Keep Bermuda Beautiful ... Please

Bermuda is beautiful, there’s no debating that. That said, there is that seedy, seamy side of Bermuda that most tourists would never see. This is, of course, the type of place I tend to seek out at some point or another during most of my ventures far a-field. It gives me the Big Picture of the place – el Foto Grande – la Grande Image - большое изображение, if you will.

I got that on Saturday, and I really wasn’t even trying at that point. I just stumbled into it, actually. Saturday was the day that we moved from the hotel in Southampton Parish to the one in Hamilton. Mrs. Guy was between conference sessions, so we took a taxi (since we had several pieces of luggage) over and checked in. Mrs. Guy decided to take that opportunity to ride the ferry since it went from the Hamilton hotel to a dock very close to the other hotel. I went along to spend the time with her, but I knew I didn’t really want to ride back on the ferry. I hadn’t really decided how I’d get back at that point.

But I did have my options planned. I figured that I could catch a bus that would take me back, or I could try walking partway on the old Railway Trail and catch a bus along the main road if I got tired of that. I ultimately decided to give the Railway Trail a try.

The Railway Trail is essentially a linear park that follows much of the old railbed from way back when Bermuda had a train that went from one end to the other. They’ve modeled it after the Rails to Trails program here in the states, and it does get a lot of use. Well, at least on the sections closer to touristy spots and closer to where the wealthy folks (the “infamous”, as one Bermudian put it) like to get their exercise. But that’s not where I was. I was in an area more populated by the locals not of the uppermost echelon (not to say it was a slum, either).

Now, out on the main roads, or out on the beaches, or near the tourist shops or in town or near parks or you get the idea, you won’t see any litter. Or at least I didn’t. It’s kept quite clean. But that’s not where I was.

The first part of the Railway Trail along my path was actually more of an alley in between houses. Cars and scooters were parked along each side. I walked right past kids playing in their yards. Quite a few yards were unkempt compared to others, but that was not a big deal. As I walked, I would occasionally get to areas where the trail was actually a trail and motor vehicles were not allowed. But people in the local area apparently used this part a lot, based on the items I saw discarded along the way.

I got back onto paved alleyways and through more neighborhoods, still noticing a good bit of debris. I even had to traverse the parking lot of a warehouse-type grocery store (where they probably never see tourists enter…and I didn’t either, though I thought about it), but I was still on the official path. And soon, I reached a part of the trail that went along the boundary of a goodly-sized county club/golf course. “Ahh,” I thought, “Perhaps things will improve.”

Of course they got worse.

The sheer amount of junk was appalling. Almost frightening, in fact. There were all of the types of things I would expect to find in a landfill. I counted no less than three twisted and mangled husks of what might formerly have been scooters shoved down the bank within about a quarter of a mile. “This must be where scooters come to die,” I muttered, barely aloud. “Yep, looks that way,” said the man I hadn’t noticed walking his dog behind me.

Almost from this point forward, though, I found a strange thing happening. I started noticing the litter less. Every once in a while I’d look around to see if it was still there – and it was…in abundance – but overall, my mind started tuning it out. I think that happens to all of us. By the time I reached the end of that section of trail and turned toward Hamilton and the hotel, it was all pushed back into my subconscious.

And yes, I ended up walking the whole way back to the new hotel. I’m not certain, but I think I walked somewhere between seven and eight miles. And thanks to that journey, I could happily abandon my plan to spend the rest of the afternoon seeking out the “dark side”.
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Trivia

OK, you know the Rules, right? And you know to send answers to bgoab at mindspring dot com as well? Good. OK then, here are this week's questions.

1. Name the characters on the front of a box of Rice Krispiestm.

2. Where is the U.S. Naval Academy located?

3. What archipelago was made famous at the onset of US involvement in World War II?

4. What is the name of the location that serves as the southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail?

5. Before the Euro came along, what was the major unit of currency in Switzerland (e.g., US=Dollar, UK=Pound, et cetera)?

Illin'

Mrs. Guy is feeling sick, so instead of posting much tonight, I'm going to go try to take care of her. Sorry, but she comes first.

Biking the Mid-Atlantic

Or “Mr. and Mrs. Guy on a Bermuda Bike”

One of the charming things about Bermuda is the fact that you can’t, and I mean absolutely can not, rent a car. It just isn’t allowed. You, as a foreigner, can’t even buy a car. Only residents can buy a car, and then at only one per household. When you think about how small the island is (something like 22 miles long) and how little roadway there is (I think Mrs. Guy read that the total was around 158 miles), you start to appreciate the limitation. Actually, calling Bermuda an island isn’t correct. It’s an archipelago, or a series of small islands. There are over one hundred, but most of the populated areas are on the seven larger ones that are joined by relatively short bridges.

