39 degrees O.A.T minus 70 mph wind chill. Anybody got numbers on that? (My stiff fingers tell me about 15 degrees).

All I can say is, a turtleneck, polyester fleece, lined cordura jacket, and a plastic armor vest are NOT NEARLY enough to keep core body temperatures from dropping to the convulsive-shiver point. (Adeomata, maybe you have some interesting analytical observations to make on the human body's response to windblast? or are you that far yet?)

An hour afterwards I was still shivering, though somewhat less convulsively.

(See, I had a courier run to make today at an inconvenient time making it necessary for me to alter my travel plans ahead a few hours. It was FREAKING COLD! (something in the nature of the human response to cold makes it necessary for me to state that in capital letters)

So, now I have an empty motorcycle, and a seriously overdrawn checking account. I tried at the gas station but they refused my debit card.

Looks like I'm holding still for a while. And given that it's still very cold outside, perhaps that is a good thing - I won't catch pneumonia.

A chilly winter morning, half a tank of gas in my motorcycle, and a seriously overdrawn checking account.

Ack. It's a Saturday! I wanted to do as much town stuff today as possible, and now I'm pinned on campus. And I'll have to call Dean and ask him to drive me to church tomorrow. Ack.

(College bookstore screwed up and finally debited my "lost" check at the worst possible time).

Time to mobilize the mercy resources. Thanks be to God I have a number of them.

I guess we all have to go through this at some point in our college lives.

I've decided it's a cross in disguise, that I brought it on myself, and no, don't ask because I won't explain. (I'm being cryptic. I'm sorry.)

Three people currently populate campus: myself, Saki, and the Sashinator. Soon to be joined by Isabella circa midnight.

I don't understand all the noises going on around here. I was walking down the campus road this evening after dark past the Bernards lot and heard, through the dead silence, an odd clicking noise coming from Sean's car. Sounded like automatic locks cycling on and off. I didn't go closer to investigate but continued my walk. Conversation with him later revealed that his car does in fact like to cycle its own locks, apparently from sheer boredom (or a short in the wiring)

Then there were these odd "thunking" sounds coming out of the empty kitchen. I was told that it was the ice machine, but gosh, that ice machine is noisy.

And right now there is a rumbling noise emanating from the ping-pong room. Like faraway thunder but not.

And now my monitor backlight is making a screaming noise. I'm signing off. Some spirits must be trying to get my attention....

I had a lovely Christmas with my San Diego family; my sleep deprivation melted away (or at least settled to the far background) in the topsyturvy bustle of a large household in which everyone including the (barely familiar) visitor is expected to make dinner. Chaos insued; but due to the apparently bottomless patience of these amazing people, it was pulled off (uh, searching for correct adjective; coming up short for correct adjective) ...well. And the food was good.

After supper we went to view the local Christmas light extravaganza, on foot, me with little girl on my shoulders and her scarf wrapped around my neck - it made an awfully effective rein...

Friends swelled the numbers after we got back home, and we made it a night of Irish music and dance. It's odd, there is so much talent buried in these little gatherings, so much talent that won't see the light of day except in the living room, and perhaps it is best that way.

Once we wore our feet out, we settled down to the Christmas tradition in this household: a 500-piece puzzle carefully sorted into three sections.

I finally left at eleven after trying for an hour. Oh, there's more I have to say and can't say it. I'm unsure how to take this blessing: I can never tell the difference between a blessing or a cross in disguise....

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

I hope you all get more sleep than I will tonight. I'm leaving at 7pm to drive JoBu to the airport, after which I am heading back to OLA for midnight mass, after which I set out for a small town north of San Diego called Poway. I ought to arrive around 6 am.

Somewhere between airport and church, I ought to grab an hour of sleep, in the drivers seat of the Nighthawk. We meet again after a long parting. I'm afraid of what I'll find wrong - will it be more than the flaky cruise control tonight? (Is JoBu taking care of her?) (Really?)

They are all insane. 1/4 of the way through, I conclude that all the characters are simply insane. The women are hysterical, the men have lost their wits, the children are monsters.

