Greetings,
I'm home safe in the beautiful state of Washington -- breathing clean, cool air and seeing a bunch of people I knew before the summer started.
Last Monday (Aug. 13), I saw "Casa Blanca" for the first time -- what a great movie: shootouts, romance, Africa, war, drunks, cheats and great music. Everything. It was playing outside at the mall in DC, and I had never put it all together that "casa blanca" is Spanish for "white house" until someone I was with pointed it out...
Tuesday I wrote and packed, and Wednesday I watched HBO and ate whatever food was left over before I moved out the next morning. Earlier that day I was buying gifts at a book store and ran into yet another Notre Dame lady who knows Adam Frisch. I swear everyone knows that guy. She only knows him in passing though. She majored in theology at ND and is doing her master's at the JPII Institute while her husband works in the USCCB Pro-life office.
Thursday was my travel day. I walked to the post office at around eleven to mail some books home and cut the weight of my baggage. Carrying two 45-lb. bags plus my carry-on, laptop and shoe-box of books, I had to stop at the end of every block and was drenched in sweat by the time I made the eight blocks. I didn't know a person could make himself that wet. Then a nice lady with two kids offered me a ride from there to the metro. Turns out she and her husband lived in Rome for four years, and she's going to JPII as well! Amazing the people you meet in DC; especially in Little Rome!
On my first flight -- to Chicago -- I sat next to a young woman who works as a naturalist in California. And she's been to NOME! Yeah, Christine said she went up there when she was in high school in Chicago on her way to do a service project on St. Lawrence Island.
So that made me feel a little more at home. Plus she was wearing Chacos and a canvas skirt, no makeup, dirty hair and carrying a guitar. With all that, I'm kind of surprised she didn't tell me she was FROM Bellingham. But she does have friends there, she said. Nobody I knew.
In Chicago I walked around outside Midway International airport. Then on my next flight I sat next to a clarinet player/teacher from Seattle named Bill. His wife is the principal librarian for the Seattle Symphony Orchestra. I told him how I'd been meaning to learn to play, but now it will probably be a while before I get a chance.
Then I got into Seatac, spent two days, two nights with friends Jana and Jenn and the Carmack family in Tacoma, went to see the Mariners at Safeco (on a scalped ticket, no less!), ate Thai food at the "Thai-ger room" in the U District and saw UW's campus. Kind of ashamed I've never been there before, but it's nice.
On Saturday I met Dad at the airport to pick up Mom who was flying in from Mexico after almost a month and we made it north up to Mount Vernon and home.
I spent Saturday night, Sunday and most of Monday in Bellingham at my other home. Good times. I'm too out of shape to play softball, but I didn't know it at the time. I am not, however, too out of shape to play X-box 360 all day.
Now I'm back in MV throwing out all of my school work from high school, seminary and Western that I've just shoved in a drawer my whole life. This beautiful Washington weather has already given me a cold. My sore throat is gone, but I still have the sniffles.
All in all, not much going on. Thirty-one days until I leave for The Last Frontier.
Regards,
Buckenmeyer
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
I walked the avenue til my legs felt like stone...
Springsteen's "The Streets of Philadelphia" seemed appropriate after this weekend...
I've been in three states and slept in six different places in the last three days: Three buses, one church pew, one park bench and -- at last -- my mattress in DC.
So as you can imagine, this last weekend was one of the most eventful ones of my life. It's amazing what you can do when you don't sleep. I might as well put some evidence down here that it actually happened before I forget the details. In fact, it was so eventful that I have forgotten what happened in my life the entire week before, so I'm going to start with Friday.
First, I went out to the National Press Club after work on Friday night and had a couple drinks with Kaitlynn and her friend Nick. It was her last day at work, and we figured, what the heck. It was a normal enough evening until we collaborated and agreed that it would be really fun to buy somebody a drink from across the room. I mean, you have to make a fool of yourself every now and then, right? Well, just about everyone was a lot older, and we figured it would either look like we were mocking them, or it would just end badly... so we were about to give up when we noticed a girl about our age talking on the phone at a table by herself. We sent her a margarita, and it actually went better than any of us expected because she came over and ended up being an intern herself and was actually pretty cool.
When she left, I got to talk to Kaitlynn and Nick's friend, Francis, who is a 50-something Chinaman who gave us draft copies of the next chapter of the book he is writing. He asked us to proof-read it. He seemed like a nice enough guy, and I got to practice my five Chinese phrases. But the book is called "Kicked in the Balls Management," by Francis Hsu. No joke. The chapter he gave me to read starts like this: "You are flying a twin-engine 767 aircraft. The weather is perfect, no clouds, light winds, visibility unlimited." That's as far as I got so far. Maybe I'll read more later, Francis. Kicked in the balls. Yep.
After the Press Club, I went home and made sandwiches to last me the weekend -- 10 sandwiches made from thin-sliced steak and chicken sandwich wafers, cheap hamburger buns and ketchup. Then at 1 a.m. on Friday night I headed down to Chinatown and hopped on a bus for New York City.
