canoeing revisited

Well, let me start off by thanking Steve for his very insightful comment on my last blog. I will agree with him that many of the people who actually read this have no interest in sports, let alone my opinion on sports, but as I mentioned in the blog it was an aniversary piece and more importantly it was what I felt like writing about at the time. More importantly, you did in fact add a little insight to anyone who read the blog on some of the stupidity we encountered on the trip, and have thus inspired me to mention a few more memorable moments from the trip that people may find amusing.

One thing that sticks out was the time that Brynne and Julie accidentally directed our canoe into a low hanging tree, effectively slowing us to a halt while our shirtless bodies scraped against the leaves and branches. This would have all been just fine if not for what fell into the boat as we struggled to free ourselves (no exaggeration, we were literally stuck into the tree). Upon making it out we both looked down to see roughly 7-10 spiders running around in the bottom of the canoe. Again, I was cool with this until I saw the largest spider I have ever seen (outside of a museum or something) right next to my right foot. This behemoth actually looked pretty identical to the spiders in the movie Aracnaphobia, being about 2.5 inches in diameter including the legs, and we ain't talkin' no daddy long-legs style, we're talking baby Tarantula. To make matters worse the fucking thing was like a Goddamn tick or something, no matter how hard I stepped on it it barely buckled, and it took about 5 well placed stomps to even slow it down. The other spiders we eventually crushed or removed with our paddles, but there were a few we never actually accounted for in the end. Maybe that explains why I have giant red mosquito bites all over my body that don't actually itch and have been there for almost an entire week now, but probably not.

The other amusing thing that comes to mind is the fact that Steve actually lost a flip-flop in the process of getting out of the canoe back at the start point. He decided to get out and help push the canoe into the beach to quickly realize that the river bottom was nothing but a silty quick sand. I myself experienced this as my foot sank a solid 2 feet deep during each and every step; however, I had my shoes securely attached (so much so that I continually fell over walking in the crap as it felt like my feet were growing roots in the damn shit). Anyway, the punchline that amkes things funny is that in searching for his missing flip-flop (he actually lost both initially, but found one rather shortly thereafter) he found no exaggeration 9 separate sandals/shoes in the muck, all right there within a 20 foot radius of the location where we banked. Apparently Steve was not the first person to suffer this same fate. Alas, despite finding so much footwear that he actually found complete pairs off others' feet, he never found the elusive second flip-flop. Luckily, they were a $2 pair I think, but I feel like they may have ellicited some kind of fond memory in Steve for some reason.

Alrightly, I think those two minor anecdotes are enough to satisfy my need to write about canoeing for now. Oddly enough I originally logged in to write an entirely different blog, so I'm going to end this one now and start a new one as the new one is a little more of a think piece and wouldn't fit the mood of this entry. Ok everybody, enjoy your weekend and read the next blog if you so desire.