I had nothing planned for New Years and I am fine with this. Normally, November through New Years is a string of unremarkable parties and events but this year I went from running a holiday party, to a good Thanksgiving trip, to a fun NYC trip, to trying ice skating for the first time. Any of these would have qualified as a highlight in previous years and I had all these in a period of 45 days.
I still hurt from yesterday’s falls while ice skating and spent the day as real men spend their New Year’s Eve, re-seasoning my cast iron cookwear. I was in bed by 11 PM.
A friend indicated she wished to go ice skating, and I, not wishing to look like an idiot, immediately took on myself the task of gathering as much skating experience as I could muster. Mike and Kacey offered to take me skating and we went to IceWorks in Aston, Pa for me to lose my skate-ginity.
The first step was getting skates. Since I normally wear a size 14-15 shoe and was told to get snug skates, I got a pair of size 14 skates that appeared to be made out of Caribou leather and bone. Lacking a jackhammer or marlinspike, I forced them onto my feet as best I could and made my way onto the ice. At this point, I didn’t know how one was supposed to skate but having one’s ankles canted at 45 degree angles didn’t seem like the right way. I made a lap and felt like my ankles were on fire so I got another pair of skates, this time a size down. Somehow these went on much easier and I began ice-walking with enough sucess that Mike mocked me for ice-walking instead of ice-skating. Thanks, Mike.
After my second through fourth lap, I gained the ability to glide for very, very short distances, and having already fallen (my first fear) got to face my second: Being terrified of cutting a child in half. I see it perfectly in my mind’s eye, I’m gracefully gliding, possibly looking over my shoulder giving someone a devil-may-care smile when an innocent child reachs for his or her mother, falls, and descends to the ice. I look forward, see him or her, and not being able to stop, cleft the youth in twain and become the Solomon of the ice.
After a few more laps, I felt that I could go short distances without staring at my feet and for about 30 feet of every lap could talk with Mike or Kacey as they passed. During one such lap, a child fell in front of me. Knowing I couldn’t stop in time, I attempted to stear around, and did, so much so that I was now going backwards. In my attempt to face forward, I fell and fell hard. I stayed on the ice for a moment and was able to make out the outline of my keys, fitbit, knife, and change in my pocket in screaming pain receptors and learned quickly that there’s no reason to bring yours keys with you onto the ice.
I hurt, my Fitbit was shattered, my pants and shirt were wet, but today, I killed no children. Victory.
When I make a print of a picture I’ve taken, I put it up in my office at work. I take these down and put them up at home at the end of each year so today I took down all my pictures. I sent out an email to my coworkers saying they were welcome to any they wished from the stack next to my desk. No one took any pictures while I was there but when I went to get a drink or work in the lab, I’d return to find that one or two pictures had been taken. I felt like I was being robbed by gypsies.
I asked a coworker if he wanted a print he always thought was nice and he declined. Later in that day he came up to me with that print that he’d taken from the stack while I was at lunch and asked me to sign it. I felt tickled.
Since September, I’ve been getting my hair cut monthly or so rather than doing it myself every few weeks with a quarterly touch up from a barber. Normally, I walk in to The Three Barbers on Bridgetown Pike, get John, ask for a Caesar cut, avoid chit-chat as I just want my damn haircut, and pay $15.00 for a cut and tip. Today was different:
John: *begins prepping me for a haircut* You’ve come in recently, haven’t you?
Me: Yeah, probably around Thanksgiving.
John: That’s more often than normal for you. Don’t you do something with computers?
Me: Not really, I do R&D work with medical devices. I use computers but I wouldn’t call it computer work.
John: *Raises scissors to my head* So you probably couldn’t explain the difference between LCD and plasma TVs.
Me: I can.
John: *lowers scissors* Go on.
John asked me probably four or five technology questions and each time I gave the answer he just held his comb and scissors and listened intently for my response. When we went to ask the next one, I cracked.
John: Can I ask you another computer question?
Me: Sure, but first let’s make a deal.
John: What’s that?
Me: How about in exchange for me answering, you cut my damn hair.