The bus left at 3:30 a.m., but there were no empty seats, surprisingly. I got to use more Chinese: I told the guy in front of me, "Me guan xi," (That's alright) when he put his seat back and then apologized.
NEW YORK CITY
I slept until about 7 a.m. on the bus (sleeping venue #1). That's when we pulled into Chinatown NYC, which is on the southern end of Manhattan. Basically the bus just pulled up to the side of the street and everybody got off, so I started walking around until I spotted the Chrysler Building in the distance and mistook it for the Empire State Building, so I started walking that way.
After about a half-hour, I ran into some people who had a map and were asking ME where the nearest Metro stop was. I told them I didn't know, and then I asked them if we were really on Manhattan Island. The look they gave me told me all I needed to know, and I kept walking until I found a store that would sell me a map of my own.
Seems like just about everyone 40 and older does aerobics and martial arts and fan-dancing on the tennis courts at 7 a.m. on weekends. I got some pictures that I'll put up when I get back.
I think I walked about 35 miles total this weekend in Manhattan and then in Philadelphia, and my feet and calves still make it hard to walk without limping. :(
I wandered through Times Square and Central Park, and met some interesting characters on the streets. They even had a farmer's market at Union Square. At one point I turned around and there was this huge, disheveled black guy smiling about 5 inches from my face. I looked down to see what he was so amused about and he was holding out his hand. Of course I shook it, and then he started rapping about what his name was and how he needed a couple bucks for food. I reached into my bag, and he got a little excited, but then I gave him my last two sandwiches, and he looked pretty disappointed. I have to admit, those sandwiches probably didn't taste that good.
There was something happening on every block, including two guys on the sidewalk in a side street -- one in a wheelchair -- beating the crap out of a piece of scrap metal with an axe. Yeah, and axe, like you'd find on a farm, but in downtown New York. It looked like they were trying to straighten it or something...
Once I had walked for about four hours, I gave Sara Thompson a call. For those of you who don't know Sara, she was an editor on the Western Front with me, and she has an internship in New York this summer. So we hung out and ate Middle Eastern food from a tiny little hole of a place, that was most likely a front for a drug-dealing business. When we got to the seating area down a long hallway in the back of the place, we noticed everything was metal, and I looked at Sara and said, "This is the kind of place where you could get whacked and nobody would ever know..." I still think we got off lucky...
Well, we wandered around some more, went to Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral, saw the park bench that opens the movie "The 25th Hour" with Edward Norton, and went to the site of the WTC.
Then we had a beer, and I hiked it back to Chinatown to catch the 11 p.m. bus to Philadelphia. All in one day...
PHILADELPHIA
It's a good thing I got to my bus stop an hour early, because the bus left about 3 minutes after I got on. I had two seats to myself this time, so I slept the full two hours into Philly (sleeping venue #2). Then I woke up just before midnight when the bus pulled in with sharp pains in my legs and feet from all the walking the day before... I got off on another strange street and walked around midtown Philly (not the best place) for an hour until I found a bar.
The only way I can describe downtown Philly at night is that it's exactly like Gotham City (from the Batman comics/movies), only it's real.
Walking up 13th Street at about 12:45 a.m. between Locust and Walnut streets was about as classy as it sounds. One dumpster bore the prophetic message, "I'm Death."
As I was walking, I found St. John's Catholic Church, which is where Venerable John Henry Cardinal Newman served as pastor for a while, and where Saint Katherine Drexel was baptized and received her vocation to serve Philadelphia's poor.
I talked to Demis, a homeless guy who was sitting in front of the church, and he asked me if I prayed. Then he told me it doesn't work for him when he prays, but it works when other people pray for him. He said he told somebody else that once and they told him he probably didn't pray enough. He said they were probably right.
So say a prayer for Demis, please.
I told Demis I was staying with friends and then left after a while and walked around until I found that bar, Fergie's Tavern. I took a seat and ordered their cheapest beer, then "washed" my face in the "bathroom" and sat there sipping on the "beer" until they closed at 2 a.m.
Then I walked around for another hour. I saw about 20 homeless people on mattresses under an overhang on one side of a Big K-mart, and I saw about five or six groups of what I would describe as "gang-like persons" walking around. I took a couple pictures of some interesting things, but I figured flashing my expensive camera around wasn't the best idea, so mostly I just took notes.
At about 3 a.m. I decided to get some sleep because my legs were tired, and the nap I had on the bus was wearing off. So I found a bench on the opposite side of the Big K-mart that only had one other person sleeping nearby, and I used my messenger bag as a pillow (sleeping venue #3).
Just about every 5 minutes, a car or motorcycle would rev up its engines nearby, or some group of guys would walk by talking loudly, so it was tough getting to sleep, but I still didn't have any clue where I was in Philly, so I didn't want to keep wandering.
At one point, three guys walked right into the plaza I was in and one started saying something like, "Ah, is this (guy) sleeping on my homeboy's bench?" So I started getting a little nervous and opened my eyes so they knew I was awake. One of his friends convinced him to leave, I think.
