tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-91009942024-03-21T13:20:30.143-05:00Hurricane Mikey<i><b>Live every day as if it were your last, for some day you are sure to be right!</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.comBlogger1799125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-91035243873183329252015-01-28T12:41:00.003-06:002015-01-28T13:10:19.268-06:00The Irony of Dozing Off in Starbucks<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I had two cups of coffee when I got up at 6:30 this morning (my day off). I headed out to a local deli for breakfast and had another cup with my eggs and hashbrowns. But since I couldn't get their free wifi to cooperate, I walked down the block to Starbucks. And I've had a large (Tall? Venti? Hell I still don't understand their post-modern metric system they use here) hazelnut latte, and I swear I could doze off in this chair right now, but I worry that the people in here might draw on me with Sharpies.<br />
<br />
I don't know why I'm so tired today, but the caffeine just ain't cuttin' it for me this morning. It may be the last month of work catching up to me, but I'm not sure. I'm still fighting mild cold, and I guess that has worn me down a bit too.<br />
<br />
Aside from being tired, I'm feeling pretty damn good today. I got a lot done at the house this morning--every stitch of clothing I own is clean, hung up, or folded and put away (except for what I'm wearing right now), I organized my closet, and my to-do list is surprisingly short. The afternoon is mine! Of course, I had to vacate the house for a few hours--the maid service is there, and while they do a GREAT job, their approach to housecleaning is to burn down the village in order to save it, and I want no part of the chaos that goes down while they work. So I grabbed my laptop and backpack and I'm taking advantage of the free wifi at my local Starbucks.<br />
<br />
Of course, I'd rather be sitting in the Fireside Lounge at the Peppermill, smoking a cigar and tapping the keys while Krista the bartender pours me free drinks, but Monday mornings in Vegas were a lifetime ago. <br />
<br />
At least then, things were settled, well, as far as I could tell. My life right now is completely unsettled. I have no idea what I'll be doing or where I'll be living in May. I may still be here doing the same job for the same company, I may be in another city working for them, or I may be looking for something else. I may be back in Nashville, I may be back in Vegas, or hell, I may even become an honorary Canadian and move to British Columbia. I just don't know. My life is like a spinning plate right now--lots of movement but not really going anywhere, and it's gonna fall off this balancing stick in a few months. I just have no idea where it's gonna land when it does.<br />
<br />
Kind of unsettling, but I always manage to land on my feet.<br />
<br />
On the other hand, I have something good to look forward to in the meantime. My gal Nancy arrives in less than two weeks for a nice lengthy visit and we're going to narrow down our choices as to where life is going to go from here. It'll be great to have her here instead of 3500 miles away, and maybe, just maybe, we can get a clearer picture of the future.<br />
<br />
Those of you that know me know that I always wanted to live by the ocean, but now that I do, I really miss the mountains and the woods. Besides, life in Florida is TOUGH. Jobs are hard to come by, and well-paying jobs are EXTREMELY hard to come by. I really like my job a lot, but it's the least amount of money I've made in almost 20 years. I need to have a better income. It really makes me miss the short hours and the good money that came from dealing poker in Vegas. I easily work ten times harder now for about a third of the money.<br />
<br />
That being said, my job at the airport has been a wonderful blessing for me. I'm on my feet literally all day, and I use that Ten Thousand Steps app on my phone to measure how much walking I do every day. Most days are at least seven or eight miles, some days stretch out to thirteen or fourteen. It sure beats sitting on my ass in an office cube or even at a poker table. I've got to find a better balance of income and exercise somehow, although I'd love to stay with my current company forever. So who knows how it's all gonna happen.<br />
<br />
But at the very least, it has improved my health--I posted a couple of pictures on Facebook of me wearing a coat I bought last year. I thought I was in good shape last year (well, compared to what I was before 2012), but this coat was a 2XL down jacket I needed for hiking. It didn't fit very well--I couldn't zip it up, and in fact, it wasn't even close--the gap was at least six inches across the front when I wore it last spring up in the mountains in Georgia. <br />
<br />
Today I took it out of the closet and tried it on for the first time in almost nine months. And I could finally zip it up. Although it's still a bit snug, it's quite a victory. I haven't fit in *anything* size 2XL since like 1992. Of course I still have a ways to go, but I'm getting there.<br />
<br />
Maybe on my next attempt of the AT, my knee won't blow out like it did this past year.<br />
<br />
Yeah, that's still on the horizon, and I still have that book I want to write, so wherever I land, it may be just temporary again. My outlook on life/work/career has been completely turned upside down by the events of the past few years. While it's nice to make good money and live comfortably, I now look at life differently. Work is just a means to an end and I don't let it define me. Back in the day, I absolutely loved loved loved working at Charles Schwab. Great people, a great company, and I enjoyed my daily routine immensely. But when push came to shove and times got tough, I was kicked to the curb, with no consideration given to my dedication or the fact that I gave my heart and soul to them. Every other job since then hasn't been quite as enjoyable, although I really liked the poker gig in Vegas. But even then, five years of dedicated service doesn't mean too much when the people in charge were complete buffoons. The poker room I worked in doesn't even exist any more. <br />
<br />
Nowadays, I just do my best and remember that loyalty is a one-way street. I try to make myself an asset instead of a liability, and then I suppose I'll move on when the time is right. Besides, you'll never get rich punching the clock for somebody else. I just need to make enough of a stake to do the things I want and still be able to invest a bit. So while whatever lays beyond my horizon is a big unknown, I'm pretty sure that it'll all work out okay.<br />
<br />
At the very least, I'll be able to sleep at night, no matter how much caffeine is in my system.<br />
<br />
<b><i>Mikey </i></b><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-42878123971629011252015-01-21T07:41:00.003-06:002015-01-21T07:41:52.259-06:00Twofer Tuesday on a Wednesday<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Oh yeah, I had every intention of putting up a second post yesterday, but the time just got away from me. I had that first one up and going before 9:00 and then had the whole day ahead of me to do with as I pleased.<br />
<br />
Pretty much all my chores were done and I had no errands to run, so I decided to go catch a movie--something I hadn't done since last May.<br />
<br />
I really wanted to see American Sniper since I'd heard nothing but good things about it. And although I'm not sure, I *think* I may have read the book a couple years ago. I honestly don't remember. <br />
<br />
What a drag it is getting old. <br />
<br />
But since I had the entire day to myself, and it was a Tuesday, I figured I'd make it a twofer and hit two movies...<br />
<br />
I drove over to Bell Tower in Ft Myers, and the tractor beam of Grimaldi's was indeed hard to resist. Yes, Grimaldi's is right across the parking lot from the movie theater. But since I'd made myself a homemade egg McMuffin for breakfast just an hour before, I was able to steer my feet towards the movieplex instead of the pizza parlor.<br />
<br />
Big line at the theater on a Tuesday morning. And oh by the way, this being Ft Myers, I was the youngest person by a good thirty years. Which reminds me--if I somehow manage to make it past 75 years old or so, I'm totally gonna hang out down here and pick up chicks, because the old women down here outnumber the old men about five to one. But I digress...<br />
<br />
Anyhow, it seemed that most folks had the same idea yesterday--go see American Sniper at the matinee. They had it playing on three screens, and the one I got into was pretty full, not many empty seats at all. And yeah--it was a great movie, totally worth all the hype. Bradley Cooper does an excellent job and it was certainly an Oscar-worthy performance, although I have absolutely no idea who or what he's up against this year. The thing is, just last week I re-watched Silver Linings Playbook (my brother had never seen it before), and caught myself thinking he (Cooper) is really an excellent actor. <br />
<br />
If you haven't seen the film yet, I'm not here to do a long review or give away any spoilers, but it's a damn good movie, and at times very intense. And it'd been a long time since I'd been to a movie that got applause at the end, too. Well worth seeing if you haven't already.<br />
<br />
When it ended, people were lined up outside all the way to the front door waiting for the next showing, so the word is out. Go see it if you get a chance.<br />
<br />
I had about forty minutes to kill before my next flick, so after waiting in line behind all the old codgers to use the facilities, I went over to one of the smaller theaters on the other side of the complex to wait for the next movie to start.<br />
<br />
My choice for round two was Wild, with Reese Witherspoon. It's also gotten a lot of hype, at least in my extended and far-reaching circle of hiker friends, because it was based on the book by Cheryl Strayed, her autobiographical tale of trying to get her head right by dropping everything and hiking most of the Pacific Crest Trail. It was better than I expected and I think it struck a good balance between chick flick and adventure movie (unlike f*cking PEARL HARBOR, but don't get me started on that rant...)<br />
<br />
I have to say that I was a little surprised at the nude scenes--of course I'm totally cool with seeing Reese Witherspoon nekkid, but I honestly don't think it really added any value to the story. It would've been just as good without it, but hey, I guess you gotta sell tickets. Still a pretty good movie, not so much about hiking as it is about taming your demons, but I really enjoyed it. <br />
<br />
After the mini film festival, I texted my bro Tim to meet me for dinner up at a little hole-in-the-wall joint called Jalapenos. Good Mexican food is *tough* to find here in southwest Florida, but everyone around here says that this is the spot, and it's been on our to-do list for awhile. Besides, I've been craving a carne asada burrito--I haven't had one in like three years.<br />
<br />
It's a small and divey place, so we knew it had to be good. But there was no carne asada burrito on the menu. They had a carne asada platter, but said that they could make it a burrito, no problemo at all. Sold! It came with rice and beans of course, and while I went with a side order of beef taquitos, Tim had the same thing except with a side of house-made tortilla chips and pico de gallo.<br />
<br />
It was all pretty good, although my carne asada burrito wasn't exactly as I'd hoped--they put the lettuce and tomato and such inside, so while I was craving an Alberto's Taco Shop style burrito, it was more like 'combinacion numero ocho' wrapped in a tortilla. Still pretty damn good, but I think next time I'll just have the carnitas. On the other hand, we both agreed that the beans were the best damn beans we'd ever had in a Mexican restaurant, anywhere. Yeah, they were that good. If we weren't so stuffed (we took half of our meals home in to-go boxes), we would've ordered a couple of pints of beans just to eat with tortillas at home. I'm not sure how they cooked them, but they were like a magical hybrid of charros and refritos. So damn tasty. Tim and I both gave the place an enthusiastic thumbs up, so we'll be going back. <br />
<br />
Once we got back home, it was a Moonshiners marathon for a couple of hours before bed. I don't watch much TV anymore unless it's live sports or Netflix, but somehow I always manage to get sucked in to watching the hillbillies law-dodging shenanigans.<br />
<br />
Today, I have no plans at all to go anywhere or do too much. We're having the neighbors over for dinner tonight, so my contribution is Scottie's roasted-garlic and caramelized-onion mashed potatoes. They're so good, people want to just eat 'em in a bowl like ice cream. Tim is making his famous cow-pig-turkey meatloaf (the next step in the evolution of the Turducken!), so tonight's meal shall be epic.<br />
<br />
Maybe I'll take a couple of pics. Since it was Twofer Tuesday and all...<br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey </b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-65220821184280798062015-01-20T08:13:00.002-06:002015-01-20T08:13:35.511-06:00Oooooooh That Smell<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Chaos. <br />
<br />
You know how it's been said that if a butterfly flaps it's wings in China that it'll cause a tornado in Texas? (Or something like that--my Google-fu is not strong today) Well, at this point, I tend to agree, but I'd change it to say that if an airplane breaks down somewhere on the other side of the country it'll eff up my whole week, because that's the absolute truth. <br />
<br />
My new job, working for an airline, has kept me super super busy for the past few weeks, and this morning is my first two-day break in the action since before Christmas. And even though I'm in sunny Florida with no weather delays, the rest of the country, well, not so much. Basically, my point is, yeah I'm getting back to writing on a regular basis, but I've felt like I've been living at the airport like Tom Hanks for the past month, and my time at the keyboard has been severely limited. Plus, the more I think about it, I work about two or three times as many hours a week as I did back in Vegas dealing poker, but I make less than half of the money I used to, so there is obviously a glitch in the Matrix somewhere...<br />
<br />
Anyhow, I hope y'all enjoyed my story about my Memorial Day hike in the mountains, because if I had myself a DeLorean with an aftermarket flux capacitor installed, I'd totally go back to that point in time and take a do-over on 2014.<br />
<br />
I ain't gonna lie--it's been a tough year.<br />
<br />
After busting up my knees on Blood Mountain in April and deciding to come to Florida, things haven't quite worked out the way I've planned. It took me FOREVER to get a job down here, and yeah, I've got a job that I really like, but the money is about as low as it gets, and I'm just on a contract anyways--I may be out of a job completely in May, or I may be offered a permanent, but part-time position, or I may get another position somewhere else in the country. I honestly have no idea. <br />
<br />
But the desire to complete a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail and <i>write a book about it</i> still burns within me, and somehow I've got to make that happen--sooner rather than later. Jobs and moving and all other real-life issues somehow have to fall into place, and I still can't see the forest of that particular goal due to all of these pressing and unknown trees. And once I got here to Florida and settled in last May, I put up all of my backpacking gear in the storage unit and have kept it compartmentalized, tucked away and kept secret, like Mel Gibson's footlocker with the combat tomahawk in The Patriot. <br />
<br />
So right now, my life is pretty routine--wake up early, drive an hour to the airport, spend all day on my feet working my arse off, drive home, sleep, lather, rinse, repeat... Most days I feel like a zombie on autopilot (with a mild-to-moderate case of road rage, of course, because these fools in Florida are the worst drivers ever, and I spend entirely too much time behind the wheel of my truck).<br />
<br />
Anyhow, yesterday, while I was driving to work, sitting in traffic, I reached up and scratched my chin for no particular reason, and was mildly grossed out because there was a bunch of un-rinsed shaving cream gooing up my beard. I felt around behind the seat, looking for a napkin or a towel or even an old t-shirt to wipe my face with, but came up empty. So not only was my face a mess, but my hand was all sticky too. Not good.<br />
<br />
I flipped open the center console, hoping to find something in there I could use to clean myself up before I got to work, and underneath the pile of junk like old pens, stray batteries, a pocketknife, a flashlight, loose change, a year-old cool ranch Dorito, I found a packet of moist towelettes, specifically a travel pack like the one pictured above.<br />
<br />
A word about them--they are a PERFECT accessory for camping and backpacking. When you're sweating your you-know-what off and wearing the same stinky synthetic clothes for days on end, one of the few luxuries you are afforded in the woods at the end of a long day is a wet-wipe hooker bath. I always carried a pack with me in my toiletry kit, and fifteen moist towelettes will last several days on the trail.<br />
<br />
But since I've been back in civilization for so long, I'd forgotten about the simple pleasure they afforded--until yesterday with my gooey beard and sticky hand.<br />
<br />
And everyone knows what an amazing psychological trigger that scent can be. Well, I opened up that package to tidy myself up there at the stoplight, and as soon as the smell hit me, I was taken back to a much happier place.<br />
<br />
I was lying in my tent at the end of a very hard day, at a place called Lance Creek. My hiking partner 'Itchy' was a few feet away in her own tent, and we were laughing our asses off while writhing around taking our nekkid wet-wipe hooker baths before changing into 'clean' dry clothes and making dinner. Such good times and such good memories, even though I was as tired and beat as I'd ever been. It also reminded me of a freezing cold morning changing clothes and using the facilities in the privy at the Stover Creek shelter a few days before, while a line of hikers waited outside to do the same thing. <br />
<br />
I honestly hadn't used one of those wet-wipes since then, and when the smell hit me, it just took me right back to the trail. Sitting in traffic, swearing at other drivers, spending the day at the airport, all of that disappeared for a few minutes while I wistfully cleaned off my beard and wiped off my hands. I missed the cold and the misery of Blood Mountain. I missed the camaraderie of sitting around the firepit with ten or eleven other random hikers at night eating dinner, but having no fire because everyone was just too damn tired to gather wood and start one. I missed the first drink of cold clear water from a mountain spring after running out a couple hours earlier. I and really missed how excited I was to crawl into my tent just before sundown and think to myself that I earned every minute of sleep I had planned for the next eleven hours. <br />
<br />
It turned out to be a very long day at work yesterday, and as much as I like doing what I do, it was nice to be able to revisit old memories to remind me of what I'd rather be doing. And yeah, I'm definitely going back at some point.<br />
<br />
Wet wipes.<br />
<br />
Seriously, inspiration comes from the strangest places. <br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-23768234630155070132015-01-08T20:08:00.002-06:002015-01-08T20:25:22.600-06:00As Promised...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I know it's been a long time, and yeah, I've had the writing itch, but y'all know how life can get in the way. So much has happened in the past year and and a half and there has been so much chaos, boredom, frustration, happiness, etc. etc. etc.<br />
<br />
For those that don't know, I am no longer living in Tennessee, and I ended up living outside of Ft. Myers, Florida, in a nifty little community called Cape Coral. I thankfully no longer have that horrible job at Comcast that I hated so much, and I'm lucky to have a fun job working at the airport. But I'm on a seasonal contract, so chances are very high that once the busy season moves on, so will I. So my life is still a bit unsettled, to say the least. I have no idea where I'll be living six months from now and I don't even know if I'll be working for the same company. I just have to ride it out.<br />
<br />
But I'll fill in the details as I can. In my head I've played out all the different scenarios hundreds of times, and like an equation with too many variables, it's an unsolvable problem right now.<br />
<br />
In the meantime, I realized that my last post from May of 2013 talked about a Memorial Day weekend trip and the chances of me winning the $600 million Powerball. Well, I took the trip, but didn't win the lotto. And as promised, what follows is what I said I'd write way back then...<br />
<br />
<b>Weekend in the Mountains</b><br />
<br />
I hated my job--it was just a means to an end, and I took advantage of every chance I had to get away from that toxic environment. I had scheduled five days away over Memorial weekend--usually it was a camping trip with family and friends on tap, but this time around, I had a grander scheme in mind.<br />
<b> </b><br />
I'd gotten into hiking and backpacking, and had been planning a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail for 2014. But I'd never really been tested on a long trip all by myself. I had all the gear, read all the books, taken a few short overnight trips and done lots of dayhiking, but I wasn't sure I had what it took to do actual backpacking. So instead of the usual car-camping trip with the hippies, I decided to head for the Georgia mountains for a few days to see about this whole Appalachian Trail thing for myself.<br />
<br />
It's about a four-and-a-half hour drive from Nashville to my dad's house on the outskirts of Atlanta, and on my first day off I slept in, made a pot of coffee, and loaded my new Osprey backpack with all of my latest gear, plus food for four days on the trail.<br />
<br />
I left Nashville around 11:00 that day, which in hindsight was a mistake--that put my in Atlanta at the peak of rush hour. I totally remember sitting in traffic that day, as the XM satellite radio was featuring an all-Tom Petty station that week. So I spent the entire drive listening to nothing but Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.<br />
<br />
I had dinner and a nice visit with my dad and step-mom, and the next morning my dad drove me about 45 minutes away to the visitors center at Amicalola Falls State Park, the gateway to the Appalachian Trail. I signed in at the ranger's station, and weighed by pack. With all my gear, food, and two liters of water, I would be carrying 37 lbs with me.<br />
<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiranfMXlAftuaLwbDLju3aO_JsdSh7v7XHsK0HkrXVt8dtyVtNddCkQbiA9Osc9m8IQPnZxn29IA3siYZQtXXLFBLZ3Tcj445U-bg0tK4iR3MuI1uOysSfky6QYAykLQ_XJlVk/s1600/IMG_0281.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiranfMXlAftuaLwbDLju3aO_JsdSh7v7XHsK0HkrXVt8dtyVtNddCkQbiA9Osc9m8IQPnZxn29IA3siYZQtXXLFBLZ3Tcj445U-bg0tK4iR3MuI1uOysSfky6QYAykLQ_XJlVk/s1600/IMG_0281.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My pack hanging from the scales at the beginning of my adventure</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">.</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
After changing out of my street clothes into all-synthetic hiking gear, we drove around the park a bit to take a few photos, plus the requisite picture of me under the arch at the beginning of the Approach Trail.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXQpSwZ2hWzSldmJyo2djF3y0ulTMGUB4qHZysuNypUDjIDlvluIvTOJ_Aomd0yBnEC3V5aSQ0zMg8y6Bm00z9eSrLaYR32IricbJVL3-BCPd_6lyn8cZIOJNA_HwRMRt7Suj-/s1600/IMG_0280.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXQpSwZ2hWzSldmJyo2djF3y0ulTMGUB4qHZysuNypUDjIDlvluIvTOJ_Aomd0yBnEC3V5aSQ0zMg8y6Bm00z9eSrLaYR32IricbJVL3-BCPd_6lyn8cZIOJNA_HwRMRt7Suj-/s1600/IMG_0280.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Your humble scribe at the Arch. I had no idea what I was in for.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUG8EA985rv6mw31FeG6Elo5WdpaJnuuPiMUJTPSVP-icr8FKk9Bm6egIdiqvx3MhadJBj2E_q3w0FQbPKeCDz0zvXe0KoOfGiUOIy88lPQQBIvq2stLdDMtqQ1pCiN3n6htYH/s1600/IMG_0278.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUG8EA985rv6mw31FeG6Elo5WdpaJnuuPiMUJTPSVP-icr8FKk9Bm6egIdiqvx3MhadJBj2E_q3w0FQbPKeCDz0zvXe0KoOfGiUOIy88lPQQBIvq2stLdDMtqQ1pCiN3n6htYH/s1600/IMG_0278.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Amicalola Creek, below the falls. It was absolutely gorgeous.</td></tr>
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What is the Approach Trail, you ask? Well, the actual Appalachian Trail (we'll call it the AT from now on) starts at the summit of Springer Mountain, Georgia, which is eight-and-a-half miles uphill from the Arch, which is just outside the back door of the aforementioned ranger station. My plan was to hike from Springer to a place called Neel Gap, which is 32 trail miles away. I knew I didn't have enough time to add another eight-plus miles to the hike, plus I just didn't want to climb all 600 stairs up the side of the falls, not to mention a full day of nothing but uphill hiking. Deep down I knew I just wasn't in good enough shape for it. <br />
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You can still get to Springer without walking all the way, as there is a dirt Forest Service road that will get you almost to the top at a place called Big Stamp Gap. I'd arranged for a shuttle driver to pick me up at the ranger station and drive me up as close as I could get. Now, it may be an eight-and-a-half mile walk, but the road doesn't go that way--it has to wind all over the surrounding mountains to get to Big Stamp Gap and it's a 45 minute drive up a steep and narrow dirt road that's carved out of the side of the mountain. <br />
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My shuttle driver, Ron Brown, showed up as promised, so I said goodbye to my dad, with plans to meet up with him the following Sunday afternoon at Neel Gap. It was an interesting drive with Ron--he told me all about his experiences on the AT and the people he met while running his shuttle service. Plus he had every phone charger ever invented wired into the dashboard of his vehicle, so I charged up my iPhone one last time while we drove. <br />
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We got to the turnout at Big Stamp Gap a little after 10:00 am, I paid him his $60 and he pointed me in the right direction. I stopped to take a picture or two, stretch, and chat with a couple of other hikers, and then I was off.<br />
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Now, the BSG parking/drop-off area is right on the AT, but you have to backtrack almost a full mile to get to the summit of Springer Mountain (9/10ths of a mile according to the data book). Everything I'd read about it said that it was 'an easy walk, shouldn't take more than twenty minutes or so', and even my shuttle driver said it would take no more than fifteen minutes to get up to the top of Springer from parking lot.<br />
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LIES.<br />
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ALL LIES.<br />
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It took me over 45 minutes to get to the summit. It was no easy walk--it wasn't that it was so steep, although it was all uphill. It's just that it wasn't a smooth easy path in the woods like I'd been led to believe. In a lot of places it was rock-strewn gulley, and with all the loose rocks, one has to pick their way across carefully and pay attention to each step, especially if one is not a seasoned hiker. Luckily I was using trekking poles (absolutely essential!), but it was exhausting and mentally taxing to just do that first mile--you couldn't just hike along and enjoy the scenery, you were watching your feet the whole time and concentrating on the next step so that you didn't turn an ankle, trip and fall, or blow out a knee.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The trail heading south to the summit of Springer Mountain.</td></tr>
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I don't think the pictures do it justice, but imagine doing that with almost 40 lbs on your back. I'm not gonna lie--I stopped to rest several times. Plus, my backpack was brand-spanking new--I'd just gotten it a few days prior, and I had to adjust it constantly. It was a difficult first mile, and I realized just how tough it was going to be.<br />
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Eventually I made it to the summit, and I was thrilled to be there. I'd heard so much about it while doing my AT research, and it seemed like some far-off place where amazing adventures began, yet there I was, at the Southern Terminus, thinking that if I just followed this trail long enough, eventually I'd end up in Maine. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The summit.</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is one of my all-time favorite pictures--my foot at the Southern Terminus of the Appalachian Trail, right next to the first white blaze. The trail is 'blazed' on trees and rocks every few hundred yards all the way from Springer Mountain, Georgia to Mount Katahdin, Maine. No map needed--just follow the white blazes.</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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I spent a little time at the summit, taking pictures, signing the register that's hidden under a rock, and resting. I had a snack and drank some water, chatting with the occasional hiker who happened by, a couple of which had come up the Approach Trail from the south. After my brief rest, I hauled my butt up off the rock I was sitting on, strapped on my pack once more, and headed back down the mountain the way I came.<br />
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Getting back down was a little easier than coming up, although not exactly easy. Climbing up is tough on the heart and lungs, climbing down is tough on the knees and ankles. About that time I realized that listening to nothing but Tom Petty for the entire drive down was a bad idea--I had 'You Wreck Me' stuck in my head all day, which was oddly appropriate as I picked my way slowly down the mountain. When I finally got back to the parking lot where I started, I tossed my pack on the ground up against a large boulder, pulled out my water bottle, and laid back and dozed in the sunshine for almost a half an hour. I was beat and hadn't even gone two full miles yet. I had no idea how I was going to make it to Neel Gap in three days, or even four if I had to. My only option was to just get up and walk.<br />
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From Big Stamp Gap, the trail is much easier for a couple of miles. Flat, smooth, and it was a nice sunny day, not too hot.<br />
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Looking back, I should've appreciated it more, because the AT in Georgia is almost never smooth and flat. But it was a great day to be hiking and I was happy to be alone in the woods, enjoying the sights and sounds of the forest. Even though I'd run into hikers at the parking lot and at the summit of Springer, while walking along the trail for those first couple of miles, I didn't see another soul for a couple of hours. But then I happened upon this:<br />
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There on the side of the trail, hanging from a small tree, was a mesh duffel bag. I stopped and looked around, thinking it belonged to somebody who might've been off behind a tree taking care of business, but then again, I could see a roll of toilet paper inside the bag. Investigating further, I could see that there were some weird odds and ends inside--cans of tuna, toiletries, a pair of socks, and random other assorted goodies. Not knowing what to make of it, I just shrugged my shoulders and hiked on.<br />
