Month: May 2022

Sport of Kings and Warriors

“On the polo field, where else.”
British gold-digger Sarah Ferguson, when asked where she met her temporary husband, Prince Andrew.

True confession: I own a couple of Ralph Lauren shirts, complete with wee polo player logo. They both came from Costco and so, cost about 1/10th of their normal retail price but what the hey, I look pretty darn stylish when wearing them, if I say so myself. Not only that, I spent this weekend at the Columbine Polo Club, rubbin’ shoulders with the cream of Denver society. It’s true; I was there in my capacity as sort-of-a-drummer for the pipe band. And I was simply providing entertainment for the rich folk, but I was there all the same.

Other than the occasional rainstorm, my car Angus hasn’t had a decent wash since my parents came to visit almost two years ago. With his numerous rust spots, dents and bits hanging off, he didn’t exactly blend in with the gleaming Jaguars, BMWs and Lexuses (Lexii?) already filling up the grass parking lot. But to the credit of the parking attendants, they didn’t bat an eyelid, simply directed me to the closest available spot. A few other band members were already there, and it didn’t take me too long to swap the shorts and t-shirt for kilt and full highland rig ready for a pleasant afternoon in the sunshine.

And dearie me, did we get sunshine. It was a record breaking 102 degrees in Denver on Saturday apparently, and the only way to fully appreciate just how toasty that is, is to wrap yourself in eight yards of wool and go and stand in the sun for a couple of hours. Like any true Scot, all I wear under my kilt is shoes and socks, so I had my own little personal sauna going on down there. Oh dear doG, it was hot! Fortunately, the organizers had found the perfect spot for us to perform. On a patch of baking blacktop, right in front of the already aromatic port-a-potties and miles from the sanctuary of the beer tent. Somebody eventually took pity on us and brought water but mine evaporated with a hiss on the way down my throat.

Fortunately, Saturday’s gig was mercifully short, and we were soon inside the tent, which frankly, wasn’t that much cooler. There were large electric fans but none pointing in our direction, so we had no choice but to replenish our lost fluids by making frequent trips for free beer. There was free food too although it wasn’t until we’d each laden our plates that one of the organizers pointed out we weren’t supposed to be helping ourselves; it was reserved for the paying guests. “You can eat as much as you like tomorrow,” they said, “but not today.” Having been firmly reminded that we were merely the ‘help’, we settled in to an afternoon of people watching.

Now I’m well aware that when it’s over 100 degrees in the shade and you’re dressed in the aforementioned eight yards of wool, with a black hat, tie and vest, and effeminate little bobbly covers on the top of your socks, you aren’t really in a position to critique other peoples’ clothing choices. But that didn’t stop us. Because oh boy, there were some doozies here to choose from.

I’ll never be mistaken for a GQ model, but I have at least seen enough episodes of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy to know there are certain combinations which aren’t done. Lime green pants with canary yellow shirts, tailored shorts with black socks and lace up dress shoes, competing stripes, the works. For the most part, the women were dressed sort of tastefully but then, their outfits were often overshadowed by the feats of engineering which had gone into creating their physiques. So impressed were we guys by the plastic surgeon’s art that the girls in the band had occasion more than once to reprimand us for staring. I suppose we were lucky none of us got our tongues trodden on. Joking apart, I’m really not a fan of false boobs but some of these were truly uhm, eye-catching.

Sunday dawned with the promise of slightly cooler temperature and while the clouds kept the mercury down, it was still plenty steamy out there. We had a bit more work to do this time in that they wanted us to march from behind the goals, out to the centre of the field, then turn and head towards the main stand where we could cook a little longer during the singing of the national anthem. Polo fields are pretty big, so this involved quite a hike but at least they didn’t make us stand out there while somebody prayed, as they do at most of the Highland Games. A few more tunes up by the entrance and we were done for the day.

Remember how they told us “You can eat as much as you want tomorrow.” Well, we should have remembered the adage “Tomorrow never comes” because by the time we hit the buffet line, the wait staff were clearing things away. Yep, the food was all gone and while a couple of folk managed to snag a wee prawn salad thing in a wine glass, the rest of us went hungry. Personally, I hadn’t felt the slightest bit guilty about snagging a plateful the day before, but I know it was preying on the consciences of one or two band-members. Not any more it wasn’t and suitably chagrined, we fell like a plague of locusts on the beer tent, ready to make up the missing calories.