I like Tolstoy better. At least I can relate to his characters. I can't relate to Dostoevsky's people at all except on a blurred and passing level. My own moments of insanity are just that: moments.

Page 246. I like Ivan Karamazov. He asks difficult questions.

I need sleep. I can't read anymore. good lord, I need sleep...and I have to do lock up at 2 am. Thank goodness I'm not a prefect all the time...

"and if today I heard she was in trouble or needed me or if there was anything I could do I would do everything I could to help her. She doesn't even know me." Straight brown hair pulled back into a ponytail, the clearest hazel eyes in a sharp German face. Quiet, so quiet. An animal inside those eyes, patiently awaiting independence and and the patience is wearing thin. And when it breaks out no one will stop it. This house of cards will crumble before it.

I listen to the footsteps of the wolf. I can't get up, I don't want to get up. I am welded to her eyes and the goodness I want to be there. Her beautiful hazel eyes. It's a complete...

"Enough! Enough with the hazel eyes shit already! You gonna fight, or you gonna sit there and let me drink your blood?!"

...complete construct. It isn't real. The eyes aren't real. I made it all up. I'm in love with a fake. The hell with the hazel eyes. But they will never go away, they always circle back and haunt me, with the wolf. She goes hunting with the wolf.

But the wolf is real.

snarl

I roll over with my fists clamped to my ears. "There isn't...won't be any blood left for you to feed on, you cursed. Do you know where I am? Do you know where I'm going to be? I'm going so far away you'll never be able to find me. I'm going to go so fast, you'll never be able to catch me..."

The wolf crouches slowly, sheer contempt in its orange eyes. It knows, as I know, that I will never go so far, never go so fast, never hide so well that it and she, both of them, will never circle round to find me and hold my face to a broken memory like broken glass. If I heard she was in trouble I would do everything to help her...

Blogger is finally running as fast as it ought to be.

I just made a discovery: I can transport a week or more worth of groceries without even filling up the saddlebags. Motorcycles are fun AND useful!! 3.69 gallons of unleaded premium moves me 140 miles and costs $11. Motorcycles are fun and cheap, too!

Brothers K. is NOT reading as fast as I want it to, yet I feel like I'm flying through the book. I'm about to break 200 pages already. But I have 600 more to go...I'll never get to my thesis. Damn you TAC seminar schedule...

I'm tired and cranky. Steve invited the five or eight of us down to his house to watch movies. Heck, I say, I've already blown the evening grocery-shopping, why not blow the rest of it.

The bike is still warm, so I'm going to gocart down to the gatehouse. Save a few minutes that way, and after the movie maybe I can build a fire and make some small dent in the mountain of pages in BK. I wonder what movie Steve has lined up for tonight...last night it was Lady in the Lake, definitely not M.Night's best work, but it had its comic moments - good acting...

Alone, in the dark, but with a means of escape: a blazing fire, fake cocoa, and Brothers Karamazov.

I love Russian writers. And musicians.

I'm going to go wander back down to my dorm and call my parents before it gets too late. "Mom, Dad, I got through finals week and I'm ok. Sitting by myself down here. Work starts tomorrow. Yeah, I'll be busy. Maybe going to San Diego for Christmas. How cold is it? Really? Brrrrr. I'm going to go drink hot water with cocoa-flavored sugar mixed in with it and read stories about Russians before I go to bed. Yeah, sounds good. Talk to you later. Love you. Bye."

Shouldn't take me more than five minutes.

I'm blogging because it's half an hour before dinner and I have nothing to do.

I rode down to Howdy's this afternoon to pick up Suzi's shop manual. I like to get a repair manual for any substantial piece of machinery that I own as soon as possible so that, if it breaks, I won't be totally helpless.

I decided that today being nice and humid and warm, it would be a good day to tighten the girth, adjust the stirrups and rein and...ride onto the freeway. It was time. I'd been riding secondary roads in heavy traffic, curvy roads in light traffic, and now it is time to chip a few more off the eggshell. I rolled through town, reviewing in my mind all the things I'd heard and theorized about blind spots and high speed obstacle avoidance.

