Kapowell

Tapping

2011-03-14T00:00:00+00:00

Tapping

Maine

14 March 2011 – Castine, Maine

So our humble first attempts at tapping birch trees were a failure this year. That is to say, we only failed for the time being. Seems birch and maple do not keep the same schedules. This is a good thing, as it happens.

After scouring the woods across the road from our house, we finally managed to positively identify one maple by the leaves on the ground. That set a big machine in motion, as we can now tell maples from oaks at a pretty good distance. With nothing impedding our tapping endeavour now, we managed to find a stand of about six maples on our own property and likely plenty more as we throughly investigate our neighbors property with our new found knack for spotting true maples.

So we sank some taps this evening, eight by my count. We’ll pick up more and, though we’re late in the season, if we even get two or three full barrels from these taps (each holding a gallon) that will likely at least meet our maple syrup consumption for the year. Pretty cool, really. Now, to find a way to efficiently turn 40 gallons of sap into 1 gallon of syrup…

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Finnegan arrives

2011-03-11T00:00:00+00:00

Finnegan arrives

Animals

11 March 2011 – Castine, Maine

Well, here it is Friday, March 11 and while we knew at some point we’d have to plant seeds, the snow just looked like it wasn’t going anywhere. Then we have back to back torrential rain storms and, poof, we can see grass again. Of course, being able to see the grass isn’t the only change around here. As you can tell from the title of this post, Finnegan has come to stay for good. Timberwyck Farm does nothing if not keep you on your toes.

Finnegan meets the chickens

After hoping out of the car, Finnegan’s M.O. was to poop and then say hello to all the fellow animals on the farm. While E.B. White could probably have written some decent dialog to go alone with the introductions, we’ll suffice to say Finnegan is “okay” with everyone. The sheep and goats seemed to freak him out less than the pigs, though he even got some good sniffs in with Gertrude in her pen. He also snuck into the barn and spooked the chickens good. We’ll have to work to make sure he understand that those are our chickens and not food.

While he’s been amped up pretty well since he got in, we’ve seen a mellow side to him a few times and think he should settle down to be a pretty easy going pooch. The separation from his old home was difficult, and we’ve vowed to keep his previous mom and dad in the loop with what’s going on. But so far so good at Timberwyck, Finnegan has a new home now and we’ll be trying to make it a nice, easy transition.

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Baba's House

2011-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

Baba’s House

Family

08 March 2011 – Chicago, Illinois

We just got back from a visit to Baba’s house in Chicago. Lacking the means to take a quick trip out on our own and lacking the time to take a long trip out, my mom graciously helped us with the flight, all we had to do was bring Jane, and ourselves, I suppose. But really Jane was the big attraction. On our end, we also got to see Nori, Jane’s cousin, who is almost exactly 11 months older. Jane and Nori got along swimmingly. Nori also provided a wonderful preview of where Jane is headed.

All in all, the trip was wonderful. We got to hang out and chat a lot. Checked out the Lincoln Park Zoo on a beautifully overcast, but balmy, March day, visited with some old college friends briefly, saw Papaw very briefly out in the burbs, and finally walked around and took a ton of photos at the Garfield Park Conservatory with my niece, sister, brother and brother-in-law.

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Finn the Dog

2011-02-23T00:00:00+00:00

Finn the Dog

Family

23 February 2011 – Castine, Maine

So we may or may not be adding a member to the family. Okay, we are, but it’s easier to swallow if it’s still only a possibility and not a certainty. We took Finnegan for a test drive today, hiking up Blue Hill mountain. It was a beautiful, clear day for a hike and the path had been well worn by other hikers before us. Barring our ignorance of proper picking-up-after-your-dog etiqutte, the whole day was a smashing success.

Peter and Sam are up visiting us for February break as well, so they got some exercise and we call got some quality time together not spent watching a movie. It was great.

Finn is a labradoodle, though his current owners noted that neither the hypoallergenic nor the non-shedding elements of the poodle came through. What did come through are massivly tall legs. Apparently his father, the poodle part, was huge, and Finn is too. He’s one of the tallest dogs I’ve seen short of a great dane.

