Walked 4 miles.
Biked 5 miles.
Huzzah!

All last week, CJ and I were on vacation near Park Rapids, MN at my parents’ cabin. With a week off, I was able to work on my 101 things.

First, CJ and I went on a bike ride on the Heartland Trail with friends. It was an 11 mile ride, and that goes toward my 1000 miles.

Also toward my 1000 miles were a couple hikes, including one at Itasca State Park. One more park toward my 20.

Itasca State Park has a huge Minnesota Tourist Attraction: the start of the Mississippi.
That’s one more tourist attraction for the year, and a very cool spot. CJ and Jeff walked across the Mississippi, but my batteries died on my camera at that moment.

Another great tourist attraction we visited was one of the huge Paul Bunyon statutes in the state.
Pretty cool, right?

Additionally, I drank a few new beers and two new wines. I failed to eat a meatless meal last week. And I read two books. All pretty good.

Quick update on my goals.

I removed ‘Hike the Superior Hiking Trail’ and added ‘Go on 10 backpacking trips.’

I also added ‘Attend a burlesque show’ because it is something I always wanted to do and needed to add one more goal to get to my 101.

This weekend, I backpacked 8 miles. And they were the longest 8 miles of my life. Dear jeebus, they almost killed me.

On Friday, Tammy (whom I’d never met) and I headed down to Richard J. Dorer Memorial Hardwood State Forest in the pouring rain. After losing our way for a short time, we ended up at the Reno area of the forest where we met up with the Minneapolis/St. Paul Backpackers Meet Up group.

Luckily, they were much more prepared than we were. They had a large tarp set up. We were able to set up our tents under the tarp and then move them to their permanent spots. From there, we headed into “town” to the bar.

Our first campsite, in the morning after the rain. Photo by Tammy Ren.

I chose this trip for a couple reasons as my first backpacking trip. It was marketed as “easy”, and “just a few hills” and “4 miles the first day and 2-3 on the second.” LIES. ALL LIES.

In the morning, we shuttled some cars and started off on our hike. It had rained the whole night before and we ran into quite a bit of mud our first half mile or so. But what’s a little mud? Nothing.

Then we came to our first “easy little hill.” Yeah. 300 feet or so up hill. Up a steep hill. Up a frickin’ mini-mountain if you ask me.

Then we did 3 more of them! I almost died like 12 times. I’m out of shape. Seriously out of shape. I would walk 20-40 feet up the hill, then need to rest. It took me forever to get up the hills, but going down the hills was almost worse. I was slower than everyone going down, but not by much, but my legs and feet killed as I went down. By the last down hill, my legs were trembling as I walked down.

But, it was all worth it. Here is one of the views we saw on the first day. Notice how high up we are, I hiked that high 4 times.

photo by Tammy Ren

When we finally made it to the campsite. After 5 hours of hiking, I was beat. I forced a smile, but 5 minutes earlier I was on the verge of tears and the verge of vomiting. I’m not joking.

Photo by Tammy Ren

Camp was great. By the time I got there, the fire had been started and people were just beginning to set up. I was totally beat, but got my tent set up. I was afraid I wouldn’t get up if I sat down. We had lunch, then dinner and sat around and enjoyed each others company.

Everyone on the trip was awesome. People stayed with me the whole time, even though I was slow, and were very encouraging. I learned a lot of tricks and tips. Heard great stories of other places they have been and people they met. And learned some great places in Southern MN/Northern Iowa/Western WI I need to check out.

After a terrible night sleep, we were up again in the morning. I knew it was to be an easy day. One down, one up, and the rest down. Perfect. I knew I could handle it, even though my body was sore and I was tired.

The next day, we saw more pretty views.

The month of April has come and gone and I was more than successful in reading 4 books. I guess part of that was due to my new love for graphic novels. I read 6 graphic novels last month and one memoir.

Of the six my favorite was Blankets by Craig Thompson. It is the story of a boy growing up in a very religious household. It does a great job of portraying his childhood, into his teenage years. It is an honest look at religion, sexuality, friendships, and life. Really wonderful.

I also read The House at Sugar Beach by Helene Cooper. What a great memoir. Cooper tells the story of growing up in Liberia in the privileged class and having to leave for the United States when unrest takes over Liberia. It was interesting, emotional, and smart. I’m not one to like memoirs normally, but this one was truly excellent.

I have a few books ready for next month. I’m going to read Sigurd F. Olson’s The Singing Wilderness for MNRead, a bi-product of MNSpeak. I’m part way through the bizzaro The Gargoyle. And sitting next to my bed is the graphic novel Palestine.

Last week, a dream came true. I won a free ticket for The Barber of Seville on Twitter from the Minnesota Opera.