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My original destination was a place called the Hawk Mountain shelter, which was seven-and-a-half miles from Springer, meaning an eight-and-a-half mile hike. I was already exhausted and knew there was no way I was making it to Hawk Mountain that night, so I set my sights on a place called Stover Creek. It was only a four-and-a-half mile walk, and I knew I'd be good and ready to call it a day when I arrived.<br />
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There was a fairly new three-sided shelter there, with bear cables, a picnic table, along with a water source nearby. A moldering privy completed the list of amenities.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Stover Creek shelter</td></tr>
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My favorite thing about this shelter was the fact that it had a bench with a back on it. It's amazing what we take for granted in civilization, and seats with backs on them is the first thing I realized was an ultimate luxury. Resting on logs and rocks is nice, but after a long day of walking, nothing beats a chair with a back on it. Nothing.<br />
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There were a couple of guys there at the shelter already when I arrived, although it was only around 2:30 in the afternoon. I dropped my pack and took advantage of the bench. I was spent and didn't move for almost a half hour.<br />
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My shelter mates were friendly guys--one guy was a chain smoker carrying a 45-lb hockey bag as a backpack. He told us that he'd just heard about the Appalachian Trail a week earlier, decided he'd had enough of working for awhile, turned over his stucco business to his daughter, and then went to Walmart and bought everything he thought he'd need from the sporting goods section the next day. He'd driven up from Florida and left the ranger station at Amicalola Falls at 6:00 pm the night before, hiked all night, and got to Stover Creek a few hours earlier. He said he was too tired and out of shape to keep going at that point, so after sleeping for a few hours, he decided to rest for another day before continuing onward.<br />
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Turns out that he was the one who left the goodie bag on the side of the trail that I'd seen earlier in the day. He wanted to lighten his load and figured other people may want tuna and toilet paper... He also told us that he was down to his last pack of cigarettes and that he was going to stop smoking while out on the trail.<br />
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The other guy was about 5-foot 4 inches tall but had legs like tree trunks. He introduced himself as 'Littlefoot', being a section hiker from Pennsylvania. He'd hiked the entire trail in sections, all two-thousand-plus miles of it, over the past three years, and wanted to come back and do it again.<br />
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We hung out and talked for awhile, and once I had the energy, I started doing camp chores. Instead of pitching my tent, I decided to just sleep in the shelter that night, giving me an earlier start the next day, so I inflated my mattress pad and rolled out my sleeping bag in the corner of the shelter. While doing that, a couple of women came by saying they were missionaries of some sort, and dropped off all kinds of stuff in the shelter for other hikers to take as they pleased.<br />
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Some stuff was useful--I pocketed some Werther's candy and a couple of granola bars, but I didn't understand the pair of jeans and the large bottles of hand lotion. And our buddy who was on his last pack of Marlboros helped himself to a bag of loose tobacco and a packet of Zig Zags.<br />
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As the afternoon wore on, more and more hikers showed up to stay for the night. Most tented or hung up hammocks, but a few opted for the shelter because there was plenty of room--it even had a loft that could hold about eight people if needed.<br />
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One thing that's always needed while hiking is water--but at eight pounds a gallon, it sucks to carry. So one always has to be on the lookout for good water sources throughout the day. Luckily, a place with a name like Stover Creek has good reliable water nearby. So I headed down to the creek that afternoon with my filter pump and water bottles to resupply. The creek isn't really that far from the shelter, just down the hill behind it, but it offered a bit of solitude compared to the activity of a couple dozen hikers milling around up at the firepit and picnic table. <br />
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As I was sitting there pumping my water, I felt like I was being watched, and sure enough, I looked up and about twenty yards upstream, the fattest deer I'd ever seen was staring me down. I said hello (really) and went back to filtering my water and she went back to drinking. Once I finished, I watched her watching me as she circled around behind me and headed up the opposite hill. We must've watched each other for twenty minutes or so.<br />
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I headed back up to the shelter and told everyone about my encounter as I cooked my dinner. Mealtime is a nice time in camp, usually because it's the social hub of the day. You may not see anyone all day long while hiking, but people congregate around shelters and water sources, (and comfy places to sit!), and mealtime is a natural gathering time. Conversation was of course about gear--that's a given, but everyone at the shelter had walked by the mysterious bag hanging from the tree, so that drove the discussion, too.<br />
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I boiled my water for my Mountain House freeze dried chili mac, and I was extremely popular because I had spare packets of Tabasco sauce I'd been lifting from Panera Bread for months, and everyone loves Tabasco sauce to spice up their bland pasta sides or freeze-dried boiled dinners.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">'Tree Hugger' filter water for cooking.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_j-qrbNNFQos79EHJBYLh-ma7brMnurNRGHFjVToR42auVb1mqB-1tP5uH8N8AR8G-Jx9iFfQK8eSYnrzdmquEljBmb8YoUfbq-DCP-1JF_hJmeuNhjO3zhtbVKc1FZ4zRj7J/s1600/IMG_0298.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_j-qrbNNFQos79EHJBYLh-ma7brMnurNRGHFjVToR42auVb1mqB-1tP5uH8N8AR8G-Jx9iFfQK8eSYnrzdmquEljBmb8YoUfbq-DCP-1JF_hJmeuNhjO3zhtbVKc1FZ4zRj7J/s1600/IMG_0298.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Food bags were hung from the bear cables with care, in hopes that hungry critters wouldn't be there...</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<br />
I met a lot of interesting people that night, including a couple of kids from New Jersey who were carrying 70-lb packs, most of which was food. After a day on the trail, they realized the folly of their ways and started giving it all away. I availed myself to a ziplock bag of trail mix, while others helped themselves to a few granola bars and such. Most people didn't take much--it was the first day on the trail for almost everyone, and food bags were still pretty heavy all around.<br />
<br />
Once the sun goes down, pretty much all activity at the shelter ceases. They call it 'hiker midnight', and everyone is just so exhausted that sleep is the only thing anyone wants to do. It took me a couple of hours of tossing and turning to get comfy on the hard wooden floor of the shelter, even with my inflatable mattress pad, but I eventually dozed off for several hours. <br />
<br />
Some folks were up before dawn, cooking breakfast or making coffee, trying to get a head start on the day. I kept the hood of my sleeping bag over my head to filter out the light from the headlamps and also to muffle some of the conversation, but it was a losing battle. Eventually I decided to get up. Breakfast was a Clif bar and a packet of hot chocolate mixed with some Starbucks Via. I honestly had no appetite for the actual breakfast I'd packed, but knew that I needed to eat something--I'd need the energy.<br />
<br />
After waiting in line at the privy to do one of the three S's, I packed up all my gear, did a few stretches, and headed off down the trail. A word about the wilderness privies--they're not nearly as gross as I'd imagined. They're basically a raised outhouse with a huge bucket of mulch and wood chips next to the hole, so it's kind of like a human-sized litter box. And there's usually a broom handy, so there aren't many spider webs and other nastiness you'd expect, either.<br />
<br />
It seemed to be a pretty nice day--there was plenty of sun out, but it was quite breezy. The first part of the trail goes downhill for a bit, then a rockhop across a good-sized creek, and then mostly it's small ups and downs for a couple more miles. A few people passed me because I'm the slowest hiker in the world, but I was enjoying myself, if a bit sore.<br />
<br />
They call the Appalachian Trail the Green Tunnel, and with all the rhododendron blooming everywhere, it's easy to see why. Many times I was walking in a dimly lit path that was completely covered overhead.<br />
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It was kind of eerie at times because I was out there in the middle of the forest all alone, just imagining what kind of large furry claw-having critter might be walking through there, too. After a couple of miles, I came to one of my favorite spots, Three Forks. The trail crossed a pretty big creek on a large wooden footbridge, and then crossed over another Forest Service road. It was a great place to stop and rest, refill my water, and look at the data book again. I remember thinking how awesome it would be to camp there, and told myself that next year I'd stop there instead of Stover Creek.<br />
<br />
After Three Forks, the trail started to climb. Again, everyone said that the first eight miles to Hawk Mountain was an easy stroll and again they lied. It wasn't that steep, but it was constant uphill and it didn't seem to end. I found myself gasping for breath and wishing to stop and rest, but the wind was just relentless. It seemed like a warm day, but I was freezing because of the breeze. And as much as I wanted to stop and rest, it was just too cold to stop moving.<br />
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Eventually, after what seemed like forever, I saw the turnoff for the side trail to the Hawk Mountain shelter.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEje_4TVk-dYkN8IS4HOIwBkmAG5rMikPAl8_MzrPsz0V4i-fTlOLxCeV2XgwNj5Zgqmgt0yOJifIMJ5qPwNriBVgUmof4NHV1gozheNGyvwX2KkxAsYlXn-8YbMG2D3UbDsQHUX/s1600/IMG_0303.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEje_4TVk-dYkN8IS4HOIwBkmAG5rMikPAl8_MzrPsz0V4i-fTlOLxCeV2XgwNj5Zgqmgt0yOJifIMJ5qPwNriBVgUmof4NHV1gozheNGyvwX2KkxAsYlXn-8YbMG2D3UbDsQHUX/s1600/IMG_0303.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The exit ramp to Hawk Mountain</td></tr>
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I walked that last two-tenths of a mile to the shelter, thrilled to reach it. It seemed like I'd been walking all day, when in truth it was only about five miles. And I couldn't stop shivering. My teeth were chattering, and I could barely function. Luckily, the two guys in the picture sitting at the picnic table were 101st Airborne out for a weekend of hiking, and as soon as they saw me, they sprung into action, insisting that I get in my sleeping bag, put on a hat, drink something, and eat as much trail mix as I could.<br />
<br />
Even though it was 70 degrees outside, I was suffering from hypothermia. I'd heard of people getting it in warm weather, but I never imagined it happening to me. I was sweating a lot from the hiking and climbing, the wind was blowing so hard that it was cooling me off really fast, and I was running a huge calorie deficit, so my body just couldn't keep up.<br />
<br />
I literally spent almost three hours in my sleeping bag, and it took almost an hour to stop shivering. I'll admit I was a little concerned, but after drinking a bunch of water and getting some protein in me, I started to feel better and actually got a nap.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx_UtqIPaerdwGxUBSATlufFd8ApMJyNA8_5cKhwAOAcgHnUyVC1VfnmbNJ9xuM-ZAFZQUEP_kqgS8GzPSD4zFKuL_jFqYczkIZ7pnOIBthk8wgbrdu22NsRJM7P1Gvdg4wdnW/s1600/IMG_0305.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx_UtqIPaerdwGxUBSATlufFd8ApMJyNA8_5cKhwAOAcgHnUyVC1VfnmbNJ9xuM-ZAFZQUEP_kqgS8GzPSD4zFKuL_jFqYczkIZ7pnOIBthk8wgbrdu22NsRJM7P1Gvdg4wdnW/s1600/IMG_0305.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My hypothermia selfie.</td></tr>
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<br />
I wasn't able to sleep for very long, as there was a large lump in the corner of the shelter who started snoring like a freight train in the middle of the afternoon. Once he woke up and realized I was awake, he refused to stop talking. He seemed like a nice guy, but he was a genuine weirdo. Once I was feeling good enough to get up, I gathered all my stuff and set up my tent out behind the shelter in one of the several tenting areas. I later found out that hikers along the trail that week referred to the guy as the Mayor of Hawk Mountain, because he'd been living in the shelter for at least nine days. <br />
<br />
It turned into a nice afternoon, and once I got my tent set up and water refilled, I laid back down for a bit until I got hungry enough to make dinner.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYg55BEr49374cM5VJPtySF2YDJCKG_KWVy2tlYCEYGm3KtcykHuvp-t5cKEe4_X0ukqCgll6shbbUCqcyjlYsH3T5O8qJMFzE2jQSXxYs6m07SmWGoMzbzyyoZoDJ9cf6n4WS/s1600/IMG_0306.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYg55BEr49374cM5VJPtySF2YDJCKG_KWVy2tlYCEYGm3KtcykHuvp-t5cKEe4_X0ukqCgll6shbbUCqcyjlYsH3T5O8qJMFzE2jQSXxYs6m07SmWGoMzbzyyoZoDJ9cf6n4WS/s1600/IMG_0306.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My one-bunk Hilton</td></tr>
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Eventually, more people filtered in to camp, and there was quite a gathering of cool people around the campfire. I met some really nice people from a church group in Tennessee, and an attractive girl who had thru-hiked the Pacific Coast Trail (2700 or so miles) the summer before. She was just starting her AT thru hike that day, and had left from the arch at the park that morning, doing in one day twice as much as it had taken me two days to hike. I was impressed, and she had a lot of great stories, too.<br />
<br />
That was a great night but again, a half hour after the sun went down, everyone was in bed and fast asleep, even though the Army Rangers were doing full-on mountain warfare training in the area, gently lulling us to sleep with machine gun and artillery fire for several hours. <br />
<br />
That next morning, I still had no appetite, but I forced myself to eat two Clif bars with my hot cocoa and coffee mixture. It took me a lot longer than I expected to break camp, too. I think I got moving by like 9:00 am that day. It was Saturday, and I was now under a time crunch. I was 24 miles away from where I was supposed to be the next afternoon, and there was no way I was gonna make it. I knew that the trail crossed the Forest Service road a few times that day, and if I could just make it a few more miles, I might be able to get a hitch.<br />
<br />
So I started walking. Hightower Gap was only a half mile down the trail, but it was too early to catch a ride, so I kept walking, and climbing, and descending till I got to a place call Horse Gap. I was pretty tired by then, so when the trail popped out at the road, I sat down on my pack to finish off one of my bottles of water. I could hear the sound of a truck coming down the road, so I stuck my thumb out.<br />
<br />
I needed a ride to Neel Gap, but the guy was only going to Dahlonega. I took that, and he was kind enough to drop me off on the side of the road that lead to Neel Gap about a half an hour later, and I stuck my thumb out again. It only took about five minutes for a kind soul to take pity on me, and I had a ride.<br />
<br />
Neel Gap is a very famous place on the Appalachian Trail. It's the first 'civilization' on the trail, and the trail actually goes right through the building. It's a general store/outfitter/tourist attraction on one side, and a bunkhouse/hostel on the other. The establishment itself is called Mountain Crossings, and every single hiker on the AT has to pass through it.<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
I went inside and secured myself a bunk and a shower for $15, and then a hot dog and a coke for a couple bucks more. I went downstairs to the hostel, peeled off my stinky clothes, took a luxurious hot shower, and then laid down on my bunk and dozed for a bit. I had no idea that the trail would be as hard as it was. It was *all* hills, and walking a mile in Georgia mountains with a 37-lb pack is not one bit at all like walking a mile around the office park on your lunch break. I was completely exhausted.<br />
<br />
A little while later a group of loud, stinky hikers came tramping through, and high-fives and greeting were exchanged as we'd all met earlier in the week. Stories of the weirdo at Hawk Mountain were shared, along with stories about the bear that came into camp up on Blood Mountain the night before. It was getting late in the afternoon, and while all those guys were getting cleaned up and settled in, I took my pack upstairs to the outfitter for a free 'shakedown'.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6D8silkj1fcxJbfkV10lO7CaeF8oIEWQE8wxu0b9vUSXyEYwI20ghu9bF3m-ZDbaliMOMAAASrntOnx-590oNGMrnODVfSPh6pfVEF6Fk6qxEnxsLj1Cwe-Q-Wdso1gvIaCSp/s1600/IMG_0311.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6D8silkj1fcxJbfkV10lO7CaeF8oIEWQE8wxu0b9vUSXyEYwI20ghu9bF3m-ZDbaliMOMAAASrntOnx-590oNGMrnODVfSPh6pfVEF6Fk6qxEnxsLj1Cwe-Q-Wdso1gvIaCSp/s1600/IMG_0311.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Josh from Mountain Crossings gives me the shakedown. I feel bad for the guy, because everyone that comes in has gear with at least three or four days worth of trail funk stinking it up...</td></tr>
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<br />
Basically they dumped it out all over the floor and gave a little tough love about stuff I could change for lighter weight or didn't need at all. It's a humbling experience because there's usually several other people watching. But he said mine wasn't so bad--I only had about 2-3 lbs worth of stuff I could change out. There was one guy there who had a 70 lb pack and was carrying three full jars of Ragu sauce in his food bag, among other ridiculousness.<br />
<br />
That evening a local church group brought over dinner for all the hikers--mac and cheese, potatoes, and pulled pork BBQ. It was awesome, and a great time to sit around with all these other people who where complete strangers earlier in the day, but due to bonding of shared experience, were now fast friends. After dinner, the caretaker of the hostel, 'Pirate' took the padlock off the beer fridge, and several of us sat around till the wee hours drinking cold PBR and passing around the flask, telling tall tales and listening to Pirate's endless supply of stories of people who'd passed through.<br />
<br />
It was a great time.<br />
<br />
I crawled back to my bunk sometime after midnight, a little tipsy, extremely tired, and much wiser about just what kind of experience hiking on the AT was going to be. I couldn't wait for the next nine months to pass...<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The bunkroom at the hostel. Just be glad this picture isn't a scratch-n-sniff.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhziUjGB4JHDhsqj7wMJZFTxjuZKUivXPG5Qdx5fewxM_jXr79OdtEHh80o_nQzU5siaVeZVwwXKDogGAJwAKKFu0-E8s6JgFO94dGpaFy942oBy-JFfVQF6PMOcY5LSy4Lb71b/s1600/IMG_0324.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhziUjGB4JHDhsqj7wMJZFTxjuZKUivXPG5Qdx5fewxM_jXr79OdtEHh80o_nQzU5siaVeZVwwXKDogGAJwAKKFu0-E8s6JgFO94dGpaFy942oBy-JFfVQF6PMOcY5LSy4Lb71b/s1600/IMG_0324.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My trail buddies--Ragu, Tree Hugger, Jackrabbit, McSomething, and Huggy Bear. They bestowed me with the name Blueberry, but that's a story for another time...</td></tr>
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<br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey</b></i><br />
<br />
<i>Post Script: To this day, every time I hear 'You Wreck Me' I think of this weekend...</i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-5058566950373623452015-01-06T07:14:00.001-06:002015-01-08T18:19:10.906-06:00Back From the Dead<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
Guess who's making a comeback.<br />
<br />
Yeah, it's been too long and I haven't written anything in over six months and anything <i>good</i> for far longer. I kind of missed it, and it seems that most of the blogs I used to read have disappeared into the mist. Everyone seems to just post on Facebook now, which is cool and all, but reading Facebook every day is like being on an episode of American Pickers--you wade through a barn full of junk to find a couple of interesting things, but then when you look back and realized how much time was wasted, it just doesn't seem quite right. Besides, with the new year and resolutions and all that, I've decided to spend more time at the keyboard. While I don't have the free time nor the everyday adventures I had while living in Las Vegas, life right now is barely controlled chaos, and I might as well keep score.<br />
<br />
Speaking of new year's resolutions, has anyone else noticed that the Girl Scout cookie sale is aligned perfectly with the timing of most of the world saying 'screw this New Years diet thing'? Those girl scouts are tricky little temptresses like that. <br />
<br />
Anyhow, there's more to come. I'm not quite sure what I'll be writing about--I usually don't until I actually sit down at the keyboard--but bear with me as I get back up on this horse and try to scrape the rust off. (Apparently, I still have the gift of mixed metaphors).<br />
<br />
More soon!<br />
<br />
Mikey<br />
<br />Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-29367446166967611132013-05-18T13:48:00.002-05:002013-05-18T13:48:51.490-05:00Good Intentions and all ThatI'm gonna be away from the keyboard for the next week--just too pressed for time and too many things going on. <br />
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But I'm taking a little trip over Memorial Day weekend, and I'll have an epic post when I get back.<br />
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This sucks, I know.<br />
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I wish I had time to write every day, but The Man is keeping me down. Fingers crossed though. I got my Powerball ticket. If I win the $600 million, well, I'm sure I'll have plenty to write about. And probably a bit more free time on my hands, I'm guessing.<br />
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Catch ya in about ten days.<br />
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Mikey out.Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-54549000270644685042013-05-09T16:45:00.003-05:002013-05-09T16:45:28.637-05:00Poker, Pizza, and Live Reptiles<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Hey everyone--I hope y'all have been having a good week. Mine has been busy, and of course I'm fed up with the job--damn near blew a gasket in there yesterday, but it was at the end of the day and today I was off, so I don't have to put up with that hell-hole again until tomorrow. <br />
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After pulling the ripcord yesterday, I drove down south to my buddy Gaines' house. He's trying to get a friendly Wednesday night poker tournament going on a semi-regular basis, and I haven't played much (except for that little side trip to Vegas) in the past couple of years, so I figured it would be an inexpensive way to work on my game.<br />
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He's got tournament software and all the things one needs to host a good poker night, so it was an enjoyable evening. I think we had eight people there, and since the blind levels were only 20 minutes each, I volunteered to do all of the dealing, just to speed up the game.<br />
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We had a good mix of players, with only one complete novice, but certainly a couple of guys who could hold their own. I think we kicked off around 7 pm or so, and aside from a brief break when the pizzas got delivered, we played straight through until around 10:15. <br />
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I didn't take any bad beats, and my big hands--AA, KK, and 88 all held up. The only dent in my chip stack came when I flopped four to a straight flush and never got any help. <br />
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The bottom line, was that yeah, I was one of the three in the money--only three places paid, and at the end it was just down to Gaines and I going head-to-head, and although he had a bigger stack than me, I had just beat him two in a row and was about to get the hat trick when he offered to chop. It was getting late for most people, and I was agreeable since most of his guests were leaving anyways, so we just split first and second place money. Had it been anyone else I would've played it out, but I too wanted to get home (he lives about 50-something miles away from me, so I had a long drive ahead of me), and well, it was still a friendly game. Not like a cut-thought tournament in a casino with a bunch of annoying assholes.<br />
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But at some point in the tournament, as you can see from the photo above, a reptile got loose on the table and went exploring in the middle of the game. I can honestly say I've never dealt a game with live critters motoring around on the felt, but Slurp is pretty mellow, and certainly the most curious lizard I've ever seen--he wasn't <i>too</i> much of a distraction.<br />
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Luckily it's almost all freeway between his house and mine, and that late at night, I didn't have any traffic to contend with. Since I didn't have to get up early this morning, I stayed up till around 1:00 this morning clearing some sitcoms off of my DVR.<br />
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I didn't wake up until 8:30 this morning, which was absolutely awesome. Lately I've been waking up much too early on my days off, and it's been messing with my system, making me tired when I go back to work the next day. But today, while I planned on being motivated, it just didn't happen. I got the pot of coffee going, but the keyboard time just wasn't happening, although now that I've been at it for a bit, I'll probably get some more writing done. It's been a beautiful day, and I thought about going on a hike, but the biggest obstacle is that I don't want to drive anywhere to go hiking. I swear I spend half my life in the car, and the closest 'trail' is still about six miles away (the greenway down in White House). Walking around here is out of the question--it's narrow country roads with ditches on each side, and no place to bail when farmers and dump trucks inevitably come motoring by (yeah, I've already had a couple of close calls before, so no, I don't really walk around my neighborhood too much). <br />
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So my motivation needle is hanging out below 'E' today, and I'm ok with that. It's nice to have a day every once in awhile where nothing gets accomplished.<br />
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The only other thing I've done today is make a big batch of my almost-famous pineapple-cashew chicken salad. I decided a few weeks ago to stop buying bread and eating sandwiches, and now I just use the smallest flour tortillas I can find. They're a perfect substitute for bread, and they don't fill me up nearly as much. Besides, I've been taking them hiking and using them for lunch, and a tortilla with sliced pepperoni, a piece of cheese, and a packet of Gulden's brown mustard I swiped from Panera Bread is a favorite meal both on the trail and at the office.<br />
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I already eaten two of them since I made it this morning, and it's oh-so-good, so I'm guessing I'll probably have it for dinner, too. (The recipe: canned chicken [although I used my last leftover grilled chicken breast I had in the fridge to supplement it], Miracle Whip, horseradish, chopped cashews, pineapple tidbits, white pepper, black pepper, and a touch of brown mustard). It's easily my favorite chicken salad recipe out there, and I've tried all the variations--apples, walnuts, grapes, celery, etc.<br />
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And since it's a beautiful sunny 80-degree day here, I don't really feel like cooking, so it's a perfect meal for a sunny day. <br />
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I don't have anything else on the agenda for the afternoon, so I'll probably just do some reading, and maybe some 'homework' (yeah, working on the book, practicing the bass, and watching my Great Courses lectures). <br />
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Back to the grind tomorrow.<br />
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<i><b>Mikey </b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-11357494692578597932013-05-05T21:49:00.001-05:002013-05-05T21:50:41.502-05:00Yes, I Read the CommentsFor my unknown commenter, here's the story about the Dalmatian.<br />
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<a href="http://hurricanemikey.blogspot.com/2007/08/german-shepherd-would-never-do-that.html" target="_blank">A German Shepherd Would Never Do That</a><br />
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Enjoy!Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-33763952838959410042013-05-05T21:31:00.001-05:002013-05-05T21:31:54.845-05:00Boots on the Ground<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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So the past two days I left the house forgetting to put on a belt, and since jeans fresh out of the dryer are always pretty snug, I didn't notice until I got out of the car and realized that I needed to keep one hand on a belt loop or it was gonna be a pants-on-the-ground kind of day. And it's a real pain in the ass to walk around all day pulling up your drawers.<br />
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Yesterday morning, I actually had to go into the office for a half-day, and I was fed up with my inability to remember to put a belt on. So I told myself that I'd just hop over to Opry Mills mall after work, stop at Bass Pro Shop, and get a new leather belt. On days that I actually remember to wear one, I'm still sporting my black leather belt from my Vegas days that I keep punching holes in and reaches around me one-and-a-half times, but it's getting to be a pain in the ass to keep the end from touching the floor in public bathrooms whenever I stop to take a piss. Yeah, it's that long.<br />
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But when I left my office park to go the 'back' way into the mall, traffic was backed up like I'd never seen. Complete gridlock on a Saturday afternoon. So I flipped a yooey and got onto the freeway instead. And the line for the exit a mile and a half away was backed up to my on-ramp. Seriously, WTF? You'd think it was the day after Thanksgiving or something, but no, it was just everybody in Nashville heading to the IMAX to see Iron Man 3. At least that's the only reason I could come up with.<br />
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So I was denied on the whole new-belt thing and squared myself with the realization that I'd just have to walk around with my hands in my pockets all afternoon. I had a full day planned, too. Reverend Dave was in town for the weekend, and we had plans to meet for lunch and then some sort of free-form buffoonery for the rest of the evening. <br />
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I met up with him and his friend Jennifer down at <a href="http://www.judgebeans.com/menu.cfm" target="_blank">Judge Bean's BBQ</a> down in Brentwood, and we got a table in the bar and ordered a round (beer for them, Diet Coke for me...) while we waited for Scottie to show up. Judge Bean's has been a favorite of ours for a few years now. Me, Reverend Dave, Scottie, and Tim used to meet there on Tuesdays for all-you-can-eat brisket tacos (which are <i>Oh My God</i> good!) back in the day, and this past Christmas, we had a 'Brothas At the Bean' gathering for all the guys in the family while all the women-folk were doing their ornament party at Amy's.<br />
