I must say, I'm disappointed in the low response to this one, but whatever. This was even cooler than the fold-out canopy in the shallow water that I posted about last summer, so you guys missed out! Now on to the answer ...

So I'm walking along, and I've pushed the unusual animal tracks to the back of my mind, and soon I sense a horse and rider ahead. I look up, and it takes a couple of moments for my brain to register the whole scene, which is this:











Yes, I know it's only another crappy thumbnail, but you're seeing it right -- it's a camel. I am practically face-to-hump with an honest-to-stu camel. On a NH beach.

So I go up and talk to the guy, but because I'm no longer a reporter I've become kind of lax about pushing for basic information, so I don't ask him his name or where he lives or anything, but I ask him if I can photograph it. He says sure, and warns me that the camel is prone to spitting and other rude behavior. I say, fine, I'm not getting any closer than this, anyway, and start snapping with the cell cam. Another guy who is also walking the beach is also quite taken with the sight, which he is video-ing, and joins the conversation. In response to intense cross-examination (LAX, I tell you!), camel-guy says he just always wanted to own a camel, and yeah, it lives right there with him. Wherever there is.

So some other horses are off in the distance, and camel-guy is all, oh, those horses don't like camels, so he keeps moving, and I'm walking backward trying to make sure I get the shot, because there is no way this is not going on the blog, and eventually he joins up with his wife/gf/whatever, who is riding another horse. But of course there is an inevitable confrontation with the other horse people, which, alas, is not clearly depicted here:




There was a better moment just a couple of seconds before this shot, where a non-camel-toting rider ended up having to jump off her horse, or was nearly thrown off, or something. It was all terribly exciting, and if I WERE still writing for newspapers, would have been a great story. Anyway, near as I could tell, everyone escaped unscathed.

Soooooo glad I went to the beach Saturday. That's one good thing about the hotel job -- if I weren't working graveyard, I'd never get up that early to go walk on the beach and I'd never see stuff like this.

Just to bring the power-outage story full circle, which I neglected to do before now: Water was also restored later on the same day as the power/heat, and so we were able to return home. That was Tuesday, Dec. 17. As I write this, I understand that power had been restored to most everyone in NH as of yesterday or maybe early today. So, yay! You just don't realize how civilizing a hot shower is until you don't have access to one; that's what I took away from it.

It was one of those experiences that you say, well, I'm glad to know I can survive it -- you know, having to go hunting for 'net access and such -- but I hope I never have to do it again. Kinda like (for me) climbing Mt. Katahdin back in 1984 or thereabouts: Glad I'm able to say I did it, but I'll never forgive the friends who told me it wouldn't be that bad and that Knife Edge was just an easy little pathway between peaks. Granted, though, the experience kind of clarified some things in my head at the time and helped me make an important life decision as I sank to the ground in a blubbering, acrophobic mass about 3/4 of the way across Knife Edge. Could probably use something sudden and undeniable like that now instead of the slow-motion kind of shock to the system I've been experiencing for a few years now. Not very helpful for clarifying future paths when, just as you get comfortable at one level, the bottom drops out AGAIN and you fall still farther down.

So, wait, isn't it some kind of holiday today? Well, dayum. Have a merry happy, or a happy merry, everyone! As I write this, darkness is settling over the ocean, that Pretenders Christmas song is on 'BLM on the car radio, and I am borrowing a beach hotel's wifi. It is very peaceful.

But now it's time to go see if I can track down some canned yams.

It's been way too long -- 12 years -- since the last time I donated blood. Used to do it regularly, often at the earliest bloodmobile available after I became eligible again. I started when I was 17, a good habit I'm thankful Dad instilled in me. As I became entrenched in the working world, the intervals between donations lengthened, but I never stopped completely, either catching a bloodmobile or going to the Red Cross Blood Center in Bangor.

