Tomorrow I’ll be off to lovely Victoria for a bit of work and a bit of fun. There’s a Drupal Workshop I’ll be attending, which apparently delightfully coincides with the Great Canadian Beer Festival. Aren’t coincidences lovely?
If you want to keep up with me, I’ll likely be twittering. Twitter.com/TK421
Ace and I were both born June 20th. Most likely, however, this is where the similarities end.
Paul Muldoon, another June 20th birthday, is an artist that I’m a very considerable fan of.
But then there’s Lionel Ritchie.
International superstar David Beckham is coming to the U.S. to play for the L.A. Galaxy. A move for Beckham shouldn’t be a giant shock as his tenure at Real Madrid was winding down, and his days of international competition with England appear to be over.
Beckham will become the biggest star to play soccer in the United States since Pele and Franz Beckenbauer played in the now-defunct North American Soccer League in the 1970s.
But will anyone care? Salary caps were lifted for the MLS to pull in these kinds of blockbuster names but the league is still far from mainstream. The deal is reportedly worth $250 million, which goes a long way toward explaining why Beckham would come stateside (that and still be in a major media market, L.A.), but what’s the larger story?
‘I don’t think it’s just about glitz,’ U.S. Soccer Federation president Sunil Gulati said. ‘He wants to play on a winning team and be part of a winning organization and help build the game in the United States.’
Admirable, but getting the U.S. to care about soccer might be too big of a task for even the world’s most recognizable player. If the MLS truly wants to become a world-renowned sporting institution, they should start by naming their sport correctly.
It’s “football,” not “soccer.” Soccer is just unfortunate slang that will forever relegate the game to 2nd tier status in the United States. For the beautiful game to ever stand as an equal to the major sports of the U.S., it has to be football to which we also have American Football.
November is crock-pot season.
Whilst the clouds roll in and the leaves and rain begins to fall in earnest, some flee to distant lands whose latitudes graciously bequeath them mild and sun-filled winter days. I do not flee however, I remain. In these short and cold days I remain, white and pasty, and here I start slow cookin.
Today marks my inaugural venture into homemade chili. Last night I had decided chili would be a good way to warm the house and the stomach, and make for some nice comfortable football-watching faire. Time to dust off that rockin’ crocker.
I don’t usually follow recipes, which at times proves to be a tragic methodology, but more often teaches me more about cooking than a cookbook ever could. I certainly don’t bind myself to rigid recipes when crockin’, such would be blasphemy. Can you imagine confining the contents of your crock to nothing but someone else’s sterile list? Worse yet, can you imagine BUYING things for your crock-pot, instead of using it as handy receptacle for ancient booty, plundered via a bold leftovers-raid of the refrigerator?
Neither can I. The crock-pot—it’s your kitchen’s Mr. Fusion. Recipe’s are as confining as roads. (”Roads? When you’re making chili you don’t need roads.”)
Turkey chili is what I decided to make, with the goal of getting robust flavor without the heaviness that frequently comes with beef-based chili. I have to say that my first effort came out quite well, so feel free to duplicate (or likely improve upon) my efforts detailed herein.
To begin your grand, savory, slow-cooked experiment, add the chicken stock and minced garlic to the crock-pot, and set it on it’s most crock-tastic (hottest) setting. Dump the beans in the crock as well.
If your beans are dry, you must soak them overnight before crocking. Also rinse them before you soak them and look for debris, and rinse them after the soak as well. The rinsing is not just for cleanliness, but it also removes a compound that can cause, well, some of that gas so often associated with beans.
Throw your turkey into a saute pan. Don’t worry too much if you sear the heck out of it- that’ll create good de-glazing fodder later. When the turkey is cooked, dump it in the crock.
Dice the onion and mince the celery and carrot. De-glaze the turkey pan with stock from the crock-pot. (Or wine, etc.) Saute the aromatics and add seasoning and spices to taste. (Cumin, chili powder, paprika, s & p.) Again, dump it all in the crock.
Dump the whole can of corn and the whole can of tomatoes into the crock, liquid and all.
