I've been here for one full week. I was supposed to leave this morning, but I decided to take up the monks' invitation to stay until Sunday because of the fire interruption. Some monks are already suggesting I "extend" my stay even longer! I feel like I've experienced quite a range of events here outside of the normal daily/weekly monastic life. But maybe that's part of it - to deal with the unexpected.

On top of the fire and the arrival of the Plum Village monks, a new group of guests arrived this evening (guest stays always start on Fridays), so I'm even experiencing what it feels like for a fresh group of guests to arrive. Last week, it was me, and this happens year round. All of the guests who arrived today are here just for the weekend. A bunch are college students, who, my guess is, are experiencing mindful awareness for the first time. And, of course, they're not very good at it, everything seems strange and funny to them. I gathered it was a professor that suggested it to them and they thought it would be a neat idea, having no idea what to expect. Fair enough, everyone is welcome, everyone needs to start somewhere.

Otherwise today was pretty ordinary, except with having the new monks helping out. In the afternoon, I drove into town to get money, because when I leave on Sunday, I want to be able to just get on the road and go. It's mental. It turned out to be an unnecessary excursion because all the ATMs are drive-thru, so it would have been just that easy to get money when I left on Sunday.

Evening sitting was cancelled (see?!), and there was a "Halloween tea" held that I didn't go to. The new guest orientation was held in the Meditation Hall, so I read in the Tea Room until they were done, and then did my sitting.

So much for normalcy. Today, 19 monks and nuns arrived from the root monastery in Plum Village, France. They actually had flown in several days ago, but because of the firestorm, they weren't brought up to the monastery until today. They came because the entire community of Plum Village monastics, several hundred in all, will be coming here for a Winter Retreat from January to March 2004, and there is apparently a lot of work that needs to be done to prepare for it.

No morning sitting is scheduled for Thursdays. Instead there are Dharma Talks, and we went down to the nuns' hamlet for them. I don't know if that's the norm - Sunday Dharma Talks with everyone up at Solidity, and Thursday Dharma Talks with everyone down at Clarity. That would be equitable. We also had breakfast and lunch down there and the newcomers were introduced.

The Plum Village extended Sangha is very international in nature (although I don't know what the Vermont monastery, Maple Forest, is like), perhaps because Thich Nhat Hanh is Vietnamese, but had to set up the monasteries in exile. There's a heavy Vietnamese contingent, but they come from all over. I think the monastics from Plum Village primarily spoke French and/or Vietnamese, and some knew English, others not so fluent. Anyway, without even a competent grasp on the names of the Deer Park monks, here was a whole new group of monks whose names I wouldn't remember.

Also a change was that the weather took a sharp turn towards Winter, maybe because of the fires. Someone mentioned that smoke from wildfires sometimes affects climates by blocking sunlight and lowering temperatures, and that certainly was the case. It was colder than it usually gets in the Winter months. It was pretty dreary all day.

In the afternoon, a group of us, including some of the newcomers, hiked up the mountain. One of the newcomers, Brother L*i, originally from northern England, was very happy about the prospects of hiking up the mountains and doing some rock climbing, which was a hobby before he entered Plum Village. In general, I was a bit surprised at the range of recreational activities the monks are allowed - hiking in the mountains, I saw a mountain bike outside one of the monks' dormitories, some go running (even though it is what I consider light running, necessitated by them having to run in their robes), and, of course, musical instruments are allowed.

That evening, I was invited into the library in monks dormitory and they even had CDs, videotapes and DVDs. The CDs were mostly world/ethnic music, and the videos and DVDs were mostly documentaries. The books in the library covered a nice range of topics, with The Tao of Physics and Stephen Hawkings' A Brief History of Time catching my eye. Seems downright cushy to me. No one had a telescope, but I'm sure they would allow that. The philosophy here probably accepts exploration of the universe as supplemental to Buddhist studies. I could even make that argument using the Lotus Sutra.

Afterwards, I sat on my own in the Meditation Hall, as there was no scheduled sitting. The one thing I would have liked would have been more sitting, as sitting is the single most important part of Buddhist practice, Shakyamuni having attained enlightenment during sitting. Maybe with the monastic lifestyle it's not as crucial since it's easier to maintain the mindfulness practiced during sitting all through the day. That's still better than living in the material world, having a strict regimen of sitting twice a day, every day, but not being mindful otherwise.

And just like that, the monastery is back to normal; normal functioning, normal day. The winds must have blown the smoke away, but it looked like the fire was out, too. Woke up to a bright and clear morning, morning bell at 5:00, sitting at 5:30, breakfast at 7:30, work at 9:00, walking at 11:30, lunch at 12:30, with plenty of time in between those things to fill with sweet simplicity and calmness, drinking tea, reading, contemplating the garden and koi pond, and appreciating the joy in that.

