fairness, chaos, structure, transparency

So we're in those early stages of organization these days with the bike Organizing (the first usage being the "putting things in order" version and the latter being the advocacy-outreach/power-to-the-people version). It's a small group, with a limited agenda. I'd like to think that the most important reason for it to exist is to make it easy for friendly folks to meet other friendly folks and get out and ride together. But at last fall's inaugural group "event" ride (other than the weekly Sunday rides), the turnout was high enough that it seemed like there was reason, and motivation, and enough people interested/concerned that it could become something more than "just" getting together to ride.

In these early stages, it's a lot of ideas floating around. What to do, how to do it, who should do it, etc. And there's the rub. With a small grass-roots group of concerned citizens, everyone should have an equal voice. There's no authoritarian figure running the show, because the show doesn't exist without the small group of concerned citizens. But if everyone has an equal voice, the conversation is more like a crowded bar - lots of fragments of topics, dynamically floating from one to the other. And while a couple people hit it off, most people go home unchanged from when they walked in - other than having spent their time and money.

I was agonizing for a while about this. A sympathetic friend, to whom I would bitch and complain, would occasionally challenge me to show leadership/ownership and forge ahead in the group. Ostensibly, her thesis was that the chaos was because no one was willing to stand up and take responsibility, so no one knew to whom to look - thus the chaos. But the tradition of authoritarian organizations that shut out minorities (read: gender, race, sex, religion) won't work here. But "structurelessness" doesn't really work either. She left me a copy of an article that's apparently canonical when it comes to the organizational challenges of second-wave feminism. The Tyranny of Structurelessness by Jo Freeman makes good points about how intending a perception of a flat structure can easily lead to a structure more corrupt and elitist than one vertically/pyramidally organized. I found myself nodding along with it - it's not just the bike group, but the small companies I've worked for exhibit similar sorts of dysfunction.

While few people are interested in the formalities of by-laws and the like, sometimes they are necessary.

The criteria of participation may differ from group to group... All of these procedures take time. So if one works full time or has a similar major commitment, it is usually impossible to join simply because there are not enough hours left to go to all the meetings and cultivate the personal relationship necessary to have a voice in the decision-making. That is why formal structures of decision making are a boon to the overworked person. Having an established process for decision-making ensures that everyone can participate in it to some extent.

and when it's a group in the early stages, but with ambition, I find:

As long as friendship groups are the main means of organizational activity, elitism becomes institutionalized.

So what do I take away from the article? Well, secretly I whisper to myself "hey look, all this time - you're more than not wrong about the world, you were right again." But more importantly that there's no reason to try to subjugate my instincts just because they were the indoctrinations by the straight white male oppressor. And just because I'm perceived as the straight white male oppressor with a shave and a haircut doesn't mean that I need to endear myself by putting on a uniform of disconformity or antitraditional style to fit in. There are plenty of ways of being effective, including the ones already known. I've advised others to "just be who you are" - I should have been listening to myself more. I don't need to put on an affected display of fairness fetishization to be even-handed and respectful of peers. The truth will be known. Eventually, always. Structure and organization can respect the individual, and if the individual "wants in" to a particular part of the structure, the way in is obvious to all.

Winter Beer Fest review

Over the weekend was the Michigan Brewers Guild Winter Beer Fest out in Grand Rapids. While I do enjoy beer bunches, I was sorely disappointed this year. This year's Winter Beer Fest was terrible, horrible, and very bad. Not the beers, but the event. Basically, the venue was SO bad that it interfered and distracted from appreciating the beers...

It was a complete maze - the up-down-around-the-bend to find a booth was annoying. The narrow paths between areas made for congestion and a melee, not to mention icy slippery wooden decking. Some parts of it were blistering and freezing in the wind (i.e. central area near New Holland) compared to more inviting areas (i.e. upper deck near Arbor Brewing/Corner Brewery). Yes, I realize that it's a Winter beer fest, but it doesn't need to be a question of winter survival. There was no gathering space for friends to have a place to stand around and discuss the beers they had. (central or otherwise) It was shoulder-to-shoulder jostling all day. And lastly, there were just not enough bathrooms.

Lansing last year was, while more crowded, better. There was less space, but it was space you could move in. I know there was controversy over the move to Grand Rapids, and while I don't particularly mind the move, I do think that having a neutral city for beerfest (i.e. Lansing) makes more sense. But if it stays in GR next year, hopefully it will be at a different venue. If it is in the ballpark again, we probably won't go. Summer Beer Fest, however is a delight.

Along with the disappointment of the venue, back at the hotel, it seems the hotel room attempted murder upon me. A short nap with the heat on dehydrated the room so badly that I was raw and coughing uncontrollably. G and I had, as part of the grand plan, wanted to go to Founders to the Back Forty show after beer fest, so we struggled our way out in the cold, went to the show, and watched some barefoot neo-hippies twirl around while The Werks opened. Ran into Monica (of Monica and Kate - the Ann Arborites we recognized in the hotel lobby and ride-shared to the Fest) and she was kind enough to buy us a beer as a thank you for the ride. The bourbon-barrel-aged Kentucky Breakfast Stout is normally delicious, but it felt strange to my tongue that night, but the Dirty Bastard Scotch Ale was delicious. We only lasted halfway through the Back Forty set - it was just a long beery day, so we bailed and walked through the cold, and then through the warm skyway, and then back in the cold, where I feared for my survival in the hotel, but somehow managed to wake up alive and had a nice little Sunday drive back home (with a minor getting-slightly-lost diversion near Ada, MI).


So in the interest of posterity, I'll share my tasting notes below. Keep in mind that it was mid-beer jotting of notes while standing on slippery wood decking, or while walking, or while slightly buzzed from an afternoon of beer sampling. In the order of having tasted them, they were:

1. Schmohz Brewery Kiss My Scottish Arse Scotch Ale: Not a scotch ale. Bitter. Vile.
2. Schmohz Brewery Mad Tom's Porter: Tastes like their scotch ale. Crappy.
(Seems lie Schmohz went the way of Jolly Pumpkin - their beers all taste the same - like the same strain of yeast, which has a sour bitterness to it that I don't care for.)
4. Sherwood Brewing Leadbelly Oatmeal Stout: Lactose-y. Ashey. Good mouth-feel, but that's all.
5. Sherwood Brewing Alaskan Sister Wit: Bitter. Too heavy for a Wit.
6. North Peak Witley's Wheat: Too much like a Pilsner. Blech.
7. Copper Canyon Rye-PA: Solid IPA notion. Looong swervy skid in the later linger. Loooovely.
8. Grand Rapids Brewing Co. Tiramisu Stout: Nice sweet coffee nose. Unremarkable taste, but ok. Thin mouthfeel.
9. Michigan Brewing Co. Winter Warmer (Rye-PA): Nice malty smooth hop. Really quite good.
10. Michigan Brewing Co. Imperial IPA: Definitely imperial in the best way. Not ridiculous hop, but big and meaningful.
11. Michigan Brewing Co. Superior Stout: Smoky. OK. Rolls around a lot.
12. New Holland Cabin Fever Brown Ale: A bit coffee, malty, round.
13. New Holland Pilgrim's Dole Wheat Wine (2005): Makes me salivate at the end. Not too sweet. Delicious.
14. New Holland Red Tulip: Never did much for me. Wendy loves it. I really don't see what she sees in it.
15. The Hideout Chicago Typewriter Double Red: A bit bitter
16. The Hideout Smugglers Hazlenut Stout: Good nose, but distractingly thin mouthfeel.
17. The Hideout Midnight Oatmeal Stout: Smoky
18. Dragonmead Imperial Stout: Whisky kick at the end. Not sweet. Pretty good.
19. Arcadia Brewing Co. Hop Rocket Imperial IPA: hop flowery, nice. Not overbearing.
20. Arbor Brewing Co. HXL Double IPA: Damn that's good. Smells like barleywine, Drinks like IPA.
21. Arcadia Brewing Co. Cocoa Loco Chocolate Stout: Had it before. Usual thing. Fine. What you'd expect.
22. Dragonmead Imperial IPA: Not that Imperial.
23. Waldorff Brewpub Hopnoxxxious IPA: sucks
24. Waldorff Brewpub Bee Sting Honey Rye: sucks less
25. Waldorff Brewpub Old Woody Imperial Stout: sucks more
26. Black Lotus Generation X Porter: enh. [shrug]
27. Black Lotus The Gift Belgian Strong Ale: Nice. Very nice.
28. Black Lotus Hip Hops American Pale Ale: Super-dry hop
29. Grand Rapids Brewing Co. Barrel-Aged Barley Wine: Goooood. Scotchy (like the liquor, not the ale), which is nice.
30. Founders Porter: Dry. OK. Not that special.
31. Founders Black IPA: Black beer and IPA? Don't necessarily think that's a good thing.
32. Copper Canyon Big Time Barleywine: Wasn't sweet enough for me to identify it as a Barleywine.

gobble, gobble

My book list has been full of non-fiction lately - dry stuff that I put there because it would "be good for me." Things I've always wondered about, things I should know more about. Well, it's been slow-going.

Thus the sudden immediate contrast when I picked up Life of Pi. Immediately engaging, and it kept me up until 3:30 last night. You've surely heard of it, and if you haven't read it yet, you should look for it. Delightful. A little rough for kids because it's about a tiger (that, by its nature, bites and claws and rips flesh), but young teens by now have surely seen or read greater violence just by watching TV.

It's supposedly being made into a movie, but I have no hopes for that. I don't think the depth of the adventure will translate well. But in the meantime, it's a great little book to gobble up in a night or two.

Yum.

true, that.

I'm officially back from The West, but haven't been able to muster the wherewithal to pull myself up by the bootstraps and do the post-trip synopsis. But I just saw this little clip of David Lynch and since, while Driving The Long Drive, I was reminded of some of the monotonous camera-on-bumper-at-night scenes in Lost Highway, here's something to think about...

foodies, avert thy eyes

The one thing I've stooped to when on the road (and on the road I am, driving in search of the sun to hang/bike/etc. in Phoenix with Matt), is to stop at McDonald's. I'll admit, it's half fueled by the fact that they have started having free WiFi, and there's just something convenient about 700,000,000,000 McD's locations nationwide where there's internet access.

So it's with mixed emotions that I go in... I do love a synthetic milkshake every now and then, and it appears that the McRib is back. Again. But going away? What IS the deal with the McRib anyway? Apparently, it has only gone away 3 times so far. Perpetually to come back, like the alternating waves of pleasure, then nausea, it induces on its victims.

So it's with a growing sense of relief that I leave the... ahem... Great State of Missouri... with it's perpetual religious billboards (and apparently vibrant anti-porn/anti-highway-adult-bookstore movement) to trek across the dust bowl and beyond to the beloved desert. I'm sure the delight of smooth mouthfeel will pass like the miles, and that patented McDonald's Sense of Intestinal Unease™ will take up residence soon enough.

not bad at all...

A flurry, I guess. Not sure where the week went.

Got a new bike. Er, frame I mean. "...and why do you need another bike?" you ask. "dude... shut up" I say. Had parts around so I only had to buy a couple things - stem and brake levers, maybe some pedals in the future. Haven't exactly "finished" it - still intend to make it a fixed-gear, but need to decide on a hub. In the meanwhile it's a singlespeed that I took for a ride last night, and it's kind of fun. It's really quiet... kind of eery.

It's Burns Night tonight over at Andre's. Looking forward to it - not only was it fun last year, but it marks something of an anniversary. It was at that party a year ago where I met a lot of people that, in the time since, I've come to call good friends. There'll be haggis (veggie, but I hope someone makes some of the real stuff), Scotch (duh), and the poetry of Mr. Burns. Who doesn't love centuries-old scottish poetry that includes such chart-toppers as "Ode to a Haggis"? I'll be bringing some variations on Rita's Rum Cake (recipe below) - one traditional, and one fucked-with. As in, with different stuff in it - chocolate and cherries. And then there'll be the testers made with 12 year-old Isle of Islay Scotch instead of rum. We'll see how those turn out. I'm verrrry curious.

Bought a BOB trailer today from Ben. It's a Yak trailer, but I don't plan on taking it to the coffee shop like the dude in the BOBgear ad. (And I'm sure as hell not going to sip coffee out of a silly-shaped cup like that, either.) I was thinking something a little more blue-skies-and-scenic-vistas.

Ran the re-use/thrift/gauntlet today searching in vain for a proper pepper mill. One with a crank that sticks out. Not a knob that you twist - a crank that you spin. When I want to grind pepper into something I'm cooking, I want it now, and I want a bunch of it. And twist-twist-twist/squeeze-squeeze-squeeze isn't doing it for me. The Re-Use Center, which is right down the street from the PTO thrift store, which is right down the street from the Salvation Army store, poses a tough problem for folks like me that can find something to do with this, that, or another thing (or at least think we can). Everything seems like a good idea. But I know that I don't have room or follow-through enough for everything, so I restrained myself. Pretty wacky place, that Salvation Army. Huuuuge place. Tons of clothes, all seemingly in pretty good condition. Grey flannel suit for $8? Sure, why not. I realized my eyes were too big and my apartment too small, so I put shoes to pavement and left empty-handed.

Tomorrow's the Worst Day of the Year Ride, and we have some snow, so that's appropiate for the day. Monday is the Bike Ypsi meeting and the logo competition. Tuesday, I think I'll go to Arizona - Matt has an extra bedroom down at the proving grounds and extended the invite, so who am I to refuse a place to sleep and recreate where there's sunshine and shorts weather? And, I get to check in with the desert (howyadoin'?). Ride the bike a bit. Tromp around in the wild. Let the sun shine on in and have my skin make me some Vitamin D.

