Where Is Hawkins?

So I Suck At Blogging

I think I promised a lot in my last blog update. Well, life gets in the way. Holiday blues, work and some life changes will always throw you for a loop.

I’m off to Montreal for a long weekend over St. Patrick’s Day weekend. It’s the opening game for the Chicago Fire and the new MLS team, the Montreal Impact. I look forward to seeing our new friends from north of the border. I’m also heading to Colombia for Hicksfestapalooza 2012 next week. Other than that, not much is planned. I’d like to get down to South Africa at some point in 2012. As much as I’d like to do a proper safari, I feel that it would kind of suck doing it alone. Unless I’d get to hunt poachers, in which case, that would kick ass.

Curling was pretty awesome. I took a Learn to Curl class with the Chicago Curling Club up in Northbrook, and learned a) it’s lots of fun b) you work up a sweat and c) it’s way tougher than it looks. Learning the art of throwing a stone is truly a fine touch. Keeping your balance while sliding on a foot with a teflon slider, trying to keep the 42 lb stone in a straight line and give it a gentle release was a lot of work. If it wasn’t work to get up to Northbrook and having to schlep out there, I’d join in a heartbeat.

Getting a Chicago Firearms Permit is a pain in the ass, and it’s intentionally made difficult in order to cut down the legally acquired number of firearms within the city limits. As we all know, stopping people from legally getting a handgun drops crime to near zero rates, especially in places like Chicago, where every gun used in a drug-involved shooting was legally acquired. I’m sure of it. Totally. But this process does affect people who legitimately need a firearm for self protection -- it’s expensive, time-consuming and best of all, there’s no gun range in the city limits so if you’re on a fixed income and without a car or otherwise dependent on the CTA, you’re screwed.

I think that’s it. I owe people some photos and more journal writing.

Adventures — No comments
13
Dec 11

Adventures in…

I haven’t blogged in a week, much to your delight. A few good topics in the pipeline:

Adventures in Paris
Adventures in learning the sport of curling
Adventures in getting a Chicago firearm permit
Adventures in 2012.
Adventures in using Google Latitude if you’re a travel blogger.

Adventures / Europe / Luxembourg — No comments
06
Dec 11

Luxembourg

There’s no shortage of day trips from Paris if you ever grew tired of the city. I figured that since I hadn’t been to Luxembourg, it was time to go. Luckily, Yvette agreed to tag along for another country on the list.

7 am came too early, and we managed to get to Gare d’Est in plenty of time to spare. The train hauled ass to Luxembourg and while zipping along at over 100mph, it was great to see the French countryside. I love high speed rail. I think we both got a few minutes of shuteye before we pulled into the train station.

There wasn’t really much to do other than wander around and visit a few museums. We decided to head into Luxembourg’s “Old Town.” The Old Town was about a 15 minuted spirited walk from the station, up a High Street and across a bridge. We were treated to an amazing view.

The first real stop was the Cathedrale Notre Dame, which was a nicely decorated church that seemed quite bigger than the outside would reveal.

The only downside is that despite me saying that the church was nice, it just blends together in the memory hole as yet another European church. Sucks.

We didn’t have a real plan, other than to wander around and perhaps see a museum or two. Yvette is a geocacher, so she downloaded some caches for us to find, which made a walking tour sound that much less fun. I’ve never thought about geocaching before, but I see the appeal and it’s kind of cool, actually.

Luxembourg City itself is a great military location -- the terrain provided more or less an impregnable fort, and any assaulters would find it quite difficult to take over. During the course of several sieges, Luxembourg bounced back and forth between France and Germany, along with others temporarily.

After wandering around some more, a quick bite at Chi-Chis of all places and my prerequisite Diekirch beer (I’m not “in a country” unless I have a beer there), we wandered around some more until we went to the Luxembourg City History Museum, or the Musee d’Histoire de la Ville de Luxembourg. Since the plan was to go to Musee d’Orsay the following morning, we’d hit up a museum instead of Luxembourg’s art museum. The museum itself was interesting, and I’m kicking myself for not buying a proper book from their gift shop as a keepsake and to learn more about the country. I’m always fascinated by countries that are relatively tiny that have survived Europe’s chaos over the centuries. The building itself was pretty amazing and had these kickass vaulted cellars and an interesting rock foundation.

After that, we were on the hunt for a few geocaches and getting to wander around the walls of the city. At around 5pm, we ran out of steam, and went for coffee, which lead to wandering back to the High Street to get beer (Bofferding was quite good) and wait it out for the train back at 7ish. We bought some wine to drink on the way back and after getting rudely pushed out of the seats on the train we stole fair and square, we hid out on the bar car for the ride home. I think it’s fair to say that we were both dragging ass after a late night.

