Had lunch at the vegetable place, which is easier than typing Crepe Myrtle Cafe, because I often misspell it.
I order the The Markets Roasted Veggie with Bulger Creek Farm Goat Cheese, because goat cheese makes everything better. You can’t even taste the balsamic, and you forget your eating grilled veggies out of a defective pancake.
And then I realized that I inherited my grandmother’s taste buds. This blueberry was bitterly sour. That blueberry was terribly sweet. As soon as I make this story more interesting I’ll have to call and tell her about it.
While we were eating we received a call. There was something we could do right then, if we could arrive at the place right now. Well. We’re just a bit away and can be there in 10 minutes. And so we were. Walked right in and took care of the appointment. It was that kind of day.
Visited the giant box store and picked up cards and box store things. The only problem was the woman who was about 55 and 4-foot-5 with six children with her. They blocked the aisle I really needed, but only for a moment. And then they disappeared in that way that means you won’t see them on the next aisle over — whatever that means. It was that kind of day, too.
Self check out, then, with no one in front of me, which meant I couldn’t make the joke about how people should be certified by the state to use those things. And the machine worked perfectly for a change. The disinterested self checkout herder could stay that way. Beep, beep, beep and we were done. Such a lovely day.
Forgot to buy a brake light for the car, but that was pretty much the extent of the day’s difficulties.
Back home and read and wrote and should have done more. We went out just before dark to run. I got in 5K and finished just at the point of darkness where I could see a silhouette without knowing who I was seeing. My run was not great, but none of them are. This one had its moments, though, where I stopped counting footfalls and exhausted breaths and just kept moving. My splits are still very poor.
Got home, cleaned up, had leftovers — a vegetarian pasta dish which makes six meals in a row with no meat. That can’t last forever.
Watched Men in Black 3, and became convinced that Josh Brolin can become anyone if you give him enough screen time. I was relieved when the kid, at the end, turned out not to be Jaden Smith. You just knew it would be. And IMDb says it almost was. The database says there is a MiB 4 in the works.
Here are all the problems with the third one. They were plentiful:
Kind of makes you not want to see a fourth one made, but then you can say that of most any series, now can’t you?
And, now, cuddling with the cat, who doesn’t even seem to mind so much that she went to the vet today. She doesn’t know she has to go back next week, though. And everyone is impressed by how young she behaves. We’re just fortunate all the way around, then. It was that kind of day.
Woke up all ready for a nice calm medium length ride and found a flat.
The damage I did at that last triathlon had returned. The wound in the kevlar I found last weekend had fallen victim to some debris I picked up yesterday. I’ve ordered a new tire, but it hasn’t arrived yet.
So I took off the old tire, pulled out the tube, found the leak was in the same place. Checked the liner there for any junk that’s going to hurt the next tube and cleaned the frame.
I have the my front tire died and my new one hasn’t arrived yet blues. A friend suggested there’s a song for that:
That song applies even when the bike is in working order..
It is slow here. Have you noticed? July is slow. I am doing other things, like catching up on old posts and catching up on email — there’s a special filter in my email called “You thought you were done, but no” — and catching up on other important things.
Plus, none of it, so far, is terribly exciting. I’m riding and running, but that’s about it. So July is slow. (Not unlike my riding and running.) Have you noticed?
But I did want to say this: One year ago today I was having surgery, getting titanium and screws, thank you very much, because 53 weeks ago today I was falling, destroying my collarbone, hurting my shoulder and whacking my head on asphalt.
So after a year of that: six months of fuzzy memories — and some periods I just don’t really recall at all — and lots of travel for work and pleasure, physical therapy, impatience and somewhat starting to feel like myself again, finally starting to ride again and wondering, for months, if I was ever going to really feel like myself again … I kinda do.
I still have some muscular issues in my shoulder, but I carry stress there anyway. I have, on occasion, finally started to notice the absence of pain in my collarbone. The surgeon said six months to a year, but I’d given up on all of that.
Last month, though, for about an hour one day while snorkeling, I realized that nothing was hurting. And it had been 11 months since I could say that. Nothing. Hurt. (It is hard to pry me out of the water anyway, but I almost willfully got left behind that day. The absence of pain is a pretty incredible feeling on its own.)
This week I’ve noticed a few times where I have to willfully turn my attention to my shoulder and my collarbone. Are you still there? I don’t think I notice you right now.
This dawned on me last night. Delightful progress.
Of course right now that section of my upper body is singing the tune I’ve come to know so well this year. It has been that kind of year.
But it is getting better. It isn’t perfect, but it is better.
We decided this morning that our current host is like the Irish grandmother we didn’t know we had. The rooms are a bit small, and the WiFi has the curious ability to stop at our front door, but it is clean. The gentleman of the house, Tim, is a retired police officer. His guardia station can be seen from the dining room window. A 30 second commute, he said. Mrs. Eileen made a delicious breakfast and fussed over us continually. One of the other current guests, she said, has been coming to visit her every year for a decade. It isn’t especially hard to see why. You’re just dropping by to spend a night or two with an old friend here. It is lovely.
