What are you reading?

[memaquay]

Perhaps I have posted this before, not sure, but it's my favorite poem for canoe tripping, I usually have a copy with me and read it to the students on day five. Al Purdy, there hasn't been anyone like him since, although I often aspire to try. Al wrote this when the Canadian government still valued its artists, and sent him to the Arctic so he could render his impressions in poetry.


WHEN I SAT DOWN TO PLAY THE PIANO

He cometh forth hurriedly from his tent
and looketh for a quiet sequestered vale
he carrieth a roll of violet toilet tissue
and a forerunner goeth ahead to do him honour
yclept a snotty-nosed Eskimo kid
He findeth a quiet glade among great stones
squatteth forthwith and undoeth trousers
Irrational Man by Wm. Barret in hand
while the other dismisseth mosquitoes
and beginneth the most natural of natural functions
buttocks balanced above the boulders
Then
dogs1
Dogs2
Dogs12
all shapes and sizes
all colours and religious persuasion
a plague of dogs rushing in
having been attracted by the philosophical climate
and being wishful to learn about existential dogs
and denial of the self with regard to b*tches
But let’s call a spade a shovel
therefore there I am I am I think that is
surrounded by a dozen dozen fierce Eskimo dogs
with an inexplicable (to me) appetite
or human excrement
Dear Ann Landers
what would you do?
Dear Galloping Gourmet
what would you do
In a case like this?
Well I’ll tell you
NOT A dang THING
You just squat there cursing hopelessly
while the kid throws stones
and tries to keep them off and out from under
as a big black husky dashes in
swift as an enemy submarine
white teeth snapping at the anus
I shriek
and shriek
(the kid laughs)
and hold onto my pants
sans dignity
sans intellect
sans Wm. Barrett
and dang near sans anus
Stand firm little Eskimo kid
it giveth candy if I had any
it giveth a dime in lieu of same
STAND FIRM
Oh avatar of Olympian excellence
Noble Eskimo youth do your stuff
Zeus in the Arctic dog pound
Montcalm at Quebec
Leonidas at Thermopylae
Custer’s last stand at Little Big Horn
“KEEP THEM dang DOGS OFF
YOU MISERABLE LITTLE BRAT”

Afterwards
Achilles retreateth without honour
unzippered and sullen
and sulketh in his tent till next time appointed
his anus shrinketh
he escheweth all forms of laxative and physick meanwhile
and prayeth for constipation
addresseth himself to the Eskimo brat miscalled
“Lo tho I walk thru the valley of
the shadowy kennels
In the land of permanent ice cream
I will fear no huskies
For thou art with me
and slingeth thy stones forever and ever
Thou veritable David
Amen”

PS Next time I’m gonna take a gun

Al Purdy
Kikastan Islands

 

[frozentripper]

Yep... wild, crazy dogs in the north, great poem. I can't hope to match that, except maybe with this googled photo of Florida dogs mauling an unfortunate alligator. WARNING... not for the faint of heart. Snowbirds, especially.

http://www.habeeb.com/images/inspirational_dog_pack_kills_alligator_in_florida.jpg

 

[Guest]

Best laid reading plans gone awry

Rampage was, in a word, horrifying. The first and last chapters were historically enjoyable, but the middle 500 pages were near verbatim horrors of the Japanese rape of Manila, taken from hundreds of witness’s survivor testimony and other evidence presented at Yamashita’s trial. Too brutal for me, I’m not into infanticide, beheadings, rape, immolations and gore.

The map book, Theatre of the World, held more promise, but the syntax and flow made for an awkward read. It was translated from Norwegian, and had no rhythm. Every other sentence was a struggle. Maybe Norwegian is hard to translate into English.

I read them (well, I speed read the horrors of Manila, I don’t need that as a bedtime story), and was happy to return them to the library.

Imperial Twilight on the other hand is fascinating. A very peculiar time and place in world history, about which I knew very little and surmised wrong. I’m only a hundred pages in, oft surprised at the social and economic arrangements, and look forward to reading in bed every night. I’m glad to own a copy of that one to loan to my history buff son, and it’s worth an eventual reread.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36296465-imperial-twilight?from_search=true

 

[alsg]

Just picked up Paddle Maryland by Bryan Mackay. The acknowledgements include a shout out to our own Mike McCrea!

