Reading (For Dummies)

On the Road

Greetings from Atlanta. We arrived at Steve Buer's apartment in downtown Atlanta at 2am. We left at 8am from Syracuse, making it a 18-hour drive (modulo food breaks, gas stops, and "other" breaks.

Tomorrow we depart for Okefenokee swamp, but first we will have massive beer consumption in honor of the "other" new year.

Catching the Twilight

It's been an unusually busy couple of days. I cancelled a trip to the Adirondacks after signs of something vaguely flu-like (which is, unfortunately, lingering with me for more than week). Exams and papers wrapped up, I have had nothing to do but sit at home -- my car's unexpected coma (possible death) has made sure of that. The prospect of a quiet solstice alone didn't sit very well with me. After a night of playing psychiatrist and psychiatrist (instead of psychiatrist and patient) with my old friend Sarah, I decided to clean up some mistakes I had made earlier in the year. That meant re-befriending a young lass around the corner, Caroline (pictured). Not a bad move, in the grand scheme of things, and it just feels right.

It was also a fun re-union with odd acquaintances from last year -- a roommate and an ex-boyfriend of Sarah's were in attendance. After much going back-and-forth, Caroline and I opted to hit up the Trans-Siberian Orchestra on Tuesday night, hitting up a French restaurant on the way. This girl is something else -- fluent French meant she could flirt deliciously (or perhaps it was order our drinks, you can never tell) with the waitstaff. Bonne peine!

So, being stuck in Syracuse (while it has prevented me from getting all my shopping done properly) has turned out to be not so bad. Or possibly that was downright good.

Gone Caving

On Friday, SUOC had its annual X-Mas dinner. Since I've been having fun at everybody elses' houses all semester, I thought I'd play host for one last hurrah. The dress code was a tad on the formal side, with usual dirty hippies donning their best suits and dress shoes. Most of us, anyway...

Hung over on Saturday, we part-goers went on a caving trip, back to Chittenango's small caverns. I lead the trip, which was a rather silly idea. We hiked in the cold rain for about 40 minutes before finding the first cave. Already cold and wet, we set about our work of exploration, body twisting, and comparison of flowstone to shaved mons.

I was brave enough to bring my camera into the caves this time. I probably won't do it again unless I get a waterproof hard case with some nice foam padding inside...even inside the cave pack, a camera bag, and a plastic zip-lock bag it managed to get pretty wet and muddy down in the hole.

And of course a SUOC trip is never complete without a price. I've got a sinus infection, probably a combination of lack of sleep and caving with a hangover post-party. I hope it clears up by the time next weekend rolls around -- I plan on spending my solstice in the mountains this year.

Breaking the Law

So I'm no longer sick, and no longer in New Jersey, so that can mean only one thing for the, "what is Reid up to?" question. On Saturday a group of five of us went caving in Chittenango, on some variety of private state land preserve. There were a series of small caves off of Route 13, right above a nice little river. I got stuck once, being the biggest member of a group including Jonas, Keebs, Arielle, and Kevin. Aside from hibernating bats, there were some pretty neat rock structures belowground in these caves that aren't touched by anyone but SUOC. In fact, our group brought the total number of cavers to the area to 12. Kind of neat.

On the downside of it being quasi-State-Restricted-Whatever land, when we got back to the actual ridge we had to scramble to get up, there was a Department of Environmental Conservation dude waiting in his jeep next to our parked car. He was occassionally doing circles around the area, probably looking for us on the top of the ridge. We decided not to risk tickets, and hiked way south, then scrambled down and out the road. By the time we got there, our law enforcement type friend was gone. We packed the car with our muddy caving clothes and made a mad dash for Freedom (and the American Way). Apparently, we were successful...

Not satisfied with my near run-in with the law on Saturday, I returned to Chittenango on Sunday to see the Chittenango Falls (which were slightly up the road on Route 13 from the caves). I took an old SUOC member, Sharon (previously seen caving). Their website reports that the falls are open year-round, but we arrived to a "Danger: Icy: Gorge Trail Closed Until Further Notice". Neither of us were very happy with this (and neither was a young photography lass who was there to get some pictures of ice flows and whatnot at the bottom), so we climed over the snow fence and hiked the Gorge Trail anyway. Chittenango is worth the view. The fact that it is home to a totally unique species of snail, known as the Chittenango Ovate Amber Snail. We weren't going to break the law and jump that protective fence...I'd hate to be responsible for the destruction of an entire species.

Everything was fine and good until the Chittenango County Sherriff passed us from the road. It was pretty clear that he spotted us, the question was whether he knew what we were doing was technically illegal (though, hell, we're both New York residents, we pay taxes here, so this land is ours anyway. We didn't want to take any chances, so we worked our way under a bridge at the top of the Falls, and hiked upstream a ways. Then we crossed back over the road and wandered through the woods for a few hours, up and down some trails made by the Indian Youth Corps. It was a nice area with more left to explore. Something to take a look at again later, even if it is sandwhiched between Route 13 and Route 173. So all in all, another fun weekend, although with a bit more law enforcement than usual...

Some weeks later, things are better

I took an almost undocumented trip to New Jersey to visit with the family over the Thanks-for-giving-us-food-and-letting-us-take-your-land holiday. Jason and Kristen threw a very large dinner for Erik, myself (aka The Brothers Strong), my mom, and Jack.

It was also a chance to catch up with some folks I haven't seen in a while, old-skool NJ crew who are mostly living on the Island these days. It was rather funny in this respect -- I recently attempted to re-get in touch with my old friend Erin in hopes of finding a circle for the Solstice (wondering if I will be in New Jersey or somewhere in the Hudson Valley for the event), but my circle need was fixed by Kat's fire pit. In traditional form, I said thanks to the mountains for teaching a little bit about patience this year. Well, patience and disease, but no matter. I've been spending enough time around rock and water lately to wonder that it isn't a bad thing.