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Of course, we don't even look at the menu anymore. It's just brisket tacos every time. We've tried everything else, but the tacos are the Old Reliable as far as we're concerned. Oh yeah, we'll usually get a piece of Texas Sushi or Shrimp Diablo to start with to get our spicy fix, but the brisket is out-fricking-standing.<br />
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Speaking of the menu, if you look closely you'll see something called the Dr. Steven Ball Quintuple Bypass burger. Dr. Steven Ball is a supremely talented cardiac surgeon at Vanderbilt Medical Center, and he's the guy who actually saved my bacon and kept me out of the grave on my worst day ever. He's a big fan of the place, too! Like all other famous people at NY deli's, he has a sandwich named after him. Not because he was the first one to eat it, but because it keeps him in business...<br />
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Anyhow, lunch was awesome, as usual, and afterwards we headed over to the hippies' house to visit for a bit and play with the pugs. But we couldn't stay long. Amy, Scottie, Cory and the rest of my usual cast of characters were heading out that evening to see Widespread Panic (bong hits and armpits!) at Fontanel Woods. Since the only song of theirs that I'm remotely familiar with is their cover of Traffic's<i> Low Spark of the High Heeled Boys</i>, it wasn't on my concert calendar. <br />
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So we took off and headed back to Brentwood to pick up my car. About a mile from the Bean is one of our favorite retail outlets, REI. Dave's dividend was burning a hole in his pocket, and I really needed to have one of their shoe experts look at my boots and find out why my feet hurt so damn bad on that backpacking trip two weeks ago. (I'm sure it had <i>nothing</i> to do with the fact that I'm still a hunnert pounds too heavy...)<br />
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A couple months ago, when I attended that Backpacking 101 class they put on, their main footwear expert gave a short presentation and I tucked her name and face into my memory bank. Luckily she was working that day, and saw me heading back to the shoe section carrying a pair of gently-used Oboz and aftermarket insoles.<br />
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She accompanied me to the back corner of the store and listened to my tale of woe. I'd never gotten cramps across the TOP of my foot before, but it happened on that trip a couple of weeks ago. Not to mention that huge blister that felt like I'd squished a grape inside my shoe about three miles into the second day's hike.<br />
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So she looked at my feet, my boots, and my insoles, and then had me just stand on the ground on top of the insoles just to make sure they were right for me. The first thing she told me to do was to bake them at 200 degrees for ten minutes, then put them into my boots, and stand on 'em for about ten minutes after I got home. <br />
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Ok, not exactly the advice I was expecting, but hey, she's the expert. <br />
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Then she put them back into my boots and I put the boots on. She then sat down in front of me and retied one boot differently, eliminating the criss-cross on the highest part of my foot. Talk about an amazing difference. It was like night and day. So she fixed the second one and I pretended to climb on the 'rockpile' in the corner, stretching my feet and ankles. <br />
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I was cured! Instead of changing back into my regular shoes, I just wore the boots the rest of the day and into the evening. I thought I was gonna have to cough up at least a hundred bucks for upgraded footwear, but I got out without spending a dime. Reverend Dave, on the other hand, wasn't so lucky. He found a Mountain Hardware puffy jacket on the clearance rack for just a hundred bucks, and wanted a flask like my new one. But he had his dividend credit to offset most of the cost, so the damage was minimal.<br />
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After our shopping excursion to REI, we headed back over to the hotel for a couple of hours. Jennifer went upstairs to take a nap, while Reverend Dave and I hung out in the lobby watching the Cardinals game on the TV. <br />
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We made plans to go bar-hopping that night down on Broadway, and our friend Lisa decided to join us. So we piled into the car that evening, drove back out to the west side to pick her up, then headed back downtown.<br />
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It was pouring down rain, and parking in downtown Nashville can be almost as frustrating at parking in downtown San Francisco, but luckily the valet guys at Merchant's Restaurant know my car and love to keep it parked right in front, so even though they say that they're full, they always make room for my sweet ride. <br />
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<a href="http://www.merchantsrestaurant.com/images/down.pdf" target="_blank">Merchant's</a> is probably my favorite restaurant in Nashville, and my go-to place before every show at the Ryman. We didn't have reservations, but managed to get seats at the bar in between a couple of bachelorette parties.<br />
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One of my favorite things on the menu is the duck fat tater tots, although I can only eat about five of them. But they are damn tasty. I think Lisa was the one who actually turned me on to them about a year ago, and I"m pretty sure a pile of them lands on the table every time we go. On the other hand, the Alabama contingent didn't like them at all. Dave said he had a bad experience with duck in the past, and after a few bites, he felt like he was getting sick. Jennifer said she wasn't a fan, either, which was hard to understand--I though everybody would love 'em. I guess not...<br />
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For dinner I attempted to eat a bacon cheeseburger with smoked Gouda, while Lisa ate a wedge salad. Jennifer had the dry-rub wings and Dave had a French dip. What I could eat, I thought was excellent, but the reviews from our neighbors to the south were mixed. Oh well, they're heathens from Alabama, so unless it's fried or run over, they don't usually eat it... They did, however, like the cocktail selection, and a few offbeat ones made it to the counter in front of us (I stuck with a glass of Oregon Pinot, however)<br />
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After we settled the dinner bill, it was time to start the pub crawl. We went around the corner to a bar on Second Avenue to see a cover band that we'd heard so much about. They were pretty damn good at first--they had a great set list and when they went on break, the drummer seriously did a 20 minute solo. The place went nuts!<br />
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We were diggin' it, but then they started playing Smashing Pumpkins and other 90s shit, so we left. Lisa bailed around that point, a better offer came across her cell phone, so it was just the three of us after that. We dashed into doorways up and down Broadway, trying to avoid the rain, and ended up in some touristy gift shop, browsing at trinkets and t-shirts for awhile. I almost bought a mint-chocolate Moon Pie, because I needed to break a twenty for the valet, but I held off. <br />
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After that, we found ourselves in one of the dozens of cowboy-boot shops down there in the tourist Mecca because Jennifer thought about getting some new hillbilly shoes. Of course, this place jacks the prices way up and says everything is buy-one-pair, get-two-free, so a pair of boots is like $389. But they were doing a surprisingly brisk business that night, considering the prices and the bad weather. Dave even tried on a pair and actually thought about getting them, but between the two of them, they couldn't find three pairs of boots that they wanted, and I certainly wasn't going to cough up a hundred and change to get a pair of shit-kickers. So we left empty-handed, save for a few iPhone pics. <br />
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Dave and Jennifer were trying to impress their friends back home at Delta House (that's what they call his apartment building) with their mad pub crawling mojo, so we ducked into damn near every bar and restaurant we passed, tagging ourselves on Facebook, documenting an awesome night of drinking, worthy of a beer commercial at the very least. The truth is, some places we only stopped in to take a piss.<br />
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We ended the night at Broadway Brewhouse, sipping on Bushwhackers and poking at a plate of potato skins. I think we ran out of gas around 11:15, said our goodbyes, and I was home in bed by midnight. <br />
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Sunday morning came much too early, and I was grouchy as hell to see that I woke up at 6:40. I tried to stay in bed, but two attention-starved house cats made sure that I wasn't going to. So I got up and made a pot of coffee instead.<br />
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It's still pretty cold and rainy out, and the Cardinals game is on at 1:00, so I have no plans except to do some reading and watching the game. I may do a little writing and/or editing, but I'm just not feeling it today. <br />
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<i><b>Mikey </b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-49621796344117646042013-05-02T12:08:00.002-05:002013-05-02T12:08:41.756-05:00Enjoying the Day Off<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Happy Thursday everybody. While y'all are stuck at work, goofing off at the computer, I'm at home doing the same thing. But it's a really nice spring day outside, so I'm going to take advantage of it as soon as I motivate myself off of this chair and away from the keyboard.<br />
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But there's no hurry. The Cardinals game isn't until tonight, and right now I'm enjoying three of my favorite inventions--coffee, bacon, and Pandora radio. Seems like lately I've been on an Allman Brothers kick, and I blame that on my hippie siblings.<br />
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Speaking of which, it's been a pretty damn good week, and they were a big part of it. Most of you know I had a milestone birthday this week. Well, 46 ain't much of a milestone to most people, but after all the shiat I've had to deal with since I got to Tennessee, every year on the top side of the grass is a milestone. <br />
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But hey, right now, I'm probably healthier than I've ever been--certainly better than anytime in the past twenty-odd years.<br />
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Anyhow, our celebrations kicked off this past weekend when a bunch of the family came to town, not really for my birthday, but some of the more masochistic relatives were running in the Music City Marathon on Saturday. But that night we all got together for dinner at Jonathan's in Green Hills, and about 22 of us took over the restaurant. Good times!<br />
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Of course, being the guest of honor, I got a few nice gifts, mostly Amazon gift cards and bottles of red wine, which are also a couple of my other favorite inventions. Hey, I'm easy to shop for... I had a great time visiting with everyone, especially some of my nieces who I don't get to see much. But one of the highlights of the night came when I fetched the Challenger from the valet and damn near ran over Kirk Herbstreit of ESPN College Gameday fan. I felt bad, because if I were to run over somebody from ESPN, I'd prefer Stephen A Smith or Skip Bayless. Or even Lou Holtz. Herbie doesn't bother me at all--he's the most tolerable Ohio State fan out there, and I believe the reason he moved his family to Nashville in the first place was because all the locals were harassing him and his wife for not being enough of a 'homer' on tv. Anyhow, we both survived the encounter and a bunch of us headed over to the hippies' house to hang out for the rest of the evening.<br />
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I was hoping to chill out and do absolutely nothing on Sunday, but when I woke up, I got a text message from Cyndi telling me to come down to Alli's house and spend the day. I really didn't want to at first, since it's 54 miles one-way. But I eventually got it together and got back in the car for the hour-long drive.<br />
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I'm glad I did, because we had a great day. About half the family was there, and we spent the day goofing off with the kids and catching up. Of course, the first thing Alli's kids did when they saw me was to bust out the magic markers and 'tattoo' my head. I don't know where they would've come up with the idea to Sharpie up somebody, but I think they'd fit in pretty well with my Vegas gang...<br />
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<i>I gotta say, the mutton chops were a cool touch, and they go especially well with the board-game look I've got going on top, too. </i></div>
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I also got to meet the newest members of the tribe, Jameson and Knox, who I'd never met before, and they were surprisingly well-behaved and quiet. <br />
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<i>Me and Baby Knox. He's the good-looking one!</i></div>
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After the Sharpie shenanigans were over, I introduced Jackson and Brynn to the Bubble Breaker game on my computer, and they spent the rest of the afternoon kicking my ass. Brynn actually<i> tripled</i> my highest score, so I was humbled by a seven-year old... <br />
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We spent the rest of the day laughing it up like we always do when we get together, ordered pizza for dinner, and just had a relaxing day. <br />
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<i>Diana, Alli, and Jackson. Can you guess which one ran the marathon the day before?</i></div>
<br />
Before it got too late, I had to say my goodbyes and make that long drive back home. It was a great weekend, and of course my family is pretty hilarious, so my face was sore from laughing (and scrubbing off the artwork...)<br />
<br />
Monday morning came much too early, and my day at the office was even less enjoyable than usual. But I was looking forward to getting out of there, and the afternoon couldn't pass by fast enough. <br />
<br />
That night I had another meetup to attend, this one a 'Creative Non-Fiction and Personal Essay' group, which is pretty much what I write all the time. There were 22 people scheduled to attend, and I was slated to read and share another chapter of my upcoming book. Of course, only nine people showed up, which kinda pissed me off, since I'd just coughed up all that money at Staples getting five pages worth of writing printed, collated, and stapled for everyone in attendance.<br />
<br />
But it was a small annoyance--the group is a knowledgeable bunch of people, and the feedback, for the most part, was very helpful. Although one person in there was bugging, trying to tell me that I needed to read <i>The Hunger Games</i> and develop my characters they way it was done in that book. Of course, that was a novel, written for 13-year old girls, and my piece is non-fiction, written for adults, and the only character I mentioned in that chapter was a 'stock' character, earning three lines of description and never heard from again, not Katniss Flaming Arrow or whatever the hell her name was...<br />
<br />
So yeah, there's a bit of chaff that needs to be sorted through, and some of the feedback needs to be taken with a huge grain of salt, but there are a couple of people there much more talented than I, and I value their input. It was time well spent, and I got some good ideas on ways to improve my work. I also met a gal who was a first-timer who does comedy writing, and I'm looking forward to hearing more of her stuff. This month's meeting was a little heavy on grief and loss, so I love love love me some good comedy pieces. One of my friends who actually writes comedy as a job, and produces a comedy show (who wasn't able to be there that night, unfortunately), does the same thing, and I'm looking forward to the three of us all being in the same room together sometime soon.<br />
<br />
My absent friend also sent me an email that night while I was at the meeting, and she wants me to submit a few stories for her show that she does once a month. She performs at a small club in midtown, usually five chicks and one token dude, and I have the opportunity to be the token dude later this summer. I'm thinking about sharing the NBA stripper story, or the one about the Dalmation and the sex toy, but we'll see how it goes. <br />
<br />
Anyhow, since our meeting was out on the west side, and didn't end until almost 9:00 pm, I had packed a bag and ended up staying with Amy and the pugs again on Monday night, going back to work from there the next morning.<br />
<br />
Tuesday was my actual birthday, and my co-workers made a small deal about it, nothing too embarrassing. Just a card and cupcakes, which was very thoughtful of them. And then another gift card showed up in my email, this one from Sierra Trading Post, (my new favorite place to buy clothes), and I finally used it this morning to order a new Columbia Sportswear rain jacket. <br />
<br />
That night, I went back over to Amy's and she took me to dinner at 360 Wine Bar and Bistro over in Belle Meade. Or is it West Meade. I'm not sure, but it's a nicer neighborhood than I live in. We even completed the illusion of high class by rolling up in Amy's convertible Benz and parking right in front for everyone to see.<br />
<br />
But we had an awesome meal--and a fantastic bottle of Oregon Pinot that was quite the indulgence. We started off with a charcuterie plate that included duck liver pate and all kinds of funky meat, served with olives, sun-dried tomatoes, and flatbread. So good! I had some sort of roasted chicken stuffed with cheese and figs, with a side of purple fingerling potatoes and some broccoli that actually tasted like it was smoked (hell yeah--kids would eat that, it tasted, to me, like green bacon!). Amy had a thick cut pork chop with creamed cauliflower, pancetta and peas, topped with roasted pears. <br />
<br />
I really enjoyed the meal, and for dessert we shared a glass of 10-year-old port and some sort of custard filled creme puffs that looked like a pastry version of deviled eggs. <br />
<br />
Yes, it was a damn good meal! <br />
<br />
After dinner, we headed off to RED! wine store and picked up a few more bottles of the good stuff (and I also got a bottle of that Evan Williams Honey Reserve whiskey that I discovered the weekend before out in the woods), then came back to the house and cracked open another bottle of Pinot.<br />
<br />
Yeah, I slept pretty well that night, even when sharing space with two bed-hogging puglets...<br />
<br />
I finally made it back to my own house again last night, and waiting for me on the porch was another package from the brown-suited Santa Claus. Reverend Dave had hit my Amazon wishlist and hooked me up with a Nalgene flask and funnel, along with a copy of <i>A Season on the Trail</i>, and a huge box of dehydrated veggies from Harmony House (they are a great source for backcountry provisions). <br />
<br />
I don't know if I mentioned it or not, but Reverend Dave is going to accompany me on my long walk next year, so pretty much all gift-giving occasions are hiking and backpacking related. And since I had a couple more Amazon gift cards to use, I did a little more online shopping this morning, getting another pair of wool socks (can never have too many!) and a couple of trail books that I've had my eye on.<br />
<br />
So my shopping is done, y'all are caught up on the latest, I don't have many chores to do today, and it's nice out, so I may go for a walk in the woods this afternoon. Oh, and I'll probably do some more writing, too.<br />
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<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-7729709848571932492013-04-27T11:01:00.001-05:002013-04-27T11:01:09.302-05:00Getting Started<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Happy Saturday everyone! For those of you that don't come lurking by until Monday, well, I hope you had a good weekend. Even though it's not even 10 am on Saturday morning as I write this, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say I had a good one.<br />
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It's a rainy, drizzly, overcast day out here in the woods of Tennessee. I have to give a shout out to my backpacking buddies from last weekend--a few of them are out again this weekend, getting soaked. I would've joined them, but they are way out east on another adventure, and not going to get back until tomorrow afternoon. But some family is in town for the weekend, and about twenty of us are going out to dinner together this evening, so I have that obligation to attend to. <br />
<br />
I even thought of going on a short day hike around here today, and I still might, only if the rain lets up though, because I left my rain jacket hanging on the back of my chair in my office. But it's coming down in buckets and it doesn't look like it's going to let up anytime soon.<br />
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Last night I went out to another meetup group, this one was a meet-and-greet for singles. I have to admit that I really didn't enjoy it very much. Yeah, I met some nice folks, but I had a couple of things working against me. First of all, I hate my job, and of course that's the first thing people want to ask you about, and it's hard to avoid being negative when you talk about a job you hate. The other thing is that I really don't like to tell people where I work anyways, (learned that lesson from my Vegas days), not that people would show up and hassle me, but because when people learn where I work, they inevitably have to offer up an opinion about the place. Nashville is too small of a town for that. I haven't figured out a good 'job alias' to tell people yet, I suppose. <br />
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Also, it seems that a lot of the people there *really* want to find somebody for a relationship right away, and well, that's just not for me right now. I've got plans and things I need to do, and seriously, none of those women I met are the least bit interested in somebody who plans on quitting their job in a year, putting their stuff in storage, and is heading off into the woods for six months. <br />
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Another thing I noticed is that while everyone was super friendly, more than a few of the women were just looking for a way to drink free. I've been to enough happy hours in my time to avoid that trap, so I didn't offer to buy anyone a drink. I did, however, meet one gal who I found particularly intriguing, but after talking to her for a bit, I got the vibe that she was actually dating somebody else in the group already. Of <i>course</i>, the best ones are already taken...<br />
<br />
So after about an hour and a half of meeting everyone and making small talk, I ordered a small plate of pot-stickers and grabbed a seat in the corner to watch the Pirates-Cardinals game on the tv, paid my tab, and got out of there by 8:30. I think I'm gonna stick to the hikers and writers groups instead. There are no expectations there, and those meetups are much cheaper to attend anyways.<br />
<br />
Anyhow, I got to bed early last night, and slept straight through until 8:30 this morning, which I enjoyed very much. I haven't gotten to sleep in for a long time. Usually on my days off, I'm still waking up at six o'clock in the morning, just out of habit.<br />
<br />
So I brewed a pot of coffee, turned on the Pandora, and sat down at the new keyboard. First of all, I went back and re-read yesterday's epic post, and did a bit of editing--I caught a few spelling errors and such, so I fixed them. (Part of the problem is that I'm not used to this new keyboard quite yet, and sometimes I accidentally move the cursor around or hit a tab button without knowing it). I also noticed some awful writing, like in an early paragraph repeating the words 'backpacking' and 'weekend' far too much. The honest truth is that I use this blog to practice my writing, and having taken so much time off, and also so much time between posts, sometimes the results aren't the highest quality. Maybe subconsciously I'm saving my best for the book I'm working on (at least I hope that's the reason), but I'm always working on improving my work.<br />
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Speaking of the book, I think I've got four early chapters almost completely finished, and they are in the capable hands of Linda Lou, getting edited. We're gonna talk tomorrow night about fixes, and I'll take one of them with me on Monday night to one of my writers group meetings to share.<br />
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The funny thing about writing a book is that I don't sit down and write it in chronological order. I just write whatever I'm thinking about at the time and just let it rip. The stuff I've got so far is all early chapters, and one of them is obviously Chapter 1, but the others don't follow immediately after that, so it wouldn't quite make sense to anyone that stumbled across my files and tried to read it. So that kinda leads me to today's project. My goal for the weekend is to not only crank out another chapter or two (probably just one--they take much longer to write than a random blog post!), but more to work on my outline and get a better sense of exactly how it's going to take shape, and figure out a way to tie together the chapters I've written so far. <br />
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Telling the stories is the easy part. Tying them together, making them flow and keeping them interesting is the hard part. Also, I'm finding that one of my personal stumbling blocks is that I unconsciously change from past to present tense and back again over and over again when I'm telling a longer story. So that creates more work to go back and fix everything. Also, writing dialogue in the past tense is probably the most difficult thing I've encountered so far. It's impossible to write <i>exactly</i> how people speak, and finding a balance between the two is a real art. Plus you can't keep using phrases like 'he said' and 'she said' over and over again, otherwise the writing starts to sound like a monotone Hootie and the Blowfish album, where every song feels like it's in the same key. And the word 'exclaimed' will never make it into my book--it's just trite way of varying up the word 'said'. So it's a huge challenge. <br />
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The<i> idea</i> of writing a book is extremely appealing. The actual <i>doing</i>, the nuts-and-bolts of putting out good material, can get rather tedious. But it's not all bad, a lot of the work is me going back and rereading old blog posts, remembering stories, remembering things I left out, and enjoying it all over again. That's actually the fun part, when I get an idea in my head and just run with it. Of course the work comes when I go back and have to fix it and make it more readable, but that's the price of a ticket for admission into the author's club. <br />
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But this book ain't gonna write itself. And nothing is more pathetic than writing about writing a book, right? I better get after it.<br />
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<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-10086639003483141202013-04-26T14:35:00.001-05:002013-04-27T09:46:15.710-05:00A Walk in the Woods<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I finally got the Blogger page to work on my new computer, although it still won't load pictures unless I use IE instead of Firefox, so I'm still a little handicapped, but I'll make do.<br />
<br />
Anyhow, my plan for Thursday was to get my doctor's appointment knocked out, then head across the street to my secondary 'corner' office at Panera Bread and get a bunch of writing done, but I got sidetracked nine ways from Sunday. First, of all, I called my sister Sherry who lives nearby and asked her if she wanted to come by and meet me for lunch--I could take a break from the keyboard and could use the company. She suggested that I just come over to her house and work instead, because she was working too and had plenty of wifi to go around.<br />
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So I skipped coffee and bagels at Panera and headed over to her place. I soon as I plugged in my new toy and tried to start working, I ran into my first obstacle of the day--one of my USB ports on my brand-spanking-new, less-than-24-hours-old computer didn't work. And all of the pictures were on my keyring flash drive, which it wouldn't read (but had worked the night before when I was loading documents), nor would it charge my iPhone when I plugged a different device in, trying to find out if it was just that the flash drive was corrupted. Nothing worked. <br />
<br />
So I got online with the HP tech support service and we did the usual reboot and troubleshoot stuff, but nothing worked. They broke the unfortunate news to me that I likely had a defective USB port and they'd either fix it or just replace the machine, but that I'd have to send it back to HP. <br />
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That really pissed me off. Nothing worse than getting a brand new computer and finding out that it's broken. So that was a huge setback and kept me from concentrating, so I just turned the damn thing off and hung out with Sherry. We ordered Chinese food and played Ruzzle while watching some brainless daytime TV. <br />
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After awhile, I figured I'd at least try to work on some other stuff, and without even thinking I plugged the flash drive in, and like a miracle, it worked fine. I tested the port with my phone and it lit right up! I don't know how it happened, but I'm not complaining. Sherry suggested that it was Buster, her 100 lb yellow lab, who fixed it.. He was lurking around looking for attention, and licks EVERYTHING, and well, you know how dog slobber has amazing healing properties... I don't care how or why, but after that I got the pictures loaded. <br />
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But then the Blogger site wasn't working at all, so I couldn't even type a rough draft, with or without pictures. By then my frustration had reached it's apex and I gave up for the day. <br />
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Eventually I got things working about 90% of the way, and as long as I load the pictures with IE, I can post like normal. So now that you have the background, on to the good stuff...<br />
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Y'all know that I'm a member of several Nashville Meetup groups, and although I spend about 90% of my time with the writers, I do, on occasion, hook up with the hikers and other singles groups, too. About a month and a half ago, I went to a Backpacking 101 class they held down at REI in Brentwood, and met a bunch of really smart and experienced people who sounded like they went hiking and backpacking damn near every weekend.<br />
<br />
I spent the afternoon with them learning about new gear and getting some good hints and tips for a successful backpacking trip, and also managed to get a spot on beginner's weekend backpacking trip out to Pickett State park, which we did this past weekend. <br />
