Thoughts in a Bog of Planning and Expectations
Have I been neglecting my adoring public?! Don’t take it personally, I’ve just been thinking about other crap lately than writing. One thing I’ve been doing lately is to try to find a boat and captain to take me and my submarine out onto the great green briny for a megabenthos photo shoot. That entails calling all over the place to try to convince someone to sail 40 nautical miles southwest of Iceland for very little pay. The real problem with this is that it would take probably a total of 12 hours to do what I need to do in perfect weather. The weather lately is far from perfect. I just had a peek at the forecast for today, tomorrow and Wednesday (the day we are trying to go out) and it does not look good. Why does this part of the world have to be so danged windy?! Wind means waves and waves mean we can’t go. The captain I found was already somewhat taken aback when, after he’d agreed to do this for me, he looked at a map and saw how far out we need to go. I’m at his mercy, now. He’s the captain and says whether the weather is good enough for the voyage or not.
So, that’s one thing that’s been consuming my thoughts lately. The other thing-a more major one, I guess, is that the wife is pregnant again. Yup, I know, the last time, it ended unfortunately and I had to let everyone know. But this time everything looks to be going smoothly. We saw that the little critter has two arms and two legs and is the right length for this stage of development. We’re going for a retard test on Thursday. That is, they now scan the image with an ultrasound and then measure the thickness of the occipital portion of the skull to see if an amniocentesis is necessary. The thicker the skull, the more likelihood of Down’s Syndrome or some other brain defect. I must say that childbirth is a form of torture I would gladly live out the rest of my life without witnessing again. But I guess the reward makes it worth it. So, I’ll be in the delivery room again in the end of March to hope that it will all be over as soon as possible. Then, the 18 years of heavy responsibility start. That’s the part that I can deal with.
I went to my first political dinner two nights ago. It was great fun. Imagine, Our Hero, rubbing shoulders with the likes of the mayors of the local towns and sitting across the table from the congressman for our district! Well, I guess it’s not so strange considering that the wife is on the board of selectmen. I’d better get used to this; she really likes to get into politics with these guys. We had a nice meal that started with skewers of lobster and scallops on a bed of risotto. The main course was grilled lamb medallions with mashed sweet potatoes and five string beans (yeah, I counted! I love string beans and was looking forward to a healthy portion, but instead I got five). Dessert was a tooth-achingly sweet chocolate mousse tart with some kind of crunchy bottom on mango-ginger chutney with wild berry sauce. Yellowtail cabernet sauvignon was free-flowing. I turned down the cognac-which turned out to be a wise choice when I woke up the day after without any bodily reminders of the evening’s drink. Though I like the taste of cognac, that Frog booze sits like two pounds of cement in the gut for a good 24 hours!
But, I digress. I get to thinking of food and suddenly, my mouth controls my brain-and, therefore, my thoughts-and suddenly it’s like I’m writing a review for Food and Wine magazine or something.
Other than those two things-the impending baby and the AUV project-my thoughts have been wandering very little of late.
But I wonder, now that I’m thinking of something else, what’s the weather like in South Korea? My friend Paul, the one who comments on this site, lives there and I wonder what life is like for him. He’s got a very cute daughter whom I’ve never met and a lovely wife who made me feel welcome from the first moment I met her. They live there, in a city with a population larger than that of the country in which I live. They eat really good food everyday (again with the food!). They are surrounded by a language that is foreign to me. They are exposed to a radically different experience of reality than I. Fun to think about where people are and what they’re doing now. It would be fun to be able to just fly off to visit on a whim. But I think that’s not likely to happen anytime soon.
So, that’s one thing that’s been consuming my thoughts lately. The other thing-a more major one, I guess, is that the wife is pregnant again. Yup, I know, the last time, it ended unfortunately and I had to let everyone know. But this time everything looks to be going smoothly. We saw that the little critter has two arms and two legs and is the right length for this stage of development. We’re going for a retard test on Thursday. That is, they now scan the image with an ultrasound and then measure the thickness of the occipital portion of the skull to see if an amniocentesis is necessary. The thicker the skull, the more likelihood of Down’s Syndrome or some other brain defect. I must say that childbirth is a form of torture I would gladly live out the rest of my life without witnessing again. But I guess the reward makes it worth it. So, I’ll be in the delivery room again in the end of March to hope that it will all be over as soon as possible. Then, the 18 years of heavy responsibility start. That’s the part that I can deal with.
I went to my first political dinner two nights ago. It was great fun. Imagine, Our Hero, rubbing shoulders with the likes of the mayors of the local towns and sitting across the table from the congressman for our district! Well, I guess it’s not so strange considering that the wife is on the board of selectmen. I’d better get used to this; she really likes to get into politics with these guys. We had a nice meal that started with skewers of lobster and scallops on a bed of risotto. The main course was grilled lamb medallions with mashed sweet potatoes and five string beans (yeah, I counted! I love string beans and was looking forward to a healthy portion, but instead I got five). Dessert was a tooth-achingly sweet chocolate mousse tart with some kind of crunchy bottom on mango-ginger chutney with wild berry sauce. Yellowtail cabernet sauvignon was free-flowing. I turned down the cognac-which turned out to be a wise choice when I woke up the day after without any bodily reminders of the evening’s drink. Though I like the taste of cognac, that Frog booze sits like two pounds of cement in the gut for a good 24 hours!
But, I digress. I get to thinking of food and suddenly, my mouth controls my brain-and, therefore, my thoughts-and suddenly it’s like I’m writing a review for Food and Wine magazine or something.
Other than those two things-the impending baby and the AUV project-my thoughts have been wandering very little of late.
But I wonder, now that I’m thinking of something else, what’s the weather like in South Korea? My friend Paul, the one who comments on this site, lives there and I wonder what life is like for him. He’s got a very cute daughter whom I’ve never met and a lovely wife who made me feel welcome from the first moment I met her. They live there, in a city with a population larger than that of the country in which I live. They eat really good food everyday (again with the food!). They are surrounded by a language that is foreign to me. They are exposed to a radically different experience of reality than I. Fun to think about where people are and what they’re doing now. It would be fun to be able to just fly off to visit on a whim. But I think that’s not likely to happen anytime soon.
posted by Our Hero, at 10:46 AM
1 Comments:
Sorry it took me so long to get back to you. I’ve been rather sick. After five days of suffering through what I thought was a cold I went to see a doctor and discovered that I had bronchitis. Anyway, I’m feeling much better now.
Congratulations on your wife getting pregnant again. Do you know if it is going to be a boy or a girl?
“We had a nice meal that started with skewers of lobster and scallops on a bed of risotto. The main course was grilled lamb medallions with mashed sweet potatoes and five string beans (yeah, I counted! I love string beans and was looking forward to a healthy portion, but instead I got five). Dessert was a tooth-achingly sweet chocolate mousse tart with some kind of crunchy bottom on mango-ginger chutney with wild berry sauce.”
You’re killing me. While the food in Korea is great there are some things I miss. You know things like lobster and lamb. While it’s possible to get lobster over here usually it is precooked and stuffed in the refrigerator until some poor unsuspecting sap orders it. At that point it is taken out of the fridge and tossed into a microwave (if you’re lucky) and served to you with cold vegetable and cold french-fries. Then to add insult to injury you get slapped with a bill for fifty dollars per plate.
As for the weather it has been a bit warmer than usual. I guess the weather would be similar to early September back home in New England. It’s hot enough during the day that you want to wear shorts and a t-shirt but at night it gets cool enough that you want to shut the windows and climb under the blankets.
By the way should you find yourself on an airplane bound for Korea you are certainly welcome here. We even have an extra room where you can stay.
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