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Archive for July, 2003

Why I Hate Qwest

Friday, July 25th, 2003

Qwest, how do I hate thee? Let me count the ways…

A few years ago, I installed a few business lines into my home through Qwest. I subsequently found out that the company had assigned me a phone number that had once belonged to another person who had long discontinued their service. Yet I still got phone calls for her. After the first few wrong calls, I asked where they go the number from: “directory assistance” was the answer. I called Qwest to make them aware of this & gave them the previous subscriber’s name & phone #. Qwest’s reply is that this wasn’t possible and there wasn’t any way that this could be happening! Well, it was. The wrong calls kept coming.

Next, I tried to get DSL through Southwest Bell which was trying to compete w. Qwest in the NW. Of course, due to the stupid way these things are regulated–if I want service with SBC, they in turn need to go through Qwest in terms of the actual phone line itself (which is a Qwest line, not SBC). That’s where the fatal bottleneck occurred. One time, a Qwest person forgot to register in the computer that there would be a service change on the line. Another time, a Qwest person forgot to leave a message for another Qwest person about the DSL installation & then went on vacation. Needless to say, my DSL installation had still not occurred after SEVEN (7) WEEKS of trying. That’s when I gave up and got broadband service. Each failure was due to Qwest incompetence. Suspicious minds might even say that Qwest was doing this purposefully to prevent competitors from poaching “their” (as if they owned me) customers.

So I vowed that I’d get rid of Qwest from my life entirely if I could. I went online & found a wonderful, scrappy upstart telecom company beginning to provide local phone service in this area. Their services were great and price was unbeatable. So I signed up with Featurefon. Only problem was that their service wasn’t ready for prime time. After I ended a call I’d get a ring back. Often, after talking on a long distance call that lasted longer than 15-20 minutes, the Featurefon software would simply drop the call. The worst indignity was when our incoming phone service would go down inexplicably. Since we still had outgoing service, we didn’t find out about the service disruption for hours or longer. The worst thing was that they simply couldn’t fix the problems (possibly due to their small corporate size).

So reluctantly, I decided to return to Qwest. That’s when the real fun began.

After placing the order for service, I was told it would take around 11 business days to begin service. On July 10th, Qwest’s records show that they connected service. Qwest’s records also show that they disconnected that same service almost at the same instant. That meant that I no longer had phone service. I’d call Qwest & they’d tell me that their diagnostic tests showed that I DID have service and that everything was working fine. What planet are these people on?

So I demanded a technician be dispatched to check out what was wrong. Shortly later, a technician called me to say: “I’m at your home and no one’s home.” I replied: “I’m at my home and you’re not.” Turns out that the tech’s dispatching computer entry sent him to a different address which now had my phone number assigned to it. So Qwest had connected my phone service to another address entirely. My incoming phone calls were going to this address. Which is why my service stopped.

I called Qwest repair once again to tell them what had happened. I gave them the address at which my service was connected (which the technician had given me). They STILL maintained that this wasn’t possible and that my service was working at my address! After checking through this, they finally decided to talk to the Qwest section that assigns phone numbers. Sure enough, there had been a programming error that HAD assigned my number to a different address. They called me a few hours later to tell me the programming error was corrected and that I should have service. Nope, no service.

I told them to send another technician and this time to send him to my address and not someone else’s. When the technician came the next day, he found that there was a problem at the phone terminal which prevented my service from working. He corrected this and I finally had phone service. Elapsed time from where service was connected (July 10) to when it actually started working: 5 days. Number of calls to Qwest & Featurefon to figure out what was wrong: probably 30-40. Number of hours wasted trying to resolve the problem: 20+.

After telling customer service about this horror story and assuming that they’d fall over backwards to try to make me happy–what did they do for me? One month’s credit for local service. That’s it. “We’re prevented by State and federal regulatory guidelines from treating customers differently.” I replied: “You mean regulators are telling you to provide the same lousy standard of service to each of your customers?” That didn’t go over too well.

So when will there be true, unfettered telecom competition that allows the best company to win, instead of the one with the biggest monopoly on bad service? My new motto: anything but Qwest.

You know I would quit Qwest if I knew there was a reliable, trustworthy local phone service competitor. Let me know if you find one (I live in Seattle).

Posted in Blogs-Tech-Science | 10 Comments »

Dun Aoghasa (1983)

Wednesday, July 23rd, 2003

Dun Aengus & Atlantic

The Aran Islands lie low on the Atlantic horizon off the Clare coast.
They are enormous slabs of rock
Jutting steeply out of the roiling ocean
Tilting like a table at a rakish angle.