He has plenty of energy, and hopefully will do well on the farm. Actually, one of our bigger fears about having a dog on the farm was allayed by, of all things, a chance encounter on the trail. A fellow, whom we know through other means, was walking his two dogs and explained how he doesn’t have leashes, but instead a little shock collar connected to a remote control. Now, everyone has their own moral feelings about shock collars, but I grew up with three dogs and an invisible fence, and I can honestly tell you that while it’s painful the first time they learn, it’s not so much a pain issue after that as a respect. Anyway, the remote allows you to give them varying degrees of shock as a reminder to stay near you, avoid other dogs, or, in our case, stay out of the road. Personally I’d much rather have Finn take a mild shock to the neck than get hit by a car.

Regardless, we have a back up plan of just keeping him in the backyard. And since our backyard is actually 3 acres of pasture, it should be more than enough entertainment. We’ll see what we end up with. In the meantime, we’ll be picking him up after a jaunt out to Chicago to visit Baba and Papaw, a trip which Emma and I are really excited about.

An now, a few more photos from our adventure today:

Finn and the family!

Word!

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Spruce beer and lagering

2011-02-06T00:00:00+00:00

Spruce beer and lagering

Homebrew

06 February 2011 – Castine, Maine

I’ve been pulled in a many different directions lately. Between crunches at the newspaper, web projects pilling up, a 7-month old baby girl and a farm covered in an ever-increasing blanket of snow, it really should come as no surprise.

That being said, this weekend things finally slowed down a little and I got to address a pet project: beer. While I sat down to lager, what I ended up with was a five-gallon carboy of Canadian lager and a one-gallon carboy of spruce beer. Spruce beer? It was used by Captain Cook in New Zeland to provide his crew with scurvy-defeating vitamin C.

Scouring the internet for ideas, I finally just gave up looking for a specific recipe and settled on boiling about 2 cups of molasses and a quarter pound of small branches from a black spruce tree. At least I think it was a black spruce. It certainly wasn’t a balsam fir, which was the first tree I tried to prune and managed to positively identify it as not a spruce.

The one source I could find online said that the straight molasses beer was very much an aquired taste. Be that as it may, I tasted some of the wort before pitching the yeast and it was delicious, if a little bitter. I did a light hopping at the end of a 45 minute boil and then added cold water to get it down to a good pitching temperature and added a basic Safbrew ale yeast. Now we wait and see.

On the upside, I only made a gallon and it only takes a handful of days to ferment before bottle conditioning for another four or five days. Then we’ll see how undrinkable or delightful it is. Really, I’m just stoked to have found a beer recipe that can be made with all local ingredients. I know I could source barley locally and then roast it myself, but did you see my list of things to do above?

My next project will be to try all kinds of evergreen steeped beers. You can use the new growth buds on a spruce to make a fresher, more wintergreen beer, supposedly. Then there’s that balsam I cut accidentaly. Supposedly it works as a flavor, but you have to drink it fairly early in the conditioning process.

And finally, I’ve decided to try tapping some our white birches. While making syrup from the sap would take about a million gallons of propane (we’re talking a 100:1 ratio of syrup to sap…one gallon of syrup from 100 gallons(!) of sap), you can use the sap, with some dextrose added, to make a very traditional New England birch beer. Again, it supposedly has a very wintergreen flavor to it. I can’t wait till the sap runs!

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Django media test files solved

2010-10-12T00:00:00+00:00

Django media test files solved

Technically Unimportant

12 October 2010 – Castine, Maine

For a while now I’ve been working on some fairly involved projects at work. In fact, they are all loosly coupled django applications. When I want to test the site, I load up whatever applications I’m working on, syncdb and runserver. Things work pretty well, now, but that’s only becuase I finally figured out what to do with my static files.

By static files, I mean applications files that are uploaded as a result of user inputs. Static css and images are easy and never too big. But when you’re submitting a 20-photo gallery as test data, we don’t want that to wind up in the git repository.

Enter Dropbox. While I tend to like to roll my own solutions to technical problems, dropbox is really too slick to pass up. Whether I’m developing on my Dell mini10 or the iMac at the office, all I have to do is wire up a few symlinks from my dropbox project media folder to my working media folder for the given application and voila, all my fixtures work like a charm.

I’m sure there are other ways to set this up, more svelt for sure. But this is a trillion times better than storing them in the repository and at least ten times better than scp-ing tarballs across my various development boxes.

More on my django development environment in another post.

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Old skool

2010-09-09T00:00:00+00:00

Old skool

Banalties of Life

09 September 2010 – Castine, Maine

I’m rocking out to Goldfinger this evening. You know, the ska/punk/alt-rock band from the late 90s… Yeah, according to wikipedia they’re still recording, but I don’t believe it. They reached their apex to me on their debut album with tracks like “King for a Day” and “Here in Your Bedroom.”

Rocking out to music that I listened to in middle school gives me pause to wonder what the word “better” really means. Has better music been produced since Goldfinger and the rest of the corral of ska/punk bands I listened to when I was knee-high to a grasshopper? Sure, why not? Do I listen to more “sophisticated” music now? Probably not. I’m a bigger fan of bluegrass and true country music than I was back then. But I still like to rock out to Bad Religion, Sex Pistols, Op Ivy, Ruth Ruth, Animal Chin, and, alas, even Goldfinger. The music hasn’t gotten worse.

Which, of course, begs the questions of whether art can be qualitatively better or worse than art that came before it. Most intelligent people (and people who think too much) will realize the nonsense of that question. A quick tour through Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance could do a 500% better job of explaining my point. But for the sake of brevity, I’ll just say that quality, that is, better-or-worse-than comparisons, serves to unravel the order of human conciousness.

Needless to say, the above rant is only loosely related to punk music. Mostly it serves to underscore why I still love rocking out to music I listened to when I was 16. ’Cause it rocks, obviously. Now get outta my way. Here comes Reel Big Fish!

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Collaboration

2010-09-06T00:00:00+00:00

Collaboration

On Tech

06 September 2010 – Castine, Maine

Since I started a web development and tech consulting business a few months ago, one thing that became rapidly apparent was the difficulty managing a complex and changing project using only email, phone and meetings to coordinate, especially when the client is not within easy driving distance.

The problem is, phones interrupt the day. Very few people are masters of the one-issue-and-hang-up routine, and so phone calls often devolve into catch-up sessions, when they were only supposed to be about business. Emails back and forth work alright, but it’s difficult to manage responsibility when the best you can come up with is, “I think I mentioned that back in August…” Lastly, in-person meetings, while wonderful, are also a bit of a time sink, taking at least as much time to organize and get to as the amount of work they usually accomplish.

That said, each of these communication styles have their pluses. I’m not saying I’ve found a solution that replaces them, but I have finally found something that strikes a middle ground very well. The answer? Teambox

Effectively, it’s an open-source version of Basecamp . That’s the best part. I’ve often admired basecamp, but 1) it’s pay-to-play, and I was never sure I’d actually use it and 2) I much prefer to own my data and manage my own backups, thank you very much. So now I’ve got an installation of teambox running on one of VPS boxes, and I couldn’t be happier. I only wish I could get some of my previous clients on board, but the need is just not that great.

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Diatomaceous earth

2010-09-02T00:00:00+00:00

Diatomaceous earth

02 September 2010 – Castine, Maine

Our cat has worms. He eats a lot of dead things. Things he has killed. They’re probably not great for him, then again we don’t really have a mouse problem anymore. But now we have a worm problem. So, DE to the rescue.

To those of you not in the know, DE is a type of sedimentary rock that is responsible for much of the world’s atmospheric dust. Eons ago, when much of the world was submerged, tiny grasses coverd much of the shallows. When this stuff all died — and there was a lot of it — layers of rock that once were confused with limestone were left.

What does this mean for us, here in the 21st century? Well, it turns out that DE, being microsopic and wicked jagged on it’s edges, makes for a beautifully deadly powder to tiny insects. What insects it does not affect with it’s jaggedness, it sufocates, as it is also colossaly porous and, as a result, dehydrating. While the jagged edges are far too small to affect macro animals like us, or dogs, we can see the effects of it on our skin. Just stick your hand in a barrel of DE, I dare you. Your hands will feel awful and dry for the rest of the day.

Despite the adverse reactions to your hands, DE is a wonderful substance. Our pigs, sheep, goats and cats are eating it right now. Some people even swear by a glass of water with a teaspoon mixed in before each meal. Our pigs are already looking healtier, and hopefully our cat can kick this tapeworm.

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Food safety

2010-09-01T00:00:00+00:00

Food safety

01 September 2010 – Castine, Maine

A hearty welcome to September. This being the beginning of what was once a very exciting and important season in most American cities, I feel the need to address a cancerous growth on this country: the consolidation of our rights to food.

Thanks to Commissioner Marc Sarnoff of Miami, Florida for sparking this fire.

Much like a war on terrorism implicitly requires government control over individual liberties related to population movement, a war on unsafe or harmful food requires government control over individual liberties related to food movement. In Miami, and elsewhere in the country as the article linked above points out, it is now, or will soon, be illegal to feed the homeless without a government license. So help you god if you hand over your leftovers to someone as you exit a restaurant. That’s an offense that could carry a hefty penalty.

