Ornoth

Now that I’m 18 months removed from it, I’d like to reflect on my seven years in Pittsburgh.

Let me apologize in advance; this’ll be more negative than positive, because I want to talk about why I left. My intention isn’t to shit on anyone’s chosen hometown. There really is a lot to like about Pittsburgh and Western PA, many good reasons to live there, and lots of genuinely awesome people. But I also want to be forthright about why I was eager to leave.

By far the biggest reason actually had nothing to do with Pittsburgh itself; it’s just that I never intended to stay. When I left Boston in 2015, my #1 desire was to finally move somewhere warm, after enduring 50+ New England winters. Pittsburgh’s weather wasn’t much of an improvement, so I always knew Pittsburgh was a temporary stop on my way to something else. Even before I arrived, moving away was a foregone conclusion, though it did become more urgent as the years ticked by and my patience ebbed.

Before I moved to Pittsburgh, my impressions of Western PA were informed by two or three trips to the SCA’s Pennsic War, one DargonZine Summit, several trips to visit Inna, plus some trips to do database work with the local hospitals. Based on that, my pre-move image of Pennsylvania was of beautifully scenic wooded rolling hills and farmland, with Pittsburgh as a leading center of medical excellence.

After living there for seven years, I left with a very different impression: that of an exploited and poisoned environment, with more openly mean-spirited people than I was used to.

But let’s start with what I thought were some of Pittsburgh’s best features:

• The countryside really is strikingly beautiful, when seen from a safe distance.
• Pittsburgh has a compact, attractive downtown with a beautiful skyline that’s shown off well from its dramatic gateway entrance and numerous surrounding hilltop overlooks.
• There’s lots of noteworthy architecture and cultural institutions, thanks largely to the philanthropic legacy of Pittsburgh’s oil, steel, and industrial magnates.
• There is an easily-accessible and uncrowded casino whose state-stipulated blackjack rules are more advantageous for the player than nearly anywhere else.
• The airport pipes in music from local classical radio station WQED.

Yes, citing a casino and crowd control music as top features is an instance of damning with faint praise, and I have a lot more negative things to say. But before I dig into those, I’d like to mention a few things about Pittsburgh that were both good… and bad. Let me show you what I mean:

• Land and housing are extremely affordable. That would be delightful, except it’s due to the fact that Pittsburgh’s population has not grown in any 10-year census period since 1950, shrinking by 55% in that span, leaving a lot of underutilized, vacant, and/or abandoned properties.
• The winters are slightly better than Boston, with considerably less cold and snow than Maine. Being further south, winter days have more daylight hours, and should have more sunshine and less oppressive darkness. But you actually see less sun during the winter. Although thankfully not inside the Great Lakes snow belt, Pittsburgh is close enough that there’s perpetual overcast skies and sporadic light flurries all winter long, and that lack of sun can be just as depressing as the shortened days up in Maine.
• Pittsburgh’s airport is spacious and quick to get through… But that’s because it was built as a major USAir hub just before that airline’s insolvency. Today PIT handles a minuscule fraction of the volume it was designed for. You can’t escape the cognitive dissonance when the loudspeakers proudly announce “Welcome to Pittsburgh!” and it echoes down the vast corridors of an empty airport.
• Pittsburgh is arguably the hilliest city in the US. As a cyclist, the upsides are intense physical workouts and memorable events like the infamous Dirty Dozen hillclimb; while the downside is a dearth of calm, relaxing routes, because all the flat land has been claimed by highways, railroads, warehouses, and industry. And if you’re a driver, those hills can be treacherous in winter.
• There’s a very friendly cycling community and loads of interesting cycling events. On the other hand, it can be difficult to get around on a bike, as there aren’t many good options heading east or south or west of the city.

And now we get to the heart of the matter: the things about Pittsburgh that turned me off. I tried to whittle this down to major points while still making myself clear.

It’s dirty.

To be fair, there’s been a ton of progress in the 150 years since Atlantic Monthly described Pittsburgh at the height of its industrial output as “hell with the lid taken off.” But a lot of damage done to the land, water, and air by the coal, oil, gas, iron, and steel industries still remains. Western PA is the only area outside California that consistently receives all ‘F’ grades in the American Lung Association’s air quality reports, and often records the worst air quality in the US. Even today, the culture of fouling the environment still lingers, as can be seen in the preponderance of roadside litter and illegal garbage dumping. Having grown up in the Maine woods, the lack of respect for the natural environment disturbed me.

It’s blighted.

I’ve already mentioned the population decline and abundance of abandoned and condemned buildings, so I won’t belabor it, save to say that the amount of urban decay and blight is off-putting. I’m sure it didn’t help that Pittsburgh was in receivership for 14 years (from 2004-2018), despite residents paying an extra 1.5% city income tax!

Collapsing infrastructure.