Then I met Mary. Mary was a young (I think) black woman who walked right by me and then stuck her whole upper body into the garbage can about 15 feet from where I was sleeping. She was barefoot and had a white rag tied around her head. When she came out of the trash can, I held up the last of the food I had brought -- a package of Fig Newtons -- and waved for her to take them. She said, "For me? Well thanks. You know, Fig Newtons are good, because they have figs in them. The figs are right inside. So they're healthy, but you don't want to eat this many all at once (holding up the whole package of about 20), because it will loosen your stool!"
Thanks Mary.
I asked Mary if she minded me sleeping there, and she told me it was fine because the guard at the K-mart didn't care and we just had to be awake in the morning. I tried to get some more sleep, and I think Mary slept on a bench about 20 feet away to keep an eye on me. I think she knew I didn't exactly belong, so she was my guardian angel for the night.
Saturday night was the only time I've been cold since coming to the East Coast. I woke up three or four times that night shivering, even though I was wearing jeans. Any other time this summer, in my bed in DC, I would have loved a cool night...
It was light out when I woke up 3 hours later to Mary tugging on my pant leg and asking me where my shoes were.
"They're right here beside me," I said. "I took them off last night to let my socks air out."
She said she was keeping an eye on me the night before, and we should probably get up because the guard would come out soon, so I started to get the sleep out of my eyes. Then before I left I offered her two dollars and told her thanks for keeping an eye on me. Mary proceeded to quiz me about Abraham, Issac and Jacob from the Bible and about the circumstances under which each of them received God's blessing.
I didn't do too bad, either; better than Mary thought I would, I think.
What a great person. I should have bought her shoes and a hotel room for the night, but I just said thanks and went down the street to breakfast. She hugged me and kissed me on the neck like they do in the South.
My breakfast was eight dollars, and that really made me think about my priorities. Mary is somebody's sister and somebody's daughter, and the same God I love is madly in love with Mary, but I didn't even invite her to breakfast. It didn't even cross my mind. Asshole. I hope no one treats my loved ones as badly as I treat God's loved ones.
Well, I ate and "washed" my face in the "diner" again. Then I went back to St. John's Church and fell asleep in the pew trying to pray a rosary before Mass (sleeping venue #4). Mass was good. A really vibrant, young Franciscan priest with a shaved head and a goatee. I would have been surprised if he didn't have old prison tats from a former life of crime under those vestments -- one of those type of priests.
That afternoon, I was the tourist and saw Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed. I saw Ben Franklin's grave, St. Joseph Catholic Church (oldest in Philly: 1733), and I ate a Philly cheesesteak from a street vendor and drank a beer from the City Tavern that was the same recipe as Thomas Jefferson brewed back in the day.
I walked into downtown again and saw a guy in a wheelchair who was playing music and singing into a microphone. You could hear him clearly for 2 blocks, no joke, but he had a good voice, and he was singing some nice soul music, so no one seemed to mind.
And who do you think was dancing her heart out while sitting on a garbage can near the wheelchair singer? Yep, it was Mary. So I said hi, and told her I was heading out of town and thanks again for keeping an eye on me, and she said, "Hey!" and accidentally spat most of what she was eating at me. Then she kissed me again on the neck and said good bye. I managed to wait until she couldn't see before I wiped my neck...
Then I caught the 5 p.m. bus back to DC and met a French teacher from England who was visiting New York, Philadelphia and DC via the Chinatown bus system as well. I tried to carry on a conversation, but I kept falling asleep and bumping into her, then apologizing and promptly doing the same thing again (sleeping venue #5). Embarrassing.
When I got in to DC, I showered, shaved, shat, and then felt guilty that Mary and Demis and John and all the other folks I met that weekend were staking out park benches so they could sleep in their own filth again while I was making plans to travel back across the country. (sleeping venue #6).
I'm still exhausted from this weekend. I can't believe tomorrow's my last day of work! Hopefully I'll see you all soon.
Take care and God bless,
Jacob
I've been in three states and slept in six different places in the last three days: Three buses, one church pew, one park bench and -- at last -- my mattress in DC.
So as you can imagine, this last weekend was one of the most eventful ones of my life. It's amazing what you can do when you don't sleep. I might as well put some evidence down here that it actually happened before I forget the details. In fact, it was so eventful that I have forgotten what happened in my life the entire week before, so I'm going to start with Friday.
First, I went out to the National Press Club after work on Friday night and had a couple drinks with Kaitlynn and her friend Nick. It was her last day at work, and we figured, what the heck. It was a normal enough evening until we collaborated and agreed that it would be really fun to buy somebody a drink from across the room. I mean, you have to make a fool of yourself every now and then, right? Well, just about everyone was a lot older, and we figured it would either look like we were mocking them, or it would just end badly... so we were about to give up when we noticed a girl about our age talking on the phone at a table by herself. We sent her a margarita, and it actually went better than any of us expected because she came over and ended up being an intern herself and was actually pretty cool.
