Innocent Bystander

Today's observation...

I think the Gingrichs get their hair done at the same place the Devo guys get their hair done.

100 Walks: #s 8 and 9...

The owner of this blog (me) has informed us (me) that he'd rather title these chronicles of our walks "100 Walks" since that is the goal he's attempting to reach in this year of our Lord, 2012. Since he pays the bills, we complied.

I've walked about 15 and 3/4 miles since I last regaled you with the tales of my meandering attempts at exercise. On Thursday, I took a familiar route: Up Sixth Ave. to Balboa Park, across the Prado to Park Blvd., down behind Petco Stadium, over the new pedestrian bridge, past the Hilton and up the Embarcadero though Seaport Village. Construction on a new park (Not a building! Amazing!) catty-corner from the Embassy Suites hotel necessitated me taking a detour up to Broadway and back home, and when I did I passed the display below near the Midway floating military museum (the stern is seen at left...I loved the green water). I pass this way a lot, but never from this angle and had never really paid attention to these bas-relief sculptures on the side of the panels that mark the "Greatest Generation Walk" at the Port of San Diego. The city is a huge military town, with major bases on Coronado, Mira Mesa, and over at what is now called Liberty Station, not to mention the Marine Corps stationed at Camp Pendleton to the north of Oceanside, about 40 or so miles away from downtown San Diego. So, yeah...there's a lot of cool military things around town, especially near the water and the Midway aircraft carrier, which has been a huge attraction since it opened a few years ago. Yes, that's people having lunch out on the lower deck, where there's a little snack bar/restaurant (well, I guess it's more correctly called a "Mess.")

My walk today took me even further afield, but still had a military bent. A month or two ago, I walked to Liberty Station, a relatively new development in Point Loma, and ever since then I wanted to walk to and back from the area. (The first time I met a friend for lunch and she gave me a lift home.) It used to be part of a huge Marine Corps Recruiting Depot (some of which is still there), but a lot of it has been turned over to public use. There are restaurants, shopping, new condos and homes, a giant church, and a whole arts district. The area is beautifully landscaped and contains a huge open area (see the photo below, at the end of this post) that borders an inlet of the bay and is opposite Lindbergh Field, where San Diego International Airport sits. I love the place, but it too has a bit of a military theme.

The open area has a large number of monuments commemorating lost ships and submarines of World War II. They're really kind of elegant, too. I love the "On Eternal Patrol" line which is on each stone. They're so sad to read, though. Each tells the tale of the ship or sub, when they were commissioned, when they sank and how many men were lost. In the case of the USS Flier, pictured here, 8 men actually survived after swimming for 15 hours after the sub was sunk.

My walk continued back over onto Harbor Drive, down past the airport. I'm not sure who thought of the landscaping of the area around the airport, but they did an amazing job. If you're visiting San Diego for the first time and you come in via plane, this is the first thing you see when you leave the airport and drive into the city proper. The natural curve of the Big Bay (that's what they call it...I can't make this stuff up) really compliments the view of the city and it's kind of breathtaking. I never fail to be impressed by it, and I've seen it literally hundreds of times since I started visiting here in 1992 and moved here in '98.

All total, this walk racked up 9.57 miles for me, and I'm feeling it as I'm typing this. The weather here all of this past week has been absolutely picture-perfect. It was probably about 75 degrees for most of my walk, under a clear blue sky. I have a new cap, which I don't think kept out the sun very well, so I'm feeling a bit sun-stroked tonight, nothing serious, but I know I got some sun, even though I do use SPF 50. Also three and half hours of constant walking is a bit much, I think. For those of you keeping track, my walking path was: Fourth Ave. to Laurel St., Laurel to the airport and Pacific Highway; Pacific to Barnett Ave.; Barnett to Liberty Station; LS to Harbor Drive; Harbor to Broadway and home. (I just know you all find that as interesting and compelling as I do.) And yes, I did a little bird-watching along the way. (I think this one was actually watching me, though.)

For the month of January so far, I've walked 9 times. My goal is twice a week, with at least 10 miles per week. That will total 520 miles for the year, in 104 walks. I'm already just shy of 60 miles for the first month of the year, so maybe I need to revise those goals a little. We'll see.

 

Good luck, Chuck...

Chuck, the TV series, ended with a bang tonight. After three great seasons (1-3), and one mostly forgettable one (season 4), the series was given another in a long list of cancellation reprieves by NBC for season 5, in what seemed to be a placeholder position on Friday nights while the floundering network hoped and prayed for some kind of replacement show that would at least better Chuck's ratings. (Note to NBC execs: the show about the stars tracing their family trees isn't it.)

The truth of the matter is, Chuck had a perfect ending when season 3 stopped. If the show would have ended right then and there, it would have been a classic. Chuck Bartowski had fulfilled everything: He got the girl, he became a spy, he escaped his failed past. But NBC listened to the fans of the series and brought it back for a fourth season, a season mired by even more stunt casting (always a problem with this show, although a few moments shine through, like Scott Bakula as Chuck's father), and an over-dependence on product placement (I'm looking at you, Subway) that bordered on the obnoxious. (Yes, fans buying Subway sandwiches saved the show at least once, I get it.)

