Chlorine is feeling just like a natural part of kayaking recently. Finally the temperatures have dropped and it’s feeling a bit more like winter. But of course that means more indoor days working on rolling. That’s ok. I’m lucky to have such an easily accessible place to go. Last week Jeff H. joined us for a day (pictured above). You’ll remember he’s the poor guy who left the northwest coast to come here. We’ve got to get him out on Superior so he can feel a bit better about the move. Jeff’s been starting to play around a bit with the traditional stick and working on his goal to hand roll by next summer. We all know he can do it.

Sunday I’m meeting JB of Milwaukee, he may bring Nydia our Puerto Rico research angel along as well. Then Tuesday we have another rolling day planned with some friends from Madison who fancy themselves a challenge to any rolling coach. We shall see. . Just for fun I may go myself today as well. I’ve still not taken a day to roll with my new IPOD gear.

As kayakers most of us are well aware of extremes. In fact it’s part of the joy, exhilaration and sensuality of the sport. We need our lows to feel our highs. We all know this. Experience teaches us perspective. We need a bit of havoc to appreciate the calm. Everything in life comes with a polar opposite. Hot & cold, war & peace, up & down, left & right, good and bad, crying and laughter and sadly, love and hate. I for one could never sit here each day and write my little tales without turning to both sides of life. Certainly the short days of winter can bring us into a series of emotional grays. I often wonder that most great novels were not written in the dead of dark winter. We have a joke around here that most musicians go to hell once they get famous. I remember really liking Billy Joel at one time, then he met Christy Brinkley and his career took a big flaming dive. He was just too friggin’ happy. Good for him, bad for the fans. Finally they broke up and he had something to feel bad about again. Good for us, bad for him. . . Sometimes people express concern when I’m in a particularly dark place. They need not worry. It’s the darkness that makes the light worthwhile. Extremes are good, in measure. Without balance of course they lead to disaster. Still, I’m led to a biblical moment, although I dare say I’m not a religious person, “So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.” A luke warm life is not an aspiration. I’d like to avoid the lows, but they are just part of the quest for the highs. The trick of course is to make choices with wisdom. Now there’s a problem!

Speaking of extremes, the folks in Wales have been having some particularly nasty weather of late. Wind gusts over 70 miles per hour were recorded in Anglesey yesterday. Power and phone lines down all over the place. I wonder if anyone went out to play in the surf?

* image of the elisabeth lloyd copyright Amgueddfa Ceredigion Museum.

If I was going to dust off my pink paisley Fender Strat and start a new band I think I’d call it, “Ice Crystal Romance”. But of course that has nothing to do with today’s post.

Today before I go on with my story I want to share that Andrew McAuley has begun his next attempt to cross the Tasman Sea. According to his wife Andrew left Tasmania today in favorable conditions and in very good spirits. He hopes to complete the crossing in less than 30 days. Of course we’re all right there wishing Andrew all the luck in the world. The talent and determination bit he’s already got covered!! – thanks for the news Karel.

So, I got up this morning and wrote. Then I highlighted and deleted. Wrote some more and deleted some more, which in the end brought us back to this. I’m suffering a major distraction today. Something I’ll share in some form or another of the next few days. But suffice to say it’s to do with the trip and a phone call. It leaves me too nervous to feel happy, sad, silly or morose. You never know what people will say or do. Yet you always try to anticipate. Then you think. . . If they say this. . I’ll say that. You want to be heard, respected and taken seriously. All the while trying to be friendly and inviting. . It’s like verbal fencing. That’s why I envy people who can just blurt out whatever they feel. It must be wonderful. .

I’ll let you know how the call goes. Slip off your shoes and cross your toes for me. . .

As I’m sure you know, In Australia James Castrission and Justin Jones had their official launch on Saturday. You can check out the photos right here. I wonder what a pirouette would look like in the “Lot 41″?

While over in Israel Simon Osborn & Jeff Allen from Sea Kayaking Cornwall will be joining the folks at Terra Santa for their annual symposium Jan 12th-20th. Also on tap are Phil Cleg, Fiona Whitehead, Pete Jones, Peter Bray and Nigel Dennis. I wonder if you can get Corona in Israel?

Aled is busy with Freya’s new “Underground”. It’s starting to look like a sleek rolling machine.

Justine Curgenven is back to working like mad on all the fiddly bits that go into making a world class sports adventure film.

Kirrion at Adventurous Experiences on the Isle of Man in the UK has been torturing the staff with a little winter rough water training.

Kelly Blades has dropped right off the map. But he did find time to schedule BCU 2* coach training in Madison. The punk set it up right when I’m probobly not going to be here.

Megan P., Rutabaga‘s woman of many talents, or was that “Jane of all trades”!?, is slaving away in the drag race to finish off all the details for this year’s Canoecopia. I did ask her if I could have a booth all my own where I could just sit in a chair and wave as people go by. No dice. I’m sure it had something to do with my penchant for bunny suits.

And back in Australia, Andrew is intensely watching the weather for that window that will let him take another shot at crossing the Tasman sea solo.

Sandy all the while keeps plugging away kilometer by kilometer. . .

And me? Well, I’m just sitting here watching the wheels go round and round. . .

* photo courtesy of Race Recon. Thank You!

