south of the loop

Last week, my physical therapist had me try out a new contraption. I hesitate to call it a machine, because this was just a wooden frame with some sort of pulley system, and seemed more conducive to being waterboarded than being rehabilitated. (As a side note, the only time I’ve seen this contraption being used was by a dancer from the Joffrey Ballet.)

I clambered on, laying flat on my back while Physical Therapist put my feet into straps. The straps were of course connected to the pulley system, but being flat on my back and not really understanding which way the pulleys were pulling, my legs flailed and kicked and tried to figure out what the hell was going on.

“This is called The Reformer,” Physical Therapist said, mercifully holding my legs together.

“Of course it is.”

“Now push your legs together and lift them straight into the air without tilting your pelvis.”

“Um. You know my legs don’t really do that, right?”

It took a few minutes of teamwork to get my legs working with the pulley system and not against it. Then Physical Therapist said, “It’s really great because it forces you to stabilize your abs while moving your legs.”

Oof. Indeed.

And today at PT, she used something brilliantly dubbed The Stick® on my outer left leg, which has resulted in… let me count… thirteen reddish brown bruises.

I thought this was supposed to making me feel better? Lest you think I exaggerate, see here, here, and here.

*     *     *

current book: Moving right along in On Beauty, and am insanely jealous that Zadie Smith is only three years older than I am. 

current music: Trying to decide if I can go to the Brighton, MA/Canasta show tomorrow night. I have a borrowed car for the weekend, which makes it feasible, but I also have to be at Montrose Beach at 6:30 on Saturday morning. I caught myself saying today, “but it’s only seven miles.” I am officially nuts.

current socks: Sandals! Flip flops! Peep toes! It’s summertime, y’all!

Filed under: running by admin2
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I’m still not done with Joan Didion’s Slouching Towards Bethlehem, even though I’m probably less than two essays from the end. I keep thinking that if I put off finishing it, I’ll blog about it right when I’m done and it’s still fresh in my mind, but of course it’s no longer fresh anyways. So what the hell:

I just started Zadie Smith’s On Beauty this morning, and it is something that Slouching Towards Bethlehem isn’t, at least not as a whole—compelling. Didion’s first essay, “Some Dreamers of the Golden Dream,” was the exception. It grabbed me by the toes and pulled me in (which perhaps unfairly set my expectations for the tone in the following essays). “Some Dreamers” is a murder-mystery story with all the necessary ingredients: love affairs, betrayal, denial, drugs. Didion’s spareness is especially intriguing in this context, because she’s not as chatty or as judgmental as your best friend might be in telling you the same story, but nor is she writing cold hard journalism. California, she says, “is the last stop for all those who come from somewhere else, for all those who drifted away from the cold and the past and the old ways. Here is where they are trying to find a new lifestyle…” After the sets the scene, she weaves, Memento-like, from the scene of murder backwards to the events leading up to it. It was the only essay I had to force myself to set aside when my Metra ride ended.

The rest of the essays are good—they’re well-written, and they’re a weird and fascinating window into the 1960s. Joan Baez, fuckin’ hippies, drug culture, it’s all there. Didion is sort of the antithesis to other, more contemporary writers I’ve read in the past few years, the kind of writers whose prose is so thick and lush that you have to gasp for air every other sentence. In that sense she’s refreshing. And while “compelling” isn’t a quality required of everything I pick up, and while Slouching Towards Bethlehem was still far from being a chore… well, maybe it’s just the kind of book I appreciate—for her swift insights and deliberate writing—more than I love.

(That took me longer than thirty seconds to write, but that’s still about the amount of time I devoted to thinking things through. Take it as you will.)

* * *

current book: I suppose now I’ll have to blog something about On Beauty, since I’ve already mentioned that I’m enjoying it…

current music: It’s my own damn fault that The Shins’ “Phantom Limb” is running a loop in my head. Better that, however, than the campfire song “Lloyd George Knew My Father,” which wormed its way into my ear whilst fact checking a bit on David Lloyd George earlier today. It is more annoying and even more pointless than “The Song that Never Ends.” If you don’t have any idea what I’m talking about, consider yourself a lucky, lucky person.

current socks: Tomorrow looks like it will be sandal weather!

Filed under: books, writing by admin2
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An email conversation between jaq and me:

me: do you want me to come visit for Indian Market? or another time, since we can’t hang out much during market?

jaq: i want you then AND another time. well, you asked…

me: yer cute when you miss me.

jaq: good thing you think that.

* * *

current book: Just started Zadie Smith’s On Beauty.

current music: Quiet today after listening to Wincing the Night Away maybe six times yesterday.

current socks: Yesterday I wore cherry socks and a cherry shirt, which is awfully matchy, even for me, but I couldn’t help myself. Today I’m wearing bright purple socks with frogs on the ankles.

Filed under: life in general by admin2
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Faithful readers, I have been lazy. Very, very lazy.

Marathon training started a mere two weeks after the Mini and is moving along somewhat rapidly—I did a seven-mile run last Saturday morning. Things are much better after nearly two months of physical therapy: I now have both hip muscles and hamstring muscles, and apparently the lack thereof was what was causing a lot of problems for me before. I skipped yesterday’s eight-mile run because of a twisted ankle, thanks to a humiliating and rather unspectacular wipe out on my bike. 

I’m also starting to look for a place to live beginning July 1, which I would tell you about, but you’d probably find it very boring, and quite frankly, I just find it very stressful. But if you’re in my address book, expect one of those “new address” mass emails in another month or so. Hopefully. 

Filed under: life in general, running by admin2
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A very vivid dream that Morrissey was singing the Hallelujah chorus. A rather young Morrissey, at that.