Back to the Usual

It's been almost a week since I mentioned anything to do with Sam and I going for a walk. I figure I've shown enough restraint (plus I have nothing else going on) so let's take a look at a few of this week's pictures, shall we?

Sunday:
Once again we went to the farmlands of a week or so back.
Less mud = more dirt flying around = less manure smell.
Better? Worse? You tell me. 

Note the oncoming cloud of dirt and silt behind the trees.

Monday:
Bad weather = no walk = no pictures. We can all take the day off.

Tuesday:
Another walk through Neighboring Town Number One (or is this Neighboring Town Number Two? It's hard for me to keep track). Then, on to walk the path which follows the canal. I took a grand total of two pictures this day, one of which is this photo of a graffiti strewn rock.

Sam and I have passed this rock many times before but this is the first time it's been decorated with a declaration of... what exactly, I'm not sure.
I feel like there should be a big heart drawn in between "D Dog" and Jessie - and I mean more than the little heart she (presumably she) has put above the "i" in her name.

I have many questions about this.

Why are these names written so small and tentative? Is this is the beginnings of a budding romance? Does Jessie 'heart' D Dog? Does D Dog 'heart' Jessie? If so, where's the friggin' heart? Will there be a heart drawn in here at some point in the future? How will all of this inevitably end? Will this rock eventually end up painted over, preferably in black, maybe with something like, Jessie and/or D Dog Sucks written all over it? (Only a suggestion.)
Time, maybe, will tell.

My second photo is also of a rock (albeit, one embedded in a foundation)....

This is even more cryptic than the first rock. What is "Turn Side"? Who is "We" and why do "we" need "Turn Side" bad enough to have the exclamation point at the end of this powerful statement? And maybe most importantly, is any of this related to Jessie and/or D Dog?

This kind of stuff is becoming too much for me. I expect these walks to be physically exhausting. I am not prepared for them to be mentally exhausting, as well.

Onward...

Wednesday:
It was back to the Quabbin for us. Thankfully, unlike our last visit, the wind kept the black files at bay.
I won't bore you with a lot of redundant pictures (other than this first one)...

Here's one of Sam following a trail we happened along. Note how his arms aren't flailing in all directions as he swats away at black flies. Thank you wind (which was strong enough to give me a wind burn).

The trail dumped out at the backside of the dam. It's hard to convey the scale of this mound of dirt you're looking at - which, by the way, braces the aforementioned dam and which is all that stands between all of that water (in picture number one) and me hoofing it (sort of) up this trail.
(I didn't notice any water leaking through this massive dirt mound - and believe me, I was looking.)

Thursday:
Thursday, it was back to Jake's old college (sans Jake, unfortunately). Not much to look at here but I'll stick in a couple of obligatory photos...

Pretty, right?

Friday:
Today, it was back to the rail yard for a prolonged walk through the woods, across the Bridge of Death, past the odoriferous sewage treatment plant, then through a couple of winding roads, across the main street then over to the far end of the above mentioned canal side trail. You've been with us before so I'll only post a few photos...

You've only seen this view about a million times. But it's a view I love - so expect to see it about a million times more. Sam and I have bets on what they're planting this year (and when I say "bets", I mean, we're only wondering). So far, in years past, it's been either corn, strawberries, or pumpkins. Any guesses? Whatever it is, they mean business this year. For the first time, they've laid in what looks to be some heavy duty sprinklers.

Here's a view that I haven't posted before (I think). This is well past the Bridge of Death, as well as past the sewage treatment plant which, on this seventy-plus degree day, with no wind, had one of us (not me) dramatically coughing well beyond what was necessary. Anyway, the point (not mine) was well made.

Here's a photo taken at a picnic table we came across, about two and a half miles from where we started. This meant, of course, that we would have to walk another two and a half miles back to get to the car. If you do the math, this means ... we walked a lot.

So there you have it. This concludes this week's walking log (except, possibly, for tomorrow). One of these days, I'll post some coordinates for you to plug into Google Earth. Then you'll be able to join us. Or at least, pretend to.

Today's Observation from Semi-Self-Quarantine

I think my fingernails might be growing faster than usual.

Today's To-Do List

1. Eat Breakfast.
2. Wait around.
3. Think about ordering pizza for lunch.
4. Stare at wall.
5. Wait some more.
6. Maybe look out window.
7. Wait some more.
8. Wait some more.
9. Order pizza for lunch.
10. Wait around.
11. Eat some pizza.
12. Wait around.
13. Maybe something else.

