sweat tea and lemonade

...as my sister would sing.

i am counting down the hours before i hit the road with my baby (yes, the cat) and embark on a 10.5 hour drive to boone, cakilacky! woo hoo!

i need to revamp and recharge for a summer in the city. it has been a difficult couple of weeks, but i'm determined to enjoy every aspect of this trip, especially meeting my new niece!!! woo!!

more exclamation points!! woo!!

alright, maybe i have not had enough sleep the last couple of days. there might be a slight possibility that i am unprepared for the ridiculousness i have completely thrust upon myself. 10 hours?? ten and a half hours?? yes. i'm an idiot.


but i did want to drive instead of fly. i admit to having a momentary tinge of jealousy upon learning katrina is already in town after a very early morning flight. however, i am reaffirmed after reading of the latest "bird strike" on a flight at la guardia--the plane landed safely this morning and no one was hurt, though paramedics were called. this was what befell flight 1549 that landed in the hudson - it was attacked by the hordes of geese that live in manhattan.

now am i afraid of a hitchcokian geese attack? perhaps when i have to run through a stubborn flock of them, refusing to move from the path in the park, but i'm not particularly concerned that one might take my plane down. unfortunately for the geese, the city does not share my faith. new york will be culling 2,000!! of our geese in the next couple months. it's pretty sad, especially as the humane society is crying foul -hardy har- and saying the geese that took down the hudson river flight weren't New York residents at all, but migratory geese.

i'm not sure how i would expect them to get the job done, but i am sure i wouldn't have imagined that they would be trapped and gassed!! we might as well write the disney movie right now-- or maybe it would be more appropriate as Hayao Miyazaki film... dark and subtitled.

this started so happy and now it is saddies.

no! happy times! with a little bluegrass, featuring my uncle Jim and one of his bands to lead the way

didn't drown today.

alright. so yes at a brief glance it would appear that it was going to be a rainy day today. however, fridays have become my day to get in a 12 mile run and i really hate to loose that. welcome, my friend, to the magic of weather.com's radar satellite. on this nifty little site you have you can play forecaster with all your local weatherman's tools. the best part is you can watch several hours into the future, following the blobs of clouds against your map. which means genius me was able to map out today that leaving work at 4:50 should give me a window of 2 hours at least before those pesky green and yellow blobs brought rain down on me. perfect!

ah. bargaining with... Zeus? well, it started out well. bright and sunny, if a bit muggy. thinking of my precious time gap, i thought it best to pick up my pace a bit. so i threw on next to normal--yes, i know i have sworn off listening to this crazy music, but for running it is surprisingly inspiring--and rocked out.

that's right. i admit to singing loudly between my puffing. i'll have you know it is a talent. besides, everyone wears earphones these days or is talking on their cells. and i'm not the weirdest person out on the path.

it wasn't until about mile 5 that things began to look ominous. across the river into jersey it was peculiarly dark. and the wind had picked up to an eye-squinting blow that made running like fighting against one of those workout jet mini pools . however, i had faith in my studious reading of the maps and was sure the storm would stay over there for at least an hour. ha. ha.

truthfully, i don't mind running in the rain. yeah you end up a bedraggled, wet rat, with your clothes sticking to you, but it is kinda nice, as long as your ipod is safely covered with a handy ziplock bag, especially compared to blistering heat. plus, running in the rain always makes me think of running up kilimanjaro with john. rain over new york smells surprisingly similar in that first burst to rain in tanzania.

it was when the rain suddenly turned horizontal that things became bad. just how does rain fall horizontally anyhow? huge pellets piercing my left side, biting into my eyes and ears till i was running with a hand at my face just so i could see the step in front of me.

then came the lightening. what does one do when one is far away from shelter in a lightening storm? and i'm not talking just flashes. i'm talking about clear distinct bolts. bright blue, splitting the sky all around me. each time one rent the air, burning on my retina, i jumped and yelped like a schoolgirl. and the real ridiculous part, i'd leap backwards, as if dodging a foot behind would save me if one of those electric spikes came down in front of me.