So, how do you get around? Well, you have a few choices. You can take a taxi, as we did from and to the airport and when moving from one hotel to the other. You can take a bus, and the bus service is pretty decent. You can take a ferry, but you are limited to going from one docking point to another so it’s best to do that for longer hauls and then grab a bus or hoof it to your final destination (we took the ferry once, just to have done it). You can even walk, as long as you stay clear of the main roads. There aren’t many sidewalks, but there is the old Railway Trail (more on that another day).

But the most popular way to get around is by bike, which are available for rent in lots of convenient locations. Now, when I say ‘bike’, I mean the bike as the Bermudians call it, which is to say that it’s a scooter. Bikes like I would normally talk about are called ‘pedal-bikes’ there. Mopeds also exist, but the main ‘bike’ is the scooter.

Mrs. Guy and I did a two-day rental on a scooter. I thought about getting just a ‘pedal bike’ for myself, but Mrs. Guy isn’t comfortable piloting a scooter on her own. Besides, I will say this about Bermuda: Bermuda is a cyclist’s paradise or his/her worst nightmare, and possibly both at the same time. Why? Traffic and narrow roads lean to the nightmarish side of the equation, and the speed limit and the beauty of the place lean toward the paradise side. Traffic is heavy. Traffic doesn’t give way a whole lot. Many tourists aren’t good scooter drivers and might (will) crowd you out. However, the speed limit for the entire country is set at a maximum of 35 kph (approx. 21 mph). Yeah, right. Mostly traffic moved at closer to 50 kph, but that’s only about 30 mph, so that isn’t too bad. And the views....

Anyway, there was a competitively priced rental place right at the hotel, so we rented from there for Thursday and Friday. We had about five hours to go out on Thursday, so we headed west toward the Dockyards. That turned out to be a good choice, because I found out that the traffic is generally lighter on that end. It gave me time to get used to driving the scooter with a passenger and also to driving on the left (a bit of British influence there). We checked out the Gibb’s Hill lighthouse. We checked out the World’s shortest drawbridge (just wide enough to allow for the passage of a sailboat’s mast – seriously, it was less than a foot). We went to the Dockyards to see the shops, but that was a little disappointing for Mrs. Guy since we were just into the off-season. I wasn’t bothered, and besides, we couldn’t carry much on the scooter anyway.

We finished off in Hamilton (the Bermudian Capitol) before heading back to let Mrs. Guy do her part at the conference on Thursday. On Friday we headed east from the start and checked out some of the south beaches, the town of St. George, and tried to find Tucker’s Town (unsuccessfully, though we did find the golf course). We got rained on a little going back to the hotel, but it ended before we got there and we weren’t terribly wet. I went back out for a little while when Mrs. Guy went off to do the conference-thing. I mostly drove along the south beaches trying to find good photography spots, but I only found a few due to the still occasional light showers and the generally bad (i.e., cloudy) lighting conditions.

I personally thoroughly enjoyed my Bermuda biking experience. I think Mrs. Guy also had fun, though the sometimes long periods on the seat and the heavy traffic in Hamilton gave her pause. But we survived it with no injuries to body or psyche, so I guess it’s all gravy.
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This post was delayed a bit tonight. I went to vote. What usually takes me five to ten minutes too an hour and a half tonight. Either more people are voting this time or my local precinct has increased in population by about 1200%. Just doing my civic duty, I guess.

And, of course, I voted for Bill and Opus.

Wishing...

OK, we’re back home from Bermuda. We got in late last night (there’s a story there, and I may yet tell it). On the whole, I enjoyed going to Bermuda, but I wish certain things had been different. What kinds of things?

I wish Mrs. Guy had more time to spend with me on Thursday and Friday. Not that I’m complaining about the time we had, because we did get a good portion of the day together, but it could have been better. Especially Friday, but there’s a little more later about that.

I wish food hadn’t been so expensive…or so good. It is expensive for two main reasons. First, a lot of it has to be imported. Bermuda grows some of its own food, but not nearly enough. Second, it’s a tourist market, and the market will bear it, especially at the nicer restaurants where we ended up for the most part. The problem with it being so good is that I ate way too much of it.

