A Weekend That Was

God smiles upon those who forgo all medical treatments.

When we had a ski weekend planned for early February we thought we'd get at least a little bit of the snow up in the Pennsylvania hinterlands. That wasn't true, but it did mean we had the entire place to ourselves. And of course by place I mean Christian Science summer camp that rents itself out as a cross-country ski center in the winter. Not a ski resort. Obviously. We did have the run of the main lodge/camp office for the weekend at least. It comes complete with sun rays, two fireplaces, seven bedrooms, and a ban on alcohol of every kind.

There's also a lake. And although we couldn't get any official confirmation on its frozenness, they were fine with us deciding for ourselves; the healing nature of god and all. We still sent Evan out first.

Broomball (with hockey sticks) proved both successful and non-leathal. The ice-skating slightly less so since there were only 3 functional skates. Like they say—thems the skates.

Other highlites? The gaming selections, including a hectic round of couch-based Trivial Pursuit, a spirited  Pictogram session, card games galore, and Bibleopoly—A Biblical Game of Fun and Faith.

With Bibleopoly, you can enjoy the fun of a property trading game while learning about the remarkable cities of the Bible! Start "In the Beginning", and travel through biblical cites of Meditation, Community Celebration, and occasionally the Abyss! You can earn a Cornerstone by helping a fellow player [like handing over a property that completes a monopoly], or by doing community service [sitting out 5 turns, hopefully making more coffee], and make offerings in order to earn the bricks and steeple you need to build a church. Watch out for the "Go Meditate" spot on the board [i.e. jail], though--you'll lose three turns! Also, though good deeds are rewarded, sometimes "Faith Cards" intervene.

It's not as much fun as it sounds. Or, actually it's exactly as much fun as it sounds.

Then there was the ropes course, complete with Leaps of Faith, moon-lit zip lines, and Darcy's judgements.

Leaping Sweater, Hidden Sweater

T. Trudeau up to bat.

Darcy never forgets ... her hipster accessories.

Then there were the illicit activities. Like the hot chocolate wine & whisky outside by the fire pit, and the wine we hid in the oven, and the pitchers of wine drank over The Pursuit, and the bottle of rum we drank over cards, and the beer cans Evan & I left on the end of the dock, and the wearing of the bearskin rug, and the late-night Sevens, Elevens, Doubles games that broke out around 2 AM each night.

Seven.

And of course the anti-religious rant the younger Barnebey's went on Friday night. It's unlikely god appreciated that. At least we got a couple of pretty nice sunsets out of him.

In an unrelated note, proving once and for all that tofu is the scrapple of the soy world, see if you can spot the difference between the two:

The Fireside Shot

The Jump Shot.

The Video

St. Patrick in the Kitchen

St. Patrick—celebrated with 4 shot glass, 3 ramekins, & a spice jar. Here's to you 21 Seasoning Salute.

Divination

Saturday afternoon Meredith had a plan to put this together from the roof of The Divine Lorraine Hotel. That plan involved breaking into an abandoned building in North Philadelphia, climbing 10 stories, filming the sunset, and then sneaking back out again. In the dark. Because it's dark in abandoned buildings once the sun sets. All while avoiding its regular population of hobos, crack addicts, and down on their luck millionaires. I'd like to pretend she and Kate asked me to come along for protection. Because it would be stupid for two young women to do that alone. But let's be honest, nobody's gonna believe that. We all know how much I love roofs, abandoned things, and climbing. And don't act like this creepy building isn't just asking for a good mounting. It's been staring me in the forehead all my life. The only question is why did it take so long to do it.

The first challenge, after finding a parking spot for Meredith's Prius, was working up the nerve to walk up these stairs.

Creepstairs

If this were the most disturbing part of the event there would be a lot more pictures of the 2nd and 3rd floor crack dens. As it was, we were too preoccupied with the debris, empty Cheetos bags, and dirty mattresses to pullout our iPhones until we made it over to the big building. 

But are you getting a load of this place?

Here's the thing though. The only time I was actually about to shit my pants was just before we made it out to the roof. As I was about to grab the top of the rusted-out metal ladder leading up there, I saw the two socks that sheathed the topmost handhold. Which I was about to grab. With my hands. And I hope that that's the closest I've ever come to contracting a venereal disease.

That scare was totally worth it though, because look at this view:


And also this one:


And this one, which I sent to my dad just to brag:

And this one, with the ladies, on the roofs:

And then the sun went down. And it was pretty awesome. And we felt like kings/queens.

But then we had to walk back down 10 flights of stairs. In an abandoned building. By flashlight. Waiting for the moment when the guy frying eggs in the dark finally noticed us and the camera went black.

No, but seriously. That guy freaked me out.

Housing to the Oldies

American & Laurel - November, 1950

American & Laurel - January, 2012

2012 - More jeeps, more recycling, more street mattresses. Fewer broken blinds.

Old Friends

The List Game strikes again:

Analogue Marketing

You know what I like about Philadelphia? How it takes 3 weeks to get the library card that was supposed to show up in 3-5 days. And how when it finally gets here it comes in a hand addressed envelope from the Rodriguez branch.

And that expire date written in black sharpie. 

A Case of Mistaken Locations

I left my house this morning at 4:05 AM to ride the holiday rails down to PHL. It's been a long time since I've flown out of a big airport during the Holidayz; Rochester and Madison never had much a line at security. I slipped onto my flight to MKE via DTW 10 minutes before scheduled take-off. Upon landing Svetlana showed me this:

It was a little unsettling. I tried to check in, which didn't help my case of the Oh-Shit-I-Got-Onto-The-Wrong-Flightsies. I was legitimately concerned that I had gotten onto the wrong plane.

Finally Qrank came through and straightened things out though.




Later, after landing in Milwaukee, Svetlana got herself all mixed up again. This time I was at Logan International. She knew one thing, I was definitely at an airport. Which one though?

Location:John D Dingell Dr,Detroit,United States