The best part of the whole argument is that food safety is largely being used as a bait-and-switch to cure affluent communities of the homeless problem. I’m personally not sure which is worse. But I can tell you that being honest about not wanting someone begging on your corner would be far better than legislating away human generosity.

The problem with masquarading a solution to homelessness with a call to keep people safe from the potential of bad food is that it provides false testimony in the case against the free exchange of food. It presupposes that the poor homeless people, having no way to vet the quailty of food given to them, might fall victim to the horrors of malice or ignorance. In the process, it builds a wall to providing one of the most basic needs to those most in need.

Believe me, no one wants to see a homeless shelter, run without a government license, to serve tained food and have everyone fall ill and possibly die. But the problem is that his happens even in the presence of impressive government oversight. Ignorant or malicious people will find a way.

In the meantime, the individual right to food is trod under foot. In the article linked above, the author makes a loose list of the rights that have already been taken away, largely because the American people are losing touch with producers and with their faith in the quality of their food.

The solution to this problem, as I see it, will not be easy. Corporate farms and commoditized food has worn a deep rut through our culture, and most people will not be comfortable leaving. But how many egg recalls do we have to watch to realize that you cannot legislate safe food? Government oversight can fall victim to the same mechanisms a small farmer can, namely underfunding and ignorance. The only difference is in the scope of the problems they create.

Keep food on small farms and with local distributors and a village, county or state may fall victim to sanitation issues from time to time, but the country as a whole will continue to sustain itself. Know thy farmer, know thy food. That’s what I say.

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The Sun Sets in Castine

2010-08-31T00:00:00+00:00

The Sun Sets in Castine

31 August 2010 – Castine, Maine

Walking down Water Street yesterday the sunlight was not to be believed. I had other things to do and places to be, so I didn’t really get any very go positions to capture it on the water. Regardless, I think they capture well one of my favorite times of year, as summer meets fall.

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Learning by Kahn

2010-08-30T00:00:00+00:00

Learning by Kahn

30 August 2010 – Castine, Maine

Have you heard of Kahn Academy ? You should, at least if you have an interest in learning some of the most basic (and often mildly advanced) math and science principals. An
ex-hedge fund manager sits in his Silicon Valley home and scribbles math problems by scribbling on a surface that is really no more advanced than MS Paint.

The thing about it: He’s really, really clear, doesn’t try to be cute, and helps you understand. Oh, and his videos follow standard school curricula so you can follow along and practicaly move through a high school algebra or pre-calculus class in front of your computer.

This is great.

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Satchmo store and UPS shipping

2010-08-28T00:00:00+00:00

Satchmo store and UPS shipping

28 August 2010 – Castine, Maine

Do you know how much it costs to ship 12 bottles of spice, each weighing about half a pound?$134. Or at least, so says Satchmo. By default, the UPS module loads all the shippable items into separate packages before whisking your information off to UPS XML look-up land. When it returns, you get the horrible result above.

My solution? A quick hack to the Satchmo code (which I’m sure, if I was better at signals would have been possible without a source hack). Anyway, the resulting code looks something like this:

In satchmo/apps/shipping/modules/ups/shipper.py, just wrap the old shippingdata dict in an else loop that never gets hit and make sure we always use the one-package lookup. You can view the code in a fork of satchmo on bitbucket.

Then all you have to do is hack the templates/shipping/ups/request.xml file and toss this in where the package gets put together. I created the fork because all the google search on this subject came up with discussions from 2008, when a few people apparently solved the problem but no one wrote it down. So now it’s in a fork, hopefully to be merged into the maineline satchmo.

Really, I’m just still bitter because it’s 2 a.m., and all the search results for this problem showed it was first addressed in 2008. That’s two years for a simple “should all items ship in separate packages or one big one,” boolean switch in the UPS module configuration. In fact, that code already exists in the Fedex module.

~~-When I have more time perhaps I’ll un-hack this change and actually propose a patch. That is how open-source is supposed to work right?~~-

Correction, patch submitted!

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Jane, a person

2010-08-27T00:00:00+00:00

Jane, a person

27 August 2010 – Castine, Maine

Yesterday was a good day. Emma was glowing by the time bedtime came. Over the past week or so, Jane really seems to be becoming less an infant and more a person. The edges of her mouth turn up ever so slightly when we are doing something she enjoys, like having her diaper removed, or being presented with a nipple. At night, when she gets hungary, instead of crying, she inches her way towards Emma’s back like a little silk worm, gently nuzzling her until Emma turns and gives her what she needs.