I wish the weather had been better, but you have to make the best of it. Still, I had really hoped to spend most of my “sans Mrs. Guy” time taking pictures, but the wind, clouds, and frequently light and/or misty rain put a damper (no pun intended) on that.

I wish we had…well, that’s a spoiler for tomorrow’s intended post.

I wish we hadn’t played musical rooms at the conference hotel. When we first found out we were going, we took over the reservations of the fellow that Mrs. Guy was replacing at the conference she went to attend. We added an extra day on the front end because Mrs. Guy was nervous about getting in on Thursday late with little or no time to set up for that evening. Of course, that did give us almost 24 hours free, but that’s beside the point. Our first night’s room was on a separate reservation, and it was pretty nice, but we had to move for the second and third nights into a room that wasn’t so nice. I could go on and on about it, but just to give you a small sample of the downgrade I can tell you that we went from a room with a harbour view (which was OK, but not of the ocean) to a room with a view of a wall and the hotel’s loading dock. ‘Nuff said.

I wish we hadn’t had to change hotels for the last night. Because we had to make our plane reservations so late, we couldn’t get a flight out on Saturday. The conference hotel was booked full for Saturday (huge Rugby tournament on the island). We ended up moving over to that hotel’s sister hotel in Hamilton, where we got a room with a view of … well, they said it was a “garden view”, but it was really a parking lot view, unless that’s where they grow asphalt. While Mrs. Guy was over wrapping things up back at the conference, I decided to spring for the extra $70 to upgrade us to a deluxe room with a view of most of the island and a whole lot of water. I earned points with the Mrs. On that one.

I wish we hadn’t wasted two hours on Sunday by getting to the airport early hoping to go ahead and get our bags checked in. That’s a story for another day as well.

I wish I hadn’t had to get up this morning and go to work. Gotta pay the bills, though.

Lastly, I wish that Mrs. Guy wasn’t feeling sick, but she started fighting a sore throat on Saturday and I think that the air travel pushed her resistance past its limits.

All of the above, except the last one, are really minor things, and didn’t make my time in Bermuda worse at all. On the contrary, they gave me a few stories to tell. Tomorrow I promise to start on some other stories, and maybe even tell one about two wheels.

Mea Culpa

OK, I think I owe everyone a bit of an explanation. I’ve been away from the blog lately because:

1. We threw a cocktail party on Friday evening. I spent almost all day Friday getting ready for it and was up until 2:00am or so.
2. I spent all day Saturday at the mountain bike race, AKA “The 12 Hours of the Hill of Truth”. The first seven hours were spent wandering around with Joshua and Elle taking a huge number of photos of the racers. The next seven or so hours were spent doing the scorekeeping on the second shift (Jay N. set up the software and hardware and took the first shift).
3. I spent almost all day on Sunday going through about 200 or so photos that I took on Saturday and also setting up my storefront website.
4. On Monday, I found out that somebody had already found my storefront (even though I wasn’t ready with it yet), so I felt compelled to go through the rest of my photos (around another 150) and get them up there.
5. Tonight I’ve been filling the few orders that have already come in (the official site announcement was made today) and,
6. I will start packing at any minute now to go on a trip out of the country tomorrow. Yes, that’s right. I’m going out of the country. Where? Bermuda. I’ll come back on Sunday.
   

Now, before you start hating me, I’m going to Bermuda with Mrs. Guy since she is going for work. It’s a rare opportunity to go spend several days on a sub-tropical island with a camera in hand. And because it’s a business trip for her, we only have to pay my airfare and food, saving us the $250/night hotel bill. Just admit it, you’d do it too.

What this means is that I may or may not have web access over the next five days. I don’t know what the situation is in Bermuda, or if I’ll actually have an internet-connected computer anywhere near me. Trivia may or may not happen this week. If not, I’ll try to make it up to you.

So, I’ll see you when I see you, ‘kay? (Hopefully soon. Tomorrow evening, if I’m lucky.)

Oops, I Did It Again...

Sorry about telling you what I would post today, but it isn't going to happen. I spent most of the day yesterday taking pictures and then doing scorekeeping at a mountain bike race. I spent most of today PhotoShop'ing a lot of those photos and setting up the website to put them all on. It's been a long day.

I did at least get out on the bike briefly to run to the post office and the grocery store, but that was hardly long enough on such a beautiful day.

I can't promise about tomorrow either. I only got to about 300 of those photos, and I still have about 150 more to get to after work tomorrow. Add to that the ride I want to do with Wally and possibly Joshua, and then I still have around 120 of Joshua's photos to go through.