 

[Guest]

Just picked up Paddle Maryland by Bryan Mackay. The acknowledgements include a shout out to our own Mike McCrea!

I’ve had a couple humorous interactions with Bryan beyond paddling club stuff. I was in a State Park campground, spotted a carbon Bell canoe atop a car and wanted a better look. I was prowling around the boat, looking up underneath at the seat and outfitting when one of the foggy windows suddenly rolled down and there was Bryan wondering what the heck I was doing.

I stupidly did not have an REI membership at one point, despite shopping at an REI store a couple times a year. When asked if I had a membership I would just give the “my” address, which was actually Bryan’s address, so the 10% off applied to his annual dividend. That went on for some years ‘til I confessed. Bryan was wondering how the heck he was getting dividends in years where he never bought anything from REI.

I don’t think any other area of the country has been blessed with as many paddling guidebook authors; Burmeister, Matacia & Cecil, Randy Carter, Roger Corbett, Ed Gertler, Ed White. I’m missing a couple, Tom McCloud and others?

 

[alsg]

Hmmmm. I have the Gertler book, but those other names aren’t ringing bells. Got any titles for those other Maryland guidebooks?

As as for this new MacKay offering, it is (as he admits) mostly taken from the paddling chapter of his prior book that also covered hiking and biking. I gave that to a friend with younger kids and bought this one. It is psyching me up to finally getting around to doing some eastern shore paddling.

 

[Guest]

Hmmmm. I have the Gertler book, but those other names aren’t ringing bells. Got any titles for those other Maryland guidebooks?

Most/many of those authors are long out of print. I believe Ed White’s Exploring Flatwater series is still in print

Burmeister penned a multi-volume series of Appalachian Waters guides in the early ’70. I think the full set is four volumes, some near 500 pages thick, and one volume is a rarity. IIRC almost the entire printer run of the last volume was stored in a warehouse that flooded, and only a few copies, stored upstairs in an outfitter shop, remained available.

Randy Carter notably wrote Canoeing White Water River Guide, a title which sounds like it was translated from German, covering WW runs in VA, WVA and the Great Smoky Mnts in NC. He was also responsible for many DIY river gauges painted on bridge abutments before on-line gauges became commonplace. Those were colloquially known by the very mysterious name “Randy Carter Gauges”. He just started his gauges at an RC canoe zero and went up.

Matacia and Cecil, and later Matacia and Corbett, wrote a multi-volume series of guidebooks; ie vol 3, Blue Ridge Voyages, vol 4 The Shenandoah River.

There some guidebook style history being lost, and some of those early guidebooks could be cheap used on Amazon. And deserving of a place on a Maryland paddler’s bookshelf.

 

[Guest]

It is psyching me up to finally getting around to doing some eastern shore paddling.

There is a lot of varied paddling on the eastern shore, from swamps to marshes to forested streams. Gertler lists close to 50 DelMarVa rivers and streams, and there are another 50 coastal bay and marsh archipelagos to explore. Too many to pick a single favorite.

For a forested stream, Tuckahoe Creek from below the dam near Tuckahoe SP five miles down to a public boat ramp in Hillsboro. Clear running stream through a hardwood beech forest; I think it is actually a trout stream.

Best can’t-get-lost marsh paddle, the Transquaking River around the oxbow and thorofare. Stop and have a walk on the two forested island (Chance and Guinea). Five mile circuit, twenty if you poke up every gut and side channel deep into the marsh. With the loop and thorofare loop no shuttle is needed. Best avoided during duck season or in bug summer.

Best can-easily-get-lost marsh paddle. Anywhere in the Taylors Island Passages. Bring a good map. And a GPS. And flares.

Best cypress swamp trips; the Pocomoke between Porter’s Crossing and Snow Hill (5 miles), Nassawango Creek from Red House Rd to the Pocomoke and up to Snow Hill (7 miles, check the tides), or up and back Dividing Creek from Winter’s Quarters in Pocomoke City.

The local author I couldn’t remember was Tom McCloud. A Paddler’s Guide to Eastern North Carolina (Benner and McCloud). Found a 30 year old copy on my bookshelves. I think McCloud also had a slender guidebook to Maryland.

Thanks, this got me looking at old guidebooks.

