There's a storm coming

There’s a storm coming. Hurricane irene is probably going to turn into a tropical storm though. So I’m not too worried about it. I parked my car far in the garage though. So far that my neighbor is gonna have trouble getting into her car from that side. Oh well.

I successfully hoisted a couch up over the porch railing today. We couldn’t fit it up the stairs, so I attached some straps and created a pully with a long piece of line. It worked! It was fun.

I’m really tired from playing basketball today, gotta get some rest. Cya.




Here's a cool photo of bled, slovenia, where the world rowing championships are occurring as we speak.

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Almost only counts in horseshoes and handgrenades

Almost only counts in horseshoes and handgrenades


















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Still here

Holding on

Big changes in my life recently. I cooked the food in this photo. Bacon wrapped shrimp in jalapenos and some grilled carrots. But lemme find another photo.

Hm everything's good. I'm already kind of exhausted.

It’s been a good summer. I’ve most recently kayaked on essex river out to crane beach, and the upper piscataqua river up to vaughan woods state park in maine. Pretty epic! I’ve taken some photos which I should get up here too.

it’s August. I hear august. My august has been pretty mellow, but as of today has gotten really busy.

I’m a little melancholy today because I don’t think I’m going to be able to row in the head of the charles because of an intercostal muscle injury which I think is back. ☹

We move on though. ok

"The Future"

I saw "The Future" (2011) last night.

Hi everyone how’s it going. It’s been summer and I’ve been slacking on blogging. I’ve been up to a lot this summer so it would be hard to recap. I’ve done a lot of kayaking. Sea kayaking is my new favorite thing. It’s awesome because you’re more buoyant than on fresh water due to the salt content. Know what I mean? Like how it’s easy to float on your back in the ocean. Same deal when you’re in a boat.

So you can go a lot faster. Pretty cool. I like going fast. I’ve kayaked a lot around Chatham on Cape Cod. Great times. Pleasant bay and north monomoy island have been a couple places that I’ve frequented.

Ok so back to the first sentence of this post. I saw the new miranda july movie last night at kendall sq cinema. Quick side note – the door at the end of the hallway on the other side of the fire exit door was closed. I called theater personnel to tell them. I literally had to bang on the door to get back into the theater. Near disaster.

Ok back to the future. Lol. I mean back to discussing “the future”, the movie that is. It was fun and I liked it and it was funny but I didn’t really get it. It had been hyped up a lot and it didn’t really do it for me. I didn’t understand why it was so visionary. Didn’t make a lot of sense. But I’m glad I saw it.

Oh and I saw another couple movies recently. I saw “wendy and lucy” as well as “meek’s cutoff”, which are both by the same director. They are super slow and kinda boring. But, again, I’m glad I saw them.

Aright that’s a good lil post for now I’ll be in touch peace

Post that

If there was something. Cow

Microsoft is the only. Nothing else. The

I

have

to

do

enough

lines.

i get it

i get it

img.davesplat.com

Placeholder post for now. Gotta rally. Startin the countdown.

Lots of stuff going on, lots to report. Lemme man up.

In the meantime, let's think about rowing. Hmmmmm rowing. Good times.

I'm rowing the Prouty this weekend with Dad. I'll tell you about it.

Stay cool.

Trip to the Great North Woods -- Second College Land Grant

The point of this trip was to go to the Dartmouth College Second Land Grant in extreme northwestern new hamphire in Coos County on the maine border and stay in merrill brook cabin for two nights. an amazing experience

first of a couple recaps below, sent in a gmail to the general public.

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just sent this to a friend and realized that i could send it around to capture some of the magnificence of the past three days.

trip was incredible. we saw moose! on the drive up actually. there was one along the road (rt 16 up in the great north woods i think), that we pulled up alongside. i've got the photo on my phone, i just gotta upload it. then we saw one moose up ahead literally run in front of a minivan. it was actually kind of scary.

other than that we didnt see a ton of wildlife. some turkey, some grouse, a woodchuck, and maybe a beaver. still, the trip was unbelievably epic.

saturday Kane and i paddled upstream on the dead diamond, which was challenging, but at that point we only had one car. it was so peaceful and beautiful and untouched. the mosquitos really got to me, and i actually got a bunch of bites on my head of all places because i was wearing a visor.