It's gonna be a full day.

Time? What Time Do You Think We Have?

Not much, apparently.

I meant to post yesterday to answer last week's trivia questions if nothing else, but time slipped away. We hosted a party last night, and I spent more of the day getting ready for it than I thought I'd have to. C'est la vie.

I also don't have time for a proper post today. I'm heading out in a little while to help work the 12-Hour race, and I likely won't get back until after midnight.

So check back tomorrow. I may even have a few pictures (if the rain holds off). And I will also answer trivia.

Teknikul Difikultees

I know there wasn’t a post last night, but I tried. I sat down at the desktop with a rough notion of a post subject in mind, but it didn’t matter.

This was my approximate experience last night. Imagine this text accompanied by an interpretive dance. Imagine the dance as performed by Heidi Klum or Napoleon Dynamite, per your own personal preference.

“OK, here’s my post for tonig …………. We are experiencing technical difficulties. Please stand by ........................................ Are we back on? Great, just let me ..................................... HTTP 404 Error: Server Not Found ……………………………. And then when I – huh? Oh, we’re back again? Are you sur ………………. Please forgive any delay. We are aware of the problem and are working on [click] nobody else was ready either. Oh, it’s working? OK, let me try to …………………………………………… skg ………………….. sfoih4h/%hri …………………… so we went – ah, it’s ba ………………….. HTTP 500 Internal Server Error …………….. 404 Error: Server Not Found ……………….. HTTP 404 Error: Server Not Found ………………………………too bad, since I was – oh wait, it’s back up. No, I don’t know for how long, but maybe this time it will ……………………………. We are experiencing technical difficulties. Please stand by ………………………….. Ah, back again, eh? Well, you aren’t fooling me this time. I’m going to bed.”

So I ended up giving my muse a much needed night off.
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Trivia

OK, I know I haven't updated the points in a few weeks, but I will try to do it tomorrow if I can. Remeber to follow the Rules and to send your answers to bgoab at mindspring dot com. You have until the next set of questions come out to answer these.

1. NAUI and PADI are governing bodies for what sport?

2. Most people likely know who Ichabod Crane is of "Sleepy Hollow" fame, but do you remember the name of the woman he was in love with?

3. Who is the real Slim Shady?

4. Who wrote the classic "Brave New World"?

5. Name at least three major characters from Matt Groening's Futurama.

Bonus Non-Scoring Question: What are you dressing up as for Halloween?

Loco Motive

Well, I'm officially trained now. In what, you might ask? Well, in the scoring system to be used during this weekend's 12 Hours of the Hill of Truth mountain bike race. I'l have several volunteer duties on Saturday, and one of them will be to run the scoring system on the computer after dark.

My first duty will come early. I told John B., who is putting on the race, that I'd come and help with registration before the race starts at 11:00 am. Just before the start I'll be heading out on the course with Daniel, Josh, and Elle, or any combination of the above, or possibly by myself, in order to take pictures of the race as it unfolds. That will last until the light starts to fail. Sure, I could continue to take pictures after that, but I think that most of the racers wouldn't appreciate having a flash go off in their eyes as they try to negotiate a technical section of trail. I know I wouldn't.

So anyway, come dusk I will head back in to the scoring area and take over for Jay, who will have manned the system up until then. His plan is to take off to a checkpoint with Tom for a late marshalling shift. I hope to have Elle or Josh or Daniel with me too, so I can have one of them downloading all of the photos so we can see haw we did capturing the daylight hours of the race.

The scoring setup is way too cool. We'll be using barcode readers to automate the process. We'll also have a local wireless hub set up so anyone in the camp area can check the scores in near-real time. And the kicker is, we'll also be posting the results to the web at the same time. Last year I heard we had someone from as far away as Asia checking the scores once in a while.

So I guess I'll be busy, eh? Don't expect a post from me on Saturday. I doubt I'll get back home until well after midnight anyway.

I guess I better remember to take lunch and supper with me, huh? Maybe next year we'll open up concessions...
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After my training session with Jay I went over to the Tomato Head to get a sandwich to go for dinner. I had to wait a few minutes for it, so I went back outside to enjoy the evening air. While out there, I watched a couple - probably in their late twenties - walking by. The guy put his hand on a rail at one point and apparently there was something gooey or slimy on the rail, which was of course now on his hand. The girl hadn't noticed this, so he slid around and - I kid you not - dragged his hand through her hair. She would have thought he was just playing with her hair, but he was actually wiping his hand off.

