two weeks in...

So, we have been at Barking Horse Farm for just over two weeks. We are in town for the day at the internet cafe so we can finally give a detailed account of our current lives. Unfortunately, we forgot the usb cord for the camera so there will not be pictures today but we have been taking them.

We are really enjoying ourselves. We get up pretty early each morning, around 7 or 7:30. We have three horses, always the pony Silky but the others change, who until yesterday were in a field behind our house, to feed. They are now in a pasture down the hill just a little bit. Sometimes feeding them is difficult, they fight a bit, we have to tie Silky so she doesn´t take everyone´s food.

Then we have goats, Mr Darcy and Isabella. Isabella is on the tail end of and Mr Darcy is just starting, an infestation of BOT FLIES, or torsolos as they are perhaps more scientifically called. So in the morning we take the goats out of the their house and tie them somewhere around the house so they can eat. They are currently up the hill a little bit with lots of grass. In the evenings before we put them back in we have to squeeze the bot flies out and then check for abcesses and maybe squeeze all the pus out of those. Elizabeth (the woman who we´re working for) is a nurse and is very adept at field lancing and things like that. We are not so adept. We are doing our best. Mostly that means David is doing his best. I help hold the goats but I have not gotten to the point where i can squeeze out a bot fly larva. Interesting tidbit of information - dogs like bot fly larva. a lot. they fight for them when they pop out.

That is the grossest thing we have to do. Maybe I shouldn´t have talked about it so soon, it might color the telling of our experiences. I´m hoping to take some pictures of it, though.

Our house has everything we need. It´s pretty big, actually. Definitely bigger than our apartment in Oregon. The back half is an open kitchen area with a toilet and a shower (indoor plumbing and hot water) where we spend a lot of our time. We have a lot of shade over the house so it doesn´t get too hot. There is a bedroom where we have most of our stuff and a second enclosed room that currently has the refrigerator and horse food. We took the second bed down and David has a spot for meditation (under a mosquito net - that´s how a wwoofer got bot flies, meditating without a net) and yoga. We have a delightful front porch with two hammocks. We sit a read a lot.

There are awesome birds everywhere. There are Keel Billed Toucans all the time and Fiery Billed Aracaris, a Violaceous Trogon, Kiskadees everywhere. And we are in the middle of a haven for Montezuma Orapendolas. Ticos do not like them because they eat bananas so our property is one place they are not molested. They are in the process of building their colony of haning nests around where the goats eat. I´m trying hard to keep track of everything as I see it.

About once a week or every two weeks we come in to town for grocery shopping. On Wednesday evening a produce man comes to Elizabeth´s house, we have gotten delicious bananas, pineapples, and avacados from him. We´ve also gotten great mangos and melons in town. We had an avacado with our black beans and rice the other night, delicious.

The kitchen accomodations are pretty spartan but we´re still managing pretty well. We breakfasts alternate between scrambled eggs and a corn meal mush. It´s finer than grits, so I can´t call it that. Oatmeal and cereal are all very expensive, so this has worked well. We bought a huge bottle of honey from a kid in a restaurant for $5 so we put honey and cinnamon and raisins and whatever other fruit we have. The eggs from the grocery store are very good as well. David is working on rebuilding the chicken coop at our house so we can bring chickens up from Elizabeths so hopefully we will have our own eggs at some point.

We also have a cat and two dogs. Salomon the cat is a skilled jungle hunter but also likes to spend the whole day sleeping on our bed and is very affectionate. The dogs are Osa, a big black lab, and Piglet, a small white and tan maybe terrier mix. They are both very fun, always up for a hike, and are in a stiff competition to see who can eat the most cicadas at night. The cicadas are everywhere and at times are deafening. You know how they get really really loud at night sometimes? It´s like that all day, except louder.

As I said earlier, we are really enjoying this experience. We are in a beautiful place and having our own little Walden set up, sitting around contemplating nature and doing our laundry at Elizabeth´s once a week.

Pictures will be on the next post, in maybe 2 weeks!

we have arrived in costa rica

We are at our voluteen position at Barking Horse Farm in Costa Rica. We flew on Wednesday, which was our 3rd anniversary, and spent a night in a hostel in San Jose. On Thursday we took a couple of buses and walked a little while to get to the farm. The house that we are staying in is about a 15 minute hike across the river and up a huge hill. We used a horse to take our stuff up to the house. We are in charge of three horses, two goats, a rooster, two ducks, a cat, and a dog. A more informative blogpost will come in the next week or so, complete with pictures!

and we're back

After our break in Atlanta/Harrisonburg Adventurequest phase 2 is underway.