For work, I still was on the same project, moving the contents of three storage tents out back to make way for another guest building for the Winter Retreat. It's physical work, kinda dirty work with dirt and bugs, and on big things we had to coordinate and work together, so it wasn't really conducive for mindfulness, especially if we disagreed on how we should move things, but the joy of being at the monastery had gotten to the point that I was really enjoying that work. And even if we disagreed on something, that gave us a chance to reflect on how we didn't want to be, and we quickly resolved the issue within ourselves and got back to our common goal and working together.

I've always dug the idea of monks and nuns shaving their heads and wearing the same robes. I think the idea is to remove the distraction of vanity and uniqueness in appearance. I can get into that. I also think the head shaving has purification or renunciation connotations in it. I brought enough clothes for a week, but with the idea that I could stretch it out to two weeks. The clothes I wore on the first work day got dirty and those became my work clothes. Otherwise, changes of clothing are on an at-need basis. Same with showering, but I think working on the tents justifies showering afterwards if needed. As for sleeping, I just zip off the sleeves of my pants, take off my socks and crawl into my sleeping bag. Emulating simple.

The afternoon was basically off, and I went up on a hill overlooking the Solidity compound with my shakuhachi as I've been doing quite a bit. I'm not any good at it, I don't know any of the many complicated techniques to get various tones out of it, but I enjoy it because it's sad and moody sounding. Later in the afternoon, we had another spontaneous creative noise-making session with hand drums, various flutes, and assorted "found object" percussion.

We had sitting in the evening, and I don't think it was a good session. I don't think it was a good session for other people, too, like it was a collective unconscious type of thing. I know that by the end I was in such excruciating pain that I was sweating and not concentrating on anything except getting through it. Behind me I heard three of the monks fidgeting, which I think is unusual, and someone else told me later that he also couldn't concentrate and just had his eyes wide open towards the end.

I was invited to extend my stay until Sunday because of the fire, and I'll consider it. My mindset has been to leave on Friday and make it back to San Francisco in time for Halloween Critical Mass and Lisa's party, so I was resistant and skeptical to the suggestion, but I'll consider it. It may be a happy medium between wanting to stay longer, but not for a full two weeks.

The family whose house we evacuated to was in Oceanside, maybe a little less than a half hour west of Escondido. We were four packed vehicles, and it was a fairly grand house indeed to put up the lot of us. We entered the property through a gate, and I never did find out what business the family was in, but the property itself was a fruit orchard of various kinds, including pumellos and sweet limon.

I guess you could say it was a bit exciting, the whole scenario being out of the ordinary for the monastics. It sure wasn't what I bargained for. But it was after 10:00 and we quickly staked our pieces of carpeted floor in various rooms, waited to brush our teeth, and then it was lights out.

The next morning we woke up and . . . no, how about this: The next morning our hosts woke up to a houseful of monks, variously drinking tea, eating breakfast, reading, walking, sitting, playing foosball, whatever, their house was full of monks. What do you do when you wake up to a house full of monks? It boggles the mind.

Some of those monks were killer foosball players, you'd never guess.

But as it went, several hours of hanging around went by without any idea what to do, and the decision was made to return to the monastery! Why did we even leave?! But as long as we were down the mountain, they asked me if I could drive them to run some errands, picking up orders of supplies in Escondido. I was glad to, anything to not caravan anymore, so my car was the first to head back to Escondido.

Escondido was a sight, maybe the burned out pick-up on the freeway on the way back was portent, but Escondido looked post-apocalyptic. Everywhere was just an eerie orange haze. Before today, the skies were clear and blue except for the plumes of smoke, billowing and dissipating into the sky. This was something else. And it didn't get any better at the monastery. Needless to say, normal functioning wasn't going to happen any time soon. Needless to say, we should have stopped for burritos while we were in town as we were considering. At least I was able to get a cup of coffee.

In the afternoon, a group of us drove up the mountain to assess the situation. This time there were no nuns chanting and we were able to get to a rocky overlook at 2000'. There were some nuns already there, hanging out, and no fire in sight, just haze in all directions. The folks I came up with kinda went off, and while I was sitting on the rock, the nuns started chanting. It was pretty mesmerizing. It was great. Intense. That was an intense 20 minutes that I sat there with my eyes closed, listening to the nuns chanting.

When we got back down, someone asked me how it looked. I joked that it looked great, the fires were all gone, and predicted that tomorrow would be clear as a bell. And it was.

In the evening, I sat on my own in the Meditation Hall.

(backdated, and supplemental)

Mondays at the monastery are considered "lazy days", where only the bells for meals are invited (rung). The monks are free to pursue whatever personal growth/cultivation thing they choose. Nothing was missed today because of the fire, except meals, which were more of a scrounging in the kitchen for leftovers affair.

I went for a walk in the afternoon, and when I got back just before six, I was told that we were definitely evacuating at 8:00, and that they had found someone who had a big enough house to take in all of us who were left or who had come back from evacuating the previous day.