The photo above is of my little local lake which is still open. Great for me, but sad for all the Ice fisherman who are still fishing but just casting out beyond the occasional ice that forms along the shoreline. Of course our spot of warm weather is NOT considered directly related to global warming but more an effect of a shift in the jet stream caused by a moderate El Niño. US government scientists are happy to tell you that El Niños have been a natural cycle for over 10,000 years and no on can prove at this time they are getting any worse, or more frequent. I’ll tell you one thing, If I could give out one Darwin award it would go to our silly government who in the end will be taking us all out and most of the rest of the world with it. I’m not a conspiracy theorist. I don’t think the government is out to get us. I just think suffer a sort of group madness. Large numbers of people gathered in rooms can it seems, convince themselves of just about anything. The ten warmest years on record, (as of 2005) in descending order, are 1998, 2005, 2003 and 2002 (tie), 2004, 2001, 1997, 1995, 1999, and 1990. 1996 is number 11. According to the UK’s Met Office 2007 is likely to be the warmest year on global record. Good thing here in the States we believe there is no such thing as gobal warming or I’d be getting nervous!! No wait, now that the other guys have a bit more power maybe we do again. . Hmmm, Well, let me think about this. . . a balance in power generally means we’re not sure about anything. Which of course means we’ll be doing nothing about global warming anytime soon. Interesting, that’s exactly what we did when we didn’t believe in it anyway.

Well, I’ve got to be off to the gym today. The beginning of my new goal not spend the whole of Puerto Rico looking at Wendy‘s back side. . . WAIT! WHAT AM I SAYING!??

I woke up this morning dreaming of summer. Not however, the hot, sunny, beach bunny, barbeque type summer where 1970′s muscle cars going roaring down the main streets of southeast, coastal towns with Lynard Skynard pumping out open windows. No, my summer dream, the one I woke up to, had me laying on a hill in the grass just as the sky began to darken. The wind pushed downward from the clouds in that warm, wet, washcloth way that heralds a coming storm. The seed heads of the tall grasses keep taping me on the forehead. One particularly insolent stalk repeatedly tapped me in the corner of my lip causing that sort of weird tickle that causes your spine to spasm. My eyes framed the sky as a bubbling cauldron of cloud approached in from the northwest. In that moment my thoughts were no more complex than that of a deer. I would lye here in the tall grass until the storm passed. Whack! I was going to pull that silly weed if it hit me in the lip one more time. . . Then I woke up.

The house was cold and I shivered as I got dressed and traipsed my way round for coffee and my multitude of morning pills; Aspirin, vitamin, allergy pill, joy pill and mixed nicely with my insanely strong black coffee in my now obsolete KayakWisconsin Cup. I came out to the office to work on my blog. I put on music; “Clair De Lune” came through the speakers. Each note of the piano fell on my ears like a rain drop.

I laid in the grass as the rain began to come in earnest. I felt tiny rivulets running down my cheek. Thunder rumbled in a deep “dump truck on a highway” sort of way. It was so warm, the drops lacked any sensation of cold as they tapped against my skin. That stupid blade of grass ticked at my lip again. I reached up with two fingers and “POP”. It was now an inch sorter. The seed head fell against my ear with the soft touch of a caterpillar. The grass swirled under the power of the humid wind. I had an impression of an giant invisible snake slithering it’s way across the top of the hill.

Suddenly I was in a car. It was winter. It was raining. I heard her voice. Something nonsensical. I was trying to remember the words.

I was standing on a side walk on an unfamiliar street corner. She was talking to a stranger about people I didn’t know. Under the lamplight I watched the barren trees sway slightly beneath the false yellow clouds of an urban sky. “I wonder if it’s going to rain?” I thought. I turned to say something, but then I woke up.

Ok, so look what I did! I got up my courage and hacked off my beard! It’s amazing how hard it can be to take the old razor to something that’s been part of your face for years. Of course over the past 3 years it was going from having a nice little white stripe to going almost all white. Ticked me off! I was almost temped to get a nice bottle of die. . . vanity thy name is ME! But in the end I just removed it. We’ll see how long that lasts. Somehow I don’t feel quite like me now. It’s interesting how easy it is these days to take self portraits. Just set the little Optio on a shelf and let it click away while I read email. If I look at the camera I’m screwed. I’ll end up making some silly face. Can’t help it. Hey, if you’re curious what my little cubical looks like Just click here. You’ll need QuickTime to view the VR. So. . how many model ships can you find??

So last night I went out to a local bar and played pool with my adult old son, Julian. Along the way listening to his adventures in dating. . Of course he’s much more comfortable with that than I was. Maybe it just me, maybe it’s a cultural change. To me dating was always a means to an end. I should clarify. . long term end. Hookin’ up never fit my mind very well. Lord knows I couldn’t survive that. He says we look like brothers now. I suppose that’s a good thing. Older children are a bit of an enigma. You can remember little kids running around but there is no way to translate that kid to the adult who’s telling you his latest escapades. Yikes! So we played 6 games. He beat me 4 of those games. Signs of age I guess. A passing of the torch if you will. Well, I can still out run him and take him out in a nice manly arm wrestling match so I suppose I can still feel somewhat virile. But time keeps chugging away.