Alex showed up that night and then the next day we left a car downriver and kayaked the entirety of the dead diamond river. took about five and a half hours with a stop for pb&js. so incredible. my favorite part was 'slewgundy', this series of deep pools. i'll never forget it.

the cabin was awesome as well, and it was tough leaving, but i was ready to get away from the mosquitoes by that time. i wrote in the logbook too, some funny entries. yesterday we paddled the magalloway out to lake umbagog which was giant and gorgeous. we paddled across the entire thing (if you look at a map you'll see that it actually stretches across to the maine border). went for a swim and made it home, exhausted and sore.

stopped for dinner at tilt'n diner in tilton, nh. made it back late last night. took a shower and a benadryl so that bug bites would ease down cause i'm so allegic.

i wanna go back there. it's a special place.

OK -- back to business

Yikes. Back to business? I was gonna say back to life, as in I feel like I am finally recovering from the kayak trip, but then I just randomly said back to business. Is my life business? Is my life, forbid, transactional (I manually inserted the HTML tags in microsoft word to get that word to be italicizied)?

Ugh, what a horrible word. Transactional. If money is the root of all evil, is a transactional existence all we have? What a horrible thought. We must detach ourselves from transactional thinking. Transactional thinking is inherently separating and demarcating. A different kind of thinking approaches the union of two entities as a symbiosis and power generating force rather than a one way connection.

Existing in a transactional state of mind and acting daily as a consumer reiterates common behavior associated with modern capitalism. By seeking to unify, unite, and join separate beings and associated actions, we can better connect with each other. We must recognize the second currency other than money/material goods: time, a new form of highly valuable currency in today’s rapid fire maelstom of electronically-mediated living.

I prefer unitive thinking. Unitive thinking draws each of closer to one another, recognizing that a lonely existence is bereft of greater human accomplishments such as compromise, teamwork, and love.

Only connect, only connect, only connect. Only unify, only unify, only unify.

Back from kayaking trip

So tired. Need to blog more. I will.

America's Cup Catamaran Capsizes

This is a good place to show you my beautiful kayak. I have not capsized it yet, and I don't plan to. I really, really wanna paddle really, really soon. Isn't she gorgeous? This is the color scheme I have too, looks just like that. It's LONG. Seventeen feet is a lot of feet.

Or at least I think this is the catamaran that will be entered into the America's Cup.

This movie is kind of terrifying, but undeniably impressive. If you’ve ever capsized in a boat before (I’ve only capsized small sailboats, and most of the time deliberately) then you’ve got an idea of how scary it can be.

One of the crew members got hurt. I’m putting this up because I love sailing and I love catamarans, and it’s also got some serious shock value. Couldn’t resist.

Virus shmirus

Here are some photos of the Mavericks celebrating in Miami after they won the NBA Finals. It was a good finals. So funny seeing Lil Wayne there too. What a nut.

What’s up folks. Wow, forgot I had a blog there for a moment. Weak sauce.

So I’ve been witness to a couple viruses recently. First my folks got one. I think it might have been because I disabled virus settings on their comp when they got it. My bad! I was able to fix it by watching a walkthrough on a different computer. All I had to do was show hidden files, then rename some hidden file in safe mode. I was happy with myself cause I’m not a windows guy, but also kind of ashamed. Lol, oh well. We move on.

I had a good weekend. Went down to Chatham, MA. stayed at the mill pond cottages. I’m gonna post this link up here because it’s recommended. We stayed in the windmill. A freakin windmill! Was awesome. Pretty cool waking up in a really old windmill with some rad views. It rained some, but we were still able to do outdoorsy stuff. Went out on the boat with K and Chris and Amy and D. we were out there for a long time. there were mostly just fishermen out there, guys in boats and guys in waders by the shore. Got up to like 30mph at one point, which was really fast. I’m just glad we didn’t beach the boat or otherwise run into any difficulty.

The Windmill Cottage at Mill Pond Cottages

Also went for a walk along lighthouse beach. Lighthouse beach is one of the best beaches in america. Don’t believe me? Ask dr beach, or whatever his name is. It’s huge and beautiful. There are a ton of seals that congregate at low tide. Like, hundreds of them on this one little sandbar. Some of them would come close to the shore, fishing, and it was awesome seeing them up close. They’re so sleek and big and fast and beautiful. Fun.

I just got some kayak booties. I’m excited about this. I’ll tell yall more soon, peace

Eeny, meeny, miny, moe

Catch the tiger by the toe

If it hollers let him go

Gooooood morning everyone. It’s a beautiful day outside. Gonna be hot out. I’m wearing shorts. I watered the plants this morning. I got a couple tomato plants on the back porch and some parsley too. Parsley tastes pretty good.