John: *looks at scissors that he’d been holding up for about 10 minutes* Ok.
Whit was in the area for Christmas and he and I got together with Joe at Joe’s house to catch up. At around 8, Joe said he had to walk his dog so the three of us took Penny the Pointy for a walk. Penny is a dog that thinks humans live life too slowly and spent most of the time pegged against her leash imploring us to go faster. I had never really walked a dog before as Max I and Max II had run of our properly which proved more than enough. I asked Joe for the leash, he passed it to me, and off Penny and I went.
I went as fast as I thought I could manage and Penny seemed happy with this higher pace. As Whit has noted, I run like a saurapod and I probably looked like an idiot as my legs went up and down like pistons rather than with the fluid grace of a runner. There was a feeling of freedom at running unconstrainted until I remembered I had no idea how fast I was going. Up until now, “running” meant “treadmill” and a tiny LED array would declare my speed. Here there was none. Penny sensed my apprehension and tugged me through it and the rest of the loop had me alternating between jogging and sprinting in no particular pattern. Penny and I then dashed to Joe’s house, and then back to where Joe and Whit were walking, and then back to Joe’s house.
Back at Joe’s there was enough adrenaline left in my system that when he asked if I wanted to play Kinect table tennis I said “yes”. I got slightly too into it but smiled when I saw the shots the game had of Whit and I mid-game. Tonight I got to strike an item from my “141 reasons I don’t want to be fat anywhere”: Play a movement game without looking like an idiot.
My family was planning on going to Delaware to visit my aunt for Christmas. She hadn’t been feeling well leading up to today so I had purchased Christmas dinner parts just in case. Then, at 9 AM, word came down that we were staying put.
Dad: Well, we’re not going to your aunt’s. Where do you want to go instead? Everywhere will probably be crowded.
Me: I will make dinner.
Dad: You?
Me: Yes.
Dad: Ok, I guess we should go get a turkey…
Me: No, my terms are as follows. I will pay for, prepare, and clean up after dinner with the understanding that I have full control over the menu and I get the kitchen to myself for four uninterrupted hours.
Dad: What are you planning on making?
Me: Bacon-crusted roast pork, turkey tenderloin, mash potatoes from a box as god intended them, an assortment of cheese and crackers, truffles, a raspberry tart, crescent rolls, and possibly a soup.
Dad: Are you sure we can’t have a whole turk…
Me: Those are my terms, they are non-negotiable.
Dad: You’ve thought about this.
Me: For five years, yes.
Dad: What if I pay for the…
Me: No whole turkey.
Dad: What about drinks?
Me: Christmas will be BYOB.
Dad: Deal.
Me: Lovely to work with you, now get out of my kitchen.
My mother said she wanted a Kindle for Christmas and I chose to be the good son and give her mine which I’d hardly used. I wanted the device to function out of the box (which I’m glad I kept), so I wiped my stuff from it, deactivated it, and contacted my mom to get her Amazon login.
Me: Mom.
Mom: Yes.
Me: Give me your Amazon login info.
Mom: Why?
Me: It’s a secret.
Mom: Ok (gives info)>
Me: Thanks. You won’t regret it, probably. *hangs up*
I registered the Kindle to my mother’s account and then purchased for her a few Kindle editions of books she had mentioned she wanted to read. I was going to win Christmas, until my mom called.
Me: Terry Robinson.
Mom: I just received a bunch of emails from Amazon saying I had bought books for something called a “Kindle” do you know what that’s about?
Me: Yeah, that was me. *Thinking quickly* They’re part of your Christmas gift, you should also be receiving an email shortly for a gift card in the amount of the cost of those books.
Mom: Oh, that’s so nice.
Since I had purchased the e-books from the Kindle that was then attached to my mom’s account they were billed to her account. In effect, I had billed my mother for her own Christmas gift. I hope the gift card covers that oversight. Good job, Terry.
