share the trail

the only thing separating maine from kentucky are rebel flags, phonetic stress put on the letter "r", and about 3 feet of snow.

rednecks are heavily camouflaged up here; subarus, ski poles and a kilo's worth of expensive puffy jackets make them hard to spot, especially as the breed native to the northeast never actually develops a mullet.

in the southeast, sharing single track with equestrians is tedious and riddled with rather large and fibrous turds, but far worse than ticks, rattlers and mountain lions- even bubba on an ATV- are the fact that maine's trails are on 'guns and ammo lock down' august through november, showcasing a different weapon of the month. november is the crossbow.

in maine, a home owner must post signs on their property stating that they have had endless meetings with the bank, some lawyers and a plethora of annoying real estate people for the privilege of having hundreds of thousands of dollars withdrawn from their checking accounts every year. should the happily mortgaged choose not to nail garish plastic message boards at the perimeter of their property, then it is within the jurisdiction of any redneck worth his blood alcohol level to take a fire arm onto said property and shoot at will in the direction of anything deemed worthy of sharing that evening's dinner plate with some mashed potatoes and A1 sauce.

staying classy in the 04240

small(er) town living means being on a first name basis with your mail carrier, facebook friending- and donating farm animals to- the postmaster at the down town building, and being given your very own nickname ("fred") by the postal workers in the back sorting office. it also means contributing to the max. capacity for fire safety statutes at 'maine's very first gay bar's last night in business'.



preconceived notions that a new england drag show is just an endless stream of leggy blonde lovelies twirling ski poles on their adam's apple, or at the very least a puffy jacket striptease down to the long, silk undies, are about as false as their fleece lined implants.



these are: thepeopleofwalmart.com(afterhours).

yee-haaaaaaaaaaaarrr! *

any remaining thoughts that maine was over run with hot, but edgey looking models from the patagonia catalogue, have been ousted by the reality that most residents hate winter, and are as familiar with ski's, snowboards, and syrup as the assumption that all californians shoot out of the womb on a surf board, munching sushi rolls.

snowstorms appear to be a retail redneck repellant, where wal-mart's statewide are missing the usual trolley gauntlet in the canned meat and cheese aisle-- because their "guests" are racing snow mobiles at the nearest body of frozen water.

the "snowdeo", predictably sponsored by budweiser, has more corn dogs per frigid square foot, than the midway at the kentucky state fair. i can only hope that they actually have monster trucks (with chains on the tyres) launching over school buses.



* new england hillbilly translation

share the road

over the course of many courses, i have run by (and occasionally into) a veritable bevy of animals, vegetables and minerals. a typical 5km excursion is not complete without at least one sighting of the common and pestilent species 'pick-up-truckus-full-of-mulleted-rednecks', often heard braying a rather futile call to courtship; "run forrest, run!" punctuated with a loud whistle or honk of the horn-- for the hard of hearing female. it is a wonder that their phylum is not extinct, but even amoeba's can multiply.

depending on the geographical coordinates, i have run the gauntlet of a country road full of listless sheep outside cambridge, dodged an assault course of turds left by the bahraini prime minister's herd of camels, and had a man in spandex give me an extra little push up a steep hill.

i have even been overtaken by a chain smoking gentleman (of a rather portly disposition) at the helm of a hover round, complete with oxygen tank and associated breathing apparatus- presumably for those taxing uphills.

yesterday, however, i witnessed my first cross country roller skiier(?) (obviously unique to this region), go sailing through the traffic lights.



i look forward to seeing an atlantic lobster, navigating the bunny slopes, this winter.

yankee doodle redneck

kfc's are to the bluegrass state, as red lobster's are to vacationland (that's kentucky and maine to those of you not proficient in your state license plates), and these fast food eateries are surprisingly lacking in both aforementioned locations. contrary to the perception that new england is the breeding ground for harvard grads (separated by half a degree from the kennedy's), that were weaned as infants from maple syrup to lobster, quoting thoreau, en francaise, from the cradle, to become nobel prize winners who drive an l.l. bean upholstered subaru to the family's private ski resort, the illusion is dispelled when walking into any wal-mart (vermont may have banned billboards from their landscape, but you cant outlaw wally world); which are just as replete with wifebeater wearing folks, as any rebel flag loving mullet man, in dixie.

in the northeast, however, roundabouts are as commonplace as the very anglo-saxon sounding streets/counties/towns (gloucester, scarborough et al., although the pronunciation is somewhat reminiscent of a midwesterner's elocution of versailles) and yankee motorists actually know how to use them.

roundabouts are also one of the few traffic features that don't have a toll booth upon entering or exiting them.

kentucky: where the grass is blue, the necks are red, and colonel sanders isn't as popular as ronald mcdonald

