Sunday, September 20, 2020

busy, busy, busy

NB:  your pardon for a very random post.

One thing I prep before a month-long walk is my toenails.  For whatever reason—probably my clumsiness—I have less luck clipping the toenails on my right foot than I do on my left foot:  I always end up with bleeders.  I know from experience that, if I'm going to go for any sort of distance walk, I can save myself unnecessary pain by clipping my toenails several days before the walk so they have time to heal.  Walking with wounded toes can be irritating and even painful, plus there's the inconvenience caused by the slowly seeping blood.

I still haven't bought myself an extra battery for my cell phone, and time is running out.  Technically, I can do the walk with the equipment I already have:  I've got a portable power pack to charge the phone while I'm on the road, and since I'm motelling my way across the country, I'll always have access to electric sockets in the evening with which to recharge both my phone and my portable charger.  I may have mentioned before that my charger—which is fairly new—doesn't have quite the capacity of the one I used last year and in 2017.  It's good for maybe one full charge of the phone, but that may be enough:  this time around, I'll be camping for only one single night.

Interesting development:  my buddy JW has invited himself along for part of the walk.  He says he has a bunch of vacation days that his company is requiring him to burn off, and I've turned him into a distance-walking addict, so he and I are in the midst of arranging the when and the where and the how of JW's segment hike.  I don't want JW doing a segment during which I have a rest day:  that would be boring to him.  We also have to think about whether he'll be driving to our meet-up location or taking a bus/train to get there.  I've suggested the latter to him:  if he insists on driving, he'll have to double back, at some point, and go back to his parked car.  Far easier to bus over to a meeting spot, walk with me a few days, then bus back to Seoul from the bus terminal in whatever town we find ourselves in.  

I admit I'm a bit worried about having JW along.  He tends to have his own ideas when it comes to agendas:  he prefers to set his own, and when he does that, his agendas tend to wreck whatever plans I've made.  I told him very clearly that I'll be following a strict schedule during my walk:  wake up at 5, be out the door by 5:30.  I won't be deviating from that schedule except on rest days.  Will JW be okay with following my lead, or will he insist on coloring outside the lines?  We'll see.

This is one of the reasons why I normally prefer not to hike with anyone else:  the clash of intentions, however benign.  Don't get me wrong:  JW is an awesome walk partner when we do our segment hikes along the bike paths at and near the Han River.  But this hike is different, and it's become rather personal (and private) to me.  The fundamental difference between me and JW is that he's a typically sociable Korean whereas I'm a dyed-in-the-wool introvert:  JW would never do any of these hikes on his own.  It wouldn't even occur to him to do so.  In fact, I asked him about that one time, and he replied, "No, too boring."  So from the get-go, he's missing the point about the silence I enjoy when walking alone.  For him, the hike is fundamentally a social experience.  For me, it's my chance to shut up and listen to the world preach its sermon in its own arcane language.

The proofreading that I'm doing at the office is taking me about eleven hours per day to accomplish.  This leaves me with very little time and energy for trip prep.  I'm not too worried, though:  there's little to prep.  

I do plan to leave the office early on Friday, around 5 or 6 p.m., so I can train out to Incheon and grab a bunk in my favorite little motel, the Techno.  The walk on Saturday will actually be over 30 km in length:  there's a "pre-walk" of 5 km that I have to do to reach the seashore:  3 km from the Techno Motel to the subway at Geomam Station, another 2 km from the next-over station to the seashore and the Ara West Sea Gate, where the Four Rivers Trail officially begins.  So Day 1 is a doozy at 35 km, and I won't be taking an extra night of rest as I usually do for over-30K days.  Day 2 takes me back to my own apartment for the surreal experience of sleeping in my own bed while on the Busan-bound walk, then I launch myself east and eventually south toward Hanam City, Yangpyeong, picturesque Yeoju, etc.  Once I leave Yangpyeong, I have to remember to take a picture of that multicolored, brickwork shwimteo that looks like a bus stop.  I'm kicking myself for not having photographed it last year.