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The plan was to meet up in the parking lot of Home Depot out in Lebanon (about 30 miles east of Nashville) at 7:00 in the morning. Amy's party was the night before, and lots of Sangria was consumed around the firepit that night, but before I went to bed I had Reverend Dave go through my backpack with me, he having about 50 more miles under his boots than I. We managed to eliminate about a half pound of unnecessary stuff, but I drew the line at my titanium pot lid, my poop shovel, and my briar pipe and pouch of Captain Black tobacco. <br />
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I finally managed to get to bed around 12:30 that night, utterly exhausted, but like a kid waiting for Christmas morning, it was a fitful sleep. I was really worried that I'd sleep through the 5:00 alarm and miss the whole trip. <br />
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Not to worry though--I actually woke up about fifteen minutes early, raring to go. I took my shower, put on my all-synthetic clothes, and laced up my Oboz hiking boots. I got all my extra clothes and stuff loaded in the trunk, and was on my way by 6:00 am. <br />
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I got to the Home Depot parking lot with about ten minutes to spare and found that I was the first one there. A few minutes later a guy pulled in and parked next to me and introduced himself as Chad, and with all of the hiking decals on the back of his SUV, I recognized that I'd passed him on the freeway about ten minutes earlier. Everyone else started trickling in, introductions were made, and while I'd only briefly met two of the nine people on the trip, it seemed like a really fun group of people. We figured out the carpooling situation, and I decided that I'd rather leave my car out in the woods at the trailhead overnight instead of as a tempting target in the shopping center, so Chad rode with me.<br />
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It's a looooong drive to where we were headed. I'd never heard of Pickett State Park, but it's way up by the Kentucky border, a little more than halfway between Nashville and Knoxville. And while we could take the freeway to the little town of Monterey, it was all back roads after that. <br />
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We stopped for a potty/food break at Hardees, and went over the driving directions to the park in case we got separated. But we made it to the ranger's station at the park by around 9:30, did the requisite paperwork and secured our backcountry permits, and then drove down to the trailhead parking lot about three-quarters of a mile away.<br />
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It was a pretty brisk morning, but the rule is to start hiking cold, because when you're schlepping a 34 lb pack up and down hills all day, you're gonna warm up in a hurry. We got our gear together made sure everyone had their keys, permits, plenty of water, and everything strapped down and ready to roll. After an impromptu 'trail yoga' session of stretching, we had a quick briefing from our leader Kerry about what to expect, along with the do's and don'ts of our upcoming day. We took a few pictures and were on our way.<br />
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In addition to Kerry and Steve, our trip leaders, there were three other fairly experienced backpackers in the group, while I was one of the four noobs. Kerry took the point and I fell in behind her, while Steve stayed in the middle, and one of the other more experienced girls took the tail-end-Charlie position as our 'sweeper', making sure nobody got left behind as everyone has different walking paces. <br />
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But the plan was to take frequent breaks and make lots of stops for rest and water, and after all, we were only going about five miles and we had all day--there was no hurry. <br />
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The loop we were doing was called the Hidden Passage Trail, which is almost exactly ten miles long, but there was a spur trail down to our campsite which added a half mile each way to the trip. Eleven miles wasn't much. Hell, when I was a kid, I did fifty in three days (of course, I was miserable, but still, I did it), and I can easily walk seven miles in three hours down on the greenway in White House, which I do a couple of times a month. I figured I was ready to kick ass and take names on this trail!<br />
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The first mile was fairly easy--the trail was smooth and well used, and although it went downhill to a creek and back up the other side to the first trail junction, it was about what I expected. Tougher than a day hike, definitely more hilly than I expected, but just being out in the woods was a lot of fun. It was a beautiful clear day, and my traveling companions were a good-natured sort, so we had a lot of laughs as we wandered through the woods. <br />
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The first trail junction led off to the left, which we bypassed--it would be part of our return loop the next afternoon, so the last mile or so of the trail would be the only thing we'd repeat. A few minutes beyond that, we got to the actual 'Hidden Passage' which was a huge rock overhang that form an almost grotto-like passage around the side of the mountain. While the roof came down low, it never got so low you had to crawl, although my backpack is officially 'broken in' now, with all kinds of scrapes on the upper frame. It was cool and shady in there and although it was a long drop to the bottom, it was a great spot for a break, as long as you watched your step. <br />
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<i>You can tell it's still early in the hike by the body language. Everyone is smiling and clean, and nobody is hunched over trying to catch their breath. That would change before long...</i></div>
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After a short break and a few pictures, it was time to move on down the trail. It started getting a little more rugged from this point forward--there were TONS of blowdowns blocking the trail that we had to step over, crawl over, or scoot under. Although it's expected out there in the wilderness, after about the twentieth time, it started to get annoying.<br />
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A few more hills and obstacles later, there was a sign for a side trail down to a place called Crystal Falls, and of course we weren't going to miss that. It wasn't a long side trip, but it was steep and overgrown, reminiscent of the opening jungle scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Luckily we had no tarantulas or headhunters to deal with, and the payoff was spectacular.<br />
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On a hot day, it would've been an ideal cool-off spot, but even though it was sunny out, it was barely 60 degrees, and that water was ice-cold, straight out of a limestone mountain spring, so instead of frolicking around in the swimming hole, we just took a few pictures.<br />
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We hung out down there for a bit, but the once we climbed back up to the main trail, it took us up the side of the hill to cross the stream that fed the falls. It was only a few feet across, but it was covered with slippery moss-covered rocks, and it was a long way down to the bottom. It was one of many times that weekend I was thankful for my trekking poles. <br />
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After the side trip to Crystal Falls, the trail got even more rugged the further we got from civilization. We crossed dozens upon dozens of blowdowns, always slowing us down. They got to be a real pain in the ass, and my only real complaint about the trip. Instead of walking in the woods, I spend a good portion of my time climbing over and under dead trees. Normally, when I'm doing my regular dayhikes, I keep up a two-and-a-half mile-per-hour pace. On this trail, we barely did a mile an hour. Not because we were slow, but because Mother Nature had set up hundreds of road blocks in our path.<br />
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On the other hand, the scenery was nothing short of awesome. A good portion of the trip was along the edge of a spectacular gorge that dropped off a hundred feet or more in most places. Yeah, it was tough to enjoy it as much when you were spending most of your time watching your step, because six inches the wrong way and it was adios!, never to be seen again. But we paused often enough while climbing through the downed trees to be able to enjoy the views. If anyone in our group was afraid of heights, it didn't show.<br />
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<i>A good portion of the trail was just scrambling along bare rocks that dropped off into the canyon below. The camera doesn't do it justice, but there were plenty of opportunities for gravity to reach up and kill you. </i></div>
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Since walking along the edge of the cliffs, punctuated by the constant creeping through the blowdowns required full concentration, the cameras pretty much stayed tucked away after the first hour or so of the hike. Eventually the conversation slowed down as went along, the trail sucking the energy out of us one by one. <br />
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After a couple of hours, we had a lunch break in a wide spot on a cliff face. The overhang provided a little shade, and there were a few flat rocks to sit down on, so we relaxed for about a half an hour or so and broke out the feed bags. My lunch consisted of pepperoni slices and mustard wrapped in a tortilla, along with a bag of cashews and some turkey jerky. It was interesting to see what kind of trail food people brought along, and since it was just an overnight trip, we weren't limited to freeze-dried 'expedition' food. One girl brought along whole avocados to eat, and there was plenty of fruit and trail mix variations, too. A couple of people even brought sandwiches that they kept on the top of their packs so as not to get smashed up, figuring it would only be a couple of hours before they got eaten, anyways. <br />
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It was nice to relax and take the pack off for awhile (I used mine as a recliner), and rest the feet. Since I was wearing shorts, my legs got beat up pretty good--I had dozens of cuts and scrapes, and one gash on the back of my calf that looked like I'd been in a knife fight. I had few handi-wipes to clean up with, but I knew I'd be feeling it for the rest of the week.<br />
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We had lunch around 12:30, having been on the trail for two hours. Steve had a GPS with him and I will admit that I was a little disappointed to learn that we'd only covered a little more than two miles. It already felt like ten. But that's the deal with backpacking--basically double the miles from doing a packless dayhike. If you're doing five miles around the neighborhood on a weekend, put on a backpack and it feels like twice as much distance--it's just that much more work. <br />
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Eventually, we got going again, and right after lunch we had a monster climb to the top of the ridge we were on, but at least we had the energy from resting and eating to help power us through. We contended with the blowdowns and rough trail conditions for a good part of the afternoon, but there were always great places to slow down and enjoy. Just before the five mile mark, there was another awesome overhang that had a small waterfall coming down from above, and we stopped and rested for a bit before pushing on to the campsite. <br />
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By the time that picture was taken, I was full-on into are-we-there-yet? mode. We'd been on the trail for over four hours and that five miles had completely kicked my ass. It was rated as a 'moderate' hike as far as difficulty was concerned, but my fat carcass hauling a 34 lb. pack up and down those hills and through all of the downed trees and just about had enough. <br />
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Nobody was happier than me to see the spur trail to the campsite a few minutes later. <br />
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Double Falls was the name of our campsite, and although it was only 2700 feet away from where that picture was taken, it felt like 2700 feet straight down. Actually it was only about 300 feet down, but it was all in a half mile, which made for a STEEP descent. I remember thinking to myself <i>Man, this is gonna be a cast-iron bitch climbing back up this mofo in the morning! </i> I was not looking forward to that.<br />
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By that point, I'd contracted a severe case of 'get-there-itis', so I took the point and led the pack train down the hill. That last twenty minutes or so was easily the longest half mile of the day, and once we got to the flat ground of the campsite, I couldn't take my pack off fast enough. I was spent. I drained my water bottle and sat down at the base of a tree, glad that the hardest day of hiking I'd ever done was finally over. <br />
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It took us almost exactly five hours to go five-and-a-half miles, and I felt every step of it. <br />
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The first order of business was to set up camp and gather firewood, so we all went our separate ways looking for spots to pitch our tents. I was impressed with the area though--we couldn't have asked for a more ideal backcountry campsite. There was plenty of cover and firewood available, and it was a huge area, easily a football field's worth of flat spots for tents, along with ready-made firepit. Plus there was a creek running alongside the campsite providing drinking water and ambient noise. Perfect is the only way to describe it.<br />
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Although I was moving slowly, I managed get my tent set up and change out of my boots into my camp shoes--a pair of Crocs slides that don't weigh anything, but are damn-near indestructible. I was getting a hot spot on my left heel that was forming into a good-sized blister, so I couldn't wait to take my boots off. <br />
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By the time I got my stuff all set up and my mattress pad inflated, it was all I could do to gather a couple of armloads of firewood. I made the damn-near fatal mistake of not hydrating enough throughout the day, and I had the worst cramps you could possibly imagine. I crawled into my tent and laid there for over an hour, shooting pain in my thighs and calves, and even in the top of my foot. I couldn't move--I just sipped water and laid there grunting in pain every time I tried to bend over to take my socks off. I was miserable!<br />
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Everyone else was scattered about doing their own thing, so nobody really heard me over in my tent swearing to myself and not-so-silently enduring my misery. I was a pit panicked, wondering how I'd ever climb up that hill, much less haul my ass five-and-a-half miles back to the trailhead, as I was literally unable to move. Eventually, after about a half-liter of water and an hour of trying to lie still, the pain finally subsided and I was able to change into warm clothes and stand up again.<br />
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I went down to the creek to filter more water and top off my bottles, plus I had a half-gallon Nalgene 'canteen' that rolls up small enough to keep in a pack pocket, which I happily shared with my trail-mates for cooking dinner. It was the most relaxing thing in the world at the time, sitting there on a log on the creek bank, filtering water and soaking my burning feet in the ice-cold stream. <br />
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The sun started setting behind the hills and the temperature started to drop, and I realized that I'd forgotten to bring my long hiking pants. I have a set of synthetic convertible pants (basically cargo pants that you can unzip the legs from and use as shorts). But somehow I'd left them in the trunk of my car instead of putting them in my clothes bag. Luckily I had a pair of merino wool 'base layer' long underwear, so with those, a wool shirt, a fleece jacket, socks, and a beanie hat, I managed to stay pretty warm as we gathered around the campfire for dinner. <br />
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Those few hours around the campfire that evening were the highlight of the trip. Yeah, it was a great hike with some incredible scenery that day, but the sense of accomplishment after a long day on the trail couldn't be beat. Plus, relaxing around a fire with good company and a hot meal is always a favorite way to end the day.<br />
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For dinner, I made a Knorr side of chicken-flavored noodles in my cook pot, and busted out a hunk of aged cheddar with bacon and a bag of jalapeno beef jerky as a side. I passed the cheese around and it was a big hit--it was that expensive stuff I picked up at the wine tasting earlier in the week. <br />
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<i>My kitchen. A can of fuel, and canister stove, a titanium pot, and a spork. Thankfully, it doesn't weigh much.</i> </div>
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Everyone else kind of had variations on the same thing--freeze-dried or dehydrated meals with veggies and meat added in, fortified with cheese or olive oil, plus dried fruit or trail mix. One girl tried to convince the rest of us how awesome chicken Vienna sausage was, but I don't think anybody was buying. <br />
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There was a lot of passing around and sharing, which was quite the bonding experience--almost like a family dinner. But it also served to give us rookies ideas for a variety of foods to try on the trail. Lipton noodles and Mountain House bag meals get old after awhile. <br />
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After dinner we built the fire up a little more to give off more heat--it was getting downright COLD that evening, and the more experienced group busted out the goodies. I brought my pipe along, which everyone loved, but smarter folks than me had flasks full of whiskey and red wine to pass around, which everyone really appreciated. Good times.<br />
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I made it till around 8:30, but by then I was done. Spent. Ready to check out. I cleaned out all my gear and packed up my kitchen stuff, and shuffled back to my one-bunk Hilton for the rest of the night. I'd brought a trail journal with me to do some writing, but I was just too damn exhausted to keep my eyes open. I crawled into my sleeping bag and zipped it up around me to ward off the chill, and promptly passed out, the effects of the Evan Williams Honey Reserve helping to dull the aches and pains of the day. <br />
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The conversation and laughter around the campfire lasted for a bit longer, but I was the first domino to fall. One by one everyone else called it a night, and by ten o'clock, the fire was down to embers and the campsite was silent, except for Chad's snoring off in the distance...<br />
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I woke up around six in the morning, not quite warm, but not quite freezing, either. My feet were a little cold, although I was wearing wool socks inside of a 25-degree down bag. Luckily, the cramps were all gone and it was just general soreness I had to contend with that morning. <br />
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It took me a good half hour to finally crawl out of my sleeping bag and get dressed before heading off in the woods to do the necessary. A few other people started stirring, and somebody was kind enough to get the fire started before I got back to camp. <br />
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Breakfast was a little more subdued than dinner was, as morning coffee was a higher priority than conversation. My niece is a manager of a local Starbucks, so she hooks me up with those instant Via packs. I mixed one of those with a pack of hot cocoa and touch of powdered creamer, and it was damn good. I'd planned on having grits and cheese for breakfast, but the thought of scrubbing my pot out again didn't appeal, so I just ate two coconut Cliff bars instead. <br />
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One of the guys had extra Gatorade powder, so he offered it to me to help keep my legs from cramping up again. And I had to drink it with 20 ounces of water, so I was good and hydrated that morning. In addition to that, I had a side of ibuprofen with my breakfast, too. <br />
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<i>Breakfast at Emily's. And I recall, I recall, we both kinda liked it.</i></div>
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While I enjoyed warming up by the fire and socializing with my trail mates that morning, there were chores to be done. I had to fix the blister on my foot (moleskin and duct tape!), get my tent taken down and all my stuff repacked, and we had to filter more water for the hike out. And that big-assed Everest of a climb was still ahead of me, too. <br />
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<i>Breaking camp</i></div>
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It took a couple of hours for everyone to get up, eat, do chores, and break camp, and we were ready to hit the trail by 9:30. Knowing that the hill wasn't going to climb itself, I took the lead once again, quite certain that everyone else would eventually catch up, if not outright pass, my slow but steady ass. <br />
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<i>About a third of the way up. Oh, look, another downed tree to climb over...</i></div>
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Surprisingly, the climb up was much easier than the climb down the previous afternoon. Maybe because going up is always easier than going down, or more likely because we were well rested and freshly fed and watered. No matter the reason, it was a lot tougher in my mind than it was on my feet.<br />
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<i>Leading the charge up the hill</i></div>
<span id="goog_325733517"></span><span id="goog_325733518"></span><br />
Once we got to the top, we had a look at the trail map and Kerry told us that we were in for a much easier day--the inbound loop was much more maintained and we wouldn't have nearly as many blowdowns to contend with. And also, the last two miles would be relatively flat. That was good news. While I didn't have to deal with cramps, I was still pretty sore, and there was a nice-sized blister forming on my left heel, too. So while it was going to be an easier day, it wasn't going to be an <i>easy</i> day. <br />
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Once we got back to the top of the hill, we had a relatively easy and flat ridge walk to a place called Thompson's Overlook. I wish the pictures could illustrate just how cool it was up there, but they don't capture the view, or the ridiculous drop-off below.<br />
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<i>Your humble correspondent atop Thompson's Overlook</i></div>
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There were only a few climbs after the overlook--it was probably the highest point on the entire trail, but there were still several ups and downs before we got close to the end. One in particular was a beast, but we made it through the entire trip without anyone taking a spill And while we still had a few blowdowns to deal with, it was nothing like the day before. </div>
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<i>A typical section of the trail. More climbing up and over than actual walking. I used muscles that I didn't even know I had. Even Sadie the trail dog was like 'fuck this' after awhile and just stopped when we'd come to another tree blocking the path. </i></div>
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<i>Some of the hills were a real bitch, but the thing that kept me motivated for the climbs was Major Payne's voice in the back of my head saying 'ONE tubby tubby, TWO tubby tubby' as I put one foot in front of the other</i></div>
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Eventually, we got to the side of the mountain with less wind, thus fewer blowdowns, and the trail leveled out considerably. Our pace picked up quite a bit, and although we took a few stops for lunch and water, we shaved an hour off of the previous day's hiking time, even though it was the same distance. <br />
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At one point, we had to road walk along a forest service road for about a half mile, and instead of using the trekking poles, I just carried them. And I was ready to stop walking, too...<br />
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<i>Notice the gash on the back of my right leg. Luckily chicks dig scars, because I got lots.</i></div>
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That service road led to a group campsite, and from there it about a half mile downhill to the trail junction we hit the day before. And from the junction back to the car, it was less than a mile back to the trailhead. But that last mile was one more big downhill to a creek and then we switchbacked our way up to the top once again. After the third switchback, I could see my car through the trees and it gave me the motivation to go those last couple hundred yards. Yeah, I was wiped out, but as was everyone else, but I'm sure I was the most out-of-shape hiker in the group. But I made it, and it was quite an accomplishment.<br />
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There were honestly a few times out there when I was huffing and puffing my way up a hill, or getting pissed off and scraped up as I crawled over or under another dead tree where I thought backpacking just wasn't for me. That shiat is hard. But I played a few psychological tricks on myself to keep going. The obvious one was reminding myself of those awful days in the Vanderbilt ICU where I had machines and tubes hooked up to me and couldn't walk thirty feet. Like the ad said, you've come a long way, baby! I felt like I owed it to myself to keep walking no matter how hard it was, just to prove that all that was in the past. Also, there was no other way out of there--I HAD to walk my ass out. One of the more creative thoughts that kept me going was the history major in me thinking about old Revolutionary War soldiers having to walk in bad shoes, or no shoes at all, with heavy, usually wet, equipment, poor food, and no end in sight. I kept thinking to myself that I'm a freakin' pussy compared to them, and the least I could do was walk my tired ass five miles in my high-tech boots and light equipment. And then drive my ass the last hundred-and-fifty miles home. <br />
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Whatever it takes, right?<br />
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Once we all made it back to the trailhead, it was a mad scramble to get the boots off and change into different clothes, then pack up the vehicles. We drove back to the ranger station to take advantage of the flush toilets and clean cold water out of the tap. We cleaned ourselves up the best we could, and I spent a whopping $3.75 for a clean and soft cotton t-shirt from the gift shop. The ranger said she was thinking about us last night--we were the only people in the park and it got down to 17 degrees that night. No wonder my feet were cold!<br />
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After everyone got cleaned up and changed, we made plans to rendezvous at a restaurant in Cookeville, about sixty miles away. We were kind of stinky and loud, so they were kind enough to put us on the patio by ourselves. But it was a great meal, and we had a lot of laughs retelling stories of our adventures. <br />
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We caravanned back to Nashville and said our goodbyes in Lebanon, making plans to all get together again soon. One thing about life on the trail--you make fast friends. I don't know if it's because misery loves company, or adventure just brings people together, but whatever the reason, I had a great time and made eight new friends. <br />
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And even though if I'd been offered 10 grand to do it again on Sunday afternoon, I would've flat turned it down, I can't wait till the next time. My body has healed and I've expanded the envelope of my limitations. It's probably a good thing to keep doing it.<br />
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<b><i>Mikey</i></b><br />
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Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-9908926695846136002013-04-23T15:47:00.004-05:002013-04-23T15:51:43.529-05:00Out of the Wilderness<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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As I start out another blog post apologizing for a longer-than-usual absence, I can offer up a couple of legitimate excuses. First of all, I had no access to wifi for about four days, and also, I was out in the middle of nowhere backpacking with some friends from the Nashville Hiking Meetup group. In fact, that trip--with lots of pictures--is the subject of my next post, which should be up before Thursday night. Also, last week, I was out every night last week doing some sort of activity, and my access to the computer was limited at best. And while Blogger has a mobile app that will work in a pinch, it's a pain in the ass to try and type up a blog post on an iPhone.<br />
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Also, as much as I love this Toshiba Satellite computer, it's now six years old, and it's unable to keep up with a lot of the new software out there, (not to mention the newer, faster wifi connection at the Hippie's house), so it's about time to upgrade. Oh, I'll keep it and leave it on the desk in my room, because it works great as a writing tool and music downloader. But for a laptop, it's relatively heavy and a total pain in the ass to lug around, and it's got the Vista operating system, which Microsoft seems to be abandoning as quickly as possible. And <i>nobody</i> is upgrading software that works with Vista anymore, much less coming up with anything new. And the battery doesn't last but a couple of hours, either.<br />
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That being said, Reverend Dave was in town this past weekend, and brought his new HP Envy X2 with him. He let me play with it for a bit, and I was instantly hooked. I don't know why everyone bitches about Windows 8 so much--I loved it. I found it to be pretty intuitive and thoroughly modern. And the Envy itself, for those that aren't familiar, is a notebook (11.6 inch screen), but it converts to a tablet--the screen separates completely and you can take it with you and leave the keyboard behind. It's got two different batteries (one in the keyboard, one in the screen), so it'll go about twelve hours on a charge, too. I had severe computer envy once I messed around with it for a bit.<br />
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Well, just yesterday, they dropped the price $50 on Amazon, so I ordered one as an early birthday present to myself (well, that was the justification for dropping six bills on it). It'll be here tomorrow, and I can't wait to get it up and running. Actually, I look forward to bringing it with me to my various writing groups, because this Toshiba feels like it weighs a ton. And I'll be the coolest wannabe-author in the Portland Brew coffee shop next time, too (off course all the Macbook fanboys with their neckbeards and hipster glasses might disagree, but you can't really trust any opinion from somebody who willingly drinks Pabst Blue Ribbon, am I right?)<br />
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Anyhow, so what have I been up to, besides the backpacking trip? Well, last Tuesday, a week ago, I thought I was going to a Blackberry Smoke concert at the Grand Ole Opry, but we got jacked. When we saw the announcement on my Facebook feed, the Opry website said 'Blackberry Smoke, One Night Only, with Aaron Tippin', so I jumped online and bought a couple of tickets. For those of you who don't know, Blackberry Smoke is a kick-ass Southern Rock band out of Atlanta, filling the Skynyrd/Allman Brothers void. I saw them last September at the Southern Grounds festival and they rocked the house, and I've been a huge fan ever since.<br />
