Accidentally Flavorless Ordinary Life
Published April 8, 2009 | 
What has happened to it all?
Crazy, some are saying
Where is the life that I recognize?
– duran duran
I was walking out of the Tescos in Holyhead, Wales. There was a police car in front of me, one of those tiny ones with the Cheap Trick paint jobs. I walked by it to the right hand drivers side of my rented white Vauxhall Astra. Adjusting my grocery bag in one hand I got the keys out of my pocket and hit the clicker. The Astra beeped back. I put the keys back in my pocket to free up my hand and open the door. I tossed my bag filled with sausage rolls & mars bars (see: The Penrhyn Mawr diet) in the back seat, and sat down behind the wheel. There with the door open, just sitting, surrounded by the muddle of traffic, voices and banging carts of an ordinary day and I thought… “How great is this!?”.
Posted in Expeditions, Loch Ness, Paddling, Random Thoughts, travel | 
Astra, Expeditions, Holyhead, Tescos, Vauxhall, walesLost Horizons
Published April 6, 2009 | 
I felt a warm warm breeze / That melted metal and steel
I got a bad migraine / That lasted three long years
And the pills that I took / Made my fingers disappear
Time will craw
– bowie
So anyway this plane is skyjacked and as if that’s not enough it crashes somewhere in the Himalayas. In the middle of a crazy snowstorm these mysterious guys show up and take the survivors to a mystical land where everyone lives forever. Well, as long as they never leave… Nothing lasts forever. And that really bums me out.
What’s the Point?
Published April 4, 2009 | 
The point of it all? The reason for the investment.. the time, the gear, the plane tickets, the time away from home, job and family.. The point? You want to know why? I should have thought it would have been obvious.. The chance to appear on the Nessie Cam of course!!
Keeping Up Appearances
Published April 4, 2009 | 
We’ll try to stay blind
to the hope and fear outside
Hey child, stay wilder than the wind
And blow me in to cry
Who do you need, who do you love
When you come undone
– duran duran
So the story was in the end, educational. This paddler had completed an amazing, amazing adventure. Yet, they were not particularly skilled or talented, their rough water experience was nil, their navigation skills were left wanting, their roll well, accidental and on and on. The trick? Only paddling on days when it was dead calm.
The Poet McTeagle (why not?)
Published April 3, 2009 |
Can I have fifty pounds to mend the shed?
I’m right on my uppers.
I can pay you back
When this postal order comes from Australia.
Honestly.
Hope the bladder trouble’s geting better.
Love, Ewan
Rule 27 (or rule 2)
Published April 2, 2009 | 
Ahnu Shoes – Definitely Rule 27. (Rule 2 in the Gaelic New Moon Version)
The best customer service is the customer service you never need which by the way sums up rule 27 (Or Rule 2 in the Gaelic New Moon Version)… but we’ll get there later.
If you really love a product, if it’s really, really great, you’ll tolerate a lot of crappy customer service as long as you rarely have to deal with them (Rule 24b). If a product is useful but always breaking down you’ll still love it IF the customer service is exceptional (i.e. they fly you out a new one to Kerguelen Island over night!) (Rule 11) or by blackmail (if there is nothing comparable out there) (Rule 667). If by some stroke of luck you get a company who actually makes a great product AND provides amazing customer service (Rule 2 or 27 depending on lunar position and ability to speak Gaelic) you are in heaven. Funny how rare that actually is.
truth about lightweight paddles…
Published April 1, 2009 | 
Lord Byron had a lot of luggage
He took it when he traveled far and wide
He didn’t get to bathe very often
But he liked to change his clothes all the time
-warren zevon
Do I really have to think about gear? September is a long way off at the moment but that does not mean I don’t have to start taking a bit of inventory. For the most part over the years you collect all the gear you need for a few weeks on the water. Still, over time things break, fall apart or get left in far off lands and need to be replaced. No one wants to paddle in the shadow of the “Paps” without proper gear.
Posted in Expeditions, Loch Ness, My Paddling, Paddle Gear, Paddling | Expeditions, Loch Ness, pdf, scotland
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