For me, it was a big whatever. Not that I didn't believe we were evacuating after so much back and forth, whenever I heard we were evacuating, I took it seriously. But I just didn't see what the big deal was. The smoke didn't seem so threatening and I thought the worst was over. I think other people were more sensitive to the smoke than me and could feel it in their eyes and throats. But really, the sky was clear except for the one plume of smoke over the ridge. How bad can that be?

So we finally evacuated, but we were sticking together and I wasn't returning to San Francisco. I had been having irrational thoughts regarding the fire and the evacuation along the lines of someone was telling me that entering a monastery was not an option. Like I finally decided to see if it's something I can do, and I get there and there's a fire and I have to leave. Who wouldn't take that as a sign?!

(Backdated entry)

My second day at the monastery began with the end of Daylight Savings time, and I still failed to wake up at the morning bell, not an easy task, mind you, as it sounds for a good 30 minutes, albeit at 5:00 in the morning. We had the extra hour which I used up last night reading in the Tea Room, rather than getting an extra hour of sleep. I took an extra hour of sleep by waking up late, and was late for the first Dharma Talk by Thich Nhat Hanh, which was videotaped in the root monastery in Plum Village, France, and sent here.

I hurriedly zipped on my pant sleeves, put on some socks, and stepped outside, and *whoa*, it was balmy, the air smelled like burning, and the world was bathed in an orange hue. Strange climate, this San Diego, I thought.

I found out after the Dharma Talk that this wasn't normal San Diego weather, but there was a wildfire raging over the mountain ridge that lined the eastern valley wall. Those clouds rising over the ridge were plumes of smoke. So much for serenity and simplicity.

At 9:00, a monk announced that the regular Sunday "Day of Mindfulness", which involves interested lay practitioners coming up from the Escondido community and spending the day, would be cancelled because of the fire, and that the monastery would be evacuated at 10:00. This was my first lesson that something stated at the monastery isn't exactly written in stone.

Come 11:00, there was no movement towards evacuating, and although ash was falling, the smoke didn't look too bad, and we began the second Dharma Talk video. After lunch, the real vacillating began. I suppose the monks were trying to reach consensus on whether to evacuate or not; some being fearful and really wanting to, others not feeling the danger and not wanting to abandon the monastery.

If it came to evacuating, there were numerous Vietnamese families in Escondido who would have been honored to have monks stay at their homes, but another objection to evacuation was splitting up the Sangha (a Buddhist practicing community).

If it came to evacuating, I personally didn't feel comfortable going to a lay practitioner's home. It was one thing for the monks to invite me to stay with them at the monastery, but it was a different thing to stay at a civilian's home that welcomed monks, and probably would have welcomed anyone practicing with the monks, but without that clearly stated, I didn't want to assume it or even inquire about it. Considerate bastard, ain't I?

So I was ready to leave if it came to evacuation, but until then, I stayed and waited in case the monks needed my car to transport them somewhere. Also because I only wanted to leave as a last resort. The afternoon went on and it looked like they were evacuating, and eventually about 2/3 of the Sangha did leave. I stayed and waited to see if they would call up my car for use.

The monks that didn't leave, I think were ones that adamantly didn't want to leave, and they curiously broke out a garden picnic. We had tea and munchies and a guitar and flutes also came out. Some Vietnamese lay practitioners were there, and some nuns showed up from the nun's hamlet (Clarity Hamlet, the monks hamlet is Solidity Hamlet), and we just let our hair down kicked back and relaxed.

At one point, I was walking outside the garden, which was close to the parking lot, and one of the monks, Brother Un*, came up to me and asked if we could take my car to go up the mountain to see how close the fire was. That sounded exciting, so I agreed. In addition, three wise-cracking nuns and the other week guest piled into my car and we drove up a dirt mountain road. After parking, we still had to hike a bit to the vantage point where we could see the fire, but halfway there, we ran into a group of nuns who were chanting, perhaps praying for the fire to stop, and we couldn't get past them because we didn't want to interrupt or disturb them. So we didn't see the fire, just a lot of smoke which wasn't too discernible in the fading twilight.

While we were up there, another group came up telling us that a sheriff had come by and the evacuation was now mandatory. We headed back down the mountain, but towards the bottom we ran into a fire marshall who said that we probably didn't have to leave yet, but wanted an estimate on how many of us were left, and also advised us to stick together and the best place to be was at Solidity Hamlet, which was higher up and had a clearer view of the ridge than Clarity. From the road at the gate of the monastery, we could also see the glow of the San Diego fire to the south, which wasn't threatening us, but now I understand that these fires were national news. We didn't get news media at the monastery, so we didn't know how big or how bad things were. We just heard there were four big wildfires raging, and one was looming over us.

But there was movement to evacuate already based on the sheriff, and directions were passed out for a meeting point in Escondido where the people who left already were. Maybe families who volunteered to take monks in would pick them up at that meeting point, I don't know how it works. It didn't look like my car was needed, so I thought I would drive with them to the meeting point, and when it was clear I wasn't needed, I would take off for San Francisco from there.

