Lazy Daze

I hate to say but the lazy hazy days of Christmas vacation are drawing to a close. The last week has just flown by. I remember back in the days of being a college undergraduate student when we would get 3+ weeks of time off between semesters. I always looked forward to the week after New Year. The week between Christmas and New Year was always hectic with lots of family and friends visiting an the usual holiday hub-bub. In stark contrast the post New Year Day week was one of almost utter silence, usually just me, the black cat, and the cranky coal stove that needed care and feeding 3x a day.

Even back then I coudn't catch up on my reading. I think I spent one year pondering thru Computer Shopper eyeing up all the hot new 286 machines I wanted to buy. I wore the print off the pages I went thru it so many times. The world was simpler and slower then so moving thru life at quarter speed the week after New Year hardly felt slower than usual. Even at snails pace I still can't figure out how the break seemed to fly by so fast. I guess not much changes over 20 years.

I enjoyed the years we had snow on the ground after Christmas. One year I particularly remember is when a buddy of mine who had a Honda 3 wheel death machine ATV. We would take off on this 110cc under-powered wonder and disappear into the woods of NE PA for hours on end, returning home only after we ran the gas tank to its reserve level or the long fingers of twilight beckoned us home. Wet, tired and hungry we returned home to eat and tell stories of things we never did with people we never met and to spin yarns over what we thought our futures would look like.

Sometimes if we didn't have enough gas in the ATV we'd head over to an abandoned ski area and sled down the bunny slopes. It was fun until we got to the bottom, and then we'd face a long walk back to the top. Sometimes a passing snowmobiler would give us a free tow to the top. We'd take our chances and run to the bottom again, daring the last remnants of daylight to sty with us until we got back to the top and the short walk home.

Every Christmas week without a snow I remember those short cold days. They blew by too quick. The deep woods aren't there anymore, replaced by too-large houses in communities named after common words with an 'e' on the end. I guess the 'e' makes it upscale. The abandoned ski area is now a thriving operation where they now charge $50 just to look at the snow.

By the way, I never did get the new 286 machine-- I waited another year and got a 386. I still have it although it has gone thru 2 motherboards. One got fried in a lightning strike and its replacement caught fire when the cmos battery shorted out. I keep it up on a shelf in the basement, partly as a reminder of how far we have come, and partly because I'm too lazy to haul it to the dump.

Out with the old and in with the new-- we had some friends (namely my primary glass blowing partner) over last night for dinner and a movie. I pumped up the home theater to watch the original Animusic DVD (www.animusic.com). I just love the bass on the final clip, Harmonic Voltage. Check out the DVD if you can. We then lowered the volume and watched Sideways (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0375063/). A good time was had by all. Maybe we'll hit the hot shop Saturday afternoon.

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Check out my buddy Pete's blog: http://www.bloglines.com/blog/rePete

First Entry

Cool.

Now even I have a blog. What has the world come to? It's Dec 29 and 2005 is draining away. When did that happen? The last time I checked it was 1994. Oh well. New Year, new blog. Mybe I'll have something interesting to say.

It is grey and rainy outside. I wish it was snowing. It is supposed to snow the week between Christmas and New Year. There's something special about December snow. By march I hate it and all it represents but in December everything is shiny and new and it just feels right.

I managed to get some good time in the hot shop this vacation. There are some nice new glass candy dishes in various colors about the house. We're being overrun with hand blown glass. It is time I started giving some away or even *gasp* selling some.