As I said, we weren’t the only ones in strange attire but perhaps because we were all dressed alike, and possibly because at least two of us had funny accents, we attracted a certain amount of attention. In the same way anthropologists might be attracted to a new and hitherto undiscovered tribe of jungle savages. I didn’t receive any dinner invitations but I did talk to some very charming people including one young lady called Dannell (sp?) who endeared herself to me by constantly replenishing my beer supply, bringing me a fresh glass as soon as the level in my current one neared the bottom.

Mind you, even she put her foot in it as we packed up after our final performance. She asked me when we were due to play again.

“That’s it; we’re finished.” I told her.

“Oh,” she replied “but weren’t you just warming up?”

Ouch.

First Published: 19 July, 2005

Saturday Night at the Movies – Redux

There are many things I haven’t done although I wish I had. I haven’t stood on the summit of Everest. I haven’t played football for Scotland (although if I had, I don’t think I would have been any worse than some of their current representatives), I haven’t seen the Great Wall of China and I haven’t ridden a bicycle across the United States. And that’s just off the top of my head – there are many more things I’d like to do but still haven’t managed. However, this weekend I did manage to mark one more item off my “things to do list”.

I finally made it to my first drive-in movie.

Generally when I tell people that I’ve yet to undergo this life experience the response is one of incredulity. How could I not have been to a drive-in movie? It is after all, a rite of passage for most Americans and almost everyone I know has fond memories of teen weekends spent in the front seat of a car watching the legends of the silver screen in all their 50ft high glory. But the crucial word in that sentence is “Americans”. I of course, grew up on that sceptred isle across the pond where drive-ins never really caught on.

There are a number of reasons for this. Britain doesn’t share America’s obsession with the motor car for one. This is partly because the enduring image of motoring in Britain is not freedom and the open road, but gridlock and congestion. British cars are generally much smaller too so snuggling with your honey takes a lot more dexterity than on the bench seat of a Detroit land ship. Then of course, there’s the weather. The whole concept of outdoor movie-going more or less demands that the weather be warm, and the sky above filled with stars. It’s hard to fully appreciate the nuances of the filmmakers’ craft when you’re freezing cold and watching through a windscreen streaked with rain.

“Ahah!” I hear you say. “But you’ve lived in the USA for over 12 years now – there’s no excuse for you still not to have been to a drive-in.” Yes, but you see, most of those 12 years were spent in Phoenix where the opposite is true when it comes to the weather. The idea of sitting in a car with the engine (and therefore the air-conditioning) turned off while the ambient temperatures hover around the 100 degree mark holds little appeal for me. There was a drive-in there, not too far from my house, but I believe the majority of the patrons were teenagers whose rampant hormonal drives overrode any discomfort from the heat. Even so, after three years in Colorado, where the summertime temperatures are far more conducive to motorized movie-going, and despite passing a drive-in almost every day, I still haven’t made it down there.

The challenge recently has been that they never seem to show films I want to see. I’m not really that big on brainless action movies and those seemed to be the staple fare of the drive-in. However, a friend recently put this in perspective for me when she patiently explained “It’s a drive-in, it’s not a frickin’ art-house. If you’re waiting for ‘Bob le Flambeur’ to show up, you’re going to be disappointed”. This logic was inescapable so I decided that the next time they showed a movie that didn’t actually promise to kill off my brain cells in measurable amounts, I would go.

I still had to wait a while, but this week the main feature turned out to be ‘War of the Worlds’, a Tom Cruise flick which has received mixed reviews. I’ve never been a huge fan of Cruise’s; either as an actor or a human being but some of his stuff has been passable. There are other places on the web where you can find reviews of the movie if you’re interested; suffice to say, it wasn’t as cheesy as I expected, and Cruise as usual, played himself very well. The effects weren’t bad, and Dakota Fanning is rapidly becoming my favourite actress.

