Baltimore-- Who Knew?

Maybe it's because of the sunshiny John Waters tinted glasses I'm wearing, but I kinda dug Baltimore. It's quirky, and the people seem pretty friendly.

Monday, 27 October: Nothing to report, not even a new episode of "How I Met Your Mother." Sigh. I'm gonna miss that show when I return to the road.

Tuesday, 28 October: I took the MARC train from DC to Baltimore for the low low price of $7. I met up with an ex-labbie who recently moved from Seattle to Baltimore, and we went back to his place for some of his wife's delicious cooking. All of you ex-labbies who have had her cooking know you're jealous! It's funny, they are now living about five miles south of the place in Maryland where I camped in those peoples' yard when there was a really bad storm, but at the time, my friends were not yet living here.

Wednesday, 29 October: I walked around a little by the waterfront in Baltimore, and climbed up to the top of Federal Hill Park for a nice view of the harbor and the city. Then I scooted over to the American Visionary Art Museum, which was completely worth the $12 entrance fee. All of the art there is "outsider art," or art made by artists with no formal training. Seriously, if any of you are ever anywhere remotely near to Baltimore, do yourself a favor and check it out. I ended up only allotting about two hours to it, but could easily have spent three or four. It was pretty much completely awesome.

I swung by the lab to surprise my ex-labbie's current labmates, who all moved lab together from Seattle. We popped by the graveyard where Edgar Allen Poe is buried before heading back home for more delicious food and the Obama variety show. The food was better than the infomercial. Mmm, fishballs.

Thursday, 30 October: I wandered around some more in the waterfronty downtowny sort of area, then met up with the scientists for lunch at the Lexington Market, which is apparently the oldest covered market in the country, according to something someone told me. I had "the best crab cakes in Baltimore" (according to the sign), which were indeed delicious. I wandered past the Washington Monument, then caught the train back to Arlington.

Hanging and whatnot

Thursday, 23 October: Much lounging.

Friday, 24 October: Some hanging. I went out in the evening to a nearby bar that serves barbeque seitan sandwiches. I was really excited about that, but then the barbeque sauce was not very flavorful, so it was kind of a let down. The horseradish coleslaw that came with it did everything it could to help, but in the end it was only adequate.

Saturday, 25 October: Some vegging. We dressed up and went out to a nice dinner, then went to Brickskeller for some beers. They have about a jillion varieties, and the cheese plate was quite tasty, especially the smoked gouda.

Sunday, 26 October: We rode out to Mt. Vernon to take in a little history. There is a nice bike path that goes all the way there, so we just had a couple of miles on the road getting to the trail. We saw a historical reenactor guy who was supposed to be George Washington's valet. He did a pretty good job, but didn't stay in character for too long. He spent more time answering historical questions out of character, and talking a lot about the relationship of GW to his slaves, which was more interesting to me than the acting bit, so yay. Then we walked through the house and looked at the outbuildings, before racing the sunlight home. It's kind of a bummer we got a late start today, because I could have spent a lot more time walking the grounds and doing some of the historical walking tours, but I may go back if the weather holds next week. It was a really nice ride.

Back in Arlington

Wednesday, 22 October: I spent last night in New York, where I pretty much did nothing but talk on the phone, photograph my tattoos, and sleep. Today I had some sushi before catching the bus home. I really don't have much to say in this post, I just wanted to make sure you are all aware that there are pics of the tattoo on my flickr, and point out that I have now added a link to youtube videos. There is nothing good there yet, but now that I have set up the account, I will make an effort.

I heart Montreal

This city is so chill. If I had even an ounce of style, I would want to live here. As it is, I am on par with the Montreal homeless population, so I guess I will stick with the original plan of going back home to Seattle, where I am average.

Thursday, 16 October: After an eleven hour train ride, I arrived at the hostel in Montreal in time for the weekly Thursday bar tour. It was interesting bar-hopping with a group of 23 people, but we managed to stick together until the bars closed at 3 am. Then everyone scattered in search of food.

Friday, 17 October: I awoke in time for the Mont Royal/ poutine walk. This isn't the cheapest hostel around, but they have activities all of the time, and the people who work here are really nice and fun, so I'm happy. After all the hard work of walking over to Mont Royal Park and climbing the "mountain" for a spectacular view of the city, my first encounter with poutine was excellent. I went with the classic gravy and cheese curds, but they offered many other interesting looking combos.