Bleak and featureless
They appear at first glance,
With grey stone walls that wander
In rickety lines up and down the hillsides
Dividing the meager land into small family plots.

The prevailing colors on Aran
Are the grey of stone and the brown of earth—
What little there is of it.
Even the islanders accommodate to drab natural colors in their clothing
With densely knit grey and brown Aran sweaters.
If you see a bright color on the landscape,
Chances are it’s something synthetic or imported,
Plastic
Or a garment bought in the big city
Like the down jackets of the tourists.

If these islands are bleak and featureless,
Then your eye has not seen well.
The enchantment of Aran
Is in the refined spareness of its terrain.
It is a landscape to put off visitors.
Like its own people, they are taciturn.
They will open themselves
When you prove your devotion
And then only grudgingly.

Dun Aoghasa, a cliff-top fortress
Is named for one of the ancient Irish Aenguses,
The pre-Christian sea god
Or the fearsome warrior
Who led early invasions of the mainland.

I mounted the top of the rise
And saw the thick fortress walls
And heard reports at intervals which I took to be sonic booms.
The sea edge came abruptly to meet me;
The drop was so sheer,
The fear of falling so intense
That I could not approach the edge
Except on hands and knees.
Beneath me the sea roiled,
Changing color from deepest copper-blue to white foam.

As I watched the water far below me,
I heard the boom:
It was the impact of monstrous waves crashing into rocks and cliffs below.

Posted in The Arts | No Comments »

Dahlia Rabikovitch: To Die Like Rachel (K’mo Rachel, כמו רחל)

Wednesday, July 23rd, 2003

K’mo Rachel (Like Rachel) from Kol Ha-shirim ad Ko (All the Poems Until Now, United Kibbutz Press, 1995) is an extraorinarily powerful poem by Dahlia Rabikovitch, a contemporary Israeli poet. In it, she imagines the death of Rachel, the Biblical matriarch, during childbirth. The poet deliberatey divorces every other outside object from her consciousness in order to focus almost monomaniacally on the condition of her subject.

The poem is deeply feminist (if that’s not a dirty word to use these days) in invoking the alienation, isolation and oppression suffered by Rachel and her kindred women in the Biblical era (and today as well). The language and syntax of the poem are relatively simple and straightforward which meshes very well with the profound emotional pathos Rabikovitch attemtps to induce in the reader. Like Lincoln’s Gettsburg Address, the simplicity of the rhetoric blends with a profundity of emotion to create a classic expression of humanity suffering.

Special thanks to, Leah Schechter, of the Jewish Theological Seminary Library for providing me the Hebrew text.

by Dahlia Rabikovitch

Chagall’s Meeting of Jacob & Rachel

To die like Rachel,
With the soul quivering like a bird
Seeking to flee.
Across from the tent stood Jacob and Joseph terrified.
They spoke about her in a shudder.
All the days of her life tumble within her
Like an infant seeking to be born.

How hard.
The love of Jacob devoured her wholly.
Now, as the soul departs,
She has no more desire for all this.

Suddenly the infant wailed
And Jacob came to the tent.
But Rachel does not feel
Rejuvenation washes her face
And head.

A great peace has descended upon her,
The breath of her soul will not rustle a feather.
They laid her between the stones of the hills
And did not mourn her.
I wish
To die like Rachel.

translation © 2003 Richard Silverstein
published in the Berkeley Graduate, January, 1982

כמו רחל

למות כמו רחל
כשהנפש רועדת כציפור
רוצה להימלט.
מעבר לאוהל עמדו נבהלים יעקב ויוסף,
דיברו בה רתת.
כל ימי חייה מתהפכים בה.
כתינוק הרוצה להיוולד.

כמה קשה.
אהבת יעקוב אכלה בה
בכל פה
עכשיו כשהנפש יוצאת
אין לה חפץ בכל זה.

לפת צווח התינוק
ובא יעקוב אל האןל
א רחל אינה מרגישה
עדנה שוטפת את פגיה
ורואשה.