A True Friend

Here’s a photo taken in early 1957. It happens to be a photo of two of my sisters, but more importantly, my two sisters happen to be sitting on one of the greatest backyard toys ever created (which I’m pretty sure has long-since been banned).

We called this ride, "the merry-go-round". I think the more formal name was “whirligig” - though I’ve also seen it referred to as the more pretentious “whirligig-gig”.

The way this thing worked was that each kid would pump back and forth in opposition to each other, and the more and faster you pumped, the more and faster you spun around in circles as you tried to hang on for dear life. That, in itself, may not sound too exciting (it was!), but that was only part of the fun. The other part of the fun was getting a friend on it who may have had, as it turned out, motion sickness.That was like a surprise bonus.

After only a few minutes of spinning around at near supersonic speeds, said friend(s) would halt the ride, stagger off for a few wobbly steps, drop to their knees - and then proceed to throw up. Great fun for all!

At least one friend couldn’t even watch all that spinning around without getting sick. How great is that?

But that's not all. Here's another story. This one has nothing to do with the functioning of the ride or with someone getting sick or anything like that. This is a tale of childhood innocence...

When I was little, I had a friend, who we’ll call “Page” (because that was his name). Page was a nice kid who sometimes displayed an extraordinary amount of poor judgement, such as liking to hang out with me.

Sometimes Page and I would go down by the train tracks and pick and eat wild blueberries from the bushes that grew along the gravel strewn banks - and we would pretend that they actually tasted good.

Sometimes, while we were down there, we would put pennies on the train tracks and watch as they got run over by a train. (Despite what you may have heard, doing this does NOT derail a train - no matter how many times you try.)

Sometimes we would walk out in the woods, dig a small hole, fill it with mud and dog poop, then lay thin sticks over the hole and cover the sticks with leaves. We called these our “booby-traps”. What we were expecting to trap, I have no idea. Dogs? Squirrels? Someone with a broken ankle? Who knows? Whatever we expected to trap, it was obviously nothing we would want to keep, seeings how whatever it was, it would have been covered with mud and/or dog poop.

Thinking back, we probably didn't intend to catch anything. We were probably just doing it for the simple pleasure of building a trap filled with mud and dog poop, and nothing more. Sort of like, “It’s all about the journey, not the destination” - or something like that.

Anyway, one day, for some long-forgotten reason, I got the great idea of tying Page to this merry-go-round. It wasn't like I lashed him sideways across the thing or anything like that. Being a true friend, I was considerate enough to tie him up while he was sitting on the seat.

Also like a true friend, it should be noted that I didn’t use some scratchy, hemp-type rope. I used a soft, heavy duty, cotton-type rope.

I’m not sure what the point of tying Page to the merry-go-round was. Probably another one of those journey-type things.

Anyway, after a while, it started to get late and before long, Page was getting called home for dinner. Time to untie Page.

The problem was, as hard as I tried, I couldn’t get Page untied from the merry-go-round. This was likely due to my top-notch knot tying skills, but it didn't help that his mother (a rather rough character) kept calling him and calling him. It's hard to untie skillfully tied knots when someone keeps yelling like that.

Still, it wasn't that big of a deal - until I, too, started to get called in for dinner.

Being the true friend that I was, I kept at it - but after a while, it became obvious that we were both going to get in trouble for being late, which was pointless. Why should we both get in trouble when only one of us was tied to the merry-go-round? It made no sense.

So... I went in to eat dinner.

About halfway through the meal, someone asked if Page went home. “No,” I said. “He’s still tied to the merry-go-round.” All of a sudden, everyone jumped up and ran outside to help get Page untied, like it was some big emergency. Apparently, it’s ok if other people disrupt dinner, but it's not ok when I do it. (Note the double standard.)

Turned out, no one else could untie Page, either. Dad finally had to cut the ropes to get Page off the merry-go-round. Even I could have done that - if I had been allowed to play with knives. (Yet another double standard.)

I don't know what Page told his parents about all of this, but whatever it was, it wasn't enough to bother them. He still came over to play and hang out all the time. This might have had something to do with the fact that his parents were the type of people that would send him out to play in sub-freezing weather to "toughen him up". Maybe they figured this entire tied-to-the-merry-go-round-for-half-a-day experience was just one more thing that would help in that department. Maybe I was doing them a favor.

