I love living in the future

[liv]

Some years ago, I met syllopsium via an internet site designed to help people meet. And we used LJ to get to know eachother better, and eventually met up in person and got on really well. Then recently, we were using IM to chat about various things, and agreed that we both wanted to do more outdoors stuff, such as hiking. And thus we made arrangements to go walking together this weekend.

I took a fast, comfortable train from Stoke-on-Trent to Manchester, and we used a combination of Facebook and mobile phones to make a casual, almost haphazard arrangement that resulted in five people showing up in the same time at the same place to have a meal together (ended up in the Thai orchid, which has tasty, reasonably priced food with a really good veggie selection).

Then this morning syllopsium made sandwiches using fresh bread from his bread machine, and home-made hummus made by mashing up chickpeas with a food blender. Then he drove me in his shiny fast car to the Lake District. It took us only just over an hour to reach Cumbria from Bolton on the motorway, and we used a satnav to plan the journey, the gadget being completely unfased by the tiny little country lanes in that part of the world.

We had a really lovely walk, on a marked trail through a "sculpture forest", but involving a fair bit of scrambling. There's still snow on the highest peaks of the Lake District, absolutely gorgeous. When we reached the summit, my smart phone was able to find a satellite and connect to the internet, so I could tweet from the top of a hill in the middle of nowhere to say that I was there. My fantastic walking boots supported my feet and ankles, didn't rub at all, and let my feet feel snug and dry but not constricted or suffocated, and in general went a long way towards making an 8-mile walk enjoyable instead of torture.

Then when I got home I had a long soak in the bath, with unlimited hot water on demand and lots of scented bubbles. And made myself a big pot of teeeeeea with almost no effort, and sat down to post about my experiences on DW.

And all this, just so I could enjoy the low-tech, even primitive pleasures of good food, good conversation, hugs, admiring beautiful natural scenery, fresh air and pleasantly tiring exercise, and pieces of wood carved into figurative shapes. I love the future!

Comments

[nanaya]

I <3 this post. That is all.

Yay :)

[syllopsium]

Was a good meal and walk :)

[khalinche]

Yay the future! Yay friends! Yay you!