KeithWikle.com

This is probably the best music video ever.

Glosoli

I am a sucker for this tune.

It’s somewhat ironic to me how the visual at the peak of the song is exactly how I feel when I hear the song. I am poised at the bottom of hill on foot ready to run to the top and take flight right at the peak.

Music says some scary things don’t it…

Icelandic preteens smooching is also cute in a sort of scary viking way.

Tail Wind

While she sits mired in windless doldrums
in the castle of our domesticity,
like Penelope weaving an endless
blanket for our empty wedding bed,
I beat my blades like wings
in quick rythmic loops
to catch the wind.

To paddle downwind
is to sail like shadows of cormorants
before a gale at twelve knots.

The kayak is carried
in the froth of whitecaps,
pushed onward with subtle tilts and leans
sliding forward until released to the next wave.

I know it’s easy to love a tail wind,
everything seems to go your way.
Gichigami glows green and blue
to the edge of the horizon.

Eventually all tailwinds end,
the tail of the kayak
skids along the surface, and
my bow points like a dowsing wand
towards Penelope.

The green and blue turns gunsmoke grey,
the sky darkens, the wind blows the tops of the waves
into blinding spray I catch on my lips.

Each blade digs into Mother Superior
like a steel rod into thickening concrete,
progress slows to four knots.

I find my the love does not diminish
in the great effort spent climbing waves,
nor does it lack joy to knife
each blade deeply past exahaustion,
because every subtle stroke keeps
the bow pointed towards home.

Day 1

The islands of the Apostles, are not named for the compatriots of Jesus of Nazareth. Instead they bear the names of what they are, as islands often do. The names of the Apostles bear names like: Sand Island, Raspberry Island, Bear Island and so forth.

Four of us paddled from Meyers beach along what used to be called Squaw bay. Now called “Sand Bay”, though our chart called it Squaw bay. The chart Jim bought reminded me of the stratified geologic layers of graffiti etched into old steel toilet stalls in Tiger stadium I saw in Detroit as a kid with the words, “Nigger” or “Cunt”.

The caves along the mainland on Sunday were amazing. The water was lumpy with clapotis and small white caps. I managed to tuck my silhouette into all but the tightest corners with very little difficulty. Becky and Tom hung back from some of the caves, and Becky appeared nervous about nosing her boat into the deep sandstone crevasses of the cliffs. My biggest fear in the caves was not the waves. Oddly enough I was more afraid of some sort of bird or bat who would take issue with me invading their home. I would spot some dark blotchy patch of color in a recessed corner of stone and assume it was a bat, only to get a closer look and see a log wedged tight into a corner.

There were tight corners and small arches to wind around
and perform turns. Oddly enough I felt my left hand side slip and bow rudder were a bit rusty going into the trip. I feel I got them back up to snuff by the second day with all the caves and close quarters paddling.

After exploring the caves we made the brief crossing over to Sand Island. We discovered the dock pretty quickly in a sandy little bay. Further sandstone caves were visible due north from the mouth of the bay.

As a result of my trips to Pukaskwa and Rossport along the Black Bay peninsula on the north shore of Lake Superior, I am pretty accustomed to wilderness camping. The appeal of wilderness camping is the solitude and a sense of raw beauty. Everyone likes the sensation of cracking the shell of the egg. The expectation is that they will get to see an unbroken yolk. For those that are allegory illiterate, the shell is the effort put in to get to the wilderness, and the wilderness is the egg yolk.

If you put in the miles and the distance to get towards the northern latitudes, a grassy campsite inhabited by summer camp counselors breaks my yolk. Perhaps the yolk is an internal headspace, and it doesn’t matter. But I wouldn’t see my solid egg until later in the trip.

Watch the TV spots, they get me all misty everytime.

http://www.soccernet.com/onegame/

Curse you Bono!!!!

Germany VS Costa Rica

Noon.