UPDATES

Time for some updates on your most pressing unresolved Salt in Wound topics!


So how did that spelling bee turn out?


Did I mention that the previous one - the one I won - was held at a hipster bar? By 2008 adult spelling bees had become passé, replaced by Guitar Hero contests.

How about the trip to Estonia?

I have it all planned out, but I have yet to make any actual reservations. I've concluded that Estonian will be an impossible language to pick up over the next 4 months, and that I'm not nearly as good at the sport of rogaining as I thought I would be. Last place is a very distinct possibility. Should still be fun, though.


Has Keenan gotten to hear any Backstreet Boys tunes yet?


No. I was able to tell him they were quite literally just a swindle.


Did anyone ever pick up that sand?


Nope. The other day when no one was home, I sliced open the bags and shoveled all the sand into an inconspicuous spot amongst the brambles, from whence it came.


What about the traffic cone?


Wait, I haven't posted about the traffic cone yet? That will be my next post, I promise.

Rogaining update

I believe I have found a teammate. Vesa Keinanen of Finland (the person in the background) has responded to one of my many far-flung postings. He seems more talented, experienced, and serious than I am but I believe I can keep up.

His name also has two dots over the a in his last name. I don't know how to type this on a blog. If anyone has figured this out, let me know. It comes up a lot in these Baltic languages.

I've had to set up some mail filters, because Micaela was deleting all the incoming messages from Estonia and Finland because they resemble spam.

Rogaining

If you want to compete in a world championship athletic event, but you are not an elite athlete, there are really only two options. First, you could compete for a very small country. This has its limitations, though, because few of us are from a very small country, and in most sports there are rigorous qualifying levels guaranteed to knock you out long before you reach the championship level. The only exceptions I can think are very small countries that want to field a team in the Olympics. I think there must be a rule that says if a country like Tuvalu wants to field a team, they're allowed to have one person doing judo or race walking or something equally obscure.

The second way is to pick an obscure sport. This, too, is harder than it sounds. The most obscure sports (and games) you can think of still have state and regional and national qualifiers. Or so I thought, until I learned about rogaining. Rogaining is a sport where, using a map and compass and competing as a team, you try to visit as many checkpoints as possible in a 24 hour period. The 8th World Rogaining Championships are being held in Estonia next September, and as of this writing I am one of five North Americans entered (for a while I was the only one. That was definitely a weird feeling). I think will make a nice book, and I'm working on a proposal, but my most pressing need at the moment is a teammate.

http://8wrc2008.rogain.ee/index.php