Just A Few Quick Blogging Moments

Anne's doing the crossword puzzle, Ben's eating breakfast, and Emmi and I are both tapping away on our laptops... Anne and I are going down to Jackson soon for a belated Christmas visit with my parents, but I have a few minutes before we have to get ready.

Plenty of stuff has happened since my last post, but not much that could be called unexpected. I rode Sals on New Year's Eve, an afternoon ride and my last one for 2008, then we had a small dinner party: the crew here, plus Judy and Erica & Toby; we made pizza and had a lot of laughs. After they took off we went to Brew Works (where we were not quite dressed like all the "Black Party with DJ and Champagne" attendees), met Donna and her BF, then when Emmi came by we headed downtown, and saw the annual Dropping of the Peep. Happy New Year! By the way, it was freezing and extremely windy.

Yesterday I did another ride at Sals, my first for 2009, and hooked up with Rich and a friend of his, a downhill guy named Kevin. Still really cold, but the wind had died down, and the trail conditions were awesome, the best they'd been in months. Dinner was the traditional PA Dutch New Year's Day dinner (pork and sauerkraut). I was feeling a little ratty lung-wise, so I crashed for a bit, then we went out but Downtown Bethlehem was closed, dead, and deserted... We stopped into the only place open, the Hotel Bethlehem, and had a quiet beer before calling it an evening.

Retrospective 1.9

Earth Say Cleanup At Sals
Originally uploaded by donXfive.

In between Moab and North Carolina was Earth Day, when Doug organized a trash cleanup at Walking Purchase Park (aka "Sals"), which is unfortunately a prime spot for illegal dumpers. This photo was from the start of the day; by the end of the day we were considerably less fresh but we'd pulled two full dumpsters of trash, and about 100 tires out of the woods.

Nice Day!

Right now I'm sitting in the Dimmick Library in downtown Jim Thorpe. Anne and I came up here this morning and did a hike up Glen Onoko, then grabbed lunch and came over here -- she's doing research for her latest writing project, and I'm goofing off on Teh Internets...

More Recent Events

Just hanging out right now, waiting for the vet to open...

Went out last night to Anne's brother's house in Belle Mead for her family's Christmas gathering. I was the new guy there, though I did know a few of her relatives from Thanksgiving: plenty of brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews, cousins playing Guitar Hero in the basement etc, it was a pretty cool evening. Diner was Thai meatballs plus lots of other stuff, and dessert was cake and cookies. Coffee, Pictionary, a gift exchange, much fun but by about 8:00 we all were pretty glassy-eyed (though the kids were still all going strong), and things started to break up. We hit Brew Works for a nightcap after getting back to Bethlehem.

This morning we heard some rustling, like the dog was messing with something. Anne got up and I heard all sorts of commotion: Langston had found a giant Hershey's Kiss and ate it, about 10 oz of milk chocolate -- not enough to kill him but he probably had poisoned himself, and he sure looked very pleased with himself too, which only made the whole thing even more exasperating...

Some Googling of "dog" and "chocolate," a talk with the emergency vet, and a tablespoon of hydrogen peroxide to induce vomiting (which didn't work), and now we're just waiting to take him to the regular vet, who actually has hours on Sunday. Not sure what the story will be: symptoms of chocolate poisoning include over-excitability, but he's sleeping under the table right now...