We went out for a bicycle ride today. Here was our route, zoom in and follow along:
This is just under two miles into the ride and we’re just getting started. We met some nice folks from the D.C. area and swapped pictures with them. Figured it would be the sort of thing where we leap frogged one another all day, but we only saw them one more time.
Here’s a lovely little waterfall we found in Ventry, just under five miles into the ride:
That waterfall is very close to the Dunbeg Fort, or Dun Beag, which is dated to about 2,500 years old. There’s a sign here that quotes National Geographic “one of the very few oldest historical monuments that we have left in this planet.”
So, being history nerds, we started counting things older. Never mind that now, though:
She does handstands at forts and on beaches and other interesting places:
And planks. (She’s taking them back.)
The fort consists of four ditches and five mounds, with dry stone masonry. It was originally a straight rampart, but later work made it circular. There were guardhouses and the remains of a square Clochaun, a dry-stone hut with a corbelled roof, a building technique common in this part of the country’s history. There is also a Souterrain, or a manmade cave if you like, that likely dates to the Iron Age. It was probably used for storage, refuge and passageway.
There’s an active geological fault here, the signs say, which has contributed to some erosion of the original earthworks.
And various reasonable yoga poses, merging old forts with old fitness disciplines in the world. Because she can:
Off to the other side of Dun Beag:
These next several are in the Slea Head area, when we were about 10 miles into the ride. Adam is beginning to think this activity disagrees with him:
Here’s a little more local history:
Is this not the coolest piece of road? A different version of this picture is going into the headers on this page and is presently the image on my home page, too:
We took a lunch break at the Great Blasket Centre, which is full of hardscrabble history. There’s still quite a bit of ancient Gaelic culture in this area, they say.
We found the Reasc Monastery about 20 miles into our journey. It is thought to date to the 6th century and featured seven of those Clochaun huts, six of which were arranged in pairs for the monks’ residences, you’ve just learned a bit about. There is a graveyard with 42 graves and the remains of a slab shrine.
There was a small church oratory here, of course. The area around it was used as a children’s burial ground after the monastery was abandoned.
It is important to note, when you see those Clochauns, or beehive huts, that the re-creations, or remains, honor an important part of the shared European heritage. During the dark ages, places like these huts were where the educated people, typically high ranking church members, lived. These were the people that played a significant role in keeping literacy alive.
You can peer at the walls of the monastery and see what was original and what had been reconstructed by archeologists. (There was a tarpaper layer noting the difference.) And if you wonder where the original stones went, my guess would be into the walls that mark pastures everywhere. here.
At least 10 of these types of slab stones have been recovered from the site. The cross inscriptions of the Reask stones also feature spiral designs and the letters DNE, which you can only barely make out here perhaps. The abbreviation is for Domine, which is Latin for “O Lord.”
This is the Kilmalkedar church, a 12th century structure on a sight that is religiously important back to at least the 7th century. Some of the artifacts here go well beyond that, even. The Hiberno-Romanesque church includes a nave and chancel. The chancel is thought to have been a later addition. The Saint’s Road, a pilgrimage trail to Mount Brandon, passes between the church and the nearby house of St Brendan. There’s a prominent medieval cemetery here, a sundial, cross slabs and this holed ogham stone.
Some literature suggests that stone had been there nine centuries before the church went up, some of the engravings support that idea. It marked a grave, which has suggested that this was holy ground even in the pre-Christian era. The hole was drilled through so people could come to seal a deal—standing on the graves of their ancestors and in front of the house of God by touching thumbs through this stone. People renew their wedding vows there, too.
You go into the church through this romanesque doorway. It has three orders and a round head with a projecting hood made from red and green stone. The keystone is a carved head. As we learned at Cashel these head carvings often had a role in warding off evil spirits. So perhaps this one was a sentry as well:
We finished our ride with a long, easy 300 foot climb as the sun set over Smerwick Harbor. In 1580 600 Italian and Spanish troops (sent by the pope to aid a rebellion) surrendered here to the English, and were slaughtered for their trouble. Have a nice day!
Here are several extra shots from the day’s ride, mixed with music we heard with dinner last night:
We coasted back into Dingle town, got back to our B&B and cleaned up for dinner at The Dingle Pub. After all of that bike riding, 29 miles and almost 1,000 feet of climbing, on rental bikes he was beat. He kept saying “I do not know what is happening.”
We also saw Westminster Abbey today. Made it just in time for a tour and a beautiful evensong service. I did not take pictures inside — this is the first time I’ve ever abided by that rule — but I did make a recording. You can hear it in the video below:
Had my first ever fish and chips today. Don’t know what took so long. I like fish. I like fries …
We went to this place, which came well recommended. And it was very good.
