Olympic Notebook

What’s up with the blue lines in the snow? I can almost understand the ones that are marking a corridor down the hill, but if you don’t get points off for skiing outside the lines, why bother? And just what purpose do the ones perpendicular to the course serve? The lines are all fuzzy too. This is the Olympics, man, every 4 years, big worldwide audience, couldn’t you get them a little sharper?

Super G? Is there a Regular G?

Giant Slalom, same question? (And is it just me or does the word slalom look misspelled?)

Curling. Enough said.

If Skeleton is the opposite of the Luge, why don’t we have Backwards Bobsledding?

I’m thinking that those women’s ice dancing costumes might be sexy with all that “skin” showing, if they didn’t look like they were designed by the eliminees of Bravo’s show Runway.

Who designed the medals? They look colored CDs on a ribbon. And why does it take 6 people 10 hours to make one?

So far the coolest thing about the Olympics was in the surreal opening ceremony, red-clad in-line skaters with specially designed flame-shooting helmets. I gotta get me one of those. Wait here while I go check Ebay….nope, but it is only a matter of time.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 51

Bird Flew

You will never never see a dead crow on the side of the road. — Mark Turner

Last night Donna and I were wined and dined by Jerry and his wife (also a Donna.) We went out to a place called Catch 22, a small seafood restaurant on New Orleans Road. Jerry was feeling expansive so he insisted we have all have an a glass of wine, appetizers, entree and dessert. The pinot noir was the best I have ever had, the crab cake for a starter that was terrific and the Veal Saltimbocca was so good that if they kept bringing to the table I would have eaten it until I lost consciousness. The chocolate brownie with ice cream for dessert while good, but was actually the low point of the meal. Catch 22 is listed as a seafood restaurant only the women had a seafood entree, unless Jerry’s duck was an eider. Everyone of us raved about our meals as the best we had eaten in memory, so while I’m sure Hilton Head Island has many terrific places to eat, you definitely can’t go bad in your hunt to find your personal favorite by starting out at Catch 22.

This morning dawned cold and overcast for our drive back. There are only so many ways to get back to Aiken from HHI and I’m thinking unless we start taking dirt roads, we’ve been on all of them. Donna did manage to map out one we hadn’t done in a while, which had about a third of it on US321 (a nice bit of symmetry seeing as we were in condo A321.) Even though it was quite chilly the birds know spring is right around the corner as there were quite a bunch active along the roadside. Quite a few cardinals were spotted along with a couple of our state birds, the Carolina Wren. As usual on the these rural two-lane roads many a turkey vulture was spooked by our approach only to hop back to feeding once we were past. There was cauldron of them feasting on a deer that I bet numbered a couple dozen. The most unusual sighting was when we crested a small rise and there were several crows and a large brown and white bird around something on the left of the road. As we got within 50 yards the crows scurried off leaving behind a slower to take off bigger bird, which turned out to be, no shit, a bald eagle. It probably had a 4 1/2 – 5 foot wing span. It was the last thing we expected to see feeding along the road.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 51

She’s Everywhere

Four shows on the Food Network alone, 30 Minute Meals. $40 A Day, Inside Dish, Tasty Travels and now Rachel Ray the Magazine: www.rachelraymag.com

Started up, went down, back up, down again, up again, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 51

Nice Day in Someone Else’s Paradise

Nice Day in Someone Else's ParadiseStated out doing a little shopping in a used book store/gift shop. We did a little driving around enjoying the sunshine and warm temps on some of the very few roads on Hilton Head that aren’t part of some “plantation.” We then took a breif respite by walking through the Newhall Audubon Nature Preserve. We then stopped at Gruby’s New York Deli to pick up a couple of sandwiches so we could have a picnic on the condo’s balcony. Plus a couple of bagels for tomorrow’s brekfast

The afternoon consisted of a brief nap on the couch, followed by a couple episodes of the X-Files in a mini SciFi Channel marathon (including one of my all time favorites Post Modern Prometheus Man.) Before dinner we took a big ol’ long walk on the great beach just outside the door of the condo. It was low tide so the beach was about 50 yards wide and was scattered with families and joggers and cyclists and dogs and a kite flyer or fisherman or two.

While Hilton Head Island is not our idea of paradise it sure is a damn fine place to spend a weekend in the off season.

Started up, went down, back up, back down, up again, down again, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 47

The 3 B’s

Tonight we (Donna) decided on a whim to head on down to HHI early, so we quick like a bunny packed the car and heaed southeast. We were already going to go down for the weekend anyway, but plan was to eat a breakfast of oversized muffins at the New Moon before driving down. With the tempuratures in the low 70’s at quiting time it seemed a waste to not start the trip with the top down, besides traveling two lane blacktop under a clear sky and moss draped trees is awesome.

A quick trip downtown to get cash from the magic wall and a loop around the busy part of town lead us to New Ellenton for dinner. Pickings are slim in this small bump in the road between Aiken and the bomb plant, heck even the Huddle House closed due to lack of business, which meant the only choices we had were hot dogs at a quick stop or Popeyes. We chose Popeyes hoping that the service here would be better than the one we have in Aiken. Nope.

I had a Catfish Deluxe sandwhich which was not realy as deluxe as the picture on the menu board would have you beleive and Donna had the Butterfly Shrimp Dinner. We split her french fries, bicuit and drink. After we finished she proclaimed, that was too much fried food. So told her for the rest of the weekend we wouldn’t have any more fried food, we would be sticking to the 3 B’s. Baked, broiled and….I didn’t have three. We both paused trying to come up with the third B but couldn’t do it. So I restated my position, “The 3 B’s, baked and broiled!”

A couple miles down the road I thought of the third, boiled.

Started down, went up, back down, up again, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 41

Astray

“Lost” starts in about 20 minutes and I’m going to try and watch it. I’m afraid though that I’m not going to like it, that I really should wait for the DVDs. I think the commercials are going to give me time ponder and…

…Donna said it best last week after she did what I did, went back and read the synopsis of the first 12 episodes of season two, “Reading these makes me wonder why we are even watching this crap.”

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 38

Harbinger Of Spring

For the first time in a week and a half the top on the Miata went down. Today it was in the low 60s, tomorrow the upper 60s and Thursday & Friday will be mid 70s. There was a hint of pine pollen, like yellow fingerprint powder, outlining where our greasy hands were when closing the trunk the past couple of times…

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 36