We left Harrisonburg around 9am this morning and arrived in San Jose around 10:30pm (central US time). After some confusion with our ride (as in not really showing up) someone "representing" the hostel arranged another ride. legit or not we got here just fine.

tomorrow we are going to try our best and navagative the two taxi rides and two bus rides that will take us to Barking Horse farm.

my spanish is really rusty, but apparently that hasn't mattered so far. I imagine the rural areas will be a bit less english-oriented.

we'll see.

David

Atlanta

Resting in Atlanta for the holidays before we leave for Costa Rica in a couple of weeks. It's very nice to see friends and family while living in a somewhat stable place for a two weeks. I've been thinking about the "key ideas" from the first part of the trip (like those bold words you were supposed to find in your language arts assignment in elementary school) and will write a few "what's it all about posts" in the next few days. Onward.

Albany to Vermont

Yeah, Albany. Or maybe not, the town didn't seem all that pleasant, but there was an excellent co-op. So at least people can eat well there. We drove back to the farm in VT after the show to stay the weekend and get in one more wwoof day before vermont turns into a statewide ice-skating rink of cold and triple-layered flannel.

Oh and to my sister in law. I'm looking at you catherine. yes you there in the back acting like you aren't paying attention while listening to metalcore on your hot pink and black ipod. Here's a website of all the other nerdy people who keep track of everything the band does. Yeah I see you rolling your eyes. Be careful or they'll come eat all of the snacks in your house and use words like "solid," "groove," and "chill." And then give you dreadlocks while you sleep. And they won't be hot pink.


Friday, 11/27/2009 Times Union Center, Albany, NY

Set 1: AC/DC Bag, Maze, Driver, My Mind's Got a Mind of its Own, Gumbo, Bouncing Around the Room > It's Ice, Two Versions of Me, Timber (Jerry) > Limb By Limb, Cavern > Light

Set 2: My Friend, My Friend > Golden Age^[1], On Your Way Down, Fluffhead > Piper -> Tomorrow's Song^[2], Prince Caspian, Harry Hood, Suzy Greenberg, The Squirming Coil, I Been Around

Encore: Fire

[1] Phish debut.
[2] Debut.

Pretty pretty pretty good. Without a doubt my favorite of the tour as an overall show.

set I: ac/dc, maze, driver, my mind and gumbo all kept up high energy. If they are going to play a slower song, I dig bouncin. It's Ice also one of my favorite shorter ones. Rest of the set pretty solid, groove, chill time. And timber came out of nowhere.

set II: and speaking of that how about the tv on the radio cover. awesome! Very solid, chill, grove second set. With freaking Piper- I've wanted to hear that song live for about as long as I've wanted to hear songs live.

Fire will never be a bad encore choice.

Great show. Really the first of the tour when I felt the band was being spontaneous, fun, and relaxed a la back in the 1.0 day. If they keep this up Maggie and I might be doing additional tours in the future.

Pittsburgh and Philadelphia

We drove from Ohio to Pittsburgh and stayed with Rives (we met her in VT, her daughter wwoofed with us). After staying in a number of less than ideal spots- her clean and well organized house was awesome- this is coming from the part of me that orders albums by genre, artist, and year. Wonderful place to stay- many thanks to her.

We drove to Philadelphia the next day and caught two shows- the following day was a classy motel 6 thanksgiving extravaganza of apples and macaroni and cheese (not together- though I would think that delicious. A party not to be named refused this delicacy).

Philadelphia = excellent town from our limited time wandering around for 5 hours. And a more extensive chinatown than DC.

Shows!


Tuesday, 11/24/2009 Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, PA

Set 1: Chalk Dust Torture, Bathtub Gin, Cities > Camel Walk, The Curtain With, The Wedge, The Moma Dance, Reba, Golgi Apparatus, Stealing Time From the Faulty Plan

Set 2: Possum > Down with Disease > Twenty Years Later > Harry Hood, The Mango Song > Mike's Song > Simple > Slave to the Traffic Light > Weekapaug Groove

Encore: A Day in the Life

Right. First set was great. I can't really say much more than that. Certainly my favorite of the tour so far. CDT, gin, curtin with, the wedge, moma dance, reba, golgi- all standards that I like to hear. Solid jams throughout. I didn't think I would hear cities this tour (no covers up to this point) and it didn't make me frown. I'm mixed about the Joy material, but stealing time is one I like a bit more than the others.

