Today I saw alanscottevil for the first time in about a dozen years. The last time I remember seeing him was at his bar mitzvah (those are done at age 13), and we’re both 25 now, so it really has been a long time since we’ve seen each other. I convinced him to come kayaking with me, something he’d never done before but was game to try. We left out of Jack’s Boathouse - my kayak is stored there for the summer, and they have rentals. I was amused to discover another deaf kid working on the dock there - apparently there have been a few this summer, though I’ve only met one other one. Because most of my gear was in my car (which is at the mechanic) I had to borrow a PFD, and I went to ask if I could borrow one from the boathouse. The kid pointed to his ear and shook his head, so I just started signing. “Oh, okay, you’re deaf? No problem. So anyway, I wanted to borrow this because…” - it was cute because I think he’s not used to having to answer customer questions!

I wanted to take alanscottevil down the Boundary Channel, but I hadn’t checked the tides, and the Potomac was at low tide so there was no way to get through there! We made the circuit around Roosevelt Island instead, and it was really bizarre to paddle around there at low tide. Thursday evenings we always leave at high tide, and it’s a very different trip! We paddled back under the Key Bridge and out to the Three Sisters, and that was the end of our two-hour rental period so we went back to Jack’s after that. I had a really good time, it was a nice gentle paddle with lots of chat and fun…it’s funny, his voice is the same as I remembered it! We spent about half the time going “wow, look how shallow it is here!” so that was amusing.

I’ve randomly decided to sign up for digital cable. We had it before, when they gave us six months free with HBO to entice us into signing up beyond that period…but we returned the digital box and went back to regular. But the cable company has added the gay channel Logo now, and I’m hoping that BBC America will carry Soundproof, and I really liked the onscreen guide, so I’m going to try it for a while. It’s going to be $9/month for the first three months, so I’ll use that period and see how it goes.