Thursday, October 07, 2004

Heritage Chase

Morning weigh-in: 175.5#, 13.5% BF

Not sure if the BF is correct, since I weighed in after my morning shower, probably a little wet and the measurement is uh, electrical or something...

Didn't do any exercise last night, instead opting to go through the living room and toss out all the old mail/etc lying around, put all the books back on shelves, do some laundry and dishes, etc, etc. Four bags of trash, mostly old junk mail, plus a bunch of newspapers for recycling, and I threw out a lot of boxes I'd been "saving." The room is still not livable by the standard of having guests, but it's getting close. I think I'll move the bed into the spare room, and make my bedroom a den/office/2nd living room. Hitting the gym tonight first though.

I saw an article on Wikipedia today about George IV's trip to Scotland and the subsequent revival of Highland culture as a source of Scottish national identity -- except that it mostly wasn't Highlanders (they'd all been driven off their land and deported) , and it was mostly just the trappings of the culture (kilts, tartans)... kind of reminds me of growing up in Englishtown, where a development -- actually in Marlboro, the next town over -- called itself "Heritage Chase."

I remember their oleagenous billboard: "distinctive homes in a distinguished community" -- don't make me retch! This "Heritage Chase" was one of the later developments, after all possible living heritage (as opposed to a few Historical Society museum-pieces) had been paved over or homogenized. The new development surround Old Scots Graveyard, which was the original location of Old Tennent Church (called "the new church" at the battle of Monmouth), and which contains sandstone grave markers carved from the ballast of the ship in which they immigrated, fleeing persecution in Scotland. Some of those graves dated from 1702, I wonder how many of them have survived the past twenty years?

By the way, Manalapan is Lenape for "bread and water" (as in "this is good agricultural land"), and the high school teams are the Braves. How long until the Cub Scouts host a Pow-Wow at the Raceway Mall?

No comments: