The Mountain Goats

Ruth and I went to see The Mountain Goats at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston on March 14^th. The MFA theater was an appropriate venue, plain and understated. It’s mostly different shades of beige and off-white, with a bare wooden floor in front as the stage. There’s no adornment anywhere. The room isn’t flashy, and neither is The Mountain Goats’ John Darnielle.

I went to the show not quite sure what I was going to see. I had a few early Mountain Goats albums, mostly collections of songs that were originally released using a variety of formats and record labels, making them difficult to find. I wasn’t sure if the music’s lo-fi, geeky character was an affectation or a true reflection of Darnielle’s personality.

That was cleared up pretty quickly. John (it seems unnecessary to be more formal) appeared to be just as quirky as his records. He doesn’t walk when he moves across the state. It’s more of a prance, as he carries himself with his weight forward on his toes while he bounces around. When he’s talking between songs, his voice comes out with an odd cadence. Every word is carefully selected and put out there tentatively, ready to be pulled back if it meets with disapproval.

But John is a lucky geek. He’s displayed his quirks in public, and he’s found an audience that appreciates them. You can see how happy he is to bask in that acceptance as he plays.

These links will bring you to videos recorded at the show, posted by the Boston Phoenix. They’re free, so don’t complain about the ads:

Ain’t Living Long Like This

Sign of the Crow

Heretic Pride

John played most of the show with a drummer and a bass player, though there was a solo section in the middle. His band mates are talented musicians who fill in spaces around John’s performance without changing the essence of The Mountain Goats music.

The day after the show, I went out and bought two more Mountain Goats albums, excellent examples of where John comes from and where he is now. “All Hail West Texas” was recorded using John’s original process, where it’s mostly John and his guitar singing and playing into a portable boombox. By the time this album was made, the boombox was on its last legs. The noises it adds to the music are readily audible, acting almost as an additional instrument.

“Heretic Pride” is the new album. The songs are conventionally recorded and produced. It’s a significant change, but the album is still recognizably a Mountain Goats album. It could be a reflection of John’s increased confidence as his audience has grown, or it could just be that he can afford to work in a decent studio now. Either way, I’m glad that John continues to put together his vibrant little pictures of life.

Why I don’t post every day

Sometimes, events get in the way of posting regularly. For example, this weekend Ruth and I went up to Waterville Valley for some cross-country skiing. There’s not much snow left in Massachusetts, but there’s still plenty in northern New England:

Sometimes, a cat wants to use the computer:

20K

While I was entering my mileage for last weekend in my running log, I noticed that my “total lifetime mileage” since I started keeping a log in 1992 had reached 19,999 miles. As a typical runner, obsessed with monitoring my performance, that number made me pause to reflect on how I’d made it to this point, what running has meant to me, and what my goals are for the future.

While not an enormous number compared to what some of my friends have done in the same period, twenty thousand miles in less than 16 years does indicate a certain amount of consistency and persistence. My first podiatrist said I probably shouldn’t try to run a marathon. When I think back on how painful some of those miles were and how many times I’ve had to pick things up again after an injury, he may have been right. But 16 marathons (and some longer races) later, I take a lot of pride in getting as far as I have.

I’m reasonably fast for a human, though not as fast as I once was. It was evident early on that there would always be someone faster in almost every race. I’ve won a few age group awards, but my greatest successes were when I reached a personal goal of some kind.

I’ve always been something of a mileage junkie. I liked watching my weekly mileage totals pile up. Shorter races were fine, and a good way to get together with my friends and work up a thirst. But I never spent much time trying to get my 5 or 10K times down. They did come down, but mostly as a result of the work I was doing, first to run a marathon, then to qualify for Boston. I qualified, seven years after my first marathon, in 2001 when I was 40. The trend lines that tracked my decreasing race times and the increase in the qualifying time as I aged finally crossed.

I managed to bring my marathon PR down a few more times, but soon became more interested in running further instead of running faster. There were times during long runs when everything was going well and I’d feel like I could go on forever, and I wanted to explore how far I could really go.

This led to a lot more trail running, since running on dirt was much more forgiving. The longest runs came in races, some as long as 50 or 100 miles. When the goal in those ultramarathons was to finish, I did well enough. But when I went beyond just finishing to begin to encompass time goals, results were more mixed. I got my 50 mile time down below 10 hours, but when I tried to train enough to get my 100 mile time below 24 hours, I broke down. That goal remains unmet, and may stay that way. The time commitment to train for century races is enormous, and the price in pain and social isolation may be too high to make it worth it.

Running has been the foundation on which my life has rested for years now. During a good run, I’m living in the moment as much as I ever am, with the metronomic beat of a solid, steady pace lending itself to calm contemplation. Success and failure are easily measured and the responsibility for either is for the most part entirely mine, though I have received a lot of help from friends I’ve run with along the way. I’ve gotten a lot of enjoyment out of being able to pay a little of that back by making use of my experience to help others.

Currently, I’ve been doing a lot of slower running with my girlfriend. It’s been a lot of fun reliving some of my past as she finds out how rewarding it is to put in the effort in training and see the concrete results. And running is a great way to spend time outdoors with your loved ones, talking or just being together.

