No Pity

2012-01-30T17:15:00.000-06:00

Our deck sits along an outdoor closet that contains the hot water heater and boiler. Add it all up and you have a good place for a mouse to hide out. Occasionally we would see a certain mouse running across the snow covered deck. There is no way for it to get into our home, so it was a very charming thing to observe. It would often run and climb into our small gas grill, usually after we had grilled chicken or steak. He never came around after grilled fish though. I guess cow grease is infinitely tastier.

After these past weeks of -17 temps he finally hit the wall. It seems that one climbing expedition into the grill resulted in a stuck tail, which spiraled into a frozen doom.

2012-01-16T17:22:00.001-06:00

Chicago is inescapable. It finds you everywhere and reminds you that it is still part of your world, mostly in happy ways. I walked out to my truck to head off for some -18 degree xc skiing. Below is what I discovered in my parking lot. It's called dibs in Chicago, and John Kass knows all about it.

I don't know if I completely agree with saving a spot in Chicago by putting lawn furniture in the street, but I do get it. It's completely illegal, but if you put the effort into shoveling out that spot so perfectly and cleanly, it is hard to watch it snatched away by the next car cruising down the street. Parking is tough in many Chicago neighborhoods and hard work does entitle one to a degree. But here in my townhouse complex! The parking lot is rarely more than half full and it is plowed by a truck. Beyond brushing off your car after a snowstorm, the tenants have no work to do. It's why we pay condo dues. Maybe there is a Bears fan lurking somewhere nearby...

The chilling temperatures not withstanding, skiing was terrific. The tracks were fresh and frozen into near concrete. The creek steamed in the deep freeze.

2012-01-12T17:30:00.002-06:00

I always get a chuckle out of inadvertently stumbling into a classy moment. It's interesting to try something new and not have built it up in your mind.

"Here, try this."
"It tastes ok. Not bad."
"It's Dom Perignon."
I wonder what my reaction would have been if I knew the champagne was coming from a $150 bottle.

After fishing in Homer last June I ended up with 20 lbs of King Salmon fillets from 4 different fish. I never examined them too closely, but after grilling a piece yesterday I was finally struck by the fact that one of the fish was a White King. It was definitely much milder as I have since read, though I do prefer a traditional King. I'll probably pass on an "Ivory King" if I see it at an upscale restaurant, though it is very fun to know that I snagged one myself.

2012-01-10T17:34:00.002-06:00

With such a snowy weekend and temperatures rising into the low teens, there was no choice but to get out and ski a bit. I have never skied in Kincaid Park even though it is acknowledged as the crown jewel of nordic skiing in town. It's the largest park and has a near infinite maze of trails. However, it is on the other (south) end of town. It's not a far drive, but it is so much easier to just drive 5 minutes and jump on the trails in my backyard. Well, Lesley (a recent family transplant from WI) lives on the southside so the lure of Kincaid was irresistible. We stayed on the mellow trails and sweated away for an hour or so in some heavy flakes, surrounded by quiet, still Alaskan woods. A perfect Saturday night.

On the Road

2011-12-28T14:16:00.000-06:00

Revisiting old books is always a fascinating exercise, usually with mixed results if I approach it honestly. Much of the Kerouac I devoured in the mid 90's has not aged too well in my mind. I do love Maggie Cassidy more than ever thanks to a rereading a few months ago, but I had until now not reread On The Road. Problem solved.

I vividly remember reading it when I was 18 because Scott was reading it at the same time. We skated almost everyday at Walgreens on Archer and would quote pieces of text to each other.

"D'ere you go man, D'ere you go."

That is an effeminate car.

"We'll look for work mon yana."

We pushed each other to devour text each night so we could chat about it at the next night's session and not end up behind the other. It was a book club that existed in a parking lot with a view of waxed curbs and the sound of flat spotted wheels.

I remember loving the way the characters rambled in all directions without any concern for money, future, or any other degree of planning. Dean and Sal were living ids. I was focused on college and showing up to work at the theater on time. These characters moved while I felt like I was standing still, as I suspect most kids at that age feel that way. I hold no regrets as I knew that college and some money in the bank would create an opportunity for bigger life movements in a few years. I had my eyes a mile or two down the road, yet I was still enthralled by 'ol Dean and Sal sprinting off at the drop of the hat. It has never been in my top 10 of favorite books, though it's energy and warm memory always lived happily in my mind.

I was somewhat hesitant to give it another try as I had a legitimate fear about adding another old favorite to the list of things I cannot now fathom ever liking (Spaceballs, Top Gun). Better to let the past stay warm and a bit hazy. However, a movie adaptation is the works and I know I will get sucked into seeing it, so I'd best tune up my memory of the actual text. Do I still enjoy it?

Yes, a great deal, though for very different reasons. As an adult with a child, I was extremely annoyed by the crass selfishness of the characters and the way they treated their families and responsibilities. I saw evidence in the text that the reader was intended to take a critical eye to Dean in this regard, though this evidence was rather lean. The energy of the book happily remains -- the pages just flat out zoom by. I was completely struck by Sal's loneliness, which is something I had not noticed to a great degree initially. Regardless of his difficulties to forge these bonds, the man is deeply searching for connections amongst men and women. I had always though of it as Dean's book, yet now I can only see Sal's stumbling hope of personal relationships.

I am now extremely interested to see which themes get emphasized in the flick. (How did I ever laugh at Spaceballs?)

2011-12-07T12:06:00.001-06:00

One of the things I truly love in life is getting rid of stuff and not replacing it. Although unrealistic, I would love to have my life fit into a studio apartment. Any even braver goal would be to be able to fit my life into a suitcase and be able to hit the road like a character a hundred years ago that is heading west to the frontier or heading east to college. In either case that person is moving their life semi permanently and all they have is 4-5 changes of clothing.

It's a goal. Chiseling towards this goal finds me glancing at my bookshelves and stacks of cd's asking "Do I need that? Will I ever pick that up again?" It means that old music gets another spin and old loves get another look.

I have always loved Henry Rollins spoken word, whether live or on cd. Over the past few years I've found his material redundant and a bit predictable as the topics fall into one of three categories: attacking political straw men (one of my huge pet peeves in arguing a point), name dropping tales that are often humorous, and listing the most recent set of visited foreign countries. Foreign travel is almost always inherently good, though presenting it in a way to make you feel like a rube if you don't do it very often due to scheduling or money is annoying. I'm a sucker for a funny story about a famous person, but taken alongside his latest straw man political rant and brow beating of the untraveled masses, the whole becomes more annoying than the charm of its parts. It's all the more annoying because he is obviously smarter than that. But what of his plethora of cd's from the late 80's through the mid 90's?

They're wonderful. You can easily hear a young man reaching for art in every story, thought, and poem he stumbles into. His stories are not about politics or travel, but about people and experiences that may or may not have political overtones. In short, they are striving for bigger things. If you tell a real and true story about an experience you have a chance at striking a universal chord that may well resonate years and years into the future. That's why people reread great books. If you rant about Bush or FoxNews, you'll get some cheers and immediately begin the sprint towards staleness as the months and years begin ticking away.

I don't care that I agree or disagree with his points of view, I care that he's getting boring. However, I am truly enjoying revisiting Sweatbox, Big Ugly Mouth, and Human Butt (these cd's are staying in my place for sure). Last week his website had a sale where all spoken word cd's and dvd's were going for $5. What a deal! For less than 30 bucks I could have had all the stuff my collection was missing. I took a pass.

Ships

2011-11-22T12:56:00.000-06:00

I believe that if we listen closely, we can hear themes converging in our lives across given periods of time. I do not believe we are necessarily living in novels of sweeping meaning, but it is fair to say that there is more to it than just saying, "I've ridden my bike a lot lately, therefore this phase of my life is all about bikes." I'll be sticking by this theory, even though I probably have sat in too many Literature courses looking for links and connections across characters and author biographies. The theme this fall involves ships, great lakes, and looking outward.

As the fall begins I always begin itching for future trips which usually sends me flipping through large maps and sliding my fingertip across ink that reads the names of forests, lakes, and remote towns I have not yet visited. This time I dug out my Boundary Waters maps and traced the trips of the past while spinning tales to Becky and Henry of Bears, rapids, and northern pike. I settled into thoughts of lakes in that area I had not canoed across, portages I had not sweated through, and campsites I had not sat in while watching the sun set. I though of Lake Superior right next door and imagined the old days of copper and taconite oozing out of the Mesabi Iron Rage and the UP. There are infinite canoeing opportunities right here in Alaska and I plan on attempting them all, though I'd love to visit the Boundary Waters every summer as well.

When November 10th rolls around the flickering memories of Boundary Waters and Isle Royale crystallize into the phantom Edmund Fitzgerald endlessly lurching across the Lake Superior of my mind. Lightfoot's dirge endlessly feeds the imagination of that day. I picture myself back in Paradise, MI at the museum looking out at Whitefish Bay.

As much as I have always enjoyed Lovecraft, I confess to not loving all of the stories at the same time. Some stories I may never love (Charles Dexter), some I recently "got" (At the Mountains of Madness), and some others I will always love (Dunwich, Colour Out of Space, and The White Ship). Man, The White Ship may not be in the top tier for most Lovecraft fans, but for me it has always threaded a needle of wonder and eeriness with perfection. The mood of that lonely lighthouse looking out over the water puts me at Whitefish Point, and the mysteries and unknown worlds hover just out of reach as I think of the trips and desires out there beyond the maps and coastlines in front of me.

2011-11-02T12:50:00.001-05:00

On Sunday morning we woke up to a few inches of snow and come Monday the newly studded cyclocross Trek made its debut. I needed to tweak the fenders a bit to get them to barely accept the 700 X 35 tires. As the snow stacks up I could probably ditch the fenders considering we won't really get above freezing until April, though if they keep working out I'll keep them on. Snow being kicked up onto my back and pants is not that annoying, though a Pineapple Express may make things sloppy for a few days.

2011-10-26T13:30:00.001-05:00

The studded tires are on my cyclocross bike and snow is imminent. It has been a slow 6 week creep towards these 20 degree mornings: first I needed a skull cap, then a head light, then had to dig out my shoe covers. (As a side note, you pretty much need gloves most mornings in the summer up here). Now it has come to studs. Bring it on! (and please groom it for XC skiing when it comes).
...

I seldom have the occasion to play Dungeons and Dragons these days (at least the more RPG centric flavor). It's actually sadly been years since I sat down and played paper and pencil D&D. It's just hard to find the time to do the preparation and time block to get folks together. Plenty of people in my age range do find the time, though I suspect my desire to ride my bike, hit the gym, watch a movie, read a book, etc. all essentially bully D&D out of the temporal room. Warhammer, skirmish games, and general board games fit my lifestyle nicely, particularly in the winter.

However, I do love to read D&D blogs. Just as I occasionally delve into online accounts of trips to the Boundary Waters, I love sparking and revisiting old memories of adventures past. This review of Beyond the Crystal Cave is fairly accurate even though I have an ultimately positive memory of the module. I ran it as a tournament back in 1992 on a random weekday when Brother Rice gave us a day off. I devised a point system that placed much more emphasis on puzzle solving rather than a body count, which fit perfectly with the module. Not everyone was pleased with the outcome, though Geoff was happy as the winner. Perhaps I'll break out my copy of Castle Ravenloft this weekend so Henry and I can envision some crystal cave styled caverns.

2011-10-03T13:16:00.001-05:00

Call it a dry run if you will. I've always wanted to hike the length of Crow Pass Trail from Girdwood to Eagle River, but the timing never worked out correctly. You have to wait for June to melt away much of the snow and it is also wise to line up a companion or 2 to head along with you due to the river crossing. I have read that the first 3 miles from Girdwood to the top of the pass are pretty strenuous, so I decided to give that a day trip on Saturday. The termination dust is on the march so it is time to get these hikes in now.

Yes, the goal of the trail is up there in the snow. I believe the parking lot is at around 1000 feet. Up and up the steep trail for 2 hours will get you to the peak.

At the top of the pass is a Forest Service cabin available for rent. I gather that it is often reserved, but after determining that it was empty I decided to go inside for my lunch break.

There is an undeniable charm to this little buttress to the howling winds and I'd like to stay there someday in the future, though hiking up the kerosene/diesel fuel for heat sounds like a pain. I read through the guest book and found a wonderfully charming entry that I will paraphrase from memory:

Your body brought you to this beautiful place! Take care of it and it will take you many more beautiful places!

I smiled at this thought and happily chomped away at the apples I brought along. About a mile across the blowing snow was the height of the pass and the glacier.

The trail descended steeply from here to the valley that will meander to Eagle River in another 20 miles. I had had enough of climbing steep mountains so decided to turn around and concentrate on cruising downhill. I cannot wait to tackle this entire one way hike next summer! In Alaska, you're never more than a 2 hour hike from winter.

2011-09-13T11:36:00.005-05:00

The colors are starting to change here in Anchorage and the birch trees are getting fairly yellow. When I ride up Hiland road in Eagle River and hit 700ft of elevation the colors become full blown and beautiful.

Keep climbing. See the ridge to the right? I'll be pedaling up and up that sucker.

And 50 minutes later I'll be at the ~2000ft. top. 15 minutes and 45mph later I'll be back at the bottom.

There will be snow up here within a few weeks for sure. Time to get in as many climbs as possible.

