I’ve updated this post, click on the “more” if you’re interested.

Details on Monday.

Don’t forget to set your clocks back an hour.

Ok, updated part below.

Friday we went to dance class; Fridays are good for this because lessons start at 8.30 PM instead of 7 like on Thursdays or 5.30 like I believe they do Sundays. Fridays you can pretend it’s a date, dancing and drinks afterwards.

Which is what it basically is, too. This Friday we did salsa, I think, or samba, whatever, and rhumba, which seemed like basically the same thing only a little slower. I figured out the function of the woman helper the dance teacher uses, she is ostensibly the DJ laying down the tracks we dance to up in her little booth, but she helps him demonstrate the dances too and is very into the butt wiggling. She’s the eye candy that keeps the guys coming back, I think, that’s my theory.

We also did this jitterbug stuff, which they call boogie woogie. Alpha and I were (i.e. I was) out of rhythym in the beginning, the teacher even came over and remarked on this and corrected us. But then we got going and it was working out. I tried to think of times when it would be cool, this dance we’re doing. I glanced at myself in the mirror (only a glance, I was observing my feet most of the time, or looking at Alpha) and saw a guy with short grey hair, a black suit, white shirt and no tie, going for it. Dude. I finally thought of Jack Kerouac or Neal Cassidy and those guys, beatniks must’ve dance like this with nursing students in some town they were passing through in some dive, I thought, those guys Tom Waits was simulating for a while.

We danced. We went out for friends afterwards, they go to the class too. I had a couple gin tonics. The guy said I was a wild dancer. I didn’t know how to take it. I felt the way I did as a kid when praised, happy to hear the praise, but the paranoiac at my core wondering how it was meant. I don’t know if I can dance or not, I can’t feel if it’s right or not. All I know is I worked up a sweat and had a couple drinks after and enjoyed myself.

On Saturday, Beta and I went on a small outing. It was sort of an end-of-season row-off at the rowing club; a bunch of us planned to row a few boats to a restaurant about 6.5 km downstream, have lunch, and row back. We ended up fitting 14 of us, adults and kids, into three 4-man boats, two with an extra person steering.

I can’t row on the Danube without thinking of history, all the centuries of trade floating down that river, back to the Romans who floated salt and iron down to the Black Sea or wherever and over to Rome. It was a beautiful fall day, sunny and clear, a few white clouds in stark contrast to the bright blue sky. A strong wind was coming up, it just helped us downstream faster, although we suspected rowing back was going to be tough. Out in the middle of a wide river on a windy sunny day, a river flowing through miles of deciduous forests in the fall, that’s a beautiful place, with clouds of leaves blown high up and way out over the water, flashing golden in the sunlight.

It’s a less beautiful place, though, when the wind comes up even more and suddenly you have waves, and a wave swamps your little racing shell “Yeah, they told us these were more for calm water,” someone said later. We were the first boat, Beta and I and three other women. We made it to the place we were supposed to dock but couldn’t get the boat out of the (fast-flowing, now choppy) water because when we tried to lift it out (the shore was concrete, at not too steep an angle but slimy with algae so all of us slipped and fell in at one point or another) a wave filled it and another wave and that’s a heavy boat, a racing shell filled with water. So we helped pull another boat out first, then they helped us. By this time our boat was basically sunk – it had a long gash in it. A racing shell, as you may know, at least one of this age, is made of a wood frame covered with a single layer of veneer, to make it light. But it’s fragile, and won’t stand being washed against rocks and concrete by large waves.

We eventually got it out, but it was totalled. Then we went to the restaurant, those of us who had dry clothes changed into them, we left the kids to eat soup and went to get the third boat out. It was upside down in the river about 500 meters upstream. They’d had to swim to shore, but had the sense to tie the boat to a tree. We had to climb into the river to get this one out. We eventually got it out, after some wrestling. Then we went back to the restaurant and ate, and drank a few beers, and waited for our ride. Alpha showed up with dry clothes and I put them on and had lunch with her. Everyone ended up riding back in the van, because 1) it was too windy/choppy to row and 2) all three boats were damaged to varying degrees. No one’s life was really in danger the whole time, although it could’ve gotten hairy if we’d stayed out 10 minutes longer.

Sunday we worked in the yard, clipping bushes and raking leaves until we had no more room to put the twigs and stuff. We made a big pile but there was a windstorm last night that sort of spread it out again, so we’ll have something to do next weekend again. Gamma seems to be getting sick, she has a cough and a sore throat, I’m wondering whether it could be an allergy, she often has something like this around this time of year, and I’ve heard that can be connected to dust mites, to which I think she’s allergic. Antihistamines have helped in the past, but I hate to give her stuff unless it’s necessary… so I’m still wondering about this.

And so on.