While the continuing list of not-bad-at-all things extends all the way down to the Rita's Rum Cake Recipe, in the meantime there's this surprisingly effective sitar rendition of a tune we all know and... uhm... well, we all know it, right?

Rum Cake
4 eggs
1 box yellow cake mix
1 pkg french vanilla instant pudding
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup dark rum (maybe 1/3 or 1/2 cup if you want)
1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts

Rum Sauce
1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1/4 (or 1/2) cup dark rum

Grease a bundt cake pan VERY well and sprinkle nuts into the bottom of the bundt cake pan. Mix the ingredients and pour over the nuts. Bake directly on the oven rack at 325 for 45 minutes.

Combine the ingredients for the rum sauce and bring to a boil. After the cake is done, pierce the top of it with a toothpick or fork or whatever you've got, and pour the sauce over the cake.

Important: Let sit for at least 2 hours before turning it out of the pan. Then call your cardiologist and make a reservation before tucking into this cake. Because you seriously just used 2 (or more if you're adventurous) sticks of butter (not margarine, you sissy) in this and will probably have a second piece of cake each time. What were you thinking? Ah, well it's good, isn't it?

the question that won't go away

Exactly when did I eat corn?

No, seriously. I don't remember eating corn. But yesterday I looked down, and there it was. Today I look down, and there it is again. I must be sleep-eating or something.

Was I abducted and the corn implanted?

I'm blaming the reptoids.

the making of sausage

There's those old sayings about making sausage - about how, like laws, you shouldn't learn what goes into it or how it's made. About how much less attractive it is the more you know about it.

Well, it seems I (metaphorically) don't agree. I mean, I know that politics and law are complicated and thorny bits, but the more I learn about my local government, the more intrigued I am. Lots of people get turned off the by the amount of bureaucracy and red tape that goes into even local government. I, for one, am ok with it.

It's easy to lean back on one's Libertarian Lounger or Republican Rocker or Democrat Davenport and snipe about the waste of time and energy and money that goes into government. Bound to special interests, lazy, corrupt, shallow, whatever you want to call them.

But here in Ann Arbor, I'm left with the overall feeling of a fairly well-run city. Sure, there's rough spots here and there, but that's the nature of compromise. And like the old saying goes: a decision that satisfies everyone's needs, but makes no one happy, is probably the fairest compromise possible.

No one gets exactly what they want, so everyone is unhappy in at least one way or the other. But that also likely means that it compromise serves the needs of the largest number of people.

Make no mistake - governing/government is a perpetual exercise in compromise (unless you live in a totalitarian dictatorship, incendiary criticism about the Bush administration ignored for now). It wasn't until recently that I saw the elbow grease/dirty fingernails of the workings of that at the Parks Advisory Commission meeting a couple weeks ago. The point of going was to show support for the Ann Arbor Skate Park, but watching the rest of the meeting was... interesting. It would seem that decisions made have reasons, and data to back them up (go figure!). Proposals in front of even modest groups like the Parks Advisory Commission still get bounced back when there's no data to support claims. There were multiple times I heard comments, criticism, discussion from commission members that showed that they did indeed have the interest of park users, taxpayers, and the future welfare of all of the city in mind.

Yes, I know... that's what they're supposed to do. I shouldn't be surprised when it happens. But still - it's nice to see that it actually happens in real life.

helllooo out there in TV land...

Well, not having had anything to rant about for a while, I guess I'm overdue. Today's topic of annoyance: morning TV culture.

I had the uhm... opportunity... today to sit in a waiting room while a friend went to to the doctor, and the waiting room TV had some apparently typical morning programming on. Regis and whoever, or Dr. Phil, or who knows what. I couldn't see it, just hear it, and I have to say that I was really kind of amazed at how much of it is essentially a full-length commercial. Commercials for other TV shows (with clips of the previous day's TV shows), promotion of fucked-up body image stereotypes, telling you who to trust and how to spend your money, accentuation of unnecessary anxieties. It's torturous. I don't know how people can watch it. And no, I'm not ranting from the high-and-mighty holier-than-thou perspective of the TV-free. I'm just reacting as someone who hasn't adopted this into their life. If it's not already something you do all the time, it is a weird-assed thing to see the constant performance of fake laughter.

Hours and hours of labor, millions of dollars worth of equipment to bounce a signal back and forth to satellites, all of it about... nothing. No wonder it's just one big ad.

It gets me all twitchy.

before I put it back on the shelf...

It's somehow appropriate for the weather - finish a book about the desert, and 6 inches of snow fall on Michigan. Just finished reading Edward Abbey's book Desert Solitaire. Abbey is controversial all by himself. In wilderness preservation radicalism, he's the arche-, proto- and stereotype. He maintained unflinching views of what wilderness is and should be, and wasn't hesitant to say what he meant. And while his politics developed over the years to be even more controversial, this book stays more or less in the desert.

Some of it flits by in graceful imagery "I was still young myself, or thought I was, enjoying good health, not quite to the beginning of the middle of the journey," and some of it becomes clunky, overstated, and absurd "Civilization is mutual aid and self-defense; culture is the judge, the lawbook and the forces of Law and Ordure; Civilization is uprising and insurrection, revolution; culture is the war of state against state..."

But before I start sounding like an armchair book-jacket copy writer - some of the things that caught my attention or got me nodding.

On Wilderness and Parks, Accessibility, and Roads

"What about children? What about the aged and infirm? Frankly, we need to waste little sympathy on these two pressure groups. Children too small to ride bicycles and too heavy to be borne on their parent's backs need only wait a few years... The aged merit even less sympathy: after all they had the opportunity to see the country when it was still relatively unspoiled... "

"A man on foot, on horseback, or on a bicycle will see more, feel more, enjoy more in one mile than the motorized tourists can in a hundred miles. Those who are familiar with both modes of travel know from experience that this is true; the rest have only to make the experiment to discover the same truth for themselves."

On Population and Water (particularly in the West and California):

"Water, water, water... There is no shortage of water in the desert, but exactly the right amount, a perfect ratio of water to rock, or water to sand, insuring that wide, free , open, generous spacing among plants and animals, homes and towns and cities... There is no lack of water here, unless you try to establish a city where no city should be."

On Population:

"It will be objected that a constantly increasing population makes resistance and conservation a hopeless battle. This is true. Unless a way is found to stabilize the nation's population, the parks cannot be saved. Or anything else worth a damn."

In a section about the Navajo, he makes a point applicable to broader populations

"In the long run, their economic difficulties can only be solved when and if out society as a whole is willing to make an honest effort to eliminate poverty. By honest effort, as opposed to the current dishonest effort with it's emphasis on phoney social services which benefit no one but the professional social workers, I mean a direct confrontation with the two actual basic causes of poverty: (1) too many children and... (2) too little money... Social justice in this country means social surgery - carving some of the fat off the wide bottom of the American middle class."