I went to the show this afternoon, and it was fantastic. I had a seat on the main floor, 10 rows back, to the left of the stage. I felt they were really good seats, not the best, but really good. I could see all the facial expressions and all the action.

Everything was amazing, and I’m still sort of reeling. The Barber of Seville is probably the most famous opera of all times. Looney Toons used it, as have other cartoons, sitcoms and commercials. The Overture is known to most of us, as are other parts like, “Figaro, figaro, figaro!” The voices were all beautiful, as were the sets and costumes. The production was funny and contemporary. And the acting was spot on. It was excellent.

My only disappointment was that I couldn’t take advantage of their outstanding offer of half price season tickets for next year. I really wanted to do it, but I just don’t have the money right now, but I will be attending again. It was wonderful.

So, that marks off “Attend the Opera” on my list and one of my live musical performances.

Not a lot going on in the last two weeks in terms of the 101 goals. I did volunteer a bit last weekend and I restarted my 4 books a month for 6 months goal. I finished The House at Sugar Beach by Helene Cooper. It was outstanding.

Here’s some more updates on select goals:
Attend 3 dance performances: I’m hoping to attend my first this Saturday. Anyone want to join me at the Southern Theater?
Attend the Opera: I won a ticket to the Minnesota Opera’s The Barber of Seville. I’m super excited.
Attend 20 live music performances: We are going to see Mates of State this weekend, one of my favorite bands.
Watch 50 Documentaries: I wonder if 50 is enough? I love documentaries so much I have a hard time NOT watching them.
Finish Fireplace and Get/build bookshelves for every book: my dad came out last week and did some measurements for both of these. We are getting closer.
Organize desk at work: DONE! I had to move cubicles, so I was able to clean up my desk.
Donate 100 hours of my time: I’ve got a bunch of volunteer activities lined up for the next month.
Find 20 new letterboxes: I hope to go letterboxing this weekend.
Visit 20 new State Parks: I think I’m heading to Wild River State Park this weekend for a nice hike with Jeff. It will also increase my mileage for my 1000 mile goal.

So, yeah, I’m working on things. And I still need to come up with a final goal…

Learning the music of a composer I like is proving to be the most rewarding and interesting of all my goals. I started off by putting a call out to my twitter friends asking for composer recommendations. I got quite a few and started going to the library to get music from them.

I don’t steal music. That means, I don’t get things from the library, put them on iTunes and keep them. I delete the music when the CD goes back to the library. If I don’t pay for it, I don’t keep it. That said, I found music I liked and wanted to go out and buy it. But CJ told me he has a big box of Classical Music somewhere in the house. I shouldn’t buy anything until he finds it.

Well, I’ve been waiting for over a month for that.

Meanwhile, knowing he did not have any opera, I started listening to it. And I LOVE IT. It is dynamic, beautiful, heart wrenching and amazing. While I like all classical music, opera is my favorite for sure.

So far, I’ve bought 5 operas. Between them and the new Decemberists, that’s all I listen to. I’ve done research about opera and find it fascinating.

So, I think, in the end, I’ll be choosing a composer who did Opera also for this goal. But I have a lot of exploring left to do.

March was to be my first month of reading 4 books each month for 6 months. I failed.

But things started out really good. I read Kurtis’s great book Mudville within the first 3 days of the month.

But things went downhill from there. But not from lack of trying.

The first book I tried to read was What is the What by Dave Eggers. It is an interesting story, I guess, but I just couldn’t get through it. I would read one or two pages and put it down. I’d bring it on the bus, but just stare out the window. I just didn’t get into it.

But, I didn’t just give up on it and move on. It took me two weeks to finally give in, all the while I could have been reading something I liked.

Second was Watchmen by Alan Moore. Same thing. It just wasn’t interesting to me. It was actually super boring and I didn’t care what happened.

So, next month I try again. I just picked up The House at Sugar Beach by Helene Cooper for the MNSpeak Book Club. I’ve read the first couple chapters and it is great. I’m ready to head to bed right now to read more. I will likely make sure the book gets finished in April so I can count it for them (they are my goals, I can cheat if I want.)

Awesomely both of our wireless routers died today, so I had to quit work early due to it. Since sitting at home without Internet wasn’t an option, I decided to head to Nerstrand-Big Woods State Park.

Jeff and I hiked around for an hour and a half. It wasn’t that great. The trails were very icy, covered with snow. That made it very slippery and difficult to hike on. But, the trails themselves are nice. It is a very wooded area near a river. We found the “hidden falls” which were frozen and very pretty. There is a bit of elevation change, which would be nice if it wasn’t all icy. Jeff enjoyed himself quite a bit.

So, 1 of 20 new State Parks down and another 2.5 miles covered.