Bike 2 (and they'll pretty much all be Bike 2 unless noted from now on I think): 358.7; 18.8.
Continuing with the innuendo titles here. Has anyone else commented on how the word "innuendo" is itself something of an innuendo? At least when used in reference to Italian sodomy...
Today I tried out the new Keen sandals with cleats that firmly affix my feet to the pedals. To get out, with this brand, you have to twist your heel outward. NO OTHER MOTION WILL GET YOU OUT OF THOSE PEDALS, and YOU WILL FALL OVER WITH YOUR FEET STILL FIXED TO THE PEDALS. Initially, the pedals were adjusted so tight that I had to stop, get off the bike, and step out of the shoe and wrench it off the pedal by hand--luckily tried this one foot at a time or I'd still be pedaling, afraid to stop, miles away from here or simply going in circles. Once loosened a bit, they work okay, and I think with a little more practice I'll be very happy with them, but boy it's a real test of faith to clip in and go with both feet! In other words, they require some getting used to--but also I suspect that sooner or later I WILL have an accident with them--not IF, but WHEN. I could be wrong.
On the up side, they add all of that upstroke power to your pedalling (that is, while the right foot is pushing down on the right pedal, the left foot is pulling up on the left pedal), and it did seem like I gained a mph or two, especially on uphills when "spinning" in lowish gears.
"Burn After Reading" was a great, funny, entertaining movie. I can't think of any reason not to give it all five stars. Excellent cast, brilliant story, superb dialogue, and many exquisite other superlatives. Also, this might the first movie I've ever seen without any advance knowledge of what it was about (aside from seeing a brief blurb that said it was the Coen brothers' return to comedy). I'm glad we're getting out and seeing movies sometimes.
I was proud (if that's the right word--one must use such caution!) to attend a ceremony yesterday wherein my wife received the precepts at her Zen Center. I know she worked hard all summer at the classes and the homework, and in learning a little bit about it, I find it an exceedingly admirable thing. Respect, T!
I have such a hard time with religion. Lately the dogma of fundamentalists literally makes me teeth-grindingly angry. It is just unfathomable to me how a person can let something so wispy and ethereal drive such hard-nosed beliefs and activities--and even within that, how they so misinterpret the book that holds all of their tenets! How they can let a fellow human--nothing more and perhaps a good deal less--plant a flag in their town and say, "I am God's interpreter on Earth," and then blindly follow. How they can fly in the face of all logic and reason, all out of the hope of a promised eternity in an improbable (and surely insufferable!) heaven and abject fear of an impossible Hell... These people are going to take this country back to the middle ages.
Buddhism, as I've seen it, is an entirely different thing. It all makes eminent sense, the precepts being a great example. My only problems with it, I guess, are the chanting of words I don't understand, and the bowing and rising, bowing and rising, which gives me head-rushes and threatens to make me pass out, and again, I'm not sure what or who I'm bowing to, and that makes me very uncomfortable. I do feel that I could take some time to learn more about it and I would probably be happy and comfortable with it. What I really like about it, something the preceptor said yesterday, something about committing to peace in the world, being yourself a cause of peace in the world... That is something I would like very much to do, and that is what will probably bring me back to the Zen Center. In Buddhism, too, there is virtually none of the "marketing," that need to convert others, that drives Christians et al to make their kids go door to door with pamphlets etc. It is absolutely true that, in the Christian religion(s), those who are innocent of knowledge of heaven and hell and god and jesus are supposedly not sent to hell when they die, and so these devout practitioners think it their duty to inform the innocents, so they CAN go to hell!
Anyway, wrong place perhaps to go off on a religion rant, when really I just want to mark the occasion of Terrie's moment. So here's to my love Junden, doing something very right.
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1 comment:
Aw, thanks!
The bowing...I'm not sure I understand what it's *supposed* to be. But for me, it's a way to express respect and gratitude to the teacher, the sangha, and to all things. The physical practice of Zen Buddhism is part of what drew me to it, and simple bow seems like a graceful and concise expression of something very complex.
I was happy to have you there; it meant a lot to me!
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