When she left, I got to talk to Kaitlynn and Nick's friend, Francis, who is a 50-something Chinaman who gave us draft copies of the next chapter of the book he is writing. He asked us to proof-read it. He seemed like a nice enough guy, and I got to practice my five Chinese phrases. But the book is called "Kicked in the Balls Management," by Francis Hsu. No joke. The chapter he gave me to read starts like this: "You are flying a twin-engine 767 aircraft. The weather is perfect, no clouds, light winds, visibility unlimited." That's as far as I got so far. Maybe I'll read more later, Francis. Kicked in the balls. Yep.
After the Press Club, I went home and made sandwiches to last me the weekend -- 10 sandwiches made from thin-sliced steak and chicken sandwich wafers, cheap hamburger buns and ketchup. Then at 1 a.m. on Friday night I headed down to Chinatown and hopped on a bus for New York City.
The bus left at 3:30 a.m., but there were no empty seats, surprisingly. I got to use more Chinese: I told the guy in front of me, "Me guan xi," (That's alright) when he put his seat back and then apologized.
NEW YORK CITY
I slept until about 7 a.m. on the bus (sleeping venue #1). That's when we pulled into Chinatown NYC, which is on the southern end of Manhattan. Basically the bus just pulled up to the side of the street and everybody got off, so I started walking around until I spotted the Chrysler Building in the distance and mistook it for the Empire State Building, so I started walking that way.
After about a half-hour, I ran into some people who had a map and were asking ME where the nearest Metro stop was. I told them I didn't know, and then I asked them if we were really on Manhattan Island. The look they gave me told me all I needed to know, and I kept walking until I found a store that would sell me a map of my own.
Seems like just about everyone 40 and older does aerobics and martial arts and fan-dancing on the tennis courts at 7 a.m. on weekends. I got some pictures that I'll put up when I get back.
I think I walked about 35 miles total this weekend in Manhattan and then in Philadelphia, and my feet and calves still make it hard to walk without limping. :(
I wandered through Times Square and Central Park, and met some interesting characters on the streets. They even had a farmer's market at Union Square. At one point I turned around and there was this huge, disheveled black guy smiling about 5 inches from my face. I looked down to see what he was so amused about and he was holding out his hand. Of course I shook it, and then he started rapping about what his name was and how he needed a couple bucks for food. I reached into my bag, and he got a little excited, but then I gave him my last two sandwiches, and he looked pretty disappointed. I have to admit, those sandwiches probably didn't taste that good.
There was something happening on every block, including two guys on the sidewalk in a side street -- one in a wheelchair -- beating the crap out of a piece of scrap metal with an axe. Yeah, and axe, like you'd find on a farm, but in downtown New York. It looked like they were trying to straighten it or something...
Once I had walked for about four hours, I gave Sara Thompson a call. For those of you who don't know Sara, she was an editor on the Western Front with me, and she has an internship in New York this summer. So we hung out and ate Middle Eastern food from a tiny little hole of a place, that was most likely a front for a drug-dealing business. When we got to the seating area down a long hallway in the back of the place, we noticed everything was metal, and I looked at Sara and said, "This is the kind of place where you could get whacked and nobody would ever know..." I still think we got off lucky...
Well, we wandered around some more, went to Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral, saw the park bench that opens the movie "The 25th Hour" with Edward Norton, and went to the site of the WTC.
Then we had a beer, and I hiked it back to Chinatown to catch the 11 p.m. bus to Philadelphia. All in one day...
PHILADELPHIA
It's a good thing I got to my bus stop an hour early, because the bus left about 3 minutes after I got on. I had two seats to myself this time, so I slept the full two hours into Philly (sleeping venue #2). Then I woke up just before midnight when the bus pulled in with sharp pains in my legs and feet from all the walking the day before... I got off on another strange street and walked around midtown Philly (not the best place) for an hour until I found a bar.
The only way I can describe downtown Philly at night is that it's exactly like Gotham City (from the Batman comics/movies), only it's real.
Walking up 13th Street at about 12:45 a.m. between Locust and Walnut streets was about as classy as it sounds. One dumpster bore the prophetic message, "I'm Death."
As I was walking, I found St. John's Catholic Church, which is where Venerable John Henry Cardinal Newman served as pastor for a while, and where Saint Katherine Drexel was baptized and received her vocation to serve Philadelphia's poor.
I talked to Demis, a homeless guy who was sitting in front of the church, and he asked me if I prayed. Then he told me it doesn't work for him when he prays, but it works when other people pray for him. He said he told somebody else that once and they told him he probably didn't pray enough. He said they were probably right.
So say a prayer for Demis, please.
I told Demis I was staying with friends and then left after a while and walked around until I found that bar, Fergie's Tavern. I took a seat and ordered their cheapest beer, then "washed" my face in the "bathroom" and sat there sipping on the "beer" until they closed at 2 a.m.
Then I walked around for another hour. I saw about 20 homeless people on mattresses under an overhang on one side of a Big K-mart, and I saw about five or six groups of what I would describe as "gang-like persons" walking around. I took a couple pictures of some interesting things, but I figured flashing my expensive camera around wasn't the best idea, so mostly I just took notes.