מנוכה גדולה ירדה עליה.
נשמת אפה שב לא תעיד נוצה.
היניחו אותה בין אבני הרים
ולא היספידוה.
למות כמו רחל
אני רוצה.
[apologies for Typepad's scrambling of Hebrew punctuation]

Posted in Jews & Judaism, The Arts | No Comments »

Mason Lake–Mt. Defiance trail (Alpine Lakes Wilderness, WA)

Saturday, July 19th, 2003

Mason Lake (south)

My dog & I yesterday did the Mason Lake-Mt. Defiance trail in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. This is hike of terrific extremes-you get a maximum of enjoyment from a maximum of pain. The views from Mt. Defiance are among the best in the Snoqualmie area (except for Kendall Catwalk) and they include Mt. Baker, Glacier Peak, Mt. Clayton, Mt. Rainer and countless other peaks in a 360 degree view.

But getting there is not easy. This is an extremely strenuous ascent. The trail begins easily enough & the first 1.25 miles are pleasant. But then, at a trail junction unfortunately not noted in 100 Hikes in Washington (the trail Bible I use for my Washington hiking), the trail begins it ascent to heaven or, as I thought to myself hours later while I was still ascending, the ascent to hell. The trail is barely a trail–a “boot-beaten path” as Spring & Manning call it. The trail consists of rolling rocks and sand with very little solid ground beneath your feet. When descending, if you misstep in a place like this you easily end up on your seat or perhaps 10 feet lower than when you took your last step. If you miss the correct trail as I did and take the “wrong” one, you will end up ascending (or bushwhacking) an old stream bed through dense, prickly shrubs which will whip you all over your body. Despite its strenuousness, I almost prefer this ascent to going up the “stairway to hell” which is the other trail.

Besides missing an important trail junction, 100 Hikes makes another serious mistake when it notes that the trail from Mason Lake to Mt. Defiance gains 900 feet (rising from 4,500 to 5,400 feet). In actuality, when I got to the top of Mt. Defiance a fellow hiker told me his GPS told him we were standing at 1,900 meters which comes out to be over 6,000 feet. Perhaps Manning & Spring meant to say “6,200 feet?” At any rate, what I expected to be an easy 2 mile, 900 foot elevation gain hike turned out to be a monstrously difficult and long ascent through exposed terrain and in blinding summer sun.

But when I arrived at the summit, I was richly rewarded by an east-west view from the Olympics across he whole Cascade range and north-south from Rainier to Baker. Who could ask for anything more? And on the way up, the wildflowers were in full, gorgeous bloom. I saw penstemon, lupines, Indian paint brush, toad lilies, butterflies and so much more. I will have pictures to prove it when I develop my film roll (and I will post them here when I do).

Mason Lake is a small, but very attactive alpine lake. It doesn’t have the magnificent cirque surroundings of Rachel or Melakwa, but it is pretty in its own right.

Must haves: bug juice (there were bugs of all kinds including big, stinging black flies), walking poles (preferably two), much water

Posted in Outdoors | No Comments »

English Laurel as Privacy Hedge: “Act of Aggression Against Oneself and One’s Neighbor”

Friday, July 18th, 2003

Sarah Lyall wrote a great piece about an growing problem in English social relations As Privet Rises, Neighbors Take Sides in the New York Times. Apparently, tensions have risen to such a pitch that one disgruntled neighbor actually killed someone who refused to trim his garden hedge.

I feel in the gardening community not enough attention is devoted to gardening etiquette, good manners and good behavior. It’s just assumed that since gardeners are good souls engaging in a spiritually rewarding pastime, that it would go without saying that gardeners would be good, reasonable and caring souls. Well, it ain’t true. Gardeners can be stubborn, willful and downright pigheaded fools (I sometimes count myself among them).

The issue of using hedges as barriers in order to maintain privacy is one that affects me personally. I garden in my home in Madrona (Seattle). The entire southern side of my property is dominated by an English laurel hedge that at its top height reaches between 40-50 feet high. Some books say 30 feet is maximum, but that isn’t the case with this monstrous specimen. The hedge’s length is about 60 feet. The research librarian at the Miller Library at the University of Washington helped me do some botanical research on English laurels and two books in particular (I’ll have to dig up her e mail in which she names the titles & authors) warn against using this plant as a privacy hedge.

In The Complete Shade Gardener (Houghton Mifflin), George Schenk says:

…The planting of an English laurel hedge is an act of aggression against one’s neighbor – and against oneself as well. It is the fightingest of hedges, pushing outward and upward as soon as you turn your back. English laurel is one of the greatest goads to giving up on the yard and moving into an apartment – in a very real sense, this shrub is a real estate agent.