While I have been back to work, really since she was born, I have still been playing a pretty active role in this early time. I can’t fathom having to work full, 40-hour weeks during these first precious few months. So much changes everyday, I’d miss it all.

A few days ago I finally got a rare glimpse of what Emma saw a lot of in those early days. With me being a night owl, Emma has taken a number of photos with me snuggled close to Jane. But this time it was she who slept late, and I, having my camera close at hand, was ready. They are adorable. I couldn’t be happier than I am right now, even just looking back at the photo:

On Wednesday, Jane got to meet her Great-Grandfather Marc. He has been dealing with memory loss associated with Alzheimers for a number of years now, but his face lit up when he saw his great-granddaughter. I was unable to be there, but Emma said she got teary eyed watching him play with her little feet and smile.

So things are going well. Jane’s still a great little eater, and she continues to put on weight. Two weeks ago she was 11 pounds, so there’s no telling where she’s at now. All I know is she’s getting harder to walk in circles with at 2 a.m. Last night I felt as though my arm was going to fall off. Though some nights are longer than others, I am blessed with a terrible memory, so I treat every night as though it might be the one where she drifts off to sleep in the car on the way home and doesn’t wake up until her midnight feeding.
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Deployment

2010-08-26T00:00:00+00:00

Deployment

On Tech

26 August 2010 – Castine, Maine

One thing I have discovered over the past month is that successful deployment is the result of having to do it many, many times. I remember a story about how Michael Jordan used to visualize taking jump shots to improve his form because the mere act of thinking about the perfect shot helps your body perform the perfect shot.

I’ve been shuffling servers around for the past week. Part of it is migrating away from Slicehost which, despite still providing a great service, has not managed to keep up with it’s chief competitors. There are plenty of places to hear about how SH has dropped the ball recently. While they still provide good services in many respects, their price/features ratio just dropped below what I’m comfortable with.

Drama of VPS hosts aside, the switch to Linode and away from some of the low-end boxes I’ve been using has meant getting really familiar with my various setups. From Django for most of my client projects, to Rails for Teambox and good old PHP for RoundCube and Pwiki, there are a lot of moving parts. Thankfully the deployment process seems to be getting less painful.

My django deployment process has been evolving for a while, and this was the first test of how flexible it is as I had to move four sites to the new VPS. The method worked admirably and I may do a post on it eventually (though in fairness it’s just cobbled together from a number of other methods people have already put forward).

The moves have also, and this is the point of this whole post, demonstrated how much smoother things get with frequency. And I am a person who loves smoothness. I know plenty of people who leave a mess behind them whenever they do something, but I like everything neat and tidy. I’ve finally found ways to setup a VPS, install the needed packages, and deploy whatever service I am hoping to run, be it web app, email, or git hosting.

Perhaps I’ll do some posts about the various server setups at some point…

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Changes in blogging

2010-08-26T00:00:00+00:00

Changes in blogging

Banalaties of Life

26 August 2010 – Castine, Maine

Between discovering posterous and discovering jeykll, I feel as though I’m being pulled in too many directions. Jeykll is beautifully simple, but in very different ways from posterous’ beautiful simplicity. So I’m going to try to continue to use both. Mostly, posterous will be for photo and video blogging, as there’s no simple way to get photos up with jeykll besides uploading to flickr and then linking to the flickr photo upload.

On the other hand, I just can’t bring myself to “blog” with email. Sending off an email to myself about myself just seems weird. So long form blogging about what’s going on in Maine and on our farm will continue to take place on kapowell.com, but instead of some duct-taped django blog, it will simply be powered by jeykll. No more onerous settings or database juggling, just commit and upload.

Right now this blog is only hosted at github, but I’m doing some server shifting right now and will get kapowell to hook up to it soon. In the meantime, watch out. The post detail page on kapowell.com has been substantially degraded to make porting the archive of posts over to jeykll.

Bare with us as we transition. Though I don’t think I have all that many followers these day so it shouldn’t be much of an issue.

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Voisins

2007-05-18T00:00:00+00:00

Voisins

France

18 May 2007 – Besançon, France

God bless neighbors. I think there was something written in the Bible about the importance of good neighbors, or maybe that was on the commandments … in which case I suppose it’s trying to ward off bad neighbors. Well, whatever the case, Emma and I have been encountering one piece of bad news after another, so it seems only fitting that all the good news should come piled up on our last few days in Besancon and France.