Anyway, before my thoughts get any more random (I'm at the office, but you can tell where my mind is at, I think), I'll leave off here.  I'll continue to figure out the nightmare that is new Blogger, and who knows?  If I come to terms with it by the end of the hike, I might just stay with new Blogger, flaws and all.

PS:  I had ordered a bunch of Survival Tabs, but they got stuck in Customs, and I've tried to contact Hanjin Shipping about the problem, but Hanjin's website has an out-of-date phone number.  I'm seriously thinking of physically traveling out to Hanjin's facility to talk face-to-face with someone, but I also know that, since I'm camping only a single day, if I don't have nutrition for a single day, I won't die of starvation:  I'm way too fat for that.

PPS:  it occurs to me that I'll be missing all three presidential debates and the VP debate.  I'll be following along on the trail via YouTube and the alt-media, though:  Tim Pool, Styx, etc. will have plenty to say.  I tend not to blog about political stuff during my walks, so I'll save any commentary for when I'm back in civilized Seoul.



4 comments:

Daniel said...

I've never done a long distance walk, but tend to put in 10 to 15K steps per day. The silence and solitude is indeed the best part of the entire experience. Having said that, I always have my trusty earphones at the ready and my favorite tunes or podcasts lined up for a walk. Just realized you've never mentioned listening to any music or podcasts along the route (not at night, but during the actual walk). Given that this is your third time on the trail, if I had to put together a playlist, I'd probably start with The Carpenters' Yesterday Once More or Lynyrd Skynyrd's Free Bird, personal favorites. Look forward to more pregame updates as the week begins!

Kevin Kim said...

Daniel,

Yeah, I'm an old, crotchety asshole who's very much against using earbuds or headphones or whatever while out walking: those devices merely shut the world out such that I can't hear that arcane sermon I referred to in my post.

This is an attitude (or maybe it's an attitude problem) that I've had since at least high school in the 1980s, back when the Sony Walkman had just come out in a super-slim version. When I was traveling to France for the first time as part of a special program in 1986, I noticed some fellow students who were listening to their tunes, and my first thought was, "You're going to France! Why're you shielding yourselves from the experience by wrapping yourselves in the music of your homeland?" Of course, that's just an assumption I was making; maybe some of the kids were actually listening to French rap. (I bet most of them weren't, though!)

So I confess that I've been averse to the whole tunes/podcast thing for a long time. That said, I've mellowed somewhat, and I'm more of a libertarian than I used to be. You do you, I now say, just don't ask me to join you. If music or podcast talk makes your walking experience more pleasant, then who am I to tell you to stop? And I'd rather have people use earbuds and headphones than broadcast their horrible taste in music out to the passing walkers and bikers via speakers, as so many inconsiderate, obnoxious ajeossis do.

In terms of my own listening habits: when I'm at home alone, and it's after midnight, I use my earbuds to watch YouTube or Amazon Prime movies without disturbing the next-door neighbor. When I'm in bed, I watch those things on my phone with the volume turned slightly down. I have only one next-door neighbor because I'm at the end of my hallway, and I'm not worried about sound floating up to the apartment above me or down to the one below me.

John Mac said...

If it isn't too late you ought to consider treating yourself to a professional pedicure before the hike. I'm not clear on why you have to "heal" after a proper nail clipping.

Well, I'll be interested to see how having company on the trail works out for you. Given your disparate personalities I've got my doubts. But as long as the "rules" are understood up front it could work. Were it me and JW balked at leaving early one morning I'd say "okay, see you at the next motel tonight then!"

Good luck with everything. You've got this!

Kevin Kim said...

John,

I have to heal because the clippings aren't proper: I often manage to cut myself, especially when clipping the nails on my right foot. The skin under the nails seems especially delicate for some reason, and/or I'm particularly clumsy when working on my right foot. Yeah, I'm curious about going in for a pedicure. Maybe sometime after the hike: it's too late to go this week.