2010

That pretty much wraps it up for 2010. That also means I've been posting assorted crap here for a full three years now, which is kind of a long time. But you know what they say: time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.

Happy new year.

End of year dog photo.

Brew

Simply stated, I like beer. And in a way, I see beer as a food, and just like food, I would like to be able to make it myself. After some self-education and investing in some equipment, I went ahead and made my first batch. It's an American pale ale and despite a couple minor missteps, it is now sealed and stored, happily fermenting away.

I look forward to sharing a drink with you (in two to four weeks). Until then, happy holidays everyone.


Measuring gravity.

Cookie Exchange

Cathy hosted a cookie exchange the other night which I heard went swimmingly. I don't personally know exactly how it went since I was busy "studying" at the local brewery, but when I got back home I found dozens upon dozens of homemade snacky cakes.

Roughly 4-6 dozen each of 21 varieties. Going from from top-left to right: a white chocolate Oreo truffle and a milk chocolate Oreo truffle, monster cookies, double chocolate cookies, triple chocolate cranberry oatmeal cookies, red velvet cake balls, chocolate cake balls, lemon cake balls, gooey butter cookies, mint chocolate chip cookies, toffee chocolate cookies, cherry thumbprints, peanut butter blossoms, mint brownies, pretzel Rolos, peanut butter mint cookie bars, peanut butter brownies, chocolate hazelnut crinkles, almond spritzer cookies, and almond biscotti. Missing from the photo are the chocolate sugar cookies, apparently all eaten/taken.

Soup

Low temps = more time inside = I make soup. Here's a basic one:


Potato + Leek


= Soup

I don't know. It's a slow month.

First Snow

Got our first snow over the weekend.

It's around this time I start dusting off random projects that I've been neglecting. I look forward to changing it up a bit. Although honestly, I haven't been doing much lately except observing the passage of time...but no big. My go-to excuse for now is that December is kind of a transitional month anyway, as the seasons change, the year ends, it's pre and post-holiday, stuff like that. Yeah.

Morning walk, Chicago River.

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Coppe

Dog Pack is at Full Power

Made my way back to Michigan to get the dogs. My pack is back to full power. Also, on the spur of the moment, my parents decided to jump into the car for a Chicago road trip. It's been good times already and I'm looking forward to the usual cornucopia of eatables at the inlaws' for Thanksgiving. I plan to eat and drink too much and then pass out watching a horrible movie.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. And now for dog photos:


Quentin is an old man. He's about four shades lighter than he was a couple years ago, can barely run down the street without getting winded, and damn, he takes naps like nobody's business now. He's still a complete doofus though: I took this photo after giving him a shower because he decided to seek out a random pile of mephitic compost and roll around in it.


Kya. She's just as old as Q and white hairs are appearing all over her coat at an accelerated pace. Still, I swear she acts younger than she did years ago. Although she did not find and roll around in a pile of shit last weekend, which was good news for me.

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Massi

MI and FL

Ah finally, the scurrying around is done (for now). The past two weeks involved a family get-together in Michigan, a stimulating work conference downstate, a wedding in Florida, and another wedding in Chicago. I'm ready to do nothing for a couple days.


Eric and Seigo, walking back from Pine Lake on a nice Autumn day. My immediate family resides in three different states, so it's rare that we can all see each other at once. Eric/Rie/Seigo were in Michigan for various reasons, en route to Japan, so Cathy and I hustled on over for a quick reunion. It was a good time, as usual.


Shortly after MI, Cathy and I flew down to Florida for Rachel's wedding. Specifically, we went to Amelia Island, part of the chain of the Sea Islands. View from our hotel balcony. We only had a couple days there since we had another wedding back in Chicago, but it was still great fun. It was a bit hectic at first since Cathy was finishing the wedding cake. Yes, she made Rachel's wedding cake, components of which we carefully transported all the way from Chicago. The cake? It was a fondant covered vanilla bean cake with Nutella buttercream frosting (I failed to get a good photo of it, sorry).


They had a cigar roller at the reception. I've never seen this at a wedding, and although I'm not much of a cigar guy, I thought it was a nice touch. I didn't have my camera with me so I took this with my phone. First phone photo I've posted.


Also taken with my phone, the immediate view from the reception area. It's of the salt marsh on the west side of the island as the sun set. Really nice. With this kind of natural beauty, it's hard to take a bad photo even with a crappy phone camera.