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Well, as it turns out, seeing a show at the Opry isn't really a concert. It's a showcase, straight out of the Fifties, where they have eight to ten different acts per night come on and do two or three songs each, and that's it. I had no idea, so it was a complete waste of time and I was pretty pissed that I paid $75 for a couple of tickets and only got to see three songs (and it was the three mellowest songs in their repertoire, too. Can't offend all the 80-year-old tourists!). Oh, and between each act, there was a guy on the corner of the stage reading 2-3 minute long AM radio-style Cracker Barrel and Dollar General commercials. It was awful. Just not anything like I expected. But now I can say as a Nashville resident, I have been to the Opry. Won't ever go back, though. At least Scottie and I had a good dinner at Chuy's before the show, and I was home before 9:00 pm. Yeah, we left as soon as Blackberry Smoke left the stage. <br />
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The next night, Wednesday, I met Amy after work and we drove down to Arrington Vineyards, way down south of Nashville, and met up with Scottie and our buddy Gaines for a wine tasting. I'd been there before, but the first time I visited, I thought the wine was kinda shiatty. I mean, Tennessee isn't exactly wine country. But I went with an open mind. We had a picnic dinner out on the lawn and then went up to the tasting house. Gaines is a member of their wine club, so as his guests we got to choose SEVEN different wines to taste for free. Oh hell yeah. As I recall, a couple of them were actually pretty damn good. By the time I got to the Port at the end, I had a slight buzz going and it all tasted good. But that was just a prelude to the main event.<br />
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Down on the patio, they had a huge events tent set up and the folks from Riedel Glassware were hosting a big, official wine tasting, their take being that proper glassware is necessary to really enjoy your wine. Of course, I thought it was a bunch of hooey, just a way to sell glasses, but it was very well put together, and after trying the different wines in different glasses and even out of plastic cups, plus matching them with the right kinds of cheeses, I was total believer--my skepticism had evaporated like the angel's share from the casks in the cellar. It's hard for me to make a case for it here on the blog, but yeah, I'm convinced. Besides, for the $35 cost of admission, we got to keep all four of the different glasses, too.<br />
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After the tasting was over, we went back up to the main tasting house and picked up a couple of bottles to go, and a couple of bricks of their gourmet cheese, then headed back over to Gaines' house to continue the festivities. I was pretty happy that I didn't have to work the next day, because it was a late night. But that red wine helped me sleep like a baby. I stayed down there at the hippies' house and spent the day on Thursday playing with the pugs and working on chapter revisions for Linda Lou (dialogue is hard!). And like I mentioned before, my laptop requires the old 'N' wifi, and Amy and Scottie use the newer 'G' band wifi (or do I have that backwards, I always forget), and since Amy works at home, they can't really put this computer on the network without slowing it way down, which would affect Amy's job, so I couldn't get online. But I got a lot of work done. At some point in the afternoon Reverend Dave called and said he'd drive up to Nashville that night instead of the next day, so I opted to stick around and spend the night there again. Friday is casual day at my office, so I had plenty of clothes with me.<br />
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We had dinner at a local Mexican joint, and just hung out goofing off at the house that night, but I was up and out early on Friday. Luckily, it was only a half day for me, and it was all meetings, so it was an easy day when I pulled the ripcord at noon. I drove back to my house and gathered all my backpacking gear and a few necessities for the weekend, showered, changed clothes, and got back on the road a couple of hours later, heading back down to the Hippies house.<br />
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It was Amy's birthday that weekend, so we were having a party that night. David grilled some ribeyes, plus made some asparagus wrapped in prosciutto and goat cheese, grilled corn on the cob, and also made a baked brie with apricot preserves, too. And Scottie made his awesome caramelized-onion and garlic mashed potatoes, and of course we cracked open a couple of bottles of red wine, too. As soon as dinner finished, people started showing up, and we lit up the firepit and broke out the sangria. Good times!<br />
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It was a great party, but I had to go to bed at midnight--my alarm was set for 5:30 in the morning. I had to be out in Lebanon at 7:00 (forty miles away) for our carpool meetup, because it was another hundred miles or so to Pickett State Park where we were going backpacking. <br />
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By the time I got back late Sunday evening, I was a tuckered out little trooper--completely wiped out. I had Monday off, which I needed, because I was hobbling around the house like an old man who lost his cane. But I felt much better today, and was extremely bummed to get up early this morning, drive in to work, only to find out that I was supposed to be out on vacation all this week.<br />
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Had I known, I would've stayed in bed. I couldn't really do much about today, so I cancelled the rest of it and came back home. I must still be pretty tired, because I fell asleep on the couch as soon as I got back, but I'm up now and trying to take a bite out of my never-ending to-do list. And one of the things on it is to write up the weekend's adventures out in the park.<br />
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I better get on it.<br />
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<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-81776381464511842082013-04-14T09:07:00.002-05:002013-04-14T09:07:09.433-05:00Get it TODAY<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho9UExN_ky2ARWNG_o0UZr6d3JJCT7vFLH_o7HGpFJ1-uWDRNGiPw480PaMpdH1vOqyNVKHBrFqFkEFu1A6MH2MV38CIeMSwVATe3jOcDsVnt5NVYlVNFanifKkoIBWbXeB9TX/s1600/bastardhusband.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho9UExN_ky2ARWNG_o0UZr6d3JJCT7vFLH_o7HGpFJ1-uWDRNGiPw480PaMpdH1vOqyNVKHBrFqFkEFu1A6MH2MV38CIeMSwVATe3jOcDsVnt5NVYlVNFanifKkoIBWbXeB9TX/s1600/bastardhusband.jpg" /></a></div>
Hey Readers, today only, get a FREE Kindle version of Linda Lou's book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Bastard-Husband-Love-Story-ebook/dp/B004M8SVPW/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1365947560&sr=1-1&keywords=bastard+husband" target="_blank">Bastard Husband: A Love Story</a>. Normally it's about three bucks (still a bargain!), but even if you don't have a Kindle you can still get the Kindle app for your iPad or droid tablet.<br />
<br />
Or if you prefer to go old-school, that's ok too. You can still get the real-book version from Amazon, and it makes a fine addition to your library, coffee table, or back-of-the-toilet shelf. Don't laugh, you know you keep reading material in there. <br />
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Don't worry fellas, I know what you're thinking--but no, it's not a Lifetime Movie gone to print. It's actually funny, entertaining, and nobody gets kidnapped, held hostage, stalked, or otherwise oppressed by evil men-folk.<br />
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Anyhow, if you want a few laughs sprinkled in with a few Vegas stories, get the book. You'll enjoy it. I promise.<br />
<i><b><br /></b></i>
<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-47387012826259179062013-04-11T14:27:00.003-05:002013-04-11T14:27:54.252-05:00Figuring It Out<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_l69i68zL873vCBEwWA7gFoRT2AT9qhyxwJjmMyI8KSfCBUIDivE16-c7jvKrHGi3TZg2ejW4qe4SSJbgPp28kzUEmiBF0vyC-UOt_WrJDOQMNM9gaU9jSPo0qzJvtEvIh4TB/s1600/figuredout.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_l69i68zL873vCBEwWA7gFoRT2AT9qhyxwJjmMyI8KSfCBUIDivE16-c7jvKrHGi3TZg2ejW4qe4SSJbgPp28kzUEmiBF0vyC-UOt_WrJDOQMNM9gaU9jSPo0qzJvtEvIh4TB/s320/figuredout.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
After a wonderful sunny day where I was stuck in the cube, unable to enjoy it, I'm spending my day off wishing that it wasn't drizzly and cold out. Well, it's not that cold, just cool, I suppose, but the rain and overcast make it feel like a curl-up-with-a-book-and-a-bowl-of-soup kind of day.<br />
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I had considered taking a nice long hike today, but I purposely asked for a rain jacket for Christmas that was a couple sizes too small, and it's still a bit snug, so I can't really use it yet. It's a nice Marmot jacket, and they make great stuff--I have one of their rain hats and everyone who sees it wants one--but since it's expensive, I don't want to cram myself into it and take a chance of breaking a zipper or blowing out a seam. Instead, I'm spending the day going through my backpacking gear and getting it organized for my next trip.<br />
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Y'all know that I'm a member of about a half-dozen different Meetup groups here in Nashville, and there are a couple of different hiking and backpacking groups. Anyhow, one of the hiking groups is sponsoring a 'beginners' backpacking trip next weekend and I registered early enough to get a spot. I met the group leaders and a few of the other participants a few weeks ago down at REI, and we had an afternoon-long meet-and-greet plus a few presentations about what to bring and what to expect and such. Now, I'm not a <i>total</i> beginner, like some of my colleagues, but I'm by no means an expert. Maybe an armchair expert, because I've read, researched, and certainly spent a lot, but I just don't have a lot of miles on my boots yet.<br />
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I'm hoping to get two or three multiple-day trips in by the end of the year, so no I have no cruises or anything else like that on the calendar (well, maybe another trip to Vegas), but otherwise I'm saving my paid time off for walks in the woods. <br />
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Anyhow, next weekend we're going on a ten-mile roundtrip trek through Pickett State Park, up near the Kentucky border about 150 miles east of here. We're gonna do five miles in on Saturday, camp and bonfire that night, then five miles out on Sunday morning, before returning to Nashville. <br />
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I'm pretty sure that I've got 100% of the gear I need at this point, although for a long time I was worried about clothing. It's dangerous to wear jeans or cotton clothing while backpacking, because it absorbs moisture (sweat and rain) and doesn't try out, so it gets heavy and causes hypothermia, too. Or as they say, 'Cotton Kills'. And they don't sell <strike>a lot of</strike> any synthetic hiking clothing at the Big & Tall. Well, I'm done with those gougers, so I've been bargain shopping at Sierra Trading Post for the past couple of months, plus picking up the occasional sale item at REI, too. I've got some excellent nylon convertible pants, some Merino wool base-layer gear, and a couple of long-sleeved synthetic t-shirts. Not to mention a very cool North Face fleece pullover shirt/jacket thing that is probably my new favorite in the wardrobe.<br />
<br />
Also, I had a small jar full of change that I took down to the CoinStar machine down at Kroger the other day, as it was starting to overflow and spill all over my desk. I held back about $8.00 worth of quarters to get my car washed and vacuumed, but the rest I cashed in. Instead of paying the 9.8% that they want to hold back to give you a cash voucher, I opted for an Amazon gift card. So the brown-suited Santa Claus is coming today with a few other goodies--a short sleeved synthetic shirt (I had a couple already, but they're now about three sizes too big) and a D-ring web belt. I'm keeping my black leather belt for work (which goes just short of one-and-a-half times around me), but it won't do for outdoors activities. Besides, my pants, no matter what size, eventually always fall down, and then couple that with slick synthetic underwear, I need a belt in the worst way when I'm out in the woods. <br />
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<i>Now</i>, I think I'm ready to go...<br />
<br />
So today I'm doing what they call a 'gear bomb', basically tearing up the backpack and repacking and reorganizing everything. I got a new ultra-light sleeping pad a few months back, and had never even blown it up before, so I got that out, along with my down sleeping bag, and gave it a test drive on the floor of the den this morning. I also had to go through the food back and make sure I didn't have any old nasty stuff in there, either. Anyhow, here's what the den looks like today:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWLb8ZxqjH-BQd_1eYjIOxAaC1WerrlvbFid6x7cD7FEcQzGUYqAfkZjLaT7XJp9eHDmkZHJO_Dj_g6mRsT2tOIixQ64ai75lzT16V0TJvauyx-HlhSoEwI3l5h24UWXucCNLa/s1600/IMG_0216.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWLb8ZxqjH-BQd_1eYjIOxAaC1WerrlvbFid6x7cD7FEcQzGUYqAfkZjLaT7XJp9eHDmkZHJO_Dj_g6mRsT2tOIixQ64ai75lzT16V0TJvauyx-HlhSoEwI3l5h24UWXucCNLa/s400/IMG_0216.JPG" width="400" /> </a></div>
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I know it looks messy, but there's a method to my madness. It'll take me most of the afternoon to get everything organized, especially since The Masters is distracting me on ESPN, but I'll get it done. I have to.</div>
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At some point I also have to sit down at the keyboard and bang out another chapter or two for my upcoming book. I really haven't done much in a week, but then again, the muse hasn't been singing and I'm still waiting for some feedback from a couple of people who've been down this road before me. I guess I could just go with the old stream-of-consciousness method and just get something down on paper, and worry about cleaning it up later, but I'd rather be effective than efficient. And while I'm hoping to have it completely written by Labor Day, I think that might be a bit optimistic. Some days I can sit and write for hours, and some weeks I can't get three sentences written that are worth a damn. It's a strange process, one that I still don't fully understand. But right now I'm wishing I were dealing poker 18 hours a week and goofing off at the keyboard the rest of the time. Wasting eight hours a day in an office I don't like being in really sucks the creativity out, and not in a good way, either. </div>
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But that's the news for the day. A fresh pot of coffee is ready, and I've got stuff to do. I'll check in later.</div>
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<i><b>Mikey</b></i></div>
<br />Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-25191705378939119732013-04-05T13:53:00.000-05:002013-04-05T13:53:03.793-05:00Pecking Away<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisuSfW2uG_QhF_rnHiy5ZaEt3pJ32h_gTclxQXXeQ5xp6PoFFjhw_EPX1Ro-F6KY9E3IKXz-sZ0VfW3OvBSyHjudtIP9Qm_rT5Ao5ILIFeEx0M_BKWVNNFYKZugQEJMiOKad1S/s1600/pecking.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="132" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisuSfW2uG_QhF_rnHiy5ZaEt3pJ32h_gTclxQXXeQ5xp6PoFFjhw_EPX1Ro-F6KY9E3IKXz-sZ0VfW3OvBSyHjudtIP9Qm_rT5Ao5ILIFeEx0M_BKWVNNFYKZugQEJMiOKad1S/s200/pecking.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Sorry for not getting anything up yesterday--I'm trying my hardest to put something up on Sundays and at least one day mid-week (usually Thursdays), but for it being a day off, I found myself surprisingly busy. <br />
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But the entire week's been busy for me. Of course on Wednesday, I had another doctor appointment. Well, I actually needed to just get my FMLA renewal paperwork signed, so I don't get jacked at work for the attendance policy stuff, but you can't see the doctor, or even just have the paperwork dropped off without coughing up that co-pay and getting the full-on exam. I really shouldn't complain because I really like my doctor and the staff there at the office, they've always treated me really well, and it feels like I'm there EVERY week. It was just a minor annoyance, because what I thought would take me about ten minutes ended up taking away most of my afternoon. <br />
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And I'd forgotten to bring my phone charger with me that day, which created another pain in the butt for me. Usually I have a USB adapter in my backpack with me at all times, and I plug my phone into my desktop at work to charge it, or into the USB port in the center console of my car. But, instead, when I left work the night before, I just put it in my pants pocket and forgot about it. And while I was sitting in the waiting room, and in the exam room, waiting, I was constantly playing Ruzzle against three or four different people, which sucks the battery faster than using it as a GPS. So the iPhone went into last-gasp mode and shut down on me. <br />
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After my day at the doctor's office, I had to drive across town to Green Hills and secure a table for eight at Cheesecake Factory for a family dinner. I had plenty of time to kill, plus I still had my laptop in my backpack, so I walked over to Panera Bread to chill for an hour and maybe do some writing. But then their wifi was on the fritz, so all I did try and edit some Word files I'd been working on, but my heart wasn't into it, so I mostly just sat and played Hearts while drinking my vanilla latte. <br />
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I did, however, have a cool random encounter while I was there. When I walked in, I wandered about for a minute or two, looking for a table with an electrical outlet nearby (the laptop is getting old, and the battery ain't what she used to be). Well, at the same time there was a rather attractive gal who kept looking at me, and once I grabbed a table, she came over to talk to me. <br />
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Turns out she was meeting a blind date there, and wondered if I were he. Of course, my best response came to me about thirty seconds after I told her that I was not. Then I was kicking myself--I could've offered to pretend we were there together until the dude showed up, and then if he seemed OK she could go over and introduce herself, if he didn't, well then, <i>Roll Tide!</i><br />
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But I didn't bring my A-game with me, and instead it was just me and the laptop having coffee. <br />
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Eventually we had our dinner a few doors down at the Cheesecake Factory. I had a few bites of some chicken-stuffed tortilla with black beans and corn fritters (so damn good!), but then got the to-go box. Of course I also had them get me a slice of German Chocolate cheesecake to go, too. Certainly not what I was supposed to be eating, but since I spread it out over a couple of days, it's OK, right?<br />
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But Thursday, it was nice to actually sleep in and not be bothered by the alarm clock. For the last couple of weeks, I've been run-down and out of sorts, waking up exhausted every day, no matter how early I'd gone to bed. So I felt pretty good yesterday. I did my normal household chores, but then I spent a couple of hours reading, too--I've got a couple of free books from Amazon that I'm supposed to review within 30 days, so I read until I fell asleep and napped for three more hours. <br />
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Too bad I didn't appreciate how awesome naps were back when I was a kid--I'm all over that shiat nowadays!<br />
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Once I woke up, I grabbed a bag of turkey jerky and sat down at the computer, and I managed to get another 1600+ words done on the first book. That's just about three-and-a-half single-spaced pages on Word with a 12 pt. font--just enough for a chapter. I have no idea how much that is on a standard printed book page, but I want people to feel like they got their money's worth. I hate buying a book and finding out that it's only 180 pages long. Anyhow, I think I now have four completed chapters (but all are still waiting to be edited). If I had to nail down a target, I'm hoping for about 28-32 chapters when all is said and done but it may go even longer than that. <br />
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Right now it's pretty tough going; even though I'm writing a memoir-style book about my time in Las Vegas, that first year I was there, I hardly blogged at all, so I have to go back and fill in all the holes from the beginning, but then I've also got to give all the pre-Vegas background stories, too. And y'all know how I can just crank out the words once I get going, so this thing might end up being thicker than a Betty Crocker cookbook. I hope Linda Lou's got her editing pencil sharpened, because I don't think she has any idea what she's volunteered for.<br />
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I remember hearing once, when I was a teenager, that in the entire Bible, there were only 36 or 39 days written about Jesus' life. Even if you take out the Old Testament, that's still a helluva book centered around eight weeks of activities. I'm finding that each chapter, so far, covers one particular day that fits into the narrative arc. And I was there for almost six years--this project could get out of hand! I might come away from this thinking Tolstoy was a piker. <br />
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Anyhow, I've got a couple more lectures to watch today, plus do a little more reading, and maybe crank out another chapter, too. I may even get motivated to pick up the bass and run some scales for a half hour during the Cardinal's game later this afternoon.<br />
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So that's the news today. And oh by the way, you wanna guess where I found my phone charger that night? Yep, in the dryer. Just like all those wallets in the old days, until I bought this huge Fossil thing that that's bigger than a checkbook (still haven't washed *it* yet, knock on wood). <br />
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Anyhow, more to come...<br />
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<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-57060690811759423292013-03-30T12:43:00.001-05:002013-03-30T12:43:32.490-05:00Housekeeping!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD8kwskbRWUkjIic2NRq0QY8FtbxXw0zt9uRN8_P4b73_5SOfgPE823TMPgmX_w2Yw3zZUi1AJ8aphFKMZLN78_v8oCHcXqw_Lme7z1P0v4f8JKz6UtAeBY0xM-LEQEecajXBM/s1600/hskpr.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD8kwskbRWUkjIic2NRq0QY8FtbxXw0zt9uRN8_P4b73_5SOfgPE823TMPgmX_w2Yw3zZUi1AJ8aphFKMZLN78_v8oCHcXqw_Lme7z1P0v4f8JKz6UtAeBY0xM-LEQEecajXBM/s200/hskpr.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Happy Easter weekend to you all. Not being a churchgoer myself, I won't really be celebrating with the masses (unless you count this ham biscuit I'm eating a day early), so I'll wait until the Kentucky Derby to get my fix of women wearing ridiculous hats in public. <br />
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However, if I were attending services, I hear there's a really good minister down in South Texas who puts on a helluva sermon, and well, that would be my choice.<br />
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Anyhow, I'm glad the weekend is here. I'm going to try to do some more writing and such, along with the usual housekeeping chores, instead of being outside having fun. I've felt a little under the weather this week, drained really, so I'm ok with the pouring rain that we've had for the past couple of days. I was going to go on a night hike last night at Beaman Park (my favorite place to hike in all of Nashville), but 1) the weather was totally crappy, and 2) I couldn't find my headlamp. The place I was going was DEEP in the woods, and while the moon is almost full, it's completely overcast, so there would be no light at all--I would've been stumbling around in the woods, tripping over roots, splashing through unseen puddles, basically having a miserable time. So I opted out. <br />
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Speaking of housekeeping, one hint for the five of you who still leave comments. You only need to submit them once. They go into a moderation queue, and stay there until I can get to a computer and approve them. Loading them three and four times doesn't help or speed up the process. Say it once, with feeling, of course, but then you'll be good to go. Midweek, I can't really get to them till late at night, since Blogger is blocked at work, and so is the local wi-fi network (they change the passwords like the entry codes at Fort Knox, so only the higher-ups have access. On my desk, most sites that are unapproved are blocked. And the mobile Blogger app on my iPhone doesn't allow me to approve comments (yet), so while it may <i>seem</i> that I have forsaken thee, I have not.<br />
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As far as my weekend goes, tonight I'm hanging out with the hippies down in Cool Springs, seeing some sort of Battle of the Bands or American Idol wannabe show (but they're using real musicians with guitars, not pitch-shifters, sequencers, and drum machines, so it should be a hundred percent more watchable than all that crap on prime time TV). Probably gonna spend the night at their place, sleeping at the bottom of a pug pile, then I think we're having a family brunch tomorrow.<br />
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Other than that, it's all up in the air. I have no plans, no commitments, and no meetups to go to. But I <i>do</i> have that whole book thing hanging over me, and I'd really like it to be finished by Labor Day. That's the goal, but knowing what I <i>don't</i> know, that might be a little optimistic. So I'll have to put some time in at the keyboard, even if it ends up where I write twenty pages and can only use six paragraphs, which is likely. <br />
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Peace out until sometime next week--<br />
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<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-21917502382507244772013-03-29T12:01:00.000-05:002013-03-29T22:30:56.431-05:00Sounds Easy, But It's Not<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2s-8mBUt9IeJqIUhBJRuihm1fVvDqGfabqcNcE1EY6UZWwWPbxC1wGpc_jqO_ZW2SCiwg_GWFeeQi8t12Kys3tqp1sDwVOuVp-MgtJxTaVXF7TWcCDPfsm3iz8ERs8yFOm0b8/s1600/writingit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2s-8mBUt9IeJqIUhBJRuihm1fVvDqGfabqcNcE1EY6UZWwWPbxC1wGpc_jqO_ZW2SCiwg_GWFeeQi8t12Kys3tqp1sDwVOuVp-MgtJxTaVXF7TWcCDPfsm3iz8ERs8yFOm0b8/s320/writingit.jpg" width="272" /></a></div>Taking a sabbatical away from the keyboard for the past year or more was exactly what I needed. Not only did I need a break, but life's ups and downs weren't nearly as interesting as times past. I mean, seriously, who wants to read about me sitting in a cube all day, fixing co-worker's screw-ups, doing busy work, and trying to bring some sense of order to my corner of a company that is built on chaos?<br />
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I don't even like <i>talking</i> about my job, much less writing about it, and since I have to spend so much time there, I've truly been at a loss for things to write about. <br />
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But even though I can't help but think of it as a jail sentence--the penalty I must do for spending over five years living it up in Sin City--I've reached a sort of detente with the sorry realization that I'm kind of stuck there for the time being. The economy is still in the shitter and the benefits are just too good to give up. And as much as I bitch about the money, it's actually been pretty good so far this year. But I know I'm going before figurative parole board next March, if not sooner, and I will get my walking papers.<br />
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In the meantime, I'm trying to make the most of my time here in Nashville. I moved here because it's where the family is, and I appreciate that, but I'm thinking that I may move on once again. Of course it's a LONG ways away--my plans are pretty much set in stone through October of 2014. Having the health issues I've had these past couple of years, coupled with living way the eff out in the woods--a geographical oddity, forty miles from everywhere--my social outlets have been somewhat lacking. <br />
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So, and I may have mentioned this before, I signed up with the Nashville Meetup groups. I think I'm actually a member of about five or six sub-groups, but I spend most of my spare time with the Writer's Group. Oh, there's a bunch of other ones I meet with on occasion (I know I've ranted about the hiking group and the full moon hike), and I joined a new one recently called Fit Journey, which is basically me and about a dozen women, all of us kind of chubby, huffing and puffing our way around the Couchville Lake greenway trail. Basically, it's kind of like Weight Watchers without the fees and weigh-ins, and it's great to hike with a group when I'm nowhere close to being the most out-of-shape person in attendance. I think that next weekend we're having a healthy-recipe potluck dinner, too, which I'm looking forward to. <br />
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I've also joined a Nashville 40+ Singles meetup, and although I don't really have much as far as expectations are concerned, it would be nice to meet some new people outside of work and family. I think the first thing I've signed up to attend is a Sunday afternoon jazz concert in a few weeks, followed by a group dinner at a restaurant in Germantown. I'll let y'all know if I come away with some digits...<br />
<br />
But my favorite thing has been the writers group. I've attended meetings all over town, ranging from general writers chat to memoirs and personal non-fiction essays, to my favorite, a group called 'The Craft of Writing'. They are all helpful, and it's a real eye-opener to attend some of these gatherings. First of all, there are some really talented people out there. Of course, there are some real head-shakers in the groups too, but that comes with the territory. Luckily, for the most part, the sub-genres are pretty well defined, so I don't have to sit through too many people sharing their own version of Twilight or a running re-telling of their World of Warcraft experiences. <br />
<br />
While I love to share my material and get feedback from people more talented than I, it's hard to sit though some of the stories that just make me scratch my head. I try not to be to harsh, but at heart I'm still kind of a misanthrope that bears the cross of impatience at all times. These past couple of weeks have been especially trying. <br />
<br />
The other day I went to my Memoirs group at an East Nashville coffee shop, for the second time, and while there were a couple of people there I could truly learn from, there were a couple of others that made the whole experience about as enjoyable as a trip to the dentist.<br />
<br />
One lesbian couple had, at some point in the past, gone to some sort of new-agey writers workshop that had absolutely nothing to do with writing memoirs, and insisted on sharing their elementary-level exercises on how to figure out exactly what the writer is talking about. <br />
<br />
No thanks, if I want you to figure out what I'm talking about, you can read my whole essay, not fold each page into quarters, draw a circle around the middle where the lines come together and look for key words inside the circle. If you can't understand what I'm trying to say, that's fine. I'm ok with some people 'not' getting it. The cool kids do.<br />