We drove the eighth of a mile to Clarity Hamlet and stopped to see how the nuns were getting along with evacuating, and after a half an hour hanging out there, eating instant noodles, it turned out the nuns weren't evacuating, and the remaining monks also decided not to evacuate and we headed back up to Solidity Hamlet.

They decided to set up a watch over the fire. Four of us took two hour shifts through the night to watch the eastern ridge. With the sun gone down, we could see the glow of the fire on the other side, and if flames reached the ridge, we would evacuate. I took the 2:00-4:00 shift.

It was fascinating watching the glow over the ridge which would shift from one point to another. It was a gorgeous, warm, Summer-like night, and the sky was clear aside from the smoke of the fire, and I passed time by stargazing with my binoculars. I think I saw Saturn in Gemini, but I will have to consult with a magazine to confirm if it was. I thought I saw what looked like rings, but at highest zoom, it's pretty impossible to hold my binos steady enough to be sure.

my ghost like to travel: backdated entry
It was supposed to be a seven and a half hour drive from San Francisco to Escondido, just north of San Diego, but since I left at 9 in the morning, I hit Los Angeles at 3 in the afternoon. Read: traffic jam galore. LA is ass. I shoulda known better. So instead of getting to the monastery at 4:30, I got there at 6. They said to arrive before 5:00, but if that was impossible, then certainly not past 8:00, but since I'm terminally responsible and punctual, I started getting antsy when I realized I wouldn't get there by five. And to make matters worse, Murphy's Law was in full effect! Every lane I was in or switched to was the slowest moving lane. Really, I exaggerate not. At first, I was, "I can't believe this", and then I was thinking, "ha ha, Buddha's having a little fun with me", and finally I just smiled and relaxed and I'd get there when I got there, and figured the monastics wouldn't think anything of it. And that turned out to be the case, so that was a lesson in letting stress levels go up, because even though I told myself to relax, everytime the traffic let up, I drove like a demon to make up time.

From the start it was a pretty loose affair. No guide or instruction on where to be or what to do, just some helpful folk who directed me to Solidity Hamlet (the monks' hamlet) and then someone suggesting I go to the dining hall for dinner, which I found after a bit of wandering. Do as the natives do. The monks each have scheduled nights where they don't eat dinner, but many choose not to eat on Friday nights, too, opting for . . . whatever a monk would opt to do instead of eating. Food is set out on a long table, and you just go down the table taking what you want to eat. I think I had it in my subconscious from my reading a long time ago to take a bowl and I would only eat what I could fit into the one bowl. I didn't think of this, but that's what I did and what I ended up doing for my entire stay there.

It was a brilliant, warm, Summer-like night and I ate outside on a chair facing twilight, over-looking the new Meditation Hall under construction, with some other people - some monks, some civilians. Very peaceful and serene, no forced conversation, just eat and watch the evening set on. The vegetarian food was stunningly good! Eventually one of the monks asked if I was so-and-so, and I said, yes, please call me so-and-so. I think it was then when a monk, Brother Du*g, and I talked, and he asked "Feels like home?", "I bet you smiled when you saw the sign, 'I have arrived'". I had. I wasn't sure if word had gone around that my initial email to the monastery inquired about joining the monastery. Looking back, it's possible, even though the monastics don't engage in idle gossip. Maybe more than one monk saw the email.

After dinner, I was shown a bed in a room in a guest dorm (six beds in the small room, four occupied for the weekend, only three for the rest of the week), and then an orientation was given about the monastery and the practice here.

today:
The wake up bell was at 5:00. It was surprisingly easy to get up. Sitting in the Meditation Hall began at 5:30 with a half hour of guided sitting for newbies, then a short walking meditation around the Hall, and then another 30 minutes of self-guided sitting. It had been years since I'd sat on a cushion (I have my own little unorthodox set up at home). I can't even get into a half-lotus position. A brother helped me into a position with my legs folded in front of me (which is the same position I used when I did use a cushion), and then pushed a knuckle into my lower back to straighten up my spine. The feel of his knuckle on my lower back lasted longer than the push and it took a few seconds for me to realize he had already gone back to his cushion.

Breakfast was at 7:30, eaten in mindful silence, after which we washed our own dishes. At 9:00, we had working meditation, or working in mindfulness. The other guests and I worked on a physical project moving three tent-fulls of crap to make room for another guest dormitory that will be built for the monastery's Winter Retreat. It was grungy work (and the Black Widow Brother N*o found as soon as I got there wasn't encouraging), but that changed through the week as I came to enjoy it.

At 11:30 was walking meditation, which doesn't sound too exciting, but . . . no but, it isn't exciting at all. Actually, yes but - but it contributed to the cumulative effect of the entire practice. You walk slowly and mindfully for this chunk of time, and if you did this in the city, it would feel like a complete waste of time. There is certainly always something better, with a purpose, you can be doing in material life. The pace of modern, material life is much faster, and the walking meditation was kind of like a punctuation of the slowness and simplicity of monastic life. Still, I think it is possible to learn something of value in walking meditation that is able to be applied in material life.