And now, this is the (optional) spicy road. I was afraid that all the above ingredients wouldn’t give me enough flavor, so I wanted a little more depth and punch. Enter dried chilies. Throw your dried chilies into a saucepan with water, cover, and cook until soft. Remove the chilies from the hot water and remove the stems and excess seeds. Mince the chillies. (Or, if you have an immersion blender, a rough chop is fine.) Dump them back in the sauce pan an add in your red wine vinegar, brown sugar, honey, and a few more tomatoes. Reduce, then blend up the mixture. Add this sauce to the chili to taste- I needed only about half a cup of the chili-sauce to spice up the pot!
This spicy divergence sounds a bit odd, but worked nicely to thicken the chili and give it much needed color and heat.
There you go, the chili is done when the beans are soft, which could be anywhere between 3 and 6 hours, depending on the crockability of your crocker. Yes, the diligent crock will do the rest of the work for you, so spend the interim watching football or making cornbread, preferably both.
The end result was very tasty—definitely a satisfactory version 1, and just enough to do the wonder that is the crock-pot some justice. In the future I’d like to try and incorporate some other flavor (and mood) modifiers like beer, whisky and coffee. We’ll see where that takes us.
The Northwest has been pummeled by rain in November. Seattle proper has received nearly 10 inches in the past week and a half, while Mount Rainier was recently drenched with 18 inches in 36 hours.
All that new rain on Rainier has to go somewhere, and one of those swollen routes to the sea is the Cowlitz River. The Wish clan has a place in Packwood, which is right on the Cowlitz, so when we heard the river had changed course and swallowed several houses we were alarmed to say the least. Most of the roads into Packwood were knocked out, as was electricity—all of our neighbors were evacuated.
Concrete details started to stream in (pun sort-of intended) when I began to follow the story unfurling on the web. I saw one of our neighbor’s houses on MSNBC:
Photo via MSNBC: Shelley Matchett / Lewis County Sheriff’s Office
And then another terribly unfortunate neighbor:
Photo via MSNBC: Nick George / The Chronicle
From what we’ve heard from FEMA, the Sheriff’s office, and scattered reports from locals we were lucky, and our place is virtually unscathed. We’ll find out for sure soon enough. Just hundreds of feet away whole houses were lost. My heart goes out to them.
Ironically, trees that had grown up on the river bank near our cabin that I had planned on removing last summer may have been what kept the earth together enough to stem the tide.
Federal investigators were set Tuesday to begin an investigation into a fire that ruined about 4 percent of America’s yield of hops, used as flavoring in the brewing of beer and ale.
…Based on an industry official’s estimate of the quantity of hops in the warehouse, the loss could amount to $3.5 million to $4 million. The impact on brewers and beer prices was unclear early Tuesday.
…The United States produces 24 percent of the world’s hops, and about three-fourths of the U.S. crop comes from the Yakima Valley. Hops were a $77 million crop in Washington state in 2004. — CNN
I felt a great disturbance in the Buzz.
As if millions of hops suddenly cried out in terror…and were suddenly silenced.
Some two weeks since an update. I’ll dispel your concern immediately by explaining that my absence has not been because I’ve found a new hobby, succumbed to radiation or anything else more sinister. I’ve been busy.
My sister is now married, (congratulations Mo and Ed! Whoo hoo!), I’ve moved to a new place here in Seattle. This is a lot for me in two weeks. I’ve also been busy trying to ignore the impossible conflict that exists between my life away from a computer and a happy readership. Two examples from the email bin, names withheld:
In case you were wondering those two quotations represent the entirety of their respective email messages. Nothing brings home the disappointment like a heart-felt single line email. I knew I should have left my furniture in the street and my family alone in the church to pen an extra pithy blog post or two.
I’ll be out of town this weekend, but if you’re in Seattle MetBlogs says there’s a pillow fight at the pier. You know how I loves me a good pillow fight.
To Whom It May Concern:
The reason why I have not been updating this website is
None of these are the culprit in the scandal that is my lackluster web performance.
It became clear to me on Friday that my hectic lifestyle is only a ruse—for the real reason I’ve not had time to update this site is because my cell phone is pelting my brain with more radiation than your cell phone.
Apparently way more radiation.
Rad.
Thanks for that little tidbit Ruben. *cough* jerk *cough* I digress into name calling, which is not surprising, surely a sign the radiation is having a profound effect. (As is the chest congestion, no doubt.) After all, I’ve never been reduced to name calling before this day. Ever.