I was in an odd mood all afternoon, and something in me at this point just couldn't let that go. So I walked up to them of course.

Me: Excuse me, but I just have to ask, why exactly did you do that just now? I mean, what were you actually thinking?
Him: (sounding unsure) Huh? Uh, what are you talking about?
Me: That thing you just did with her hair. You know, wiping whatever you just got on your hand off in her hair?
Him: Uh...
Her: What?!? (feels the back of her head) What the...? You [string of expletives]!!! What the [additional expletive] do you think you were you doing?!?
Me: Not to meddle, but that's what I wanted to know.
Him: (directed at me) Hey, [expletive] you!
Me: No thanks, I'm straight.
Her: (to him) Hey! Answer me!
Him: (to her) Hey baby, it's not like that. I didn't do anything.
Her: [Reference to bovine scatology]! There's stuff in my hair!
Him: Hey, I don't know how that got there...
Me: ...and chivalry breathes its last...
Him: (to me) [Same expletive] you!
Me: Again, I'm straight. Perhaps you should develop some better bon mots and witty repartee to spice up your conversational lexicon.*
Him: [Expletive] this! I'm outta here! (Exit, angrily but quickly, stage right)
(Pause as he leaves)
Me: Sorry about all that, Kate, but I figured you should know.
Kate: Well, I'd been thinking about dumping him anyway. I guess this makes it easy, if somewhat abrupt. Thanks, Big Guy. I didn't even see you there, but I'm glad you were around. What is this gunk in my hair, anyway?
Me: Dunno. Looks like it could be some grease or something. So, do you need a ride somewhere?
Kate: No. The silver lining is that I'm the one that drove, so now he has to figure out how to get back to his place across town. (Laughs) I hope he has to walk the whole way in the cold.
Me: That's the spirit. Well, I'm just glad I didn't get shot or something.
Kate: Not to worry. (Shows me the inside of her purse) I got my Concealed Carry Permit last year.
Me: Just what a knight in shining armor needs. A damsel with a sidearm to protect him.
(Close curtain to sound of good natured laughter)

* Man, I really loved saying that.

Who's Counting, Anyway?

What’s all the fuss about? I mean really?

OK, I guess I should mention what I’m referring to. It seems that there has been an intellectual-like battle going on over the use of the term “The Sixth Estate”. I’ve been watching a discussion on an other website to remain nameless here ( I refuse to give them the web-traffic) that started out as a disagreement and rather quickly devolved into a flame war. The word "vitriole" springs to mind. Over what? The Sixth Estate.

For those of you who don’t know what this is all about, let me offer the following summary. In medieval Europe, the first, second and third estates referred to the estates of the realm. The First Estate was made up by the clergy and the King. The Second Estate included the nobles, or royals, other than the King (see First Estate). The Third Estate was everybody else not included in the First or Second Estates.

At some point in history, the Fourth Estate was given over to the Press, or print media. Why? I don’t know, but there you are. Bob’s your uncle and all that. A bit later, the title of the Fifth Estate was taken over by the electronic media (not to mention that both a Canadian TV newsmagazine and an American anarchist newspaper used the name). Why? Again, I don’t know. Bob’s wife is your aunt, I guess.

So, what about the next number in line? What shall become the fully expected and natural progression of things as the Sixth Estate? Well, here is where I wish that there was actually somebody in charge of assigning these numbers, instead of leaving things to the loudest and most persuasive (or pernicious, as the case may be) voice. Some say it should be this. Some say it should be that. I’ve heard a number of suggestions as to what “this” and “that” should be. It seems a lot of people have an opinion. And sure enough, eventually when certain people have opposing opinions that they’ve invested their time and energy espousing, all Hades* will break loose.

And what are the options for argument? Well, if I weed it down to eliminate the silly ones, at least in my opinion (uh-oh, I’ve got an opinion…flames and name-calling will surely follow [sigh]), it comes down to just two.

1. Bureaucracy, or at least a certain bureaucratic mentality as it relates to trying to counter Estates Four and Five. Well, it’s actually a little more complicated than that. If you’re interested, you can read up on the concept here (this link is the basis of a lot of the argument for this option).

2. The Blogosphere

Hmm. The Blogosphere is definitely more fun. Seeing as how I’m a willing participant out here on the fringe, I think I prefer that one.

Aw, forget it. Who cares? It's all arbitrary. I think I’d really prefer to just go ride my bike.

* This is a relatively PG-rated blog, you know.