First, the two pieces of bad news. Emma and I are flying home via Dublin. The cheapest fares to the States are out of Ireland, which makes sense, and on Tuesdays. The cheapest fare we could find to get us to Dublin from France is out of Grenoble, of all places, for tomorrow on Ryanair. Now, we’ve flown easyjet before, but not Ryanair, and we certainly didn’t have as much luggage when we flew from Rome to Basel. I’d heard that the limit on Ryanair’s checked baggage was 15 kilos per bag, quite a bit lighter than the 50 lbs allowed by most domestic carriers in the States. Well, upon further inspection, Ryanair only allows 15 kilos PER-PERSON! Shit. Each kilo which goes over that is an extra 8 euros. Let’s see, that puts our baggage in at about 300 euros. These budget airlines do not cater to people on big trips …

So that was some hard news, but not to worry, our landlord said he was interested in buying all our furniture off of us and renting a furnished apartment in the future. That would be an extra 600 euros, plenty to pay for our luggage.

Enter Monday. Our landlord shows up to talk about some of the end of the lease things: last payment, electric bill, actual check-out date. He shows up to this meeting with a potential tenant who takes a look around and decides he doesn’t want the furniture. Wait, what was that? I didn’t quite hear you. We’re leaving at the end of the week, and you’ve decided you don’t want the place furnished, rather you want us to get our stuff out in six days so that the apartment is as clean as we found it. Well fuck me.

So two huge pieces of hold-your-head-in-hands-and-cry bad news. What can you do but make posters, put them up around town and pray that they work quickly, very quickly. Of course, Thursday is a bank holiday, so not a lot of people are going to be out and about looking for used furniture … Since it really was all we could do, I thought that perhaps someone in our building would want to buy things and stuck a poster down at the bottom of the stairwell. We wait a couple hours and one of neighbors comes a-knocking. “Do you still have that chair for 30 euros?”

“Um, sure.”

“Excellent, I’ll be back with cash around … is 5 good?”

“Fantastic.”

This was on Wednesday. The next day, a bank holiday, mind you, a couple other neighbors stop in to inquire about the couch and maybe even the table and chairs. At this point our one poster has succeeded beyond our wildest dreams. In fact, nintey per cent of our furniture hasn’t even left the building. We didn’t get as much money for it as we would have from our landlord, but this was a FIRE (sale), so we expected to take a loss and really just wanted someone, anyone to come take our stuff.

Only one thing was sold to non-voisins. Our bathroom scale was sold to a nice guy from the CLA in town (a center for applied languages). He haggled me down to four euros from five, so there was even some comedy after the tragedy.

We’ll be back in the States before our next post. So if this space stays stagnant for more than a week or so, you should probably assume the worst. Thanks to everyone who’s followed us through our adventures in France, and I promise to have some more wrap-up appropriate material once we’re safe and sound in Chicago.

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Returning

2007-05-09T00:00:00+00:00

Returning

France

09 May 2007 – Besançon, France

So we cut our vacation by a day. The decision was based mostly on our states of mind, but I’m sure the weather forecast and finances played their part in creating those states. Also, it turns out that Munich doesn’t have a whole lot of really obvious tourist sites, so on a rainy day you can’t just jump in a museum (especially when you’re strapped!) because each museum may have one or two things that’s actually interesting. For example, I would have loved to see the small collection of Klimts at the Leopold Museum, but the rest of the works there reeked of “filler” or “personal taste only” matter. Given our financial situation on this trip, it just wasn’t worth it. And we are tired of traveling.

Yes, it’s official. We’re ready to come home. I can’t really speak for Emma, but I am very excited to start doing work that will lead to a happy and stable life in the future. France, for all its splendor and entertainment, was really just a place-holder, and we knew that going into it. We’ve learned a lot, especially about the French language and people, and we’ve seen a lot. But the party’s over and it’s time to get down to business. We have a lot to do when we get home, and not much time to do it.

I’ll try to post with some details of our trip in the next few days, especially getting some photos on-line. For now, sit tight and let your breath out, as we survived a couple of near disasters on the road (none fatal, mind you) and are sitting safely in Besancon for the next ten days.

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A Friend in Innsbruck

2007-04-30T00:00:00+00:00

A Friend in Innsbruck

France

30 April 2007 – Besançon, France

So here we are, in Budapest with not a lot of money to our names, and nights are slow. So I better just give a little peak into our travels thus far.