But you see; that’s not really point. The movie itself is secondary to the experience; the novelty of watching a film in a setting that was totally new to me. That’s what made it such a fun night. Spoiled as I’ve been by multiplexes, it’s a few years since I’ve queued up to see a movie. However, that’s what we did here. Not shuffling along on foot like in the olden days, but in one, then two and finally three lines of idling cars, inching our way along the street. Little cars park at the front, bigger ones behind and the biggest of all at the back. Just like in school photos.

I was familiar with the concept of the speaker hooked onto the car door (I have after all, seen the opening credits of ‘The Flintstones’ many times) but what I was totally unprepared for was the option of listening to the movie via FM radio. I had never heard of this although I later learned it was introduced in the 1960’s as a way to reduce costs incurred by boneheads driving away with the speaker still attached to the door. Our truck has a factory issue, but quite acceptable sound system so the audio quality was way better than the crackly resonance I expected from the speaker.

A number of folks had brought along lounge chairs, others parked backwards so they could sit in the bed of their trucks or tailgates. I saw two small girls in sleeping bags on the roof of a Ford Explorer and one enterprising couple had brought along a couch which they set up to watch in style. I was more than happy to sit in the cab and watch the show from there although I did wish I’d thought to bring along a bottle of Windex and some paper towels like the folks two cars down from us. Our insect graveyard of a windscreen didn’t exactly enhance the viewing experience.

All too soon the film was over and as nobody else seemed to be in a hurry to leave, we were out of the parking lot and on our way home while most people were still packing up. It was kind of hot and rather sweaty, and I didn’t get as completely absorbed in the movie as I normally do in a theatre. It was also somewhat alarming to have people walking by your head every few minutes, so I doubt I’ll be seeing too many movies in this format.

Mind you; if I ever invent my time machine and get to become a teenager again…

First Published: 12 July, 2005.

Footnote 1: We learned later that we’d paid for a double-feature of which ‘The War of the Worlds’ was simply the first. Yep, we left halfway through. No wonder nobody else was in a hurry.

Footnote 2: Sadly, this particular drive-in was flattened to make way for an apartment complex less than a year after this post was written.

Sick Note

We had a wonderful trip, thanks for asking. The Light of my Life™’s folks recently moved from the Bay Area to Ventura, further down the California coast and we hadn’t seen their new house before. Their garden is a paradise for bird lovers like them and I spent a lot of time simply sitting outdoors reading. We still found time to explore some of the small towns nearby, sample numerous restaurants and take some long walks on the beach so it even felt like a real vacation.

Coming home, with all the real-world entrapments such as bills, laundry and work is never much fun but at least the dogsters were pleased to see us. (Although not quite as pleased as we’d assumed – it seems we’d made a good choice of boarding kennels.) Still, by Sunday night my shoes were polished, my lunch was made up and my laptop was sitting by the door, ready for another week in the salt mines. I was feeling rather tired so headed off to bed early, ready to be bright and cheery come Monday morning. Well, OK that was never going to happen, but you know what I mean.

By 2am I was awake again and paying a visit to the bathroom. No biggie, I’m sliding kicking and screaming towards middle age, and they tell me this is the sort of thing I can expect. Most nights I can get up, take care of business and be back in bed without really waking so I didn’t give it a whole lot of thought. Until around 4am, when I thought about it a lot. Not only was I now wide awake, it was becoming increasingly obvious I was going to be spending a lot more time in the smallest room in the house.

Even at that point however, it didn’t occur to me there was anything majorly wrong. I figured there was just some kind of icky stomach bug in there and all I needed to do was ride things out until it passed, then head into work, perhaps an hour or two later than normal. By 6am I was aware that whatever else the day might have in store for me, sitting at my desk and catching up on e-mail wasn’t going to be it. Shivering and aching, I was huddled beneath the covers wondering if I was going to live through this. By 7am I was wondering if I really wanted to.

Remember the chariot scene in Ben Hur? Remember the bit where the bad guy falls out and gets trampled by the horses as they drag him around the Circus Maximus. Well, I could empathize with him. (If you don’t remember that bit of the movie don’t bother renting it just for the refresher – those few minutes don’t justify the tediousness of the rest.) My whole body, head to toe felt as if it had received a good kicking, while my stomach and intestines appeared to be full of break-dancing flamingos.