I intended to continue it once I moved to NH, really I did, but various personal dramas and a brutal work schedule made it difficult to fit into my day. I did donate once, the first December I lived in NH, before driving back to Maine for the holiday. Since then, whenever I've seen posters announcing blood drives I would tell myself, oh, I need to remember that, but somehow never did, except for once. After 9/11, when there was such a push to get people to donate and such an outpouring of people doing so, I did try, at St. Michael in Exeter, but the line was long, and I was under a time crunch, and well, it just never happened.

Broke the drought today. There was a Red Cross blood drive at the beach, which you might think would be perfect for me, given how much time I spend there. But the drive only went until 4 p.m. (tip to the Red Cross -- schedule the drives later and get people coming off the beach, AFTER they've been swimming) and I had other things to do before I could go to the beach for *fun*, so I ended up making a special trip to give blood. No big. What it meant , though, was circling around a couple of times to look for acceptable (free, on-street) parking and, finding none, circliing around a couple more times scouting for acceptable (close to the bloodmobile) *metered* parking. A satisfactory one opened up as I was about to give up. Then I had to estimate how long it would take so as not to pump in more quarters than necessary. I certainly hope whoever gets my blood appreciates the effort. (Tip for the Red Cross -- validate parking!)

I call giving blood the poor woman's physical -- iron check, temperature check, blood-pressure check. The process is essentially still the same as it always was, with some technological advancements. I've failed the iron test sometimes in the past, and once or twice had to have my blood spun in the crit (I think that's what it's called) as a backup or whatever when it didn't float to the bottom of the fluid fast enough for their liking.  Now, of course, it's all digitized, and mine was 13-point-something, well above the 12-point-something needed to be eligible (guess taking myself out to breakfast wasn't such a bad idea, except maybe for my cholesterol).  My temp was 98.6 -- actually 98-point-freaking-6. I hate being so on-the-nose, but I like the '60s song. My blood pressure was 102/70, on the low side like I like. Despite my advanced weight (thankfully they didn't make me stand on a scale), I at least can continue to thumb my nose whenever Dad insists I should follow a high-blood-pressure diet just because he has to. But with those stats, I told the R.N. who processed me, I've never felt so bland. When it comes to giving blood, bland is good, she said, then launched into the excruciating series of questions about my health and, uh, let's just call it "history," that never fails to make me take stock of certain aspects of my life and end up feeling like I've wasted a lot of time -- now more than ever. Huh -- maybe there's another reason I've been avoiding these things.

That's the point where the poor woman's physical turns into the poor woman's therapy session. This time, I kept it down to one tissue, especially when the R.N., who was cool to commiserate with me instead of slapping me upside the head, related a personal tidbit of her own that put my own problems into perspective. Somewhat. That was a cool bonding moment.

But it wasn't all heavy. One of the other nurses was a dead ringer for Turk on "Scrubs," so I was enjoying that bit of eye candy, and joined in when he started singing along to "Maneater" on the radio. And there were a couple of cute younger men in the waiting area who actually acknowledged my presence without calling me "miss" (see the "call me ma'am" post). And of course, there was the free food and juice (the latter made me kinda glad I never had kids and  missed the whole juice box trend -- those things is complicated!). And on this occasion, there was a lovely view of the beach and, out the other window, better people-watching than I remember at other bloodmobiles. I told the staff they should have set up the cots on the roof of their little RV so we could catch a few rays while squeezing every few seconds. AND, they were giving away free Red Sox t-shirts.

It was after 5 before I got back to the beach for my more accustomed purpose. I wasn't supposed to get the needle stick area wet, so it's a good thing "swimming" to me usually just consists of "wading in up to my waist and letting the waves wash over me." But have you ever tried to do that and still keep your inner elbow dry?

Every so often -- not very, but sometimes -- I become possessed of the idea that I'm going to cast aside my generally sedentary lifestyle and become the active person I once was. Hence, my  return to the beach walks I mentioned in the beach-debris post earlier this month. For several years, I would walk Hampton Beach year-round, in all kinds of weather. On a good day, I'd walk it (in the dry soft sand) end to end and back, intensifying the workout by climbing up and down the dunes on the state park beach at the southern end. On a bad day, the walk would be shorter and less intense, and if it was low tide, might take place on the harder, wet, easier-to-walk-on intertidal sand. In previous lives, walking had been a mainstay of my regime, but I had often grown bored with the route or the monotony or whatever and eventually petered out.