Pittsburgh has some unique challenges that other cities don’t. The steep topography means that parts of the city get flash floods (Washington Blvd, Mon Wharf, the Bathtub, Millvale, Glass Run). And there are seasonal landslides that can close roads for months (Greenleaf, Commercial, Pittview, Route 30). But then there’s also numerous avoidable, man-made infrastructure failures. For example, during my brief years in Pittburgh:

• The Fern Hollow Bridge carrying Forbes Ave over Frick Park collapsed.
• Concrete slabs from the Swindell Bridge fell onto the Parkway North, forcing closures on I-279.
• More concrete fell from the Greenfield Bridge over the Parkway East (I-376) , so the state built a semipermanent “bridge” underneath the main bridge just to catch the falling debris.
• Several building facades collapsed in the Southside, Lawrenceville, and the Strip, including Kraynick’s bike shop.
• A Pittsburgh city transit bus was driving along Liberty Ave in the heart of downtown when a huge sinkhole opened up and swallowed it whole.
• An entire parking deck collapsed in the Penn Hills.
• Repeated train derailments in the South Side, Harmar, and a dramatic moving conflagration as a burning train rolled on obliviously for twenty miles through Freedom and Harmony, PA.

So much anger.

I don’t want to overemphasize this, because I made a lot of wonderful friendships in Pittsburgh. But in comparison to New England, many Western PA locals seemed eager to take opportunities to be rude or mean toward one another, while hiding behind the anonymity of the internet or ensconced in their self-propelled rolling fortresses. Pittsburgh has a lot of schadenfreude, which was unpleasant.

A culture of unlawfulness.

A lot of cities found themselves at odds with their own police forces following the Black Lives Matter protests and de-funding rumors, but Pittsburgh already had a head start. Speeding has historically never been enforced; in fact, it’s still illegal today for county and local law enforcement to use radar guns to enforce speed limits! In seven years living (and riding) there, I don’t think I ever saw a state trooper, and saw only one or two traffic stops by local police.

The Covid pandemic provided another disincentive to conduct minor traffic stops. And the police reacted hostilely to BLM and de-funding protests. Then both the city council and even bike advocates asked the cops to stop traffic enforcement! All this made it much more dangerous to be a pedestrian, cyclist, or motor vehicle operator in Pittsburgh. Tho sadly, I now realize this is a much broader problem than just Western PA.

Monopolies in healthcare and groceries.

Healthcare in Pittsburgh is dominated by UPMC. Because it’s loosely affiliated with the University of Pittsburgh, this immense hospital chain does everything it can to take full advantage of its categorization as a non-profit. No one I talked to had a positive experience with them, whether as a patient or an employee.

Pittsburgh also suffers from a near-monopoly in grocery stores. You would think that when I lived in downtown Boston’s tony Back Bay, my groceries would have been extremely costly; but my food bill actually jumped 25% higher after I moved to Pittsburgh.

Misplaced regional pride.

I get it: every place needs to have a sense of regional pride. But it’s kind of lame that the “Paris of Appalachia” bases its sense of identity on things that are ubiquitous throughout urban America, such as putting a chair out to reserve a parking space, or trying to jump the green when turning left at a traffic light. Or rabid loyalty to a company like Heinz, which left Pittsburgh 20 years ago. Or mindlessly hating all the other cities in the region (Philadelphia, Cleveland, Buffalo, Detroit). Sure, take pride in your city, but make some effort to identify the things that genuinely make Pittsburgh special; the “Pittsburgh Left” ain’t it.

The food.

I just don’t know how Pittsburgh gained its reputation as a city for foodies.

Let’s consider the foods Pittsburghers take pride in: Beer. Ketchup. Pickles. Lenten fish frys. Pierogies. And sticking french fries into literally everything. None of these qualify as “cuisine”. If I were a Pittsburgher, I’d be ashamed.

And while I’m admittedly a culinary philistine myself, I didn’t find any places that impressed me in my preferred food zones, like burgers, Indian, and Mexican food. Thai was a wasteland except for Thai & Noodle Outlet. Pizza wasn’t “all that” but Aiello’s was tolerable… tho they (and their arch-rival Mineo’s) still refuse to deliver and require payment in cash. And the best Pittsburgh could offer for ice cream was Bruster’s (no, don’t talk to me about Page’s or Dave and Andy’s).

Toxic redneck culture.

I grew up among rednecks. A lot of my family were rednecks. Almost everywhere I’ve lived, there have been a lot of rednecks. And outside of Pittsburgh’s city limits, Western PA is infested with rednecks.

I just don’t fit into – or get along well with – that culture anymore. The rabid devotion to the local sportball teams (The Stillers, The Pens). The preoccupation with beer and alcohol. The gun fetish (open and concealed carry are both legal). The mindless nationalism. The constant othering and barefaced xenophobia. The utter absence of compassion or open-mindedness.

Several Western-PA wing-nuts played leading roles in the 2021 Trump-inspired attempt to overthrow the United States government. And in 2018, less than a mile from our apartment, the deadliest massacre of Jews in United States history took place. I hope I don’t need to tell you how offensive those are.