2011-08-30T10:54:00.002-05:00

Hiking Flat Top on a sunny day is the closest Anchorage gets to a traffic jam. The parking lot is craziness and the police have a field day writing parkers along the road up to the Glen Alps trailhead. We beat the crowds by a few hours Sunday morning and found a perfectly clear sky and Denali out very clearly (often Denali is only clearly visible from Anchorage in the winter when it is well below 0). Perhaps not the hottest and sunniest day of the summer, but certainly the best one on Flat Top. Aside from a 10 day stretch here and there of solid rain, this has been a very warm and sunny summer. We hit 70 over half a dozen times.

As we scrambled down from the peak a college age blond met my eyes and asked if I was wearing a Wisconsin hat.

Yep.

"I'm from Wisconsin!," exclaimed the corn-fed young lady.

"I lived in Madison for a bit."

"I'm from Wausau."

I gestured back to my cousin L while she already was stating, "I went to Point."

"Cool! I'll be back in Wausau in a week."

"I'll be visiting Edgar in a few more," I added.

More pleasantries and smiles were exchanged and soon down we went again. We joked about FIBs and FOBs (in Michigan) and tried to determine if I'm still a FIB. I don't think so, but I won't be betting the farm on it.

Wisconsinites are everywhere up here.

2011-08-26T09:58:00.002-05:00

Why was I almost late for work today?

a)I caught a flat.
b)It was raining.
c)The moose and her calf would not move out of the bike trail.

The answer is C. After some clapping and stomping and 10 minutes they trotted a few yards into the swamp.

2011-08-08T23:47:00.001-05:00

The Double Musky in Girdwood is my favorite restaurant here in Alaska, perhaps even my favorite anywhere. I usually have a craving for steak a few times a year, so their Pepper Steak becomes a welcome bath in gluttony. The remaining seafood and cajun dishes fill out the menu nicely.

However, thanks to little Hank these days, we don't find ourselves heading out to Girdwood that often for rich, leisurely dinners. No problem at all, as I own the Double Musky cookbook and have plenty of time to tinker around at home. I made a stab at their jambalaya on Friday and it was fairly successful. I swapped the shrimp for chicken breast and opted for chicken Andouille sausage. It came out very spicy (just right for me and a bit hot for Becky) and a touch too salty (I neglected to account for the salt in the chicken stock). Overall I really enjoyed it, it flat out looks correct, and I now know where to make the adjustments next time. I'll just need to pick up some fresh,traditional Andouille at the butcher shop in town and give the non chicken option a shot. We'll have snow and cool days here sooner than I'd like to admit, so a spicy dish will be welcome before Halloween.

It just needs some rice.

Done!

2011-07-06T13:25:00.002-05:00

Just to reaffirm that this is not the cute, family blog.

2011-07-06T13:04:00.002-05:00

Tomorrow is the big day and we couldn't be more excited. I'll certainly keep blogging here about metal and cycling, though I've started a family blog to capture the changes in our growing family. No musings on black metal there.

2011-06-28T17:45:00.002-05:00

If I commute by bike, I arrive to a near empty office at 6:30 am. There is one guy that beats me here, but he is on the far end of the building. My quiet half is only broken up by a lone clock radio humming away down the hallway, whose clarity only reveals itself when I walk by on the way to the bathroom to change into work clothes. A full-throated and excited pentecostal preacher rails away for souls from a tinny little plastic box deep in an office. Another employee arrives sometime after 7 and undoubtedly walks in and clicks off the championing voice, though this does nothing to stop the next morning's pre 6:30 am ritual to repeat. It certainly has a mood of a horror flick or an eery roadside store one stumbles into, but at this point it has descended into a small note in my morning ritual. I look forward to it.

2011-06-19T23:03:00.002-05:00

Alaska is truly the last frontier. This means being aware of hypothermia when boating, having a break down kit and extra fuel when traveling in the winter, or just generally being more self sufficient than people in most parts of America. The climate and rugged country dictate this, though in Anchorage you can largely avoid these challenges. It's not the same as Chicago, but in most cases you can pick up the phone, whine, and soon have someone headed for your home to fix your problem.

I anticipate a frozen pipe someday, perhaps a malfunctioning boiler, or even a pesky septic. I did not plan for getting our water from a hose for 48 hours. It turns out a water main needed to be replaced in the parking lot and in order to have continuous water service throughout the repair we needed to have a hose mainlining water directly into our hot water heater. It worked out just fine, albeit with a slight dip in pressure. It just seems a little silly. The last frontier indeed.

Catching up...

2011-06-16T12:25:00.002-05:00

The triathlon went better than I had expected. I shaved 13 minutes off of my previous time and placed 75th out of 128. I improved greatly on my transition times. In the future I believe my biggest gains will be found in the running portion. Considering I dislike running, 29:33 for a 5K is not terrible. I could probably focus on a better kick and finds some gains there, though running with cement legs from the bike will not change.

Overall I had a great time and loved the feeling of pushing myself beyond preconceived limits. I don't know if I'll participate next year, as I'm hoping for the Fireweed 200. Eh, maybe I'll do both.

...

Getting older means slowly stripping away all of the little behaviors that I once thought made me cool. This usually happens years after everyone else in the world knows I should give it up. In high school my coolness told me that waiting for the bus in January without a hat was a good plan since only the uncool wear hats. Once I started commuting by bike to UIC I quickly got over any hangups on wearing a skull cap, though it took 7 or so years to complete that mental journey.

I have an aesthetic issue with too much crap on my bike. I like it lean and slick. However, I do not enjoy arriving at work with a mud racing stripe up my back. I've used a removable rear fender before, though it was marginal at best. I'm hoping to commute into the winter which means studded tires and some proper fenders for the cross bike. The Trek XO1 looks a little less sexy with its full Planet Bike fenders, but it was time for me to grow up. I commuted through a steady drizzle this morning and only arrived at work with wet hair. I'm a believer.

The Orbea will not be getting any fenders though.

2011-05-20T16:15:00.003-05:00

Today is the culmination of Bike To Work week here in Anchorage (and in most cities I suspect). There are a total of 9 people at my gig that participated and we were lucky enough to receive t-shirts from the city (about a third of participants randomly get chosen for these freebies).

Given that today is the big, final day, the bike trails and major intersections become littered with the occasional comfort station. Most of these have free water, a cookie, or maybe some coffee. I gather that most of these were up and running by 6:45-7am, which is unfortunate because I am at work by 6:30. I can live without a free bottle of water, but it is harder to know that I missed this stop on my commuting route:

This year we are very excited to bring back the popular BCA Bacon Station. You can find us on the Chester Creek trail in the park just east of the tunnel under the Seward Highway. We’d like to thank Spenard Roadhouse for donating the bacon, Raven’s Brew Coffee for the coffee and Great Harvest Bread for the cookies!

2011-05-09T23:41:00.000-05:00

The baby will need a rocking chair so the stripping and refinished has begun. It's a fun little project.

2011-05-04T17:24:00.002-05:00

I've restarted my bike commuting and it is as fun as ever. I'd happily do it every day of the year, but the bike trails become ski trails and a snow bike becomes a necessity for 5 months. I haven't quite determined whether I want to make that purchase or not. If I had more room for a 3rd bike I suspect I'd jump on it.

I guess it is spring these days, though riding in at 26 degrees is a touch chilly. Riding home at 50 degrees in the same day is much nicer.

Riding in this morning in a 36 degree drizzle makes for a pretty filthy mud streak from my back to my ankles. My Chrome bag is pretty filthy right now and it is making me realize that I have never washed the thing. It is well over 8 years old and has who knows how many hours and miles on it. It's a trooper and I should probably show it some love. I'm guessing some oxy clean and a hand washing in the sink will do the trick. The bag seems like it will easily last another 10 years, if not longer. Chrome makes great stuff.

2011-04-28T12:14:00.002-05:00

Once you post your resume on Monster or CareerBuilder it is on there forever. Head hunters must either download all resumes for safe keeping or scour the cached archives. I have not had an active resume on either place for quite a while, but I am now receiving calls for opportunities, this time in Madison. If that means that folks out there are hiring, then good for everyone. You'd think the Alaska phone number would tip them off though.

2011-04-25T12:12:00.002-05:00

It appears that Halloween has come late for me. I've been burrowing into Bradbury tales at lunchtime, chipping away at the 900 page collection of short stories (I'm well into the second half). At home I've dug into some Poe stories I've needed to reread as well as started a fresh look into Lovecraft.

I have always enjoyed Lovecraft, though at times in my life I just wasn't in the mood to dig deeply into the mythos and plow into his often dense prose. (Oddly, I have never minded the denseness of Poe's sentences). The Rats in the Walls is just as great as ever and my Lovecraft interest is at a high these days. And I have started reading a few pages of The Colour Out of Space each night to Baby Turek. How that bodes for him, I have no clue.

2011-04-14T11:53:00.002-05:00

I always attempt to enter the spring cycling season as strongly as possible, usually with mixed results. As much as I had more access to winter cycling in Madison due to their plowing of bike trails and ubiquitous salt usage (up here they only groom for skiing and rarely use salt anywhere), I often had to ramp up early in the season to break in my legs and lungs for longer rides. I believe the opportunity for intermittent winter cycling (I have never owned a snow bike) was just enough to keep me off the treadmill. Why run a 5k a few times a week if you'll be able to get on your bike a time or two?

When I moved up here I realized how much more difficult winter cycling is if you don't commit to a snow bike, so I quickly found myself jumping on the treadmill here and there during the winter. I decided to give a spring triathlon a try, which means swimming laps soon followed. As much as running and swimming definitely generates fitness, it doesn't necessarily feed into strong miles on a bike. The cardio strength is there, but the precise cycling muscles need to be rustled from the their slumber.

This winter I xc skied about 6 times per week (8-9 hours total) in hopes of staying in shape and embracing the winter, both of which happily worked. I had also read that the muscles involved were nearly identical to those used in cycling. Holy cow is that true. I've only been back on my bike for a week but I am amazed at how in cycling shape I am. It's a wonderful surprise. There is a very steep climb nearby (Stuckagain Heights), that I often use as a barometer of my strength on the bike. When will I be able to make it to the top without standing during the grinding climb? It usually takes a month or so, but this year it happened on day one (and I turned around and climbed it again immediately after the first attempt). I am very pleased and really looking forward to the triathlon in 7 weeks. The next challenge will be climbing Hiland Road in Eagle River. That is earmarked for this weekend, assuming the road is ice free.

It's also very exciting to come back from my ride at dusk and notice that the clock is just turning 10pm.

2011-04-13T11:38:00.002-05:00

Aside from seeing more and more bikes cruising around town, I noticed a steel Colnago passing along one of the back roads near my place. I really enjoy that my dream bike is rolling around my immediate neighborhood somewhere. It just proves that in a small way the model is getting closer and closer to being in my home. That day will come.

2011-04-11T22:32:00.000-05:00

It's still winter at higher elevations, but the snow is melting and the road is acceptable for road tires. Spring is coming.

2011-04-05T12:08:00.002-05:00

Saturday and Sunday were the final, joyous XC Skiing outings. I hit Russian Jack on Saturday and the trails were mushy and ungroomed, but I completed my usual loop. Even though it was in the high 30's the hard packed trail has a long time to melt.

Sunday I opted for a drive out to Chugiak. Their trails are groomed more often than most and the hills are pretty fast, yet safe. It's a great blend. On Sunday the freeze/thaw cycle had generated a trail of crusted ice -- extremely fast and fairly unsafe. We still skied an hour as planned, but took the turns and twists with way more caution than we had the previous week.

By the time I returned to town on Sunday it was 40+ degrees with a clear, sunny sky overhead. I tore open the storage locker in the garage, filed away the skis, pulled the fishing gear to the fore, tuned up the bikes, swept out the garage, and then washed and cleaned both vehicles for the first time in months.

Which means that today's ongoing dump of snow is my fault.

Russian Jack

2011-03-22T00:28:00.002-05:00

Above is the short but somewhat steep hill that has been the small learning experience for this, my first season on nordic skis. I've been zipping down it easily these past few months, though in November it was a bit intimidating. I love it now. Also, this picture was taken this evening at 8 pm. Spring is coming someday soon as shown by the longer days and my slightly improved skiing. Perhaps I'll be pedaling down this path in late April on pavement with a little luck.

2011-03-18T13:06:00.002-05:00

I'm brainstorming on the wise things I need to do with my son while also trying to find a way to pursue my own hobbies and interests at the same time. If I don't spend a little bit of time on the things that spin the wheels in my head I won't be as interesting as I can be for the little guy. It's a balance, though it leans way towards him. Great.

The one constant in the literature I read is that the more you speak to your child the better. I think this primarily helps generate language skills as well as encourages general bonding. Sign me up. I'm sure I'll be reading plenty of children's books, but why not Ray Bradbury stories? There are plenty of stories I've been meaning to read so why not read them a little more slowly and out loud? There are no vulgarities in the stories.

It strikes me as no sillier an activity than the permutation of "googoo/gaga" aping parents indulge in. Sadly, Becky's kindergarten experience has shown me that many parents do not even have the inclination to consider reading to their children. So my impulse has me on the right side of the curve.

The question remains: If the lack of vulgarities is the primary qualification for a story being read, will Poe, Hemingway, and Lovecraft be far behind Bradbury?

2011-03-17T13:22:00.003-05:00

You see all kinds of interesting people while waiting for your appointment at the OB/GYN office. You see many people happy and overjoyed at their situation (I'd include us in this group). There are a handful that seem skittish and nervous at the unplanned roller coaster they are on. And there is a huge amount that is a blend of both.