Saturday, 18 October: I spent all day getting tattooed by Yann at Glamort. I am completely enamored of the work, but hadn't considered how old and faded my other tattoos would look in comparison. I had thought they were holding up pretty well...

Now my legs are burning with the fire of a thousand suns.

My friend from Ottawa and her husband (an ex-labbie) came to meet me in Montreal, and we stayed with her cousin, who lives near many good food shops. We ate like kings.

Sunday, 19 October: After sleeping in a bit and having a leisurely breakfast of croissants and pastries from a fantastic local bakery, we went to Mont Royal Park for a walk in the sunshine. Although I had just been there on Friday, I was glad to go again, because it is a huge park, with many trails and a lot going on. Every Sunday while the weather holds there is a "tamtam jam"-- basically a big hippie drum circle that waxes and wanes throughout the day. We stopped for a bit to watch them on the way into and out of the park, but didn't hang around long enough to get a contact high. At the same time, nearby, there is a weekly medieval battle. There was an interesting range of warriors present: from people with full costumes and crests on their shields to dudes in KISS T-shirts who like swords. One guy had a door for a shield.

We went out to eat, and I had to try the Mexican poutine. It basically had nacho toppings, with a sort of salsa-ish chili-ish sauce in place of the regular gravy that is usually on poutine. It was not as good as the classic.

Monday, 20 October: I wandered around for a while today, and got Vietnamese food in Chinatown. I attempted to go to an art exhibit that I had heard good things about, but the place is closed on Mondays. C'est la vie...

Tuesday, 21 October: Another ten hour train ride back to New York. It rained on both of my train riding days, but was nice the whole time I was in Montreal. It's like my time there was favored by the travel gods.

When did Gaiken grow all of those extra chins?

He must have gained weight during his pregnancy.

Tuesday, 14 October: It was only 4.5 grueling hours by bus from Arlington, VA to NYC. There was a ridiculously polite kid on the bus who was chatting with his seatmate, and he actually referenced his time in the Boy Scouts. It was such a cliché.

I dumped my stuff at a hostel, then walked to Times Square, that gaudy ode to consumption, and found the half price ticket booth, where I picked up a ticket to Monty Python's Spamalot. At half price, it was right at the upper limit of what I was willing to pay. The show was completely awesome, and was only dragged down a little by the presence of Clay Aiken, who was adequate in his multiple roles (kind of an inspired choice for Brave Sir Robin, actually) but who seemed a bit in love with being Clay Aiken. Unfortunately, he was the only "name" in the show, so all the Claymates were cheering for him, even though he is the least experienced actor in the show.

During intermission I chatted up the lone woman seated next to me, who turned out to be a reporter from Copenhagen. She had lived in New York for several years as a foreign corespondent for a Copenhagen newspaper. Shortly after moving back home, her boss, who also publishes travel books, sent her back here for two months to write a New York travel book. It's a tough life. I asked her to join me for a drink after the show, and we went to the bar upstairs at Sardi's, which was quite mellow. Our conversation was a bit odd, for a couple of reasons. She is one of those people who loves New York, and she spent a lot of time trying to convince me that it is a great city, and that I should give it a better chance, and why all of the things I dislike about the city can actually be interpreted positively... The love-New-York people and the hate-New-York people will never understand each other. The other thing that was odd in our conversation was that I found myself clashing with her Euro-brand super-liberalism. It's not that I necessarily disagreed with her critiques of our country, but I found them to be really condescending. She had that sort of "you unsophisticated gun toting Americans should just grow up and throw out all of your guns because you don't need them and your brand of democracy is weird" attitude. So sorry we invented it! I found myself in the strange position of having to defend gun ownership and the electoral college. Well, I guess I didn't have to, but I was feeling like *someone* should. I wasn't in the mood to agree with her condescension.

Wednesday, 15 October: I dragged myself out of bed super late this morning, after enduring hours of sleep interruptions from my thoughtless roommates. Seriously, people, if you are sharing a room in a hostel and plan on getting up at 4:30 AM, you need to figure out how the key works in the door, and you need to either pack the night before, or do it in the hall. You can not spend half an hour rustling through every single thing in your luggage while four other people are trying to sleep.