Nick's letters / WTF — 1 comment
29
Nov 11

Nick’s Letters: In Which I Ask The Pope About The Chicago Cubs

Since I am not caught up in Theomania because I’m a Sox fan, I’m fascinated by the devotion that Cubs fans display. It’s a religion, and when there’s a religious question, why not go straight to the top?

———-
His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI
Apostolic Palace
00120 Vatican City

Most Holy Father-

I have a theological question in which you might be the person most suited to ask. I apologize for asking such a question, but it indirectly involves your most humble servant, Francis Cardinal George. Cardinal George is an excellent representative of the Holy See in Chicago, and you should be proud of his leadership. In fact, I would highly recommend him for a promotion if your Eminence would consider it.

The question I have to ask you involves the baseball team the Chicago Cubs. The Cubs have endured a losing streak that would try men’s souls of over 102 years since they have won a championship. They have encountered curses, dumb luck and a most arduous journey that have shattered the faith of the most devout. Cubs fans are much like good Christians. Even Cardinal George (a Chicago native and Cubs fan) has mentioned that the Cubs winning the championship is akin to Christ returning to Earth: It will happen someday soon. Unfortunately, we’re more likely to see Christ returning in our lifetimes than we are to see the Cubs win.

It does beg the question: Why would God allow the devout and faithful to suffer so long? Why does God insist on punishing loyalty and obedience? What if Romans 8:31 is not true at all, and that God is actually punishing the wicked? If that’s the case, what did a century of fans do to merit such a punishment? I know that the fans are full of sin, but this seems a bit harsh, even if you believe in a spiteful God.

Better yet: Does this actually disprove the existence of God? After all, you could argue that God would not necessarily give a divine hand into winning, but might be inclined to help in circumstances where they’d need it in order to prevail. In fact, I’d wager that if the Cubs did win, you would see quite a sizable increase in parishioners, thanking Him for allowing a miracle to occur, ergo, God would be inclined to help the Cubs win. Therefore, logic might conclude that there is no God, because a century of punishment is bordering on sadism.

If you’re not too busy, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this matter. It would certainly make millions of devout fans feel more at ease.

Your friend,

Nick Hawkins
Chicago

Ps: If you can ask the man upstairs to help with next year’s Chicago Fire season, that’d be swell.
———-
I’m glad I’m an atheist otherwise this probably assured my place in hell.

travel — No comments
28
Nov 11

Literature Update

Somehow I added the Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction to the Harvard Classics Project, and I added more books. Why? Because I’m a masochist.

I’m halfway through Guy Mannering by Walter Scott and The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri. Guy Mannering is pretty interesting and is rich in depicting Scotland like the Wild West. Sounds like my sort of place. The Divine Comedy is very rich and is rough going because there’s so much Italian history involved and even with the footnotes. And Dante had his Beatrice throughout.

A side note: Petrarch had his Laura, Dante had Beatrice… but did I have my “muse”? It does make me wonder about that someone whose name I dare not mention. Some relationships make you want to understand the dynamics. This is one of them. It helps me feel better about myself and how I feel towards her.

Being behind on literature is a pain in the ass but I’m trying to step it up. Now that I’m rocking the Kindle Fire as well as the 3G one, I can read twice as fast! YEEEEAAAAAAAHHHH!!!

Adventures / France / Paris / soccer / travel — No comments
27
Nov 11

“If It Wasn’t For Us, You’d Be Krauts…”

Soccer’s great. When the UN fails, we have a slightly more/less corrupt agency known as FIFA to pick up the charge.

It was quite a coincidence that the US announced that they’d play France in a Friendly during my stay in Paris. It made it a no-brainer and I gladly threw down my 10 Euros for a ticket in the Supporters Section. I’ve been to a handful of US matches before but never outside the States. Let’s bring it.

There are some rules about international matches. For example, you’re not allowed to stab/kick/punch your fellow American supporters if they come from a rival city. For example, I met someone who was a supporter of the Philadelphia Union, and despite that, I didn’t pimpslap him. It’s a temporary alliance. The second rule is that you totally rock out nationalism. Wear the biggest, gaudiest American thing you own. It’s what happens.

The first thing that struck me as awkward was that half of the Supporters Section was French. That did suck because it’s hard to get tifo going when you’re dealing with shenanigans of people in your section. To their credit, they were nice enough to us, but still, they shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

Like this guy:

It’s also a well known fact that every stadium for soccer hires complete dicks for security. It’s true for my home club, the Chicago Fire. This douche made US fans sit down so French fans could watch the game. In the Supporters Section. JTFC.

And as typical for any international matches involving the US, the threshold for earning a yellow card is seriously biased. Anything short of Clint Dempsey getting kicked in the face won’t get a French player booked, but if a French player pulls a Thierry Henry and flops, well, consider it a foul at the very least.