English laurel according to various botanical websites is mildly poisonous (leaves, stem & bark). I have a two year old son and I don’t want him to be endangered by something like this. It can grow up to 5 feet per year. It throws seeds at least 40 feet (well into my yard) forcing me to pick out 50-100 germinated seedlings each year. It sheds leaves profusely and leaves scatter far from their source (forcing me to rake them up on my own property).

Which all leads me to the fact that my neighbor who owns this monstrosity does (in his own defence) trim this hedge once every two years. But in the year when he doesn’t trim I essentially lose about 25% of my yard for gardening purposes since the hedge wipes out that much sunlight. I offered to pay for the trimming in years when he didn’t choose to. He refused. I think he’s being downright selfish, bad mannered and unneighborly.

Posted in Gardening | 37 Comments »

Media to Bloggers: “Drop Dead!”

Thursday, July 17th, 2003

I’ve always loved that New York Daily News headline which trashed Gerald Ford during New York City’s 1970s financial crisis: “Ford to New York: Drop Dead!” So I thought I’d reuse it here to describe the media’s blithe indifference to bloggers.

There seems to be a deep philosophical divide between those who populate the web world and those who populate the publishing (media) world. The web was designed (with the glaring exception of Microsoft) to share information among users as quickly and widely as possible. Most online resources do not view themselves as “owning” their sources of information. They might want to be the first to distribute a piece of news or information, but ownership seems an alien concept. Not so in the media where control of information seems a high priority. Media outlets not only want to own information, they want to control how you access it, when you access and where you access it.

Which brings me to the subject of my wrath: the New York Times and her fellow media sources. Bloggers do great service to these news outlets by quoting from articles, placing links in their blogs, spreading the word throughout the web. Bloggers increase online awareness of both the publication and specific articles quoted in blogs. Instead of embracing bloggers, these publications treat them like the general online public and deny access to many of their best articles after a short period (a week in the case of the New York Times). I’d like to see the “open sourcing” philosophy percolate down into the media as it relates to blogging and bloggers.

Here’s a case in point: Frank Rich wrote Had Enough of the Flag Yet?, a memorable piece on the U.S. media’s incessant drumbeat of patriotism and how the headlong rush to wave the flag during the Iraq war did a great disservice to the nation and journalism. I waited till July 16th to write my post which would’ve publicized this article. By then, it was too late & I would’ve had to pay the NYT for my access to it. As a result, I never wrote a post about the article. Today, I found the link above, which is not to the New York Times, because they’ll make you pay for it. Common Dreams, an online news resource for the progressive community, won’t.

Which brings me to another important guerilla technique: there are alternative ways to find articles online. If you want to access a locked down article from, say, the New York Times, I suggest that you do a web search using the exact name of the article or the author’s name. This should take you to alternative media sites that catalogue such news sources. Et voila, you have your article without paying for it! I’ve been able to find several old articles this way including the one I referred to above.

So here we see the bizarre and convoluted situation in which a blogger who wants to link to a New York Times article must find it online off-NYT site and then link to that independent site. If I were the NYT, I’d be upset with this arrangement, but they’ve really brought it on themselves.

I twice e mailed the New York Times webmaster & suggested that they have a different policy for bloggers, allowing them access to articles. A blogger would provide proof of blog ownership and would sign an agreement guaranteeing use of articles only in their blog. Of course, the webmaster never responded. The blogging community may still be too small for large media outlets to notice it (outside of technology sections).

I know that this proposal for no-fee access would rely on quaint notions like honor, which are no longer honored today–and perhaps bloggers WOULD abuse this arrangement if given a chance. But there could be limits on access like a link/read-only (no printing) policy that would limit abuse.

If the media doesn’t like the gratis proposal here’s an alternative: blogging services, either individually or as a group, could negotiate with media outlets, either individually or via a “coalition of the willing,” for blogger access to news articles. Either individual bloggers or blogging services would pay an access fee to the outlets. The fee could either come out of the blogging service user fee or be an add-on fee the blogger pays either to the outlet or the blogging service. The amount of the fee could be based on the number of sources the blogger wanted access to. I’d be willing to pay $25/year or so for this feature.

The added benefit of this proposal is that the blogger gets access to news sources for a reasonable fee and the media get a new source of revenue.