Alright, that does it. I now look forward to a week or two of my normal routine. Sweet, sweet, normal routine.

Amsterdam, Netherlands

We got back from Amsterdam a while ago, but Cathy and I have been pretty busy. We're still busy, but I've finally gotten around to looking at my photos from Amsterdam. Now I'm not as...enthusiastic, or passionate maybe, about traveling to Europe as some other people, but I admit I had a great time.


Flag of Amsterdam. We arrived at 9 a.m. Central European Time, and had been basically up for 30 odd hours already. I wasn't sure if I was delirious, excited, or both, but it didn't really matter. We just checked in and started wandering.


There was a lot of walking. Good thing I like walking and the city is pretty much made for walking too. And, as you know, the place is made for bicycles, although we never did get around to renting any...oh well.


Typical canal view, building towards the left is the Bijbels Museum. As for the weather, the forecast the week prior predicted clouds, rain, and more clouds. Needless to say, I was happily surprised when the clouds gave way to blue skies and sun. It stayed that way for most of the trip. Foolish forecasts.


We visited a lot of museums, including the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh (awesome), and a couple photography museums/galleries I was interested in. This one is at Huis Marseille. We also hung out at some parks (mainly Vondel Park), gardens, other random spots.


There was a lot of this. Beers and maps. Between sights, the general rule was to wander into a random cafe or bar, get a beer, and look at the map. Maybe a sandwich. Beers, maps, and a sandwich.


Zuiderkerk, a church. There was a lot to look at just by walking down any random street. I found it all too easy to just wander around and see interesting stuff everywhere I went, especially the architecture.


Ok, that's enough for now. Obviously, there was much more to the visit, but I think you get the idea. Vacation successful.

Going out of town again. We'll be back shortly.

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No wading

North Shore Channel Trail

I went for a bike ride last weekend on the North Shore Channel Trail. It's a paved trail that runs north-south through the city and a couple suburbs, running alongside it's namesake, the North Shore Channel. I leisurely pedaled the length of it, which is about a 25 mile round trip starting from home. It's nothing amazing, but still a nice local ride.


There's a lot of random stuff along the way, including the occasional view of the the channel, which is technically a drainage canal. Now I'm not jumping in anytime soon, but it's basically a small river lined by trees and inhabited by your standard local wildlife. The best part though was that the autumn weather was perfect (for me at least); thermoregulation was not an issue.


The path runs through a sculpture park for a bit in the suburbs. Most of it was relatively underwhelming, but this one caught my attention: Directing Traffic by Victoria Fuller. Humorous.


A juvenile Cooper's Hawk, a common bird of prey to see around here. I was taking a banana break when this guy swooped down and landed on a sign right next to me. Good looking bird. They used to be an endangered species in Illinois but made a great comeback since the DDT ban. I also vaguely remember a National Geographic article stating that the DDT ban is also a big reason the Bald Eagle is not extinct, or at least nearly extinct, in the states.

Alright, that's it for now. We're flying out tomorrow, so I should probably start packing.

Milton Lee Olive Park

A slight lull in activity for now, but Cathy and I are finishing preparations for our trip to Amsterdam next week. Never been there so I'm looking forward to exploring.

I stumbled around Chicago for a couple days last week to kill time and get used to the new camera, but also because the autumn weather has been so swell.


Hancock from Milton Lee Olive Park - a really nice, but somewhat ignored, park.

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It's between the pumpkin shed and whiskey hut

Anniversary

One year, done.

We decided to lay low since we'll be taking an anniversary vacation later this month. We did, however, make a nice dinner together, including spice-roasted Cornish hens with cucumber-yogurt sauce, cauliflower soup with toasted cumin and lime...and of course, defrosted one-year old wedding cake for dessert. I guess it's some sort of tradition to save the top tier and eat it a year later. Seems a bit odd to me, but whatever, it still tasted good.


Tastes kind of like commitment.

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Couch

Temporary Doglessness

As the annual tradition seems to go, I'm dogless once again. Cathy and I have a lot of random traveling coming up for the next several weekends; dogsitting services were needed. So they're at my folks' place for now, where I'm sure many walks, naps, and treats will be had.


I let old man Q sleep on the couch the day before leaving.