Thinking it might settle my innards and replace some lost fluids, Dear Wife made me a cup of mint tea. It tasted quite refreshing but I managed only a few mouthfuls before heading straight back to the throne room. I’ve never really looked that closely at the inside of our toilet before; it’s quite unattractive although I did send up a silent prayer of thanks that I’d cleaned it just before we left for our trip.

Fortunately, by midday I was pretty well hollow so was able to devote my energies to squirming around the bed in discomfort. Whatever kind of cooties I had inside me, they were certainly having one big old party and were presumably enjoying the day a lot more than I was. Weak and trembling I may have been, but they were full of energy and ready to play.

By day 2 the pain and discomfort had subsided somewhat and while I still felt as though I’d been put through a wringer, I had at least regained enough strength to work the remote control on the TV. However, I’m not sure if that did anything to aid my recovery. There really is an astonishing amount of dreck on American television. The programming itself is bad enough but every five or six minutes each channel takes a commercial break, the sole purpose of which (as far as I could tell) was to promote the other garbage the channel shows. If nothing else, that was an incentive to stay employed.

That afternoon I was able to eat a slice of dry toast and miraculously it stayed down. Later still I managed a few chunks of melon. Maybe I was going to survive this after all. The biggest challenge by this time was that even though I felt completely exhausted, my total lack of physical exertion during the day meant that when night finally came, sleep was impossible and I spent the next few hours, flipping and flopping trying to get comfortable while I waited for morning.

On day 3, propped in a cocoon of pillows, I was able to sit with my laptop and take a look at some of my work e-mail. It wasn’t as bad as I’d feared, and I was pleased to receive a number of solicitous enquiries after my health. A fair number of those were along the lines of “Oh, you’re back. Good. Can you do this for me?” but overall, it seemed as though I’d been missed. I didn’t last the whole day of course, there’s no point in being home on the sick if you’re just going to work but I did make significant headway. At least until ‘Dr.Phil’ came on and I had to go to sleep.

Thursday morning found me back in the office. Early Thursday afternoon found me heading home feeling like a wet dishrag and wondering if the steering wheel has always been so heavy. It didn’t help that the entire population of Colorado had decided to take off early for the 4th of July and were sitting in front of me. But I slept the sleep of the innocent (yes,me) on Thursday night and by Friday I was up and ready to take on the world.

A good job too. If there’s one thing worse than being sick, it’s being sick on a holiday weekend.

First Published: 5 July, 2005

Ben Nevis – The Hard Way

First Published: 28 June, 2005

The other night, my friend Mike was talking about his ice climbing expeditions. Although this holds no appeal for me, I’m always intrigued by the weirdoes who find it fun. Perhaps not surprisingly, he misinterpreted my interest and assumed I was fishing for an invitation. I hastened to put him right, but in the process casually mentioned that I had in the past, done a bit of climbing. Maybe I was hoping he would be impressed as yet another hidden depth to my character was revealed. Our eyes would meet across the table; we would nod a salute of mutual respect and our friendship would be forever cemented as brothers of the rope. Real men, hard men; men who’d been tested and knew what life was about.

Instead to my distress, he demanded details and before long had ferreted out the truth that my résumé as a climber was somewhat limited and, let’s be honest, rather wimpy. Even trying to tell of the time I solo climbed Ben Nevis, Scotland’s highest peak didn’t do much to resurrect my status.

Soaring to the dizzy height of 4,000 feet above sea level, Nevis doesn’t inspire awe among too many mountaineers. Sitting at my desk in Denver for example, I’m 1,250 feet higher than its summit, while on my couch at home, I’m 3,500 feet higher still. K2 it’s not, but despite racking up many miles hiking the hills of the English Lake District, it was at the time the highest peak I’d attempted.

“Don’t follow the trail.” advised my sister as I spread out my camping gear on the floor of her Glasgow flat. “Drive round the back of the Ben and go straight up the side. It’s much faster and the view is better.” Bowing to her experience in these matters, I camped at the base and after a quick drive into town for a bacon sandwich and a mug of tea, steered my little car back along the winding road to the start of the climb. The sun was out, life was good and when I saw two fellow climbers thumbing a ride, it was only natural that I should pull over and offer a lift.