I needed some Canadian cash, but sadly my bank seems to be the only one that does not change money. All of the other banks will do it for their own customers, but not my bank. Sigh. I ended up at Western Union, which gave me a decent exchange rate (I think) and only charged me $5. So that's taken care of.

I spent the larger part of the day wandering around Central Park, which was pretty nice. I started to think maybe I hadn't given NYC a fair shake, and should have stayed longer and explored more, but that feeling went away once I left the park. Just kidding, I think I would come back with a friend, but I've had enough alone time here.

After Central Park I decided that a subway ride would be the cheese in my New York cake, so now that's done. The subway system seems pretty fantastic.

I checked back at the half price ticket place, but they didn't have tickets for the other show I wanted to see, which is just as well, because it would still be pricey, and I was beat anyway. Better to go to bed early, so I'll be ready to catch the train to Montreal at 8:20 in the morning. I'll likely be out of contact for the next five days while I'm there.



Many of you know that I've never really been interested in visiting NYC, because the bigger the city, the less I like it. And this one seems like the d-bag capital of the world. But I couldn't travel the entire country and just skip New York when I am *right here.* So I forced myself to come, kinda like when I went to Niagara. Besides, I shouldn't judge it without visiting.

This city is a trip. There is this kind of lawless feeling to people's actions, that reminded me at first of Montana. Everyone just does whatever they want, and expects everyone else to deal with it. That works okay when you live in a town of six hundred people with no stoplights, but in a city this big and crowded, pretty much anything you do, ever, will cause you to tread on someone's toes. It could be argued that this gives people all the more reason to behave selfishly since you will never get what you want unless you get assertive and take it for yourself. It could also be argued that people go too far with this mode of living, and that if more people followed the rules, there would be a lot less people getting angry about things. But the anger seems brief, and a way of life. People shout or honk at each other constantly, then walk away and forget anything ever happened.

The lawless individualism is paired, weirdly, with herd behavior. As soon as a few people start to trickle across a street against the light, the floodgates open, it's safety in numbers, and everyone is in the street. The cars are pretty much completely subject to the whims of pedestrians, and all they can do about it is honk. A lot.

It's weird to be in an area this crowded. I'm completely over-stimulated, despite the fact that I haven't had a real conversation all day. Central Park was better than the streets, but there is not really anywhere truly peaceful. I guess no one comes to New York looking for peace and quiet, and the people who live here can just go home and close the door and windows, and hope they have good soundproofing. Or maybe the noise doesn't bother them. After being here for a day and a half, it's easy to see how people who live here have to tune everyone else out, for their own sanity, which is why it's possible for people to be murdered in the streets while all of the neighbors pretend it isn't happening and don't call the police. You also have to pretend everyone else can't hear you, otherwise you would never be able to have a normal conversation. That's how you end up with something like this.

And of course, everyone is always talking on their bluetooth devices. Hardly any of the devices are imaginary-- way fewer than I expected.

Brr

It's a lovely day, but I'm on a highly air-conditioned bus to NYC, where I will be splurging on a hostel and visiting the obligatory sites. Everyone on the bus is wearing a jacket. This is ridiculous.

Friday, 10 October: We went to the Dogfish Head Alehouse, which is run by my favorite brewery. The actual brewery is in Delaware, but one of the two random alehouses they run happens to be just a few miles away, in Falls Church. I heart their beer, but the alehouse was a bit of a letdown. The food was adequate, and they were out of a beer I wanted to try. The beer I had was good, but I had tried it in Chicago. They sold some stuff to go, but not the thing we wanted, and were out of another thing I wanted. The waiter was kind enough to direct us to a small neighborhood grocery store that specialized in beer, which is pretty close to the apartment, and well worth the trip.

Saturday, 11 October: We had a nice bike ride out to Bethesda for lunch. I reached a new personal best: 1.1 miles without touching my handlebars. And I could have gone further, if it weren't for those meddling kids! Several times I got to about 2/3 of a mile and had to brake when confronted by too many other trail users. The last time this happened, I wasn't having it. I held up my hands and yelled "Don't make me touch the handlebars! I'm setting a record!" They moved aside. I thanked them on the way past.

In the afternoon we returned to the beer store for a beer tasting, and spent much time discussing porters with the devoted beer lover who was pouring.