10 years ago when i announced that i was going to graduate school in kentucky, i was met with the: "i just smelled boiled eggs dipped in cat litter and deep fried in garlic" face. i personally, can imagine far worse places to pack your 'two suitcases at 40kg' luggage allowance, to begin accruing tuition debt at exorbitant international student rates. while kabul and east st. louis no doubt offer a competitive package for inexpensive accomodation and an affordable cost of living, the 'getting shot at/stepping on a landmine while nipping out to the supermarket to buy a (competitively priced) carton of milk, holds about as much allure as trying on lance armstrong's bike shorts after he finished the final stage of the '05 tour de france. but then it's a bit odd what some people come to identify as "home" for themselves (zip codes with an emphasis on genocide rather than generic front lawns, or trailer parks in the midwest where the retail demand for miller light is only surpassed by the high consumer interest in sudafed), no more than speculating why a chihuahua is now an acceptable definition of "dog", or that dressing in voluminous floral trousers, showcasing every colour in the crayon box is o.k., especially when co-ordinated to match the "dog".

in the last decade, i've only seen a handful of KFC's (and certainly never from the interior), have not become destitute as a result of buying a horse, gambling on multiples of them, or just trying to purchase a regular admission ticket to the derby. my taste buds have proven impervious to the local zealour for graeter's ice-cream, or an even more inexplicable and ungodly adoration for ramsi's (a long standing "ethnic" restaurant), earning it's "genre" as mediterannean, because it serves overpriced, flavoured hummus. find me an arab who eats fire roasted garbanzo dip, and i will try to find an israeli that munches on sun dried cinnamon raisin bagels with blueberry brown sugar cream cheese. for me, "the big lebowski" was mostly experienced during REM sleep, so an entire weekend festival devoted to it, is about as appealing as a BLT is to a hasidic rabbi. i have seen muhammad ali twice, never eaten a white castle hamburger, and cannot stomach the american version of "biscuits", "gravy" or anything else that represents the "country cooking served in platters upon 20 foot long picnic tables covered in checkered cloths" food group. i do enjoy looking for rednecks, just not in a 'steve irwin to snapping crocodile' proximity. there are also many things that are not typically associated with kentucky that i have experienced, and would never have had the opportunity to do so, had i not chosen the road south of the mason dixon. now when i tell people that i am moving to maine. i get the familiar "face", followed by "wow, you know, it's really cold up there in the winter".

"no shit?!!"

obviously, living in the bluegrass state the last few years, i have been completely cut off from any news and weather that didn't involve histrionics over 'o-zone levels' and panic over the possibility of an inch of snow accumulation. however, there are just as many rednecks in the northeast as there are in the south, and quite frankly the northerner's tendency to punctuate the "ar" sound at the end of certain words (making them sound like they just got stabbed in the chest), grates on my ears more than a twangy drawl operating slower than jessica simpson's limbic system.

the kentucky state fair

apparently there was a redneck convention going on somewhere else in kentucky this weekend, because the mullet tally at the state fair was highly disappointing. and i cannot accept that america's trailer parks have received the bulletin that this "do" is done.

while i could count the number of mullets on one hand, the balance was tipped by the volume of obesity at the fairgrounds, further enabled by a surfeit of motorized hover-round wheelchairs. fortunately they are now designed (baskets on the handle bars) with deep fried concessions in mind. perhaps the real kodak moment of the afternoon was the 7 months pregnant carnie; standing in the shade, puffing on a cigarette.

i did not see any flying mormons this year. i did not laugh until my stomach hurt.
entertainment rating: 1 and a half stars.

leave a message

i have a pretty high tolerance for irritating habits and people (except when im hungry), one look at my social circle and immediate family is a testament to this.

i deplore the regional (rural) phone message etiquette that ends with an "if you don't care to call me back at 123-(up yours)". this is a pointlessly passive signature that is not even a request. these are no doubt the same chronic apologists (never "excuse me") during an accidental collision by the photocopier room door. basic lore of psych. posits that it is that which you find obnoxiously unbareable in others (picking your toe nails with a paperclip while sitting at your desk), that is your own guilty pleasure.

and no, i do not care to call you back. be careful how you ask for what you want.

monster truck racing

there are some things in life that you don't realize are on your "try at least once before i die" list until the opportunity presents itself to you. i admit, i had my preconceptions, none of which were fulfilled. perhaps if i had gone to a monster truck rally in kentucky it might have had a little more "culture". it would appear that anything loosely resembling a sporting event has mandatory tailgating; there were RV's, lounge chairs, and grills set up all around qualcomm stadium. i was on "mullet watch", unfortunately i didn't see a single, solitary waterfall or rattail. in fact, there didn't even appear to be a majority "type" to the audience as you might find at a nascar race or WWF event, which i have yet check off my 'to do' list. i saw bruthas in bling, the requisite pack of randy teenagers, but mostly middle class suburban families in charger wear, bundled up in blankets.

the schedule included monster truck racing, motorcross tricks, souped up golf cart racing (thats what they looked like to me, i almost expected johnny knoxville to be in the lead car), and finally the monster truck freestyle aka carnage. the noise was unreal, and in the way a newborn's scream triggers lactation, the loud humming and buzzing had me yelling for all i was worth. the air was thick with the smell of gallons of burning fuel, but it was sweeter, closer to hot nail polish remover. none of the trucks tipped over, flipped, or lost their cabs, but they almost did. as a viewer, there is that split second of held breath, not dissimilar to when ice skaters are launching and twirling, when they might just fall, and if they did it would be messy, but when they don't your sort of disappointed.

i still haven't been to a rodeo, or a good hog wrestle, but i think higher on my list is probably the tomato throwing festival in spain.