In closing:

Pittsburgh was a city of contradictions and trade-offs. Western PA was beautiful, if you looked past the pollution and decay. The cycling was great, but also quite challenging. It was inexpensive (housing), except where it wasn’t (groceries). I met plenty of wonderful people (undoubtedly including the Pittsburghers who are reading this), and about as many that were truly hateful.

Although the winters, as the natives say, “weren’t all that”, it was a fine place to spend a half-dozen years. I have a lot of very fond memories of Pittsburgh. Those include the many valued friends I made; the heart-warming meditation communities that welcomed me and nurtured my growth as a teacher; plus the people and landscapes and rides that I enjoyed while cycling. These will stay with me forever.

But from the very beginning, I always planned to move farther south, beyond the clutches of the Snow Miser. And as the years passed, I needed to move on to a warmer, sunnier place.

It goes without saying that Austin, our new home, came with its own set of pleasures and challenges… But that’s a story for another post.

Just twenty-four hours after I landed in Kuala Lumpur, Inna turned me around and we flew out of KL for a weekend expedition to Singapore.

This blogpost covers just that weekend side-trip. You can read about the rest of my two weeks in Malaysia here, and our other weekend side-trip to Thailand in another separate post, here.

Saturday, 17 March 2018

We got up early Saturday morning for an hour-long cab ride back to the airport. After being dropped at KLIA’s main terminal, we discovered that our airline, Scoot, flew out of the separate KLIA2 terminal. We had some stress and confusion finding the train between terminals, but eventually got there and passed through customs, where I added a Malaysian exit stamp to my passport. Along the way, we passed a saffron-robed Buddhist monk, which delighted me to no end.

Singapore at Night from Dragonfly Bridge

Sands & Helix Bridge

Supertrees at Night

Inna Posed at the Merlion

Selfie with Supertrees

Rocking Out to the Bear Necessities

The Flowers & The Trees

Cloud Forest Dome

Sands Framed

Sakura in the Flower Dome

Enjoying the Roof Pool Skyline

Singapore Roof Pool Panorama

Full Singapore Photoset

As we’d find at other airports, there was no central security checkpoint at KLIA2. Instead, you go through security screening at the entrance to each gate. That meant waiting in the airport hallways until the checkpoint was manned an hour before the flight, and until then you couldn’t get through to the copious seating at the gate. It seemed inefficient and inconvenient.

After a 90-minute flight—which felt trivial to me!—we were on final approach when I noticed the dozens of cargo ships moored in Singapore’s harbor. We landed, passed through customs to get our passports stamped, changed money, and stepped aside for a casual breakfast at a place called Paris Baguette.

At less than two degrees north latitude, Singapore is only 85 miles north of the Equator. That’s farther south than some parts of Brazil! And also a new record for the furthest south I’ve ever traveled. Yay!

We picked up some MRT tourist passes and hopped a train into town. We successfully made a couple transfers, while Inna marveled at the changing indicator LEDS on the train’s subway map, and I “marveled” at the natives’ indifference toward body odor; Singapore may be clean, but its citizens still stink! We exited into a strange semi-outdoor shopping plaza (South Beach Avenue) and dragged our bags a few blocks in the ultra-humid heat to our hotel: Naumi.

Naumi is one of those chic boutique hotels, and its interiors are an interesting example of trend-conscious but user-unfriendly design. There’s an immense glass foot (sculpture, apparently) in the lobby. The room numbers were hidden, lighting controls were unintuitive, and the electric windowshades were difficult to control. Both the shower and bathroom had glass windows into the living area, which only turned opaque at the flip of a switch… and the switch was eerily located on the *outside* of those rooms, rather than the inside! Having set out early that morning and lugged our belongings around all day, Inna and I both collapsed and siestaed from 2 to 6pm.

When dinnertime sneaked up upon us, we faced our first decision, and a difference of philosophies. I figured we should consult a map and decide where to eat before leaving; Inna wanted to walk toward the Singapore Flyer ferris wheel and pick something up at random along the way. I skeptically gave in, and off we plodded, down the street, through two malls, all the way to the Flyer, without seeing anything to eat that we could agree on.

Although the Flyer—the second tallest ferris wheel in the world—had been Inna’s destination, there weren’t any people around, and it appeared idle. There was no obvious indication, but we’d later learn that a couple weeks earlier they had shut it down due to “technical issues”, and it would re-open two weeks after we left. Disappointing, but not the end of the world.

A bit grumpy from flying, humidity, walking, and lack of dinner, we regrouped along the Marine Promenade and made our way slowly across the Helix Bridge toward the famous Marina Bay Sands hotel and Inna’s main objective for the weekend: the Gardens By The Bay.

There we faced more confusion as we tried to navigate toward the Gardens. We walked around the Sands, then back through it, then around again, and finally found ourselves at a landing across a small lagoon from the Gardens, whose man-made 165-foot Supertrees were captivatingly lit up in their regular evening light show. We sat down and rested our weary feet and watched the end of the show, then fought against the flow of a huge crowd across the Dragonfly Bridge to a tall platform that offered a closer view of the Supertrees and the walkway—suspended in mid-air 75 feet off the ground—that encircles them.