We travelled for a long time on a train, going through Basel and Innsbruck on our way to Salzburg. In Innsbruck a really nice women got on with her husband and sat in our compartment. At first we were quite irritated at their presence, as they were the two that made six in our six person compartment. Eventually, though, she started conversation with us, as much to help her improve her English as anything else. But as we talked she mentioned how much she loved travelling and had been to Arizona a number of times as well as a plethora of other places. She explained how she really enjoyed knowing someone wherever she visited so that she could actually improve her language skills. In both the US and Australia she had friends who took her in and showed her around.

This went on for a while (Innsbruck to Salzburg, while short as-the-crow-flys, is not short as-the-train-goes-through-the-mountains), and eventually we got around to invitations. She seemed disappointed that our plans did not involve a stop in Innsbruck, and insisted that the next time we found ourselves in Austria we should stay with her and she would show us around town. Fantastic, now we have a reason to come back to Austria. Of course, we reciprocated and told her that she’d be welcome to visit us in Indiana (or wherever school takes me next year), though she’d probably be better off holding off until we settle in Maine in the next few years. Then we could really show her some great scenery.

In the end, it was a great trip through the Tirolean Alps and we made a new friend in Austria. I can’t remember her name, but her middle name is Monika. That I only remember because she told a hilarious anecdote about how her father, unbeknownst to her mother, switched her first and middle names to his preference before putting it on the certificate. Her mom wanted her to be named Monika, which is really much easier to remember, at least for an American.

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Disaster averted

2007-04-29T00:00:00+00:00

Disaster averted

France

29 April 2007 – Besançon, France

Emma and I departed for Austria and the start of our “further” eastern Europe vacation. Our path has already taken us through Salzburg to Budapest. Eventually we will go through Vienna and Munich before returning to Besancon. Thus, it is only sort of Eastern Europe, mostly it’s simply further east than where we’ve been so far.

Quickly, though, the averted disaster was not nearly as big a problem as it seemed from the outset. We rode a train for 11 hours to Salzburg, walked across the city to a really nice hostel, opened my wallet to pay and … no bank card. What … the … fuck? I had left it in an ATM (or distributeur) in France. Thankfully I had left it after having withdrawn quite a bit of cash under the theory that after about a week of using our card outside of France (or sometimes just outside our region of France) the bank puts a hold on it. So we were hedging our bets that we’d only get a handful of ATM transactions for our trip. Thus, when I pulled this idiot move and left the card, we already had a back-up plan. Thank you, tax returns.

So that was our adventure with money. Needless to say, Salzburg was beautiful and a joy to just walk around in. We really only had one full day there, and managed to take in the castle and walk a fair amount of it (seeing our own bits of Sound of Music tourist sites … ugh.) More details when I’m not at a computer that hurts my hands.

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And we're back

2007-04-20T00:00:00+00:00

And we’re back

France

20 April 2007 – Besançon, France

After a long absence, we’re back in France and Besancon. Emma’s parents and sister flew down to see us and we roadtrip-ed out to Germany. The whole thing was spectacular, though any extended lengths of time in a car are bound to make people a little tense. It’s interesting that trains allow you to relax and enjoy the ride, once you’re on it, and cars allow you to relax and take your time, until you’re in it. We got turned around only three times, once trying to find out how Fussen is laid out, once on our lunch trip to Austria and once on our way home, where Mulhouse and Basel seem like the same basic highway exchange, but are certainly not.

Our first stop on this trip was Rothenburg, a walled Medieval city that remained quaint and undisturbed for more than 250 years because everyone in the city was dirt poor. Now it’s a bit of a tourist trap, but the night watchman tour is worth the stop. Pedrick bought a DVD of him … it was that good.

Our next stop was the castles of King Ludwig II located near Fussen. The drive down to Fussen on the Romantic Road leads straight into the Tirolean valley of the Alps — simply beautiful. I’ll post some pictures soon. The castles themselves, while amazing, suffered from very short and not detailed tours. Also, they were both built in the 19th century, the largest one near the turn of the century. It was almost as though no one bothered to tell the royalty of Bayern that the French king had already lost his head. Ludwig died under mysterious circumstances, though it’s pretty well understood that one of his advisors was pissed off that his castle was serioulsy draining royal coffers.

We had an overnight stay in Meersburg, Germany on Wednesday after having eaten lunch across the border in Austria. Meersburg is a resort town on Lake Konstanz and provided a great opportunity to walk along the lake and drink a local specialty … cola and pilsner. It was interesting.

