Friday, May 2, 2008

Return plans

When I get back from Cape Hatteras, I'm getting my wisdom teeth out so I'll be out of commish for a while. After that, I'm trying to do three days from South Salem to Rocky Neck in Gloucester where I'll take the ferry back to Boston. I'll most likely be working in the city this summer so I'm just going to be hanging out on the Islands for the summer. Maybe get down to Hull for a couple days and finish up there. Anyway, that's the short-term plan for when I return.

See you on the coast!

Brad

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

TECH UPDATE



Since my grandmother was born in the '20s and is only slightly tech-savvy, she sent me an email recently saying that her iPhone is "too complicated" and was wondering if I wanted it. !!! Of course, I said yes, thanking her profusely and anticipating my use of it (even though I will definitely feel like an asshole in the beginning when I bust out my iPhone to take a call), but hey a gift's a gift and I am extremely grateful for that.

I'm most excited though to have it's navigational opportunities at hand with the web browser. Also, the battery is said to last 250 hours on standby, which, with minimal phone usage and occasional web browsing, could last me a week or so without charging so it would be handy for long hauls. Unfortunately, the battery isn't removable so I can't just switch it out.

Anyhoo, this is keeping things looking up, just thought I'd share. Off to class!

See you on the coast.

Monday, January 28, 2008

...

So it's been much too long since I last posted. I didn't realize what taking on this challenge involves. It's so hard being in Ohio and going on Google Earth just fawning over what I'm not walking on. The same here (I'm in Iceland for the semester currently). All I want is to walk New England for now. I don't think it completely impossible in a lifetime for certain, so it's good enough for now.

What I found to be my two biggest problems last summer (I'm not including work because that's a given) were transportation and living at home. And I think I may have solved this problem. It's called Couch Surfing. Quite simply it's a trust-based online network of people with a couch to share! My two good friends Colin and Charlie used it this past summer driving to Colorado from Boston and had a really positive experience. I see this as an easy way to get places in a more secure and affordable fashion. If I do this this summer, I won't have a job and frugality will therefore have to be my credo. I just joined so I'm still exploring but I think this could be a big step in achieving my goal. Just like the bike idea, I can make this shit happen.

Summery - 2007

I did nearly 100 miles over the whole summer. Not as much as I'd hoped but still decent.

Here's where I went (north to south) and a brief memory from each

Kittery, ME (Shaun's house was great.)
Marblehead, MA (the Neck was cool...seeing a biker in front of me slam into a Jeep that cut him off.)
Swampscott, MA (Biking back to Lynn racing back and forth with this guy...also seeing unusually large numbers of Jews and hearing lots of Hebrew)
Lynn, MA (the fucking smell...finding a flophouse and what i thought was a dead guy but just turned out to be a sleeping homeless man...b
iking through the Lynn rotary)
Revere, MA (sandcastles with Creaghfish...free Cape Cod chips...Kelly's with Carolyn)
Winthrop, MA (meeting the cast of some PBS documentary show and getting a free DVD...they should've filmed me.)
Boston, MA-includes Orient Heights, East Boston, North End/Harbor area, Southie, Dorchester, and Savin Hill-(ice cream at Fort Independence...biking through the business district)
Quincy, MA-including Squantum and Hough's Neck-(how long it took...dead things and ghettoness at Gull Point)
North Weymouth, MA - CURTISS and those dudes we chilled with.

Hingham, MA - (getting a flat on the bike back...that sucked)
Worlds End - (party boats in the cove)
Hull, MA - (getting stung by two gigantic hornets and losing my machete...throwing a ball over a roof into a square of screaming kids and running away)
North Falmouth, MA - (Carolyn...Carolyn wearing shorts...my dad not knowing where we were...the first day my camera worked)

So this summer, lots of pictures, lots of chronicles, lots of couch surfing, lots of movement and miles, little to worry about. That's the hope at least. I'll keep this updated with some pics of Iceland.

See you on the coast,
Brad