<br />
I believe I even got called out for rolling my eyes and shaking my head.<br />
<br />
Then there was yet another couple there who really didn't have anything to contribute, the husband making a point of saying he wrote 'on a higher level than this group', yet kept interrupting as other people were doing their reading, while the wife just wanted to market herself as a ghostwriter for old people. She told us that she writes memoirs for the elderly, but it seemed to me that what she was doing was following a fill-in-the-blank formula found in dozens of workbooks readily available on Amazon. Hey, I say god bless you if you can carve out a niche and make some money doing what you love, but since I wasn't getting anything from it, my attention completely shut down after about thirty seconds. Thankfully the group organizer had the stones to say "Hey, that's not what this group is about, we're not here to share already-published works or try to generate business". They were a bit miffed, but it was wonderful that somebody put the brakes on that nonsense before it got out of hand.<br />
<br />
While I was a little disappointed with the distractions of people wasting a good chunk of my afternoon, I still came away with some good feedback and I chopped my Foreword back to just a few paragraphs and the rest of it became the kernel of Chapter One. So the day wasn't a total bust. I've also spent the better portion of the past two days writing yet another chapter, and even though it drove me crazy, two thousand words and four pages later, I was done. I sent it to our group organizer, and she promised to look it over this weekend. <br />
<br />
So I'm finally on my way. All those Vegas stories are going to become a book. And even though a good chunk of them are already written, the hard part is coming up with the thread that ties them all together so that it's not just a series of copied-and-pasted blog posts. Of course they need to be edited, clarified, and tightened up, so I've got my work cut out for me.<br />
<br />
In the meantime, I've been squeezing in as many of those Great Courses lectures that I can fit into my already-packed schedule. The first one I tackled, Building Great Sentences, is amazing in it's complexity. I've got the first 12 lectures done, and I will admit that they're a little tough--not that they're boring, far from it. But they are technical, and even though I know most of the material intrinsically (I've been doing it for years), there is still a lot to think about. I may have to watch 'em twice.<br />
<br />
I'm also really enjoying the Writing Creative Nonfiction series, too. I'm about five or six lectures in on that one, and like that guy in Depeche Mode said, I just can't get enough. After each half-hour lecture I feel inspired to sit down at the keyboard and let it rip. Of course, some of the stuff that makes it to the screen is trite, lame, and downright embarrassing, but I figure that it's like anything else--it's a numbers game. You throw enough spaghetti at the refrigerator, eventually some is gonna stick.<br />
<br />
So that's what I've got going on in my life these days. I work, I take walks, I watch lectures, I attend meetings, and I sit at my keyboard trying to write a book that doesn't come off as being too snarky, which sadly, is my default setting.<br />
<br />
It's a hard thing, trying to tap the well of creativity. Anybody can write a laundry list of experiences, but it takes an artist to tell a good story.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey</b></i><br />
<br />
Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-26128325620456159832013-03-24T13:18:00.001-05:002013-03-24T13:18:35.705-05:00Looking For InspirationIt's a cold, foggy, and dreary Sunday afternoon, and I'm sitting in an East Nashville coffee shop, sipping the strongest hazelnut latte one could possibly imagine while getting my money's worth with the free broadband. Usually, the background noise works wonders for generating content at the keyboard, but today I'm drawing a blank.<br />
<br />
I woke up early this morning, having fallen asleep a couple of hours earlier than usual last night. I put on a pot of coffee and cranked out about three or four pages of what I hope is the Foreword of my first book. <br />
<br />
Having taken a break for a few hours and then looking at it again in the cold light of day, I'm just not satisfied. But I'm down here at the Portland Brew East, getting ready to attend a Memoirs meetup with the Nashville Writers Group, and I'm hoping somebody with more experience and talent will not only give some welcome critique, but maybe point me in the right direction, too. It's not that I'm lost, but I don't want to waste my time writing junk. I know where I want to go, I'm just not sure how to get there. <br />
<br />
Writing is hard.<br />
<br />
Don't let anyone tell you differently. I admire the hell out of these people that can crank out novel after novel, you know, the guys like Grisham and Baldacci who make millions selling paperbacks at Hudson News in airport terminals around the world. While I have no aspirations to take a shot at writing the Great American Novel, I'd really like to get a couple of memoirs done. And while everyone talks about how awesome it is to take that first step in journey of a thousand miles by deciding to actually write a book, nobody says shiat about that second step where you have to actually, you know, get something done and create something worth reading. Deciding to do something is easy. Actually doing it can be a real pain in the ass.<br />
<br />
So here I sit, drinking my overpriced hazelnut-flavored motor oil, hoping that somebody I haven't met yet can steer me in the right direction.<br />
<br />
More in a bit...<br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-52246005571605354152013-03-21T17:20:00.000-05:002013-03-21T17:20:06.269-05:00It's Been Far Too Long...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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March is always a great month to get away to Vegas. Well, I've always believed it to be. The weather is usually nice, and coming off of a crappy winter anywhere else in the country, what could be better than escaping to America's Playground for a few days to shake the winter blues, indulge in some long-overdue buffoonery, and maybe drop a bet or two?<br />
<br />
Sadly for me, once I left Vegas back in August of 2010, I never really looked back. I'd pretty much had my fill by then--the shine was off the diamond and having lived and worked there for six years, that chapter of my life was in the rear-view mirror.<br />
<br />
Sometimes I missed it. Well, I didn't miss the traffic, the ever-present payday loan joints and massage parlors on every corner, or being regularly hit up for a ride, money, or anything else every time I got out of my car while running my daily errands. But sometimes I missed the casino environment--the sights, sounds, and even smells of people cutting loose and having a good time, not worrying about the next day or the next week, only concerned with the next turn of a card or the next roll of the dice. It's an experience like no other, and even though one can get used to it--and maybe even a little tired of it--the thrill of it never really goes away completely.<br />
<br />
Even though the thrill might've been missing in action for me, I always figured I'd get back to Vegas 'sometime'. My buddies keep suggesting get-togethers, but I've always had excuses to avoid going back--health issues, work, not enough bankroll, and my long-range goal of quitting my job next year and hitting the Appalachian Trail kind of trumps everything else.<br />
<br />
But they are a persistent lot. A few weeks ago, around midnight, I was lying in bed and my phone started blowing up. I let it go to voicemail the first time, but then it started buzzing letting me know that I had text messages, too. So I relented, picked it up, and looked to see what all the ruckus was about. Then it rang again. It was my old buddy Cool Pacific, somewhere on a business trip, sitting in a hotel bar, a few cocktails in him, when he decided that I'd been away from Vegas for far too long.<br />
<br />
After a brief conversation, the plan was that I'd bring my ass to Vegas without argument, and he'd cover the trip. All I needed was a bankroll and swimming trunks. He had tons of miles and comps on the books, so room, food, and flights were all taken care of, all I had to do was show up.<br />
<br />
So I crawled out of bed, found a flight that would work, and a few minutes later there was a confirmation in my inbox. Of course, after that it was impossible to sleep, so the next day at work was kind of a pain in the ass. Well, except for that part where I scheduled a few days off a couple weeks away.<br />
<br />
Once I knew I was going, I had mixed emotions. Part of me wanted to call everyone and tell them, and part of me wanted to keep it a secret and just show up unannounced. I decided to keep it under wraps, if only to be able to enjoy the trip and not have to schedule out blocks of time to see everyone. I did, however, call my old Schwab buddies in Phoenix to let them know I'd be there, but only Eddie W was able to make the trip up that weekend.<br />
<br />
The next couple of weeks were quite different than trips past. I wasn't bouncing off the walls with anticipation, I wasn't visualizing everything we'd be doing that first night, and I wasn't going crazy staring at the clock and the calendar wishing that they'd move faster. It was more like, "man, I'm so busy for the next ten days, but at the end of that I'll be going to Vegas, so I got that going for me, which is nice..."<br />
<br />
In a nod to planning, however, I decided to get a rental car while we were there instead of having CoolP pay for cabs everywhere. First of all, I was getting into town several hours before him, and wanted to drive out to my old stomping grounds for the evening, and also, I don't drink nearly as much as I used to, so cabs wouldn't be needed. I certainly knew my way around town, and if I were sober, we could save that expense. So I booked a car at Thrifty for four days, getting a pretty good deal in the process.<br />
<br />
As the trip got closer, the anticipation grew, but nothing like previous jaunts to Vegas. Yes, I was excited to go, but more excited to see old friends than to 'do Vegas'. I could've been going to Bakersfield for all the excitement I showed, but that would've been fine if that's where all my old friends were going to be.<br />
<br />
Thursday morning dawned bright and early, and I awoke with no help from the alarm clock. I was packed and ready to go for the most part, just needed to unplug the laptop and put the phone charger in my backpack. I showered, shaved, threw the luggage in the trunk, and headed down to the airport. I made a quick stop at the bank to take out $500 in cash, then swung by Bass Pro Shop to pick up some new cargo shorts (all of my summer clothes were much too big, and although it was only 25 degrees in Nashville that morning, it was going to be 84 degrees in Vegas when I landed). I found my way to the economy parking lot, and just as I found a spot, the shuttle bus showed up. Instead of making me lug my bags to the proper bus stop, he waited for me there at the trunk of my car while I ditched the sweatpants I was wearing for the new cargo shorts, giving everyone else a show while I changed pants in the parking lot. Heck, when I finally got on the bus and stowed my luggage, the lady in the seat across from me was kind enough to help me remove the tags, too.<br />
<br />
I checked the bags, got my boarding pass, and was on my way to the gate in no time at all. I had almost two full hours to kill, so I wandered over to the Blue Burrito Grille to nibble on some chips and salsa while starting on the latest paperback offering from David Baldacci, <i>The Innocent</i>.<br />
<br />
The flight to Vegas was non-stop, luckily, and I scored an aisle seat with nobody sitting next to me. The guy sitting by the window slept the entire time, so I got a good solid three hours of reading in with no interruptions except for the flight attendant and her snack basket.<br />
<br />
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Not having a window seat, I really didn't see anything upon arrival except for Hoover Dam and the new bridge, and that's when the realization struck that I was finally 'home'. The flight landed about fifteen minutes early, and the luggage carousel was already circling by the time I got downstairs. I only had to wait a couple of minutes for my bags to arrive and barely had time to snap a picture to let everyone know that I'd arrived safely.</div>
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<br />
I got the last seat on the bus to the rental car pick-up, but the line at Thrifty was ridiculous. I'll never understand why it takes so many people ten or fifteen minutes to make a two-minute transaction, whether it be at the rental car counter or the front desk at the hotel. So far, that was my only gripe of the trip.<br />
<br />
Once I got to the counter, I was done in record time, turned around to the still-waiting crowd and said "See--it didn't even take as long as having sex!" which got a chuckle from the ladies in line behind me... I got upstairs, showed my credentials, and was presented with the biggest POS Mitsubishi on the lot. No upgrade for me--no Dodge Charger, no Chrysler 300, hell, not even a Ford Fusion. I mean, it ran, but it was definitely a candidate for the rental car hospice. It already had 30,000 miles on it and sounded like a box of angry bees when I started it up. And compared to my bad ass Challenger sitting back home in Nashville in the economy lot, it was a gutless turd, too. But it was transportation, and it had air-conditioning, so I was on my way.<br />
<br />
I jumped on the 215, and instead of heading towards the Strip, I went east towards Hendertucky, my old neighborhood. My phone was blowing up again, this time my old buddies from Sunset Station wondering where I was. I told them I'd be there by 4:00, and I rolled in about two minutes early.<br />
<br />
I parked on the roof of the parking garage, like I used to do, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't check to see if Kimmy's car was there.<br />
<br />
It wasn't.<br />
<br />
But I hit the elevator and retraced my steps to the poker room, just like I'd done hundreds of times in the past. Of course on the way I passed one of the biggest pieces-of-shit annoying players that I used to hate. She didn't recognize me, but confirming my misanthrope status, the first thought in my mind was "Gee, I thought she'd be dead by now"<br />
<br />
But I rolled in and surprised most of the folks there--they had no idea that I'd be back in town. Two and a half years was far too long, and although I wanted to play some poker for a bit while waiting for my friends to show up, I had to visit with all the old players and such and catch up on the latest gossip. Since there wasn't an open seat at any of the games, they put me on the waiting list, and I wandered out to the pit to play some Pai Gow and maybe see some of my old co-workers.<br />
<br />
It was still day-shift, so I only knew a few of the folks working, but I sat down at a Pai Gow table where one of my friends was dealing, and for the next half-hour or so we caught up on all the latest gossip and whereabouts of the old gang, and I think I made about $14 playing.<br />
<br />
I colored up when they paged me back to the poker room, and I got into a 4-8 game while waiting for the rest of my buddies to show up. I think I made another $16 or so before James arrived, not really anything interesting to speak of, but happy to take the money and head to the bar with him.<br />
<br />
We ordered a few drinks at the Gaudi Bar in the middle of the casino, and I found a 9-6 Jacks or Better machine to put a twenty in to get the drinks comped. We chatted for a bit, and while I slowly played video poker, I managed to double my money to $40. I cashed out, and by then the plans were to meet some other friends across the street at Sierra Gold, just like old times.<br />
<br />
So we headed over there for dinner, getting a table for four, and pretty soon my old poker buddy Dave showed up, as did another former Sunset poker dealer, Lorna. So the four of us ordered dinner, trading old stories and gossip, catching up on each others past couple of years. I had some sort of crazy-good Asian BBQ'd shrimp, and made the mistake of ordering a beer. They brought me a HUGE stein full of Newcastle, and although it was good, it would've taken me a week to drink. I think I got about a third of it down before waving the white flag.<br />
<br />
After finishing our meal, we changed tables and went out to the patio, and it was such a perfect evening outside--the smokers smoked, and we told more stories, and time flew buy. Eventually, it was about 9:00 pm and CoolP texted me saying he was making his way to the Tropicana right then. I texted back saying I'd be there in less than a half an hour. I said goodbye to my old poker crew, telling them I'd be back in the neighborhood on Sunday, then headed for the Strip.<br />
<br />
Luckily, the Tropicana is probably the closest Strip casino to Sunset Station, and there wasn't much traffic that night, so I got there pretty quickly. I gave the car to the valet, the luggage to the bellman, and found CoolP about a minute later wandering the casino.<br />
<br />
We grabbed a couple of seats at a $10 Pai Gow table, and the weekend was officially underway! <br />
<br />
I think we played for about an hour or so, laughing our asses off just like old times, hitting on the sixty-year old waitress who, once she got that green chip, came back every two or three minutes to make sure we were properly refilled. I told CoolP that I'd need to get up to my room and have my bags sent up before we got too stupid to remember, so I took the room keys he'd procured for me, and hit the elevator. I got to my room, but something was amiss. It looked like I'd already been robbed, but none of my stuff had been there yet.<br />
<br />
Clearly the maid had never gotten around to cleaning the room after the last guy checked out. I went back downstairs, told CoolP what happened, and he headed back to the front desk. A few minutes later, he came back telling me that I'd be staying in a Bungalow room instead. Score!<br />
<br />
A few words of background about the Trop may be in order. First of all, I will freely admit that the place has been a dump forever. Well, about the time I was going all Nick Cage and Elisabeth Shue, the new owners decided not to implode the place and start over, but just rope it off sections at a time and just take it down to the studs and rebuild. So now they've got a Havana-in-the-50s, Miami-in-the-60s vibe going on that they pull off <i>extremely</i> well. Anyone familiar with that show on Starz, Magic City, will know exactly what I'm talking about. Kinda like if the Rat Pack hung out in Miami instead of Las Vegas. <br />
<br />
Anyhow, the Bungalow rooms are in the old three-story 'motel' wing that lines the parking lot. From the outside, it doesn't look like much, but the room was over-the-top awesome. Maybe I had no expectations, but when I got there I was blown away how not only nice my room was, but how big, too. And of course it had a small balcony. Unfortunately, since it was a last-minute fix, I got one facing the Excalibur, overlooking the parking lot, instead of the much cooler ones overlooking the pool. Didn't matter--I loved the room and wouldn't hesitate to stay there again. The bed was every bit as comfy and big as the ones at MGM and Caesars, but for the price, it can't be beat. And it decor kind of reminded me of the rooms at Red Rock, although more retro-cool and less Euro-trash. <br />
<br />
The funny thing is, when we set this up, CoolP had offered me a room at either Caesars Palace, Planet Hollywood, or the Trop, and since I didn't want to be <i>that guy</i>, I told him to keep the nicer hotel for himself and I'd slum it at the Tropicana. So when he saw the room, he said he got jacked--my room was far nicer than his place at the P-Hol. I believe that right then and there he decided that the next dudes trip we take, we'll set up HQ there at the Trop. <br />
<br />
Anyhow, I got the bags dropped off, and we decided to walk over to the MGM to play a little Spot the Hooker and smoke some cigars. I unpacked a couple of Partagas, grabbed a cutter and torch lighter, and we were on our way. I had a spring in my step because by then it was after midnight and after my first day in Vegas, I was already up over a hundred bucks. Woot!<br />
<br />
We didn't gamble there at MGM, we just headed straight for the same lounge we always go to. I can't remember if it was called 'Misu' or 'Suri', but we made the obvious Mizzou joke. We found a couple of seats on the lower level and ordered a round of cocktails. We slowly enjoyed a couple of fine stogies and had several rounds of drinks while I filled CoolP in on all of the details of the trials and tribulations of the past couple of years. <br />
<br />
Yeah, I'm lucky to be here, and my lack of blogging has left a lot of holes and questions for my long-term readers, I realized. But we had a great time catching up, and even though we weren't gambling and acting stupid--like we've been known to do--we had a great time catching up. Had my trip ended right then and there, I would've called it a success.<br />
<br />
Around 3:30 or so, CoolP was fading fast--he'd been working his ass off all week in order to make the side trip to Vegas, so we finally called it a night. He wandered back down to the P-Hol and walked back to the Trop, declining the two propositions I got in the half-mile walk from the lounge to my room.<br />
<br />
I slept like a rock for a good two-and-a-half hours, but like a dumbass, I'd forgotten to turn the alarm off on my iPhone. So at 6:30 in the morning, I was wide awake again. Although my body told me I needed the sleep, my brain was screaming DUDE--IT'S YOUR SECOND DAY IN VEGAS!!!! GET THE HELL OUT OF BED!!!<br />
<br />
So I got up and took a shower.<br />
<br />
That reminds me of another reason to sing the praises of the Tropicana. First of all, they have combination alarm clock/iphone charger/stereo speakers on the nightstand. I love that. That alone will get me to come back. And also, in the Bungalow rooms, they ripped out the old tub-shower combination and put in huge tile-covered showers, big enough for you and a couple of friends. But not only that, while they may have rebuilt from the walls out, the plumbing remains the same, so there's none of that low-flow shower crap so prevalent in the new joints. It was like showering under a fire hose. A hot, luxurious fire hose. I really dug the shower there. Basically, I really liked everything about the room, and next time I'm back in Vegas, I'm booking a Bungalow room at the Trop. Done deal.<br />
<br />
I got dressed, grabbed a few more cigars, and headed down to the casino. As I was heading down the elevator, I realized that I was experiencing a typical Vegas moment--I was much too tired, but I was still freshly scrubbed and ready to squeeze as much as I could out of the coming day. I should've stayed in bed and slept for a few more hours, but the siren song of the Strip was calling my name, and I had to answer.<br />
<br />
I stopped at the new Starbucks that they'd put between my room and the casino, overpaid for a hazelnut latte, and took a lap around the pit. The Pai Gow table wasn't open yet, but the $5 dice table seemed to be calling my name. I bought in for a hundy, and after almost an hour, I'd more than doubled up.<br />
<br />
I cashed out after a quick point-seven-out, and decided that even though it was only 8:30, I'd call up CoolP and see when and where he wanted to meet. He said he'd been down in the Heart Bar drinking Bloody Marys and playing video poker for the last hour, waiting for my lazy ass to get up out of bed.<br />
<br />
Only in Vegas.<br />
<br />
So I told him I'd be down there in a jiffy. I cashed out and made my way over to Planet Hollywood--I said I'd walk, but he did it the night before and said it was a lot further than we remember, just to take the car instead, so I drove. No traffic on the Strip at that hour, so I got there in no time.<br />
<br />
We met up, briefly, and while he still had action going on the video poker machine, that didn't interest me, so I found an empty $15 Pai Gow table and played for about an hour, earning about $50 in the process. I then went on a string of increasingly frustrating pushes, so I said the hell with it and headed to the bar for coffee and Baileys while CoolP played video poker. I think we hung out there till around 11:00 or so, then decided that we'd spend the day with a cabana at the Tropicana pool. Of course, it was like pulling teeth to cash in my chips when we left. There it was, a Friday on the Strip, and the geniuses at Planet Hollywood only had one person working in the cage while the line was at least fifty people deep.<br />
<br />
Eventually I got my cash and we headed back to the Trop. While I went upstairs to grab some swim trunks, he went out to the pool to secure proper accommodations for gentlemen of leisure such as ourselves. I called Eddie and told him where to meet us, as he was driving up from Phoenix that morning and was on the road somewhere in the middle of the desert at the time.<br />
<br />
As I left the room, I met my attractive across-the-hall neighbor, who was leaving at the same time. It turned out that she wanted to go to the pool too, but had forgotten to pack a swimsuit. I told her of our cabana and where to find us, and that if she wanted to come on by, she wouldn't have to pay for drinks. She said that she absolutely would, if she were able to procure proper attire in the next couple of hours.<br />
<br />
I got down to the pool and was glad to see that we had a smaller private cabana off in the corner, but it was already fully stocked with buckets of ice, water bottles, energy drinks, citrus, mixers, and a bottle of rum. And of course a young hottie at our beck-and-call to keep our glasses full and our ice unmelted.<br />
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Another nice surprise was the rows and rows of bikini-clad talent surrounding us for us to gaze upon. We honestly had no expectations for the Trop pool, but like everything else, it was much better than we could've imagined. CoolP's only complaint is that they seemed to all be in their mid-20s instead of the much-easier-to-close-the-deal-with uber-milfs. But none of that really mattered, we were just there to enjoy the great weather (and it was PERFECT), cool off in the pool, empty a bottle of rum, smoke some cigars, and avoid taking a beating at the tables. Oh, and maybe appreciate the scenery, too.<br />
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Mission accomplished.<br />
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<i>At the Tropa, Tropa-Cabana. The hottest spot north of Havana...</i></div>
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At some point, after a few rounds of rum-and-diets with lime, CoolP decided it would be a good idea to order some grub. I concurred, and while I wandered off to the men's room, he told our waitress to bring both the shrimp and cracked crab, just like Winthorpe and Billy Ray<i> </i>did. Unfortunately, they don't offer cracked crab at the Tropicana pool, so we went with shrimp cocktails and cheese sticks instead. <br />
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They hit the spot, and we spent the next several hours slowly getting drunk and sunburned while we went back and forth between the pool and cabana, waiting for either Eddie or my new friend from across the hall to show up. The wise guys put the money on Eddie, because the neighbor lady never showed. Ah well, two ships and all that...<br />
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I think it was around 5:00 pm or so that we finally called it a day. We were both pretty sunburned, and although Eddie was only there for the last hour-and-a-half or so, he got some sun, too. When we cashed out, we were shocked at the tab. But in a good way. For all the food, booze, and extra mixers we ordered, plus the automatic 18% gratuity, the total for the afternoon at the cabana was only $325. Holy shit--had we been at Caesars Venus pool, which was the original plan, the afternoon would've set us back around $1500. CoolP was so excited that he tipped the waitress an extra $75 and called it his biggest win of the trip. <br />
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We decided to part ways, go back to the rooms and clean up and change, then meet up for the evening's buffoonery a couple of hours later. CoolP, however, wasn't feeling too well. After a bottle of rum and all that sun, he said he had to go take a shower and lie down.<br />
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He headed back to the P-Hol and Eddie and I went back up to my room so I could take a quick shower and change, then we'd head over to Bally's so he could do the same.<br />
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Traffic on the Strip that night was absolutely ridiculous, and what I didn't know was that the northbound lanes were restricted due to the construction in front of the old O'Shea's and Imperial Palace. Only two lanes open when they're usually gridlocked with three or four lanes. So it took us almost an hour to get to Bally's.<br />
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We finally got the car parked and I hung out in the casino while Eddie went upstairs to shower and such. I found a seat at a $15 Pai Gow table, but for the 45 minutes that Eddie was upstairs, I didn't win a single hand. It was ridiculous. I had two Full Houses in a row at one point, and lost 'em both. It sucked.<br />
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Eddie wanted to get some dinner, and we were going to meet up with CoolP again, but he called and said that he couldn't do it--he'd gotten sunstroke and had been throwing up since he got back and couldn't cool off--I guess the sun really got to him. But to be fair, the dude is whiter than a Canadian porn star, and spends most of his winters up in the oil fields near the Arctic circle, so the sun was a whole new experience for him. He said he'd be ok, just needed some rest, and that he'd catch up to us in the morning.<br />
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So we just bounced around in Bally's for the evening, hitting a blackjack table or two, playing some Pai Gow, but basically just lost the entire time we were there. It wasn't much fun at all. I went down to check out their new poker room, and it was nice and BIG, but I didn't get into any of the games. As much as I loved working there a couple of summers ago, the $5 tourist rake is just a bit much to pay.<br />
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Eventually, we decided to get dinner, and the plan was to hit the Cafe at Paris because of their awesome French onion soup, and that baked scallop dish that I loved so much. So we took a break from getting our asses kicked at the Bally's tables, cashed in our shrapnel at the cage, and took the walking Chunnel to Paris.<br />
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We got a seat at the Cafe pretty quickly, but we sat there for over twenty minutes and not a single acknowledgment from a waiter or waitress. There was a very angry couple at the table behind us too who'd obviously been there longer than we had, and Eddie was telling me how bad the service was at Paris every time they've come there. He and his wife had actually walked out of the Eiffel Tower restaurant the previous September because the service was so bad, and she vowed not to come back. After just under a half and hour, we said <i>Fuck this</i> and left also. Nobody ever came to the table, and even the hostess who sat us ignored us when she saw us leaving and obviously pissed. <br />
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Paris, you suck.<br />
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On the other hand, we wandered back to the Le Burger Bar, home of the former Ortanique, site of the absolute best meal I've ever had in Vegas, and we were seated immediately and the service was outstanding (especially when compared to what we just experienced). We both ordered Paris Burgers, a third-pound hunk-o-meat topped with Brie, caramelized onions, and bacon, on a Parmesan bun. Eddie ordered a tower of onion rings, too. <br />