I like the young couple that consists of an expectant father with a plethora of facial tattoos. What kind of tattoos, you ask? Well, advertisements actually. Logos and websites in their correctly branded font. He must have received some sort of payment for that, though that hardly seems like a justification.

I liked "pornhub.com" on his cheek the most.

I'm trying not to be a snob, but I suspect my son will have a leg up in life on the the kid with the dad at the playground with a porn web site on his face.

The NHL has the best commercials

2011-03-16T16:40:00.002-05:00

2011-03-03T10:25:00.002-06:00

I spent a lot of time in Gage Park while my aunt lived there and beyond. This is a sad story.

...

On a happier topic, it will be a boy come mid July! Let the name suggestions begin.

2011-02-25T16:52:00.003-06:00

If you are somewhat famous and see me walking near you, treat the sound of those steps as your death rattle.

Last summer we were in Girwood at the Double Musky when Uncle Ted walked in. We chuckled and elbowed each other at our small brush with fame. Ted was dead within 2 weeks.

This past weekend we were in Homer for a relaxing weekend and as we cruised down the spit I craned my head in hopes of finding the Time Bandit in port. There it was. I'm not the huge Deadliest Catch fan that I was when the show was new (the plotline is pretty repetitive at this point), though I still enjoy it. We snapped some pictures. Even cooler was watching the boat randomly tool around outside of our room Sunday afternoon.

(more pictures here)

The weekend was terrific all around and we were sorry to leave on Monday. However, a Time Bandit deckhand passed away later that night. He had to have been on the boat while we observed its 10 minute cruise just off the Homer spit.

We did see Tom Skilling at the Double Musky a few years ago, but he seems to have escaped unscathed. Maybe only the Alaskans have the mark of doom?

2011-02-16T15:04:00.002-06:00

The more I live in a townhouse, the more it annoys me. I understood this potential decline when I bought it, but at the time it fit my budget and needs. I suspect this is true of many people. However, as the years pass the fees and rules get more frustrating. The only cure is single family home ownership, which should happen in 4 years or so.

Waking up on Monday morning to no hot water sent me downstairs to realize that the first floor was 53 degrees. The electronic thermometer also told me that it was -3 outside. I threw on some pants and shuffled onto the deck to check the boiler/water heater closet. It couldn't be more silent in there, meaning that nothing was operating. This boiler feeds 2 total units and is accessible from outside the 2 units. I called the emergency condo line, flipped the switch on the gas fireplace, and embraced an ice cold whore bath. Becky and I washed up and put on a few extra swipes of deodorant.

The outdoor closet was very much off limits in terms of tenant monkey wrenching. The heating and plumbing guy would be there within an hour and would not need access to our unit to fix the problem. And since he doesn't want to fix any burst pipes, he would be there in a hurry. Finally, since it was outside the unit we would not pay a penny. +1 for condo ownership today.

2011-02-13T23:58:00.002-06:00

I'm pleased with it and very happy that it is done. It was an excellent change of pace from painting little dwarfs, and also a sentimental journey (I hadn't built a model plane since middle school). The decals are a bit long in the tooth, but then again they are close to 20 years old. I have a few more kits from that era that have yet to be built. And they will be built.

It's hard to permanently escape the model cars and planes I built way back when that brought me to my current Warhammer hobby.

2011-02-11T14:51:00.002-06:00

So many things these days are dangling and crying out for completion. It's not as if the world will shudder to an end in mid July, but rather things will happily take a sharp 90 degree turn after which it will then be much harder to find the time to wile away at solitary tasks.

I can't say that I am being much more productive than usual. It is probably more accurate to say that my focus is on being less schizophrenic in my interests.

Rather than dabble across several stacks of comic books and collections, I now pick a single title and finish the sucker within a day or so.

That stack of complete Jonah Hex comics from the 70's that I had been reading in slow tastes as to enjoy them like fine wine or kobe beef? I'm now devouring about 5 comics each night and immersing myself in the themes and settings. I've chosen a sack of White Castles over a bi monthly Kobe slider. How could that be wrong?

I've been mentally annoyed with finishing a model airplane and have consequently not painted a Warhammer model since Christmas. I asserted that the plane must be finished before anything else hits my painting table and I have stuck to that, albeit with sluggishness. The plane goes down this weekend.

I have thrown my hat over the wall regarding a June triathlon. It's a sprint distance and one I have completed before. Now I just need to do it faster. Between swimming laps, hitting the treadmill, and nordic skiing, I'm training away 6-7 days a week, showering twice a day, and producing as much dirty clothing as cycling season. This may explain why the model plane idles away, but that is a weak excuse.

Miles to go before I sleep...

2011-02-02T11:14:00.002-06:00

It sounds like the snowbeast has put the hurt on the midwest quite forcefully. Judging by the facebook status updates and growing stack of posted pictures, Chicago and Madison have been slammed. We get plenty of snow and cold up here but without the population density and arterial road system of the midwest, it is much easier for us to muddle through. Also, it is expected and tolerated to a much greater degree. It's Alaska.

I do love the pictures of Lake Shore Drive and the orphaned cars. So cool.

As a child I remember the blizzard of 1979 vividly as a time when I was not allowed to build snow forts in the yard without direct adult supervision, which meant someone watching from my parents room. I guess a kid somewhere in Chicago found himself in some collapsed snow, and due to not being monitored closely enough ended up suffocating. So that's the doom of '79 in my mind.

Chicago always has a strange, distinct beauty when submerged in superfluous fresh snow.

...

I am a long time fan of The Office, though these days it is more mediocre than anything else. We're staying together for the kids, regardless of the random guffaws a given new episode will yield. Parks and Rec is complete genius in my mind though. Ron Swanson is the man.

The remainder of Thursday nights on NBC is a good impetus to head upstairs and iron or paint for an hour or so. The less said about Outsourced, the better. 30 Rock always feels very pretentious and cute about itself -- if you're not in on their little jokes, well then you are just not in. And Community is a bit too repetitive in theme.

However, this week's Community is all about Dungeons and Dragons so they've captured my time.

Point, NBC.

2011-01-24T22:27:00.002-06:00

The Bears did what the Bears often do. They break your heart. I did like that the third string quarterback had a mustache. That was something.

...

Mid July will undeniably be a truly happy moment. Just wonderful.

2011-01-10T16:19:00.002-06:00

I finally caught up with The Social Network this past weekend and enjoyed it a great deal. I don't have much to add about it that has not been stated better in many other places. It's not my favorite film of the year (I have not seen True Grit yet, so The King's Speech is currently my favorite), but I would not object to seeing it on anyone's list.

My mom saw it back in October when it was first released and aside from strongly recommending it to me, felt compelled to tell me just how much the main character reminded her of me. I asked why and she said it was due to the fact that I am a computer guy and that I (in her eyes) have a fast mind with creative ideas. I took it as a compliment.

After seeing the movie and knowing my mother is plenty sharp, I am starting to wonder how much of a compliment it was. Perhaps a backhanded one, kind of like telling a woman she dresses up pretty nice for a fat girl. It confuses me.

2011-01-04T14:28:00.001-06:00

Like most people, I gravitate strongly to books, movies, and shows that relate to places I enjoy or have some sort of connection to. The smaller or more unique the place, the better.

I get my Chicago fixes via podcasts from Nick, Milt, and Jake (I wish Roe Conn offered more podcasts). Madison comes from Ultimate Outdoors .

I still have not found the perfect North Woods piece of entertainment, but the Starvation Lake novels come pretty close. They may be set in northern Michigan rather than my preferred Wisconsin, but the mysteries and settings are excellent. I just cannot get enough of these books lately.

Now I need the perfect Chicago novel (Stuart Dybek has the short story front covered) and some Boundary Waters fiction. I've been told I could simply just satisfy this need by writing them myself. I'm trying.

2010-12-28T16:42:00.001-06:00

I love playing Rock Band with a group of people. It's just a blast.

I love it even more when an 11 year old is singing Slayer's Black Magic or Dio's Rainbow in the Dark.

Makeout point

2010-12-08T11:34:00.002-06:00

As I had planned last spring, I purchased cross country skis this fall. Our snowfall was a little late this year, but as of the past 3 weeks the trails in town have been groomed with plenty of hard packed snow. Game on.

I've been getting out quite a bit these past few weeks and I just love it. Russian Jack park is about a 5 minute drive from my place (with stoplights) and has a lit, groomed trail. I've skied at 10 pm and the lights were still on. I honestly don't know when they turn off. On a given weeknight it is the easiest thing in the world to throw on some quick gear and ski for an hour. I'm also amazed at how quickly you build up a sweat. Even when skiing at -4 temps I only needed a nylon shell over my sweatshirt. It's just an amazing workout, a beautiful way to enjoy winter and the scenery, and excellent cross training for cycling.

Russian Jack has a large parking lot on DeBarr Ave that I never park in. I prefer the smaller one on Boniface, but both lots connect to the park and the trail. The smaller lot is simply closer to home and often empty. The first time I skied there it was -4 and I found 2 idling vehicles in the lot with their lights off. A small hatchback purred away with no occupant while a panel van next to it sat with its exhaust steaming away. As I sat on the gate of my truck frigidly trying to get my boots on as quickly as possible a middle aged woman exited the van, jumped in the hatchback, clicked on the lights, and zoomed away. The van followed moments later. It must really be amazing forbidden fruit at -4 on a weeknight. On another night I found 2 different vehicles in a similar set up, the van now replaced by a steamed up Silverado. At this point I'm averaging a 30% chance at running into a hook up.

Hot times in Anchorage.

You're a big winner tonight.

2010-11-21T18:29:00.003-06:00

You're a big winner. I'm gonna ask you a simple question and I want you to listen to me: who's the big winner here tonight at the casino? Huh? Mikey, that's who. Mikey's the big winner. Mikey wins.

We had the only painted army, but I believe my models were painted such that they would have done just fine in any pool of painters. We played Warhammer all day, so everyone won.

Misunderstandings

2010-11-10T13:35:00.002-06:00

In 1995, soon after my birthday, my parents got on a big Edmund Fitzgerald kick because the newspapers were noting the 20th anniversary. They talked about how great the song was and how sad and big of a deal it was that the ship went down. I sat there with a blank face and knew not what they were discussing. For some reason, this sent them into extreme disbelief.

"C'mon! You remember it. It went down right after your birthday."

"The song was everywhere on the radio. Everywhere. Right near your birthday."

"How can you not remember? It was the only thing on the news or the tv."

I just knew nothing about it. I understand that kids in Michigan and Wisconsin learn about the ship in grade school, but the Chicago punks never did as far as I could tell. As much as it is a Great Lakes story and Chicago is a Great Lakes town, Chicago is big and broad shouldered enough to really not care too much about what happens up in that place where you go to drink Old Style and fish. Sure we care, but not enough to incorporate it into our schooling. I'd like to think we were studying some denser, more urban information, but that is probably not true. Suffice to say, St Nick's didn't preach the gospel of Big Fitz.

My parents frustration grew to such silly heights until I finally popped the balloon.

"What year did it go down?" I scanned the article. "Oh, I don't remember it because I was 6 days old."

"And the song was a big hit the next year, when I was 1."

So the tension lifted and we all ended up with a chuckle. I was alive and it was on the news, so why shouldn't I remember it?

"Well, you remember everything else that ever happened."

Over the years I have actually become quite fascinated by the story, even visiting the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum in the UP (a place I cannot more highly recommend visiting).

So as today's headlines tell of the (now 35th) anniversary of the sinking, I chuckle at the frustration of my parents at our kitchen table in 1995 and listen to this killer track many, many times.

2010-11-08T10:43:00.002-06:00

The Ray Bradbury stories I've been reading have been zipping by at the rate of 2-3 every lunch hour. Some are terror tales, others science fiction, and many simply fiction. All are charmingly written and very palatable. Halloween always draws me to such things, though I also like to indulge in some straight up splatter flicks.

AMC always incessantly runs the Halloween movies during October and I always get sucked in. Now, the original Halloween has been one of my favorite movies for as long as I can remember. We had it on VHS and I watched it as much as possible. Honestly, we may have had it on Beta as well. While I can certainly appreciate the weaknesses of each Halloween sequel, I'm a softy for them and find something to enjoy about each one.

It all got me thinking about other John Carpenter flicks that I hadn't seen in a while. I revisited The Thing earlier this year and it was excellent -- easily as good as I had remembered it. Prince of Darkness quickly rose to the top of my list of films to revisit. I don't believe I've sat through it since I saw the theatrical release at Ford City West in 1987. I remember enjoying it, but finding some of it confusing, ultimately having me conclude that the movie was a misfire. After watching Prince this weekend I found that I really enjoyed it and that what I disliked about it as a kid was that at times it was a bit chatty, though this time the verboseness worked very well. Most movies from my youth that I revisit are absolutely terrible (see Spaceballs, Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, Sleepwalkers, etc.), so it was great to find the reverse.

One of my favorite weekly rituals is to download the podcasts of Nick Digilio, place them on my jump drive, and then listen to them throughout the work week at my desk. Even when I lived in Chicago and had easy access to AM radio, it was difficult to make it through his shows as they were over night. Thankfully the podcasts have solved that problem. In particular, I loved his segment with finalgirl. It sent me happily to her site and fed even more fuel into my horror film appetite. Her site is well worth bookmarking.