Laden with ropes, helmets, slings and other accoutrements, it was obvious this pair were the real deal. The wild beards, broken teeth, hairy arses and body odour simply hammered home the point. They weren’t tackling the Ben but instead, some obscure granite tower, the name of which meant nothing to me. Despite it being a mere 200 feet or so, they were anticipating taking the entire day just to summit and return. Not as experienced as I’d assumed, obviously.

With a note of smugness I explained that not only did I plan to summit the Ben (did I mention it’s Scotland’s highest mountain) but was doing it the hard way and still planned to be down in time for a couple of pints and a nap before dinner. Curiously, they were less than impressed.

“Where’s your gear?”
“I’m wearing it.”
“Do you have a rope?”
“No”
“Do you have a helmet?”
“No”
“Are those the boots you’re planning to wear?”
“Uhm, yes.”
(Uncomfortable pause)
“Maybe you’d better take the tourist trail.”
“Maybe you’d better get out and walk.”

In the face of such unassailable logic, they changed the subject and before long I was waving them a cheery goodbye as they unloaded their gear at the base of a soaring monolith. On then to my own climb. My good mood lasted right up until I hopped out of the car and cricked back my neck to stare up an endless slope of bigger-than-me sized boulders. Not even the mountain goats were reckless enough to try and pick their way across this terrain but somewhere here was the route my sister had cheerfully told me to follow.

Ah well, I’d come this far so for almost three hours I scrambled, slid, scraped and heaved myself over first one boulder then another. On and on as the sun rose higher and the sweat dripped into my eyes. My fashionable jeans gripped and tugged at my legs and my T shirt stuck to me like a cheap shower curtain. But it wasn’t so much the physical effort, as the fear. The fear that any one of these rocks could topple, roll or shift and trap a random part of my body, pinning me to the mountain for the rest of my life. Every time I crawled over another boulder, I could feel it wobble beneath me, just itching for the tiny bit more momentum it needed to begin a downward trajectory that would crush me in an instant. It was around this time the often-heard-but-routinely-ignored safety instructions for mountaineering came back to me. Never climb alone; always let someone know where you are; take proper equipment, blah de, blah, blah, blah.

Finally, aching and trembling, I hauled myself over the final rock and saw my goal. The Summit of Ben Nevis. I’d made it. Boulder field or not, I’d taken on this mythical mountain and won out. 4,000 feet of aching sweat and toil rewarded. I was at the top.

Me and about 500 other people. Old people, overweight people, people barely old enough to walk. The entire tourist population of the British Isles was milling around in a bovine manner, eating sandwiches, taking photos, admiring the view. All completely unaware of the Herculean task I’d just achieved. Looking down I could see hundreds more inching their way up the trail towards me.

I sat and put my head between my knees, sucking air for a while before concluding I wasn’t up to facing that boulder field again for the climb down. To hell with it, the mountain had won. I’d take the damn tourist trail. So, I did. And such was the press of humanity; it took me almost four hours to get to the base. A good five miles from where I’d left my car. And nobody stopped to give me a ride back.

Since that day, I have done some real rock-climbing, you understand. I even have several dollars’ worth of gear out in the shed…somewhere. Uncomfortable shoes, a harness which hates me as much as I hate it, a helmet with bona fide scratches, and lots of karabiners. Some of those are currently doing service on the dog tie-outs and one as a key chain, but the point is I do have them. And they’ve seen combat.

But even though I know all the lingo, have read many of the books and have summitted Ben Nevis the hard way; I still can’t pass myself off as a climber.

A Slight Hitch

First Published: 14 June, 2005

“I don’t think anyone’s going to pick us up” groused Dave.

Irritatingly cynical he may have been, but it was hard to deny, it was looking as though he might be right. I wasn’t prepared to concede that point just yet however. We had after all, only been attempting to hitchhike for about two hours, and he’d been grumbling since the start.

We were making our way home after completing a long-distance hike. We’d taken the bus part of the way but were now completely broke and still 80 miles from home. No big deal, I’d hitched that distance and more without a problem in multiple countries and was pretty experienced in the game. But I had to confess to a nagging worry that my previous efforts had always been flying solo. It’s a general rule of thumb (there’s a joke in there somewhere) that if you must hitch with a partner, it should preferably be female, blonde and drop-dead gorgeous. Dave was none of those. He was on the other hand, becoming increasingly pessimistic about my ability to procure a ride.