It’s gonna be pretty hard to be patient enough to wait for the tomatoes. I used to not even really like tomatoes, but last summer I grew to love eating farmer’s market tomatoes with basil, mozzarella, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar. Hmmmmm yum I can’t wait to eat that again

Speaking of, I haven’t been to a farmers market yet this year! I guess I’ll go to one this wknd. Gotta do it. Or I could try to find one to go to during the week. We’ll see.

Last night was cool. Matt F showed up out of nowhere. Texted me and before I knew it we were hanging out. Saw Ben and D and went to middlesex for a couple drinks. Good times, good to have you (briefly) back Matt. I really hope I see you again soon brother.

The photo posted here is of the lightning storm from last week. Craziness.

Hmmmmm lemme think of some other stuff to write, ttys.

The time has come

To go to Charles River Canoe and Kayak. I am excited.

I can’t stop reading the Dartmouth Outing Guide, reading about the second college grant etc.

More dartmouth blabbering – congratulations to the men’s varsity lightweight eight, who won a bronze medal at the IRA today. A great accomplishment.

Also – must see tv tomorrow – the college rugby sevens tournament. Dartmouth hasn’t lost yet! They play penn state. I’m gonna try to watch it.

Went to riverfest today in cambridge, which was fun, but last year’s was way better. Got jerk chicken which was fun.

Went to rack attack in framingham today and got a kayak carrier for my car. Booyah.

Gotta go to sleep, talk soon. -D

Survived the storm

Here's a photo of Coos County, New Hampshire. Northern New Hampshire. I want to stay at the Dartmouth Second College Land Grant cabins. A ton of them are reserved though.

Made it through the storm ok. Saw crazy lightning which was awesome.

Bruins lost, pretty weak.

Really getting into kayaking, I'm interested in a Chatham 17.

Rowed this weekend too.

Sleepy.

Filling space.

Night.

Papoose

Do you know what a papoose is?

Cool map here. I like it. Weather's really hot. I'm lovin it. Gotta go kayaking and canoeing this wknd. Feelin it.

Everything's been pretty good with me. Went out and partied last night and only got five hours of sleep so I'm a little tired.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm. I watched Dartmouth women race this morning but they didn't make it to the semis from the heats. Gotta watch the reps now.

I'm excited for the new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Should be good.

I gotta watch this week's episodes of south park and modern family and such. I'm way behind on 30 Rock too. Gotta finish playing Dragon Age this weekend too. Lookin forward to it. :)

Have good long weekends everyone!

Have a heart

I like six seat's smile in the women's boat :)

Have a heart, Dave

Where oh where/Heartbreak

Listening to "Baby's Arms" by Kurt Vile. Really good. That combined with the rain outside is making me sad.

Check out the photo of the space shuttle or whatever going up to space.

Everything’s pretty good with me. I hate this weather. Hate it. I really think it affects me emotionally. I don’t really get seasonal affective disorder, but days upon days of overcast/rainy weather really starts to drive me nuts. Ugh! I guess I’ll hafta wait til this wknd for some sunshine.

I watched “Last Train Home” (2010) last night (if I were really a film student I would be underlining the name of the movie. Oh well). It was so sad. It was all about chinese migrant workers and how they go home ONCE a year for chinese new year. That’s still hard for me to believe. ONCE a year? It focused on this one family and how the parents really never even raised their kids because they were just working the whole time.

Was such a bummer. All about the life of chinese peasants and migrant workers and such. Sheesh. Made me grateful for what I have/do. I mean, I guess we all get up and go to work in the morning, but they are in like work dorms, and they probably can barely like leave the building. Sad. Jeff told me it was typical for me to watch a bumout kind of documentary like that, but I’m still glad I watched it. Was difficult to watch when the daughter and father got in a fight, but I’m gonna keep on trying to watch movies.

I’m trying to get on the blu ray kick. I’ve got “Public Enemies” and “The Next Three Days” on blu ray sitting at home. Right now I’m looking forward to getting home tonight and putting one of those on. Yes, yes I know I should read books, but on a rainy day a movie really helps.

Ok fine I’ll post the lyrics to the song that I’m obsessively listening to in their entirety. You can thank WZBC for consistently playing the best indie tunes out there. I’ll talk to yall soon, stay up. -Splatman




There has been but one true love
In my baby's arms, in my baby's arms
And I got the hands to hold onto them

I get sick of just about everyone
And I hide in my baby's arms
I hide in my baby's arms
Cause except for her, you know, as I've implied

I will never ever ever be alone
Cause it's all in my baby's hands
Shiny, shiny secret stones
In my baby's hands
In my baby's hands

I get sick of just about everyone
And I hide in my baby's arms
Shrink myself just like a tom thumb
And I hide in my baby's hands
I hide in my baby's hands

Cause except for her
There just ain't nothin' to latch onto

There has been but one true love
In my baby's arms
In my baby's arms
In my baby's arms
In my baby's arms

Donde esta la zapateria

Where is the shoestore?