At about 3 a.m. I decided to get some sleep because my legs were tired, and the nap I had on the bus was wearing off. So I found a bench on the opposite side of the Big K-mart that only had one other person sleeping nearby, and I used my messenger bag as a pillow (sleeping venue #3).
Just about every 5 minutes, a car or motorcycle would rev up its engines nearby, or some group of guys would walk by talking loudly, so it was tough getting to sleep, but I still didn't have any clue where I was in Philly, so I didn't want to keep wandering.
At one point, three guys walked right into the plaza I was in and one started saying something like, "Ah, is this (guy) sleeping on my homeboy's bench?" So I started getting a little nervous and opened my eyes so they knew I was awake. One of his friends convinced him to leave, I think.
Then I met Mary. Mary was a young (I think) black woman who walked right by me and then stuck her whole upper body into the garbage can about 15 feet from where I was sleeping. She was barefoot and had a white rag tied around her head. When she came out of the trash can, I held up the last of the food I had brought -- a package of Fig Newtons -- and waved for her to take them. She said, "For me? Well thanks. You know, Fig Newtons are good, because they have figs in them. The figs are right inside. So they're healthy, but you don't want to eat this many all at once (holding up the whole package of about 20), because it will loosen your stool!"
Thanks Mary.
I asked Mary if she minded me sleeping there, and she told me it was fine because the guard at the K-mart didn't care and we just had to be awake in the morning. I tried to get some more sleep, and I think Mary slept on a bench about 20 feet away to keep an eye on me. I think she knew I didn't exactly belong, so she was my guardian angel for the night.
Saturday night was the only time I've been cold since coming to the East Coast. I woke up three or four times that night shivering, even though I was wearing jeans. Any other time this summer, in my bed in DC, I would have loved a cool night...
It was light out when I woke up 3 hours later to Mary tugging on my pant leg and asking me where my shoes were.
"They're right here beside me," I said. "I took them off last night to let my socks air out."
She said she was keeping an eye on me the night before, and we should probably get up because the guard would come out soon, so I started to get the sleep out of my eyes. Then before I left I offered her two dollars and told her thanks for keeping an eye on me. Mary proceeded to quiz me about Abraham, Issac and Jacob from the Bible and about the circumstances under which each of them received God's blessing.
I didn't do too bad, either; better than Mary thought I would, I think.
What a great person. I should have bought her shoes and a hotel room for the night, but I just said thanks and went down the street to breakfast. She hugged me and kissed me on the neck like they do in the South.
My breakfast was eight dollars, and that really made me think about my priorities. Mary is somebody's sister and somebody's daughter, and the same God I love is madly in love with Mary, but I didn't even invite her to breakfast. It didn't even cross my mind. Asshole. I hope no one treats my loved ones as badly as I treat God's loved ones.
Well, I ate and "washed" my face in the "diner" again. Then I went back to St. John's Church and fell asleep in the pew trying to pray a rosary before Mass (sleeping venue #4). Mass was good. A really vibrant, young Franciscan priest with a shaved head and a goatee. I would have been surprised if he didn't have old prison tats from a former life of crime under those vestments -- one of those type of priests.
That afternoon, I was the tourist and saw Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed. I saw Ben Franklin's grave, St. Joseph Catholic Church (oldest in Philly: 1733), and I ate a Philly cheesesteak from a street vendor and drank a beer from the City Tavern that was the same recipe as Thomas Jefferson brewed back in the day.
I walked into downtown again and saw a guy in a wheelchair who was playing music and singing into a microphone. You could hear him clearly for 2 blocks, no joke, but he had a good voice, and he was singing some nice soul music, so no one seemed to mind.
And who do you think was dancing her heart out while sitting on a garbage can near the wheelchair singer? Yep, it was Mary. So I said hi, and told her I was heading out of town and thanks again for keeping an eye on me, and she said, "Hey!" and accidentally spat most of what she was eating at me. Then she kissed me again on the neck and said good bye. I managed to wait until she couldn't see before I wiped my neck...
Then I caught the 5 p.m. bus back to DC and met a French teacher from England who was visiting New York, Philadelphia and DC via the Chinatown bus system as well. I tried to carry on a conversation, but I kept falling asleep and bumping into her, then apologizing and promptly doing the same thing again (sleeping venue #5). Embarrassing.
When I got in to DC, I showered, shaved, shat, and then felt guilty that Mary and Demis and John and all the other folks I met that weekend were staking out park benches so they could sleep in their own filth again while I was making plans to travel back across the country. (sleeping venue #6).
I'm still exhausted from this weekend. I can't believe tomorrow's my last day of work! Hopefully I'll see you all soon.
Take care and God bless,
Jacob
Wednesday, August 08, 2007
It's the heat. Trust me.
Today was hot. Somebody told me they think it broke a DC record. The weather this morning said it was supposed to be 98 degrees with 82 percent humidity. They said that means it will feel like 108 degrees. I believe it. Then there was the breeze. A hot, damp breeze.