Thanks to finalgirl and a few other recommendations I made an effort to catch up on The Descent. I was very underwhelmed. The spelunking was exciting and the jump scares were good, but it just never built to enough for me.

2010-11-01T12:38:00.003-05:00

No more skateboarding essays for a while. I'm all theorized out.

We had 4 total trick or treaters yesterday -- a single and a group of 3. Across both groups we had two butterfly/princess combinations (with snowpants incorporated). Did I miss an animated film here? Last year we had a single group of 3 so we are moving forward. For a townhouse complex in 30 degree temps those are decent numbers.

...

There will be more snow in town any day now which means we are a few weeks away from groomed ski trails in town. I'll be buying XC skis very soon as planned and hopefully cruising around Russian Jack most nights this winter. As excited as I am for a good snow base to arrive, I've now begun to excitedly plan for next summer. The small list at my desk turns into a dream set of goals for next summer. I may not accomplish half of them, but right now I honestly believe that backpacking to Symphony Lake, over Crow Pass, and then near Hope are all easy check marks for summer 2011. If I reach for a great deal and only achieve half, that will be pretty satisfying.

...

I've had really good luck with horror movies lately. Devil and The Last Exorcism were nice little flicks and well worth the budget theater price. I say this having spent plenty of time ranting about how my $3 was completely stolen from me after walking out of some terrible movies there.

Regular Foot

2010-10-20T12:13:00.003-05:00

Why are skateboarders today so much better at such a younger age with fewer years of practice than they were back in my skating youth (early 90's)?

It's not as if equipment quality has become so much better. Yes, shapes certainly changed, but the quality has always been excellent. I can rule out steroids as well. I don't think nutrition has ever been a factor and I don't believe any skaters engage in any gym work. Skaters still just skate and eat fast food while tearing around cities.

I believe that in that last 15 years skateboarding has lived within a series of defined walls. Tricks have not changed; they have only become smoother, faster, and bigger. Before 1995 you had to reevaluate your entire mindset every few years. Step hops and curb stalls gave way to ollies and rail slides. The emphasis changed. Those ollies expanded into nose slides and kickflips. Board shapes changed every few months without fail -- year old boards looked ancient and unrideable. Times changed again as people become obsessed with hyper technical flip tricks. Wheels become thinner and boards become exceedingly narrow as we fought for any advantage to get that board to flip a little easier. Around this same time everyone decided that every trick needed to be done with a switch stance. I am not complaining at all about this period. Skateboarding was amazingly creative, fresh, and in a seemingly endless sprint into the future. It was exciting.

However, it was schizophrenic for someone attempting to keep up with the latest tricks or trends. The walls and parameters kept moving. How much easier would switch tricks be if you started learning them within months of first getting on a board? What if you learned to switch ollie at the same time as learning to regular ollie? That seems to be the approach of people picking up the sport these days. They don't have to wipe clean a chalkboard of assumptions in their mind just to begin attempting the new stuff.

Decks are practically identical to the way they were shaped 10+ years ago. And most importantly, tricks in videos have not changed too much since then. Smoothness and style continually refines itself though, and that is the key. Watching Marc Johnson isn't about determining if he can pull the new switch trick du jour, it is about enjoying how he's taking the old bag of tricks and sliding them into his unique flow. It's about the rhythm, not checking boxes to make sure so and so can switch 360 flip. This is probably why I still prefer watching Kris Markovich over Mike Mo (yeah, I do love Mike Mo though).

I guess it is a natural progression. By 1995 the boundaries had been pushed and the lines had been painted. The future was in examining the fine grains inside that space. I don't believe this prohibits creativity or flies some flag asserting that the glory days will be forever gone. I liken it to a piano being designed and constructed. At some point we all agreed on the number of keys and then moved forward. The permutations and beauty that have come out of that are stunning and no one would doubt their creativity.

In 1989 I didn't know what a 360 flip was, but now everybody does and they can set in on the horizon and shoot for it. Maybe that is why kids get much better at a faster rate -- they know where to point there compass.

Regardless, session on in perpetuum.

2010-10-06T13:50:00.004-05:00

Everything is on the internet somwehere and it all lives forever. At least that is what I believe. Perhaps that is just a cautionary axiom. It makes it all the more strange that I cannot find the random picture and accompanying information nugget that I am seeking.

Being a Boy Scout on the south side of Chicago meant you went winter camping in the cabins at Camp Sullivan or Falcon in the south suburban forest preserves. Aside from playing football and capture the flag in the snowy fields surrounding the cabins, the centerpiece of the weekend was a 10 mile hike through the forest preserves. It was an epic hike for us and it skipped across streets, powerlines, and chilled creeks. Looking back at that from my perch surrounded by all of Alaska, it was a fairly urban trek, though coming from the postage stamped Chicago bungalow neighborhoods it was plenty of nature. I always dug it and I'm sure my enjoyment of it augmented my eventual need to drive all the way up here.

As an 11 year old the point of my fixation of the hike was always the name and the map sign. It was called the Bigfoot hike and the large wooden sign sketching out the map stood near the hike's start, which was right next to the winter cabins. The weathered white and red piece of plywood had a dense crosshatching of streets, creeks, and trail markings. I didn't understand it in too much detail, but at that age your faith in the older scouts and adults hiking along is pure. They'll remember where we need to turn. The map had a large, imposing red foot on it, further echoing the name of the hike. It was the Bigfoot hike and I could not have read enough about UFO's, ghosts, and Bigfoot as a kid. One adult told me it was named as such because back in the early 70's mutilated animals were found in the area without explanation, save the large footprints nearby. How great is that, veracity happily unconfirmed? You can't plant a better seed for a kid's imagination. And we got to hike it every year, some times in October if the winter weekends were already booked. I'll further raise the ante -- the famously haunted Bachelor's Grove Cemetery was a stopping point on the hike.

The hike was always fun, though long for a kid's patience. I loved the possibility that something unexplained lurked in the suburban woods or the old cemetery. I'm sure we chatted about Transformers or GI Joe in our trudges, but I always kept a hidden eye out for more.

A few times in my late 20's I stopped in the parking lot near the cabins in hopes of glancing at that wicked, fertile, wooden map, only to find it long gone. It was ratty in the mid 80's, so finding it guarding the trailhead in 2000 was a slim chance. It looks like the trail may still exist in some form, though it has been renamed. This is the only relic on the web I can find, and it sadly does not have a photo. I'm sure if I look hard enough over time I'll track down my picture somewhere on the web.

2010-10-05T13:01:00.002-05:00

This photography project in Chicago seems pretty interesting. I do hope that they fill in the glaring south and southwest side holes in the map. Try 63rd and Kedzie. It has always been a particularly strange and busy intersection, though not as loopy as Wilson and Broadway.

And get over to the long forgotten steel graveyards on the south east side. I hope they put a full photo set up when all is said and done. A virtual art gallery might work perfectly for such a project.

2010-10-04T13:20:00.007-05:00

October always becomes a scramble for me. I try to ride as much as possible and do anything else outside before the winter tumbles in. I wash the cars a few more times for good measure. I snag some anthologies from my bookshelf, dust them off, and then promise myself that I'll tackle some of those Poe and Bradbury tales in honor of Halloween. In between all of that is the goal of catching up on as many random horror flicks that cable can throw my way. Pepper in the Misfits and Samhain records and I end up with a busy month.

I just became aware of this documentary La Porte, Indiana, and I can't wait to see it. We had a cottage in Fish Lake, IN for many years and we always had to drive through La Porte on the way. Since Fish Lake was only 10 miles down the road, we often ran into La Porte for dinner or groceries or whatever. It remains a nice town in my memory and I'm sure I would find it a nice town if I walked through it today.

2010-09-27T09:53:00.001-05:00

It snowed yesterday. It did not accumulate and did melt once it hit the ground, but there were undeniable flakes in the air.

This is probably because I washed the cars on Saturday.

It's over, man. Here comes winter.

2010-09-18T01:21:00.003-05:00

The rides to Eagle River are getting chillier, the leaves are giving up the ghost, and in another 4 weeks or so there will be some snow. When things begin fading away I gravitate to appropriate music and llately I cannot get The Band's "The Night they Drove Old Dixie Down" out of my head. It's a great song, and perfectly sorrowful for the death of summer.

The moose has the right of way

2010-09-03T15:24:00.002-05:00

I still have thankfully not been charged by a moose, but this is a little too close to that distinction for my taste. Riding down the bike path pre-dusk last night (9:30 pm), I made a 90 degree turn to head back to Muldoon Road. This is a narrow stretch of the path, bounded by a ridge to the Glenn Highway and a long chain link fence. It's a corridor or a shoot of sorts.

I realized quickly that there was a large Moose 10 yards ahead in the middle of the path. It started to trot away from me once it heard my brakes chirp. However, the group of kids 20 yards ahead quickly let out a cackle and started to run away from the moose. The moose, now finding its avenue closed, promptly turned back towards me and started running again (though thankfully not with its ears pulled back). As fast as I could I picked up my bike and hiked up the highway embankment, careful to keep the bike on the moose side of my body. He passed at a distance of 6-7 feet away and kept trotting down towards the large park. All in about 2 seconds.

Man, how do you try and get your brand new bike warrantied because of a moose conflict?

Great Things

2010-08-29T22:01:00.002-05:00

Most of life is not lived on the extremes of emotion -- neither happiness nor sadness. Most of the time things cruise along and bob slightly into good or bad sides of an emotional bell curve. Occasionally they hover at the extremes, though usually for reasons relating to human relationships (ie. births, deaths, marriages). They key is that physical objects just don't have the strength to push us into the heights. At least they ought not.

Without violating that hypothesis, I came pretty close in the past few weeks to allowing objects to send me spinning to the far right of the bell curve.

Picturing Hemingway's Michigan just feels like a perfect book written just for me. It captures a plethora of photographs and anecdotes relating to Hemingway's time in the north woods. Having visited his Horton Bay stomping grounds last year, the images and smells of that place are fresh in my mind and also send me dove tailing into memories of the north woods I have known. It's a strong piece of Hemingway scholarship without a doubt, but more importantly it captures the mood of a very important time in a great writer's life.

I bought an aluminum and carbon Orbea in 2005 and due to bad luck on my part it had to have been warrantied on 2 occasions. Though I purchased an Orbea due to the brand's lifetime warranty, I did not relish the need to have it shipped and repaired at the US offices (Arkansas). After a creak developed this June I knew the doom that lay ahead -- weeks of no road bike while the Alaskan summer sprinted toward fall. I made a strong request to have a replacement frame sent as I no longer trusted the current one. As a side note, Orbea is a good brand and I seem to have simply drawn a lemon. They complied and some 2 weeks ago I became the owner of a brand new '09 full carbon Opal frame. This is a huge (FREE) upgrade and feels like I am now pedaling on a cloud. All hail Orbea!

I won this past 10 days without a doubt. Now to ride as much as possible past these changing leaves.

2010-08-16T10:55:00.002-05:00

I plead guilty to slacking off here, though I have been extremely busy. We went to Wyoming for a week in July, my folks came up a few days later for a week long visit, and now we have another set of visitors for a week. It's good to be busy. Add in some fishing trips here and there and July just rapidly fades away.

The weather has been less than stellar, though I've steamed ahead in defiance with whatever activity I had planned. If I want to go for a jog through the bog behind our house, I go even though I'll come back soaked. The pouring rain didn't keep us from fishing Bird Creek for 3 hours. You just have to ignore the elements and squeeze in all the summer activities you can.

I'm slowly uploading pictures to flickr from the last few months. I wish I could find a suitable tool to mass shrink the jpegs from 1.5 MB down to 500k. I tend to do it manually.

I created a list throughout the winter of summer activity goals and I have been able to cross off at least half of them, which is not too shabby. I always reach for the moon when it comes to summer plans. Considering vacations, obligations, and visitors this summer, I have found a way to get out and fish, camp, and canoe fairly often. Of course the ubiquitous cycling is in play as well. Summer is not over yet, but it appears I've used my time wisely.

I'm getting to be such a grown up and am getting excited about the silliest things. Case in point: we're refinancing the house thanks to the rock bottom rates. It's a wise decision but not one that should be too exciting. But it is, because I that is how my brain works.

Salmon Ass

2010-07-06T01:03:00.005-05:00

It was a marathon weekend and that was the way I approached it. I broke down each set of hours in front of me and decided on enjoying and completing those hours. Take bites not gulps and it will all get done with a smile, yet also maintain the tenacity of a cockroach.

We were up at 5 am on Saturday in Seward and found ourselves waiting for the Halibut charter at 6 am. The shuttle wasn't on time so we found ourselves waiting around and expecting the shuttle to arrive any minute, only to watch it finally pull up at 7 am. Standing next to the building where the breakfast buffet wafted outside made this really tough. If you know you have that time buffer, you'd jump on the buffet. Eh. We were on the boat around 7:15 and the diesel engine was roaring away by 7:20 -- 3 hours out to Montague Island.

After the first hour we poked out beyond Resurrection Bay and hit some nasty seas. The boat bounced up and down and waves crashed over the rear deck. It was nasty and I was glad I had taken Dramamine. The cabin had heat and was soon cooking at 70+ degrees, which really will start your stomach in the wrong direction. I walked out onto the deck and sat down, soon finding myself wet, yet cool and calm. Being wet is better than being sick. I understand that the other boat that left before us had almost all of their passengers puking inside the cabin, so since our boat only ended up with a few wet and tired people, we won that one. Also, our boat limited out on Halibut much quicker. Becky caught the bigger fish and I snagged a small rockfish.

