Garbage Pail Kids

I remember when Garbage Pail Kids came out and were the most popular thing around. I don't remember exactly when they hit, but I must've been just the right age because I knew they were cool and I had to have them. They were so wildly popular for a while that you absolutely could not find them anywhere. You would have to call the local 7-11 to find out when they were getting a new shipment and then beg your mom to go and buy as many as she could while you were in school, because if you waited... they'd be gone. Now as I look back at the cards I'm trying to imagine my mom going to a 7-11 during the day to grab up cards that were.. well, let's face it... garbage. I know my mom snagged me a few packs on a couple of occasions, so thanks Mom! And thank you Garbage Pail Kids, for being such a memorable childhood fad that was sooo much better than Pokeman!

Walden Pond

I went to Walden Pond on Saturday after my soccer game. This is the same Walden Pond of which Henry David Thoreau wrote:

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan- like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion.

Ironically, these days the shores of Walden Pond are filled to the brim with beachgoers. Lots of family types, parking lots overflowing with cars and general traffic. Still a nice close place to go for a swim and a walk through trees, but you really have to use your imagination to picture Thoreau feeling all isolated out there.

I managed to get my frontside well suncreened, but my back (beneath the very top part that you can actually reach) and shoulders got a nice little sunburn. Now I am covered with 3 very distinct colors: Forearms are nicely tanned form lots of soccer and golf. Front side chest and belly, still a nice shade of pasty white. Upper arms and back, sunburn red. It looked pretty funny to me last night but hopefully once the sunburn fades I'll go back to my normal farmer's tan!