That basically means that walking home from work today was like sticking your face into the steam above a pot of boiling water. Only it was your whole body. And you were walking for 15 minutes. And the steam had exhaust fumes mixed in.
I think I passed four or five cockroaches on the sidewalk that had passed out from heat exhaustion. Poor buggers.
Take care everybody.
That basically means that walking home from work today was like sticking your face into the steam above a pot of boiling water. Only it was your whole body. And you were walking for 15 minutes. And the steam had exhaust fumes mixed in.
I think I passed four or five cockroaches on the sidewalk that had passed out from heat exhaustion. Poor buggers.
Take care everybody.
Sunday, August 05, 2007
57 channels and nothing on... except Spanish HBO...
Well, this week was the most eventful since I arrived, with a few twists and turns and unexpected guests. Apparently all roads lead to Alexandria... and Nome...
Last Sunday I went to The National Zoo here, but on the way we got stuck in the Metro Center metro stop for a full hour, problems on the track, I guess. Later on Sunday the HazMat team was called in to inspect the metro line. I guess some exterminator was supposed to be killing birds and then removing the bodies, but he didn't finish the job. Some people saw piles of dead birds and figured it was a biological attack or something. Figures. Frickin' DC: terrorist magnet.
The only Mass I went to Sunday was in Spanish, and I understood the readings and most of the homily and everything. I thought I was going to forget all my Spanish, but apparently it's sticking with me...
On Monday I went down to the mall and saw an Audrey Hepburn movie outside on the grass. "Wait until dark" was a pretty good film, and it was dark out, so I didn't have to be embarrassed about going to see Audrey Hepburn alone. Then on the way home I ran into another guy who's staying in the house here, and he pointed out the huge bugs that come out after dark and walk across the sidewalk. Pretty gross, and there's so many of them you have to constantly watch where you walk to keep from crunching them. Frickin' DC.
So Antonio and I are walking home, and he asks if I was at Western all four years, or if I transfered, so I mention I was in seminary for a year, and he ask if I'm still going to be a priest (which is what everyone asks). And I say, "I don't know" (which is how I always answer that). Then Antonio says, "So have you ever read that book by that monk guy? The "Seven Storey Mountain" or whatever?"
"Heck yes! That's by Thomas Merton."
Hah! I think that's the first time I've had a conversation about Thomas Merton where someone ELSE brought up his name. What's next?
On Tuesday at work I got to record a little news spot for Catholic Radio Weekly. It's going to be broadcast on Aug. 19, and will be available online, so check it out. It's my first stint at broadcast, so it's noticeably rough, but you have to start somewhere, right? After work, I went to the National Press Club to hear about Press Freedom in Latin America. They had journalists from Mexico, Venezuela and correspondents from the U.S. Those Venezuelan journalists have it pretty bad, I guess. Organized crime bosses putting hits out on them if their crimes end up in the paper and stuff like that. After the little panel discussion there were free drinks. Now I've had a Heineken.
On Wednesday I left work early to go to the top of the Washington Monument with Josh and Andrea. It's a good view, but unfortunately you have to get there at 7 a.m. to reserve tickets because they're all gone by about 9:30. On the way home, a group of about six little kids started throwing half-eaten apples at me and Andrea. They didn't have very good aim, but they were throwing to hurt, and one got me in the ankle. We live in a great neighborhood.
So when we got to Andrea's building, I picked up an apple and playfully lobbed it back at the kids, who were about a block away by then. Apparently they didn't think it was very funny because they started taunting me and saying I couldn't throw. For half a second I thought I was going to have to fight some little kids. That would have made me sad, but fortunately they kept walking after they gave me crap about it. Good times.
On Thursday I called up the St. Paul-Minneapolis Archdiocese to ask the archbishop and a priest about the bridge collapse there and about the prayer service they planned for that afternoon. Pretty sweet opportunity, and the story went on the homepage.
Here's where my week gets more interesting.
My friend from high school, Jake McCarty, is in the Air Force, so he sent out a mass e-mail last Saturday saying he was serving out his last two months in New Jersey. I let him know I was in DC for the summer, and he said he was coming down to DC with his family. So on Thursday, we met up and had dinner downtown. Small world, let me tell you.
On Friday I got to cover a summer camp in southern Maryland for work. I went down with a photographer from CNS who said I should check out Alexandria, VA this weekend. They have some cool shops or something, she says. So talking to kids about how much they love summer camp took all day, and then after work I went downtown and had a seven-fifty glass of whiskey (Maker's Mark; not bad stuff) while listening to jazz outside in some park. After that, I walked down to the Lincoln Memorial and the Jefferson Memorial and the FDR and Korean War memorials. Little did I know who had been to those monuments just minutes earlier...
On Saturday I went to daily Mass here in the neighborhood, then decided to head down to Alexandria. I looked up St. Mary's Catholic Church online and decided to do the vigil Mass in Alexandria that evening because I didn't know what else I was really going to do. So I took the metro out of town down to VA and walked to St. Mary's. I misjudged the time and walked in just as the entrance procession was starting, so I had to stand in the back.