Our fish was filleted and packaged by 6 pm and we were off for Anchorage. By 9pm we were scrubbed down and relaxing. However, I was preparing for round 2, which began at 3 am on Sunday. Becky wisely slept in, but I was up and waiting for my 3:30 am pickup.

Off we were for the Kasilof River, where we ended up in the water at 7:15. Our boat had a goal of 145 red salmon on Sunday and come 4 pm we hit it. It's a slog of blood, slime, and brutality. And so worth it. I occupied the rear of the boat and used a flat surface near the motor to cut the gills on each sockeye before dumping them in the coolers (can't have the blood spoiling the meat). Within a few hours there was a growing pile of coagulating, darkening, and slippery blood. It's the price of filling the freezer. Around 2 pm I slipped on the floor and sat perfectly in the blood with some authority, giving me a wet salmon blood ass. There is no way to describe it another way. So I sat on a tarp for the 3 hour ride home and dumped a stain stick all over those beasts when I got home.

After about 7 hours of filleting, sealing, and cleaning 105 salmon on Monday my freezer is full, the pants are clean, and there is no shortage of fish awaiting our next visitor from the lower 48.

Black Coach

2010-06-30T20:45:00.003-05:00

I've been noodling with this model and base for a long while, perhaps a bit too long. I'd pick at it a bit, adjust a few highlights, and then scratch my head with more basing ideas. It was time to call it done and move on.

I am very pleased with a great deal of it, and satisfied with the rest. I had ideas for a more elaborate base, but decided to stay within the dimensions that would be legal on the playing table. If I had to do it all again, I'm sure I'd do a much better job, which is fine. I'll take that knowledge and confidence into my next model.

Alaskan Commuting

2010-06-23T12:40:00.003-05:00

Once the snow melts, I am quickly back on commuting by bike here in Anchorage (winter commuting is a little tough as the trails are constantly groomed for Nordic skiing). It takes me about 25-30 minutes to cover the 6 miles, though I like to leave a fair amount of buffer time these days. I have a daily meeting with my east coast team scheduled for 7 am, so being late is really not an option. I leave at 6 am, arrive at 6:30, and find myself dressed and ready by 6:45. Easy. I allot buffer time in there for fixing flats, and also keep the phone numbers for my meeting on hand so if need be I can have my conference call on the bike trail. Adapt and overcome they say.

I have a healthy fear of the untimely, commuting flat. When I picture Archer Ave. in Chicago, aside from the wondrous litany of late night burrito joints, I see the littered line of locations where I sat in the early morning or late night fixing flats on a curb as people speaking English, Polish or Spanish drifted by me.

... 35th Street, California, Damen, Austin, Narraganset, Ashland, Throop, Lock ...

But those were my UIC days when there existed flexibility in being 10 minutes late for work. I'm in the real world now, and showing up on time for work and meetings is a given. So I have 20 minutes of fixing a flat time budgeted in to the ride.

But this is Alaska, and glass and other road debris is not as common as it is in Chicago. However, the large moose in the middle of the trail this morning is common. It wouldn't move even though several people less than 10 yards away were heckling it. It just stood there and chewed leaves as moose only have 2 gears: park and full speed ahead. This cow was in park, probably for 30 minutes at least. So I doubled backed, jumped onto a busy street, and hustled down a more congested alternate route. I made it here at 6:45 am, taking advantage of the moose detour time budgeted in.

2010-06-15T15:59:00.002-05:00

There was a recent bear attack at the park closest to my place. I usually commute to work by bike at 6 am, though not through that specific park. I do travel along a stream that will have salmon in it fairly soon. Carpe Diem.

***

I really still cannot believe the Blackhawks have won the cup. Perhaps if I still lived in Chicago I could be more thoroughly convinced. I just never thought this day would come. I attended so many games over the last 10 years and watched a weak team plod around against much better teams (often the Pronger captained Blues) and always thought that after Bill Wirtz eventually passed on we would still have a generation of slog until a winner could emerge. I never expected it to happen so soon, in a such a dominating fashion, and with such an inspiring sense of team unity. The whole team is just a joy to observe.

I don't put too much stock in mystical sports rituals like wearing a certain type of sock on game day or putting a specific leg in your baseball pants first, though I know many pros do care about such things. I believe Michael Jordan always had to have North Carolina shorts under his Bulls uniform. But I'm watching at home, so who cares if I have that extra ounce of confidence when the game starts. However, once your team is in the finals, out comes the chanting and shaking of chicken bones.

While the White Sox were getting torn up by the Orioles in 1983 , I sat nervously in our bungalow's front room and rooted along. My father told me I should wear my White Sox cap since we were watching the game. The whole family and city were nuts for the Winning Ugly Sox. For whatever reason, I couldn't stand having that cap tight on my head for the duration of the game so I fidgeted with it and removed it. I remember distinctly watching Julio Cruz get moved over to third base with no outs, only to be stranded. I swear this happened twice. Each time my father told me to keep my cap on, only to have to keep reminding me to put it back on as I fidgeted it off as the inning dragged on. They never were able to just get Julio home. Frustrating. Each time the inning ended my father burned another brand upon my brain, "You should have kept your cap on. Julio would have scored." We joked about it, but here I am blogging about it 27 years later.

I have a Blackhawks sweater with Probert on the back above the towering "24". I wear it when skating around in the winter, largely because it's incredibly comfortable and fits perfectly with hockey gloves. I also dug him as a player, so I skate around like a nerd with his jersey. You would think I would have been wearing that sucker all over Anchorage for the last 2 months. Incorrect. I wore it the day of the first game against Vancouver, only to watch the Hawks get torn up like a minor league team. Was this the end of the cup run? Is it my fault? I'm not taking any chances. In Chicago most potential sporting victories are snatched away cruelly and forever -- Cubs 1984, Sox 1983, Bears 1984, Bears post 1985, etc. (I'm sure Cub fans could sing a dirge about all the pain they've dealt with, and to that I say good for them. ) So I sat and watched nervously as the Hawks slowly thundered to the finals, yet I still only murmured that they might win the cup while keenly hiding away my jersey. They won on Wednesday, and out came the jersey on Thursday night. I can exhale now and plan on wearing it often.

It is just so wonderful to watch Pronger lose and get rocked into the boards after witnessing his Blues teams tear up the Hawks all those years.

Sorry, Julio. At least I learned from my 27 year old mistake.

I never thought this day would come

2010-06-10T11:29:00.002-05:00

Thank you, Captain Serious!

2010-05-16T21:56:00.001-05:00

What a difference 30 days makes!

2010-05-14T11:26:00.005-05:00

One thing I often wrestle with is how much the biography of an artist matters when it comes to appreciating their work. In most cases it doesn't matter at all. The words on the page are what they are and nothing more. In many cases, the story behind the creation of those words is fascinating (Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and very much Kerouac).

I saw a very good movie about Joe Strummer a few years ago and one of the new facts I absorbed is that Joe was a bit of a hippy/bohemian before he ended up in the Clash. He had a tight group of friends and everyone was pretty mellow and communal. He ended up taking a very aggressive turn in personality when he got involved in punk , even somewhat shunning former close friends that were still flying that bohemian flag. It's screams scene jumper, though I'm sure a more passionate Strummer fan could explain it away as an personal evolution, a need to finally express what he always felt, or the fire of his politics burning brighter. There may be truth in those arguments, but in the end he seems clearly a scene jumper, and one that made an effort to turn his back on old friends, which is the real rub for me. I have a real hard time with people that refuse to at least acknowledge that all the things they chose and did not choose in life have aggregated to the person they are today. Everyone wants to remember the cool stuff they got into before everyone else knew it was cool, yet they are reluctant to admit that they took some boring turns into mediocrity or pop culture. It's a pet peeve for me.

I still love the Clash and Joe Strummer will always be the man. Some of the optimistic leftist politics on their records are woefully dated, but I still love those records. Adding in the Strummer biography blemishes won't change that conclusion either.

But perhaps this largely rests on how well you know the artist. Maybe if I was a long lost bohemian buddy of Joe's I'd never be able to stomach a Clash record.

I went to Brother Rice High School, a very good school without a doubt, though people beyond the south side of Chicago probably have never heard of it (unless you count John C. Reilly). It and the surrounding neighborhood are not looked at as artistic incubators, which is perfectly fine. Few places are. I honestly don't think any place in Chicago really fits the bill either. Maybe time is too much of a component (ie. Paris in the 1920's, Harlem in the 20's and 30's, New York hardcore in '88, etc.). I do know a bit about the Rice neck of the woods though, so I take any art that emerges from it seriously.

There is a bit of a hot potato writer out there these days that is a year older than me that went to Rice that is weaving a biographical tale of high school punk rock identity and all the exclusion, frustration, and angst that goes along with it. I knew who he was back then and had a class with him, though that is as deep as it went. I was into sxe hardcore, metal, and skateboarded as much as possible (swap out biking for skating and you're pretty close to where I'm at today). This is a precise cross pollination of subcultures. At that time, even one of these subcultures would place you in a minority, so much so that you always had a sense of the other dozen guys in the entire school that shared that interest. There weren't that many of us so you could always smell your own. There is nothing morally superior about these subculture cocktails, but suffice to say he was not in any of these little buckets. I'm assuming he got into punk after high school, which is great. It just drives me up a wall when he spins these stories of outlaw days in Mt Greenwood. Maybe he was a punk rocker in his walkman, but he kept it well hidden in his IOU sweaters and preppy friends. Eh, I digress. Many people find him a very good writer, so perhaps he is. I'm too close to the whole deal, so I will endlessly cry bullshit. I am well aware that the finger here really just needs to turn around to me and I need to write some good books. Fair enough.

So who is the bard of Mt. Greenwood and Brother Rice? I'd vote for John Powers. I had never read any of his books, but I recently barreled through The Last Catholic in America, Do Black Patent Leather Shoes Really Reflect Up?, and The Unoriginal Sinner and the Ice Cream God. They are amazing and charming snapshots of Catholicism and Chicago in the 60's. It's not Hemingway, but it is not trying to be. They were very satisfying and poignant. The Unoriginal Sinner is the gem by far, capturing perfectly the confusion and desire of college life in a blue collar world. Powers was always referenced here and there at Rice as a local boy done good, but I never made the effort to track down the actual texts. Silly of me. I have now and am all the better for it.

Here's to artists proudly standing for their backgrounds, however boring or bland they may seem through lens of our current mind's eye.

2010-05-12T13:53:00.003-05:00

I'm always fascinated by all of the little things that make cities and regions the specific and interesting places they are.

Bubblers, Culver's, fried Cheese Curds, shooting prairie dogs, what a hoosier is, a gaper's block, beef sandwiches, publics, etc. It all makes life unique and helps hang some decoration on memories of times and places.

...

I was at the bank the other day opening a new account which had a $50 minimum deposit.

"Are you going to just deposit the minimum, sir?"

"Yeah, that's fine. I didn't get to the cash station so take it out of my checking account."

She glazed over at 'cash station.' Ah, I forgot that is a Chicago thing.

"Just take the $50 out of my checking."

...

Lost was starting soon and dinner remained a question mark, so we opted for the quick escape hatch of grilled cheese and soup. I remarked that as a kid we always had Mrs. Grass' chicken soup with our grilled cheese meals. I can't think of another soup we ever paired with it, which might explain why I have no affection for tomato soup and sandwich combos. Becky had never heard of the soup, the company that made it, or anything. I was a bit incredulous and remarked further that my parents still eat it like clockwork today. Is this a Chicago thing? I believe so, though it is available everywhere. I'll be buying some soon.

...

In some ways, I was spoiled in West Lawn and never knew it. I mentioned to Becky that Dove's was right down the street and she asked if it was the same Dove's name that is plastered across all those lovely chocolates and ice cream bars in the stores across America? Yep, that one. And the original was 3 blocks from our house.

And we went to it about once a year. I'm guessing it was because it would always be there and so would we so we'll go again next week/month. It's the same logic that kept me from ducking my head into the Field Museum or Art Institute more often. Dove's on Pulaski is long gone and we don't live next to Springfield Ave. anymore. But the Dover bars live on.

2010-05-04T00:58:00.001-05:00

It's kind of a bi-weekly present, but with an ebay flavor. You know what is technically coming and you know the quantities, but you don't really know what it will all look like. It's exciting.

Last week was our first delivery from Full Circle Farms in Carnation, WA. We signed up for a small box of fruits and vegetables to be delivered bi-weekly and specified the certain types of produce we wanted to permanently exclude (mushrooms of course!, beets, etc.). You get an email midweek with your list of produce and you then have 4 days to make substitutions before it gets thrown on the plane the following week where it will be stacked in the lobby of the local Powerhouse Gym.

We usually eat fairly well, but this past week we have eaten better than ever -- delicious and extremely healthy. I also like that way it is already stretching our palates. For example, it looks like next week we will be receiving purple potatoes. They will certainly be new to me.

It does reify our living in Alaska, albeit in a small, charming way. We need to arrange to have our produce flown in.

...

It may be in the 50's during the day, but at 6am on my bike commute it's usually 32-34 degrees. It's bright and clear and I'm pedaling trough the quiet trails snatching a glance at a moose most mornings, so you'll hear no complaints from me.