By then it was after 9pm and the walkway had closed, so we reluctantly turned back toward the Sands, which was still a chore to get around. Eventually we gave up and hopped a cab back to the hotel. Still hungry, we arived just before the restaurant’s 10:30pm closing time. I had a tasty rogan josh, but Inna was sickened by the acrid smell of the chemical air freshener the hotel used, so she ate quickly and headed straight upstairs. While the Trees were nice, it had been a tiring and trying evening for both of us.

That night I could only sleep from about midnight to 4am. Inna woke up and we had a nice conversation before she fell back asleep, and I used the early morning time for my daily meditation.

Sunday, 18 March 2018

Sunday—our only full day in Singapore—we headed out early to try to beat the heat. The plan was to walk to a quick photo op at the nearby Merlion statue, then hop a cab and spend the balance of the day exploring the Gardens By The Bay in detail. However, barely a block into our walk, Inna announced that she was already getting cooked by the heat and humidity.

I convinced her to carry on, and we kept to what shade we could find as we walked through the WW2 War Memorial Park, past the Theatres On The Bay, and down some stairs to the Waterfront Promenade, a short way from the Merlion.

Visiting the Merlion was my idea: the one thing I wanted to see in Singapore. Not because it’s particularly impressive; rather the opposite. It’s a bit of a story…

Although I’m not much of a mass media maven, one of my side interests is anime. One show that was running at that time was called “A Place Further than the Universe”, wherein four Japanese high school girls join a scientific expedition to Antarctica. In Episode 6, which aired a couple weeks before my trip, they spend a couple days in Singapore, which is depicted in realistic detail, including the Sands, the Flyer, the Theatres, the Gardens, and much more.

At 6:15 into the episode, one of the girls expresses particular interest in taking a posed shot in front of the Merlion statue, which is famous in Japan for being one of the “Three Major Disappointments of the World”. While getting their shot, the girls express chagrin that it’s just not as disappointing as they had heard. With that as background, the one thing I wanted to be sure to do in Singapore was recreate their photo.

When we arrived, I just about spewed myself because the Esplanade, the footbridge across the harbor, and the platforms around the Merlion were all absolutely jammed to overflowing with—who would have guessed it?—Japanese tourists!

Between the walk, the heat, and the crowds, Inna wanted absolutely nothing but to find a cab and go somewhere else. Trying to be sensitive to that, I quickly positioned her, got something close to the image I wanted, and got out. It’s unfortunate that we couldn’t enjoy it in the moment because it was all so rushed in our desperation to leave.

A quick cab ride later, we arrived at the Gardens By The Bay and found a little cafe for breakfast. I had a raspberry donut while Inna regained her spirits thanks to their air conditioning.

From there, we went back out into the hotness to walk around and explore the grounds. I spent some time exploring the cactus section, while Inna danced along to the sound of Disney’s “Bear Necessities” song being played at their kiddie splash fountain. We took our time and did a full circuit of the park, which included an immense sculpture of a floating baby, some interesting topiary, a mushroom den, and lots more. Leaving aside the obscene giant baby, the plantings and displays were satisfying and creatively done.

We bought tickets for the two massive greenhouse exhibits: the Cloud Forest and the Flower Dome. The former was absolutely breathtaking, beginning with a 115-foot waterfall, climbing up a 140-foot forested mountain, then descending down a suspended walkway encircling the mountain… all man-made and within the greenhouse dome! It deserves a much longer writeup, but the photos will convey the experience far better than I could describe.

After successfully exiting through the gift shop, we secured a table and had lunch at a nearby restaurant. I had a spaghetti carbonara, which seems to be a staple tourist dish in Southeast Asia. By the time we finished, some taiko performers (Japanese ritual drummers from the local group Hibikiya) had begun performing, which amused me because I was already signed up to take a four-week taiko class myself beginning four days after I got back to Pittsburgh (which you can read about here)!

The taiko group were part of the Gardens’ spring sakura matsuri (the Japanese cherry blossom festival). Inna and I made our way into the second greenhouse—the Flower Dome—where a chorus was singing amidst dozens of cherry trees, with an incongruous bonus anime cosplay demonstration taking up a far corner.

Besides the sakura, and as compared to the Cloud Forest, the Flower Dome’s displays were somewhat mundane: simple regional collections from succulents to baobabs to a “California garden” featuring such exotic plants as thyme, beets, pumpkin, and carrots!

With heavy legs after a long day of wandering, and tired of fighting the increasing crowds, Inna and I decided to bolt, walking back through the Sands hotel and taking another cab back to our hotel, where we rested and downloaded our pictures.

Instead of wandering around at random looking for food, I made an executive decision, choosing a nearby Swensons, an American franchise ice cream shop. We’d walked past one in the Singapore airport, which had brought back memories of being taken to a Swensons in NYC’s Greenwich Village on one of my first dates with my ex-wife. The dinner was mediocre, and very expensive for what we got.

Completely spent, we walked back to the hotel and crashed.

