On the way back from Akron I broke a new personal travelling record. No, this wasn’t my millionth mile or thousandth segment. I sat next to the fattest man ever to fly on a US commercial jet. When some people fly, their knees touch the seat in front of them. This man’s stomach touched the seat in front of him. I am not making this up.
Poor guy. They put him in the middle seat in the last row. Chris cynically thinks they did that for better gas mileage. He’s probably right.
Jacob went to watch the dragon boating today, and found Burns Park near Harvard Square by accident. So when the boating was complete, we packed up our things, drove around in circles for half an hour, and played some hockey.
Let’s examine the state of Burns Park in detail:
Pros:
Cons:
So it’s a mixed bag. If the fences and sinkholes were fixed, it would be really excellent.
Of the 4 people who showed up to play with us, Jacob and I managed to get the best person on our team, and completely dominated. Oh, we only had one goalie, Joe, so we hung a duffel bag from the other net and had to hit that. Once we shook the teams up a little, and a new person showed up, it was a lot better. We really need a second goalie, though, because “hit the bag” started to become a lot harder than “beat Joe” as we all got tired. At first, when we were fresh and Joe was unbeatable, we really cleaned up on that bag.
Someone posted this retrospective about the week following Reagan’s death, and implies rather strongly that a large volume of stories about Reagan is a clear indicator that the “liberal media bias” doesn’t exist.
Whether there is a liberal media bias is not something that I have the energy to debate with most people, even this very one-sided debate where I write whatever I want and you consume it without question.
All I’m saying is that I bet he didn’t actually read those articles, because rubbish like this was likely included in his count.
And boy, was I ever surprised to see that kind of detritus come out of the Globe and Mail.
Zach arrived, only five hours late! I guess that first there was some kind of equipment delay. And then the President was landing or something, so they sat on the runway while that happened.
Those of you who believe I’m spoiled beyond all recognition, let me just point something out: one of us spent the day at home, moving all of his worldly possessions upstairs, and one of us went flying to Martha’s Vineyard to have lunch. Did they bring anything back? Noooooo.
I was reasonably happy with the movers who brought all of my furniture from the port, so we used them again. Not the exact same guys, unfortunately.
Because these near-competents hit every single wall with every single piece of furniture, in some combinatorial explosion of minor property damage. And they broke my desk. And they were not, by any means, the lowest bidder.
There are 3 phone lines coming into the house — one of which is not connected to any jacks on purpose — and three different sets of jacks, and the dispatch centre could not resolve this logical paradox in advance. So Verizon sent a pretty awesome technician out who, although his mind was wandering, did eventually solve the problem.
He wanted to climb the pole out front to switch things around, but it was rotten. So he wanted to climb the pole down the street, but that one was rotten too. So he called for a basket truck. Hours pass.
He comes back in the house after a while and I ask him “Why don’t you just switch it around in the basement?” A look of recognition passes over his face, he realizes he never asked the critical question, and he’s done in ten minutes.
The cable modem still works so far, but I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop. I give it about a week. It’s never just as simple as moving the modem.
I bought a pretty sweet 8 foot by 4 foot piece of showerboard to use as a whiteboard. Ten bucks. I got the drill bit stuck in a stud while hanging it, though, and needed some vice grips to get it out.
Zach has departed, after what I hope was an enjoyable stay. He was replaced — well, not really replaced, as such — by my father and one of my sisters. He’s in town to give some kind of sales pitch to Harvard, I gather.
He was not all that successful at hiding his disappointment when he saw at last the house that I bought. He has this adorable midwestern notion of what things should cost, so I think he had painted a mental picture of a 200-year-old stone mansion, with servant’s quarters, Olympic-sized pool with jacuzzi, and fleet of chauffeur-driven automobiles. He’ll adjust.
It should be interesting to see the look on his face when we have to pay $17 for parking tomorow.
Dad and Lucy hung out most of the day in Harvard Square, and I worked for most of the day. This is Lucy’s first time in anything that could be called a big city, so I imagine it’s pretty exciting.
We had a delicious dinner at Legal’s with minimal fanfare.