Kya, giving me her best impression of an owl.

m4/3

About two years ago, I briefly noted that Olympus had announced the Micro 4/3 (m4/3) standard. The rest of this post is yawn inducing so feel free to check out anytime, but like I said before, it's essentially Olympus DSLR quality with a smaller body. I bought into Olympus SLR 4/3's format despite its major shortcomings since the good parts fit my uses, the bad parts didn't matter too much, and I subjectively like Olympus, having used their venerable OM-4 long ago. I recently decided to buy into m4/3 as my "compact" camera for similar reasons.


A standard m4/3 setup is smaller than my most used 4/3 lens. Certain limitations mean it won't replace my brick yet, but m4/3 has a place with me. A natural feature of m4/3 and similar formats is a shorter flange-to-film distance, allowing the effective use of many legacy lenses. I've seen nice results using old OM, Voigtländer, and even CCTV lenses. I won't be screwing around with that for now though, I just look forward to traveling with the thing.

*the photo is a m4/3 E-P2 with 14-42mm 3.5-5.6 kit lens, compared to a 4/3 12-60mm 2.8-4 (which has some grime on it).

NCT > Manistee River Trail

So I did as I planned and did an overnighter through the Manistee National Forest. I started on the epic North Country Trail and zigzagged north for a ways (the NCT actually runs all the way from New York to North Dakota). I eventually split off and connected to the north end of the Manistee River Trail, and hiked back south until it ended conveniently exactly where I started. I've done this exact loop a couple times now, it's good for a random weekend. Minor elevation changes, maybe 20-25 miles in all.


This portion of the NCT is well-maintained and is a basic hike through a hilly forest. Pictured Rocks, where I hiked with Nick last month (1, 2), is actually part of the NCT too. Anyway, it had rained the prior night and the day was cool and overcast, so conditions were...damp and grayish, I guess. It made for a peaceful hike.


A massive collective of shelf fungus on the NCT. The NCT segment was relatively uneventful, as expected. It's "close" to the Manistee River, but it's not riverside, making it not as popular as the MRT segment which hugs the river closely. So even though I didn't run into anyone yet, I knew that would change. Thankfully, I wasn't in any particular rush, so I scoped out a nice isolated campsite immediately after finding the river and relaxed for the rest of the day.


The forecast predicted a big cold front would be pushing through all weekend, so I was prepared for a chilly night. It ended up dropping down to around 35 degrees overnight, accompanied by a steady breeze. It was fine though, since generally I'd rather be a bit cold than a bit hot.


Woke up early the next morning to major fog, which I figured would be the case. You can see the footpath which connected my campsite to the river, which was totally obscured. I was glad I didn't have to wade around in the river that morning, having filtered extra water the day before. Also, I just noticed this photo was taken in the same spot as the above photo, except looking towards the ground a bit more.


All this talk about the river, and not one photo of it yet. So here you go. After an hour or so of hiking, the fog started to lift and the sun was trying to break through.


I think the MRT is a great Lower Peninsula trail and offers some really pleasant scenery. Views of the river and surrounding forest, while standing high on a cut bank, are common. It has gotten a bit more popular, which is understandable, but overall it's still chock full of good times. I'll be back for sure.

Hike and Hogback

Throwing together a solo overnighter in the Manistee National Forest, a forest I've hiked in many times. I was there earlier this season (here, there) but this time I'll be more inland, near the Manistee River. I used to go there a lot when I lived in Michigan, which was about seven years ago. I was looking through some old shit for a photo of the trail when I found some older shit from at least nine years ago which I scanned:


35mm of Mike and me on one of the various "peaks" at Hogback Mountain, near Marquette, MI. I'm pretty sure Chuck took the photo. Hogback isn't terribly tall, but it's steep, it's the only tall thing out there, and you get a near 360 degree view. I remember the night was nice so I chose to sleep without a tent on a relatively large flat area on a peak. I woke up a couple hours later to find that I had rotated and rolled 30-40 feet towards the edge of a large cliff, now only about 10 feet away. Now that would've been unfortunate.

Cake?

What is that?


A diaper cake? I've never heard of it until Cathy made one for her friend's baby shower. When I first saw it from a distance I wanted to taste it, then I got closer and realized it was made of baby rearing items and no longer wanted to taste it.

Just thought I'd share. Have a good weekend.