It's something I keep coming back to over and over. Overpopulation. Why are we humans consuming ever more and more energy? Creating more and more garbage? There's this competition to out-breed other religions (the real motivation behind Roman Catholic bans on condoms, etc.), out-breed other cultures, out-breed other nations. We're guilty of the shortsighted inconsiderate greed of believing that we are right and everyone else is wrong. Whether it's neighbors, cities, nations, or entire cultures. We might see the effect and want for a better world, but we need to act our beliefs and not just give it lip service. Not succumb to the gleeful Fuck Yeahs of the Biggest Lawnmower On The Block, or Shiniest Granite Countertops, or Little League MVP. And where does that all come from? Conformance to an image of an ideal our parents or grandparents were sold while they weren't watching. We need to not be afraid to be who we are - who we were before we let someone else convince us to be ashamed of ourselves for not being like them. Whether that's buying a Toyota Prius, or breeding buckets of children.

And lastly, while I'm an amateur careerist navel-gazer, some observations are refreshingly familiar

".. my theory is that solipsism, like other absurdities of the professional philosopher, is a product of too much time wasted in library stacks between the covers of a book, in smoke-filled coffeehouses and conversation-clogged seminars. To refute the solipsist or the metaphysical idealists all that you have to do is take him out and throw a rock at his head: if he ducks he's a liar. His logic may be airtight but his argument, far from revealing the delusions of living experience, only exposes the limitations of logic."

Dominic Wilcox

Some good pieces I like, but can't remember how I found... check out Switch, War Bowl ... heck, Ivy Shelf would be pretty easy to do at home.

alternatives in time for the holidays

From Sabrina Abbott, via McSweeney's: alternatives to "... and they lived happily ever after."

And they barely tolerated each other.

And they stayed together because of the kids.

And their contempt for one another occasionally spilled over at family gatherings, prompting moments of uncomfortable silence.

And they expressed their unhappiness through passive-aggressive toilet-seat positioning.

on what planet?

Spats are back. Apparently. According to some. A tip o' the helmet to BikeSnobNYC for not only the continuing chuckles at the expense of hipster-diculousness, but the timely fashion news.

Some years ago in a store I saw spats on some basketball shoes, but I thought it might have just been a momentary blip in the Footlocker Fashion. Apparently they made their way into football too.

Sheesh. When the High School marching band uniform had spats included, I sure wish I had scammed me a pair. I'd be stylin' now. Fo' sho'.

just because

I can't remember where I saw this, but it seemed pithy enough that I wrote it down... if only now I could remember.

"Congress does not pay attention to the NRA because they are full of wisdom, they pay attention because the NRA is full of money, influence, and trouble."

For some reason, it's the "trouble" part of it that I like. Maybe because I don't have money or influence like the NRA does, but I'm full of trouble. Makes me feel like if I just work a little bit harder at being a prickly curmudgeon I could make Congress pay attention to me.

...alright, maybe I'll need the money and influence first.

because it's there?

Why do we create? I mean, as a species.

I look back to this summer while backpacking out in the desert and the encounter and small talk with the lone German Tourist on the trail. She had a wooden flute with her. It's clear it was her self-defense flute. When crossing paths with strangers far from civilization, apparently having a cudgel (musical or otherwise) at hand gives some comfort. But let's assume that she didn't carry it around solely for self-defense. Assume for the moment that she was hiking in the wilderness without water, food or extra gear. Shorts, T-shirt, sneakers, flute, camera. She wasn't planning on staying overnight.

So she consciously packed her flute. To play it out in the desert. Why? What does that mean to her? She's the only one who will hear her. And she's not the only one . There are visual artists or writers who never exhibit or publish in their lifetime. Their works are found only after their death.

"It's just a part of the human spirit - to create" is too easy an answer. To what end do we do? If we have free will, that conflicts with compulsion by some extra-corporal forces like environmental/evolutionary pressures to create art. If it were some complex form of sub-/pre-/meta- mating ritual performance, the solo artist would be an evolutionary dead end. It would have been eliminated from our genetic repertoire long ago.

It is an act of anthropological vandalism? Make a mark on the world to prove we were here. Not wanting to feel alone in the world. For some taggers, spray paint on a boxcar that travels across the country takes them to places they never otherwise would go. For some breeders, their children are the "me I never was".

On the desert trail, rock cairns mark trails, but when you come across an alcove filled with them, it's not just marking the path. It's a statement. The first cairn marked a path. The second one wasn't redundant - is said "Kilroy was here". After the 20th or 30th, maybe it becomes a competition. Creation as a competitive act?




Or is it just boredom? Too simple there, too. Sure, in boredom, idle tapping can become a rhythm, a beat, a song. Doodles become an image. But the intentional, planned, staged effort of sculpture or performance? That's not boredom. Boredom with the addition of a competitive streak, evolved beyond its source or origins, maybe.

I don't get it... I usually get off things like that

No surprising admission here - I use Wikipedia. I use it, you use it, he/she/it uses it, we use it, they use it, they use it. In the nature of giving back to the community, I figured I'd do a little work for them, and along the way, maybe learn something new. Particularly, I wanted to have an excuse to learn/use Inkscape. (I gushed over GIMP, but it isn't a tool for vector graphics manipulation. Which I have occasion to do. And Inkscape is, like GIMP, pretty good at it. Again... full-featured, open source/free, multi-platform, etc.) To kill two birds with one stone, I'll learn a bit about Inkscape, do something with what I learned, then learn a little about Wikipedia contributions and then do something with what I learned.

Along the way creating/uploading derivative work I want to be sure I'm attributing properly and editing/linking cleanly in Wikipedia, and thus I find myself in a morass of legalese and wikitext/links that baffle my normally tenaciously inquisitive mind. (I mean, we're talking about a bloke (me) who willingly spent hours digging through web pages and on the phone to figure out exactly how to know whether you're standing on federally/publically-owned land, or if you're on Billy-Joe-Jim-Bob's little patch of privately-owned meth lab heaven.)

Most of the time my overanalysis nit-picking engine kicks in and I can't be disengaged without a pry bar. But the Wikicheese just is too much. I took the easy way out. Made a good faith effort, stuck the new image up, think I covered everything and I'm done. Usually figuring out the "right" way to do something, especially when firmly embedded in the morass of bureaucracy, is something I engage in and relish for relishing's sake. What happened to me?

Am I losing my overanalysis fetish? Hopefully it's just a temporary thing. What would my navel do without me to gaze at it?

new for the ears and the toes

Been having a hard time with descriptions... trying to pick out words that describe well (but not tritely or predictably) this band I saw Wednesday at TC's for She Bang night... The Shondes The best I can come up with? I felt ridden hard and put away wet.

Sure, the music reviewers have compared them to Sleater-Kinney and Rasputina, and while they've got hints of those, (if Sleater-Kinney had richer instrumentation, if Rasputina didn't have the goth/vintage aesthetics) they're definitely themselves.

