ABBA

Wow, I suck at keeping up with writing here. I take it as a sign that I am too busy enjoying my vacation, which is a good thing.

So I went to Ausable Chasm, about 45 minutes away from Lake Placid. It was a really cool place, carved by the Ausable River through sandstone. I had a nice one hour walk along the edge. Since the weather was bad, with light drizzles, not that many people were out and about. I met only five people on the whole walk, and when I came to the raft launch point I was the only one waiting.

Now, I am not an out-doorsy person at all. Ask anyone. Nature. Yuck. And I am really not someone who's into hiking or diving or skiing or whatever. My brother got me to try cave tubing a few years back, which was insanely cool, but stuff like that is never on my agenda by my own choice.

When I got there I wasn't planning on going rafting. I didn't even know it was an option. I'm not even sure I registered it as I bought the ticket, but looking back at it I know she asked me if I wanted to add the raft trip or not. So all of a sudden I was standing there, on a dock, while the guide was prepping the boat.

It wasn't a wild ride by any means. The so called rapids weren't so rapid, and we just drifted along. A nice little ride, and it was cool to actually be at the bottom of the chasm which at places was 50 meters deep. I took some pics, up on Facebook, and had a nice conversation with the guide. I wrote him off as the stereotypical "hang loose dude" dude first, but it turned out he had a degree in chemical engineering and had chosen to get out of the lab and into nature. Good for him!

The raft ride was half an hour, and the walk back to the tourist centre was another 45 minutes. Since I am a couch potato extraordinaire I was really tired at this point. This combined with the fact that the weather got worse meant I decided to scrap my other planned outing. Instead? Football! I often only watch one game per week at home, so now that I had the opportunity I binged and watched almost three in a row. Sprawled on the bed, pizza box on my stomach, yelling at the screen like an actual sports fan.

On Monday I got into the car and drove to Albany. It was very much just a stop on the way, and I hadn't planned on doing much of anything. I packed a box of books and some other stuff I'd bought and sent it home, to be able to cram more stuff into my bag for the flight home, and did laundry. Yes, laundry. The glamour of a three week vacation.

In the evening I went to a nearby sports bar and watched the Bears annihilate the Cowboys. I talked to two men in their 60s about all things football and Sweden, and let them buy me a drink.
"Who's the most known Swedish person in sports or pop culture then?" they said.
"Björn Borg!" one of them answered before I had the time to say "ABBA."

What are your thoughts on that subject?

Today I drove to Manchester, New Hampshire, to have dinner with Jeanne, the teacher from the writing class I took last year, and her husband. The trip here was interesting.

Google: The trip takes four hours!
My GPS: Four hours? Pfft! I laugh at your four hours! Three hours and twenty minutes! BWAHAHAHAHA!

We went to a nice Italian place and reminisced about last summer. It was a good night. Now I've been writing and watching weird reality shows on SyFy (Face Off and Hot Set). I have also finished booking some nice restaurants in New York. Hooray! Tomorrow, up early to drive to Boston to fly to NYC.