Second set also quite good. Some of the setlist felt a litle recycled, but I won't really ever complain about mike's groove (with simple and slave in the middle at that). A day in the life is one of my favorite encores.

Wednesday, 11/25/2009 Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, PA

Set 1: Kill Devil Falls, 46 Days, Sugar Shack, Halley's Comet > The Divided Sky, Sleep Again, Ocelot, Train Song, Wilson > Run Like an Antelope

Set 2: Birds of a Feather, Farmhouse, Tweezer, You Enjoy Myself, Esther, Time Turns Elastic > Tweezer Reprise

Encore: Oh! Sweet Nuthin'

Set I: And here's a love/hate example of my phish relationship. I thought this show was a bit on the boring side for most of the first set (though it did pick up at end). I mean, really? KDF -> 46 days -> sugar shack? Meh. Halley's and Divided were nice (the best dived so far) but then Ocelot-> train song -> wilson. I've said it once... but I'm getting tired of wilson. Hard to criticize antelope though, it's always a personal live favorite.

Set II: Yeah birds of a feather! metal. farmhouse = smash my face with a porcupine. then tweezer-> yem -> esther. soild, good funky yem. then it happened. sometimes it takes time to get over a tragic and painful event- the years will yeild more comfort in retrospect... least to say we got tte'd again. does the band not notice the entire venue sit down when they play this.. for 15 very drawn out minutes. Tweezer reprise was standard. Good velvet underground cover to close the night.

Great seats for night 1, ok seats for night 2. Still fun, I've enjoyed watching Maggie start to "get" what being a phish fan is about. It's different than most other bands and very hard to explain to folks who've never been to a show.

Cincinnati Shows

Two shows in Cincinnati this weekend. Many thanks to Sparky for being a fantastic host.

Friday, 11/20/2009 U.S. Bank Arena, Cincinnati, OH
Set 1: Chalk Dust Torture, The Moma Dance, The Divided Sky, Alaska, Water in the Sky, Fast Enough for You, Time Turns Elastic, Gotta Jibboo > Fluffhead
Set 2: Punch You In the Eye, Tweezer -> Light -> Back on the Train -> Possum, Slave to the Traffic Light, You Enjoy Myself
Encore: Joy, Golgi Apparatus, Tweezer Reprise

Saturday, 11/21/2009 U.S. Bank Arena, Cincinnati, OH
Set 1: Wilson, NICU, Wolfman's Brother, Ocelot, Torn and Frayed, Strange Design, Ginseng Sullivan, Albuquerque, Split Open and Melt, Dirt, Limb By Limb, Run Like an Antelope
Set 2: Rock and Roll, Ghost, If I Could, Backwards Down the Number Line, Prince Caspian, Suzy Greenberg, Also Sprach Zarathustra, The Squirming Coil
Encore: Sleeping Monkey, Axilla
Notes: Albuquerque was played for the first time since 9/14/00 (115 shows).

Nice to be back at US bank for a phish show- it's a well thought out venue. Good lots both nights on the top level of a parking deck.

Friday
Set 1 - opened strong with chalk dust, divided sky was on point. then it kind of went suck. really alaska, fast enough, and tte right next to each other? boring. i don't think i'll ever find tte interesting. picked back up at the end. Fluff sounded much better than it has lately.

Set 2- redemption. Great throughout- maggie was excited to try out aud particiation chants for the first time with pyite. high energy jams for all of the seques. solid encore.

Saturday
Set 1- This is the second time I've seen them open with Wilson at US bank. Is it bad to say I'm kind of tired of it? Nice bust out with Albuquerque. Solid Wolfman's, SOAM jam was a little more laid back than some of the jams as of late. The lights during Antelope were Chirs K's best showing of the weekend.

Set 2- Fantastic Rock and Roll -> Ghost, went dark and angsty at one point. Favorite jam of the tour so far. Great Coil solo from Page as usual. Why oh why must we continue to play f-er pants? Keep Caspain in Narnia, not at the Phish show (thinking of making lot shirts that say this). But in sum, best show of the tour so far.

In all it was a fun weekend. Phish is really returning to form, but I hope they can shake off the setlist formula they're currently using. Working from the more controlled jam structure (a la early 90s) is suiting them well to get comfortable again.

We're spending today in Cincinnati, then driving to Philadelphia by way of Pittsburgh for two more shows on tuesday and wednesday.