Bassist/frontwoman Solomon has a huuuge voice - a big hand that grabbed on and shoved into my head in about 3 seconds. Punchy, full... niiice.

Georgina (who speaks from the experience of having been to lots and lots and lots of shows) commented "she sounds great, but there's no way she can keep that up the entire set." ... which Solomon then went and did, and then some. Sure, it was a school night and not a long set, but .... damn.

I could say more here gushing on and on, but I'll just stop after saying that they're my latest most delicious new ear thing. Check 'em out... they have two songs on their myspace page. "Let's Go" is not exactly they best example - the live show and the CD are better represented by "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow".

Better yet, go see 'em live. In St. Paul, MN this Sunday, Dec. 2 and in Portland, OR Dec. 8 next weekend.

"everything?" "Everything." - redux (amended)

There a saying out in The Land - one I generally ascribe to: "Everything Is Better With Bacon - Including Bacon." I've espoused the merits and pleasure of bacon before, and I'll do it again...

For my birthday celebration recently, Ypsipearl got me (along with the Stone 11th Anniversary Ale) a Vosges gourmet chocolate bar. A BACON chocolate bar. I'd been holding off for just the right opportunity to crack it open and have some nibblin's, and that day was today. And no, I have no idea why I held off this long.

Well, the verdict is in: everything IS better with bacon. Including chocolate. Granted, some of the delightful pleasure has to do with the bonus inclusion of some smoke-flavored salt in the chocolate, but I'll give it an unrestrained thumbs-up in general.

As for the Stone 11th Anniversary Ale, it's big, roasty, a little sweet, and with a medium linger. Leans towards a Scotch Ale on the nose and tongue but not as sweet, tangy like a black beer, and a little heady. Good thing I don't need my car keys to get to my couch tonight.

... mmm, nummers.

Everything Better With Bacon Amendment (EBWBA) - talking with Daye at Punkin Fest, the notion of a bacon Immersion Garnish in a cocktail might not be the best idea. The bacon would probably get soggy and the salt would disappear. But if the bacon isn't IN the cocktail, maybe just a twist on the rim or something, then it would be OK... right?

driving while _____ing

Came across this tidbit, which had a couple thought nuggets associated...
- It's not the hands that are to blame when drivers crash/wreck/kill because they were on the phone. It's that they are distracted from the spatial reasoning required to pilot a vehicle because they are engaging the verbal centers of their brain. The distraction is because of the conflict in attention, not because their hands are occupied. And if you think it's easy to synthesize motor skills and language centers, try rubbing belly/patting head while simultaneously memorizing a few sentences of written text. You can do one or the other effectively, but both of them only poorly.
-The study is inherently flawed... they were studying the first driver stopped at a line of cars at an intersection. Only the first one. Stopped. At an intersection. If you want to see what people are doing while driving, it should be...(wait for it...) ... While They Are Driving. [sheesh] You know... like in the middle of the block. Of course people unwrap their burgers or dial their phones or sort their playlists when they get to a stop light. They aren't driving. They're stopped.
- A good point or two... that hands-free kits aren't the solution to anything (other than to boost flagging sales of hands-free kits). They free up your hands so you can drive, talk on the phone, masturbate AND eat at the same time.

Been away a while with the Cranksgiving, but now that's over. Back to the regular shenanigans. Check out xkcd:

gushing over _____ today

I'm not much of a photo/graphic manipulator/maker myself, but I do always like to keep my eye out for good tools.

Sometime you want photo tweaking, sometime you want vector graphics creation, sometimes you want a universal translator to turn those EPS files into JPGs. There's times when you want CAD-like functionality without the CAD overhead. Times when MS Paint just doesn't do the trick. Times when iPhoto sucks (almost all the time).

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I recommend... The GIMP.

I've known about it for a while, but haven't yet had to reason/opportunity to play with it. While the interface is a little unfamiliar and overall conceptual structure takes a little adjusting to, it's a fantastic piece of software. Especially when you consider that it's free. Yes, Free. No guilty complex about that copy of PhotoShop that you "borrowed" from the office or "are evaluating" way past the trial period. It's got tons of capabilities, and it's cross-platform and multi-lingual, so Mac/Windows/Linux zealots don't have anything to bitch about. The UI layout is consistent across OSes (unlike Mac apps on Win or Win apps on Mac).

I'm not going to lie to you... in order to do even medium-complexity stuff, you have to get used to the concepts of layers, paths, channels, and selection masks, which can be a little strange. But once you're beyond that, it's pretty sweet. Keyboard shortcuts, scripting features... etc. etc. I could go on, but you should give it a try yourself.

busy boy

Haven't been posting much lately - been spending that time working on getting Cranksgiving organized. I'll be sure to rant and blather more soon, mmmkay?

Cranksgiving Ann Arbor

Alrightey folks, it's ON.

Come one, come all to Cranksgiving... bring your bike, a bag, some cash, and a lock (helmet be a good idea too) and come on out.

Rain/shine/snow there'll be prizes in all sorts of categories and probably some sort of raffle - everyone has a chance at winnin's.

how sadly ironic

I help out with a local volunteer organization called Neighborhood Senior Services. The crux of the organization is to have volunteers to help seniors who live in their own homes with minor tasks (grocery shopping, help around the house, etc.) and in the case of those who are single, widowed, widowers, or otherwise living alone, provide some companionship in the form of coming by for an occassional visit. Basically, a Senior Citizen version of Big Brother/Big Sister.

So the irony here... I'm taking this very nice lady to the eye doctor for outpatient laser surgery (15 minute procedure... for surgery! wacky.) I wheel her into the opthamology office, take her up to the desk, and after talking with the receptionist, she's handed the check-in paperwork that has medical release blahblahblah at the bottom in fine print.

WTF? This lady who is obviously 80+ years old, with imperfect eyesight, who IS HERE FOR SURGERY TO IMPROVE HER VISION, is supposed to be able to read the fine print? Are you kidding me?

Among my many gripes with our health care system is the clickwrap (or contract of adhesion) that applies to the fine print. You agree to give up all claims of liability, and permit the health care megaplex to do whatever they want with your personal information, or else they won't touch you with a ten foot pole. Same goes for credit card companies, cell phone service providers, ISPs (you know, those "addendums" you get in the mail that change the terms and conditions of your service plan every month).

But seriously, folks... I can understand when people who are able to read the fine print choose not to be bothered by it, but giving fine print to a woman whose vision is poor and is seeking surgery to correct it? And expecting her to just sign it? She signed it, but obviously had no idea what it read.

Does this bother anyone else? It bugs me, that's for sure.

it's wednesday already, ain't it...

Yesh. Overdue happenings. Action-packed weekend.

Start with a trip out to Grand Rapids for the IMBA trail school thingie. Pretty cool, actually. For 3 hours they talked about all kinds of things like Fall Lines, Grade Reversals, Outslope, and los of other stuff. Making good trails and trail systems to ride bikes on, that last a long time, that are copacetic with hikers and equestrians, don't need much maintenance... and are fun to ride on. Gotta say, those Trail Care Crew folks have a pretty cool job. Drive back and forth across the country showing people how to build trails, and along the way getting to ride all those trails too.

