Good Grief!

Call me old fashioned but I cannot accept Christmas/Holiday-themed tv commercials until after Thanksgiving. Perhaps I’ve not been paying much attention or perhaps yesterday I happened to watch more real-time tv than I have recently but I just couldn’t seem to escape them. Today is November 4th people, let’s celebrate Thanksgiving and the go hog-wild for the next month with Christmas/Channukah/Kwanza/Whatever-the-hell-you-want-to-celebratah. That is all.

Camping With The Stars, Or At Least Beneath Them
I realize that no one will believe this but my drive down to Providence Canyon was one of the most boring back-road drives I have ever taken. There were one, maybe two photo-worthy opportunities, but by and large I drove down roads which divided forests.

Perhaps the highlight of the trip was traveling through Plains, Georgia. Cartography aficionados will quickly point out that Plains is nowhere near the route that I should have taken, and they’d be right. Since I stopped so few times I was down south plenty early so I took a detour or two.

Perhaps the lowlight of the trip was circling Americus, Georgia looking for either the Ace Hardware or True Value Hardware stores that both Jill (the GPS) and my phone told me existed. I had addresses, but neither of the buildings with the provided addresses looked like a hardware store. The strip-store / fast-food portion of Americus was additionally frustrating since it consists of two large one way roads, so if you miss something it’s a challenge to get back to where you need to be. After fifteen or so minutes of circling I gave up, ate lunch at Zaxby’s, and then left town. I eventually found a hardware store and purchased a really crappy $12 hatchet that cut wood as well as a butter knife would.

Even with all these side trips I still managed to be the first one in camp.

What happens at a hash camp-out stays at a hash camp-out. You could have been there and then you would have seen that I slept alone the entire weekend (oops, I guess I should have given you a spoiler warning.) The only details that I will provide is that when you give a handful of obsessive-compulsive people the task to provide food you will have way more than you need, and when you challenge fourteen (?) hashers to drink a keg of Sweetwater 420 they can step up to the plate.

ITP Flickr Pick
No trip to Providence Canyon would be complete without a photo of the man-instigated devastation.

It is pretty though.

This Race Could Be Amazing
I think that I will enjoy this season of Amazing Race if for no other reason than to watch the dating couples bicker at one another. It’s not the I am that petty, okay perhaps I am, but I just can’t comprehend why two people who can’t manage to get along in the best of situations attempt to do so under the worst.

fwiw – My early prediction is that the winners will be Lorena and Jason.

And Then There Were Two Next Iron Chefs
I think that Food Network and the judges have gotten this competition right. Even with all of the comparisons between The Next Iron Chef and the last season of Top Chef there is a marked difference in talent.

The final two contestants, Michael Symon and John Besh, belong there and will be fighting head-to-head next week in an Iron Chef competition to determine the champion. I like it and cannot wait to watch!

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood – fair
Current Music – Sirius Satellite Radio, Channel 26 playing Sebadoh — “Ocean”
Website Of The Day – Soul of Athens is a really cool art project that you should check out.
Exercise (b)Log – hiking, ~10 miles
Monthly Mileage – 14.5 miles
Mode Of Transportation To Work – My car

November Goals
1) Run no fewer than 25 miles
2) Not worry about running the Atlanta Half-Marathon
3) Read at least one book

Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]