Lunch was at 12:30, also in mindful silence, then the rest of the afternoon was spent in rest or "personal practice" - the monks are entrusted to be responsible for their own cultivation. I had brought along my shakuhachi which I hadn't played in a long time and decided to get re-acquainted with it.

There were musical instruments around. This isn't an ascetic monastery. There was a guitar, another monk had some hand drums and others had Asian style wooden flutes (horizontal design, different from my vertical, bamboo shakuhachi). Through the week, we would have . . . I wouldn't call them jam sessions; more like spontaneous creative noise making. None of us were particularly expert at our instruments, but we made a joyous, uninhibited noise, often trading instruments.

At 5:00, there was a chanting ceremony in the courtyard garden for pretans, or "hungry ghosts", which in Buddhist belief are beings in one of the realms of hell who suffer horribly from insatiable hunger and thirst. My personal belief is that pretans are human in form, and are people like junkies, corporate CEOs, and the like.

Dinner at 6:30 followed by 45 minutes of sitting in the Meditation Hall at 8:00.

Most nights end with the temple bell ringing for 20-30 minutes starting at 9:30 to call for "Noble Silence" which lasts until after breakfast the next morning. Minimal talking during Noble Silence, heightened mindfulness in all things. Lights out is about 10:00-ish.

OMG, is riding season over?!! Unless I climb Mt. Diablo tomorrow, it just might be. Daylight Savings ends this weekend and that has traditionally signaled the end of my running season, now riding season, and heralded the start of my smoking season (mm, cloves). No ride on Saturday, even though it's supposed to be hot, because I'm leaving Friday morning to go to San Diego, Escondido to be exact, to . . . visit friends. Um. Visit "friends". Oh what the hell, I'm going to a monastery for a week to get a taste of the monastic thing. OK, you and you, stop laughing, and you close your mouth please, we are not a codfish! That should cover my readership.

It's something I've always wanted to try out, and I feel I need to do it now before I lose my car, and the reality of dwindling finances forces a dusting off of ye ol' resume. It's a branch Zen monastery of a famous Vietnamese Zen "master", whose name I won't try to cold spell. That will have to do. American Zen and American Buddhism drives me absolutely crazy. Ever peruse the hokey, new agey titles in the Zen section at your local Borders? *sticks finger down throat*. I don't know, it's a double standard. Pauline Christianity is criticized for depicting God, Jesus, Mary, Joseph, the whole cast of characters as being white, but then Western Buddhism is criticized for adopting Asian cultural affects and consider it a substantial part of the religious doctrine. But Western Buddhism is still young and looks like it will become sophisticated and develop its own character in due time. But it'll probably be the Germans who lead the charge. Wha...?

My major influence has been Japanese Zen, and I view Japanese Zen as being suspect as well. Maybe it isn't a coincidence that Japanese Zen has been the major influence on American Buddhism. But Japanese Zen, Korean Zen, Chinese Zen, Vietnamese Zen, ZEN . . . is just a tool. A practical tool. I think the hardcore stuff is Tibetan, the closest to what Shakyamuni Buddha touched and preached. Zen is nothing but a new age, feel good philosophy without thorough study of the sutras and doctrine, and it seems a lot of Americans, myself included way back when, get drawn to Zen and think that's it, when it's only just a tool. It's like learning to use a hammer and becoming an expert in hammering nails into boards, but never building anything to realization. I don't know. I'm writing this like I know, but I really don't know. But that's why I'm more optimistic about this place in Escondido, which has an international monastic order, over local Bay Area "Zen Centers" which I think of, without basis no doubt, as stereotypical liberal, white, bleeding heart NIMBY types.

Anyway, hopefully the week I spend there will open me up more. Like just about everything else I do, I'm self-trained, and that's not always a good thing. I really could have used guitar lessons. No doubt I'd learn a lot from group rides. Guidance is not a bad thing! Maybe I'll even be more open to the local places. Whatever.

I went for a ride up in Marin today. It was strange, I went almost 50 miles, but it sure didn't feel like it. Not the most challenging course, but 50 miles is still at the upper end of distances I've gone. I rode from the Golden Gate Bridge to Fairfax, 18 miles, almost all flat with just one very minor hill, then I climbed up Bolinas-Fairfax road, which had two consecutive almost 1000' climbs, followed by rolling ups and downs along a ridge leading to Mt. Tam. Not summiting Mt. Tam, the rest of the ride was a screaming downhill, then flat again, and all there was left was the minor climb out of Sausalito. I was tired, but I wasn't zoning . . . although that's debatable as evidenced by missing a sidewalk ramp and hitting a curb just outside of Sausalito. I thought I might have damaged my rim and my thigh which cramped up on impact, but it was low speed and all is well. Just embarassing. I don't think anyone saw it.