Pretty cool photo eh? That’s at playa jaboncillo in Guanica. Want a map? Aright I can dig one up at some point.

So that’s a panorama that my camera took. Functionality is pretty good eh? I wish I had taken a couple more of those. We went back before heading to the airport and it was sunny but I didn’t bother taking my photo out of my backpack. Oops.

So yeah the trip was good. I’m back now and everything’s good. Celtics lost the worst game ever last night, but other than that all’s well.

Hmmmmmm have I told yall about my phone? Yeah I guess a lil. Htc thunderbolt. Battery’s not great, but it’s a lot of fun. The screen is so big that it drains the battery. Oh well. I’m enjoying it. Right now I’m having a great time playing paradise island (kinda like sim city) and also I’m totally addicted to angry birds rio. Lol good times.

Ok folks I’ll talk to you soon, peace

Comin home

Adios Guanica. You were pretty awesome. We had a great time. Bosque seco, playa jaboncillo, playa tamarindo, cana gorda, it was all fantastic. And everyone, if youre going to a certain all inclusive resort in guanica, get the all inclusive package, for the love of god. I swear we were the only people I saw with the purple wristbands. The deal was a steal, so just do it.

Everything was great, both at the resort and the area. The resort was great – good food, awesome servicice. They upgraded our room, we had a huge room with an ocean view. The food was awesome. I had spiny lobster for the first time (I still prefer maine lobster). We had a good cinco de mayo yesterday with margaritas and coronas. Fun fun fun.

The grounds here are beautiful. We saw some wildlife at some of the other beaches – some huge iguanas and a cute blue crab. D even sailed the hobie cat, she’s a natural.

Here's a photo of playa jaboncillo. We drove down a rocky dirt road to get to it (luckily we happened to be driving a 2010 Nissan Pathfinder which they gave me even though I registered for a full size, turned out to be a huge windfall). It was gorgeous, and felt like our own private beach.

It’s 80 something degrees here and sunny, but it’s back to boston. I’ll catch up with you soon. Gtg pack and so forth.

Salud, and hasta luego!

Vamos a Guanica

Hey everyone how’s it going. So I’m about to get on a plane to san juan, puerto rico. It’s been a while since I was there. I guess I was there once when I was like 14 or second. All that I remember is that the weather didn’t change at all every day (strange for a New England boy), and that there were Ricky Martin posters everywhere. I’m looking forward to more of the same!

We’re going to Guanica, which is on the southwestern coast. There’s an accent on the first A, but I’m still not sure I’m pronouncing it right. We’re going to a nice spot, and I’m very excited. It’s going to be very hot, and I may melt, but I guess that’s what pools are for.

So they got bin laden. Can you believe it? They said on the news last night that we would all remember where we were when we heard. I was in my apt, I had just gotten home, and Jeff told me. But will I remember it forever? Unclear. It was certainly momentous, and we watched Obama’s presser, but I dono if it has the same gravity as 9/11. I just don’t think that 5/1 is going to have the same staying power.

Still, pretty…awesome? I dono. I dono how to feel about it. Is this the end of the war on terror? (no) is it mission accomplished? (maybe, ehh no it isn’t) too many lives have been lost, we fought a war in Iraq for no reason, etc etc. I’ll stop there. Just give thanks for the troops, their families, and all involved.

Ok enough seriousness. Celtics lost yesterday. Boooo. I may be able to see game 2 in puerto rico if she lets me, we’ll see.

Wknd was good. Went for a bike ride on minuteman trail with Chris on Saturday. Went for a row yesterday, but we were in a double with a toe rudder, which was hard to control.

D is reading this post right now, and I feel like it’s somewhat dull. I talked her into getting coffee cause that seemed like a better alternative than trying to fall asleep on the plane or in the car.

Back to puerto rico – we’re going to drive across the country in a rental car. I’m pretty excited for this. Supposed to be a scenic drive – but I gotta keep my eyes on the road! I will take photos and try to post here. I might do a separate post with maps and professional photos of the area, cause I like doing that sometimes.

Ok yall, I’m on free wifi at logan, flight’s boarding soon, and I got a sweetheart next to me who’s saying that my writing’s not dull. I gotta go give her a big hug. Talk to yall soon, and come visit me in Guanica if you’re in the area.

-Dave