The beach walks never got boring for me, because they were at the ocean, and I always seem to be mesmerized by the ocean. Nonetheless, they ended about three or four years ago, when my life became hinky, or rather, hinkier even than it already was. Hinky in ways I hadn't previously experienced and wasn't easily able to cope with.

I began those walks again with the onset of warm weather this year, and although I haven't been entirely faithful to a routine, I have managed to get out usually a couple of times a week.

This week, I added biking. I've tried to include it in the past, but always grew bored with the route (I was limited by not wanting to deal with hills). But that was before I moved to the coast. Its flatter terrain makes it ideal for me, and better still, stretches all the way to the beach. Just one problem: The bike I had when I lived inland was somewhat worse for the wear after I left it out in all manner of inclement weather, and didn't seem worth sinking money into.

But this week, I went out in search of cheap wheels. Having no luck at the department stores, I stopped at a place on the Route 1 causeway in Hampton, where there was a sign out front advertising bike rentals, on the off chance that they also sold used bikes.

I was in luck; after showing me several bikes that either weren't what I was looking for (mountain bikes) or well out of my price range ($300???!), the proprietor showed me an older 21-speed men's bike. It needed front brakes, but he said he could remedy that in a couple of hours, just didn't want to put the time and money into it until the bike was spoken for. The price was right(ish): $75-$80. I agreed, paid the man, and he said I could pick it up the next day, which I did.

That day rained, so I waited until this afternoon for its inaugural ride. I set off around the "block," heading down the residential road that ends at the marsh and turning right before that point onto the little causeway with the clearing that looks out over the harbor. The bike was riding really nice, so rather than complete my intended circuit, I turned left and headed off toward Seabrook Beach on Route 286. I had visions of going all the way to at least the parking lot overlooking the harbor in Seabrook, but amid the gathering weekend beach traffic, began to get a little spooked at the prospect of approaching the T-intersection with Route 1A, where two lanes of traffic can turn left at the light, and one of them can also turn right. I hadn't, after all, bought a helmet yet, and couldn't visualize where it might be safest to cross so as to remain on the right-hand side. So, when there was a break in the traffic on 286, I crossed the road and doubled back toward home.

All told, probably five or six miles; not a bad first day's effort. The price of the bike, truth be told, was a little steeper than I'd like to have paid for a used bike, but I figure if I can use it for short errands instead of the car, maybe in the coming months I'll save enough on gas that it'll pay for itself. Hell, at current prices, I'd just have to forgo a tank and a half.

So, the journey begins.

Don't let anyone kid you; being a 50-year-old woman may look glamorous in the movies, but in real life it's not all that and a bag of fiber wafers. You're too old to pull off belly shirts, but too young yet to qualify for senior discounts. Shopping for bathing suits becomes an even fresher hell than usual.

Worse -- too often, you're invisible to the rest of society. People brush you aside, or simply walk through you like you're Patrick Swayze in "Ghost." Young men look right past you, even while you're carrying on a conversation with them, 'cause they just ain't gots the time to waste actually paying attention to you. I had to grow my shocking silver hair (not a badge of age, incidentally; I found the first glint of gray in my brown hair at 14 and was half-n-half by 25, at which point I was pleasantly surprised to learn that a lot of people actually liked it) down to my butt, Emmylou Harris-style, just to minimize the chances of getting lost in the crowd. (And to give my blog a title.)

If they're not looking through you, they're overcompensating with condescension. Case in point: Yesterday, I brought my car in to the nearest chain lube place for an oil change. As I headed outside to drive off after paying, the 12-year-old who had worked on it brought me up short by cheerily wishing me, "Have a nice day, miss."

