Crawl Home

Well, we're back in Beverly and as much fun as we had down in Hilton Head, it's good to be back. Not sure if I'll be saying that tomorrow at work, but that's okay. The drive back was definitely tougher than the drive down. Here's a quick summary of the week:

• Lots of pool and beach time. Our resort had a nice little pool and the kids had a blast in it. We hit it almost every day we were there. We traveled 10 minutes across the island to the Monarch Resort to go to the beach. I was surprised that the waves weren't as strong as at Brigantine Beach near Atlantic City. Still, it was a nice beach and we had fun boogie boarding and just hanging out. We went yesterday and the lifeguards were keeping folks out of the water because an alligator was sighted. They had a guy come to try and catch it, but he didn't have any luck. We were allowed to swim further down the beach, but later they made everyone get out because a big storm was on the horizon.
• Holy sweltering humidity. We took full advantage of the AC because it was super muggy down there, as you would expect. I went for a 9-mile run yesterday and felt like I was wading through soup. Tough stuff. Kudos to bro-in-law Matt, who did a 16-miler and looked none the worse for wear afterwards. He's training for a 50k trail run (approx. 31 miles) in October, so he's in good shape already.
• Snuck in some golf. Matt and I played 18 at Planters Row, one of three Port Royal courses. It wasn't very busy because this was the last week before school starts down there. We weren't complaining. We were paired up with a couple of guys from Indy and got through our round in 4 hours. Matt hadn't played in three years and I hadn't played in six weeks, so neither of us was very sharp, but we had fun. We spotted several gators in the various water hazards, plus a family of raccoons running across the fairway on one hole. I had one interesting shot with my 6 iron when the club head snapped off and went half as far as the ball. Guess I'll finally have to buy a set of clubs; I've been using my dad's old set from 1990.
• Field recording. I managed to find some time Thursday night to record a conversation with Matt for the podcast. We talked about how he has a Red Sox fan married a Yankees fan and all the friendly rivalry that ensued. I plan to put the show together tomorrow or Tuesday.
• Endless driving. As I noted earlier, it was a tough ride home. Unlike our trip down South, we both struggled a bit with the whole staying awake thing. We left at 4:30 p.m. yesterday and hit some serious traffic as we were leaving HH because of an accident, but that was it. Deb drove until 10:30 and I took over near the NC line, driving us into Maryland. We switched again at 3 and Deb could only last about an hour before turning it back to me. And we kinda went back and forth the rest of the way, getting home at 11 a.m. Fueled by my first iced coffee ever, I drove the last stretch from past Hartford to Beverly. Crashed upstairs for several hours this afternoon. Tomorrow should be interesting.

Chillout Tent

Just a quick note from Hilton Head. We're enjoying a fairly relaxing week here at the Marriott
SeaPines resort in Harbour Town. We got here Sunday after spending a night in Charleston. The drive down was pretty uneventful. Deb drove the first five hours, I took the midnight to 5 a.m. shift and didn't yawn once. Then we alternated the rest of the way. It took a total of 17 hours with about two hours of stops mixed in. We timed it right, not hitting any major traffic the whole way. Matt, Tricia and the boys got here an hour or so ahead of us. Deb's mom decided to drive down by herself and got to Charleston later. Matt and I got in a long run Sunday morning before we checked out an old plantation and then drove to HH.

As you can imagine, it's pretty damn hot down here. It's also beautiful. Great ocean views. We've spent a lot of time by the pool and hit the beach yesterday at the Monarch resort. Matt and I are planning to golf tomorrow. We're going to leave Saturday night so we get home Sunday afternoon. Hopefully I won't be too fried on Monday morning, but I'm not going to think about that now.

Highway Star

Well, we're getting ready to head off to Hilton Head in a few minutes. Hopefully, it'll be smooth sailing. Deb managed to get a nap in this afternoon, so she's going to take the first shift. Actually, we're doing the 16 hours to Charleston, so hopefully we get there by 11:30 tomorrow morning. Then we chill out there until late Sunday morning, when we finish the trip to HH.

Last night, I ran the Beverly Homecoming 5K in 22:06 (21:58 by my watch). I was hoping to do better, but my stomach had been bugging me the last few days. Still, I finished strong. The girls had fun running the kids' quarter-mile race, too. Looking forward to doing a long run in Charleston on Sunday morning; it's supposed to be really pretty there.

Don't think I'll have much opportunity to blog from HH because we don't have a laptop and Matt's is a work machine. But I will be posting Twitter updates from my phone, which you can read in the lower right corner of this page. Later!

European Oils

A truly uninspired day going on here. No rain, but it's been alternating between sunny and cloudy. We've been kinda lazing around the house, doing laundry, clearing shows off the TiVo and reading.

Things are coming together for the Hilton Head trip. We're planning to leave after Deb's mom gets home from work, around midnight Friday. We can't check into our condo until Sunday, so the plan is to drive the approximately 13 hours to Charleston, where we're staying at a hotel Saturday night. Matt, Tricia and the boys are meeting us there. We should get there in the afternoon, so we can relax and hang by the pool and then go out to dinner. Then we hit the road by 10 Sunday and it should only take us an hour or two to get to HH. I'm bringing the clubs so Matt and I can hit the links once or twice while we're there.

Friday was a weird one. I had planned to run at lunch, but it got really dark and started pouring so I ended up just waiting a day to run and doing some leg machines at the gym for the first time in about five years. I kept the weights low, so I wasn't too sore the next day. Around 5, this isolated storm system whipped through a stretch of Beverly and Danvers that included our neighborhood. The storm ripped trees out of the ground, knocking down power lines and causing plenty of destruction in a short period of time. We lost power and Route 1A was blocked off by emergency crews so I had to take the long way around to get home. We ended up losing power for seven hours. Deb, her mom and the girls had gone to run some errands, so I grilled up some hot dogs and sausages for dinner.

I had to leave around 8 to meet OJ at the Paradise to catch the Destroyer show. It was a light crowd due to the lack of college students and the general obscurity of Destroyer, which is a one-man production by Dan Bejar, who also plays with the New Pornographers. We had a beer at the Dise Lounge bar and then caught the last five songs or so from Iran, a band that is probably most notable for including Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio, but he was likely on tour with his main band. But these guys sounded good. We were hoping Bejar would bring a full band so we could hear the songs with full instrumentation, but he opted for the acoustic approach. Which was cool. He played about 70 minutes worth of songs from throughout his career, which has spanned 10 albums over the last 14 years. Very intimate show, with I'd say maybe 100 folks in attendance.

I hightailed it home and was pleased to see the streetlights on before I turned onto our street, and sure enough, the power was back. Yesterday morning, I went out for a run and had to turn around because my normal route was blocked off by work crews clearing the fallen trees and branches. There were tree service trucks all over town doing similar work. I got a 6-miler in before it got too hot. We then headed to Briggy's in Newtonville for the annual Webnoize BBQ. OJ, Amy and baby Chloe (who looks just like her dad, minus the beard) were there, as were Ric, Karen and Max, and Lee, Mary Helen and the boys. It was pretty damn hot, in the mid-80s, but Dave and Beth had a slip-and-slide and a kiddie pool set up, so the kids were able to stay cool. We were there until after 3 and then headed back to Beverly for a birthday party hosted by our friends the Ploszays. They rented a bouncy tent and there were a bunch of kids there, so the girls had a blast. We hung out there for several hours before finally heading home.

So after all that, we decided to keep it low-key today. Although Deb's already begun packing for the trip, so that when Friday rolls around, we'll be ready to go. As I noted previously, she's a good organizer.