maze meltdown
well, most of you have heard about our messy fwy collapse over the weekend. i'm still amazed (and relieved) that no one other than the driver was injured--i had at least one friend coming home over that overpass that night at about 2:30am--so i'm still a bit stunned. glad that the ferry was free, and today's commute was mostly uneventful (paid for a cuppa coffee to make up for my free ride this morning), but we'll see how the freeway and transit systems hold up over the next few months.

[photos below from sfgate.com, check out the nwzchik blog for updates as well...]

Labels: bay area, news, traffic

:: ewee 10:55:00 AM [+] :: 1 comments ::
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:: Saturday, April 28, 2007 ::

sfocc practice to sinbad's and back

still playing with google maps. this is our practice route from saturday, 4/28. gorgeous and sunny day, oc-6 novice and open women's crews. nice ride down, strong headwind going home about 10 mi. (open boat went to bay bridge, so they went more like 10.5 mi.) 25-30 minute pieces with ladders, leapfrog and the like to keep us focussed.
Labels: outrigger, paddling

:: ewee 8:00:00 AM [+] :: 0 comments ::
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:: Friday, April 27, 2007 ::

remembering baskie
after a lifetime of adventures, snackins, and snoozin... bask (baskie, basque, baskieboy, buddy, budster, lovechop, bladder of steel, breath of death) passed away on apr 6th, 2007.

he is very missed.
Labels: bask baskie dogs, baskie, dogdogdog, dogs, heartbreak, video

:: ewee 5:20:00 PM [+] :: 0 comments ::
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:: Saturday, April 21, 2007 ::

sfocc practice around angel island

playing with google maps (pretty cool little toy. hoping to get a nice road trip or something in on it...). this is our practice route on saturday, 4/21. nice flat oc-6 ride out, and bumpy oc-2 ride (with debdeb) back. total practice about 3-4 hours (no watch, sorry), and mebbe 12 miles, without much stopping for breaks (a yogurt before practice, and a gu during). my first run around angel island. woohoo!
Labels: outrigger, paddling

:: ewee 8:00:00 AM [+] :: 0 comments ::
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:: Friday, April 20, 2007 ::

The Guest House
by Rumi

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
...

[swamped, fried, and still no time, so a poem for today from miz kc's poetry flood.]
Labels: poetry

:: ewee 4:38:00 PM [+] :: 0 comments ::
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:: Wednesday, April 04, 2007 ::

poetry-schmoetry
welcome to poetry month, brought to me mainly by kc-from-kc.

last weekend i was at a memorial service for a close friend's mom, and one of the many moving readings was this poem by Marge Piercy below. the entire service touched me more than i'd expected it would (bad time to forget the tissues!) and it's left me with plenty more good stuff to chew on--including more poems to look up, which seems appropriate for poetry month.

To Be of Use
by Marge Piercy

The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.

I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.

The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.

found marge piercy's biography interesting and inspiring. not only for her political and "aberrant" behavior, but also for the fact of her having to eke out a living like the rest of us mortals, but continuing to write through it all.
She finds it important to like the routine of daily life in order to survive as a political writer in the long haul. In the past, when she did not have support at home, she has felt as if she were fighting on all fronts at once with no base. One gift Wood [her current husband] has given her is that warm place of support. She is a writer who feels guilty if she is not writing or writing enough.
...
In her poetry, she bears thanks to what she has been given as well as bearing witness to what is withheld from us and what is taken away. Piercy doesn't understand writers who complain about writing, not because it is easy for her but because it is so absorbing that she can imagine nothing more consuming and exciting at which to labor. So long as she can make her living at writing, she will consider herself lucky.

incidentally (or perhaps not incidentally, but speaking of npm), the essay by Charles Bernstein on why npm is bad for poetry is a pretty funny bit of reading. it includes such tidbits as: "This program is intended to promote safe reading experiences and is based on ARF's (Artificial Resuscitation Foundation's) founding principle that safe poetry is the best prophylactic against aesthetic experience." and it certainly sums up my experience of poetry (tho i'm learning...):
Go ahead, don't read any poetry.

You won't be able to understand it anyway:
the best stuff is all over your head.

And there aren't even any commercials to liven up the action.

Anyway, you'll end up with a headache trying to figure out
what the poems are saying because they are saying
NOTHING.

Who needs that.

Better go to the movies.
Labels: marge piercy, npm, poetry

:: ewee 3:25:00 PM [+] :: 0 comments ::
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