Sabino Canyon: to the END!...and fun with accents...

Finally, a Saturday morning with time and the built-up 'training' to run the 'entire length' of Sabino Canyon...actually, just the paved trail part: 3.7 miles...(I know, I know, it's not a marathon or anything, but just a local 'landmark'-goal for me)...I'd thought it was four-miles...but still makes for a nice 7.4 mile round-trip jog...

I must admit, though, that the last half-mile was too steep to run, so I walked it...a mile-walk in the middle--not 'race-worthy,' but a beautiful way to spend a late-October morning--in the chilly shade almost the whole time, though, since the sun is low enough now that the canyon doesn't see sunlight until mid-morning...Sabino creek is dry in spots, but still sports a few little waterfalls here and there...

(photo from last December, taken near the end of the road)
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And now--perhaps some of you have seen this; it's making the e-mail circuit...but since my entire childhood was colored by foreign accents of different kinds, I just had to post this.

(warning: if you're overly politically-correct, read no further...but come on; remember I'm 'having fun' here, not 'making fun.')

It's a pretty good approximation/amalgamation/transcription of Asian and Hispanic English, to my eyes/ears at least:

"TENJOOBERRYMUDS"...

(By the time you read through this YOU WILL UNDERSTAND "TENJOOBERRYMUDS")

In order to continue getting by in America we all need to learn the NEW English language! Practice by reading the following conversation until you are able to understand the term "TENJOOBERRYMUDS". With a little patience, you'll be able to fit right in.

The following is a telephone exchange between

maybe you as a hotel guest and a call to room service

somewhere in the good old USA today......

MUST be read aloud:

Room Service: "Morrin. Roon sirbees."
Guest: "Sorry, I thought I dialed room-service."
Room Service: " Rye . Dis Roon sirbees...morrin! Joowish to oddor sunteen???"
Guest: "Uh..... Yes, I'd like to order bacon and eggs."
Room Service: "Ow July den?"
Guest: "......What??"
Room Service: "Ow July den?!?... pryed, boyud, poochd?"
Guest: "Oh, the eggs! How do I like them?

Sorry.. scrambled, please."
Room Service: "Ow July dee baykem? Crease?"
Guest: "Crisp will be fine ."
Room Service: "Hokay. An Sahn toes?"
Guest: "What?"
Room Service: "An toes. July Sahn toes?"
Guest: "I... don't think so."
RoomService: "No? Judo wan sahn toes???"
Guest: "I'm sorry; I feel really bad about this,

but I don't know what 'judo wan sahn toes' means."
RoomService: "Toes! Toes!...Why Joo don Juan toes?

Ow bow Anglish moppin weet bodder?"
Guest: "Oh, English muffin!!! I've got it!

You were saying 'toast'...Fine ...Yes, an English muffin will be fine ."
RoomService: "Weet bodder?"
Guest: "No, just put the bodder on the side."
RoomService: "Wad?!?"
Guest: "I mean butter... just put the butter on the side."
RoomService: "Copy?"
Guest: "Excuse me?"
RoomService: "Copy...tea..wid meel? chooger?"
Guest: "Yes. Coffee, please... and that'll be all..."
RoomService: "One Minnie. Scramah egg, crease baykem,

Anglish moppin, weet bodder on sigh and copy ... rye??"
Guest: "Yes, yes-whatever you say."
RoomService: "Tenjooberrymuds."
Guest: "You're welcome"

(Remember I said "By the time you read through this YOU WILL UNDERSTAND 'TENJOOBERRYMUDS' "
......and you do, don't you!)

NY "London" Times...on aging and national stereotypes... (Or, Europe as an allegory on aging)

...on the way home from work today, I stopped for a cup of coffee...
Leafing through a prior drinker's left-behind New York Times, I came across the editorial page's presentation of sayings and conceptions about aging,
including this blurb, taken from The Times of London this past July:

"I've often thought that Europe is an allegory for the ages of man.
You're born ITALIAN. They're relentlessly infantile and mother-obsessed.
In childhood, we're ENGLISH: chronically shy, tongue-tied, cliquey, and only happy kicking balls, pulling the legs off things or sending someone to Coventry.
Teenagers are FRENCH: pretentiously philosophical, embarrassingly vain, ridiculously romantic and insincere.
Then,in middle age, we become either SWISS or IRISH.
Old age is GERMAN: ponderous, pompous and pedantic.
Then finally we regress into being BELGIAN, with no idea who we are at all."

(found on the editorial page of the New York Times, 19 Oct., 2009)

My apologies, condolences, and 'appreciation' to all who resent and/or resemble these remarks...

actually about Nicaragua...

Well, it's been a while since I've posted something directly about Nicaragua. It has been over three years now since we moved back to the States...but this afternoon I was looking up something online, and I happened upon a NY Times article about Nicaragua...which led me to this: Click HERE for the New York Times travel resource page on Nicaragua--

many cool slide shows, video presentations, other practical links...

...including THIS video about 'volcano surfing:'

http://video.nytimes.com/video/2006/12/15/travel/1194817122256/hiking-nicaraguas-volcanoes.html

Crazy, eh?

And yet I know that volcano well--I didn't 'surf' it, but my wife and I, along with a few other friends, spent the better part of a day around, on, and in Cerro Negro, in January of 2006:

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...and one last Nica-photo for tonight:

(...this one, of my bike against a doorway in León, taken when I was on my way home
from running errands, was featured on the online edition of today's Tucson paper.)

A couple of Sunday links...

To get an idea of what some of the social conditions
are for Tucson's urban high-school students, especially
refugee-kids, here's a link to an article in this week's
local paper: click HERE.

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And...another Sunday-morning published (!) surprise...although this time,
I did submit a photo specifically for the newspaper's request:
(The photo's from last summer, one evening when Sara and I drove out to Gates Pass, just west of the city...)

For the whole article, click HERE.
...for a larger photo, click HERE.