This was a seriously orthodox Catholic church. The altar BOYS wore the traditional albs, used patens, and there were no extraordinary ministers because the pastor worked it out to have enough priests there. Organ music. The works.
Anyway, about five minutes after Mass started, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that some other people had come in and were standing behind me. So when one of them tapped me on the shoulder, I figured I was probably blocking someone's view, but no, it was Steve and Mark Sherman from Western and their parents! Hah! Small world.
I knew Steve was in Connecticut this summer, but he said he and his family were just touring the East Coast (Boston, NYC, etc.) before they all went back to WA, and they decided on a whim to hit up a vigil Mass in Alexandria. They said they'd been to all the same places I visited the day before, about 30 minutes before I got there. What are the chances?
So we went out afterward to Chinese after Mass, and I got to use Ni Hao, Zai Jian and Xei Xei (hello, good bye, thank you). I'm still in disbelief 24 hours later. The Sherman's -- one a former Xavier man himself, and the other having lived there for a summer -- standing in the back of the same church I happened to walk into minutes earlier. I'm not sure what plan God had for this one, but that's His business. I enjoyed the Chinese food.
Then yesterday, Amelia calls me to tell me that her family friends in Alaska, the Burkes, just moved to Nome. Their dad is now the chief of police in the town I'm moving to in a month. If I were Ian Audette, I'd say something right now like, "I've got more connections than a box of tinker-toys."
Yeah, you guys are lucky I'm not Ian, or you probably would have had to read some horrible comparison like that just now... oh, oops...
Late last night I got sucked into a facebook discussion group about euthanasia and abortion. Good times as usual...
Now that brings us to today. Not much happened. I walked around and tried to go to the JPII Cultural Center (closed), Trinity College (closed), the Paulist bookstore in the neighborhood (closed). Then I came home and watched "War of the Worlds" on the HBO Spanish channel without subtitles. I'd never seen it before, so I was surprised I understood most of it perfectly.
Other than that, I have started making plans to visit NYC and Philly this weekend. A bus system connects Chinatown in DC, Philly, NYC and VA for $12 to $20 a ticket. So round trip it'll be under 50 bucks. Who knows which of my old friends I'll run into up there! In other news, I'm seriously thinking of buying a third handgun. Either a .357 or a .44 mag. One reason is that they're just big, and I don't have any seriously powerful guns yet, and the other is as a precaution in case I run into anything while I'm hiking up in bear country...
Hmm... that's about all I've got for you guys. If you've read this whole thing, congrats, you are now up to date on the life of Jacob Buckenmeyer. Oh, wait! I bought a bottle of pre-mixed Long Island Iced Tea yesterday, and I've been sipping on that. It's pretty good stuff; I don't think I'd had it before.
Okay, NOW you're up to date on my life.
Enjoy the week. Take care and God bless. Everybody be good.
From Washington, this is Jacob Buckenmeyer.
Last Sunday I went to The National Zoo here, but on the way we got stuck in the Metro Center metro stop for a full hour, problems on the track, I guess. Later on Sunday the HazMat team was called in to inspect the metro line. I guess some exterminator was supposed to be killing birds and then removing the bodies, but he didn't finish the job. Some people saw piles of dead birds and figured it was a biological attack or something. Figures. Frickin' DC: terrorist magnet.
The only Mass I went to Sunday was in Spanish, and I understood the readings and most of the homily and everything. I thought I was going to forget all my Spanish, but apparently it's sticking with me...
On Monday I went down to the mall and saw an Audrey Hepburn movie outside on the grass. "Wait until dark" was a pretty good film, and it was dark out, so I didn't have to be embarrassed about going to see Audrey Hepburn alone. Then on the way home I ran into another guy who's staying in the house here, and he pointed out the huge bugs that come out after dark and walk across the sidewalk. Pretty gross, and there's so many of them you have to constantly watch where you walk to keep from crunching them. Frickin' DC.
So Antonio and I are walking home, and he asks if I was at Western all four years, or if I transfered, so I mention I was in seminary for a year, and he ask if I'm still going to be a priest (which is what everyone asks). And I say, "I don't know" (which is how I always answer that). Then Antonio says, "So have you ever read that book by that monk guy? The "Seven Storey Mountain" or whatever?"
"Heck yes! That's by Thomas Merton."
Hah! I think that's the first time I've had a conversation about Thomas Merton where someone ELSE brought up his name. What's next?
On Tuesday at work I got to record a little news spot for Catholic Radio Weekly. It's going to be broadcast on Aug. 19, and will be available online, so check it out. It's my first stint at broadcast, so it's noticeably rough, but you have to start somewhere, right? After work, I went to the National Press Club to hear about Press Freedom in Latin America. They had journalists from Mexico, Venezuela and correspondents from the U.S. Those Venezuelan journalists have it pretty bad, I guess. Organized crime bosses putting hits out on them if their crimes end up in the paper and stuff like that. After the little panel discussion there were free drinks. Now I've had a Heineken.
