia and beyond - toward my own school in Ohio. I identify this need to hold on to something tightly, even if the only thing real connection I have with the situation is that I lived on the same wrinkle on the map as Virginia Tech.
2:55 PM - Talk to Peter. He's in Miami Beach where it's a sunny 80 degrees, whereas it's a rainy 55 here.
3:20 PM - My coworker is saying "Ja" on the phone rather than "Yes". This is driving me nuts.
3:59 PM - Think about how dogs apparently wag their tails to the right when they're pleased, and to the left when they're displeased (or so says the Oregonian). But this is confusing to me, because I didn't think dogs wagged their tails when they weren't happy? Please advise.
Wanderlust Strikes Again
Baia Mare. Budapest. Prague. St. Petersburg. Brasov. Krakow. Moscow. Ljubljana. Sarajevo. Reykjavik. Dubrovnik. Istanbul. Warsaw. Tallinn. Zagreb. Bratislava. Minsk. Odessa. Kiev.
I don’t know if we'll be able to take this one stateside.
the mississippi voyager
I've been trying to figure out how to write about this without sounding overly juvenile, but have been unable to do so.
On Monday, I picked up a phone call at work - it was an OIL TANKER that needed new chairs. And could I please come see them immediately? We (I went with my coworker Sarah) were given instructions to go to Swan Island, check in at the gate, receive our ID badges, and then go to Berth 313 (!) and wait for a Lieutenant (!) to come prepare us for boarding (!). Said lieutenant arrived and fitted us with hardhats, safety glasses, and steel-toed boots. Not that we were really dressed for steel-toed boots, but we made our way towards The Mississippi Voyager nonetheless, bare feet rubbing against the sides of aforementioned boots. It was so definitively a boat, in every sense - huge black hull, broad painted red band above with large white capital letters reading MISSISSIPPI VOYAGER. Even the name was characteristically nautical.
The lieutenant ended up taking us to the captain's quarters. YES!!! Sarah and I could barely contain our enthusiasm, and were out of breath while shaking his hand. He had sparkly blue eyes with unruly grey hair - exactly the way a captain should look.
I called dad that night to tell him about it, and basically spoke in caps lock the whole time: "DAD I WAS IN A BOAT!!! A BIG BOAT, A REALLY REALLY BIG BOAT!!! AND I GOT TO MEET THE CAPTAIN!!! AND HE GAVE ME A HAT!!!"
Aye Aye.