The fifth season, which NBC said upfront was 13 episodes and done, redeemed the show slightly. The final two episodes, with Sarah Walker (Yvonne Strahovski) going rogue and forgetting all her memories of her relationship with Chuck (Zachary Levi) were great. But the season was once again mired by stunt casting (an unrecognizable Mark Hamill in the first episode, the imminently forgettable Angus Macfadyen as the big bad in the final episodes, and Matrix refugee Carrie-Anne Moss still milking that whole black leather thing from her only hit film). By season five most of the regular characters had gotten tired: Big Mike, Jeff and Lester, Morgan, Ellie and Awesome, had all become TV show cardboard cutouts, more annoying than enjoyable. Worst of all, star Zach Levi seemed to phone the show in during some episodes, and it remained for Yvonne Stahovski to put on a cat-suit to wake me back up. (Seriously: I would SO watch a Sarah Walker show with her as a CIA agent.)

I'd like to say all is forgiven, Chuck, but that's clearly not the case as far as I'm concerned. Despite an open-ended ending that was ambiguous enough to be really appealing, the failure to abort at the right time made you fail your 5-year spy mission. Better to have gone off to TV heaven back at the end of season 3 when you had a natural, (dare I say it?) AWESOME ending, then to stretch this out for two more seasons.

But still, the real story of Chuck began with a kiss...and the series ended with a kiss, too. There's a certain symmetry to that which I find kind of special. So good luck, Chuck. We'll always have those first 50 or so shows when you were simply wonderful.

Justified: Hello, Karen!

If you missed the first wham-bam-thank-you-m'am episode of the third season of Justified, you missed a doozy. I won't reveal too much here other than this: ice pick, prison, Dickie, rotting weed, the return of Jere Burns, a new ruthless villain, the above-mentioned "wham-bam," and watch out for that frying pan. It picked up just where season 2 left off and I couldn't be happier.

When episode 2 premieres tonight at 10:00 on FX, a mysterious fellow marshal from Raylan's past comes to Lexington. She's played by Carla Cugino and her name is Karen Goodall, but you may know her better as another of Elmore Leonard's memorable literary characters, Karen Sisco. First played by Jennifer Lopez--in her only watchable role--in the movie Out of Sight, Gugino starred as the character in a short-lived (10 episodes) series on ABC in 2003-2004. And while the producers of Justified are being cagey, and not admitting that it's the same Karen, we all know it is. And even if it isn't, I'm going to say it is. She just got married sometime in the past few years...

Leonard's new book, Raylan, also debuted last week on what we call around these parts "Justified Tuesday." I bought the e-book version, but looking through the actual printed book last week, it's slim to say the least, more of a novella. I'm uncertain of the history of this project. It contains characters we're familiar with from the TV series, including Dickie and Coover Bennett, but as Dickie and Coover Pervis. Their father--not their mother, Mags--is the pot king of Harlan County. And Loretta and her dad, the doomed Walt McCready, also make an appearance, so it's a bit fuzzy as to what came first: season 2 of Justified or Leonard's book. I'm guessing the latter and the producers of the TV show got an advance look, since there are scenes in it that are right out of the show.

I must confess to loving Elmore Leonard's work when it's done right on film or TV. The aforementioned Out of Sight--along with Get Shorty--are two of my favorite movies. Justified is great, as was Karen Sisco, and I enjoyed Beau Bridges years ago (1998)--also on ABC, which seems to greenlight Leonard series only to kill them quickly--as Maximum Bob. But I've always had a hard time trying to read the original novels by Leonard. I tried with both Out of Sight and Get Shorty, thinking I'd have an edge there since I liked the (mostly-faithful, from what I know) adaptations. No go, tho. I'm having a bit of a hard time with the Raylan book, too. There's just something about Leonard's use of dialogue to mainly advance the story that gets me. But I love the characters from the TV show so much that it's an interesting-enough read, even though it seems to take place in an alternate universe. And any window into the adventures of US Marshal Raylan Givens is a welcome one to escape through at any time.

100 Walks (#6 & 7): Special bonus walk edition...

I have been a bit remiss in both my walking and my reporting of said walks. I know you're all hanging on my every word when it comes to my feeble attempts at physical fitness. But both a certain malaise and a dose of ennui (leave it to the French for coming up with those snobby words that explain their diffident world view while looking down their snooty long noses) have contributed heavily to my life the past few weeks. So "today's walk" is kind of a euphenism (hmmm...French again?).

Last Thursday I took a walk at work. I'm getting a little bored with my (admittedly) beautiful walk routes downtown, so I decided to combine both my lunch time with walk time. I ended up walking a very short (for me, these days) 2.66 miles, on a route that I thought would get me closer to 3+ miles. I walked up La Mesa Blvd. (which is part of "Historic Route 80"...who knew?)  to Grossmont Center, a shopping center, then down Center Street to Fletcher Parkway and up Baltimore Ave., back to work. Like I said, I was hoping for more--aren't all of us always hoping for more?--but I was sadly mistaken.

Yesterday I had a work-related meeting to go to, and I didn't want to miss the football games, so I walked before the meeting and only totaled 5.96 miles. Yes, I know...that's not bad for 2 hours, so I shouldn't complain. And oh, yeah...those of you who know me well enough to be scratching your heads about that "didn't want to miss the football games" comment: They always lull me into the best naps.

Here's the trees in Balboa Park that are near the big fountain on the Park Blvd. side. I have no idea what they are...at first I thought they were cherry blossoms, but those are more pinkish. Chime in if you know what they are...