Liza Sabater in her rejoinder to this post in Burundanga rejects the idea of paying for access to news sources. She believes that bloggers are like journalists, artists and others in society whose activities have special consitutional protections that place them in a different category of user than the general public. She writes:

…in the case of articles, i say that the only way to bring attention to this issue is to try it two ways: to either start REPRINTING WITH FULL ATTRIBUTION or to BUY THE ARTICLE and then post a link to it (and then think napster). either way, this issue will not go away because copyright laws are so skewed in favor of publishers. once the community of bloggers explodes (thanks in part to TYPEPAD and grock knows Google’s purchase of BLOGGER) all hell will break loose and companies like the New York Times will C&D anybody in sight –especially given that they already disseminate content to subscribers of Radio Userland.

i almost never refer to anything posted on the nyt but if i had to, i would reprint the whole article + add the link to their pay-per-view site. then i’d just sit back and wait for them to come get me.

I’m curious about the Radioland agreement with the New York Times. If anyone knows more about it could you send me a Trackback or comment? It sounds intriguing.

I would go Liza one better: if no agreement can be worked out between bloggers and the media why not create a Napster like system in which bloggers download articles to their hard drives while they are accessible. Then one could create a network of blogger news file sharers who could exchange articles from their hard drives in a network. I have no idea how to do this, but it doesn’t seem that much different from what some of the music file sharing services are doing right now. This service would have a stronger basis than music sharing because bloggers are trying to perform a public service in creating an online community to discuss and disseminate ideas that will benefit society.

I also note that Pops, who is a freelance journalist, has a different perspective on this and I would invite him to join the debate: let a thousand flowers bloom.

I don’t know if any of these ideas are viable in the form in which I’ve presented them. But I think as blogging grows that the need for easy, reliable access to news sources will become greater. This idea, in some form or another, will become real (at least I hope so). Is there some enterprising person out there who wants to make this happen?

Posted in Blogs-Tech-Science | 3 Comments »

Umbria Travel Diary–September, 1996

Tuesday, July 15th, 2003

Friday, August 30-Sunday, September 8, 1996

ORVIETO

LA BADIA: 8th century monastery turned into a hotel. Stately building with long, dark corridors. Surrounded by rolling hills and farmland and olive trees everywhere. Orvieto produces some of the best olive oil in Italy.

Lunch in La Badia restaurant was not especially good. But olive oil was unlike anything I’ve had in U.S. It was bright and fruity, a surprising taste!

Dinner at Volpe e L’uva (Wolf and the Egg) recommended in Fred Plotkin’s book (without his guide I would’ve been lost gastronomically): also not great. Concierge at hotel recommended Trattoria Etrusca. What a wonderful dining experience! Thin slice of steak grilled rare and smothered in herbs. Followed by three dessert sampler: delicate cake, tiramisu and rather gooey fruit/pie sort of thing. Waiter was helpful (no English!), impeccably professional. Recommended wineries to visit (one where a relative was the manager) but they couldn’t take me because they were in the middle of a harvest.

Orvieto Duomo: amazingly huge scale and ornately decorated. Inside, however it is very simple box-like structure. Heard powerful cathedral organ. Most shops closed on Sunday.
Never in my wildest dreams did I believe Umbrians would know so little English. I thought only in remote, “primitive” places they knew no English! Here all TV stations are in Italian. Sometimes there is no CNN, no BBC, no Sky TV, no Herald Tribune and certainly no New York Times. All signs, even in museums are Italian-only. It doesn’t help that I left my excellent guide book somewhere at home. I bet it’s on the stairs or in my car, one step away from joining me on this trip, where it’s supposed to be…alas!

I suppose I should be happy about the lack of English. It means these people are still fully native Italians, not under the spell of some international, cosmopolitan influence which would dilute whatever makes them Umbrian.

Driving through the narrow alleyways of Orvieto yesterday night, trying to make my way back from the restaurant to the hotel, I tried to turn a corner and scratched the paint on the rental car. Disaster! I seem to have a knack for damaging cars (my own car is in the body shop back home waiting to be repaired after a nice fellow cut me off on Lexington Avenue). It’s nothing that a little touch up paint wouldn’t fix. I know exactly how I would go about getting it done in the States (parts department of auto dealer). But who knows where you go here? Something to worry about…just what I need on a wonderful Italian vacation.