Few people were in on the Friday before Christmas. The only person besides myself in my area was my CAD boss who took this chance to play music through his computer speakers, loudly. I can normally deal with music in a work area as I’ll either play my own or deal with it but the combination of bad sythesizer and the tinny sound of computer speakers cut through the sound coming out of my own headphones. His play list seemed to be bad Emerson, Lake & Palmer covers and movie soundtrack pieces. I didn’t know that people actually owned CDs with “Chariots of Fire” encoded on their smooth silver surfaces.
Later, my boss passed my desk.
Him *visibly bopping his head*: Hey, Terry.
Me: Hello. Happy Friday.
Him: It’s nice to be here when the place is empty. You have privacy and can crank the tunes.
Me: Yeah, that you can do. How late are you staying?
Him: Me? Probably late, I love this stuff *points back at cubicle*
After a quarter hour of what sounded like Italian technotronica being blasted through a victrola I snapped and went to the lab to do legit work. The price I pay for my mid-week holidays.
Suzie and I woke up late or at least well rested and packed our things to return home. The weather was faultless in contrast to the two previous days and the ride to my house was unexceptional. Our only calendar item for the day was to meet up with Ben, Kacey, and Mike and have dinner downtown. We changed into fancy pants clothes and our chariot was SEPTA.
Ben in Motion
Ben lives in Philadelphia and his hallmarks are a mix of sagacity and paper folding. Here he passes in a blur.
Dinner was at Buddakan, a Stephen Starr restaurant that was my first big kid dining experience some 12 years ago when Paul Dickler took myself and other students here after an Foreign Policy Research Institute presentation. I had finished that meal with the chocolate pagoda and have spent the time since counting the seconds until I could again eat a tiny chocolate house. I said less than I normally do as the geometry of the table prevented me from dominating the conversation and a small grin kept creeping over my face. It is nice to be nice to nice people. Merry Christmas.
The rest are in photos.
On the way back, I ran into my high school men’s choir coach who asked me to join his choir. I desperately wanted to say “yes”, but not right now, Garry. I have a few things to take care of.
Whit shares an apartment and his bedroom consists of a bed, a computer, and books that I’ve never read but by authors I really like. Â My book shelves are similar. Â Together, I think we have a handle on Western Literature but only when we can text each other. Â Before he left for work, I watched him play Star Wars: The Old Republic and he force lightning’d bitches like a boss. Â Suzie and I were going to do some sight seeing and Whit went to work after we got classic Jersey dollar-a-slice pizza for $2.00 a slice.
Whit Pizza Slam
Suzie and mine first stop was at the Museum of the Moving Image in Queens.
Out of Nowhere
This unassuming museum houses wings dedicated to each part of the craft of movie making like set-design, acting, prop work, filming, sound and costuming. The last had a few neat artifacts like the hair from the Bride of Frankenstein.
Bride of Frankenstein Wig
Having only known the film in black and white I presumed the wig would also be such. Nope.
The top floor was taken up with a Jim Henson exhibit which led from his earliest works as a kid through his first animations through commercial work on to his legacy. The man had a creative output that was simply ridiculous. No photos were allowed.
We made our way back to Manhattan and visited Rockefeller which was decked out for Christmas.
Rockin' Balls
Onward to the giant Christmas tree, World of Nintendo, and Legoworld, each of which had their holiday spin. At World of Nintendo I took an obligatory peace sign shot but it was far away using a 200mm lens. No one at all thought I was being creepy.
I Was Forced to Take This
I had hoped to get a Christmas concert while in New York and there were a few but various things held us back. My favorite impediment was that the Lincoln Center Concert (always travel with a pair of slacks and a tie) came with a free candy cane martini which required showing ID and that ruled out Suzie. At Time Square there was a wandering church group that was singing. We ran into them a few times and we shuffled about the Square. I will consider them my Christmas concert.   I also got what is probably my favorite pano of the city as well.
It’s big and will probably print nicely.
Our pen-ultimate stop was the main branch of the New York Public Library forever guarded by the lions Patience and Fortitude. Inside, someone had apparently made a large donation and their name was being immortalized in a marble block. I had no idea that marble engraving was still done my hand.
Craftsman
Our final stop was to see a movie, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows. Not bad.