I was following all the rules; standing by a straight stretch of road where the drivers would have long enough to check me out, decide I didn’t look like an axe murderer and pull over on the wide shoulder I’d thoughtfully selected, and yet not so straight a stretch that they’d already be up to full speed and disinclined to stop again. I had my thumb clearly raised in the accepted style and was making eye contact with each driver as they sailed by, attempting to communicate by telepathy how interesting, clean and safe I was and how much their lives would be improved if they would only invite me into their cars. Oh, and my friend Dave too. And our oversized backpacks.

Nada.

Hitchhiking isn’t a game for people in a hurry, or for those who need to live by a schedule. Yes, there have been times when I’ve been escorted to my destination by a succession of fast cars with barely a moment’s wait between them. On one occasion I made it from my front door to the centre of Edinburgh, some 150 miles away, in a whisker over 2 hours after being picked up by the first car to come along, driven by a company executive who by coincidence was following the exact same route as me. Other times I’ve had multiple lifts separated by no more than a few minutes. In Australia I once travelled 350 miles in 7 rides with no time to eat the sandwich I’d packed for lunch.

But more commonly a hitchhiking trip will require some hanging around. Sometimes for a long time. I was once stuck on a back road in an industrial area of Scotland and after four hours fruitless thumbing was just on the verge of walking to the next town and checking the train schedule when a delivery van came to the rescue by transporting me the 25 miles to a real highway. Another time, cold and hungry I waited for just over three hours on a desolate Yorkshire moor before being driven straight home by a lady who reminded me of my Mum.

But the thing is, you never know how it’s going to be. Sometimes you can wait all morning to get started, before receiving half a dozen rides in quick succession. Other times the whole day can be plain sailing while very occasionally you just get flat out stuck. Some hitchhikers turn down the offer of short rides, preferring to hold out for the longer run which might be along shortly. To me that’s a little like walking past a five-dollar bill in the hopes you might find a twenty further on. Also, if somebody has been decent enough to stop and offer a ride, then I’m not going to be churlish enough to spurn them. It’s true, there are times when you may be standing at a promising spot, and a short ride runs the risk of stranding you somewhere less appealing, but generally I’m willing to take what I’m offered.

The only downside to short rides is that you get weary of repeating the same conversational openers multiple times in quick succession. “What’s your name?”, “Where are you from?” “What do you do for a living?” and so on. I once met a Canadian who swore the next question was always “Would you like a blow job?” but that never happened to me. Generally, most drivers were just looking for a little conversation to break up the monotony of their own journey.

So to keep them entertained I sometimes got a little creative in my answers and rather than just repeating the truth over and over, would start to make things up. In my time I’ve been a trainee vet, a professional gambler, a chess master, and an Olympic marathoner among other things. Of course, there’s always the risk I’d run into someone who knew more about my chosen subject than I did, but in all my fibbing, I was only caught out once after claiming to be studying for the priesthood before learning my driver was the brother of a priest. Ironically, the only reason that popped into my head was because the previous driver had been a born-again Christian who tried to convert me.

But here Dave and I were, getting increasingly hungry and nowhere nearer home. Two hours turned into three and then to four and it was obvious that today wasn’t to be our day. We tried new locations, took turns, changed our clothes to look as appealing as possible but despite the abundance of traffic, nobody was stopping. Eventually, like the worrywart he is, Dave sloped off to find a payphone and called his parents. Oh, the shame. I’d never failed so completely before.

A couple of hours later, up they rolled to find us sitting disconsolately on the grassy verge. They teased us mercilessly most of the way home, before handing us a newspaper. As I said, we’d been on a long-distance hike and had been totally out of touch with the media for almost two weeks. Which meant we were the only two people in the country who didn’t know that there was an escaped murderer on the loose in the area with a manhunt extending over three counties.

I looked at the paper, and immediately felt a whole lot better about my hitchhiking performance. There, in two-inch high black type screamed that morning’s headline:

DO NOT PICK UP HITCHIKERS!

Now if only somebody had told us beforehand.