 

[DaveOR]

Just finished Wanderlust: A History of Walking by Rebecca Solnit. A fascinating read. From the dust jacket: "...Solnit draws together many histories - of anatomical evolution and city design, of treadmills and labyrinths, of walking clubs and sexual mores - to create a portrait of the range of possibilities for this most basic act." It's dense, for sure, in content and in layout and typography. But in moderate doses, like good cheese cake, it's very good.

Finishing Eager: The surprising, secret life of beavers and why they matter. by Ben Goldfarb. I really like these types of reads, part history, personal anecdotes and insights of the author, and connections to the present and implications for the future. From the dust jacket: "Goldfarb's captivating book reveals how beavers transformed our landscapes and how modern-day "Beaver Believers"- including scientists, ranchers and passionate citizens- are recruiting these ecosystem engineers to help us fight our most pressing conservation crises."

Lastly, Snow Walker by Farley Mowat, is a collection of 11 "Passionate adventures of heroic people surviving in a stark and savage land." All terrific tales. (The movie "Snow Walker" was based on one the stories included titled "Walk Well, My Brother.")

 

[Odyssey]

Whew, well that went well. It's not often I pick up a real page turner but thanks to this site I did, and continued turning pages until it was done.
I scribble down the helpful reading suggestions from this thread and leave my reminder notes in various places around the house where they remain ignored by all and are soon forgotten by me. I came across one stuck to the fridge the other day, I guess that was the one a daughter found and didn't ignore. She bought me Barkskins by Annie Proulx for Christmas. It was one of those rare "picked it ip and couldn't put it down" type of books. A real historical epic, following the descendants of two young Frenchmen newly arrived in New France who both go their separate ways. The reader is taken on a journey through the ages, cultures and characters of all who are swept up by Western colonization. The insatiable lust for resources, timber being the primary one, plays a central role in this story. And like any good story, the ending, of forests, families and futures, happy or sad, is yet to be written.

 

[Tiernan]

Lonely Voyage by Kayak to Adventure and Discovery
by Kamil Pecher



Fur trader history and native culture.
Insight into solo tripping.

 

[Sweetfancymoses]

Just finished Jared Jellison: Fighting the current - there & back. Interesting read about a 8,000 mile trip through the western states. Lots of canoeing, long portages using a dolly and sometimes bicycles. Interactions with nice and not so nice people along the way. Not the most polished writer but well worth reading.

https://flic.kr/p/2eev6Gx https://www.flickr.com/photos/133956285@N05/

 

[Sweetfancymoses]

James West Davidson and John Rugge: The Complete Wilderness Paddler. Although from 1976 it still offered some good information I didn't know. I liked the style. Ernie Lyall: An Arctic Man. The memoirs of an HBC clerk, hunter/trapper, interpreter in the early and mid part of the 1900s in the arctic. Very engaging book that was hard to put down.

 

[Boreal Birch]

i am reading TIP OF THE ICEBERG by Mark Adams. His 3,000 mile (4828.032 kilometers) trip to Alaska in the footsteps/wake of the 1899 Harriman Expedition. I was going to save it for my winter reading, but as my father used to say "The road to heck is paved with good intentions."
Thanks to everyone posting good books on this good thread. 99.9% of the books recommended have been pretty good. Many books we would not have found out about without your telling us what you are reading.

 

[Odyssey]

My brother sent me The Awakening Land Trilogy by Conrad Richter. The Trees, The Field, and The Town describe the American colonial world through the eyes of a girl. Whatever you do don't skip the forward by David McCullough, as he explains the historically accurate language used in the books.
"The books were written as a trilogy to be read in order, as the beginning, middle, and end of an American pioneer epic set at a time when "out west" meant Ohio." D. McCullough

 

[memaquay]

Lately I have been listening to audio books. The Ontario Library service has a free download site with lots of stuff available. When I go for my walk in the morning, and when I'm working on the party barge during the day, I am listening to audio books. It's very cool, especially since CBC radio is in the toilet now. CBC used to be a station of wide ranging and interesting talk shows and documentaries, but now it is a series of repeats of shows about snowflakes being triggered cause their mom dressed them unfashionably when they were 6. Barf.