I sat at the red light across from the Chevron station, bouncing the forks, praying to the Blessed Virgin, and thinking to myself, 'ok tiger, this is it'. The next few minutes will determine whether or not a motorcycle is truly practical transportation for me, and in a more remote sense, whether or not I will spend the rest of my life as a hopeless cripple. Well, not thinking about that second part.

The light glowed green, I snapped on the blinker and handed out the clutch. The freeway ramp glistened satin in the late afternoon sun as I toed Suzi through all five gears. Hmmmming along the superslab at 60 mph, I thought to myself, hey this isn't all that bad. Here I am, with a massively broad, perfectly smooth road to ride on with no intersections, mailboxes, telephone poles or four-foot canals to slam into. And I'm sitting up high, I can see all around, and gosh, the wind smells good...

...and gosh (twisting the throttle slightly and pegging the needle at 70) hanging on is a lot of work...I wouldn't want to sit here holding these handlebars for dear life for hours on end....

...(twisting and pegging at 80) gosh this is a lot of work and not so much fun and (thunk) wait what's that slapping my backside slowing down, slowing down (detwist to 70, then 60) I can't turn and look damn those saddlebags I bet I look stupid, really stupid right now and a minivan passed me on the left. I looked sheepishly towards it, expecting someone to be gesturing toward my (apparently) loose and flapping bags. Thunk, slap thunk thunk. Okay, I'm not going to pull over in rush-hour traffic. I'll just ride another mile to the Main Street exit and deal with the mess then.

Off the freeway, jet across into the left turn lane and slow, all is calm 30 serene mph. I slow to a stop at the red light and kick into neutral. The bags had flapped up off the sides of the bike, twisted against the grab strap and twisted themselves into a truly ghetto-looking mess on the rear seat. Damn. I guess riding on the freeway with empty bags is not an option unless I keep the speeds below 70.

I cranked over to the bike shop, picked up the book, stopped by Target.

part deux

I had to pick up some highlighters, as I was out of them.

I found my desired el cheapo brand and made beeline to the express lane to make my $1.60 purchase. The cashier took a second look at me, a towering mass of cordura and plastic armor. "You a motorcyclist?"

"Yes" - poking my card in the slot - "I am."

"What kind of motorcycle"

"I uh, I ride an 82" - the machine spits out my card; I key the pin - "Suzuki GS1100."

"Ah. I ride Harleys. I like them."

I looked at her again. She was probably younger than I was, but didn't have a lot of piercings.

"Mm. I like my Suzuki....it's reliable..... gets good gas mileage....."

"Have a good day."

"Yeah, you too."

I think I have unwittingly taken my place in a new strata of society. Motorcycling is indeed a way of life, as I'm coming to learn, and those who ride come to know those who ride...(especially when those who ride have to walk around everywhere looking like, well, bikers...)

It should be interesting. It's kind of cool. We'll see what happens.

My question right now is this: Are Harley drivers and Jap drivers supposed to, well, get along?

I mean, is this like Chevy vs. Honda? What's the etiquette is in this strange new society? Am I supposed to even give the wave to these Harley dudes? So many new things to learn about...

Last final is over.

I hope I haven't failed. I don't think so, but at this school, that means nothing.

One more final to go, one more afternoon submerged in Aristotle. I hope the snorkel doesn't leak.

I had Suzi's brake lights fixed on Tuesday, coinciding with my second and final payment on the bike. She's all mine now, and even better, people can tell when I'm stopping. The brake light wasn't entirely awol before, but required absurd amounts of pressure to click into life, and thus only useful by squeezing the brakes gorilla-fashion when stopped. Did no good for the crucial slowing-down part.

But now it's all fine and properly touchy. Now I need to be disciplined about keeping my right toe from creeping foward off the peg and onto the rear brake lever, so I don't say "stop" when I'm not stopping. But that shouldn't be too hard.

Okay. Aristotle. (pushes chair back from desk) Let's do it.