2010-04-26T00:14:00.002-05:00

I've been rereading portions of the 1st edition AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide and it is more of a remarkable text than I had remembered. It's fascinating, rich, and well worth revisiting. This was always one of my favorite little images from it.

2010-04-22T17:30:00.002-05:00

And, here comes some slushy snow again.

The plan is to take more pictures of Eagle River on my bike rides as it melts and document the emerging happiness. The plan is on hold.

2010-04-18T13:20:00.003-05:00

44 degrees is plenty comfortable for a bike ride. The roads and bike paths are full of melting snow and sloppy gravel from the road, but I'm out there riding again. No complaints. I went on my standard 30 mile round trip to Eagle River, a place that needs a little more melt. We'll get there.

2010-04-13T11:56:00.003-05:00

I should have photographed it, though I know there will be other opportunities. It was just so beautiful. The Kalua pork was shredded into a pile of tender meat and juices that looked identical to what we had seen and copiously consumed in Kauai. It looked right. And after smelling it in the crock pot for 18 hours, it smelled right. In the end, it tasted completely right. It's a cheap and delicious way to grasp the islands. We'll be making this often, very often.

...

Spring is coming.

I dreamt of fishing along a beautiful river here in Alaska with some old Chicago friends. They were catching King Salmon and I remained casting away. I then hooked into a huge Musky and successfully landed him after a long fight. I held him up for a picture before releasing him. He was completely tattered and torn up from being in the river with the aggressive, spawning salmon. There are no Musky here in Alaska, but when thoughts of summer fishing populate the near future of my life it's hard to keep the Midwestern good times from shoehorning back in.

There is still plenty of snow on the ground. I rode my bike to Stuckagain heights yesterday, which is a neighborhood up the hillside in East Anchorage. It was drizzling at our place when I left, but snowing at the top of the climb.

Spring is coming slowly.

2010-04-06T12:05:00.002-05:00

The roads have been dry and dusty and it appeared that we were in a full scale melt of the remaining snow. This is probably still true, but not for the first half of today. I woke up to 33 degree temps and about 2 inches of wet snow everywhere. That snow will probably be gone by the end of the day, but it stands as an extended palm to Anchorage's burgeoning spring excitement. There is still 4-5 weeks left of high snow probability.

...

Driving down the Seward highway toward the bike shop on Saturday, I felt a piece of gravel ping off my shield. That is an Alaskan winter tradition to be sure. I had a few small chips in my windshield already, but no cracks. I chalked this up largely to avoiding the Glenn Highway on my daily commutes. Well, on my drive to work Monday morning my defroster found the little Saturday gravel ping and spawned a 10 inch crack across the bottom of my windshield.

I'm getting more Alaskan by the minute.

2010-04-02T14:48:00.005-05:00

I really want to see this, though I have a feeling even the Bear Tooth theater may not get it. That's what dvd is for.

2010-04-01T13:04:00.002-05:00

Alaska is a pretty clean place. The air is almost always excellent here in south central Alaska(though Fairbanks has large amounts of particulates in winter -- though not for the reasons most people would guess) and when you head off to fish, ride, hike, or camp you will mostly likely find beautiful, clean wilderness. Sadly, there is sometimes a random piece of litter to let you know that humanity made it to this little piece of heaven before you did. It stinks, but that's life. In general, Alaska is very clean. A great deal cleaner than Chicago, and a fair amount cleaner than Wisconsin (and Wisconsin is a pretty clean place). I'm beginning to split hairs here, but suffice to say -- Alaska is just about as clean and beautiful as you would expect.

However, as the snow melts each April we are confronted with our annual, dirty task -- cleaning up the trash. All along the roads a brutal amount of trash collects, waiting for volunteers to attack it within a few weeks in preparation for summer and the visitors it brings. It's kind of nasty to glance at, but it does make a cruel bit of sense. Think about it. All winter long random pieces of little trash find their way onto the roads, only to be plowed into the snow back . Our winter has no freeze/thaw cycles -- it only all melts once, and that is after about 5-6 months of snow. So you find a plethora of junk neatly assembled on the sides of the road, all ready for picking. It's kind of like getting the majority of the city's annual litter in a 2 week window.

Everyone is now starting to get in good mood as the snow melts a little more each day. The parking lots everywhere are turning into gravel and the trash is preening itself for the light of day. Soon trucks will come around and pick up all of the gravel and we'll get that litter taken care of. It's the annual eyesore before life explodes into green and seemingly endless daylight and we are all reminded yet again of why we all live here. Just a few more weeks...

2010-03-27T18:21:00.001-05:00

This is the kind of thing that made the girls fawn in high school.

Great game.

2010-03-24T14:23:00.002-05:00

The Warhammer Fantasy Battle tournament on Sunday was a blast. Honestly, as long as the sportsmanship is good, any game is fun. I missed the first game but played the last two, which is plenty. 2250 point WHFB games take a few hours just to get going.

I played the empire first and our artillery just pounded each other as we ever so slowly inched towards close combat. I got lucky as his cannon misfired and the crew was killed in the first round. In the end I won by a few hundred points and ended up with a draw. If we had another hour to play I suspect the game would have broke much stronger in a given direction -- a direction I am unsure of.

The second game was my umpteenth match against Andrew. Always fun and always good gameplay. His wood elves zipped left and right across the board and were always out of line of sight of my dwarfs and out of a flank shot from my bolt thrower. I made a few tactical mistakes early, but my Hammerers caused some Glade Guard to panic and I found some breathing room. After 2.5 hours he had taken 1800 points off my side of the table, but our differential was only 500 points, giving him a Marginal Victory. That's a lot of spilled blood just to get a MV.

So much fun.

...

After visiting Pearl Harbor I really want to build a USS Arizona plastic model kit. Revell makes one for around 20 bucks. I've built plenty of model cars and planes (and am building a Revell Fighting Falcon right now), but never a ship. Sign me up.

...

Though I play mostly table top wargames, I have a soft spot for old Dungeons and Dragons. I've played plenty of it throughout my life and have a pretty sizeable collection of the stuff. Lately I've had the bug to reread some of the older modules and rulebooks and have been having a lot of fun with Hackmaster stuff. I've been noodling through the Ghost of Lion Castle lately and then found myself standing in a games store in Honolulu, looking down on pile of Hackmaster stuff at 40% off. Done deal. I just get so much enjoyment out of reading older styled modules. It's such a cultural touchstone for me.

...

Facebook is nothing if not a grade school reunion generator, and good for that. While I have connected with a fair amount of St Nick's '89 Tigers over the last year or so, the reunion has only been mentioned as a good idea someday. It looks like an '88 reunion happened in Mt. Greenwood the other day. I recognized a lot of the people in those pictures. An '89 reunion would be a blast, and I mean that beyond the initial bald/fat checklist it would secretly be. I'd win the travel distance award for sure.

...

I took my cross bike into the shop for a new handbuilt rear wheel and a tune up. It needs some love after being shoved into a dirty corner soon after Cyclocross racing season ended. Spring is just around the corner!

Random Kauai

2010-03-19T16:42:00.002-05:00

We had a condo, so our first day was a trip to Costco to load up for a handful of breakfasts and lunches cooked in our condo. It's a good approach to save money and time. We stocked up on snacks as well -- plenty of macadamian nuts, a locally grown pineapple, and oranges. I like oranges a lot and the warm, tropical atmosphere had me in the mood to eat a pile of them. So I quickly grabbed the 10 lb box, slid it in the cart, and watched Becky blink and smile, "That's all you. I don't really like them."

"No problem. I love them."

Well, it turns out 10lbs is a lot of oranges. We lost one to mold, and Becky ate a few. Otherwise, I at many oranges each day. Many.

At the airport we were told that any produce whatsoever cannot head back to lower 48, so there I sat slamming down 3 oranges before heading to our gate. There was nothing else was in my stomach.

Do the math. Even in the 30 minutes before boarding you can't go to the bathroom enough to diffuse those oranges. I inconvenienced the guy seated next to me more than a few times during the first half of that flight.

I will be hard pressed to not think of oranges when I think of Kauai. I still love oranges and need to buy some soon.

...

There are chickens everywhere on Kauai. I cannot overstate this. They have no predators and along with the wild pigs number around 300,000. There are 60,000 people on the island and as you can imagine these chickens start screaming every morning around 5 am. After a few days it became kind of charming in the way a unique quirk about a foreign place is to the visitor. I suspect the moose have this effect on Alaskan visitors.

...

Kalua Pork is ridiculously delicious. I think I ate it at least 4 times. We purchased some of the red Hawaiin sea salt and will be trying to make it at home very soon. It seems easy enough.

...

I don't remember exactly what my expectations were regarding the perceived high points of the trip, but after leaving I cannot forget the Na Pali coast. It was beautiful and unique almost beyond words. Our dinner cruise brought us close to the shoreline and it was magnificent. I still think cruising down Turnagain arm is prettier, but this was stellar.

...

Hawaiian prices are pretty close to Alaskan prices, so we missed out on the sticker shock most people feel when they visit the islands. You do get hit with sales tax though, which is always an annoyance to us tax free Alaskans.

...

The USS Arizona memorial is extremely impressive. While waiting for our time to shuttle over to the memorial itself we watched the 15 minute film setting the stage for December 7th. Halfway through that flick I was ready to bomb Japan again, today. Within a few minutes the context and history of things crept back in and I was fine, but for a 20 second window I was ready to go.

...

It is now light to almost 9 pm here! It's time to get my bike to the shop for a tune up and get ready for the snow to melt next month. With any luck we won't get an early May snow dump.

2010-03-16T22:38:00.002-05:00

And the trip to Kauai ends in the Anchorage parking lot on Monday night. I'll have more to chat about later, but for now I am left to readjust to snow and mountains. It is nice to be home, but maybe a little nicer to still be in Hawaii.

Loads of pictures here.

2010-03-04T15:12:00.004-06:00

The Iditarod starts on Sunday and we'll be in Willow tailgating on a frozen lake at the official start. It's a beautiful event. You stand around a fire, whistle down a few reindeer dogs, glance at Denali (it was out last year), and listen to the state song of Alaska as mushers zip by every 5 - 10 minutes. Aside from hoping Lance Mackey pulls it off again (even though he won't smoking weed this time), I've tried to pick out a few underdogs to cheer for. They won't be winning the race, but they certainly can make a good run. I'm a fan of Zoya thanks to her interesting journey from Madison, WI to Alaska. Also, how can I not be a fan of the first Jamaican musher? Awesome. This has Cool Runnings 2 written all over it.

...

It's really hard to think of anything but Kauai. We leave on Monday.

...

As I get older I have to embrace being an adult more and more, which means getting excited about purchases that are not exciting. A Colnago road bike is exciting. So is a new Warhammer army. A new front loading washer and dryer should not be, though it is. Our dryer went the way of the dodo a few weeks ago and since it was part of a stacked washer and dryer combo, it was time to shop for both. We settled on independent units that stack quite nicely, sing songs when they are finished, and have controls more akin to a cd player than a churning old machine. It's all very exciting and we still get a big kick out of using it. We're silly about it.

2010-02-16T12:01:00.002-06:00

What to give up for Lent? Religious implications aside, it's a good exercise to put yourself through. I'm not sure. It really crept up on me this year.

...

There is a Mordheim tournament in a few weeks. Man, I love that game, though I have historically been pretty bad/unlucky at it. From the beginning I played the Sisters of Sigmar largely because I liked the models a great deal and really enjoyed their back story. But man, I could never paint them to any degree of personal satisfaction. I just hated any paint job I gave them. At the time I was painting a lot of Vampire Counts, skeletons, Eldar ships for Battlefleet Gothic, and maybe a few Warhammer Quest models. Looking back I am moderately pleased with much of that painting, and some of it still garners compliments when they hit the table today. But in that time period those Sisters models were puzzles I just could not solve. Just a conundrum. I must have sprayed them primer white 3 times just to cover up my painting attempts and start anew. So here I stand today -- a much better painter staring down a Mordheim tournament in a few weeks. It's reasonable to paint the Sisters in a few weeks given that the color scheme will be very similar on each model. It's like a showdown with a high school bully from 1o years ago. I'm halfway through the bulk of the models and they are looking great. I feel like my time away from them was well spent, and my skills have much increased. 10 years ago I painted in a typical high light driven approach, whereas now I push towards blending with solid layering as my back stop.

I'm getting to the point where I am not pleased with sloppily painted models, so I just can't rush things. I'm not an amazing painter, but I know when I am painting at my best and when I am cutting corners. My dwarf army will not be painted within the next month to any degree of quality, but the Mordheim models could be. I'll target the achievable goal.

Now if I can just get better at the game itself!

...

I usually attend spin class at least twice a week on Elmendorf AFB. The class is usually taught by active or retired military. It's a good class and the music is always whatever the teacher wants it to be. One guy is techno, the other 80's cock rock, and another loves 70's soul and early Michael Jackson. That class always ends with Thriller. Cool. However, this past Saturday we found ourselves sprinting to The Village People's "In the Navy." And I thought it was odd pedaling last month to Def Leppard. Maybe it's a snide jab to a different branch of the armed forces? I know good natured sniping is common.