So the presentation is over, and they lunch gets put out on tables, but I have to bail because I've got a 2 hour drive back before PunkinFest, and I head out to the parking lot. Realizing that I left some swag inside, I go back, and when I walk out again, there's a couple people on the way in from the parking lot chatting near the sidewalk. Double take. Triple take. Holy shit... that's... that's... I know who she is, but brain not working... I just watched Off Road To Athens last week, and she's an Olympian and a pro and National Champ, and World Champ and an ass-kicker and .... I was caught so off-guard I could not think of her name. GAH. It escaped me. I felt ashamed, but I managed to eek out a starstruck "uhm, Hi. you're... uhm... pretty cool." She's there with her husband and a friend and asks if I know these trails, and of course I'd never been there before today, so I feel sillier, even.

In the car 2 minutes later, names come easy: Allison Dunlap. I'm such a dweeb. Apparently she's in town because her husband's family lives nearby, so visiting and all. Anyway, so that's my star-sighting/feeling like a dork moment for the month.

So then I drive back to AA in time to get a quick disco nap before heading out to Pete & Wendy's PunkinFest (Barn Christening) Party. Good times, there. Tons of food, drink, and merriment. Union Pulse was going to Canada for a gig, but got turned back at the border, so they came to the barn instead and played a set for the partiers. After the live music, some 80's tunes made their way into the audio and Brooke and Shawn were killin' it on the dance floor with their mad breakdance extravaganza. Yes, they have skills.

So as all good parties should have, there was the starting of the fire (camp-, not barn-) and the gathering there-round. And then Garth gets out his spears, sets up a couple pumpkins, and while I never would have predicted it, apparently throwing spears at pumpkins is a crowd-pleasing activity. It went long into the night. And while those pumpkins 30 ft away were fairly safe for most of the time, a couple people did indeed hit them. You'd think it's easy, but spear-tossin' (accurately) is pretty tough. Drinkin' and sittin' by campfire rounded out the evening, and then off to bed.

Sunday... well, Sunday is turning out to be a regular gig... the local boys from the couple of alleycats I've been to have been gathering on Sunday afternoons for bike polo. Fun, that be.

So Matt and I met up for some trail riding beforehand just because, and then looped back to the park where people were starting to gather. The other Matt brought mallets and stuff, the cones came out, and the hijinks ensued. After a couple times trying it, I'm starting to notice some subtleties. I wouldn't go so far as to say strategy or tactics or anything like that, but I can see some normal patterns of play now. When it comes to ball-handling style, there's dribblers, long-bombers, blockers, sharp-shooters, all kinds of strengths. All I know at the moment is that if I have the ball, I'm the dribbling, between the legs, tongue-out-Jordan-style, take-it-to-the-hole type. I can't make a long shot to save my life, but I'll juke a muthafucka all day like some Harlem Globetrotters ('n' shit, yo).

Pete seemed to take the hockey enforcer style, using his charging and coaster-brake cruiser skids and rattling chain guard to intimidate the dudes on the shiny fixies. Gotta say, if you love a bike too much, don't bring it to polo. Silly shit happens. Low speed crashes, multi-bike entanglements, and dudes like me happen too (if I'm rubbing wheels with someone while scrabbling for the ball, my wheel pushing on theirs in the hope of forcing them to put a foot down... is a good strategy).

But in the end, Pete was getting ridiculous with his bullying and no one would take him on. The best thing I could do for my team was to share my elbows with him, and going for the ball on the breakaway was a good excuse. Didn't even get near the ball, just putting him into the grass was what was needed. Sorry Pete, but you bring that cheese, you're gonna get the shoulder every time.

Last night (tues) was the Halloween alleycat, and while it wasn't freezing, I did get a little chilly. G came out and staffed a checkpoint, but realized that there's stretches of boring in that - and didn't bring a book or anything. I raced and had a modest 10th, but I'm gonna blame the fact that one checkpoint wasn't set up or visible when I got to it (I had to go back and do it later). Probably was there, I'm just whining. Had a bad case of the Post Hard Riding Coughing afterwards, but whatever.

Ok. mmph.

All I got right now. Happy Halloween, y'all.

blech.

Crapola. I want to go to the IMBA Trail Care Crew class out in Grand Rapids this weekend, but my plans are foiled, more or less. Call 'em pseudo-foiled.

I was going to head out that way this afternoon/evening to ride some trails, then camp overnight somewhere local, and then show up at the class/presentation in the morning. Mostly, because riding is fun, camping is easy/cheap, and I don't like early morning wakeups. I figured I could be local and just stumble out of my tent to go to the thing. But since it's raining right now and a 70% chance of rain this afternoon/evening in GR, so me no ridey. Looks like I'm just gonna chuck the idea and just get up super-early and drive out there.

The one good thing about it is that in the search for a spot to pitch a tent, I learned that the State Forests in Michigan have a policy similar to Federal USFS/BLM land regarding dispersed camping - it's free, and as long as you abide by the rules, you can just plop down, pitch your tent, and sleep the sleep of the just. Keep in mind... State Forests are ok, not State Parks. Check out the rules here and here.
...
OK, so in the meantime since typing that, I read the rules. Since the Rules specify certain dates in State Game Areas that camping is forbidden, and not knowing where those might be, obviously, I had a bunch of questions (this isn't the first time I've pondered the survey boundaries of federal/state public land). So I called the State of Michigan. I pay my taxes, surely they would help me in my quest for information. Bouncing around trying to find the right answers, 45 minutes later, what I learn is this...

County plat maps.

Sure... the State and Federal agencies and governments have the Master Control over what is and what is not, but they don't publish map books. Somewhere deep in the bowels of the GIS system there is surely a way to display an accurate rendering of the land survey for State Forests. But Joey Taxpayer can't get at them easily. HOWEVER... if you know what county you're looking at, the county maintains records of plat ownership, so those should indicate boundaries, even if they don't hold administrative authority over the land.

So there it is.

One last thing... funny bits you didn't think were necessary (from the Rules document):

  (l) "Person" has the same meaning as defined in section 301 of 1994 PA 451, MCL 324.301

Apparently, not everyone has a clear understanding of what a "person" is.

(and no, I haven't looked up PA451. I'm done with gov'ment fo' the day.)

odds and ends...

Cleaning out the photos from my phone, I come across these little chuckle-worthy bits:
The funniest parts about this poster is where it's located. Above a urinal at eye level. "Touch consumers"? Wow, now that's powerful campaign. It can reach out and grab your junk while you're taking a whizz. And yes, that's a low-distraction moment. Just me and my wang. Even if there is another guy pissing, it's not like we're having an in-depth conversation or anything.