in spite of the storm raging, i kept my headphones in and turned up the volume. now this may sound foolish, however, did you not read of the girl who survived 300,000 volts because the charge went through her ipod wire, saving her vital organs?? just last week?? well i did. and those bolts were freaking big. and right above me. and though cars crept by me on the freeway, i remember from my youth that lightning is supposed to bounce off car tires or something.

it did occur to me that it would be the height of irony to be struck by lightning while rocking out to next to normal--Alice Ripley is belting out her electroshock therapy and i fall down crisp. it would be a fitting end to my last two weeks.

despite all my self indulgent musings on the effectiveness of electroshock therapy to cure one's foul mood, the thought of looking straight into one of those bolts was putting a bit of the fear of god in me. i played an electrocuted patient once for a doctor exam. they bruised me up all over then bloodied up my ears, where my eardrums i guess had burst, blackened up my hands, where the bolt supposedly entered, and bloodied up my feet where the burst was supposed to have exited. cool in makeup. not cool in actual burning flesh.

i admitted momentary stalemate by mile 7 and huddled under a tree for a good ten minutes, still leaping at the increasing light display. was i actually saving myself at all under this sad little bush of a tree on the shore of the exploding hudson river? i have no idea.

though the rain didn't let up much, the lightning seemed to move a bit further into the city and i took off again.

why is it that playing in rainstorms or defying your parents by leaping through ocean waves in the middle of a storm is only exhilarating, with barely even a hint that you might actually suffer? by the end of my 12 miles, i was running by children playing in the water while their parents huddled under plastic sheets. true, the rain was much kinder, but the occasional bolt, like an afterthought, still had me leaping backwards--a funny syncopated jog.

does the worry come from being older and wiser? i don't know. i don't have any storm wisdom. or is it the responsibility itself that creates the fear? as a child, the stormy ocean was thrilling--because, even if i wanted to ignore them, subconsciously it was ultimately my parents' fault if i got struck down? out there by yourself, well you've got no one to blame but you. you have to find the escape route, come up with the death-defying plan.

"sheild eyes with hand and out run storm" isn't much of a plan.

no habla espanol

I find it rather sad that my very next post is yet again the trials and tribulations of walking my cat. my only excuse is that this past week has been rather overwhelming. the show that i'm in is about to open so rehearsals have ramped up, but that's not really a problem- i live for that type of business. no, between the rent-paying jobs and certain maddening individuals, i've been wishing for some kind of prescription that will allow me to turn off and on my ability to care, think, and feel. or at least something to reduce the anxiety and allow me to get a little sleep at night.

so with that in mind, i decided to spend the sunset at the park with my cat. phbbbbt. :p

it began well enough. hard to say whether she enjoys the outings or not, but i prefer to think that it gives her something to dream about outside of my four walls. the park is quite full these days. families with their lawn chairs and cabanas, kites and barbecues. i chose a spot rather far from the water this time, as Chui can't resist the water and it has a few too many bitey bugs if you sit for long. we did do our requisit creep to the water's edge to investigate, but then i hauled her back so we could bask in the sun. unfortunately it was enough to alert a couple of nearby toddlers to our presence.


they were delighted at a cat oudoors and Chui was remarkably behaved, though she did climb back to my arms after a bit too many exhuberant little hands. it was really baby Miguel that put her over the top. he would wander away, then wander back babbling as a two year old is want to do, then insisting in spanish things i couldn't begin to answer. he poked and grabbed, till Chui retreated to the bookbag, shaking. eventually she made her way back to my lap, but that left her little carrier free and the next time baby Miguel showed up he decided he was a cat. or at least that's what i got from the only word i could understand "meow! meeeeoooow!"


where was this child's parents?? how did i end up with a baby instead of a cat? a baby who proceded to throw grass on me, pick through my belongings, try to take my camera, my earphones. another child, a bit older and with some english, came over to drag the baby out of the carrier, but minutes later he was back, trying to squeeze into the holder, while Chui cowered in my lap.

ridiculous. we survived Miguel, and i huddled Chui against the cold wind, hoping to calm her before we gave up on the park. but we are still away from leasurely walks. and hopefully Chui will be dreaming sunshine and flying things and not of scary children.