What's cooler than a box of crayons?
A bigger box of crayons.

Philosophers disagree not on the distinctions made, but on which distinctions are important.
-Berquist

Longitudinal waves in the lunch line.

A falling leaf rotating about its axis.

A dull pain at the capital vertebra.

Lack of imagination, and bicycling in sand.

Suzi sounds good in a tunnel at 6000 rpm. *heh*
And 62 degrees + 55mph wind chill at the bottom of a valley is FRICKING COLD!!!! ((shivering))

Most important values:

Generosity, under which is comprehended the willingness to go to ridiculous lengths to do good to other people.

Reverence, under which genus is comprehended the species respect.

Respect for God.

Respect for parents.

Respect for friends.

Respect for nature.

Of these, respect may not be what it seems.

Ok, adeomata, I like the Pascalian approach better.

Masses of cumulus clouds pad the horizon and a gentle late-summer breeze dusts through the alfalfa fields as I pedal toward the empty intersection. I could smell freshly mown hay and alfalfa and listened to the rustle in the popple trees. A car or two swished by and left dents in the breeze. I sniffed the air and turned my head to let the airstream wash over the side of my helmet.

"I'm really going to miss this. I don't think they have sunsets this nice out in California. At any rate I'll be far too busy to enjoy them."

I couldn't breathe enough of the clean country air that had been shoved over thousands of miles of flat nothingness. I figured I'd miss it.

Fast forward four years...(heh. four years)...and I'm sitting on the crest of a ridge seperating the peaceful Upper Ojai Valley in the north from the populated bustle to the south. Faraway bustle, way-down-there in a shimmering carpet of streetlights. Up here, on this little mesa of weeds and sage, it is absolutely, frozenly, frighteningly still. I listen hard and the silence is deafening. The air smells of dust and citrus and vegetables and sage. The flat tinsel quilt that is Oxnard scintillates in waves. The sun has sunk behind the mountains on the western coast and left them fingers of rough lava thrust into a rim of fire. The lava rears out of the ocean in a couple humpbacked forms - the Channel Islands.

I had never seen such colors in the sky. I guess I had forgotten to look, or was paying too much attention to the nondescript smell of the breeze. My eye traveled from the place where the sun used to be, all the way up and over and across the hemisphere. Burnt-red orange yellow pink purple deep lavender to blue and all the way back to reddish blue again and then chalk-blue on the eastern horizon. The eastern mountains stood out chalk on chalk, beige against the blue. The moon hadn't risen yet, but I knew that when it did it would be a massive orange ball. SoCal moonrises are one of a kind.

Half an hour later I was striding down the gravel road in the dark. It took me twenty minutes to hike back to where I'd parked the bike, collapsible-chair and backpack a not-yet-uncomfortable weight against my back. I found all as I had left it- helmet clipped to the side lock, saddlebags untouched, bike still upright in the gravel patch. I slipped the helmet on, swung a leg over and thumbed the starter. The motorcycle growled quietly to itself and we glided away onto the twisting saddled ribbon otherwise known as Sulphur Mountain Road. It's a road that goes on and on, twists and turns and ducks and dives like a roller-coaster and you never know what the next turn is going to look like. Suzi handles a like a bike 2/3 her weight even at 20 mph.

I caught glimpses of Ojai through the trees as we slithered in second gear through twist after twist. The road warped right and left in the yellowed bar of the headlight beam. The tach and speedo glowed warm orange, both needles down and out of my peripheral vision. It was okay, I didn't need to know. I was going too slowly. A quick check showed 2000 at 25 mph. I quickly got a feel for how loud 30 mph exhaust note sounded, and went by that.

Something bounded away into the trees ahead. Maybe that doe I saw earlier, on my way up. Where there's one there's two. I passed the spot and glanced around, no animal life in sight.

It seemed like fifty twists later before we finally plunged into the cold lake of air at the bottom of the valley. Business as usual now. The road shook itself straight, we coasted up to the stopsign behind the dumpsters, and carefully nosed out into the two-lane, headed home. I'd make it back for supper after all.