Measured Extravagance

29 April 2003 - 12:12 p.m.

Bless Lady Bird Johnson and her passion for wildflowers: the swaths of bluebonnets and primroses along the interstates definitely improved the ride to and from Marble Falls, Texas, where the BYM and I helped a bunch of leather- and cordura-clad waltzers raise over $10,000 for the Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children. (For that matter, right now I-10 through Mississippi is lush with thickets of fragrant white flowers (honeysuckle? jasmine? privet? not sure). That alone made it well worth being on the bike instead of in a car.)

We also caught some of the flugtag action in Austin, and stopped in New Orleans to catch up with Saz and Erac. All in all, it was an excellent trip, although I suspect it's going to take a couple of days for my body to sort itself back to normal: to give you an idea of how skewed my system became, Sunday's breakfast was two cups of coffee, a Shiner Bock, and an enormous slice of German chocolate pie from the Bluebonnet Cafe. (Add that to the usual barbeque and Tex-Mex (the latter served by a cousin of John Arthur Martinez, who made the latest cut on Nashville Star as we finished up our meal there, causing cheering to resound through the whole restaurant) - and some pralines and Texas toast and a lot more Shiner Bock, plus pretzels and SweetTarts to stay awake on the Kaw - yeah, I'm leaning towards veggies and fish for the rest of the week.)


Some of you librarians might get a particular kick out of Jon Hansen's catalog card at the ELP Library.

Logged in some offline reading (the first half of Nuala O'Faolain's Are You Somebody?) and writing during the trip as well; came back to two rejections and a sale; fired off another submission this morning and have firm plans to finish and send out three new sets by the end of May. And, as usual, spending 20+ hours on the bike means that my head and notebook are stuffed with fresh ideas, and the week is stuffed with existing deadlines, never mind that what I really want to do is get going on my basil and zinnia seeds and go play tourist in my own town.

'Sokay. It won't all get done, and certainly not this week, but I'll get to a good deal of it, even if I'm too zonked to notice such things as the earth shuddering under my feet. (Frankly, chez Mechaieh, we just tend to assume any strange shaking, rattling or rolling to be the fault (ahem) of the dog, the cat, or the fact that our house is over 100 years old.)


One year ago: ". . .nervous music. . ."

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