On Wednesday I left work early to go to the top of the Washington Monument with Josh and Andrea. It's a good view, but unfortunately you have to get there at 7 a.m. to reserve tickets because they're all gone by about 9:30. On the way home, a group of about six little kids started throwing half-eaten apples at me and Andrea. They didn't have very good aim, but they were throwing to hurt, and one got me in the ankle. We live in a great neighborhood.
So when we got to Andrea's building, I picked up an apple and playfully lobbed it back at the kids, who were about a block away by then. Apparently they didn't think it was very funny because they started taunting me and saying I couldn't throw. For half a second I thought I was going to have to fight some little kids. That would have made me sad, but fortunately they kept walking after they gave me crap about it. Good times.
On Thursday I called up the St. Paul-Minneapolis Archdiocese to ask the archbishop and a priest about the bridge collapse there and about the prayer service they planned for that afternoon. Pretty sweet opportunity, and the story went on the homepage.
Here's where my week gets more interesting.
My friend from high school, Jake McCarty, is in the Air Force, so he sent out a mass e-mail last Saturday saying he was serving out his last two months in New Jersey. I let him know I was in DC for the summer, and he said he was coming down to DC with his family. So on Thursday, we met up and had dinner downtown. Small world, let me tell you.
On Friday I got to cover a summer camp in southern Maryland for work. I went down with a photographer from CNS who said I should check out Alexandria, VA this weekend. They have some cool shops or something, she says. So talking to kids about how much they love summer camp took all day, and then after work I went downtown and had a seven-fifty glass of whiskey (Maker's Mark; not bad stuff) while listening to jazz outside in some park. After that, I walked down to the Lincoln Memorial and the Jefferson Memorial and the FDR and Korean War memorials. Little did I know who had been to those monuments just minutes earlier...
On Saturday I went to daily Mass here in the neighborhood, then decided to head down to Alexandria. I looked up St. Mary's Catholic Church online and decided to do the vigil Mass in Alexandria that evening because I didn't know what else I was really going to do. So I took the metro out of town down to VA and walked to St. Mary's. I misjudged the time and walked in just as the entrance procession was starting, so I had to stand in the back.
This was a seriously orthodox Catholic church. The altar BOYS wore the traditional albs, used patens, and there were no extraordinary ministers because the pastor worked it out to have enough priests there. Organ music. The works.
Anyway, about five minutes after Mass started, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that some other people had come in and were standing behind me. So when one of them tapped me on the shoulder, I figured I was probably blocking someone's view, but no, it was Steve and Mark Sherman from Western and their parents! Hah! Small world.
I knew Steve was in Connecticut this summer, but he said he and his family were just touring the East Coast (Boston, NYC, etc.) before they all went back to WA, and they decided on a whim to hit up a vigil Mass in Alexandria. They said they'd been to all the same places I visited the day before, about 30 minutes before I got there. What are the chances?
So we went out afterward to Chinese after Mass, and I got to use Ni Hao, Zai Jian and Xei Xei (hello, good bye, thank you). I'm still in disbelief 24 hours later. The Sherman's -- one a former Xavier man himself, and the other having lived there for a summer -- standing in the back of the same church I happened to walk into minutes earlier. I'm not sure what plan God had for this one, but that's His business. I enjoyed the Chinese food.
Then yesterday, Amelia calls me to tell me that her family friends in Alaska, the Burkes, just moved to Nome. Their dad is now the chief of police in the town I'm moving to in a month. If I were Ian Audette, I'd say something right now like, "I've got more connections than a box of tinker-toys."
Yeah, you guys are lucky I'm not Ian, or you probably would have had to read some horrible comparison like that just now... oh, oops...
Late last night I got sucked into a facebook discussion group about euthanasia and abortion. Good times as usual...
Now that brings us to today. Not much happened. I walked around and tried to go to the JPII Cultural Center (closed), Trinity College (closed), the Paulist bookstore in the neighborhood (closed). Then I came home and watched "War of the Worlds" on the HBO Spanish channel without subtitles. I'd never seen it before, so I was surprised I understood most of it perfectly.
Other than that, I have started making plans to visit NYC and Philly this weekend. A bus system connects Chinatown in DC, Philly, NYC and VA for $12 to $20 a ticket. So round trip it'll be under 50 bucks. Who knows which of my old friends I'll run into up there! In other news, I'm seriously thinking of buying a third handgun. Either a .357 or a .44 mag. One reason is that they're just big, and I don't have any seriously powerful guns yet, and the other is as a precaution in case I run into anything while I'm hiking up in bear country...
Hmm... that's about all I've got for you guys. If you've read this whole thing, congrats, you are now up to date on the life of Jacob Buckenmeyer. Oh, wait! I bought a bottle of pre-mixed Long Island Iced Tea yesterday, and I've been sipping on that. It's pretty good stuff; I don't think I'd had it before.
Okay, NOW you're up to date on my life.
Enjoy the week. Take care and God bless. Everybody be good.
From Washington, this is Jacob Buckenmeyer.
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