Too Little Pink
Diane and I stayed up late watching The Bourne Supremacy, so I wasn’t all that thrilled when my internal sunrise alarm clock began ringing at 6:10. I hit the snooze alarm but woke up every ten minutes until I lurched out of bed at 6:40. I peeked through the drawn curtains to see pink promise, then with the lights out and trying hard not to wake Diane, I dressed myself and, quietly, but still half asleep, walked out onto the balcony.
Sitting next to our room was a middle aged gay guy who launched on me like I was his long lost best friend.”It’s beautiful isn’t it? I couldn’t sleep. We’re here another day and then we go back home. I’m from Pennsylvania.”I was so groggy I could barely babble enough to escape his verbal clutches. What the hell was he doing sitting outside at this hour on a Sunday in ten degree weather? Why was he talking to me? No, don’t tell me. I left him in mid-sentence with some comment about getting closer to the ocean and I walked across the street for my non-telephone wire view of the rising sun. Except where the sun should have been were clouds too thick to fly through. Pink on either side but opaque in the middle.
Optimistically, I hurried back across the parking lot to my car and drove to Adam’s suggested Neddick Nubble which appeared from afar to be the perfect spot. Except the old lighthouse, adorned with Christmas lights, sat proudly right in front of that cloud bank behind which might have been a rising sun.I tried different vantage points but none mattered because I’d missed my best opportunity which occurred twenty-four hours ago.
**************
Last night we ate dinner at the Village Inn and were served by Shane from Chicago. We were this close to asking him if he were named after the character in the 50’s movie, but the next four grey-haired parties beat us to it.
When all else fails, crop.
Comment by rakkity — December 2, 2007 @ 2:56 pm
What’s with this “sphere” of “related content”? Or is that something my browser did?
Impressive crop of a previously-appropriately-named photo, rak.
Comment by Jennifer — December 2, 2007 @ 4:56 pm
Sphere seems to be finding a lot of sleepyheads who woke up too late to see a good sunrise.
Comment by rakkity — December 2, 2007 @ 10:54 pm
I’m testing Sphere but I’m not impressed. So far I’ve found some truly boring blogs written by self absorbed people moaning about lousy sunrises and mediocre movies.
Comment by michael — December 3, 2007 @ 8:44 am
Yeah. Who needs self-absorbed people? I’m self-absorbed enough, thank you very much.
Comment by Jennifer — December 3, 2007 @ 8:03 pm
Funny thing. “Self absorption” in astronomy means lack of transparency. (Wasn’t transparency Michael’s word of the day recently?) I think it’s strange that jargon about inanimate objects can sometimes mimic words about people.
Comment by rakkity — December 4, 2007 @ 1:50 am
But “transparent” and “self-absorbed” are both insults, when applied to people, instead of opposites.
Comment by Jennifer — December 4, 2007 @ 8:41 pm
“Transparent” an insult? I did a search for transparent on the blog, and found “Looking right through me” from 2006. To Diane, Mike’s as transparent as glass. (Could be a good thing objectively speaking, but only slightly insulting.) More recently, the blogmeister said he was striving for more transparency. Watch out, Mike, you may become the invisible man!
Comment by rakkity — December 5, 2007 @ 10:54 am
The sooner the better and I call that a blessing not an insult. I’d be just like my hero Lamont Cranston.
Comment by michael — December 5, 2007 @ 1:35 pm
Don’t you mean Kent Allard … ?
Comment by adam — December 5, 2007 @ 4:03 pm
According to Wikipedia, “The Shadow became an invisible man who supposedly learned “the mysterious power to cloud men’s minds, so they could not see him.” Well, you’ve got that power to cloud minds down pat. Invisibility next?
Leave it Adam to know this hard to find factoid–
“Later on in the pulp novels it was revealed that in fact he was NOT Lamont Cranston, but in fact aviator Kent Allard” (http://weirdscifi.ratiosemper.com/shadow/faq.html)
Comment by rakkity — December 5, 2007 @ 8:04 pm
Seeing how I’m a self-proclaimed expert on the Shadow’s radio incarnation, and having also read the Wiki piece, I can tell you that there was never any doubt about how he became invisible. Lamont (not once ever alluded to as Kent) studied in the Orient and in London and Peoria (I made up that last city) and learned and used the art of hypnotism. And, unlike the book version, he never battled the same bad guy twice.
Comment by michael — December 5, 2007 @ 8:32 pm