2010-02-09T14:39:00.002-06:00

So that's it. I finally finished all of the Homicide:Life on the Street dvds. I don't even want to count the number of discs/episodes/hours, but there were 7 seasons (5 of which were full seasons) and a tv movie. I had spread this task over several years, but it still feels exhausting to be done. And extremely satisfying. What an amazing show, and what a moving coda. The movie finale was just perfection. I'm not physically ready to start watching the Wire yet, but mentally I am prepared. I'm ready for more Baltimore. It looks like a strange permutation of Chicago's Canaryville smashed into old Bronzeville, with an occasional trip to Hyde Park.

...

In all my years of fishing I have never run into a game warden. Before moving up here I assumed that Alaskan game enforcement was certainly less than in Wisconsin. It's a bigger country, game is more plentiful, etc. Wrong, very wrong. Upon settling in here I immediately heard many tales of strict enforcement and commando tactics.

Case in point, a friend was fishing with people for King Salmon on a river after having been flown in. There was no one around for miles.

As a side note, once you catch a King Salmon in Alaska you cannot fish for King Salmon again that day. You cannot fish for fun in the same water. Your line is now dry so just drink your beer and watch your friends fish. Those are the rules.

One of the friends caught his King and was bored watching his friends fish. He figured that being in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness after being flown in made it reasonable to keep fishing. Maybe he has the hot pole and he can help his friends limit out? Makes sense. Out of the trees comes 2 wardens, "Why are you still fishing when you caught your King 10 minutes ago?" Bang. $250.

I obey the rules anyway, but still don't expect to get checked. Saturday we were ice fishing in Wasilla and out of the snow storm drifted a solo figure in all black with a definable gun belt bobbing along. We ended up chatting with the State Trooper for about 20 minutes, received some tips as to hot fishing on other lakes, and produced our licenses. The natural resources up here are a big deal, and their strict enforcement is fine with me.

2010-02-01T00:48:00.002-06:00

This demonic moose was in our condo parking lot on and off last weekend. There are plenty of tracks near the trees just outside of our door so it seems that we're just missing this moose on our walks to the car or trash. I'll have another moose on my doorstep sooner or later.

I took a handful of pictures in Juneau as well last week. Our new camera is getting a workout.

2010-01-28T12:27:00.002-06:00

All condolences to the family at the news of J.D. Salinger's passing.

Is it wrong that an almost immediate impulse in my mind was to wonder how soon we would finally see a handful of finished, yet unreleased works?

2010-01-25T01:38:00.002-06:00

It's 36 in Juneau at 10:30 pm, which is a lot warmer than Anchorage was at noon earlier today (It was about 10 degrees in the blaring sun). Everything is dark here, but I'm told it will be very picturesque when the sun comes out tomorrow.

...

I never could stand Leno. I believe I tuned in once or twice a year if the guest was somebody I couldn't say no to, though all it did in the end was remind me how vanilla and unfunny he is. I can't stand him even more now and hope nobody tunes into the Tonight Show in March, though I'm sure enough people will.

I've always been much more fond of Letterman, even though in the last few years he's gotten a little too cranky. Still, he makes me laugh and he is the king of late night tv. So what of Conan? I figure the best plan is to find a place for him to do his show for 3-5 years before taking Letterman's spot. He deserves it and they certainly have a similar style of humor. That's how I'll lay it out when I'm king.

2010-01-21T16:54:00.002-06:00

Looks like I'll be heading to Juneau for work the first part of next week. I've never been there so I'm very interested to check it out, although most of my time will be taken up chatting about J2EE, Flex, and LiveCycle.

Attack From a Forgotten World

2010-01-12T18:09:00.002-06:00

I didn't see any of this, but we do live in the Muldoon area, which means we are the front lines of the Chugach alien assault.

2010-01-08T10:30:00.002-06:00

Having grown up in Chicago, it seems I can always realize anew that I was plugged into yet another shared cultural experience. I love rambling on about the minutiae that fueled growing up in the midwest, Chicago, the south side, west lawn, marquette park, Brother Rice, etc. It's the charming cultural glue that transcends politics and jobs and responsibilities and all the other things that distract us endlessly into our own homes and lives. We need stories of the 63rd street Indian to crack a smile and forget the looming question marks of our future. Let's drift into the past.

When I think back to birthdays, I always hear either my grandmother or mother teasing that "Pretty soon you'll get to have Dressel's cake!" I had a whipped chocolate one every year, as did my mother, father, and grandmother for that matter. I just thought they were good cakes and hey, we like tasty chocolate cakes in my house. They were not terribly expensive or hard to find, so why didn't we just buy one every month or so for a treat? I wasn't smart enough to ask that question back then. They were Dressel's cakes and there would always be Dressel's cakes -- available and tasty. Well, sadly that is not true. I don't remember when they stopped appearing in our home, but I know they did stop. Here is the story.

The more I dwell on these Chicago experiences and institutions, the more I wonder if all of us little Chicago southsiders were just wooden soldiers marching along to beef sandwiches and vienna red hots.

...

Cross off another step on my path to true Alaskan status. No cabin or food cache yet, but I did sign up to receive my first (2009) PFD. Gimme, gimme, gimme!

Goals

2010-01-05T10:56:00.001-06:00

We booked our 7 day trip for Kauai last week and we will on the plane the Monday after the Iditarod (March 8th) and home the following Monday.

The Warhammer Tournament at Brimfrost will be the weekend after we return and there will actually be some degree of points for a painted army. My strength is in painting rather than being a good general, so I now have my goal. 2 months, 2K worth of dwarfs. It's doable. Sprint through painting an army in the next 8 weeks and then run off to a tropical honeymoon. Go!

2010-01-03T23:32:00.001-06:00

I'm getting a little more local everyday, thanks to buying some Bunny Boots on Saturday. They had my feet sweating at -16 while ice fishing.

2009-12-31T10:48:00.002-06:00

As every winter really sets in, my movie watching spikes. I'm catching up on all the good stuff I missed while I was riding my bike, fishing, and getting married.

Everyone that saw (500) Days of Summer told me is was a warm, sweet, charming , and surprisingly deep and insightful story of love and relationships. I genuinely hold these people in high regard when it comes to movies. I was excited to see this at Blockbuster the other day and scooped it up without a pause. Usually I drift down the entire wall of new releases before deciding on a new flick to grab. Not this time. It was at the beginning of the alphabetized wall and I did not hesitate. After watching it, it was...ok. I enjoyed it, and the actors are very charming and perfectly cast. The movie has so much going for it and none of it is bad, though in the end it felt like a creatively organized flavor of a solid romantic comedy. I am told by those that recommended it that I am dead wrong on this. I wonder if I would have loved it much more if I wasn't married? Maybe if hipsters didn't grate on me as much as they sometimes do? Maybe I am just getting older and more cynical? I have always loved Say Anything... and probably always will, but man do I see the cracks in that when I watch it these days. Perhaps you need to see certain things at the right time in your life and just reconnect with those memories in order to enjoy subsequent viewings? I suspect many people would not love The Catcher in the Rye if they waited till their 30's to read it, though I read it in high school and always find those warm feelings drifting back each time I reread it. (500) Days of Summer is not bad, but not the great thesis on modern or hipster love. She doesn't like you. Get over it.

I initially thought Rushmore was a tight little masterpiece and The Royal Tenenbaums came up short, yet with a more audacious reach. I loved them both, but preferred Rushmore. I remember vividly seeing Rushmore on the mag mile in Chicago with Melissa, Jess, and the entire crew. We walked out of the movie giddy with the enjoyment of having seen something truly original and enjoyable. After a handful of Rushmore viewings quite a few years ago I sort of set the movie aside in my mind. It's great, let's let it happily sit in that trophy case. I kept digesting The Royal Tenenbaums and the layers of that onion expanded unceasingly. I was wrong. It had not failed in anything it reached for at all. Like Scorsese or Kubrick, Wes' work really needs a few screenings to unfold. We watched Rushmore again last night and while I still laughed non stop, I saw little cracks here and there. I always thought of Bottle Rocket as the learning experience that produced the perfection in Rushmore. Maybe they both were a big warm up for RT's? I still love Mr. Littlejeans.

I'm planning on seeing A Serious Man this weekend. That is supposed to be excellent. And World's Greatest Dad is on dvd now. Time to catch up.

Texting Fun

2009-12-20T19:07:00.002-06:00

I don't often get random texts from unknown numbers, but when I do I try to play ball. Last night around 9:30 I received one from a 907 (Alaska) area code, couldn't find the name in Becky's phone, and therefore decided to respond. The whole back and forth took under 5 minutes.

?:Hey chris...r u and Becky in town for the holidays?

Is it a coworker from my former job planning a New Years party? There are all kinds of people up here that have their families elsewhere. We are a sort of pack of strays up here so parties seem to develop more randomly. I did leave my number with former workers before my last day. Ok, my money is on party. We're in.

Me: Yep. We're here in Anchorage.

?:Cool. I have banana bread.

?:Sorry for the late txt. didn't realize the time in my baking frenzy!!

?:Oh and if u don't like b bread I have mini cheesecakes too.

No party, but man do I like cheesecake.

Me:They both sound very good. Cheesecake is a fav of mine though.

?:Cheesecake it is!!

At this point asking whom it is may be a little late. Cheesecake is coming, though I'm not sure from where or how I will get it. But cheesecake is coming. The details are an uptown problem.

I woke up today not sure where it could be coming from. Hmmm... At this point I don't have the guts to mail back. Let the ball stay in their court.

The doorbell rang at 3 pm and there stood my realtor from a year or so ago. She was great -- just beyond great. And she was now holding 2 cheesecakes. "I'm parked illegally so Merry Christmas!," she smiled and shuffled away. Perfect.

...

About 6 months ago I had some similar fun, albeit without cheesecake.

?: R u going to kerrys?

Me:Yep. For sure.

?: Kewl. When are you leaving?

Me: In a bit.

?:Who is this?

Me:Kris. Who is this?

?:Anna. How old r u?

Me:How old r u?

?:14

Game Over. Phone down. Becky and I stopped laughing and let those texts slip into the ether.

2009-12-11T12:21:00.002-06:00

I liked my job here in Anchorage plenty, but work there was drying up. A few months ago they told us it would be wise to look for a new job while also promising to hold on to us as long as possible. They had every hope that something would happen and contracts would be signed guaranteeing work for another year at least. They also promised that if anyone was let go they would be given 30 days notice. Given the economy, that's a very ethical promise. It seems that the east coast branches are doing gangbusters, but the Alaska location (which started the company) is not doing as well. The DoD prefers to do business locally. I guess I can see that. Regardless, the last few months have seen a careful polishing of my resume, a hope that a contract might pop out of the ether, and a careful attitude about dollars being spent. And Hawaii was put on the back burner. Through a priceless recommendation and a few successful interviews I was able to land at a new gig doing the same software engineering I have always done, yet with clients local to the state. It's more stable and the future there looks much brighter. I am very thankful to have avoided an interruption in income and the honeymoon is being booked any day now. Given the economy, I anticipated being out of work a lot longer. I really dodged a bullet and I know I am much luckier than most these days. Sounds like I owe a few Novenas.

A funny epilogue is that after my final day at the old gig I attended the Christmas party that night at Sullivan's steakhouse. Today, the following Friday, I will be attending the new company's Christmas party. Do I know how to time it or what?

...

I bid on things on ebay all the time, mostly in a completely dismissive way. "If if stays this cheap and I win, then great. If the bidding increases, I lose." I lose all the time, and don't really care. I rarely win anything with this approach, an approach which is really more of a constant litmus test on the weekly price of Mordheim or Necromunda miniatures. Minimum bids do not stand, until this past week that is. I guess everyone is burned out on Christmas shopping because I ended up being on the hook for a pile of great stuff this past week.

Talisman game and Reaper expansion for half price? Check.
1980 Dungeons and Dragons Electronic game for $10? Sure.
Dungeonquest? Yep.
That random, hard to find AD&D solo adventure I had been hunting down? Gotcha.

All at great prices and sure to fill the random holes in my Dungeons and Dragons collection. But man did they all come at once. It's never bad to have gaming stuff show up in the mail like presents though.

2009-12-02T17:22:00.002-06:00

I've never had pink eye, though I've seen it in plenty of other folks. Last Wednesday I woke up with one eye sealed shut with gunk and the other full of plenty of gunk as well. After rinsing it all down with a damp cloth I noticed that both eyes were completely bloodshot. The night before only one eye was mildly irritated -- this sucker moved fast. At work that morning I read about pink eye and most of what I read said that treatment mainly masks the symptoms and keeping your hands clean was really the key. You ride it out. So I had somewhat decided to just tough it out before I came upon the nagging fact that it could permanently damage your eye in rare cases. Fine, off to urgent care I went.

At a glance he looked in my eye and told me that I certainly had an infection, but also that it was not pink eye. So they tested me for everything under the winter season banner of possibilities. Negative on strep throat, H1N1, pink eye, etc. I walked out with a Rx for some antibiotic drops and a promise to come back for the results of the eye gunk culture in a week. The eye drops then zapped it within 24 hours.

Well, it looks like it was strep after all, though it never made it to my throat. A round of antibiotic pills should kill it for sure.

I always try to not touch my face when I'm at the gym, and I do often wash my hands after leaving the weight room. It has to have been from one of the plethora of people there that use the barbells.

I got off light -- Becky's the one that had swine flu. No complaints here.

...

Is Maui the best island to hang around for a week? Are any of the islands really bad? I doubt it. We'll be fulfilling a typical Alaskan lifestyle trait by heading "outside" to our 50th state this winter.

...