I did get a pinhole puncture in my tire after the first of those two climbs up Bolinas-Fairfax road, but it was so small that it just couldn't support the normal amount of pressure, but could maintain enough pressure to ride normally. When I got home and checked it out, that's when I realized how incredibly lucky I had been. Since I had been able to ride, I wasn't sure it was a puncture, even though I distinctly heard air escaping during the ride. So I pumped up the tire, and found that there was, indeed, a leak. I took out the tube, found the hole, and it was so small that all it needed was a patch. So I got the patch kit out, and found out the bottle of sealing glue was empty. Oh well. I'll patch the hole once I get more glue, but for now I had to put in a new tube. So I took the tube that I had been carrying with me on the ride and put it on, only it wouldn't inflate. What the hell? I took it out again and it was defective, couldn't even be patched, it was an inch long gash at the seams. So I got another tube and installed it, pumped it up, and all is well for tomorrow's ride.

About a half hour later while I was sitting on the couch watching the World Series (alright Marlins!), I realized that with a defective tube and an empty bottle of patch glue, if I had really punctured, I would have been SO screwed. What would I have done? I had no idea. OK, I might not have been that screwed, a half hour after that, I realized that someone would have helped me out, there were plenty of riders out at that time and someone would have had patch glue. But that's another thing! I left unusually early for this ride. I'm an afternoon rider, but today I left before noon. In the afternoon, there aren't quite so many cyclists out.

That was interesting. I left "early", but when I started out, there were tons of riders and oodles of group rides, ostensibly on the return, finishing up their rides. It was cool seeing so many cyclists out. That's what I've been missing doing all afternoon rides, when all the group rides are done and all you come across are other lone riders. Tomorrow, I'm thinking of joining a group if I can get up and get to the Golden Gate Bridge by 9:30. Ugh, I don't like the sound of that.

Pink Floyd was one of the bands that I grew up on. They're terribly out of fashion now, but these primordial ringings don't stop just because they're not the flavor of the month, so when I saw that Netflix had the newly released Dark Side of the Moon Classic Albums series DVD, I had to put it at the top of my queue. It certainly is a must-see for old-timer Pink Floyd fans, it will give you a new appreciation for the record. The editing is just brilliant, cutting between original footage, finished track, demo recordings, and current day re-creations of performances.

The "Money" sequence in the bonus features had me captivated. Roger Waters explained the creation of the opening rhythm track with all the *ka-chinging*, and then producer Alan Parsons recreated in a studio how they took that tape, using the original, and looped it for the master, using a microphone stand as a spindle for the loop tape to go around. Very low-tech by today's standards. I happened to have a guitar out (for the first time in over two months) and I couldn't help but start playing along with the bass line as I did as a teenager, but then, all in real time, cut to David Gilmour in a studio demonstrating all the guitar parts by isolating them and cutting everything else out. It was great fun trying to keep in time with this 7/8 signature bass line, while David Gilmour punched various guitar parts in and out.

It makes me wonder what music I'm listening to now will excite me just as much 20 years from now.

My condolences to fans of the Chicago Cubs. I saw that play in game 6 which turned the tide, and spun the team to face their accursed fate. I was convinced - it's a curse. That fan who forgot to consider that the ball may have been playable was the goat. He should hereby go under the nickname "Goat". As for the other cursed team, I'm no fan of the Yankees, but I hope they take the Red Sox out.

I rented a movie from Netflix by Shohei Imamura called, Warm Water Under a Red Bridge because I thought I missed it at this year's S.F. International Film Festival, but I was mistaken. The film never showed at the festival. But it was a great film, in certain ways it reminded me of another one of my favorite films, Bagdad Cafe, in that it was quirky (the quirky feel is almost exactly the same to me), with a host of characters who seem to mean something to some central thesis, but it's ambiguous what that is.

I first saw "Bagdad Cafe" as part of a film syllabus for a religion class, and like most of the films (and most of the students), when I watched the film, I was perfectly strained to figure out what the film had anything to do with the class material. It became clearer when we discussed it in class with the professor's guidance, but we were convinced, in part, because we wanted to be convinced (isn't that how belief goes?). It wasn't a discussion for skeptics. Relevant themes included "calling", Rosenheim (home of the roses, i.e. the Garden of Eden), magic, boomerangs, watching from a distance, and "too much harmony", among others.

I've been trying similar "observational skills" with "Warm Water Under a Red Bridge", and I have the African marathon runner, fishermen, tasteless food, sex/orgasms/water/neutrinos/the universe, the non-existent but real golden Buddha, waiting, and others, I'm sure. I have a feeling Imamura meant to connect these disparate elements in a non-obvious way.

I just realized that I usually stop riding after Daylight Savings Time ends, so there's just a few more weeks of cycling. Then what will I blog about?!! Hopefully something more interesting, but I'm not gonna hold my breath. I've gone on some pretty unusual rides this year, but I think today was the first time this year that I went as far as 40 miles and had some leg-busting climbs. Other 40+ milers didn't have any serious hills, and I don't think I've done a single ride over 50 miles. Pretty sad. Especially since I was floating on such an endorphin cloud for hours afterwards, and I only get that on the rides where I'm thinking beforehand, "Eh, do I really want to do that?" And all this year I've been chickening out and doing shorter rides.

