Tonight I used a wheat gluten product known as mock duck. It’s a brownish blob formed into a miniature duck-ish shape complete with dimples that works as source of protein when you’re out of duck. I picked it up after coming across it in a recipe for squash curry that sounded good. Tonight was my night to cook, so I walked by Vieng Lao on my way home from work and picked some up. They also have mock chicken, abalone and oyster, but I didn’t see any mock turtle.
Anyway, it wasn’t bad by any means, though duck would have been much nicer. I managed to make a curry that didn’t bomb, and I’ve got lots of leftovers for tomorrow.
When Michelle was in law school, we routinely met with friends to watch the debates for the 2004 election. The events were great – you pack a room full of smart people who are drinking beer and know more about politics than some of the candidates, then you try to make out what the candidates actually say over the live auto-correction and fact checking. At one of the debates, a dog sensed the negative energy towards the incumbent candidate and started barking and jumping up at the screen while that candidate was speaking.
This election season was much more subdued. We’ve watched or heard all the debates and now with Tivo, we can pause and discuss both fallacy and history while the debate is going on. THere was still beer, but by a large part, there was less yelling at the TV. We’ve caught up with many of the same friends from 4 years ago several days later, and the analysis, while delayed, is just as good if not better.
Last night’s debate was by far the most interesting of the 3. I was hesitant to watch it since I’ve known who I was voting for now for over a year, and frankly, I’m exhausted of politics. The only reason I’ve been keeping up though is what I would call “morbid curiosity.”
On a Sunday morning in early September, we found an abandoned bike leaning against the tree in our front yard. It was in wretched shape. The frame was mangled as if hit by a car, the brakes missing, the bottom bracket shot, the wheels out of true, the seat post was duct-taped in place, and it smelled weird. Still, it held promise as a commuter bike. But first, I had to clear it with karma.
I posted about the bike on bikeportland.org and craigslist on the off chance that someone had it stolen or lost it. Bike thieves are among my most hated kinds of people, so I didn’t want any guilt by association. After 2 weeks, I decided that the posts and the wretched shape were enough that I could adopt it and return it to usable condition. However, I didn’t want to spend much money because the idea was to have a bike I could ride to work and leave parked outside. So, for a minimal investment, I returned it to working order. Brake pads, a spoke wrench to true the wheels, and a seat post that was the correct diameter. I have two spare saddles, so I put the lamer of the two on (again, minimizing my potential loss). After a small investment of time and money, I had a commuter. Here’s the Smoke in its current incarnation. Commuter
I love bikes, and I love tinkering, so even after 2 weeks of use, it has been difficult to not make any more changes. It will need a few fixes eventually, like that whack bottom bracket and some back brakes, but for the most part, it’ll do. I really need to replace the saddle though. The current one is a triathlon seat that is so hard that feels like someone is punching me in the perineum when I ride. 2 weeks hasn’t really improved that either, so I think it’s time to switch before it does any damage to my… bike seat area.
Still, its a perfectly good machine again and I’m pleased to have it. Thanks mystery bike santa.
We’ve been a little surprised at the infrequency of egg laying by our chickens. However, my mother-in-law Debbie discovered that Layla has been using a spot behind the grill for her own nesting box. In fact, Layla had laid 8 eggs in the same place away from the coop. The sudden supply of eggs means we’ve now had over 20 eggs laid, bringing the average to closer 1 a day. I was so pleased I dropped them all in to our surrogate egg crate.
..and I turned 30. We share a birthday out of convenience. Michelle threw a surprise party for me over the weekend and I was honestly shocked. It was my first surprise party and I hadn’t an inkling that anything was going on. In fact, when people said “surprise,” I looked behind me to figure out who all these people I knew were saying it to. At the same time, my brain was trying to reconcile why friends from different towns and eras were all in the same place. Michelle totally got me, then forbade me from doing it to her.
I can’t really say much about 30 because it doesn’t really seem any different. I suppose weight is easier to gain than lose, and I spend more time talking about health care benefits with friends, but I’m living largely the same life as I was at 28. I take solace in knowing that I’m not as old as Barley though.
He’s aging fairly well considering the shape of his hips, and he’s become a good friend and protector for Ella. However, he’s going to be passing from Barley Roostopher to Elder Statesmen RooBar here in the next few months.