Monday, 19 March 2018

After my first lengthy sleep since arriving in Asia, we had the morning to kill before our late-afternoon flight back to Kuala Lumpur. I decided to mosey up to the 10th floor to spend some time in the hotel’s rooftop infinity pool. There was a wonderful view of the Singapore skyline, and in the distance you could clearly make out the profile of the Merlion statue and the jet of water he spews out into the harbor. Eventually I was joined by a couple Japanese girls taking selfies, and Inna came by and hung out for a while. I was surprised to see a tall high-rise where people had long poles projecting outward with clothes hanging from them like clotheslines.

As I air-dried, I suddenly realized that after leaving a snowy Pittsburgh, I was sunbathing, at the Equator, on the day before the vernal equinox, when the sun passes directly above the Equator. I took a few minutes to appreciate that fact and catch a few extra sunbeams before rejoining Inna downstairs.

After packing, we checked out and walked back through the shops at South Beach Avenue, opting to have lunch at an Italian place called Atmastel, where I had a delicious ziti in tomato cream sauce with sweet sausage. Between the call of nature and my curiosity about Singapore’s reputed fastidiousness, I stepped outside to a public bathroom and found it had a push-button electric sliding door, heavy HVAC and scenting, and was of course spotlessly clean.

We took the train back to the airport, returned our MRT passes, then killed some time at a Krispy Kreme (egad!) before making our way through the computerized immigration stations. Having gotten through first, I watched as Inna navigated the automatic stalls and unintuitive fingerprint scanner. Sadly, no exit stamps from Singapore for my passport. Hanging around outside our gate (due to the at-gate security checkpoints), Inna decided to try one of those free leg-massage chairs, making the most diverse set of faces I’ve seen in ages, ranging from pleasure to confusion to horror!

On the flight back to KL, I did my daily meditation, which garnered me two “achievements”: 60 consecutive days of sitting, and 1,200 days total. Arriving at KLIA2 and getting another Malaysian entry stamp, I exchanged my Singapore dollars while Inna hit a convenience store, then we cabbed back to her hotel. I had my first Malaysian dish at the hotel restaurant: nasi lemak (aka chicken drumstick in curry gravy with coconut rice). Then we went back upstairs and turned in.

My overall impression of Singapore is that it’s attractive, comfortable, artsy, and very expensive. For the most part, I felt at home, since English is the primary language. Surprisingly, the widely-publicized police state wasn’t visible, and seems to have succeeded at making the place cleaner and nicer than anywhere else I’ve been. I particularly noted the lack of sirens being heard, as compared to other large cities I’ve visited.

Despite a lot of fatigue and some irritability, we both enjoyed Singapore, and are glad we went. The architecture was a constant highlight, and the Gardens By The Bay were amazing.

While I’ve shared a few good photos here, be sure to check out my full Singapore photoset. Then get Inna’s perspective in her own Singapore Day 1 and Day 2 blogposts.

As mentioned above, you can continue reading about the rest of my trip in my separate Malaysia blogpost, as well as the side trip we made to Phuket the following weekend in my Thailand blogpost.

If I were to choose the destination for a birthday trip, I probably wouldn’t choose Cleveland. However, that’s what Inna wanted. At least it’s easily accessible from home. Here’s a quick trip report.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: I wouldn’t call it disappointing, but it was spotty. A third of the building was closed and under construction. The layout was chaotic and confusing, so we probably missed some of the exhibits, but we saw nothing from numerous major acts like the Who, Michael Jackson, Kiss, the Bee Gees, Abba, Pink Floyd, Duran Duran... While entire walls were devoted to some acts, superstars like Elton John and Madonna were represented by one item each. But then what would you expect from an institution that is only now getting around to inducting Joan Baez, ELO, Journey, and Yes? Overall I give it a C+.

Spent a lot of time around Market Square. Ice cream at Mitchell’s was awesome. Killed time playing Codename Pictures and Forbidden Island at the Tabletop Board Game Cafe. Had a good dinner at the Great Lakes Brewpub, where Inna ordered and mostly stared at their flight/sampler of twelve five-ounce beers. Salivated a lot while browsing the huge West Side Market meat and produce stalls, where Inna (after some tribulation) eventually fulfilled her quest for a slab of strawberry cassatta from Cake Royale.

Returned downtown and checked into our hotel before the main event: a punk concert at the House of Blues by Inna’s adolescent idols, the Damned. They seemed tighter than previous performances, and overall it was a good show despite an iffy mixing job. Not so good was the rain-soaked walk back to the hotel afterward, nor the 3am fire alarm and building evacuation later that night.

After a decent hotel breakfast, we stopped by a mall in Mayfield Heights to hit the World Market (an internationally-focused grocery store) with an unplanned bonus bra shopping expedition.

Other than Inna’s desire to see the Damned, nothing about Cleveland was a must-see by any stretch of the imagination; however, we enjoyed the trip, got a nice break from our regular daily routine, and had fun together.

Then, after a night’s sleep, we got up and hit Pittsburgh’s amateur Art All Night exhibit, which we both found engaging, then enjoyed a damned savory lunch at Salem Halal on the Strip and a lovely walk around the Highland Park reservoir.

