Monday, August 14, 2006

A Different View

I briefly posted my car woes and then my sister advised me to take it down...Who knows if a student will read this one day and then I look like I'm irresponsible? So, yes, I am without car right now and I have to say that I do like riding my bike. It's a whole different world and it really makes you aware of your surroundings. I never realized how many people in Buffalo do ride...although there is a worldwide movement called Critical Mass who only ride bikes as a way of saving the environment, etc., who have a Buffalo contingent. I'll also say that Europe is MUCH more bicycle-friendly. When I lived in Germany, the bike path was right next to the sidewalk and went throughout the cities. There were so many bikes that all you had to do was lock your wheel to the frame; nobody was going to steal it otherwise. Anyway, I have enjoyed the wind in my face, the extra exercise, and the chance to look around my neighborhood. I may continue to ride to work in the fall, until the weather gets bad. I'm just trying to figure out how to transport "work clothes" so they're not wrinkled and/or wet. Ideas?

So this weekend DF and I went to a wedding in southern Erie county. His future best man, Dean, got married on the family property out in the woods. The bride wore a simple white sundress, adorned with his family's (Scottish) tartan and arrived by hand-made canoe at the dock of the large pond near the house. They married on the dock with the sun overhead, we all blew bubbles as the bagpiper led us back to the house, and we all danced and drank the night away. It was so relaxed: Everyone changed into comfy clothes after a while, there was a bonfire with s'mores, we saw the meteor shower, dogs and children ran through our legs, and a number of us stayed the night in tents pitched around the property. Just such a pleasant weekend. I'm still exhausted, but it just reminds me that, while my wedding will be more formal, I still want that fun, relaxed atmosphere. Next weekend we have another wedding, so I'll have to see how it compares. Oh, and the DJ was great, but DF and I have sworn there will be no Celine Dion or Shania Twain at our wedding. SJ, does that remind you of sophomore year, when we banned Celine and Oasis, I believe, from our room? ;-)

Now it's back to reality: Lesson planning, cleaning our messy little apartment, and grocery shopping. Somehow this weekend we began talking about how great it would be to have a personal sherpa to carry all of our stuff. Do they have those, personal sherpas? My sherpa would carry all my school stuff to and fro. I always seem to have lots of stuff to carry. And where, where is the maid to do all the cleaning? Oh yes, she's typing this.

Happy Monday!

2 comments:

Ouiser said...

Having never much liked riding bicycles since I rode one straight into a barbed wire fence at age 6, I cannot tell you exactly how to solve your "work clothes" woes. MoWask did tell me once, though, that she used to roll her clothes in her backpack and change once she got to her destination. That probably won't take care of the wrinkled problem, though. I am zero help...

feather nester said...

We came so close to having that kind of wedding. We seriously considered two places where it would have been very like what you described. In the end, we weren't quite that ballsy and went much more traditional, as you know.

Ah, yes. We were strict about our listening displeasures in those days. It's strange how frequently something reminds me of the Vanilla Ice phenomenon. For any readers unfamiliar, Ice Ice Baby blasting from a college dorm room drew the freshman boys like bees to honey in 1996. It was a beautiful thing.

I think you can rent a sherpa for life for the price of indoor plumbing, a pair of jeans, and a McDonalds Happy Meal. No hate mail, I'm just kidding! Tune in next week for more of Politically Incorrect with your host, feathernester.