Clarling Around Mad Town

My dear friends:

It’s been a little while since I’ve posted anything beyond pictures, and I apologize for that. I was out of town, in Washington DC (or, more correctly, northern Virginia) and Clairee was in New York City. Anyway, for now I’d like to write a post about the beginning of summer. . .

As we all know, summer doesn’t officially begin until June 20^th, or sometimes June 21^st: the Summer Solstice. That date marks the time of year when the Sun shines down on us from its northernmost perch in the sky, or, for some of us, the time of year when Zelgourd the fire god races his fire boat through the cloud world above our flat earth and chases out the evil spirits of winter. Don’t judge me. (In any case, it’s more plausible than dinosaurs and modern humans co-existing, or “intelligent design”). For Claire and me, however, summer begins Memorial Day weekend. We haven’t discussed that assertion, but it is my decree, and we will honor it from now on (with Claire-belle’s blessing, of course).

We had a fantastic weekend, a weekend so good we couldn’t even squeeze it into a normal sized Saturday/Sunday weekend. Instead it ballooned out ostentatiously, and became a weekend that started on Thursday and didn’t end until Tuesday. It was a fat weekend, or maybe even a “phat” weekend, I’m still not sure how to use that word. It was like we had to use a shoehorn to fit everything in. Here’s how it went:

Thursday evening we went down to Café Zoma on the Eastside, which I had never been to before. My friends from Cali would feel right at home—this place is right out of Mendocino, or maybe Berkeley. Beautiful outdoor seating area, almost like a park, great atmosphere inside, and hippies everywhere. And the weather was perfect: clear, warm, sunny. Gorgeous. Claire was inside with my Mom and their knitting friends, I sat outside and read. After that, we (Claire, me, my Mom) went down to Café Costa Rica and sat outside. Reggae was playing, the temperature was just right, the food was delicious, and the conversation kept us there for a long while. As it turned out, the sustenance gained from this excursion proved to be essential for making it through the weekend healthy and alive, though we didn’t know it at the time. There’s actually no evidence for that claim, but I stand by it.

Friday consisted of a movie with J (Ironman 2, do not see it, it’s horrible), then meeting up with Clairee for some sushi at the always delicious Muramoto, which, incidentally, is also the site of the first date Claire and I went on. But enough about Friday.

Saturday Claire and I got up late and went to the farmer’s market, which was nice except we got there too late so the Capital square was packed beyond belief. You have to get to the farmer’s market at about 7:00 am if you don’t want to slowly lumber around the square, like a herd of cattle to headed for the slaughter. I can only make it around ¾ of the market when we get there that late before I lose patience and start to drown in the heat and body odor (which is mostly imagined), so we didn’t get too much there. We did get a strawberry plant which is currently producing delicious, succulent berries for our consumption. (No strawberries for you unless you’re nice and visit us).

Later, we took the Bee (our dog, Beetle) to Lake Kegansa, which boasts a pet swim area in a state park. It was my first time there, and I’m sure we’ll be back. We packed a picnic (here I should mention that I failed at picking out good salads), had some drinks (here I should point out that Claire made some bizarre concoction consisting of a gewürztraminer—from Mendocino—and some liquidy homemade raspberry sorbet, mixed on site), and played around in the cool, refreshing water (finally, here I should mention that yes, our Beetle is quite a swimmer. Handsome, graceful, “a natural”). It was hot, probably in the high 80s, and the park is lush and green with a lot of space to relax in the shade between trips to the water to wade in and let Beetle fetch his new Frisbee. Unfortunately all the sun and playing wore us out, and so the trip to the lake pretty much consumed our day. We crashed on the couch for the rest of the evening.

Then came Sunday. Thankfully, we were able to sleep in again. Jason didn’t have that opportunity, as he was running a ¼ marathon that day, beginning at 7am or some such crazy-ass hour on a humid, hot Sunday. We would have liked to be there to watch him cross the finish line, but apparently we liked the idea of sleeping in just a little more. While he was actually running in the race, I was stretching in my patented Hussein Bolt style (see picture: that’s the move I do when I stretch in the morning). My cousin Katie ran a half marathon that day too, and her parents, who double as my Godparents, had a great cook-out to celebrate the accomplishment of all the runners we knew. The food was excellent, especially 2 parts of it: the brats, by Eddie, and the chocolate-chip bars, by Mary. And I can honestly say that while Eddie was merely mediocre as a host, which is an improvement for him, Mary more than made up for it. To his credit, Eddie regaled us with stories that were, though hilarious, most likely invented out of whole cloth. (I kid Eddie because he’s a very good golfer and when we played later that week it was embarrassing for me to be so awful at golf, playing alongside someone with real skill). A great time was had by all. You would think that about this time Claire and I might be wrapping it up and heading home, but no: we headed down to the union that afternoon. The union was absolutely packed, (the union, for my friends outside of Madison, consists of a large terrace alongside Lake Mendota where beer is served, bands play, and students and other Madisonians come to enjoy the lake and the weather—see picture). We ordered a beer and then, almost on a whim, texted a friend of ours who is an avid sailor. By sheer luck, he texted back that he was meeting some other friend in 20 minutes at the dock, and we were welcome to come along. We accepted.

So we met our friend Eduardo at the dock, and then proceeded to accompany him and his three Lebonese friends out onto the lake on a sail boat, and spent the afternoon cruising around, swimming, and just plain relaxing in the sun on the lake. The national championship for college sailboat racing happened to be going on, and we cruised around the race area for a closer look. I love being out on the lake—this may be my summer to learn how to sail. More on that later.

After a few hours of meandering around Lake Mendota on the will of the wind we made our way back, at which time we were invited to play some sand volleyball. We only had a couple hours of daylight left, but those that know me know that I cannot turn down beach volleyball, so Claire and I went out, and we played until the sun went down.

I’m hurrying up the summary of our Memorial day weekend now because this post is getting very long, and it’s no doubt getting very boring. I should have just said: we had a great Memorial day weekend, the first weekend of the summer for us. But I didn’t. Praise Zelgourd, I didn’t, and lucky you for that. I feel I have to end this now, but I would be remiss in not at least mentioning that our weekend did spill over into the next few days. We had a wonderful time and great food and company at Claire’s parents on Monday (a description that doesn’t do the trip justice), and a fun cook-out and volleyball match on Tuesday. This post is too long, so cheers for now.