Sunday, 12 October: I dragged myself off the couch for just long enough to go to Hellburger, because my friend claims that they serve the best burgers ever, so despite my love of guilt-free protein, I had to see what she was talking about. The burger was alright, and they offered many delicious topping options, but the bun disintegrated quickly, and the burger was just too big for me. My mouth is tiny. It all fit in my stomach, though, with a little help from my friend the fork.

Monday, 13 October: I took a nice bike ride around Arlington, in a loop on three different bike paths, with barely any time on the street.

Oh My God, Are You Serious!?!

As much as I want it to be a joke, (seriously, stick around for the last two minutes, it's worth it) AIG asked for another $37,800,000,000 bailout after spending $440,000 on a corporate retreat after getting an $85,000,000,000 bailout from the government. I could have just typed "billion," but I thought all of the zeroes were more effective.

And speaking of corporate financial shenanigans, a friend's blog alerted me to the fact that 79% of US corporations pay no taxes at all, according to a report by the Government Accounting Office. It's all very well said in that first link, so I am going to move on to the real purpose of this blog, and you can choose to dig it if you wish.

I think being in the DC area right around election time is having an effect on me...

Tuesday, 7 October: I showed up late for pub quiz, and was no help at all, but our team won, so my two beers were free.


Wednesday, 8 October: After giving the nice man several hundred dollars, I picked up my bike from the shop, and man is that thing sweet. I glided (glid? glode?) soundlessly back to the apartment.


Thursday, 9 October: I considered riding my bike, but then I didn't. Maybe tomorrow. There is a surplus of nice weather here right now, and getting on my bike doesn't really feel urgent.

I like to lounge around.

It is good.

Friday, 3 October: We went out to a pirate bar in Maryland, where we enjoyed (some of us enjoyed it too much-- and by some of us, I mean me) some tasty grog. Which is pretty much a fancy name for rum, rum, rum, triple sec, and spices. On the rocks.

Saturday, 4 October: We met my mom and her friend in Annapolis for sushi. Yum yum yummity yum.

We went to the haunted forest, which was pretty much a giant money pit, but, you know, for charity. I had fun. The best part was when we got in a discussion about what sorts of things would be scary for adults. April 13th and you haven't done your taxes! Your mortgage is past due! Then we started personalizing the scariness. Mine was "you have two flat tires, no spare tubes, and it's raining, so you can't patch the tubes you have!"

Sunday, 5 October: I did nothing, unless you count eating, reading, watching tv and napping.

Monday, 6 October: Much like Sunday.

Whitest. Day. Ever.

Thursday, 2 October: This morning after breakfast and morning news I got dressed and walked to Whole Foods to buy some food. I found myself in the midst of a consumer mecca, replete with bike and coffee shops. It was interesting to note that almost all shoppers were white, and basically every person working in the service sector was not white, with the exception of that heavily tattooed kid. I passed by the park on the way back to the apartment, where I spent the rest of the day rocking out while baking, cooking and cleaning, and of course, catching up on a few shows I miss, since I don't have a TV.

In the evening, the girls and I watched the vp debates. A good drinking game, with simple-to-follow-rules: drink every time Palin says or does something cutesy/folksy (gol'durnit!), and drink when either candidate attempts to identify with/ ingratiate themselves to "Joe Sixpack."

Friday, 3 October: More of the same, although I'm hoping to also fit in some yoga, and maybe go out for some beer and food tonight.

(Sorry I went a little link crazy. Posting from an actual computer is so much easier than from my phone.)

It's day 150 on the road...

...and I quit. Temporarily, of course. I'm a little bummed that I didn't quite make 5000 miles before the break, but 4934.3 is pretty close. Painfully close.

Wednesday, 1 October: I rode easy today, with my only goal being to facilitate my salvation by getting closer to the DC metropolitan area, but not too close. The ride was mostly non-treacherous, thanks to a little advice from last night's hosts, who invited me in for breakfast and bathroom time this morning.

Once I got closer to the large population center, I parked my bum at a bar to wait for one of my oldest friends to arrive in her internal combustion-driven road machine to rescue me. I am really looking forward to taking a little bike break. Hopefully soon my muscles will stop being sore, those three brand-new aches that popped up yesterday will go away, and my enthusiasm will return. So you all can look forward to a time of sporadic, boring posts about bike maintenance, baking cookies, bus trips to New York City, and train trips to Montreal, while I look forward to a birthday dinner with my mom.