Please don’t get the wrong idea, I love phone calls from friends, family, the occasional nutball who found my phone number on the Internet, or the friend at a bar who didn’t lock their keys and accidentally called the first name in their cell directory; (”Alex” starts with the letter “A.” Curses.) background noise rocks my world.
This post is only to say that once I get my spectacular sister married off (Ed, you are a lucky guy), and I find a new home for my computer (plus me), the updates will be back to normal. Oh, and I’ll need to start shopping for a new cell phone, but whether I get to that point pre-brain-meltage or not is another question all together. I can’t believe Motorola’s marketing strategy is to launch their customers into slow brain death (though arguably this is what all cell phones do, regardless of radiation output), but perhaps it is to cripple them enough mentally that they can’t pen libelous blog posts. Let’s hope for the best.
Maybe my extra radiation will spawn super-human powers like it does in the comic books. Unaided flight would no doubt aid in the house hunt and make me a hit on the wedding dance floor. Again, let’s hope for the best. I think I’d look good in a cape.
What is this, the fourth year in a row I’ve done this? No, it doesn’t get old.
…some fifteen minutes ago:
Gregg: “So how are things, did you get your truck out of the shop?”
Alex: “Things are good, yeah, I have the truck back.”
Glances out office window at the truck parked across the street.
Gregg: “So how did it turn out?”
Pause
Alex: “Funny you should ask about the truck, I just watched someone run into it. Do you mind if I call you back in a few minutes?”
As I walked out of my building the driver asked me in broken English if I could please help her re-park her van, for obviously it was in direct contact with the truck in front of it (mine), and sitting precariously at a 45 degree angle, rear-end still sticking into the street. She was flustered, and clearly nervous about getting behind the wheel again on the steep street.
She had no idea the truck was mine.
“Sure, no problem.” I hopped in her van and quickly re-parked, happy to help.
No damage was done to my truck, but it was a bit stunning (or amusing, or both) to watch a woman and child sheepishly climb out of their van after ramming my vehicle, all while taking part in a phone conversation about the same truck.
Once again the lifestyle choices of Alex Wishkoski prove to be terrifically ahead of the curve.
When I listen to music I listen to albums. I can count the number of singles I’ve bought in my life on a single hand, and have never purchased a song independent of its album online.
I consider a song without its album a quote out of context, or an abstract thumbnail only vaguely resembling the complete image. I believe many artists craft albums as cohesive wholes, and listening to an independent song doesn’t take advantage of the entire work. How many times have you heard someone say, “I bought the album because of that cool song, but the rest of it sucks.” In my world that person (oddly enough) bought an entire album they don’t like with a rogue song in it they do. Go figure.
I do enjoy a clever playlist—there is nothing like a series of songs that carry a beat, emotion, intensity, or even tell a coherent story. A well-crafted playlist can be just as good as any album by itself; for me they serve two different but complimentary purposes. Unfortunately however I rarely have time to create a playlist that is anywhere near my expectations, and much of the software that I have used that attempts to do so somehow falls short. So how did I, serial play-it-straight-through-or-nothin listener turn shuffle-ite?
It started with wanting something fresh and unexpected from my music library, and that’s exactly what it serves up:
These are the first five songs at the top of my current playlist. It’s chaotic, uncrafted, and almost disturbingly eclectic. Sure the shuffle sifts up a lot of tripe from time to time, but do you know what’s fantastic about the shuffle? I have 100 Gigs of music of which I listen to 10. Not anymore.
All Artists > Shuffle > Play
A brief list of a few small things (and a few big ones) that I greatly enjoyed in 2005, in no particular order:
Christmas Crustacean III. Thanks to the Mainers the family again dined on lobster this Christmas Eve. Here’s a fun close up of one of the live ones, pre-pot.
For several local ski hills more snow has been forecast for today (this single day) than the total for last November, December, and January combined. A rockslide early yesterday has caused I-90 to be closed in both directions, meanwhile a fatal accident on already bottlenecked Stevens Pass briefly made snow-covered White Pass the only way to cross the state. Maybe last year’s dry winter precipitated a bit of a rebound?