Pardon me for being a little materialistic for the moment, but I’ve just watched Yota drive away for the last time. We sold the Previa to a nice Russian gentleman who plans on using it for camping and climbing. “Yota” was our nickname for the Toyota minivan, which my parents bought new in 1993. It’s been the family workhorse for 15 years and has seen some pretty incredible trips. It was really quite hard to watch it drive away, partly because it means that we’re now a 1 car family, and partly because it carries so many fond memories with it.
Since seeing it for the first time when my mom stopped by a scouting event when I was 14, it has been all over the western United States. Some of best trips included driving back to Nebraska with a pre-painted picket fence strapped to the top, driving to San Francisco for spring break in 1996, and an untold number of backpacking, hiking, canoeing, and biking trips. When it came time to sell it, I was a little nervous about sharing my memories of it, so I stuck to details like how it has the “largest wipers in its class,” a gaffe that got the attention of one potential buyer. Here are some details that I didn’t mention:
It can comfortably break 100 MPH, and has done the Yakima to Bellingham trip in 2:57
I backed in to our house-sitter’s car on the morning we were leaving for Germany
It has more backcountry miles than 99% of the SUVs out there
Several friends helped push it through Bellingham one halloween night singing the Doc Watson version of “You are my Sunshine.” The radiator had broken and we were all in costume.
I took Michelle on dates with it in high school, and she married me anyway.
Mid-engine + rear wheel drive + studded tires = awesome fun in the snow
It carried me and all my possessions back from Bellingham after I finished college
5 stereos in 15 years
The Oil Can Henry’s on Capital Highway refuses to service it because of the engine location
Scott and I drove around SW Portland and Tigard during some snow days a few years ago and helped other people who had gotten stuck. Then we went to a movie. Then we did cookies in the deserted theater parking lot.
I like the way it looks
So, here’s to your new life Yota, and thanks for the 169K you’ve shared with us.
The US and Poland have finally inked a deal for putting a missile defense site in Poland. Ms Rice, our secretary of state, claims that it will “help Nato, Poland and the US respond to “the threats of the 21st Century.”
Having not seen any missile based threats of the 21st century yet, I’m wondering if she actually meant the 20th century. It seems putting a pack of wild mustangs to roam freely in Poland would prove just as useful at preventing stateless actors from attacking modern states. I’m not sure how you fire an anti-missile missile at a letter containing anthrax, or a dirty bomb, or a shipment of rocket propelled grenades to Taliban fighters, or global warming, or bird flu, or the increasing dichotomy between wealthy and poor nations, or ethnic cleansing, or religious fundamentalism, or even blatant misuse of public funds. I suppose if the wild mustangs go rogue and start to fly, this plan would make sense. We’d want to make sure we could clean up after a disaster like flying rogue wild mustangs in Poland.
I suppose there were those 4 3 missiles test fired by Iran last month. If we really want to rekindle the cold war, perhaps we should just doctor the map.
July marked our first year in our new home in North Portland. It’s been a blur in some ways, so I was looking back at all the household projects we’ve completed and I now see why. Since taking possession of the house, we’ve:
I’m a little shocked to see the list all at once. I also know it wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our family who provided material, moral, and physical support at various times throughout the year. Now I’m hoping for a year off. We need to rewire the house and replace the roof at some point, but both are big and rather expensive. We’ve managed to do the above either with funds left over from selling our house, or on the cheap. I love DIY.
A phone saleswoman from Qwest called last night to see if I was interested in any package deals. I was almost gleeful to tell her that we were leaving qwest in 2 days. She hung up, I hung up, l think I enjoyed it more. Take that telecom!
Wednesday was really quite boring for anyone not intimately concerned with online education or learning management software. I was “in session” from 8am until after 6pm, and despite the potential for some major snoozing, it was actually really informative and useful. Not only was I able to learn a lot that would be very useful to my job, I was able to meet a number of “internet” people that I frequently encounter online and folks from other schools and companies that I routinely collaborate with. I sometimes forget the power of the spoken word and the face to face when so much of my world is RTFM.
The keynote of the day was by Blackboard’s own CEO. Among other things, he was showing off the direction of Blackboard’s product over the next 2-3 years. The upside? The product will eventually contain the things we want now, like ajax interaction, mobile delivery, full CSS styling and easy inclusion (integration is a strong word) of other web applications like flickr and youtube. The downside? Migration, time, and money.