I'm listening to one called Caleb's Crossing by Geraldine Brooks right now, which follows the life of a pilgrim girl in the 1600's. Pretty good. Another really interesting one was The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker. No canoe relate books, I like my mind to be occupied with something new when I'm doing mundane things.

 

[Odyssey]

It's been years since I last had a good listen to the CBC. Well, that doesn't count their excellent music programming in the evenings and into the witching hour, but you have to love jazz, blues, folk and some kinda futuristic alt musicmindmelting thing to appreciate it. But true, the blab blab programmes have lost their appeal. But you don't know what you've got until it's gone. One time I was working in a customers home in which he had an 80's intercom system going to all rooms, for my benefit he said. He was tuned to some kind of "talk radio" station where all they did was complain about the current state of current affairs. b*tch radio I called it. No matter which room I worked in I heard it...All. Effffffing. Day. Long. Eventually on the job I pushed the Off buttons as I went from room to room working, but not before he heard me lose my cool with my outdoor voice shout obscenities at the radio boob.
Going back a few years Morningside was a good show while it lasted. Kinda like a cross country chat show about positive minded current affairs. I'd tune into that on the job. No obscenities ever happened there. Nowadays I decline any offers to turn on a radio while I work. I don't even bring my own. Now I can hear myself think, for myself.
Speaking of radio stories mem, I'm subbed to a yootoob channel that does nothing but radio (horror) drama. Feels a little weird I admit, to open the laptop in the kitchen and eat a quiet meal doing nothing but listening to a story, and it's easy to let the mind wander and drift off into the story, no flashy big screen necessary. Just like the olde days I guess. I'll look for that library service, thanks Mem.

 

[frozentripper]

Hmmmm... I have looked forward to CBC radio listening many times at night while on solo trips. There's something comforting about finally relaxing in the tent at night and listening to good old Communist Broadcasting Canada. It's good for you, even if you don't like it at first.

Still listen every day, favorite programs...

Ideas, radio documentary usually from academics at nine every weekday evening, during shorter days on trips.

Quirks and Quarks... science news, some of it weird, which is good.

The Debaters, comedy.

A program describing the effects of advertising and how it shaped today's world... can't remember the name.

Matt Galloway's morning radio if you can get Toronto CBC. Beats the pants off of any other for getting to the issues.

Writers and Company, about books, and writers.

Because News, comedy, news parodies.



And more, you never know what you're gonna get. CBC radio, and yeah, I miss Peter Gzowski too.

PS.... also bought a new compact radio for this purpose. Reception is much better than the other and sometimes larger old ones.Good value at about $50 CAD if you can stand the Chinese writing. Before the American/Chinese trade war tariffs started up so price might be higher, relatively speaking.

Good reviews.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMZZG87iQL4

 

[Pook]

Yup, while I miss those golden days of CBC Radio- and the constant repeat shows drive me nuts- its still my Radio station of choice everywhere in Canada.
Sounds like you're referencing Terry O'Reilly and his show "Under the Influence", frozentripper. I loved his earlier show "Age of Persuasion", too.
Sunday Morning with Michael Enright is enlightening too.

I miss hearing Gzowski, Arthur Black, Vicky Gabereau and especially Stuart McLean and his stories...

Reading currently: Paddling, Portaging and Pageantry by Doreen Guilloux; Great stories about the Centennial Voyageur canoe race Rocky Mountain House to Montreal in 1967. Having paddled with a few of the participants in the past- Norm Crerar, Dave McLure, Vic Maxwell- I figured it was about time i learned the truth!
Bruce

 

[frozentripper]

Bruce... yes, Terry O'Reilly's shows were great... some great research on business. trends, consumer culture and advertising.

I used to listen to Erika Ritter's Dayshift every afternoon while working at various remote places with Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources. And Bill Richardson's show replaced Dayshift IIRC... I was driving around about ten days ago and he had a half-hour on Sunday afternoon describing how he fell into a depression and couldn't face going to work any longer or even leave his apartment. But he eventually found happiness working as a dishwasher in Vancouver for some irrational reason. Didn't want to go back to doing anything professional again. You never know what you're going to get...

Rita Celli is a real sweetie at noon on weekdays and has been on for years. Also the gardening phone-ins with Bill Lawrence in Ottawa... that helped get me interested in gardening many years ago.

Vicky Gabereau also, nothing quite like her style, mind like a steel trap.