Unusual (?) things

[altivo]

From brunbera and songcoyote:

A CD you own that you don't think anyone else on your friendslist does: This is probably too easy. Picking from the top of a stack, Granada: Jim Riggs plays the Grande Barton Organ.

A book you own that you don't think anyone else on your friendslist does: Also probably too easy. let's go with Willow Song by Richard Amory (soft core gay male fantasy, oddly like furry fiction except the associations are with trees rather than animals.)

A movie you own that you don't think anyone else on your friendslist does: I'm a silent film fan, so let's pick The Return of Grey Wolf (1922) with James Pierce and Helen Lynch, featuring the dog Leader.

A place you've visited that you don't think anyone else on your friendslist has: The top of the Greenstone Ridge, backbone of Isle Royale in the middle of Lake Superior? Edit: OK, dogteam has been there. Guess I was wrong trying to pick the most secluded place. How about the most obscure? On top of a hill locally known as the "Old Maid's Nipple" to watch the sun set behind Torch Lake in Antrim County, Michigan.

A piece of technology or any tool you own that you think no-one else on your friendslist has: A raddle, weaver's tool used to spread and count warp threads while dressing a floor loom.

Comments

Rider is different but so is mount

[goldenstallion.livejournal.com]

Hi, Rider.

Well, I doubt anybody else has been to lake Titicaca or hiked the Parthenon in Athens, has "Trustee From the Toolroom" book, or owns a press brake, but CDwise and moviewise, I can't be at all sure.

Oh, Bob Thompson, who owns the old Fox River Paper Mill and leasing out to various companies like the one I work for, Hov-Aire, recently gave to me a huge old American lathe (became Cincinatti) of about 24 inch swing and a twelve-foot bed. Weights twenty eight tons and flat belt driven. Of course I will donate it to Hov-Aire (I could never deal with such a huge machine, otherwise) and will be fixing it up and restoring the drive and buying tools for it so... I also kinda doubt anybody else has a big and very real lathe like this (twenties vintage).

Re: Rider is different but so is mount

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Eek. How do you move a machine as large as that? And don't tell me "very carefully" either.

You know I haven't been to Titicaca or Athens and probably never will be. And I couldn't mention arriving at a certain Gryphon-owned private beach on Pegasus-back, since you have been there too, of course. ;)

Both wrong...

[dogteam.livejournal.com]

I've both hiked the ridge of Isle Royale (though I didn't know it's name) and paddled Lake Titicaca in a reed boat (which was rapidly sinking.)

Re: Both wrong...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

You win. Had I thought about who was most likely to have been on Isle Royale among my LJ friends, certainly you'd have been a candidate. Beautiful place, isn't it?

I've been in a number of "roadless" wilderness areas in the US, but none more exotic or less traveled than that one. Most are just in various national forests here in the midwest. I did a long drive out west once, and hit several national parks, but again, those are very well traveled and surely someone has been to every one of them. I'm just not much of a traveler, when you come down to it.

I suppose I could mention having been (several times) in the abandoned, dusty stacks of the old Schaffner research library in Chicago. Probably no one else on my friends list has been there, but it's hardly fair because the building isn't open to the public. Spooky though. It's an entire library that was just shut down some time in the 60s and left "as is". Staff work area with desks and blotters and pens and pencils still on them, shelving areas full of forgotten books, research carrels covered with dust a centimeter or more thick... Owned by Northwestern University, and the kind of thing that such institutions sometimes do in my experience, for whatever peculiar reasons.

Re: Both wrong...

[linnaeus.livejournal.com]

I don't count since I'm not on your friends list, but duncandahusky brought this post to my attention. I hiked the Greenstone Ridge in September of 97, and it was one of the best experiences of my life so far. I really need to make it back there one of these days. Now if you'd said Minong Ridge, you probably would have been the only one. Apparently that's about as secluded as you can get on the island. Anyway, good to hear of someone else who's got an appreciation of such a special place.

Take Care,
Linnaeus

Re: Both wrong...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I've been on Minong, but only for a few miles. We covered most of Greenstone that year. I'd really like to tour the outlying little islands by canoe, actually.

Yes, it's a very special place, and I'm glad it is isolated enough and lacks any mineral resources that the Bush administration wants to exploit, so it will remain free of snowmobiles and oil rigs.

Re: Both wrong...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh, and you are on my friends list now. Anyone who appreciates Isle Royale is definitely a step up in my estimation. :)

Re: Both wrong...

[linnaeus.livejournal.com]

Likewise. :)

Hiking Minong end to end is something that I'd definitely like to do at some point, it's supposed to be pretty hard, but the solitude makes it worth it.

We took the ferry from Grand Portage to Wendigo and hiked the Greenstone trail east to Rock Harbor in about four and a half days. This was in September after enough of a cold snap to kill off most of the bugs, which was a Very Good Thing. On an interpretive trail near Rock Harbor they had excerpts from the journal of a mining engineer back when they were trying to make a go of copper mining in the 1800s. It was stuff along the lines of "mosquitoes and black flies are so thick that my body is one continuous welt. God, I hate this place." :)

Re: Both wrong...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

We flew in and out from Houghton because one of our party insisted he would die of seasickness. But it had the advantage that we could get to Windigo on the day the park opened in the spring, before the ferry was running to that end. We did, fortunately, have good weather except for heavy fog and drizzle on the last day. Took six days to go end to end, which would have been more leisurely except we made side trips. I'd have to look at a map to tell you the whole route, but most of the distance hiking after the first day was on the ridge. We'd climb down at night and go north or south, mostly camping in regular campgrounds, though we spent one night at Hatchet Lake all by ourselves as I recall. Managed to visit both the north and south shores, and never saw anyone except in the larger campgrounds nearer to Rock Harbor.