I am currently knee deep in the final 2 seasons of Homicide: Life on the Street. I had plowed through the first 4 back in Madison after getting my wisdom teeth yanked, then put the last few season sets aside just to avoid burning out. The years have passed and the snow is here and everytime I head to Blockbuster I think about grabbing the first season of The Wire. I've never seen it and I'm told it will change my life. I want in. However, the little voice in the back of my head keeps reminding me that I need to finish the other, precursor Baltimore cop show that I have already paid good money for. Fair enough. I love Homicide and I really see a lot of Chicago (and any other decaying, northern, industrial city) in its depiction of Charm City. Homicide may seem a necessary stop off on the journey to the Elysian Fields of The Wire, though it is a perfect destination all on its own.

2009-11-30T12:05:00.002-06:00

Thanksgiving was a simple, happy affair in Chugiak, AK. Thanksgiving up here usually involves the Packers at 9am along with plenty of Rainier beer. We missed the Packer game this year due to our focus on the smoker puffing away in the yard. I brined 4 large salmon fillets with a very basic brine. It was my first attempt at brining so I didn't want to overcommit to too many fish. Also, I just don't have the fridge or garage space to really lay out numerous trays filled with marinating salmon. So it was a test run, accompanied by a plethora of Vitamin R. My measly 4 fillets ended up tasting delicious after a 10 hour smoke in 125 degree temperatures fed by cherry and alder chips. Next time I'll have to ramp for more volume. No worries. It's not so much that smoking is a big production that takes a great deal of labor, as much as smoking takes 8+ hours, therefore demanding you to be in the general area for the entire day.

The conclusion is simple -- I need a smoker sooner rather than later in life (I suspect later is the probable choice, as the townhouse doesn't really allow smokers on our meager decks). Let's put that high on the 5 year plan.

Man V Food

2009-11-19T14:42:00.002-06:00

I guess I am a fan of Man V. Food on the travel channel, though I don't feel like it. I always end up catching up with the episodes sooner or later, and I always end up disgusted at the end. Also, most of what he eats is not necessarily something I would like to eat. Why do I like it? My appetite for grease is long dormant. I guess I just enjoy the idea of a new city being explored down to the back room of a kitchen with some local chef. And it has been fun to watch the host noticeably plump up over the last year.

Well, the show that aired yesterday was in Alaska, so that made it all the more interesting. Oddly, they spent 66% of the show in Talkeetna. Cool town, but really? I had been to the breakfast place before, but I only bought some of their great bakery. Why didn't they show that? They have a very good bakery there. I haven't had the caribou burger at the other Talkeetna joint, but now I really want to do so. I'm not taking on that silly, huge burger that he did -- I'll just get a single, thanks.

He ended up at Humpy's right here in Anchorage. I'm not familiar with the challenge (it seems fairly new), but I am plenty familiar with Humpy's. I really dig the place, but for some reason Becky and I haven't made it there in a little while. I'm sure that will change now that the bug has been placed in our heads. I am not taking on the challenge though (It must cost over $100 -- 3 lbs of crab meat, plus everything else!?); I'll settle happily for the Bill's Way Halibut burger.

...

It was only -4 this morning! We're warming up.

2009-11-17T17:06:00.003-06:00

It was -10 this morning when I started my truck, but happily the timer on my heating block did the trick. It kicked on at 3 am and warmed up the fluids for a safe start at 6:30. It's still flippin' cold though. The radio nob barely wants to turn, and this is just a warm up for the winter to come.

This morning I did pass a cycling commuter geared up with a light, studded tires, and lots of layers. Right on.

Once I arrived at work I spent the first hour chatting in the dark as the power was out for an hour. It is the last frontier after all.

The sun is out for the last few hours of daylight now and I can see the buildings and vehicles belching steam. It's almost time to leave for the gym in the 5 degree sunshine. We have almost 6 hours of daylight right now, and we ought to enjoy it because that number is retreating everyday.

...

Little Shoppe of Horrors is streaming tonight (and every Tuesday night) from 10pm to midnight (CST) in Madison, WI. Great show, great host. It's my Tuesday night destination.

Catching up

2009-11-16T12:49:00.002-06:00

As of 8 days ago, we now have snow. There is only about 6-10 inches packed down so far, but the temperature is well below freezing so consider that snow a permanent base. This morning at 6:30 am I started my truck in -3 temps, but thanks to it being plugged in all night it turned over like a champ. I just need to dig out the timer so I can avoid having the block heater on all night. I'm told 3 hours is the golden number for maximum benefit in cold starts. It's only going to get colder this week.

...

I removed the seatpost and front wheel from my Orbea and placed the entire operation in the crawlspace. It's just not fun to have the whole bike in the dining room all winter. If I do get some riding in this winter it will be on the cyclocross bike anyway. Still, it is a sad note to sound. It is also a chance to hit the Elmendorf pool for lap swim a little more often. And the treadmill. I feel like I need to plan on the triathlon again, shave 10 minutes off my previous number, and power through the winter.

...

With the advent of freezing temperatures I have been painting more than ever lately. My Vampire Counts Black Coach is almost finished. I just need to base it properly and take some pictures. Gaming nights on Fridays are a reliable good time every week. Winter in Alaska is settling in.

...

Moon is a very cool movie.

...

I am pretty hooked on Scrabble on Facebook these days. Send a game request along, please!

2009-10-26T11:28:00.002-05:00

Fred Meyer is the main grocery store up here (along with Safeway). It's an excellent grocery store that also has a the equivalent of a Kohl's and a good sporting goods store in it as well. Oh, and a good jewelry store. And my bank Alaska USA is inside as well. It really has everything, yet doesn't have an enormous footprint. And the prices and quality are very good. Everybody goes to Fred Meyer.

They have fabric shopping bags available for purchase ($1), though I think I ended up with some free ones thanks to a few coupons a year ago. The idea is to encourage their use over endless plastic bags, and to push this end they give you a nickel for ever bag you use in your purchase. Not a lot of money, but free money nonetheless.

Now, I can be a cheap bastard about many things -- in truth, about as many things as possible. However, I don't blink when it comes to special occasions, vacations, or bike parts. When it comes to most other things, I try to save money whenever possible. "Will this sale/coupon give me a little more money for Warhammer models, a comic book, or a nicer wheel for my bike?" Little things add up.

I like not wasting whenever possible also, so I'm all over the reusable bags. They're very durable as well. However, it seems that most cashiers make a concerted effort to not key them in when ringing you out. They want to make you verbally whine for your stinking nickel. In truth, I doubt they really care if they maneuvered Fred Meyer into an unexpected nickel profit. Yet it sure feels like they do. More times than not I have to remind them at the end that my $20 sale needs to be reduced by 15 cents. Sometimes they roll their eyes, but I quit caring about that a long time ago. If they want to encourage this good behavior, get consistent with the policy. If I'm going to eke out an extra trade paperback here or there, get on the ball. All those nickels add up to spokes and tires and handlebar tape. Their shame will not work on me.

Decisions

2009-10-23T16:42:00.003-05:00

People up here are winterizing their boats and motor homes. In Mt. Greenwood Tom is draining his Harley and getting it ready for a long rest. I'm triaging my bikes and shuffling the needs and wants into a Spring '10 wish list.

The Trek cross bike has been through a war zone. It is 3 years old and has 3 years of racing in it, and most parts are still original. That is impressive, but also telling. It tells me that I should not sweat it that the frame is scratched everywhere, the rear wheel only stays true for about 20 minutes after it is adjusted, the shifting is suggestive at best, and the brakes are left to merely apply a general soft friction to the rims. The bike was a great deal, has served me well, and was actually welded and constructed in Waterloo, WI. That is cool. I wish it had a sharper paint job, but that is a small complaint. I really want a steel Lemond Poprad or a Gary Fisher Presidio, but how can I justify the jettisoning of a Wisconsin made friend that still has life left in it. I spin stories of putting it out to stud as a commuter, but I don't believe that is fair. It can stay filthy and maladjusted in my garage all winter and when the long days of April start to appear I'll take it down to Chain Reaction for an epic tuneup and a burly handbuilt rear DT Swiss wheel. I'll show the Trek some love and it will shine again next cross season. I still want a Wisconsin made steel cross bike (Lemond/Fisher) though.

My Orbea road bike is entering the off season a little less wounded. It has that overall sloppy, loose feeling, which an April tuneup will happily fix. I don't think it needs the large influx of parts ($$$) that the Trek does though.

So I'll do my usual fall mail ordering of parts, tires, chains, and handlebar tape to take advantage of the year end sales. The snow has not fallen yet, but it will any day now. It's sad to see the bikes being put away for a nap, but unfortunately the trails in Anchorage are groomed for cross country skiiing (unlike the plowing and salting they receive in Chicago/Madison). Come April the bikes will emerge shinier and faster.

2009-10-15T14:04:00.000-05:00

I’ve never been particularly fast in cross races, but I did have my fastest season this year. And, I have finished stronger in each subsequent race this season, which says something. It’s usually easier to finish higher earlier in the season when more new riders show up for the first exposures to the sport. At the end of the season you’re left with the people that are much more serious, and consequently much faster than me.

The race on Saturday was in a 55 degree rain (thanks, El Nino!) and had 3 long segments across the beach. By the start of the race, all of the practice laps had turned the beach into an enormous deep and long sandpit. It was brutal, but how could a cross race be any different?

I started off towards the rear and kept position for the first 25 minutes. As the race went on more and more people started to just dismount for 2 of the sandpits (the third pit was fairly firm). The main stretch of one pit was a cavern that was not even navigable on the first lap so I carried the bike through that one. The other pit was doable if you reached really deep and had your gear selected properly before you were in the pit. After those first 25 minutes I decided that I was not going to dismount for that pit, and quickly found myself passing a few people here and there in those moments. This was the last race of the year and the sand had already turned my bike into a grinding cement mixer, so I embraced the rain and mud and filth and tried to put all I had out there.

I picked off a few more riders on some of the flats and barriers and only was passed by the lead pack. I held my own in my little group. I came nowhere close to winning, but I finished the race on a personal high note – one that gives me a good deal to build on for next year.

I enjoy the book A Separate Peace, particularly the small kernels of wisdom it contains about social behavior. Phineas is fairly close to a perfect friend in many moments. I am thinking specifically about the scene where he jumps in the pool, swims all out, and finds that he has broken the school record. He and Gene are the only ones there and he has Gene promise that this record will remain a secret. They know, so who cares if anyone else does?

The results on the cross race had me only riding 6 laps, whereas all the people I passed were marked at 8 laps. I lost of lot of points in that slip up, and I know I counted 8 laps while I pedaled. So I’ll take a cue from Phineas and just keep that one in my pocket for myself. I know it may nullify my altruistic intentions by announcing that all here, but I don’t think too many people read this blog. Also, who wants to hear somebody whine about their race results so instead of finishing the bottom quarter of the field you can finish in the bottom third? Big deal.

It’s a great book, and now I want to reread it (again). And with some off season work 2010 can be an even stronger cycling season. Good plans all around.

2009-09-28T11:16:00.002-05:00

A Cyclocross race has its own pattern and heartbeat. If you have a chance at winning(which I do not), the first lap is a high intensity chess match of positioning. If you get snaked or end up behind someone slow or crash prone, it is almost impossible to climb back up the field. The first lap is also almost completely adrenaline. You settle in actual breathing in the second lap. Given the pacing and tension in the first few laps as you angle for positions and attempt to settle into a sustainable pace, I end up with random songs or thoughts stuck in 5 second loops in my brain, not unlike a scratched lp or cd. Everything is immediate and quick and there is simply no room for thoughts or songs to develop beyond their main point or hook.

For the first 3 laps all I could think of was an endless loop of the refrain to Judas Priest's "Painkiller." I don't really love Priest, but they are catchy enough to give me a chuckle now and again. By the second half of the race I actually settled into complete thoughts, though I was still left with a need to rewatch "Heavy Metal Parking Lot" from 1986. It's simply amazing and frightening at the same time. Completely hilarious, and the Priest songs kind of rock. It is below across 2 youtube clips and totals 17 minutes.

2009-09-21T13:34:00.001-05:00

The weather was not optimal, but it was not as bad as it could have been. It could have easily snowed. It varied between 37-47 degrees, was cloudy, and intermittently rained. While never terribly comfortable, it never became too uncomfortable to not leave the truck. The park was full blown orange and red, with the spruce the only green to be found.

The scorecard (in order):
2 Bull Moose
A single grizzly eating berries
A snowshoe hare.
A sow and a cub atop a mountain ridge digging furiously. Dirt and rock flitted through the air. The image was striking and crisp as it framed itself on the ridge with overcast clouds in the background.
Sheep everywhere, all the time.
A half dozen Ptarmigan in what seemed like their full white winter colors. This seemed a bit early, but maybe we just don't want to accept that Denali will be covered in snow within weeks.
A single wolf walking slowly in a small yellow clump of grass. After watching for a few moments in binoculars the other 3 bedded down wolves came into focus. 4 wolves!
2 large Bull Moose and a nearby Cow, which was wearing a collar of some sort. The bulls were very close to the road and quietly stood still as the shutters clicked away.

After a 10 hour round trip to Kantishna we were ready for dinner, a warm campfire, and a good night's sleep. Even though the chilly weather obscured the mountain and we did not see any of the seemingly ubiquitous Caribou, it was a beautiful day in the park and how disappointed can you be when you had the chance to observe wolves?