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All I can say is that it was damn near the best burger I'd ever tasted. I wanted to eat it all, but five bites and two onion rings was all I could handle. But it was seriously good. It may have been a little pricey, but still, for a gourmet burger on the Strip, you could do a lot worse. I have to give Le Burger Bar mad props for both service and the quality of food.<br />
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I think it was after 1:00 am by then, still early by Vegas standards, but Eddie had been driving all day and I'd been out at the pool, and we were both pretty much wiped out. I headed back to the Trop, while he stuck around the casino at Bally's for awhile. Of course, once I got back, I got hammered again, this time by the $10 dice game at the Trop, house money long gone and getting deeper into my bankroll before I called it a night.<br />
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The next morning, the plan was to eat at the Central Cafe (I think that's the name of it) just off the lobby at Caesars Palace. I believe the plan was to meet at 10:30, in the main lobby. CoolP had lots of comps to burn up from the beating he took at Caesars a few weeks before, so he told us to take 'em down. Unfortunately, the line was out the door and there was a 45 minute wait for a table. Even with all the stars and diamonds that CoolP flashed with his players card, we still had to wait in line with the unwashed masses.<br />
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Instead, we decided to head over to the new (?) Gordon Ramsey restaurant there in the far-flung bowels of the casino. We made our way back there, but they didn't open for another half hour we were told. No biggie, we'd just go next door to the food court and have a drink at the bar. Even the damn bar was closed. By this time we were good and irritated that apparently the only thing opened in the whole damn place was one over-crowded Cafe. And the casino, of course. So we went to the bar behind the sports book to wait 'em out and at least score a free drink. Eddie and CoolP got machines, but the video poker machine at my seat was out of order. CoolP was playing dollars, and although we were obviously together, the bartender insisted that I pay $7.50 for my 'tall' screwdriver that wouldn't fill a communion cup at Mass.<br />
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I was used to such treatment from the Evil Empire, but I'm pretty sure CoolP had had enough of their gouging. We didn't order another drink while we waited the half hour until the restaurant opened, but we did enjoy a colorful rant about Harrah's fucking up everything they touched. <br />
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Gordon Ramsey's place looked good, but oh dear god, what a gouger. Eddie had three half-dollar-sized sliders and a side of fries, and I think it cost $29. I had a bowl of 'British' onion soup and some Black Truffle mac-and-cheese, and it was upwards of $35, I believe. CoolP had the same, and, although the food was good, it wasn't so over-the-top wonderful to justify the ridiculous prices. Trading on the name? You bet. Gotta pay the lease for floor space at Caesars? Certainly.<br />
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Basically, we all felt like we'd gotten bent over at Caesars. I don't mind paying a little premium for a premium experience, but this the whole morning just felt like gouging every dime they could get. Luckily CoolP had comps to cover it, but even free, we all agreed that it was overpriced. <br />
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We got out of the Palace as soon as we could, and headed back to the much friendlier confines of the Tropicana. Of course we took a beating at the dice table there, again, so less than an hour later we headed back to our favorite spot, the MGM Grand.<br />
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I don't know why I like that place so much--it too is a little pricey, but they certainly don't skin the players like Harrah's properties do, and I've always had a good time there. It just feels like my 'home' casino, kinda like New York New York used to be. Besides, the drink service is fast, and they always have open tables, with plenty of Pai Gow and even $10 blackjack on weekends.<br />
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Anyhow, we sat down at a $25 Pai Gow table and proceeded to lose our asses. Slowly, but still losing. It was a slow killing, kinda like the proverbial frog in the pot of water who doesn't get out and slowly boils to death as the heat is turned up. On top of that, CoolP's phone started to blow up, and he had to hop on a plane back to Calgary. He apologized for an early departure, but work was calling, and the deal he's working on was much more important than a weekend bender in Vegas. Besides, he told us, if the deal goes through, our next trip will be 'done right'. Hey, I'm ok with that, but now I can't wait for this fall when we do it again...<br />
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So I thanked him for the awesome trip, we said goodbye, and he headed off to grab his bag and get to the airport. Eddie and I stayed behind to take our beating.<br />
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After not getting anything going at the Pai Gow table, we found a $10 shoe blackjack game to try. Figuring our luck had to turn, we sat down. The only thing that turned was the rate at which we lost. Blackjack is a much faster game, and we burned through hundreds like a couple of Kardashian gold diggers on a shopping spree.<br />
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At one point, Eddie went to hit the ATM, and by the time he got back, I was down another $200, so we gave up. As much as we like the MGM, we just couldn't get any traction there. He wanted to find a good $25 double deck game, but all of the games there on the Strip were 6-deck shoes. I suggested that we head over to my old stomping grounds, Sunset Station, and give them a try. I told him of the decent Blackjack games they had, but the $5 dice with 10x odds was the deal closer.<br />
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Instead of going straight over, we stopped back at that same cigar lounge that CoolP and I visited on Thursday night, and we smoked a couple of Black Labels and had a few rounds of cocktails while we nursed our wounds. We had a great afternoon re-telling stories from old Vegas trips and a few of our sailing trips out to Catalina from years past, and making plans hang out more than once every couple of years. <br />
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Once the cigars were reduced to piles of ash, we tabbed out and walked back over to the Trop to fetch the car, neither of us needing to go to the cage before we left, and headed out to Henderson.<br />
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When we got there Eddie was especially excited to see the China Panda sign, so after hitting the head and the ATM, we got some lunch. Well, I just had a veggie spring roll, he had the full-on meal. While sitting there grubbing out to absorb all of the fine Scotch he drank at the MGM, I saw a fetching brunette walk by. No, it wasn't Kimmie, but one of my other favorites, probably the nicest gal to ever sling drinks at Sunset. Her name was Suzie, and of course she did a double take when she saw me. She ran to deliver the tray she was carrying, then came back to visit. Of course she was impressed with the new me, and we had a nice visit for a bit before she had to get to work. She told me that she works the poker room on day shift now, and to come by the next day. That was my plan anyways, and when she left, Eddie was asking why I never mentioned her before because it seemed that she was all into me. <br />
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I told him that might be the case, but back when I worked there she certainly wasn't all into me, and everyone in the casino knew I was hot for Kim anyways. But that drama is so far in the past that it doesn't even matter anymore. <br />
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We finished lunch and before we even made it to the blackjack pit I heard a familiar voice behind me and I turned around to see Kim walking behind us offering drinks to anyone who wanted them. <br />
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She did a double-take, too, not recognizing me at first, but then after a second she was like <i>Holy shit--Mikey! How've you been? </i><br />
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We caught up for a minute, but it was like talking to a wall--she'd obviously not given me a second thought after I left, and well, even though I figured that was the case, it still kinda sucks to find out for sure. It was nice to see her, but man, there was just nothing there anymore. The thrill was definitely gone. <br />
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After that little reunion, we decided to give the dice tables a try, and not even an hour later, I was down another $250 and Eddie around $400. We gave up and moved on. He found the $25 double-deck pitch game and planted his flag. I moved on to Chinatown and grabbed a seat at a $10 Pai Gow table. It was a great night because there was a new rule on that particular table. It was a no-commission game, but the only thing they took away was that whenever the dealer turned over a Queen-high Pai Gow, the whole table pushed, win or lose. Of course there were three sucker/side bets which most everyone played, but I just put a dollar or two on the regular bonus each time, and slowly chipped up. Without a commission and all of the sucker bets, I turned $50 into almost $500 over the next six hours or so, only betting between $15 and $25 a hand. <br />
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It's a great game for the player, if you don't play the sucker bets (I think I only ran into four Queen-high pai gows all night, and on two of them I had junk hands I fully expected to lose before I saw the dealer's cards, so I was totally cool with the new rule). Anyhow, once people wise up and enough stop playing the sucker bets, that game will disappear into the archives. But that's probably not going to happen anytime soon, because the players I saw were all bouncing from there to 3-Card Poker and Let It Ride all night, and everyone was putting the same wagers on their base and all the sucker bets. I even got a few comments people saw my stacks and were saying <i>Man, that guy's got the lucky seat, he hasn't lost all night!</i><br />
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No, I just wasn't playing the sucker tax, that's all.<br />
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It was also nice because as I sat there that night, all of my old co-workers cycled through the table, and it was nice to catch up with everyone. Of course a lot of the people I used to deal to were there, so there was plenty of good conversation to make the evening more enjoyable. <br />
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Anyhow, we both camped out for hours at our particular tables, slowly making a comeback. I think Eddie was down about $1500 when we got there that day, and by the time we'd left, he had $800 or so back in the win column to offset some of his losses. I was still behind, but only down about three or four hundred by the time we finally called it a night and headed back to the Strip.<br />
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It was a long day at Sunset, because we got there during day shift, played all the way through swing, and I even got to catch up with my friends on graveyard before we left, too.<br />
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I dropped Eddie back at Bally's around 3:30 or 4:00 in the morning, drove up to the Trop, gave the valet the car and a $5 chip, and collapsed into my huge comfy bed with the Dean Martin station on Pandora providing the ambient noise.<br />
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The Sunday plan was the old reliable Peppermill. It had been such a long night that we said we'd just meet there at 11:30 for breakfast. That gave me plenty of time to sleep in, but of course I couldn't. I was up earlier than I wanted to be, so I showered, put on clean clothes, and hit the tables at the Trop for an hour or so. In retrospect, that was a mistake because I took a $200 beating before breakfast.<br />
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I gave up and headed down to the Peppermill, and just as I was pulling in, Eddie texted me and said that he was in the lounge and there was a 45 minute wait for a table. No problem there--I'm never hungry anymore, but that would provide an opportunity to smoke a couple of cigars and have a couple of their famous Bloody Marys.<br />
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So we took seats at the bar, put a couple of twenties in the VP machines, lit up a couple of cigars, and did our Sunday morning in Vegas ritual. Bloody Marys at the Peppermill--a tradition like no other, except for maybe that little golf tournament down in Georgia they do every spring...</div>
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<i>We didn't think to take the picture until after the goodies on top got eaten and had a couple of sips. But you get the idea... </i></div>
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The Peppermill was pretty busy that morning, it seemed like everyone else in Las Vegas for the weekend had the same idea to do breakfast there at the same time. But eventually they called our names and we gathered up our smokables and such and headed for the restaurant.</div>
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Now, I can't eat nearly as much as I used to, so I figured there wouldn't be much on the menu I could handle. Eddie was in hangover-recovery mode, so everything sounded good to him. Me, on the other hand, had subsisted on coffee-Bailey's-Kahlua for most of the weekend, and knew that I needed to get some protein in me. I was thinking ham-and-cheese omelet, or maybe even the eggs Benedict, but when the smoking hot Bulgarian waitress asked me what I wanted, I heard my self ordering my usual chicken friend steak and eggs. For years, that was my favorite breakfast in all of Vegas, and I firmly believe that it's the best thing in the world after a long night of drunken buffoonery. And although we were a little light on both the drunkenness and buffoonery, it just sounded so good that I had to have it.</div>
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<i>This is the 'before' picture. I should've taken an 'after' picture, but it doesn't look much different. The waitress was pretty worried that I didn't like it, but she was wrong. I loved it. All five bites that I had.</i></div>
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Breakfast was wonderful, as expected, but I could hardly put a dent in it. I felt bad for wasting it, but the Peppermill doesn't have a kids menu to order off of. And of course Eddie couldn't finish his either, or else I would've offered him my leftovers. </div>
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Since Eddie covered the bar tab, I picked up breakfast. I think it was close to 1:30 in the afternoon by the time we got out of there, and Eddie had to get on the road back to Phoenix before too long. He said that he wanted to play a little more blackjack before he left, and since he liked Sunset Station so much, we decided to drive back out there. And since it was right next to the highway out of town, and I was headed out there to play poker anyways, it worked out perfectly.</div>
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He followed me out to the east side, and while he went back to the same $25 double-deck game, I went back to my seat at the no-commission Pai Gow table. I wasn't there a half hour before Eddie walked up and said that he was out. He was down another $400 and wanted to leave town with only a $1700 bite taken out of his ass, and he'd just reached it. A little bummed that he'd left on a downer but he said he had a great time anyways. We've all taken beating much worse than that, so it didn't hurt too badly. </div>
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We talked about plans for a football-season get together a few months down the road, and said our goodbyes. He drove off to Phoenix and I headed over to the poker room to spend the balance of my time playing 4-8. I probably sat there for about ten hours or so, grinding away, but clearly my game was a little off. I mean, it wasn't bad, but I caught myself making a few questionable moves, and I think I pissed away about $120 that evening. Eventually I just got tired of sitting there telling the story of my whereabouts for the past two years over and over again, that I cashed in sometime after midnight. </div>
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I played Pai Gow again, won a little back, but then the table went dead and since it was a Sunday night, they wanted to close down the Chinatown pit early. I visited with Kimmie some more (having never saw Suzie again), and ended up at the dice table. I got lucky there and won about $250 back before I went point-seven-out on my second roll. So I colored up and called it a trip. </div>
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I had an absolute blast seeing Eddie and CoolP again, and even though we were a little more mellow this time around than in times past, it was just what I needed. I felt like I got a little closure with my favorite city, and even though I knew in my head I made the right choice to leave, my heart wasn't convinced. It is now. I love Vegas, and yeah, I may even go back someday, but right now, I'm in the right place for me. </div>
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I got back to the Trop late that night, told the valet I'd be back down in a couple of hours to pick up the car again in a couple hours to head to the airport, and he gave me a knowing smile like <i>That kinda night, huh?</i>, and I went inside. Of course I <i>planned </i>on going straight to bed, but there was an open Pai Gow table in my way so I sat down and tried to take one more shot at that 8000-1 payoff on the 7-Card Straight Flush.</div>
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$200 later I realized that I probably should've just gone straight to bed and gotten the extra 45 minutes worth of sleep. It would've been better all around. Instead I packed, showered, and got dressed, lying down for a quick two-hour catnap before heading back to the airport. I set my alarm and called down for a wake-up call, paranoid that I'd finally sleep eight hours on the one night I didn't want to. </div>
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Like a zombie seeking brains, two hours later I would've given a green chip for a cup of coffee, but the line at Starbucks was way too long and I had to get out of town. I hit the road, heading south past the Welcome to Vegas sign, and a few minutes later I had the rental car turned in and I was back on the shuttle bus to the airport. While the skycap line at Southwest was a complete clusterfuck, I made an obvious production of fumbling for tip money and one enterprising fellow parted the rope and brought me up to the front of the line, getting me checked in and printed my boarding pass for me. He earned his five bucks. And when I got to the security check-in area, they opened a new line right as I got there. So from curb to gate was less than ten minutes total. That has never happened to me before.</div>
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Since I had two hours to kill before my flight, I sat down in one of the terminal restaurants, ordered a diet Coke and a breakfast burrito, and raised a silent toast to my favorite city and all of my friends. Saying goodbye is tough, but this time I know I'll be back.</div>
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<i><b>Mikey</b></i></div>
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<br />Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-4746288131800467312013-03-19T22:24:00.005-05:002013-03-19T22:24:47.029-05:00So Tired...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFOHGIU6Y1NQCEP0C4VbByEgq6ozJkFpZcD-Xbw1_wvBQ8rumJ1x1jEY8h1OQqDR_B9oeTD-QtO03cvgpDCaiDiUEgtb0_54hrwITE0-TsYaD2G-GZuP2PLgC1rfuNRiDDcYQk/s1600/backsign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="170" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFOHGIU6Y1NQCEP0C4VbByEgq6ozJkFpZcD-Xbw1_wvBQ8rumJ1x1jEY8h1OQqDR_B9oeTD-QtO03cvgpDCaiDiUEgtb0_54hrwITE0-TsYaD2G-GZuP2PLgC1rfuNRiDDcYQk/s320/backsign.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Yeah, I snuck off to my favorite city for the weekend, and got home last night.<br />
<br />
Today was tough...<br />
<br />
I'll share the details soon, but right now I have to grab a bite to eat and answer about a hundred emails.<br />
<br />
But as you can imagine, I had a good time.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-77675615209604525682013-03-13T09:11:00.000-05:002013-03-13T09:11:29.724-05:00Off The Rack<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This one was a little harder to write than my usual drivel, but I'm working on improving my ability to convey emotion rather than sarcasm. I hope it worked.</span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">*** </span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I went shopping for
clothes the other day, and although I didn’t buy anything, it was an enjoyable
experience nonetheless.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You see, for the
past twenty-plus years, my wardrobe has come from the Big & Tall store.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">For those who are
unfamiliar with that type of retail experience, a little background explanation
may be necessary.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At first glance, being
overweight not only requires larger clothing—the one thing the normal-sized
world sees—but one of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">other</i> side
effects of the social stigma is disdain for doing some many things in public,
and shopping is one of those many things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I suppose that’s why it’s thought to be easier for gentlemen of stature
to have their own place to shop, away from the prying and judgmental eyes of
strangers, rather than dedicating a portion of valuable floor space in ‘normal’
stores for larger-than-life customers.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">While a lot of heavier
folks may be gregarious, outgoing, and the center of attention, there are many
times where drawing attention isn’t desired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Having body issues is tough, and nothing draws attention to the body
more than the clothes we choose to wear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So clothes shopping for the heavy set has a few more degrees of
difficulty than most people would ever consider.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The internet has
alleviated most of the anxiety that goes with shopping for clothes when one
does it out of need instead of for pleasure, but it only goes so far.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, it’s private, and nobody can see you
doing it, and there’s no judgmental sales clerk unconsciously looking at the
size on the tag and then looking up at you, and then back at the tag, but
buying clothes without being able to try them on first presents its own set of
obstacles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Aside from the mental
and emotional hurdles one faces when shopping for plus-sized clothes, there is
an unfortunate financial component to consider, also.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A pair of Dockers that would cost a skinny
guy $34.99 would cost me about $55.00, plus another $5.99 if I want them
hemmed, because when your inseam is only half the distance of your waist size, your
pants generally have to be custom-made.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Even then, you’re not actually getting a name-brand pair of pants, like the
afore-mentioned Dockers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s usually
some sort of Indonesian knock-off that fall apart after eight washes—or if you
sneeze, whichever comes first. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Shirts are a little
easier to find, but if you want one with buttons, there’s an upcharge for that,
too, kind of like getting power windows in an economy car. A few extra ounces
of material tend to run upwards of $15 by the time it becomes a finished
product, but then you’re faced with trying to find something to wear that’s not
hideously ugly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">That brings us to the
other problem with shopping at the Big & Tall. Besides being expensive and
generally of low quality, most of the selection available is just too god-awful
to consider wearing in public.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Someone
once said that life is too short to wear ugly clothes, and I’m firmly convinced
that whoever said that was a skinny person.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It’s not enough that
the universe punishes you for being fat, but part of your sentence is being
forced to wear clothes that are already on the trailing edge of fashion, if not
downright ugly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Ask yourself this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Have you ever seen an overweight person and
said “Man, they really dress nice—I love their wardrobe!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not likely. It’s because when you’re fat, in
addition to all of the hundreds of other daily reminders that you’re different—and
not in a good way—you are condemned to less-than-ideal wardrobe choices. And
you’d think that expensive clothes should at least be stylish, but you’d be
wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I supposed it may be
just a matter of perception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It seems to
me that most of the clothes to choose from would be just fine if I were an
extra in a hip-hop video, but since I have to go to the office every day in
order to pay for the wardrobe, it’s tough to separate the business casual wheat
from the urban casual chaff. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But all of that is
behind me now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">In the past year, in
addition to losing over 160 lbs, I’ve lost an entire hard-core porn’s worth of
X’s from my shirt size. And because of that, I can now get my clothes ‘off the
rack’. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It may seem like an
insignificant thing to those who’ve never given a second thought to the
clothes-buying experience, but for someone who’s been on the outside looking in
for the past two decades, it is, in the words of our esteemed Vice President, <i>a
Big Effin’ Deal!</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The realization came
one morning when I had to punch another hole in the belt that’s slowly making
its way around me twice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was an
expensive piece of leather, and I’m determined to get as much use out of it as
possible, so every month or so I take out the cordless drill and create a
visible measure of success, every bit as significant as the hash marks on the
kitchen wall of a growing family. So while my pants may be baggy like all of the
cooler, younger fat kids, I realized that it’s probably getting to be time to
clean out the closet, donate to Goodwill, and think about improving my
wardrobe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So one day last week I
took the afternoon off of work, telling my boss a little white lie about going
to the doctor, when all I really had planned was a bit of retail therapy. I
drove over to the mall, a little nervous, wondering if I’d really crossed that
magical Rubicon into the world of skinny people—at least ‘skinny’ as defined by
me—the only evidence I had was a belt that was too long, pants that were too
baggy, and shirts that now hung to my knees when I kept them untucked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Not knowing what to
expect, I left my wallet in the car, unprepared to deal with either
disappointment or buyer’s remorse, regardless of which way the afternoon
went.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Like the first Apollo astronauts
to circle the far side the moon, I was on a mission of discovery, not
colonization—I just wanted to see what would happen if I went there, I had no
intention of planting my flag and collecting a bunch of rocks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I would be lying if I
said I wasn’t a little bit nervous in the first store I visited, and I’m sure I
was a little too quick with the ‘No!’ to the first salesclerk who asked if they
could help me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I figured that if I got
pinned down, I could always say I was shopping for a gift, that way if they
didn’t have anything that would fit me, I could move along and pretend that
their selection just wasn’t up to my standards.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>At least that’s what I told myself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I pretended to be
casually browsing, but in truth I was desperately searching for a certain size
that I estimated would fit the new me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Nobody bothered me while I dug through the racks of shirts, hoping to
find something, anything, I could wear. Still a long way from the textbook
definition of ‘average’, I figured anything that would fit me would still be at
the far end of the size spectrum, but persistence paid off.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I found a decent looking shirt in a size that
interested me, and in a fit of optimism, grabbed another one just like it, only
one size smaller. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I may have been even
more nervous walking to the fitting room than I was walking into the store a
few minutes before, and I had the passing thought that the sales staff must’ve
thought the only guy sweating on a 40-degree day <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">had</i></b> to have been a
shoplifter, but I wasn’t sure if it was that or the old me thinking that they
were just worried that the fat guy heading to the fitting room was going to
ruin the merchandise by trying to force ten pounds of sausage into a five pound
shirt.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I closed the fitting
room door, looked in the mirror, and tried to reassure myself that things were
different now and that even if these clothes didn’t fit, there was always next
month. I said a quick non-religious prayer that I wasn’t embarrassing myself,
and chose the bigger of the two shirts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It fit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It wasn’t tight, it
wasn’t binding, and I didn’t look ridiculous in it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact I looked pretty good in it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But just as my definition of ‘skinny’ is
somewhat skewed, so is my definition of ‘well-fitting’, so I tried on the
smaller shirt, just to see.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It fit also,
but it wasn’t quite as comfortable as the first one, so I changed back, anxious
to see myself wearing normal clothes comfortably.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Like the pounds that
I’d lost in the past year, the burden of self-doubt and self-consciousness disappeared
and were replaced by the newly discovered weightlessness of self-confidence. It
was an amazing transformation, but one that nobody could see but me. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Armed with a new
attitude about life in general, and clothes shopping in particular, I bounced
between several stores that afternoon, hauling piles of clothes with me into
the dressing rooms with absolutely no intention of buying, finally
understanding what women feel like when they shop for shoes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I must have tried on a dozens of things in
several stores, sometimes striking out, but other times pleasantly surprised.