We’ve come a long way from last winter for sure, when LA’s rainfall doubled Seattle’s. The rain can be tough in the winter but it’s excellent to watch the recovery from last year—we can build a little snow pack and give the fish, the farmers, and the skiers all a bit of a break. I suppose I can sport a rain jacket a few extra weeks this winter for a good cause, but don’t expect me to enjoy it.
74 years ago today Clyde “Upside-Down” Pangborn belly-landed a monoplane in Wenatchee to complete the first nonstop flight across the Pacific Ocean.
On October 5, 1931, Clyde Pangborn (1894-1958) and Hugh Herndon Jr. land in Wenatchee, completing the first nonstop flight across the Pacific Ocean. They are flying a Bellanca Skyrocket monoplane. The flight succeeds in part because Pangborn, a stunt aviator and test pilot, dropped the landing gear into the ocean shortly after takeoff in order to lighten the aircraft. In Wenatchee he successfully belly-lands the airplane, according to plan.
Back on the farm in the waxing years of my adolescence I fondly remember the fateful day I made a brilliant discovery in the back-pages of ragged Popular Mechanics- an ad for a mail order store that carried large machetes for next to nothing. (Under $6.)
Any men reading this that can remember their youth with relative clarity would never balk at the momentous importance of such a find for a young man, but for any others that might be reading this I’ll elaborate: The farm needed machetes as a quick implement to take out the weeds that couldn’t be killed by any other means, and I needed them, well, to chop stuff up. (Mostly things that deserved to be chopped, and a few things that most likely did not.)
Can’t we all remember those quirky mail-order ads? Magic tricks, sea monkeys, and kit helicopters made from lawnmowers to be assembled in your garage overnight (100% safe!) As you might have guessed many of these outfits have slowly died as technology has marched on past the limitations of the postal service and classified advertising, but some have not, some have thrived.
Enter Bud K Worldwide, Incorporated. Once I ordered those copious knives from Bud K (C. 1989), they sent me their multi-paged black and white photocopied catalog, which I profusely drooled over. The catalog didn’t just have machetes, but ninja swords, Rambo knives, and impressive maces, even an occasional throwing star set or battle-axe duo thrown in for good measure. And all at discount prices. It wasn’t just cool, it was silly, and actually flat out amazing that such an array of bizarre weaponry was available at such reasonable prices. Ah America! Home of the brave because of the free.
Just today I’ve just discovered that Bud K has a rather formidable e-commerce presence, so let this be my personal, informal, and slightly tardy welcome to the 21st century for inexpensive good old fashioned wood n’ steel weaponry.
I just caught the second half of NOVA’s Mystery of the Megaflood, and enjoyed it much despite the questionable timing of its release. (Does PBS really have to stoop to this type of pandering for viewership?)
If you don’t recall your geo 101, perhaps the most dramatic flooding of the planet’s history happened right here in the Pacific Northwest—and in the dry part no less.
About 15,000 years ago, in the waning millennia of the Ice Age, a vast lake known as Glacial Lake Missoula suddenly burst through the ice dam that plugged it at one end. In the space of just 48 hours, geologists believe, the collapse sent 500 cubic miles of water cascading across the Pacific Northwest, creating overnight such unusual landscapes as the scablands of eastern Washington.
Having driven the Columbia Gorge and toured the channeled scablands countless sometimes it’s hard to keep perspective on just how unique this area is in the geologic history of the globe. If you’ve never seen either you’re missing something—or you should at least watch the show.
Talk Like a Pirate Day, most austere of holidays, is upon us. Oh the memories… ARR.
For the first time since 1913, select stores in the state of Washington will sell liquor from noon to five this Sunday.
In what marks the end of Prohibition-era liquor bans, Sunday sales of alcohol become legal tomorrow in about three dozen stores around the state.
After failing twice, the Legislature this year passed a law allowing stores to sell hard liquor and other alcohol on Sundays, during restricted hours.
The state’s 154 contract stores — those that are privately run — were offered the chance for Sunday sales, and 35 applied. In September, 20 of the 160 state-owned liquor stores, which have not yet been selected, also will open on Sundays.
Read the partial Seattle Times store list here: Buckley, Cashmere, Cle Elum, Duval, Granite Falls, Sprague, Steilacoom, Washougal, Mossyrock, Twisp.
