Jingu Skate Rink is an oasis in summer.
If you overlook the slightly choppy ice surface, unsharpened rental skates, and a few crazies on the ice, this is the best place to spend a 34 degree afternoon that I can think of. It’s cool. It’s athletic. And it’s not too crowded on a Saturday.
We went yesterday. Tod hadn’t skated in about ten years, but within minutes he was skating backwards and zipping around the rink. I can only skate forwards, a little shakily, but I loosened up after a couple of laps. Even with a wobble, I love to skate.
I turned around the rink with Lionel Belasco tunes running through my head, and the first few lines from Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age
“The bells of St. Mark’s were ringing changes up on the mountain when Bud skated over to the mod parlor to upgrade his skull gun. Bud had a nice new pair of blades with a top speed of anywhere from a hundred to a hundred and fifty kilometers, depending on how fat you were and whether or not you wore aero.”
Later on, Stephenson describes Bud as “a little hinky on those skates” which is exactly how I see myself. Only I don’t have the skull gun.
Info on the skating ring (in Japanese): http://www.meijijingu.or.jp/gaien/05.htm
Posted by kuri at July 11, 2004 10:38 AMAnd did you think of the frozen lake at Valley of Lakes and your sister on double bladed-skates while you struggled on single-bladed ones?
Posted by: Fran on July 12, 2004 07:12 AMOf course I did. I also remember then next winter, when Jenn had outgrown her double-blades and took as many prat falls in my old skates as I had. Maybe it was the skates…
Posted by: Kristen on July 12, 2004 03:29 PMI had just as much fun falling as I did skating.
Posted by: Jenny on July 13, 2004 04:14 AM