And while it may not be the most masculine thought I’ve ever had, while
carrying an armload of hangers to the fitting room, I couldn’t help but liken
myself to Julia Roberts on her Rodeo Drive shopping spree with Richard Gere,
but the opportunity to say “BIG mistake” to a salesperson never really
presented itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">After a couple of hours
the novelty wore off, and I was disciplined enough to go back to the car, not
to fetch my wallet, but to drive away, knowing that the next time I get some
extra cash, I won’t have to spend it all on clothes because I have to, but
because I want to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those jackals at
Casual Male and King Size Men have a pretty good racket going, and sadly, they
are a necessary evil, but I’ve moved on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I don’t have to shop at the Big & Tall anymore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It may be a small step in the grand scheme of
things, but to me, it was a giant leap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><i><b>Mikey</b></i> </span></span></div>
Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-76037725772031502522013-03-07T17:24:00.005-06:002013-03-07T17:24:49.850-06:00Cryin' Won't Help You, Prayin' Won't Do You No Good<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc3Z2F__pwHX-KaDdIBzl2TWiSWksgbM5x7IbUxepjy59jUW3yzJgzBOyetJWlShhcGXPFczaLsHTgV3g17AZCMmEKOhv6zgW8t3b12pb9dyvkl8xxdeVDX8btJ63FbrAtXsJC/s1600/dambreaking.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc3Z2F__pwHX-KaDdIBzl2TWiSWksgbM5x7IbUxepjy59jUW3yzJgzBOyetJWlShhcGXPFczaLsHTgV3g17AZCMmEKOhv6zgW8t3b12pb9dyvkl8xxdeVDX8btJ63FbrAtXsJC/s320/dambreaking.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
I promised myself that no matter how busy I was today, that I'd get a blog post up at some point. I wish I had something good in the 'draft' file, but the cupboard has been bare for some time.<br />
<br />
However, that is about to change because lately the Muse has been singing her heart out. But I've been away from the computer for most of the week. The other night I was killin' time in a coffee shop and ideas just started gushing so fast that I couldn't keep up. Of course I didn't have my laptop with me, but I had a legal pad in my backpack and got two pages worth of scribbling done. No coherent stories, but lots of ideas, a few smart turns of a phrase, and an overall vision for what I wanted to do.<br />
<br />
And I realized that I actually have to write TWO books, not just one. I had a flash of inspiration while reading one of my 'how-to' writing books, and everything just clicked. Had I not been in public I would've just turned on the voice recorder, like a songwriter, and let 'er rip. But I got some words on paper and we'll see where they take me over the next few months.<br />
<br />
In the meantime, the chores of daily life continue apace. I was actually off today, but I'm at the tail-end of a 20+ item to-do list, and I've got two hours till the next place I have to be. So I'm holed up at a corner table at the Panera Bread in Brentwood, fully aware of the envious glances cast my way from those who would colonize the electrical outlet where the Hurricane Mikey flag is currently planted.<br />
<br />
I got out of the house early today, hit the bank and the grocery store, then had my emissions check done on the Challenger. After that I took a nice drive over to my favorite little town, Gallatin, to renew my tags. Unlike the DMV in Henderson, where it is not only an all-day affair, they never even gave me a reach-around for the $900 a year I paid for the privilege of driving my truck on Nevada's roadways. Here, I pull up to the drive through window--that had no line--gave the nice lady $75, and my car is fully legal once again to flex it's muscle on the back roads and freeways of Tennessee. <br />
<br />
Once that chore was done, I drove over to the Dodge dealer to get the last of my severely-discounted oil changes and the 20,000 mile look-see. Except for the huge pile of crusty bird poop on the satellite antenna, everything was in mint condition and the total cost of the check-up was about twelve bucks. I was done much earlier than expected, and all of my automotive chores that I'd budgeted four hours for were finished inside of one. What was I to do? I had all kinds of time to kill. <br />
<br />
So I drove down to Opry Mills and caught an early matinee of Silver Linings Playbook. I'd been wanting to see it, but just never had the time until now. And while I wasn't quite sure what to expect, I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. (It's always risky when the only people who recommend seeing it are women... I'm never quite sure if I'm gonna get suckered into a romantic comedy or costume drama).<br />
<br />
After the movie, I got a bit of exercise by walking just over a mile around the mall. I ended up at Bass Pro Shop, where I picked up some synthetic clothes for backpacking. I've needed a long-sleeve shirt forever, because it seems that it's always too cold for a short sleeve t-shirt, but much too warm for a fleece jacket. And I also got some convertible pants (the legs zip off and turn into cargo shorts), but the more I think about it, the more I realize that synthetic convertible pants are direct descendents of those silly zipper-covered parachute pants we all wore in the 80s. And while I was tempted to go full-on MTV style and get the black ones, I went with a respectable and trail-friendly olive green instead. <br />
<br />
The best part of the whole shopping experience was the simple fact that I didn't have to go to the Big & Tall store to buy new clothes. Yes my friends, while I still have a way to go, I know longer have to give the rip-off artists at Casual Male and King Size Men another dollar. I can now shop amongst the 'normal' folks. And I can't believe how CHEAP clothes are for skinny people. I was disciplined and only got a couple of things, but it was actually enjoyable to try on new clothes. It was a momentous day for sure, and that's an essay for another day, too.<br />
<br />
I was planning on going to Costco and picking up some non-perishables, but the check I deposited at the bank was larger-than-usual, so they put a 24-hour hold on my money, only letting me walk with two hundy. So the Costco excursion has been delayed until further notice. <br />
<br />
I have another Meetup Group gathering to attend this evening, tonight it's the Tennessee Backpacker's Meetup. It's not until 6:30, and it's way down here on the south side of town, so that's why I'm parked at Panera Bread this afternoon. It's just not worth driving home thirty miles and then trying to come back through downtown in the height of rush hour. So I'm kickin' it here enjoying half a steak and mushroom panini and getting full on iced-tea refills. <br />
<br />
Tonight's meetup should be an interesting one--we're all bringing our trail stoves and cooksets to compare and compete. Word around the campfire is that there is a contest to see who can boil water the fastest, but I'm more interested in finding decent meals I can pack that won't make me sick, but will still get me the nutrients I need. I usually take in about 500-1000 calories a day, total, and when backpacking you burn about 8000 calories a day. So I have a few more challenges ahead of me. But I guess the takeaway is that if you <i>really</i> want to lose weight, just strap on a 35 lb backpack and walk 12 miles a day up and down hills...<br />
<br />
I'm really liking these Meetup groups I'm a part of. The writers groups are absolutely fantastic, it's like drinking from a firehose of knowledge and experience. The hiking groups aren't quite as enjoyable as I'd hoped, only because of the subconscious competition that seems to go on whenever I go on a group hike. Everyone wants to be the Alpha, and everyone wants to be the fastest. <br />
<br />
Not. For. Me.<br />
<br />
I haven't given up on 'em yet, but I've scaled back on signing up for trips. My new thing is to find out which trails they're doing, and then just go on them by myself at a different time. <br />
<br />
Regardless of the Meetup groups scheduling, I've still got three overnight trips planned between now and the end of April, and then at the end of May, I'm going to hike most of the Georgia portion of the Appalachian Trail with a friend of mine for about eight days. At least that's the plan right now. Gonna go from Springer Mountain to Hiawassee, which off the top of my head I believe is around 65 miles. That'll tell me what I'm made of.<br />
<br />
If I don't find any inspiration, at least I'll have something to bitch about.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-11646808357141302452013-03-04T11:55:00.000-06:002013-03-04T11:55:05.218-06:00Sorry, But I've Been Pretty Busy Lately<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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When I got back to blogging, I told myself that I'd like to do the way I did back in Vegas--going on binges and pounding the keyboard for hours on end, always having something in the hopper and always drawing on new ideas.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately, real life has intervened with a never ending line of commitments and other projects, and a small bout of writers block hasn't helped either. I've been putting in lots of overtime at work (even went in to the office on Saturday and stayed till about 6:00 pm), so financing my buffoonery has been taking the lions share of my time lately.<br />
<br />
But I'm here at the computer all day today, so while you may not see the fruits of my labor immediately, trust me, I'm putting the time in. My big project, a book, has got to be started, and while I know I can actually write a pretty good one, it's that <i>second</i> step in the journey of a thousand miles that nobody seems to want to talk about that's holding me up. I have a topic, I have some stories to tell. What I don't have is cohesion and an overall vision. And being a planner, it's tough to start on any project when you're not exactly sure where you're going or quite how you're going to get there. I mean, I have an idea (Cold War propagandists would call it the 'Radiant Future'), but it's still kind of nebulous. <br />
<br />
So in the meantime, I went out looking for help. And to borrow a tortured metaphor from my past, I went <i>all-in</i> looking for help. My normal cranky muse (and I say that in the best way possible), Linda Lou, is not around to crack the whip on me every day-- her already-full plate is 1300 miles away and so I'm kind of out here dangling in the breeze. Some folks would say that writing is a lonely endeavor, but if you want to get good at it, you need some feedback and encouragement from people more talented and experienced than you are, otherwise you're just hunkered down in a cabin somewhere vomiting up a 'manifesto' that nobody really cares about. <br />
<br />
It's also discouraging to work on something, post it up on the blog, and see it get ignored for days on end. I'm all about the instant gratification, so when I get no comments, my particular demons tell me it's because my work sucks and nobody wants to read it. Taking a year off, losing most of my audience, and not having any Vegas stories has <b>nothing</b> to do with it, I'm sure... So it can be a never-ending downward spiral of procrastination and apathy. But that is over. This book ain't gonna write itself, so even if I have to lock myself in a hotel room for a month and type <i>All work and no play makes Mikey something something </i>over and over again, I'm going to overcome the inertia of sitting around not writing.<br />
<br />
So what have I done so far, you ask?<br />
<br />
Well, first of all, I joined the <a href="http://www.meetup.com/nashvillewriters/" target="_blank">Nashville Writers Meetup</a> group. I figured out a long time ago that the path to success is to surround yourself with people better at you in whatever activity you wish to improve upon. You want to be a better musician? Hang around with talented musicians. You want to be a better options trader? Hang around with the experts. You want to be a better writer? Go to where the writers congregate. And yeah, sometimes that means I have to swallow my pride and hang out in trendy coffee-houses populated with hipster-douches in skinny jeans and nerd glasses, but that's where the writers seem to be found.<br />
<br />
Of course, I'm over-generalizing there--they can be found at Panera bread, too! In the past month I've been to three or four different meetings, and so far, it's been a totally positive experience, regardless of venue. We've actually met in the conference room at a lawyers office, coffee shops, and a couple of restaurants.<br />
<br />
The best part is that not only are there groups for writing in general, but then there are meetups that are more specialized. When I was attending the Henderson Writers Group with Linda Lou a few years ago, my biggest gripe was the never-ending parade of suck that came with listening to an endless barrage of drivel about vampires and dragons. Oh dear god, just kill me now.<br />
<br />
Wait. What I meant to say was, hey, if you're into that, bless your heart. Just keep it away from me. Basically, I had to go to these readings, and if I wanted to present anything, I had to listen to everyone else's material too. Now, some of the time, there was some real brilliance to be had--I believe Linda Lou presented her entire first book to the Henderson Writers Group in chunks over the course of a couple of years and had it critiqued and deconstructed. On the other hand, it's hard to offer any kind of constructive feedback when the subject matter is nothing that I'm remotely interested in reading. Then couple that with truly painful storytelling and character development, and well, it's a recipe for me paying my dues at the first meeting and skipping out on future meetings depending on the email I'd get listing that month's presenters.<br />
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But here in Nashville, they've got it broken down all kinds of ways. I've been to groups discussing the 'craft' of writing, along with groups whose interests lie in non-fiction and personal essays. My favorite thus far has been the memoirs group, and I've managed to take away some great tips and suggestions from each group, all without having to suffer through another juvenile 'fantasy' reading.<br />
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Participation has also introduced me to some truly gifted people, and of course I'm picking their brains and having them look over my stuff, too. I've already met Linda Lou's younger sister--she sat next to me one night in the conference room at the lawyers office. I shared my old Asteroids essay, and she wrote an entertaining piece about her sister's wedding. Hell, she even blogs and does stand-up comedy, too. Chatting with her helps get my brain in the right place.<br />
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And last Sunday, while I was sitting in the upper loft of Portland Brew East, being self conscious of being the only person there without a Macbook Air, I met another lady who I'd otherwise have absolutely nothing in common with, but the essay she shared hit me like a ton of bricks. Not wanting to let an opportunity pass, I've already gotten her to agree to let me use it as the foreword for my own project. Yes, it was <i>that</i> good.<br />
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In addition to the meetup groups that are helping me along, I've picked up a few other references over the course of the past few months to help me overcome some of my self-imposed hurdles to creativity. I've got books dealing with the nuts and bolts of writing non-fiction, creating a memoir, and telling better stories. I carry them around with me in my backpack wherever I go, and if I'm not out walking around the office park on my lunch hour, I'm reading and trying to learn.<br />
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Lastly, I put up a financial investment. Years ago my dad turned me onto something called <a href="http://www.thegreatcourses.com/greatcourses.aspx" target="_blank">The Great Courses</a>, and it's basically college-level classes on a myriad of interesting subjects, 24 lectures to a set, all on DVD. He's raved about them for a long time, and somehow their catalog found it's way into my mailbox last month. From there, it found it's way to the shelf above my toilet, so eventually I found myself browsing through it. I couldn't help but be intrigued, and last week I finally coughed up the scratch and ordered four of their courses: <br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Analysis and Critique</li>
<li>Building Great Sentences</li>
<li>Writing Creative Nonfiction</li>
<li>Understanding the Fundamentals of Music</li>
</ul>
Yeah, that last one I got just because I want to attempt to make music 'click' for me, something that hasn't happened in all my years of trying. But the other three courses represent knowledge that I'm sure I'll need once I put fingers to keyboard.<br />
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I will say, however, I'm not a total neophyte at this. I know I have a small bit of talent for writing, and I'm amazed at how much I've retained from my freshman composition class at Ricks College that I took in January of 1988. I couldn't appreciate it at the time, but I had an amazing teacher. That shiat stuck with me for all these years, and I'm still using it today.<br />
<br />
But that's where I'm at. My main priority is writing this book, finally. I know that this blog will suffer because of it, and I may even lose more of my dwindling audience. But hey, stick with me. It'll all pay off in a couple of years.<br />
<br />
In the meantime, I'll be busy figuring out how to approach step two.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Mikey</b></i>Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9100994.post-86165265845125519102013-02-16T08:24:00.001-06:002013-02-16T08:30:38.814-06:00While I'm Out In This Tent With These Freaks and Musicians<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Sometimes, it pays to be in the right place at the right time. Actually, I'm betting it <i>always</i> pays to be there, but it's such rarity for me that I'll just enjoy it when the occasion comes along.<br />
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Earlier, this week I was miserably sick, which is usually a big pain in the ass, but it kept me home in bed for a few days instead of actually, you know, working. And since I wasn't working, I was goofing off on Facebook, which is almost impossible while I'm at the office.<br />
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Anyhow, like most people do, I follow one of my all-time favorite musicians, Todd Snider, and keep an eye on his posts, hoping for early info on concert dates, new albums, and stuff like that.<br />
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A lot of you may have never heard of him, and that's understandable--I didn't hear about him until about four or five years ago. While I was living out in Las Vegas, my sister Amy made me a modern-day mix tape, basically a CD of a bunch of stuff that she liked that she thought I might like also. In fact, at the time, I think I wrote a post about it--the CD was called <i>Hello CD Listeners</i> (Check out the archives for March 2008, 'The Tom Petty Reference' for the full story). Anyhow, the first song on the disc was Todd Snider singing <i>Vinyl Records</i>, which was not only a great song, but it cracked me up.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/8Vq4lk0tBjM" width="420"></iframe><br />
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Hope you enjoyed it, but that's just a taste of his collection. Not only does he write fun songs, his live shows are great because of the stories he tells between numbers--they are sometimes the most memorable part and always good for a laugh. <br />
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I had the opportunity to see him live at the Ryman Auditorium last fall, and if you ever have the opportunity to see a show at the Mother Church, please take advantage of it--unless you have the misfortune of sitting under the balcony, it is one of the greatest places in the world to see a live show. Words can't quite describe the coolness factor, and for an old-school venue, the acoustics are excellent, and most of the seats are fantastic--I've yet to have a bad one for any of the shows I've been to.<br />
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Anyhow, after finally being able to see him do a live show, I was hooked. I had so much fun and was amazed at how good of an entertainer he is. Some people have a real talent for it, and others, while being great artists in their own right, either don't care or never really learned the craft of entertaining. Hell, Bob Dylan is one of American music's greatest songwriters ever, but if I paid a few hundred dollars to see him sit on a bar stool for two hours, never looking up, never engaging the audience, just working through his songlist, I'd be pissed. But Todd Snider, he knows how to entertain--those of you who've been to a Bruce Springsteen concert will understand. He's got a reputation for putting on high-energy shows where everyone in the audience has a great time. Eddie Vedder and Bono are supremely talented, but I don't want to pay to get preached to--I come to see them sing, not pontificate. But that's a whole different rant I guess. My point is, some artists have really embraced the performing-for-an-audience gene, and Todd Snider is one of them. It would be well worth your time to familiarize yourself with his music and go see him next time he comes to your town.<br />
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Point is, I'm a huge fan.<br />
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So when I saw on his Facebook feed that he said he'd be playing a semi-impromptu gig at Drifter's BBQ in east Nashville the next night, I was all in! A few weeks ago, he put the word out that he'd be doing an open rehearsal in town and everyone was invited, and it turned out that it was in that very same rehearsal space that I wrote about a few posts back--he was there the night before we were and only about fifty people showed up. Up until then, I'd never been to that place, so I had no idea what he meant when he said he'd be at 'the big purple across from the red door'. Of course, I found out when Scottie and the guys were doing their Geek Jam practice and the sound guy told us that Todd Snider had been there the night before.<br />
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WTF?<br />
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Yeah, we were all a little pissed that we'd missed it, but at least now I know. I already knew that the guy lived, and drank, in East Nashville, so when he's not touring, he's just hanging around his neighborhood like a normal guy.<br />
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Speaking of East Nashville, for those of you who aren't familiar, I guess a few details are in order. I actually lived in 'East Nasty' eight years ago, just before I moved out to Vegas. Back then it wasn't nearly as hip or as trendy as it is now. It was pure ghetto. And old. It's across the Cumberland river from downtown, so the running joke about going there is 'over the river and through the hood'. It's come a long ways since then, and although it doesn't have the upper-middle class cache that Franklin and West Nashville have, the wannabe hipsters that infest the place are just fine with it. All the tourists hang out on Broadway and Second Avenue downtown. East Nashville is where the real people live. Especially if 'real' means having a neck beard and 60's nerd glasses, wearing a beanie hat 24/7, you like to be seen drinking tallboy cans of PBR, and never did quite made it to Austin... (Sorry if that last bit sounds snarky, but all seeing all of these stubborn individualists trying to look exactly the same cracks me up)<br />
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Most every place you want to go is within a block or two of Five Points--lots of bars and restaurants and such, and maybe my next post will be about the Vodka of Doom we had at Mad Donna's, also in the area. But if you ignore the hipster d-bags, there is a lot of coolness to be found in the neighborhood. Just not a lot of parking spaces.<br />
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Anyhow, I told the hippies (Amy and Scottie) about the show, and we made plans to go. I was feeling well enough to finally get out of bed, and was looking forward to solid food for the first time in a couple of days, too. While the show wasn't scheduled until 7:00 pm, we wanted to get there early. The announcement had way too many 'likes' on Facebook, and we wanted to make sure we got seats. I found a place to park about a block away and scored two small cocktail tables and three chairs maybe twelve feet from the 'stage', which was actually just a taped-off corner of the tent in the alley behind the restaurant. About the time I took my first sip from the front end of a two-for-one Sweetwater 420, Amy and Scottie walked in and joined me.<br />
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We had about an hour to kill before the show started, so we ordered some dinner. I got a basket of some excellent hush puppies for an appetizer (made with bits of jalapeno!), but could only eat two of them. For dinner, we all got variations of their signature BBQ. I had three sliders--one pork, one brisket, and one chicken. They were great, but entirely too much food for me. I managed to eat two of them over the course of about a half an hour, then just picked at the chicken from the third one. The bun just got in the way. And even though I rarely, if ever, eat french fries, I was told that their seasoned fries were pretty good. I ate two. They were. <br />
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As we ate dinner, the crowd started showing up and space in the tent got to be a premium. We'd scored primo seats, and nobody could get in front of us, so it was ideal. About twenty people had seats around the stage area, the rest was Standing Room Only, so it was nice to be part of the chosen few. <br />
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The show started a few minutes late, but well worth the wait. Todd came in talked to the crowd for a minute and thanked us for showing up, and kicked in to a couple of his more popular songs to start things off--<i>Play A Train Song</i> and <i>East Nashville Skyline</i> (a huge hit and a favorite local anthem). I guess that was it for his play list because then he just asked us what we wanted to hear. Both Amy and I offered up <i>Vinyl Records</i> (much too early in the evening to yell <i>Freebird!</i>, although later, somebody behind us inevitably did). The word from people who've seen him a lot more times that I have is that he rarely plays <i>Vinyl Records</i> in his live shows, and he didn't do it when I saw him at the Ryman, either. But it's our favorite and he looked right at us, got up off the stool, and off he went. The rest of the band caught up in no time and the small crowd all went bananas for it. (And bananas is good!).<br />
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He played every request we tossed out, so it was like having our own personal concert. Imagine sitting front row at a concert and just dictating the playlist to your favorite artist. Yeah, it was <i>that</i> cool.<br />
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He took a break after about an hour to let everyone go to the bathroom, have a smoke, or get a refill. And while the tent emptied out and everyone headed inside to the bar, Amy went over to talk to him, got a hug, and then I had the chance to spend a minute or so talking to him. Nicest guy in the world, and genuinely appreciative that we'd come to see the show and knew so many of his songs. Now, he's not a hugely famous artist by any stretch, but he's got a pretty big following and could easily have a big ego and attitude to match, but that's just not the case. (This is Nashville fer cryin' out loud--the town is full of musicians with big egos!). He's totally laid back and mellow, and it's quite obvious that he knows he's got a good gig going--people will actually give him money to sing for them!<br />
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After the break, he played for another 45 minutes or so, and had a few other people from the crowd join him on a few songs. He took requests the entire time, too.<br />
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An absolutely awesome show. And it was totally free, except for the dinner bill.<br />
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By the time it ended, I was absolutely drained. I'd gutted it up for as long as I could, and was glad that I made it as long as I did, but I was back on the freeway headed home less than ten minutes after the show. I made it back to the house, took a hot shower, and collapsed into bed, thinking I hadn't had this much fun since I left Vegas.<br />
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<i><b>Mikey </b></i><br />
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Hurricane Mikeyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13216133452496563760noreply@blogger.com2