Gosh, now when was that? I hate to admit how long ago it was... spring of 1981 sounds right. I know about black flies and mosquitoes, but not from Isle Royale. We were so early in the year they weren't out yet. On the other hand, the concern and paranoia over liver flukes did make drinking water a real nuisance. Boil, filter, iodize. When you mix iodized water with powdered milk it turns blue...

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

You "win" on all counts compared to me. You'd think that I would've been to Isle Royale by now, after four years living in Marquette and countless trips to the U.P. since then, but I haven't managed it yet.

I did this meme a while ago (many months ago, I guess), and it seemed too easy to pick a CD and book that no one else was likely to have. The fun there would be trying to find one that would be a conversation starter. Like, say, Willow Song by Richard Amory. (If it's about trees instead of animals, does that make it a Leafy story instead of a Furry one?)

Places and movies were a little tougher in terms of finding a unique one. The technology/tool question is a new one from the last time I did it.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

You need to visit Isle Royale. I know you will like it, and I'll bet you'd find considerable inspiration in the history and desolate beauty of the place.

I've never been on the campus at Marquette (I assume that's where you were) but I have been at Michigan Tech in Houghton (I think it was called something like the "Michigan School of Mining and Technology" at the time. See how old I am?)

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

I'm sure I could get my friend Dr. Dave to go with me, as long as his wife was getting some other help with their four kids. He'd love to go, I'm sure. He teaches at Northern so he's right on the way to Isle Royalee for me. We've been on a couple of hiking trips together, while in school and since, most recently in Adirondack Park.

I'll never tell how old you are. But I haven't heard "Michigan School of Mining and Technology" in a long long time. :)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I forgot to answer your question about Willow Song. Yes, it is a leafy story, sorta. It's a typical Amory fantasy, in which men are somehow found in the wilderness between modern California cities, living not exactly off the wild, since they go into town occasionally and raid stores at night without being caught. Their culture is a peculiar mixture of Celtic and Native American, and the main character is descended from both lines so he belongs to the Alder clan and is also the grandson of Chikwesen Ehekatl, a Nez Perce chief and shaman. Amory himself was quite a linguist (I suspect he was a professor of languages somewhere) and mingles bits of Nahuatl and Latin into the story until it drives you to obscure dictionaries to figure out the symbolism. In spite of that it's a good puzzle and a good romance and a bit of wistful fun that at least leaves me wishing there really were such a culture to run away and join. (A la James Barrie's "Lost Boys" in Peter Pan I suppose.) Published about 1971, I think, and long out of print. But if you can find it, you'd probably enjoy reading it.

[songcoyote.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm not exactly sure where it might be, and I'm not entirely certain she actually has one, but I think my sweetie has a raddle to go with her loom.

Still, it's hers, and she's not on your friends list, so you're still ahead. I hadn't even heard of the other things you listed!

Light and laughter,
SongCoyote

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yep, if she's done any amount of weaving, she probably does have one. It is not essential, but very useful if you thread the loom back to front as I do. If you thread front to back, it is not needed, nor if you use the sectional beaming technique (which my new loom allows, my old one does not.)

Speaking of which, the new loom is now warped and ready to weave silk scarves. Casting about for something simple to test and adjust with, I remembered some nice silk yarn that had been given to me a couple of years back and even was able to locate it. ;p

(And I'm stiff and sore. Dressing and threading took a lot more bending and squatting than I'm used to, particularly because this loom is too large for me to just push around to make room one one side or the other where I need it. Tying up the treadles or rather, chaining them on this model, requires crawling around on the floor like an auto mechanic.)

[songcoyote.livejournal.com]

Sounds like the pony could use a good rubdown!

Fortunately this coyote has strong hands.... *offers rubses*

I've observed the arcane art of loom preparation and found it fascinating, and very tempting to get into. Not quite fascinating or tempting enough to add to my already rather full plate thank you very much tired now, but certainly very nifty :)

All that tying up and chaining on really could be interpreted amusingly ;)

Light and laughter,
SongCoyote

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Mmm, I'd probably accept. I'm contemplating ibuprofen for lunch at the moment, but it will pass. Yes, it hasn't escaped me how much weaver's terms can imply something quite different. Then there are the arcane words, like "raddle", "lamms", "heddle", "quill", and "drawdown". Toss those into everyday conversation and you definitely get stared at.

Is your sweetie in handweaving perchance? Or should I add her to my list? (Not knowing her username, I can't without some guidance. But my posts are nearly all public anyway.)

[songcoyote.livejournal.com]

The Evil One has too few spoons to do any weaving (or Journaling, for that matter) herself right now. Our friend Mary does, but she doesn't really have (or desire) a web presence.

My beloved Evil has exactly two entries, the latest one being nearly a year old now - and I typed it for her. You can go have a look at theevilmo but that's about all you'll get. She reads journals almost as rarely as she posts in her own.

Jargon can be fun. I've had in-depth conversations in which I discuss role-playing game system quirks with friends of mine, and the level of geek-speak gets pretty thick - and the looks we get can be pretty amusing, even from people who know us :)

Light and laughter,
SongCoyote