Anyway, many years later, when we finally got rid of the merry-go-round, it still had a knot of rope tied to one of the cross bars - a remnant of the time Dad had to cut Page loose to set him free - and a testament to my excellent knot making skills.

Throughout the remainder of our grammar school days, Page continued to come over, joining me in digging more booby-traps, setting more pennies on the train tracks and god knows what else.

Some people, especially those with poor judgement, never learn. Thank goodness.

Optical Delusion

Want to see something weird? Sure you do.

I posted the above photo on Instagram the other day. It's a bunch of flowers (in case you couldn't tell)  which I spotted beneath a tree on, yes, yet another one of our walks. It looked so pretty and out of place - the only bunch like it we saw all afternoon.

The thing is, it looks like a pretty large patch, but it's really pretty small.

After I took the photo above, Sam decided that taking some pictures seemed like a pretty good idea and he snapped some too.

Here are a couple of pictures of Sam snapping his photos...

When I look at these photos, I feel like it's some kind of weird optical illusion - like Sam is way in the foreground and the bunch of flowers are way behind him. But no, they're all in the same plain! Amazing and weird, right?
(If you disagree, feel free to keep your opinions to yourself.)

Today's Playlist

I'm playing my Van Morrison playlist at home today - something I usually reserve for the car. This playlist is years old, probably twenty-five years or more. It's one I made back when the kids were small and boy, does it bring back memories...

This was in heavy rotation back then, back when we would go tooling around on our weekend adventures.

It doesn't get played as often as it used to - not due to a lack of interest - more due to a lack of little ones to share adventures with.

Regardless, it's still on my phone. It seemed like a good idea to play it on this grey, so-far low-key day. I'm not sure this was the wisest of ideas. Even though I'm home, I find it's making me feel a little homesick.

You would think I would know enough to shut it off. But no, I keep listening. Part of me feels like I should wallow in my oncoming borderline depression now, while I have the opportunity. Soon the sun will be coming out and it might evaporate. Better enjoy it while I can.

Here's a couple of videos. And because I know you're busy, the second "video" is music only - leaving you free to do other things.

Totally Not About Going for Another Walk

Just kidding, it is... sorry.

The thing is, lately, if I weren't posting about going for a walk, I wouldn't be posting about anything at all (except for maybe shucking five pounds of peanuts). I'll let you decide which is preferable.

It rained all day yesterday so Sam and I didn't get outside (hence, the shucking of the peanuts - which I'm pretty sure is what most people do on rainy days) - so we made up for it today.

The rain tapered off by late morning so we started weighing our possible route options for an afternoon walk. This is not as easy as it sounds. We're running low on ideas for places that are new and different - which explains our drive to the Quabbin the other day.

Today, as we were getting ready to retrace our well-worn path through Neighboring Town #1, Sam got an email from some family friends who talked about all of the walks they had been going on, and one place they mentioned was walking through Neighboring Town #2.

I'm not sure why I never thought of this. Old age? Fatigue? Old age? Probably a combination of all three. In any case, it sounded like an idea good enough to be my own, but we went anyway.

I've been to this area many, many times and several times, I've driven by here with Sam. But this is the first time we've walked this area as extensively, either alone or together.

It was a nice walk through a mostly rural area. Sam managed to deal with a brief whiff of the aroma emanating from a massive pile of cow manure - before suggesting we make a turn down an adjoining dirt road. And for the most part, we both managed to zigzag past the large and frequent puddles filled with mud, water or otherwise.

With today's walk, our grand total for walking this week (so far) is just under twelve miles. I'm pretty sure that this is more walking than I did for the entire year last year (excluding back and forth to the bathroom).

We may or may not get out again tomorrow. We'll have to wait and see. As I write this, it's raining out, yet again, hard - this time accompanied by thunder and lightning.

I guess we made it back just in time.

I don't know if this storm will clear out by tomorrow. If we do get out, I'm pretty sure it will be to Neighboring Town #1. They have a pizza shop we like, and Sam and I both agree that ordering a pizza to bring home after a long Saturday morning walk sounds like a pretty good idea - which, by the way, I sometimes have.

Anyway, here are more pictures...