Nice weekend with the little woman.

When I moved from Boston to Pittsburgh, one of my friends was interested in how the two cities differed. After living here for a year, I now feel like I can make some somewhat informed contrasts.

Here’s my list of the top twenty differences between Boston and Pittsburgh.

• Time is a little bit different. Pittsburgh is a little further south than Boston, so its days are a little longer in the winter and shorter in the summer. But more importantly, Boston is at the eastern edge of the time zone, while Pittsburgh is at the western end; so the sun rises and sets about 30-45 minutes later.
• Pittsburgh doesn’t get Boston’s cold onshore sea breezes in the spring. On the other hand, Boston doesn’t get Pittsburgh’s periodic light lake effect snow.
• There aren’t many evergreens in western Pennsylvania. It’s mostly hardwood, unlike New England.
• Obviously Pittsburgh is hillier, but the soil is also different. Boston is granite and glacial till, whereas Pittsburgh is all sedimentary rock: visible strata of limestone, sandstone, and shale, a whopping three miles deep!
• Surprisingly, western PA has a lot fewer lakes than New England. Most rainfall winds up coursing down narrow canyons and into the major rivers.
• Because of this lack of natural reservoirs to trap and hold rainwater and snow melt, combined with the steepness and softness of the underlying rock, western PA is very prone to flash flooding and debris in the roads. The only time New England floods is during spring runoff, and that rarely washes debris into the roadways.
• Aside from its tiny downtown, Pittsburgh is a much less walkable city. Distances between points of interest are greater, and the outlying towns don’t have dense commercial or cultural centers, so it’s mostly undifferentiated sprawl.
• As such, Pittsburgh is a much more car-oriented city. There’s no subway, no commuter rail, and minimal public transportation. The automobile is a necessity here, whereas they are a liability in Boston.
• Despite that, the landscape and street design makes it stunningly difficult to get from Point A to Point B in Pittsburgh. Unlike Boston, where you can pick between several bad routes, there’s usually only one way for Pittsburghers to get where they need to go. That in turn creates horrible blighted sections of roadway like Bigelow, Liberty, Washington Boulevard, Second, Fifth, Penn, Carson, Ft. Duq, 51, and BotA.
• Because of the poorly-designed infrastructure, and Penn DOT’s unconcealed hostility toward accommodating cyclists and pedestrians, there are fewer road cyclists in Pittsburgh, and more of them are killed by motorists than happen in Boston, where government is more responsive and the cycling and pedestrian advocacy groups are better organized.
• Between that and the lumpy terrain, there aren’t as many century rides in western PA as there are back in Massachusetts.
• Pittsburgh does have a ton of railroads and former railroad and mill property. There’s a lot more post-industrial wasteland than you find in Boston, where most of it has already been cleaned up and redeveloped. In that sense, Pittsburgh is more like Lawrence MA, only on a vastly larger scale.
• There’s certainly more poverty, abandoned and/or condemned property, and overall urban blight in Pittsburgh. Property values are too high in Boston for space to sit unused and uncared-for very long.
• There does seem to be a greater rate of crime, murder, and drug problems in Pittsburgh, as well.
• There are, of course, certain neighborhoods in Pittsburgh that are gentrifying, but it’s decades behind Boston in rehabilitating itself overall. Tho they’ve made a lot of progress from their industrial past.
• In addition to property prices being lower, salaries are also much lower in Pittsburgh than Boston, which has always been a tech hub. On the other hand, groceries in Boston are considerably less expensive than western PA.
• There’s less ethnic diversity in Pittsburgh than Boston. Sure, there are some small enclaves, but Boston is far more integrated than Pittsburgh, with a greater variety and diffusion of immigrants from all kinds of ethinic origins.
• At the same time, western PA has a whole lot more uneducated, low income white folk. The substantial redneck population reminds me a lot more of rural Maine than cosmopolitan Boston.
• Pittsburgh might be widely known for its food, but I find it pretty uninspired. Their signature pizza places don’t even deliver! Frankly, I don’t know how they stay in business, because delivery makes up the majority of most pizza joints’ orders. Oh, and they call them “cuts”, not “slices”. Stupid.
• On the other hand, Verizon doesn’t sell its Fios fiber optic internet service in Boston. It does in Pittsburgh, and that’s a noteworthy plus!

I can’t say that I’m a big fan of losing a body part that has been with me since birth.

The first time I consciously noted the discomfort in my abdomen was in August, after I finished the Pan-Mass Challenge. I didn’t really pay much attention to it. It came and went, but eventually it became clear that it wasn’t just going to go away. By the end of September, it became prominent enough that I scheduled a visit to the doctor.

After describing my symptoms, the differential diagnosis was gall bladder, which was later confirmed by ultrasound. It made sense that my discomfort presented after the PMC; the gall bladder is involved in the digestion of fat, and PMC weekend typically marks the celebratory end of my training diet, when I finally allow myself to binge on high-fat foods like ice cream and cheese, after avoiding them throughout the spring and summer.