A palette of parts, and apparently the empty palette should be returned to an android. Hopefully no one at Cyberdyne Systems knows about this.
Hmm... so there's D/s, B/D, S/M, BDSM, and an infinite variety of kinks out there. Auto-domination too, apparently.

downtown LED lighting

Looks like the city government is going ahead with 100% LED lighting downtown. Every time I would walk past the pilot program installation and see the "New lighting... Comments? call ___"sign, I've been meaning to comment about the color (they have a bluish cast to them and could stand to get more yellow into their spectrum) and that they should protect a little better against light pollution.

But it looks like I waited too long... one of those "speak now or forever hold your peace" things.

pedal therapy

A new mantra to cure what ails: just go pedal somewhere.

A couple weeks ago after a build up and tension-filled anti-climax of over-thought expectations, I found myself crashing hard, and into a navel-gazing funk. A little voice inside trying to console myself, trying at both ends to pull deeper within and extract from the morass. "Go, get out and do something." "Do what?" "I don't care... Try Something. Try Anything." "I should at least have some sort of plan." "No. Just go pedal somewhere."

And that's the voice that won. And as I rolled along, the lint clot in my head broke free. The bike love took over.

It fixed me.

There's lots of bike love - whether you're a pro or new to it. Sometimes you just have to remember that it's there Available, cheaper than therapy, and no reservation required.

secret identities

Every now and then I have troubles with this whole blogging concept as a dynamic-journal-of-sorts (yes, I know it's self-referential to blog about a blog, but just ignore that for the time being). It's a thing that I've had decision-making problems with before, and that's the boundaries between things public and private.

I think of this sometimes as a personally therapeutic activity. No, gentle reader, I'm not using you as a substitute for proper mental health care, but there is something to be said for exercising the cobwebs, preventing the mental stagnation that comes from a lack of thoughtul contemplation or the running around and around in the same rut. Here I am sounding all high-falutin' when really what I am describing is the conversation that any kid has when they start off their first journal entry with "Dear Diary..." But you see, the diary is ultimately a very a private thing. Something that you trust no one will read - something to which you can entrust your deepest darkest secrets. The blog? not so much - it's on the web and just about anybody can see it. Of course, it's a form of voyeurism too - you WANT people to look at it and read it, or else what's the point? Without another participant, it would just be masturbation.

I started thinking about this a year ago and wrote two paragraphs. I shelved it then, but was talking with a friend recently (who reads this) about exactly this. And it seems we were both independently headed to the same mental place - to have or not to have a secret blog. Our "usual" online identities are bound up or connected in some way or other with our real world identities (slightly obscured though they may be). When you really want to cut loose and talk about what's really going on in your head, maybe you don't want anyone you actually know to know what you're really agonizing over. But then if it's so secret no one knows about it, what's the use? Maybe the anonymous voyeurism that someone, somewhere might just read it. Like having sex in a public place or Larry Craig-like airport bathroom hookups, perhaps the danger of getting caught is part of the thrill.

Moving in... spreading out closer to the edges of myself... buying vacation property there instead of just visiting every now and then.

Debate Questions for GOP (link)

The Fine Art of Buying Nothing (and doing)

Been inadvertently perfecting my buy-nothingness lately. The other day I made the triple-threat mistake of going to: a hobby store, a Lowes, and a GFS outlet. All this on a day when I was already goofy, scattered, and unaware of what I wanted in the world.

The usual way that I make for myself in the world is to avoid deadlock. In those conversations not deciding and agonizing over where to go, what to do, I'm the guy who eventually blurts out "this is fucking stupid... we're going to ___, and if you really don't want to go, we'll meet up after." And if that pisses everyone else off and I walk off and no one comes with, that's my own burden. Resolving the impassible quandary gave me more mental satisfaction than getting everyone to go along with me. I just can't stand that metastable, activated but going-nowhere, state. But when it comes to myself when I'm by myself, it seems I can agonize over this for a seeming eternity.

So now I'm on a smaller cashflow, highly caffeinated, and going to a hobby shop (where there's thousands of fascinating widgets and projects I know I don't have time or follow-through for), and a hardware mega-plex (where there's hundreds of solutions for problems I didn't know I had), and a GFS (food-service sized portions and implements I don't need... I cook for myself). It was a fairly bizarre experience that left me unable to make the simplest decisions. Why? I normally would just go ahead and buy the thing that I was agonizing over - if it was ultimately a wasted $50, so what? Nowadays, not so much. And I could just throw it in the car and move on to the next thing. But that day was sunny and 70, and I was on the bike. So you'd think my available options would have helped me, but they didn't.

And then I went to the UMich Property Disposition Center the other day. Need a centrifuge? Robotic genetic analysis dispenser machine? Sun Sparc enterprise server? Shelves? Desks? Alas, I know my tendency is to buy because Look! At! All! These! Great! Deals! (on used crap). But here I am, in a brave new world. Perfecting the Art of Buying Nothing.

One of the many reasons I think of to buy a house. Stuff Projects. Widgets. And it would only make it worse, wouldn't it?

But this general situation is what I worry my problem is these days. I find it far too easy to decide for other people what is right and what to do. For myself, I see far too many possibilities - I can't decide. There's nothing too far from reasonably doable, either through force of will or creative solutions. So what do I do? Of late, I've been doing nothing.

Am I natural? I'm abhorring the vacuum, that's for sure.

just trying to have a snack, fer chrissakes...

Rough day at the office...

(the first few minutes are boring, but it gets wayyyy better halfway through)

prepickle? postpickle?

A question I ask the wind... are you a prepickle eater or postpickle eater?

When you get your sandwich and it comes with a pickle - whole, half, spear, whatever - do you eat the pickle first or last? Is it a warmup or a cooldown? Apertif or digestif? And what does that say about the person? I realize that there are many cases where the pickle is a component of the dish (burger with pickle slices, chicken shwarma, etc.) or irrelevant (conscientious pickle objectors) but those aren't the point of the question.

I, for the record, prepickle. The way I see it, it's a self-contained food item that has few thematic connections to the rest of what's on the plate, and while they are tasty, they also take up space. No reason not to just go ahead and have it right then and there, and as a benefit, clear space on the plate/basket for mid-meal food maneuvering.

Does this mean anything? Is it one of those anal retentive (controlling, OCD, etc.) or anal expulsive (emotional, prone to outburst) things? Is it poor impulse control on my part?

Or am I just a little too prone to over-analysis? Perhaps sometimes a pickle... is just a pickle.

Dapples (overdue Manistee mumblings)

The weekend before last, in honor of the last decent expected weather in Michigan, a trip just came together on a lark.

It was impromptu, happenstance, and serendipitousish, and thus begins my flawed and biased re-telling...