"Miss." This was not the first time. It's still only anecdotal, but my trendspotting antennae have detected an unmistakable acceleration in the incidence of this salutation, chiefly within the service industry, in direct proportion to my advancing age. I remember (sort of) back in my -- what, 20s? 30s? -- the opposite rite of passage: the first time a store clerk called me "ma'am." A little part of me died that day as I realized I'd probably never again get carded trying to buy beer or get into a dance club. Has even "ma'am" now passed along with my waning fertility?

This latest indignity, though, makes me think wistfully upon the "ma'am" days. "Miss"? Really? The first time it happened was jarring, perhaps because even when "miss" was more age-appropriate to me, I never used it. Instead, I adopted what I considered the more progressive-sounding "ms." as my courtesy title of choice, happily checking off the option on magazine subscriptions, health forms, employment applications, announcing to the world that I was a Modern Woman. "Miss" just never sounded much like me to begin with, at least not since I was around 13 and latched onto a feminist movement I didn't yet even understand. But what's going through the heads of these people? Do they think I don't know how old I am? Sure, I don't wear a ring, sure, I'm not married, so technically, in Emily Post-world, I AM still a "miss," I guess. But I can't even delude myself -- however youthful I feel inside or however childish I behave outwardly, however many times a week I wear tie-dyed t-shirts, all it takes is a look in the mirror or an all-too-frequent bad knee day to snap me back to reality. If I can't fool myself, surely I can't deceive you, whippersnapper. Now get off my lawn.

I suppose, though, there'll come a day when I look back even on this stage fondly. That day -- the day I give myself the full Kevorkian -- will be when someone, somewhere, describes me as "__ years young."

Turns out, not all my friends have LJ accounts and so can't post their guesses to the weekend's beach-debris puzzler. So, in order to drag this thing out way beyond its sell-by date, I'll post them here.

Blair posits:
Andy Goldsworthy's tent?

(Whoever THAT is. [google google] Oh. NOT a porn star.)

And Reid sez:
Looks good! I'd say some kind of fishing net holder.

(Maybe, Reid. We'll see.)

And Travis wonders:
Is it the framework for a windsurfing apparatus?

(Another good guess.)

Are any of them right?

Answer... all in due time, my friends. All. In. Due. Time.

I've recently resumed a favorite former pasttime that I've let slide in the last three or so years -- walking on the beach. What's new to me this time, thanks to my current wacky schedule, is doing it in the early morning: On weekends I work graveyard, and I find I'm more likely to do the walk if I stop at the beach on the way home, rather than stopping off at the house first, which would leave me vulnerable to being distracted by shiny objects ... like TV ... and sleep ...

Added weekend bonus to early-morning walks: No fighting beach traffic (much) at 7:30 a.m.

So I've made it semi-routine on the weekends, as long as I can find free street parking at Hampton Beach. (When I work up to walking on the dry soft sand, which requires more exertion, I may include Seabrook Beach. But for now, Hampton offers the best options -- I like walking on the harder intertidal sand, but if the tide is in, something I don't keep track of and don't know till I get there, Hampton has that nice sidewalk. Seabrook doesn't have a nice hard surface with an unobstructed ocean view, so there it's either low-tide sand or soft sand.)

A cool thing about walking on the beach is that you never know what you'll find washed up on shore. Usually it's nothing more interesting than a battered lobster trap, but I've also seen what looked to be a discarded Christmas tree.

Today, as I approached the beach from Bradford Avenue, I was greeted with this sight:





I was instantly fascinated, and I wasn't alone. There weren't many people on the beach at that hour (by now it was around 8 a.m.), but a small group of us stood at water's edge contemplating the object, maybe 50 feet out, easily the largest piece of flotsam I had seen in many years of beach walking. Some sort of thing off a boat? A contraption used in sailing, perhaps? Some kind of frame? An oil derrick ready for Bush to lift the offshore-drilling ban? The possibilities were mind-boggling. I happened to have my cell phone, so I started snapping pix, and ended up wading out to the object, not taking time to remove my shorts. Which got wet. But I ended up with this (excuse the finger in front; I haven't yet mastered this cell-phone-photography thing):





We onlookers ultimately were able to figure out what it was; can you? I'll post the answer tomorrow ... or later this week ... or sometime.