Celtic and Scots Festival

I went to a festival this weekend for all those Americans who love to revel in some distant ancestry. Above you'll see a woman about to stuff a ferret down the trousers of a guy in a funny hat. Other activities included traditional dancing and whisky drinking. Ah yes, I really must tell you about the Scotch tasting. It turned out that a close friend of the scotch tasting guy had recently passed away, so we began by passing a bowl of whisky around the group in his honour. During this time our host took the oppurtunity to rib whoever was sipping from the bowl at the time, and it soon became evident that the guy was completely hammered. According to his collegues he had already consumed three bottles of the finest Scotch - by noon. Oh, and did I mention he was swinging a massive axe around the whole time!
His attempt to explain the whisky making process were from then on completely hilarious. Not much serious Scotch tasting was undertaken, by I can honestly say we were all complete drunk on fear for our very lives by the end of the session. Good times.

See the album here

St Mary's Wilderness

This Saturday I went to visit a waterfall. Yes, I went in. Yes, it was cold. Yes, I was doing it to impress a girl. No, none of you are at all surprised, are you?! Out in the mountains there are areas designated as wilderness, where you can't build anything. So when the trails get washed away, you just have to scramble through creeks and undergrowth.

The leaves are changing - life is beautiful.

The Best Day Ever

My life's been a bit fucked up recently, so it was nice to have a really awesome day today. Like most days, it started with a hangover, courtesy of Raz's birthday, which was a good time up until I flipped out and totally ran away. The first activity of the day (10am) was riding the trails at Poor Farm Park with Lori from work and her friend Crystal. After about 45mins I headed of on my own and tore up the gnarl, stopping for a short break by a brook. Having consumed all my bananas I went in search of BK (12pm) but realised I hadn't had enough riding yet. Also, I was really enjoying driving around. I very almost drove to the beach, but decided Petersburg National Battlefield Park was probably a better idea. Got down there (2pm) rode around and saw a bunch of cannons, took a nap under a memorial, then decided it was time to head out again (4pm). Got back to Richmond (5pm) but still wasn't ready to go home, so got a Subway and went in search of a tranquil spot to eat it. Went down to Pony Pasture on the James River. Waded out to a sunny rock, and chilled (6pm). Then finally went home, cleaned the bike, gashed my finger open on the big chainring, and wrote this blog entry.