Labor Day

What did you do during the holiday weekend? My presence was required here in Chicago so I never made it more than 15 miles from home. I still had a good time though, enjoying the locality, spending time wandering the city on foot and bicycle. It's a favorite hobby of mine; wandering.


I covered a lot of ground but I didn't find much. Then again, I wasn't really trying to find anything at all. I did take two meaningless photos. This is one of them.

Right now? Currently tossing around ideas for a hike sometime soon, probably just an overnighter. Not sure where but that's not important right now.

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Dive

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Thanks, I guess.

Boos Blocks

Well, not too much going on these days, considering the one thing I'm "excited" about right now are my new cutting boards. I've been using crappy boards for a long time now and after great deliberation, I settled on two big 24x18 maple edge grains. I got them from John Boos & Co., which makes excellent boards and as a bonus (to me at least), both were made in Illinois, just a couple hours away. Actually, most of their stuff is made in Illinois, and all of it is made in the USA.


If I ever made my own board, I'd use the better-performing end grain - but I decided against it this time around since it would've been something like four times the weight and price. Considering I'll probably be dicing white onions and not white truffles on these things, I think it's a reasonable compromise.

Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, Part 2

Ok, let's finish up Pictured Rocks.


A significant amount of Pictured Rocks is composed purely of sandstone. It's the whole reason Pictured Rocks is what it is. The workability (I don't know the correct term) of the rock lends itself to: (1) the creation of some interesting geologic features; and (2) vandalism. For example, here are some holes that have been created by the waves of Lake Superior, and to the left are the initials of some people who, well, don't seem to get it...


Nickbot examining the underside of Chapel Rock, another of the many weathered sandstone features in the park.


This was a first for me. Nick had been growing some peppers back home and brought along a bag of fresh jalapeños. We generally added some into whatever flash-frozen dehydrated bag of stuff we were eating at the time. Besides the obvious amusement factor of dicing a fresh jalapeño on the beach while backpacking in the Upper Peninsula, it added a surprising amount of flavor and some nice heat to the food. Good stuff.


Not much to say here...just soaking in a real nice view of some of the very cliffs that give Pictured Rocks its name.


Kayaker, waiting for the sunset. I've never kayaked my way around the park, but it looks like a lot of fun...might add it to my long list of things to do.

Anyway, that's just a handful of the many highlights of the trip but I think you get the idea. It was great fun. I hope to get back out there soon.

Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, Part 1

So like I said, I got back last week from backpacking Pictured Rocks with Nick. I've been there a couple times, and it's not the best if you're looking for pure solitude or challenging trails, but there aren't many places that offer lakeside cliff-top hiking where you can relax on a beach every night. We hiked about 36 miles in four days, skipping the Great Sable Dunes portion. It was great fun. Here are a couple of the many photos I took:


Packed up, ready to go. We spent the prior night trying to sleep at an unexpectedly busy rest stop (I was curled up under a picnic table), so needless to say I couldn't wait to get started. Anyway, one of the practical benefits of hiking with someone is sharing the weight, since a lot of gear works for more than one person, like fuel, stoves, water filters, etc. This time around, Nick carried the kitchen, I carried the house.


Nick strolling down Twelvemile Beach (it is indeed 12 miles long) near our first campsite. A dip in a somewhat chilly Lake Superior is a perfect way to end (and start) a hot day's hike. You can see the cloud cover moving in here, which was later followed by a good overnight rain - all of which was expected after scrutinizing weather forecasts during the entire preceding week. It wasn't bad at all, except that we later discovered that the rain fly on my two-man tent (roughly 10 years old) was quite leaky. Chinese water torture all night long.


Much of the trail is cliff-side but most of it still involves winding your way along a typical forest trail. Pictured Rocks is heavily visited and lacks a real trail network, so the main trail is well-worn, well-maintained, and pretty easy on the feet. All good or bad things depending on who you ask.


Like most responsible hikers, I generally abide by the Leave No Trace ethic, like purposefully minimizing the evidence/damage that a fire or shelter creates, packing out your trash, and leaving the natural things I do find. Besides Leave No Trace though, I also have a general policy of picking up any garbage I encounter, which Nick also has a natural affinity for. Besides the piles of cigarette butts, wrappers, and duct tape we scooped up throughout our hike, we also found a stray beach ball floating around a cove. Nick killed it and packed it out.


Nickbot in Lake Superior.

More to come.