Apparently first off they’re hitting all the towns where people drink on Sundays regardless?
Not only does the Summit Public House serve many a fine beer, but it’s also Seattle’s de facto Tour de France headquarters. This establishment also just happens to be only a few short feet from my apartment. Primetime coverage on OLN is from 8-11pm—please consider yourself invited. (Ideally let me know you’re going first.)
Speaking of OLN, what a terrible site redesign! How many bajillion Tour fans do they greet with gaudy yellow, gigantic fonts, hideous architecture, and dismal layout? Their site is so bad I can taste it, and sadly it’s nothing like a pint at the Summit.
Other notable June 20th happenings:
This was a fantastic weekend, definitely a great precursor to my birthday tomorrow. Today Dan, Rich, Matt and I met up to watch the Mariners shellac the bejeezus out of the Mets and Tom Glavine. It was a beautiful day at the field and I believe the best possible way I could spend my day recovering from Brandon’s Saturday night bachelor party.
BRed’s shindig began at El Gaucho Seattle (Spanish for, “The Gaucho”), where the prices are not for the faint of heart (entrees $40-$50), but neither is the food. My filet mignot was utterly stunning. I don’t say this lightly but it may have been the best steak I’ve ever had. We began the meal with lobster tails cut tableside, gravlax, short ribs, seared ahi, and oysters on the half. Brandon supplied some truly stunning wine- as a group we spared no expense and not a soul regretted it. Thanks everyone.
Today was my first day back to the Safe for the year. Though it was a disappointing one-run loss to the Rangers (just like last night), I had a great time. Thanks Tim for the tick.
The pic below I snapped from behind the fence down by the bullpen- Gil Meche warming up before the game. Click on the image for a larger pick.
» Britannica in hostile takeover of Wikipedia
If you’re as big a fan of Wikipedia as I am I’m sure you’ll be amused by this. Make sure you scroll down to the “international reaction” with “closet Wikipedian Ziggy Stardust,” keep reading for details on the “new corporate structure” featuring, “Secretariat Joseph ‘Cup of Joe’ Stalin.”
That’s nice work.
It’s been three weeks now since the apartment manager told me the bad news, “you’re showers screwed dude, we gotta yank it.” In a yearly inspection last month it was discovered that a shower two floors below my apartment had some very serious leaks, and sure enough, each shower on each floor above it had the same problems. Thankfully we do have two showers in the apartment, and I am being compensated financially for the gaping hole in my now inoperable bathroom. Still, it’s a huge pain.
Funnier still (I’m laughing on the inside) the plumber (now basically my second roommate though he emphatically declines contributing to rent) told me never to drink the water in our apartment without filtering it. Hmm…now I have a second reason for a Brita pitcher.
I’ve been busy lately but I’ve almost got something to show for it for on Wednesday we’ll be launching BetterDonkey.org, where our fledgling group will have a blogging platform, mailing list and member organization, event calendar, and other fine Web goodies. Guess who designed it? (Needless to say the site will be gorgeous.) February 12th with luck will see our launch party too- all are invited! I’ll e-mail out some specifics when the contract has been signed on the space we’ll be renting. Kegs of extremely inexpensive beer, cases of truly cheap though flavorful wine, good loud music, and good loud people- what more could one want?
Reading…
What elst, thou queries? I’m reading of course: while still awaiting the first issue of MAKE, the book club is on The Devil in White City, and I’ve started chewing on Digital Media Revisited, which was kindly supplied free of charge by NGale.
Tonight while checking the status of a few of my domain names, I ran upon this rather comical post regarding some ill-fated SuperBowl ads. Any company that gets two ads rejected by FOX makes me a proud, proud customer. (Via boing boing) I also saw a few interesting glacier pics of my old stomping grounds of Glacier Bay. Though the photography demonstrates rapid glacial retreat I can attest that at least one glacier in the bay is advancing. (Thus proving science and global warming a complete fallacy.) Also of note in this evenings web-scavanging is an IHT article speaking of the shrinking Google-gap (that’s my name for the superior performance of Google over other search engines). Search could very well be the most drastically changed part of our digital universe in the coming decade, and I’m not just thinking engines here…more on my pie in the sky theories later.