While I waited for a surgery date, the only way to manage my discomfort was to go right back onto a diet that was even lower in fat than my training diet. It was tolerable at first, but very limiting, and as the weeks dragged on, it got pretty damned boring.

Things proceeded pretty slowly. I talked to my GP in September, then a wait for an ultrasound, then a wait for a consult with a surgeon. He told me the surgery would probably happen in three weeks, at the beginning of November. Seven weeks later, November had passed with no surgery appointment and no word from the hospital.

I started a new job on Monday December 1st. That day, I came home and gathered up my paper mail from my mailbox, which included a notice informing me that my surgery was Thursday morning! You would think they would have called to make sure I was in town that day, or at least make some attempt to find a date that worked for me. Nope… Here’s your date, take it or suffer!

You’d think they would give more than 48 hours’ notice, right? Nope… So what if it’s your first week on a new job; if you want relief, you’ll clear your schedule on short notice. Ironically, their instructions included things to be done a week before surgery; I should have consulted a fortune teller, so that I’d have known to do those things five days before I was notified of my appointment!

The big challenge for me was finding someone who would take me home from the hospital. I’d already gathered four friends I hoped I could rely on, but one was out of town, two were unable, and another wasn’t responsive. I was pretty haired out until my friend Roopa agreed to help. Without her kindness, I would have had to cancel the surgery.

The actual surgery went pretty smoothly. While I expected hours of sitting around waiting, someone was usually talking to me, whether it was a prep nurse, an OR nurse, the anesthesiologist, his intern, the surgeon, or his intern. On seeing I was a cyclist (the unique tan markings are present year-round), the prep nurse gave me a memorable pitch for doing the American Diabetes Association’s North Shore Tour de Cure, which she oversees.

Once the appointed time came around, they wheeled me into the OR. By then I was already mildly sedated, but I remember the unique pattern of the lights. When the anesthesiologist put the mask over my face, I decided to count aloud for them, so that they’d know when I was out. I was told to just breathe deeply, and that pretty much was the end of that!

I have very little recollection of the recovery room, save for someone ringing Roopa to come pick me up. They wheeled me out and down to the car, where I lifted my arms in mock victory. Roopa got me home, where my halting gait caused one of the condo staff to ask if I’d been in another bike accident, but I replied, “No, just out of surgery…”

We made it upstairs and I flopped onto my bed. While Roopa very kindly ran down to the corner CVS for meds, I stripped off my jeans and shirt, hopped into PJs, and pretty much passed out. When she returned, we chatted for quite some time before she exercised her option to go home. I slept on and off a bit more.

The first 24 hours were challenging. Hydration and pectin drops were key because my throat had been irritated by intubation.

Being something of a Luddite about pain medication, I skipped the Percocet they prescribed, and didn’t even take any over-the-counter stuff. I’m a cyclist; I’m used to far more intense discomfort!

The worst pain was the dissipation of the CO2 gas they use to distend the abdomen; it irritates the diaphragm, but the signals sneak up that nerve and manifest as really sharp cramping pain inside the shoulder joints. That took a few days to dissipate.

After spending most of the day sedated or asleep, I opted to stay up late, then slept only briefly before waking up again at 4am. But that worked out okay, because I really wasn’t tired and had enough things to keep me entertained.

The surgery had been on Thursday, which worked well. Friday I spent most of the day sitting up at my desk, and was even able to remotely attend a couple work meetings. Each day I got a little bit stronger, tentatively introduced a little bit more food into my healing digestive system, and the pain slowly diminished. On Sunday I showered, shaved, and took the temporary dressings off my four incisions, leaving just some steri-strips. That made me feel a lot more human.

After three solid days of recovery, I headed back to work on Monday. I took the train in to the office and worked a regular day. Tuesday the trains were backed up, which forced me to walk the mile to work. None of this was fun—it challenged my stamina—but it did help me get back to normal functioning.

In the meantime, I experimented adding high-fat foods to my diet. Cookies. Cashews. Donuts. Pizza. A burrito. Fajitas. Lindt chocolates. And Häagen Dazs ice cream! My system took everything in stride, without any of the discomforting “downstream effects” that can accompany gall bladder removal.

Now, twelve days after the surgery, I’ve been cleared to do anything I want, including returning to kyudo and cycling. My sutures still require a little more time to heal, but life has pretty much returned to normal. I seem to be able to eat whatever I want, and I can finally make life plans without worrying about an operation with an unknown date and outcome.

About the only question I have left is how this might alter my on-bike nutrition needs during really long endurance rides. But I’m pretty confident, and eager to find out. But I’ll wait a while longer, letting things heal until springtime makes long rides possible again.

But overall I’m happy to say that I couldn’t have imagined a more successful outcome.

Since I seem to have a large contingent of yinzers in my flist, I’ll post this brief writeup of last week’s PIT trip.

Since food seems to be the majority of what PIT is good for, here’s the run-down.