La Badia is somewhat disappointing. Soft, cheap mattresses, no shower heads. It does have a beautiful pool on the hillside with comfortable lounge chairs. Nice to laze about under the warm Umbrian sun. There is a cool breeze on the Orvieto plateau. Down below at La Badia there is less breeze and stronger sun.
Found a carnozzieri (auto body/paint shop) to fix scratches on car. They mixed paint for an hour, applied it, cleaned off my scratched mirror and sent me on my way. No charge! What a blessed, unspoiled country!

Todi

Drove to Todi and saw interesting Duomo. Church organs seem to always be ornately and sumptuously appointed. Had good meal at Ristorante Umbria: wild boar and polenta. Rucola (arrugula) salad so salty almost inedible. Very good torta with pine nuts and cream. Umbrians don’t seem big on desserts—usually fruit salad, torta, tiramisu or maybe gelato. That’s it. Fairly disappointed in restaurants so far. Mike Rose (co-owner of Semifreddi’s Bakery) cooks better than 80-90% of chefs I’ve sampled here. That’s a compliment to Mike, but a real insult to Umbrian chefs. Is it possible that Italian food and chefs have become so sophisticated in the States that our Italian cuisine rivals or even surpasses theirs?

Deruta

Ubaldo Grazia shop (Deruta)

World-renowned for majolica ceramics. Plotkin recommended Grazia & Co. Walked there in the rain (why did I think Italian summer weather would be as dry as Israel or California?). Grazia has many rooms…first was modern garish garbage. God, why does he feel he needs to “keep up with the Joneses” by commissioning a “Toucan” parrot/jungle theme? The 15th century designs and colors are the best and will always be. Saw beautiful dinner plates with floral motif. Outer rim filled with luscious looking fruit—pears and pomegranates (with skin peeled back to reveal ripe red seeds within—connected by yellow vines. Asked price of four plates. They don’t sell them that way. Only in sets. Talked with Mr. Grazia about set of four. He said: “$146” and I thought he meant for a set of four, but he meant for a single set! Full set of four and shipping would come to (get this!) $1,000!! Yikes!

Bought small teapot for Suzanne and painted tile which came to $90. That’s the last I buy of majolica for a while—that’s for sure. Majolica museum closed…as everything is in Italy on Monday.

Now staying in Lo Spedalichio (which in the past had something to do with being a hospital) in old elegant hotel in a drippy little town halfway between Perugia and Assisi—but really in the middle of nowhere. Hotel sits next to dumpy little highway. When I booked the reservation, I thought it was much closer to Perugia than it actually is. Hotel sent me to wonderful restaurant where I had a soup made with small white beans which I’ve never seen before—extraordinary!

Tuesday

Called La Badia in AM and asked them to search for missing CD player and—guess what?!–they found it! Umbria…what a place! Unspoiled by wealth and privilege, people live by a simple honest code.

Drove to Gubbio this AM. Market day with wonderful foods sold, mostly salad greens and lots of flowers. Huge priory building with beautiful view from balcony overlooking city. Mountains, mountains everywhere! Had wonderful lunch at Federico de Montefelcro (named after medieval duke): turkey breast scaloppini with caper-parsley sauce (delectable!). For dessert, waitress called it pane cotta, but to me it seemed like smooth as silk crème caramel. Orgasmic!

Afternoon to Perugia: most cosmopolitan city thus far in Umbria. God, they even sell the Herald Tribune at the kiosk! A really big town compared to Gubbio, Deruta, etc. More English in evidence, but not much. Rained again…man, do I need an umbrella! That’ll be the last time I assume Italy’s climate is like Israel’s or California’s.

Sat in Cathedral of San Lorenzo for one hour while it rained and before restaurants opened. Here restaurants don’t open in PM till 7:30. Hard to adjust to. Had gnocchi with tartuffo nero (black truffles) and cheese (Mmm!) and minestrone filled with small pasta and legumes.

Sitting in church I realized that for me Italy is delightful mix of sacred and profane. Italians are planted firmly in the earth (hence the wonderful cuisine, farming and gardening) and their heads mount up to heaven (hence the serene cathedrals and sacred art).

Watching Italian TV: how weird to watch Hollywood Westerns with the cowboys and Indians speaking Italian! What would Geronimo and Sitting Bull make of that!

THURSDAY

Assisi—city of churches even more so than other Italian towns…full of them. Saw wonderful sanctuary, Hermeo del C ? , hillside convent with beautiful walking paths.

Read in Assisi guide booklet that you can hike 15km from Assisi to Spello (seven hours) and take train back. If I ever did this I might reserve hotel room in Spello and train back to Assisi next day.

