The Patient Etherized

The Patient Etherized
Q: Et tu, Jonathan? A: Read. Read some more. Buy Red Bull.

Monday, August 29, 2005

Let's see -- there are only a few days until I start school so I should start facing the inevitable dreary administrative tasks I have to do when I get there on the 1st. I've had an entire summer of deferring thinking about school so I don't have to worry about classes; now, however, is the time I have to gear myself up for hard and patient work (or, failing that, making myself do things in an orderly and consistent fashion).

School is good as long as you keep the school as the top priority -- as long as it is the ground upon which everything else is founded. It is something that I like and I can't imagine that most people would treat their jobs in the same manner that I believe school should be treated. That means that, unlike if I had a job, I should think about completing my work before any of the vapory things that can appear in your life -- things more vexing, though possibly ultimately more rewarding (just as the road trip was rewarding in giving me a context with which to understand the personality of places and use the information for reading books like Don Delillo's Underworld, which I have been reading before bed every day this week).

I've decided that I'm only going to buy one significant piece of furniture when I move into my apartment, and that's going to be a nice desk (by nice I don't mean a mahogany desk -- I mean something functional and space efficient, and possibly made out of modern materials so it doesn't weigh a ton).

My blisters are all healed and now are hard scabs. I've been eating tons of fruit and sitting on the couch reading a site on French grammar (very good site -- better than the instruction in most courses I think), while also getting distracted quite often too. I should probably review Latin for the next three days and only do a little bit of French on the side (French is easier anyway).

But now I should go get some rest.

posted by Jon | 5:33:00 AM

Saturday, August 27, 2005

I want to start a company and call it "J'ai Cru."

posted by Jon | 2:14:00 AM

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

Glacier National Park

And so I have returned from the second road trip, which was unfortunately cut four days short when I got huge blisters (subsequently infected) on both my heels, not to mention an incredibly painful hematoma under my right big toenail.

Glacier is one of the most beautiful places I've ever been to (pictures forthcoming, of course, since I'm the laziest uploader of photos on this side of the moon) and we saw lots of wildlife (a bighorn sheep, pikas, grouses, a ptarmigan, and, thankfully, no bears) during our 55 miles, four day hike through the Two Medicine and Nyack Valley areas.

Here's the chronology of the trip:

Day 1: Drive from Boston to Chicago; arrive in Chicago by dinner time; eat at a Caribbean restaurant called Calypso.
Day 2: Drive from Chicago to Minneapolis, where we watched the Red Sox beat the Twins 11-7 in a day game, after which we drove through to Jamestown, North Dakota, where we stayed at a Day's Inn for a princely sum of money (considering it was freaking North Dakota).
Day 3: Drive from Jamestown, ND to Belcourt, ND: This was a short drive of 180 miles so we meandered through small towns and farmland, stopping at an old place called Fort Totten to read about life on the frontier in the 1860s-90s. At one point when we were driving fast, however, we nearly died when we attempted to pass a grain truck which then tried to take a left off the road without signaling. Fortunately the Subaru's brakes were extremely effective, even at 90mph. We arrived in Belcourt at the Turtle Mountain Indian reservation at about 4pm and ate a communal dinner with the volunteers who were building a wellness center for the area. At night we went and shot pool with some locals, which was definitely a case of the abstract becoming very real, as we heard about all the poverty and problems of life on a reservation.
Day 4: Woke up at about 4:30am and packed up our tent to drive to Glacier National Park and East Glacier, Montana. Driving along Rt 2 was one of the best drives of my life, as it passes through dozens of old western towns that oftentimes consisted only of a large grain silo, some industrial machinery, a main street, and a few residences. On the way through North Dakota, we passed through the center of North America in a town called Rugby. We also ate at one of the best diners ever in Minot, a place called Kroll's, which featured myriad flavors of milkshakes and pancakes the size of tire rims. We got to Glacier around 3:30pm and scampered over to the Two Medicine Ranger Station to get our permits for hiking just before it closed. The little old lady working there made it seem as if our hike was easy and suggested we take an even longer route, one that we found out the next day was nearly impossible to finish in one day with the difficulty of the brush-choked trails and stony passes.
Day 5: We began hiking at 6:30am. I'll post a more detailed account of the hike and subsequent drive back later. Right now I need to get some rest.

posted by Jon | 1:44:00 AM

Thursday, August 04, 2005

I really...

should give a recap of my trip, but right now I'm focusing on my toe, which I think is broken. I tripped while trying to get down the Mt. Osceola Trail yesterday before the sun set, and now the top of the joint of my big left toe is swollen and red. So I guess an x-ray is in store for my plans today.

I really hope this will not make me unable to go hiking in Montana and Wyoming, which is what a large part of my next trip will entail. Just have to leave it to the x-rays for now, I guess.

The plans for the next trip are to go to northern North Dakota to visit an Indian reservation, then to go to Glacier National Park for three days/two nights of hiking, and then to go to the Grand Tetons for five days to hike the Teton Crest Trail. This trip will definitely be less driving intensive, which will be nice, as we drove 9,500 miles on the last trip in 24 days.

The itinerary for the last trip went something like this:

Day 1, July 2nd: New York-->Atlanta -- a long painful day of driving because we had stayed up until six am the night before and woke up at 8 this day to drive 888 miles.
Day 2: Golf in Anniston, Alabama at a Robert Trent Jones course
Day 3: Hang out on July 4th and walk around Atlanta, go to Atlanta Braves game against Chicago Cubs at night. Attempt to go clubbing but find that Atlanta's main clubs are exclusively black; feel somewhat intimidated and just walk around Peachtree
Day 4: Atlanta-->Memphis: go walk around Beale St., look at the Mississippi River.
Day 5: Memphis-->New Orleans: on the way we stopped off at William Faulkner's house, ate some southern food in Oxford, MS, drove the Natchez Trace parkway, stopped off and walked up the Emerald Burial Mound, stopped in Natchez and looked at a few of the antebellum southern mansions, and made it to New Orleans around 10:45, whereupon we went out to Bourbon St. and drank a bit.
Day 6: New Orleans-->Houston: Went to the Cafe du Monde and had beignets and coffee. Ate a great creole meal for lunch at Mandina's before leaving for Houston. Got pulled over by a cop near the Texas border but he just told me to drive slower. Went to see the Astros play once we got to Houston and chilled at Aruna's house otherwise. I think we watched Anchorman at night.
Day 7: Houston: Relaxed at Aruna's house. Played golf at Bear Creek, which was not too bad. Splashed around in da pool. Ate at Papasito's for dinner, nearly killing ourselves from overeating. Saw War of the Worlds.
Day 8: Houston-->Hobbs. We drove through the entire state of Texas this day, stopping off at noon to go to see the Alamo in San Antonio, which began my souvenir-buying bonanza in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. The air conditioner broke somewhere in West Texas, right around where Chao claimed he saw a road runner. We drove through a lot of oil fields and had a long stop in McCamie, Texas where we saw a (crazy) Native American guy who was yelling at people. Made it to Hobbs around 9 or 10 I think.

To be continued...

posted by Jon | 11:51:00 AM