Even last week, I climbed to Mt. Hamilton's 4000' peak in San Jose, oh, which I did do earlier this year, but it was at the beginning of the season and I wasn't up to form yet, so it wasn't very fun. Anyway, it was pretty hard that first time, so last week I truncated the ride by about half, and it was just not worth it. The grade isn't that steep, so the ride has to be longer to make it worth it, although the only way to make it longer is to add a completely separate, more challenging 1500' climb.

Today I did that Tunitas Creek Road course in the Santa Cruz Mountains that I abandoned several weeks ago because the road was so bad, and did it the reverse way so I'd be going up the bumpy road. It was just great, hard, the course goes all the way out to the ocean where it was sunny, but cold and windy, and I was struggling for a while out there waiting for a second wind. Most rides in the Santa Cruz Mountains have at least two major climbs, one going up to Skyline Boulevard from the east, and then after going down the mountains on the west side, coming back up. My second wind usually comes on the second climb, where either it has to come or I bonk.

On top of that, I was reminded a few weeks ago that cyclists call the third front chain-reel the "granny gear", implying even your grandmother can make it up hills in that low gear. I'm not serious enough of a cyclist to not have one, but pride demands that I make all effort not to go down to the granny gear. Passing people on climbs is not really anything if you're doing it granny-style.

My endorphin high may have been helped by the perfect weather. Sunny and 70s, except right by the coast. That was weird. It was very sudden that the temperature just plunged between 5 and 10 degrees. I stopped for a rest out there and it was too cold in the shade and to stop for too long. Then riding back inland, same thing, the temperature jumped right back up to summer-like, with attendant smell and feel.

Yay! I might be getting rid of my car. Being contradictory is nothing new to me, but I'll be glad to be rid of the SUV-urban cyclist contradiction. I got my car before they became this big yuppie status symbol phenomena, and the idea was that it would be useful to lug around music equipment. But now, especially since I'm not doing music anymore, there's no justifying having it. So I'm gonna give it back to my parents and my brother back east since they just got rid of the two cars that usually get them through the winter.

I volunteered it, but I'll be a little sad to see it go, especially into my brother's care. He's a sucky driver and he just totalled one of those two winter cars. I've had it for ten years and I've been a lot of places with it, and just about every person who has been important to me has had their ass in the passenger seat. Ah, sentimental value. But it's a love-hate relationship I have with it. The hate is that it is a gas-guzzling SUV. The love is the familiarity and that it was mine.

But no, no attachment. If they want it, I'm glad to give it back. I'll drive it to New Jersey once I talk to my brother and figure out the logistics, and while I'm at it, I'll take back a bunch of music stuff that I'm not anticipating using anymore.

Woof, two movies in two days.

Yesterday I saw Concert for George. Terrible title, probably referencing George's "Concert for Bangladesh", but it was a tribute concert staged by Eric Clapton for George Harrison exactly one year after his death. All of the musical people close to George brought together to play George's songs, with notable exceptions.

Ravi Shankar featured an original piece that was a play on George's name, suggesting a closeness with Krishna, performed with an ensemble of Indian instruments. Ringo Starr did "Photograph" which George co-wrote (I didn't know that) and "Honey Don't", George being a big fan of Carl Perkins. That's OK, it's Ringo, and maybe it was George who suggested Ringo sing it with The Beatles, but I think I would have like to have heard Ringo sing one of George's songs. But maybe he tried and realized, with his limited vocal range, he couldn't pull it off. Paul McCartney's rendition of "Something" was moving, and Billy Preston's "My Sweet Lord" was a show stopper.

George Harrison was my favorite Beatle because he was so easy-going and had a calm, concentrated energy about him. Eric Clapton did a great job capturing a perfect spirit for the concert, both solemn and humorous, emotional but not smarmy, holding it at the Royal Albert Hall, with muted lighting, starting it with a Hindu prayer and incense, and the flowers at the end could bring a tear to the eye.

And on Monday I saw Tibet: Cry of the Snow Lion, which is a great documentary about Tibet. It sums up what's been going on to date. It's heartbreaking and can be depressing, but that wasn't the point of the documentary. As said in the film, they don't want to defeat the Chinese using force or kill them, but they want to liberate Tibet from China through knowledge and awareness. So it helps if as many people see this film to know what's happening. If you have a cursory knowledge of the Tibet situation and would likely sympathize, then this is a must-see. It really helps to see the context, the land, and the people.

My only complaint is that they show a political map to locate the Tibetan Plateau, and they use a map showing Burma, but it's labeled "Myanmar (Burma)".