Basilica of San Francesco is so big, reminds me of Pentagon. Isn’t it strange to take a simple down to earth man like St. Francis and build a whole spiritual industry around him? I read in the Assisi booklet that when St. F. lay seriously ill messengers were sent from the town to where he lay, asking him to return home so that no other town could lay claim to his remains. How odd!

Le Silve (Armenzano) nestled into mountains

Staying at Le Silve (2000 feet up) near little hillside hamlet of Armenzano. Way out in God’s country. Drove in yesterday on roads barely wide enough for one car, let alone two. Also, rainstorm lashed at me. Kept mumbling to myself: “you must be crazy…this is insane.” I was angry at hotel and my hotel guidebook for not making clear how remote a place it is. But when I arrived I saw how spectacular the scenery is. High up on flanks of Mt. Subasio. On a sunny day it must be like sitting on flanks of Garden of Eden. Unfortunately, it’s been overcast, but you still get idea of how perfect it can be. Great place for honeymoon or “love tryst.” One quibble…there is hotel-wide PA which plays romantic jazz standards—mostly dull piano-style ballads. How odd to hear Georgia in the middle of the Umbrian mountains. I’d rather hear Umbrian folk music.

For breakfast, tasted freshly made ricotta cheese. What a wonder! Cheese by the same name in the States is a pallid imitation. This was so delicate in flavor, so light and moist in texture that it almost fell apart as soon as it touched the fork. What a pity I can’t bring it back with me to the U.S.!

Just now had breathtaking visual revelation. Here on Mt. Subasio looking across small valley to another hillside with undulating line of trees rippling across it. Sky filled with enormous, hightop clouds. Sunlight towards sunset is crisp and bright, flashing off clouds. Reminds me of Italian Renaissance painting (which I never really liked that much because it seemed so ornate and embellished—but this is real!) filled with heavenly figures enveloped in sun-drenched clouds. Now I see where that bright light came from! As sun sinks lower, tops of clouds are orange and bottoms are dark blue. Off to the western sunset the sky between clouds is most delicate shade of light blue. Ah Italy! Ah Umbria!

Being in the mountains is so invigorating. The senses are heightened. You’re on the edge of the world and also at the edge of existence. The struggle to live is more intense here than down below. That makes life that much more rewarding. The quiet, the simplicity, the purity of air…all make for a bracing, life-enhancing experience.

Spoleto didn’t seem to agree with me today. I arrived just as everything closed for afternoon siesta, and when I say closed, I mean closed. The whole city shut down tight, unlike other towns like Assisi or Perugia where some businesses and institutions stayed open all day. I couldn’t find the tourist office which wasn’t clearly marked. Automobile traffic in Spoleto is more intrusive than in any other place I’ve been. Cars are everywhere. What about a little traffic and city planning here?

Decided to take off early for Norcia

Norica Piazza del Popolo

because road was winding and also spectacular. Wanted to arrive with plenty of daylight. Spent several hours sitting in Piazza Benedetto outside the Norcia Duomo dedicated to him. It was delightful to watch Italian families, both local residents and tourist visitors promenading in the Piazza, communing with each other…girls walking their puppies, boys giving each other bike rides, and older men standing by St. Benedict’s statue and joking, talking. Italians are a social people, communitas is a central value to them.

St. Benedict and Norcia Town Hall

Ate at Tric-Trac (the Italians delightfully pronounce it: Trica-Trata) for lunch in Spoleto, just outside Festival of Two Worlds office, which is in the piazza in front of the Duomo. Italians sure know how to grill vegetables: tomatoes, zucchini, eggplant, etc. Dinner at Granaro del Monte (Norcia)…wonderful pork sausage stuffed with black truffles and wrapped in prosciutto and cheese. Got my monthly supply of salt in the process. Dessert was sfogliatine , light pastry shell smothered in custard, raspberries, blackberries and berry sauce. Wow! Watching waiters scurrying around ensuring each customer was either eating a course, cleaning up after finishing a course and preparing for a new one. It was like ballet—a very strenuous ballet, but ballet nonetheless. Head waiter racing in and out of kitchen shouting at his assistant: “Mario! Mario!” This wouldn’t do in France or America, but it’s fine here.