The game itself ended in a 1-0 France win. I was happy though. I got to see the US play hard in a foreign crowd, made Yvette drink beer (before, during and after the game) and had a really good time. After the game, I spotted a kid wearing a Sounders jersey. I may or may not have mentioned that their team has a rapist (“Fredy Montero, no means no!”), but I blame that on the jetlag.

We got back to the hotel around 1am and had to turn it around quickly -- we were off to Luxembourg the next morning and figured we could sleep on the really fast train there. Bitchin.

Adventures / France / Paris — No comments
25
Nov 11

Oh, Paris

It’s been a few years since I’ve been to Paris, a city that I thoroughly enjoy. Sure, the cafe lifestyle has appeal but I’m not one to sit down with a cup of coffee and a cigarette.

The airport was ok -- I had dickish security people (pre-TSA) who wouldn’t let me through with a third carry-on bag so I went to another security line. The flight over was decent. I still haven’t figured out the key to sleeping on planes since I’m a noisy side sleeper, so I ended up getting about 2 hours of racktime. It worked for me.

Upon arrival, I flew through immigration and customs and humped it to the RER to take the train into Paris. Of course, the RER had some sort of maintenance thing going on, so it involved a schlep of airport train to bus to RER to Metro x2 to get to the hotel. Next time, I’m going to use the RoissyBus. It seems to be the better choice anyway -- it does dropoff/pickup at all the T2 points (T2A, T2B, etc.) versus the 10-15 min hike to the RER station.

I stayed at the Pavilion Pereire Arc de Triomphe, an unremarkable hotel that was the really quasi-affordable thing I could find. The only real downside is that it was a 10 min walk to the nearest Metro station but other than that, it was just ok. Not that it’s bad, but it was a place to lay my head.

I dropped off my gear and went to the Pantheon, quite a lovely building that is now a mausoleum for famous French who have passed on.

As for famous citizens buried there? Marie Curie, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire -- it’s a collection of intellectuals and philosophers that make you realize how much we really owe the French. They were the American sugardaddies during the Revolutionary War, and their philosophers helped us construct our republic.

The building itself is absolutely remarkable, and has the most amazing paintings and sculptures. But what topped it off was the infamous Foucault’s Pendulum, a 150 year old experiment showing that the earth does rotate. Very cool. The crypt below had a fair number of famous French, and I felt stupid that I didn’t know who most of them were until I looked them up back at the hotel.

After that, I grabbed a doner and crepe (delicious!) and walked to Saint-Chapelle, a chapel that’s hidden near Notre Dame next to the Royal Palace. It was the place where royals could pray privately without dealing with the riff-raff. I really liked it but it was small and crowded. It also made me wish I had brought my monopod.

By this time I was dragging serious ass and went back to the hotel to take a nap before I met up with Yvette from her eponymous blog. I lured her down from her PhD studies in Amsterdam to come play in Paris for the weekend with me, and our first activity was going to the USA/France Men’s Soccer game. But that’s worthy of a blog post of itself.

Pics from the Pantheon and Sainte-Chapelle are in the usual spots.

travel — 2 comments
30
Oct 11

Travel Humility

Yesterday I felt like I had a moment of travel humility that I wanted to share, mainly to make readers think I’m less of a jerk.

I love travel. I love airports. I like talking to people at airports. I love hearing about where they’re going, where they’re from, and the fun they’re going to have. Absolutely love it. I really enjoy talking to people on their first international trip, or even just the furthest they’ve been away from home. They really are super excited and you can see it radiate from them.

I sat next to a couple at the bar who were going on their first cruise and the woman was even more excited because she had never seen the ocean before. She was stoked, and you know what, the cynical asshole in me melted because here’s this nice woman with an equally nice husband who work harder than I do to scrimp and save to go on a great trip. And it’s a good reminder to remember to still be excited and encourage people to take new steps outside their travel comfort zones and want to get curious about the world and see it.

So fellow travelers, remember that some of your fellow passengers are stepping off into the unknown and are scared and excited. They want to talk about it and share. Be kind and helpful and remember that you were in their position once.

travel — No comments
22
Oct 11

Nick’s First Earthquake

When I went to India with my friends Tim and Holly, we got to experience our first earthquake. It was a cool little bonding experience -- a mere 4.3, but still, kind of neat.

It happened in the middle of the night at the same time I was stumbling to the bathroom. The building vibrated, and I just attributed it to jetlag and a truck going by.

The next morning at breakfast, I said “Hey, did you guys feel the place shaking last night?”
“Yeah, it was an earthquake. 4.3. We watched it on TV.”
“There’s a TV in the room?”

I don’t miss a thing…

Adventures / soccer — No comments
18
Oct 11

US/France

I land the same day as the US/France international friendly, so it looks like I’ll be enjoying some world class soccer within 12 hours of landing. It should be pretty epic. Although Klinsmann better have a winning game otherwise the “Fire The German” bandwagon will get full quickly.