These days, I still run 20 or 30 miles at a time, and jump in to marathons or shorter races and see how fast I can go, but my expectations have lowered. A good race is one where I pace myself well and run strong the whole way, even if the times aren’t what they used to be. There’s a certain wistful longing for when I could run faster or go on seemingly forever. But as long as I can keep running, I’m pleased. Someday, I hope to be winning my age group by virtue of being the only one at that age left running.

Drowning isn’t good enough for him

Ruth and I were running past the Mystic Lakes in Arlington when we saw this on the narrow strip of land between the road and the water (click on the picture to see a larger version):

Since the thief left the lifevest behind, wouldn’t it be more appropriate to hope that he drowns?

Given that the boat’s owner had tethered his boat on public property by the side of a busy street, it might have been the MDC that took it away.  It was a bit arrogant of the owner to leave the boat there and expect that it remain unmolested.  Arrogance that comes as no surprise in retrospect, after seeing his response.

Caught in the maw of the system

I’m subject to random drug testing, part of my sentence for my second DUI.  I have to call in every weekday after 8AM to see if my color (I’m green) has been picked.  If it has, I have to get to the center in Southie in time to give a sample before 7:30PM.  Since I’m already at work by 8AM, if I get called in I have to go for my test after work, because the only practical way I can get back to the city from Bedford is by a bus that doesn’t start running until late afternoon.

Thursday was the first time my color was called in the three weeks since it was assigned to me.  It was also supposed to be a running day.  The center in Southie is about 7 miles from home, so I figured I’d take the T in (the center is within a mile of Andrew Station), then run back.  That meant I’d be in my tights and other running gear while I was there, but it wasn’t like I was going to blend in no matter how I dressed, being significantly older and whiter than the vast majority of the others at the center.

I jogged to the center from the T, scanned in using my center ID badge, then sat and waited (it is a government operation after all).  There were only two other people waiting in the dingy lobby ahead of me, so within a half hour I was called in. 

I had to check in with the ID again, then sign some paperwork and an evidence tracking form.  Then I went across the hall to a bathroom, and peed in a cup over a toilet with a official watching via a large mirror on the wall behind the bowl. 

Within 10 minutes, I was back out in the lobby.  While I was putting my gear back on, a line of young black men filtered through.  I was the most interesting thing that had appeared before them lately, so I drew some comment from across the room.

“Hey man, I’ll bet you just got unlucky.”

I grinned and replied “We all fuck up once in awhile.”  (See – I’m smiling, so I’m not threatened, and I said “fuck”, so I must be cool) (Nah.)

“Yeah.” (dismissively)  “You probably got a big house out in Lexington or something.”

“No.”  (I didn’t think he’d appreciate the distinction between a house in Lexington and an apartment in Arlington, so I didn’t elaborate.)

Another guy wandered over.  “You’re green. if I was green I’d be smoking marijuana. You’re like once a month.”

“I don’t know about that. This is my first time.”

“Green’s the color to have if you like to smoke or sniff.  I’m red/purple – I have to come in all the time.”  (Hmmm… – I can see how you got there.)

 By then I was ready to go so I checked out, and ran away.

Kitties!

Meet Phoebe:

and Felix:

Felix and Phoebe were rescued from a home in Lowell where there were 90+ cats. They had kitty colds when they moved in with Ruth, but they are both doing well.

Felix is an attention-whore. He loves to butt heads and purrs loudly and often, especially in the middle of the night. Phoebe was initially shy but has gotten used to the house and us. Don’t let those big innocent eyes fool you, she delights in tormenting her brother by stealing whatever toy he’s playing with. Her favorite toy appears to be Felix’s tail. At the moment, they seem to alternate between moving at kitty warp speed and total crash mode.

Click for a slide show with more pictures.

Watch the video:

Good night!

Why I don’t read the papers or watch TV news

“And I am sure that I never read any memorable news in a newspaper. If we read of one man robbed, or murdered, or killed by accident, or one house burned, or one vessel wrecked, or one steamboat blown up, or one cow run over on the Western Railroad, or one mad dog killed, or one lot of grasshoppers in the winter — we never need read of another. One is enough. If you are acquainted with the principle, what do you care for a myriad instances and applications? To a philosopher all news, as it is called, is gossip, and they who edit and read it are old women over their tea. Yet not a few are greedy after this gossip. There was such a rush, as I hear, the other day at one of the offices to learn the foreign news by the last arrival, that several large squares of plate glass belonging to the establishment were broken by the pressure — news which I seriously think a ready wit might write a twelve-month, or twelve years, beforehand with sufficient accuracy.”

-Walden, by Henry David Thoreau

Vinyl #18 – My very first time

The first album I bought with my own money was Love Will Keep Us Together, by The Captain and Tennille.  The title cut was a big hit in 1975.  Today, my preference would be for “Love Will Tear Us Apart” by Joy Division, but at the time I only knew what was on the radio in central Vermont.  It was either this, or Glen Campbell.

What was the first album you bought?

(Posts have been a bit less frequent lately – don’t forget, you can be notified when I put up a new post by using the RSS feed!)