I had a nice, peaceful day. How 'bout you? I had very little human contact, too. The Giants got eliminated from the post-season (bah!), and the A's didn't eliminate the Red Sox when they should have. They lost 1-2 tonight when they should have won 3-1. Eric Byrne failed to touch home plate, and Tejada of all people stopped running home because he thought there was interference and should be given home. He was tagged out as he leisurely strolled down the baseline and raised a stink when they called him out. I agree with the call just because he didn't even try to make it home safely, thereby avoiding any conflict if made it. If he got called out, then the manager could appeal that there was interference and he would've been safe.

I did get out to the bike shop. The brakes on my B bike were still giving me problems, and after taking them apart and looking at them from all angles, I realized I wouldn't be able to figure it out, no matter how long I squoze the calipers or twiddled with the springs and bolts. After a bit of fiddling, the guy at the shop fixed them with a wrench that I don't have, and used them on the part that I didn't want to go near, so I didn't feel bad about not figuring it out.

I also got two anime DVDs, one of them really cheap used. Still, this whole anime kick I'm on is getting out of hand.

Welly, welly, well, when I went to turn on my only friend today (my computer), it was having a little trouble. OK, let's not mince words, it was having a lot of trouble. Aw, screw it, it was kaput en la cabeza. The first clue was when the screen came up a color that I hadn't chosen for the background. Next was all the familiar desktop icons were gone. You know you're screwed when the "Start" button doesn't work to shut down or restart. My entire afternoon was spent scanning the disks for errors, getting through to Dell tech support, and then speaking with an Indian guy to fix the derned thing.

Long afternoon short, the A's beat down the Red Sox again (why do they even think they can win the World Series?), I patched a tube on my B bike, did assorted cleaning, and I didn't have to re-install Windows or any drivers. The damage is, in fact, minimal compared to the feeling of dread and doom when you turn on your computer and it doesn't do exactly what you expect it to do. I lost all the websites I saved as Favorites in IE, my Earthlink dial-up is a little funny, but I can deal with that, and I can't figure out how to turn Norton Anti-Virus back on. Probably a bunch of other stuff is gone, too, that I'll find out about in time. I'm glad I didn't have to re-install Windows, thereby losing everything on my hard drive. Wake-up call to back everything up somewhere. To you, too!

Is it just me, or is anyone else addicted to online? After the whole afternoon of my computer being sick, I had to go check my usual haunts of websites to make sure everything was alright or if anyone had missed me. Everything was fine, Netflix can somehow go on without me, and no one had missed me. Bastards.

Geez, riding is all I'm doing these days. I went to Kings Canyon National Park yesterday, and what did I do? I rode. I wasn't even planning on riding much since I figured the altitude would kill me. The first thing I did was test the altitude and did a short ride from the Grant Grove Visitor Center to Panoramic Point. On the map, it looked short and sweet and it seemed reasonable to assume that there would be some climbing to get to a "Panoramic Point". It turned out to be a 1000' climb over 2.2 miles! I kept thinking, "it burns!!" in regard to my lungs (apparently a quote from some movie that Katie kept saying a while back). I even stopped once, and as a rule it's bad to stop on a grade because you lose momentum, but there was no let up in the grade, and I just had to stop. But wow, what a view as a reward! There was a parking lot up top, and then a walkway up for another 50-60 vertical feet, and I just rode right up the walkway since I was on a roll and not a soul was around. Kings Canyon and the high Sierra spread before my eyes, looking almost fake in its grandeur and stunning silence.

In my mind, the important thing was that I made it all the way. Even though I felt a burn in my lungs from the altitude, I was able to do it. So in my mind that meant I should ride some more. Brillig. I drove down Rte. 180 into Kings Canyon. It's just a road that goes 30 miles down into the canyon, a vertical drop of 3500'. It isn't decked out to be a major tourist draw like neighboring Sequoia National Park is with its Giant Sequoia redwood trees. Unless you're planning on camping or hiking, it's just a drive in and out. But I love shit like that, winding canyon roads, towering granite cliff faces, not a whole lotta people.

I drove 25 miles in, rode 15 miles out and then back in again. It was an arduous ride, but it behooves me that the statistics aren't that impressive. 30 miles total is no killer ride, the total vertical climb was 1600', also no biggie, and the altitude was between 3000' and 4600', below where lungs start burning. I'm not sure what made it so hard.

I was just about to write that I wasn't dying, but I just remembered, I was. I actually drove in 5 miles too much. Five miles shorter, I would have started at Boyden Cavern, the low point at about 3100'. Where I started, at the Grizzly Falls picnic area, was at 4200', but that five mile stretch runs along Kings River and there was an illusion that it was flat, and driving in I didn't feel it was a 1000' climb, and riding out it didn't feel like a 1000' descent. But riding back in from Boyden Cavern to Grizzly Falls, boy howdy, I felt it. If I had started and ended at Boyden Cavern, it would've been a perfect ride, but those last five miles/1000' was not fun. I got through the last two miles by watching my odometer, counting my progress by hundredths of a mile. My theory is that you can get through anything if you break it down into small enough increments. Concentrating on 200 hundredths of a mile is still better than thinking about how much you're suffering.