• India Garden on Atwood: been there three times now, and still feel they’re passable, but nothing special.
• Mad Mex on Atwood: very tasty enchiladas, but they fought with my internals. Went at 3pm and so avoided the raucus college crowd.
• Pamela’s on Forbes: as always, very good but insanely greasy and too much food.
• Green Mango on Braddock: not bad. New Thai place. Grabbed a fistful of Thailand tourism pamphlets for future reference.
• Klavon’s Ice Cream on Penn: odd retro place with eerily friendly staff, but an awesome Pecan Ball with caramel. I’d do that again!
• Oh Yeah on Highland: okay ice cream place. Somehow both reminiscent of JP Licks and yet nothing special.
• Mario’s South Side Saloon on E Carson: very good burger, for a second choice after the Fat Head had a 45-minute wait at 3pm.

Other activities included: a very profitable trip to Papermart on Baum, where everything (including red mini-Sharpies and big glass markers) was seventy percent off due to the store closing; a damned cold walking photography expedition from Heinz Field, around the Point, up to the Seventh Street Bridge and back down past PNC Park (full photoset here); sharing my Scotland photos and travel info with Inna’s mean friend Monika; meeting Inna’s new cats Pumpkin and Prawn; and just generally driving around and getting a better idea of Pittsburgh’s neighborhoods and what they’re like.

Took JetLoo for the first time; seemed no different from any other airline, except the ground crew were a lot more potty-mouthed (pun intended) than on Merkun, Untied Airlines, or USHair.

Wasn’t a bad trip. It was nice to have a reason to break the camera out, even if it was really too cold to do a lot of work with it.

In this post I gave you a glimpse into the drawbacks of living with my ex wife. Two days earlier, in this post I gushed when writing about the 25th anniversary of meeting Ailsa, my first girlfriend. Well, lest you get a lopsided picture, I thought I’d relate a story that casts Ailsa in a very different light.

Ailsa and I lived together for a brief time after my divorce. It was another period of intense learning for me. Some of those lessons were rather pleasant, as I alluded to in my Valentine’s Day post; and then some of them were less than pleasant, like the explosion.

Imagine sleeping peacefully and being suddenly woken up in the dead of night by a loud explosion. Something like a gunshot, actually. When I got up to investigate, everything looked okay until I got to the kitchen, where nothing was amiss… except for the blood dripping from the ceiling and all the shelves.

After some very traumatic WTF moments, I discovered that, no, it really wasn’t blood; it was orange juice. But it was f-ing everywhere!!!

Apparently what had happened was that Ailsa had taken one of those cans of frozen orange juice concentrate out of the freezer and left it on top of our microwave to thaw a little, before mixing it up in a pitcher with water.

And then promptly forgot it.

For several days.

Nature taking its course, the stuff thawed, warmed, and eventually fermented in its surprisingly well-sealed container. When the internal pressure reached a sufficient level—which of course happened at 3am one night—the can exploded like a water canon in a mostly-vertical jet of warm orange slop.

It coated the under-sides of four rows of shelving as well as half the ceiling before giving in to gravity and splooshing the shelves a second time on the way down, then the microwave, the countertops, and eventually the floor. I have never seen a mess like that in my life.

Of course, I’d like to say Ailsa’s OJ and Linda’s cookware behaviors were isolated incidents, but these kinds of hazards never came up when I lived with other guys in college. But then maybe I’m just prone to dating women with underdeveloped survival instincts.

Euhhh! I still have nightmares about that…

What’s worse than there being only one food source—a cafeteria—within walking distance of your office?

Realizing that today is “Seafood Jubilee” and that you can’t get anything that isn’t seafood unless you find someone to drive you somewhere.

What’s worse than that? Having your only coworker at this client site take his car and go home before lunch because his computer died.

What’s worse than that? Calling three different coworkers at your home office a mile away, requesting that they include you in their lunch plans. Then waiting until 45 minutes past noon for them to pull their heads out of their asses and make a plan.

What’s worse than that? Being told that after waiting so long, your coworkers were in fact unable to pull their heads out of their asses; they decided that they aren’t going to pick you up at all, and that they’re just going to eat lunch at one of the many lovely and diverse eateries within their office park, and to hell with you.

What’s worse than that? Spending five bucks for a tiny iceberg salad from the cafeteria.

What’s worse than that? Receiving an email announcing free sandwiches in the cafeteria… at 1:30pm. Just in time, if you’d decided to wait an hour and half past noon to get your lunch.

What’s worse than that? They’re catered sandwiches that the visiting clients wouldn’t even eat when they were fresh, 24 hours earlier. You remember, the very ones you saw sitting out on a counter all afternoon yesterday.

What’s worse than that? It’s only Wednesday, folks… Let’s do this again tomorrow! And the next day!

At least if I ate the sandwiches I could call in sick…

Stop reading, and start eating!

Okay, I admit it. I like stale cheese balls, okay? Is that so egregious? Can I help it if I like a little toothsome chewiness in that particular corn meal-based snack food?

I think I can trace this particular predilection back to college days, when Linda and I were so poor that generic store-brand cheese balls were about the only snack we could afford.

Come on… Say “Cheese”!