As y'all might know, the public lands administered by the US Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management are, unless specifically prohibited otherwise, open to the public for recreation (meaning hiking, camping, hunting, parcheesi, whatever). Assuming you aren't governed by something else (hunting season/permits, motorized vehicle restrictions, etc.) you can pretty much do your thing. And in the Manistee N.F. you've got a stretch of the North Country Scenic Trail, which is on its way from New York to North Dakota (a glimpse of the map below and full map of the National Trail System here). And the NCST, which you can read up on here, also intersects the Big M trail system. Lessee here... a pinch of trail, a dash of forest... hmm.

So G brought the minivan over, we packed in some bikes, some gear, some food and drink, I refrained from making any Soccer Mom wisecracks, and off we went up to Manistee.

4 hours later we're within the bounds of the forest. While it was a little confusing figuring out what all the obviously private dwellings were doing in the middle of what we expected to be just miles and miles of pseudo-wilderness (remember that "Wilderness" has specific federal definitions... which MNF isn't), we nevertheless managed to blunder about.

We got to the established USFS campgrounds, and instead of paying the ridiculous fee ($12 for a campsite where there was no water, no showers, no nada... just a flat piece of ground) we elected to just plop ourselves out in the forest somewhere. Down this chunky 2-track, down that chunky 2-track. Hoping that we're on public land and not inadvertently stumbling onto private land or a meth lab so that we don't get shot.

We find a spot, set up tent-age, get the bikes out and go for a quickie ride. Nice to roll out of home base and in a 5-10 minute ride be on a trail that goes for 1000 miles in either direction. NICE trail I tell ya. Wooded singletrack moseying through stands of pines and oaks and maples. Occasional boardwalk or bridge crossing creek and marsh. We go south a ways and notice that the map board at a road intersection indicates part of the NCST off-limits to bikes. Puzzling, but not a worry since it was time to turn around, and there was more trail to the north of our campsite. Back to camp in delicious pre-fall weather, make some dinner (Saag Paneer) and a beer, or was it wine start a little campfire, sit around a bit before turning in for the night.

A nice morning to wake up to and an easy breakfast of instant oatmeal and instant coffee. I have to confess - I am an unapologetic coffee snob. I'll tell you how much I hate when a bean blend is cheaping it out with Brazilian filler beans. I'll bitch about strength. But when it comes to carrying gear and cooking on the trail... nothing beats coffee crystals for that perfect combo of light, easy, adjustable strength, quick, and no cleanup or garbage. Leave the coffee pot at home, folks. Just carry instant.

Right, so the next day we have some breakfast and lazily make our way into bike gear, pack lunch and stuff, and head north seeing lots of pretty forest (some of it heavily wind-damaged, but happily cleared trail) and on the road connecting off-road trail, this yard art/eco-mower. We get to the Big M Outer Loop intersection and head around the outside of the Outer Loop, which has a couple climb sections of note and interesting bridge building technique. I've never seen bridges on primarily MTB trails that had handrails. Constructed with downed trees and a chainsaw. Three of 'em. It was weird.

So at the top of one of the longer climbs, the stomachs growling decreed that lunch was to be had, so we pulled over, munched a lunch, and lazed about in the forest watching the dappled leaves, listening to the breeze in the trees, napping a bit. er... I mean "resting my eyes"

Rolling along after lunch, it became time to head back, and so we did. Back to the campsite in just enough time to mosey over to the river and rinse our selves off ("The Little Manistee River... where the water flows clear and chilly, and the scrotal shrinkage is instantaneous."), gather water, and get to cooking. Fried tempeh with zucchini and Kung Pao/Szechuan noodles, some wine, and a campfire. Nice, that. Bummer though - the rain, she did come. Luckily, the warning sprinkles gave us time to get things stored away before it got raining for serious. But there was lots of firewood left over, and plenty of wine and beer, and that was unfortunate that they couldn't both get used that night.

But the next day was the journey back, and along the way came the Beer Gauntlet. On the way back from the Northwestern Lower (Peninsula of Michigan, for you out-of-staters) to Ann Arbor, the highway is littered with breweries. It's like a truck was driving along and they just fell out the back. Founder's in Grand Rapids, Bell's in Kalamazoo, Arcadia in Battle Creek, Dark Horse in Marshall.

Gotta say, the start and end points were... tasty. Founder's, y'all rock. I have much beer love for you. And you sponsor bike racin'. And have cool live music. Have I mentioned I like your beer lots? Kentucky Breakfast Stout, while very limited in availability, is delicious. Round and full, swells nicely on the tongue and rolls strong, comes off it slowly and gently. Well done. If you get a chance, give it a try. And the regular Breakfast Stout. And the Red's Rye. And Black Rye. And the Dirty Bastard Scotch Ale.

I limited myself in time and liver capacity to one, and we moved on to Bell's. While it's a fascinating tap room (with art and maps and historical documents), the beer was... mediocre. Bell's continues to non-impress me. Yes, they are the 800 lb gorilla in Michigan Beer. But the hoopla about Oberon is overrated, especially since every time I had it this year it has been terrible. Two-Hearted Ale, sure, but that's about all I can stand to buy. Everything else is ridiculously priced, and not really good enough to justify the price. I had the sampler, had a hard time picking because there was nothing on tap that hadn't been around on store shelves already over the past 5 years.

On to Arcadia. Beautiful bar/restaurant in the celtic style, but again... nothing new. The beers have remained the same as they have been for 10 years. While they've had small-run interesting but not very available batches like Coco Loco, Hopmouth, and Cereal Killer, the rest of the beers have stayed middling.

Dark Horse Brewing wins the Upstart Award. It's a tiny, tiny place in Marshall, MI (also a tiny place). What they lack in refinement of label art they make up for in enthusiasm. Favorites of mine: Crooked Tree IPA, the Black Beer, the Amber Ale, and the joint venture with Corner Brewery: Dark Corner. Tasty stuff, it is.

And Dark Horse likes bike racin' too. Oh yeah, and the sister brewery of Corner Brewery, Arbor Brewing Co. also sponsors bike racin'. I'm seeing a trend here.

Ok, blah. I've blathered too long. Forest, Bikes, Beer: mmm, Good.

woof.

spoiler votes

So now that Michigan is no longer going to have a meaningful Democratic primary election, the question is: what do Democrats do with their free time?

If the Republicans have a primary in Michigan, those Democrats could potentially switch over just for the primary (mind you, I have no idea if this is even possible... I've never registered with a party or voted in a primary) and to raise havoc in the Republican primary. But the question becomes... how best to muck the Republican primary - try to get a friendly candidate elected, or add votes to the crazy nutso? If a moderate Republican wins the primary and then the presidential election, then it won't be as unfriendly of a President to Dems. On the other hand, getting an extremist wacko onto the presidential ballot in order to influence undecideds and moderate conservatives to vote Democratic because that candidate is not as bad as the other one might be useful.

Of course, all this matters not a bit if the Republicans cancel a Michigan primary specifically to avoid these hijinks.

chuckle-snarky

Gah. Been bad. Ain't been posting. But couldn't resist passing along the snarkiest corporate slogan/motto/tagline I've seen in a while:

BOB Trailers - "the leader in following"