SATURDAY

Hotel reception useless for advice on how to entertain myself. Sent me to Cassa del Parco—the Sibilline Mountain National Park office. Wonderful young woman advised me to go to Castellucio (4,500 feet), crowning the Pian Grande (Great Plain), which produces the best lentils in the world. I bought a bag, and at $4/lb. They ought to be best in the world! Thousands of acres of them are grown and harvested in summer. As I drove over the mountain pass from Norcia to Castellucio, the great bowl of the Pian Grande spread before me as far as the eye could see. It looked something like the Great Salt Lake plain in Utah. An impressive sight.

Park guide also directed me to Mt. Vettore (7,500 feet) near alpine lake. Began the hike, but dark, cold clouds and vendi furiosi came up with light lashing rain. I thought better of going on, especially without warm coat or raingear. Instead I went to another town, Perci, with a cloister, Abbazio de St. Eustizio. There was a wedding in progress which I snuck into (otherwise it would have been closed). In Perci, every single person, except one boy riding his bike, was off the afternoon streets. Eerie quiet broken only by a dog and cat lurking in the street.

Returned later in day to Norcia to give update to lovely National Park ranger. Turns out one can rent an English speaking ranger guide for 12,000 lire/day. That would’ve been a great plan that would’ve enabled me to learn a great deal more about flora, fauna and geology of the region. Asked her name and she said something that sounded like “Juicy.” I asked: “Like the orange?” incredulously and disappointedly; to which she replied: “Yes like fruit.” She learned English at the University and during a month she spent in London two years ago. She charmingly thanked me before I left for allowing me to help her practice her English.

Up at 6:15 AM Sunday in order to race from Norcia to Orvieto to pick up CD player and sweater which I left at La Badia (and which, of course, no one stole after I left). Then raced to Rome Airport to make 12 noon flight home.

I had endless bags of food, wine, and majolica to bring back and which weighed me down terribly. Bag broke on plane. Thank God car and driver met me at Kennedy. Just as I emerged from terminal with my bags, the heavens opened and the remnants of Hurricane Fran descended. Driver drove car through three foot high lakes on Grand Central Parkway. Finally, home and to bed at 11 PM (New York time) or 5 AM (Italy time), meaning I was up 23 hours in a row!

What a wonderful journey!

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Snow Lake (Alpine Lakes Wilderness, WA.)

Saturday, July 5th, 2003

Snow Lake looking west

Snow Lake looking north

This is a 7 1/2 mile round trip hike in the Snoqualmie Pass area of western Washington about 45 minutes by car from Seattle. I took the route to Snow Lake beginning fr. the Alpental parking lot. In getting to the trailhead, be careful if you’re using 100 Best Hikes in Washington. The directions are wrong. Trailhead is ONE mile (not two) fr. the freeway exit. Trailhead is at the first main parking lot you reach on this road (don’t continue on past to a higher parking lot). Also, you have to make a turn fr. the freeway exit onto the Alpental Road (there is another road at this intersection that you might mistakenly take).

100 Best Hikes warned me how popular this trail is–and they were right. On a Thurs. in early July there were scores of hikers on the trail. Most were nice, unassuming, friendly folks but there were a few loud parties which tended to ruin it for the rest of us.

I guess this trail is popular because it has relatively low elevation gain & is an easy trail with a big payoff at the end. I wish the trail were harder or longer to discourage some of the masses of people that clog it up a bit.

Snow Lk., as its name implies, still had snow & ice both in the lake & on surrounding slopes. Some snow on the trail itself (bring a hiking pole). What a gorgeous site to see the lake cirque surrounded by Cascade peaks. Be prepared that temps. can descend 5-10 degrees once you descend fr. the saddle to the lake below. Winds & clouds pick up & it can be quite a bit colder than the Snoqualmie Valley side.

There is little direct lake access but nice spots above the lake for lunch. The log bridge over the outlet stream is beautiful with the detritus of logs & rocks creating a striking setting; along with the thundering outlet stream rushing straight downhill through a narrow shoot. My Lab had a great time fetching sticks I threw into the freezing cold, clear green lake waters.

Bugs are just starting to become a problem so bring insect repellant.

If you’re a hearty dad with a strong back & a good toddler backpack, I think this would be a great hike to bring a toddler on. Not too long, not too steep but with beautiful views along the way. A great introduction to the outdoors for a little one. One small drawback is that there isn’t a lot of flat open space for a child to run & play in once you get to the lake. There are steep drops to the lake below, so if you take your child out of the backpack you’ll have to be mindful.

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Snow Lake (Alpine Lakes Wilderness, WA.)

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