On our last day we pushed through the Black Forest, stopping in Triburg to see a clockwork museum. Apparently southwest Germany was known for the development of automated music boxes. These ran on steam or electricity and were not as small as the words “music” and “box” suggest. One was the size of a large wardrobe and the description boasted that it sounded similar to a 50 person orchestra. 25, maybe.

The whole time we ate wonderfully. On Tuesday we celebrated my birthday at a delicious Bavarian resturant in Fussen. I had wenierschnitzel and spatzle with a nice dark beer. Well, two beers. This was also my first time ever in Germany. Not a bad way to spend a birthday!

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Advantage

2007-04-06T00:00:00+00:00

Advantage

France

06 April 2007 – Besançon, France

One of the strangest negative aspects I’ve experienced in France so far has been comprehending my own satisfaction, or lack thereof, with my stay. The problem almost always manifests itself in the same way and, as such, is so obviously predictable that I’m not sure why I always let it get to me.

The situation: sitting in the teacher’s room and being asked, “what did you do this weekend?” or some other variant of the same question by the other assistants. (Really, only two of the assistants.) The problem is, those two are “do-ers,” if I may use that expression. I am not a do-er. I am a let-us-sit-and-think-er. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy getting out, touring other parts of Europe and generally taking advantage of my location in France. But I often find just as much happiness in the really basic elements of life.

This is a complex emotion I’m trying to express in a rather feeble medium, but I’ll keep trying. I find myself re-evaluating my experience in France using the lenses of these two other assistants, lenses which don’t actually reflect what I find “fun.” Thus, I come away from such interactions disappointed with the un-excitingness that is my experience in France. And this couldn’t be farther from the truth for the ninety percent of the time I’m not discussing what I have or have not done with them.

Emma and I have had some amazing experiences in France, but we have not done everything there is to do in France. We’re going to leave a lot un-done, but then again, so are the other two assistants. And speaking of which, the other two assistants took advantage of the high school’s free lodging opportunity, meaning that they never actually had to learn or go through the process of looking at apartments, signing a lease in France, paying bills, filling said-apartment with furniture or learning how to maintain a house while sticking to a budget. I hardly hold their lack of experience in these matters against them, but just living self-sustained in France was a big goal for Emma and I, the problem is it doesn’t make for a good “what did you do this weekend” story. “Yeah, we spent the weekend basking in the satisfaction that for the first time in six years (really in our lives) WE paid for our housing, electricity and food.” That just doesn’t sound as great as visiting the Iguana Cafe (where we are now, officially, regulars) and drinking with friends. Ok, to Emma and I, yes, yes it does sound better.

This post was simply an exercise in removing weight from my chest. For too long I’ve stood silent on the issue of expectations versus real-world accomplishments. It’s also a warning that I’m not going to take much crap on the issue of “did I take advantage of my time in France.” That’s so subjective it just makes me want to throw up, and I’m in to good a mood living in a quiet little French city to throw up just now.

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High-pitched Squeals

2007-03-30T00:00:00+00:00

High-pitched Squeals

France

30 March 2007 – Besançon, France

So there’s a new ringtone making the rounds at schools everywhere. I had heard about it in a podcast months ago (it’s surprisingly easy to remain “in the loop” when abroad these days), but had yet to see anyone actually try to use it. Well scratch that.

There I am, in the classroom a little early because my French has at least developed to the point where I now understand that the chatter in the teacher’s lounge at break time is not actually secret messages full of criticisms of the assitants, but actually trite and superfluous talk about how So-and-so forgot to lock the classroom door five weeks ago or Whats-her-name had a spat with the tech support guy downstairs — truly boring. There are five students actually waiting for me to open the door, a first in it’s own right, but then, the students actually seem happy! They chat away for a couple of minutes while I pretend to busy myself with a document for another class, when two of the students, almost simultaneously, ask me what my age is. Holy shit, they were even using English! I excitedly responded by saying, “Ummmm…twenty-four.” The thinking before responding to age questions is a curious phenomenon that began sometime around twenty. I continued by explaining that I was actually nearly twenty-five, my birthday being just a few weeks away. This seemed to satisfy their curiosity and all the students focus went to someone’s mobile phone. He played with it for a couple of minutes before it let off a horrible high-pitched squeal. All the students in the room groaned a little and I made a sour expression towards the student and wondered what horrible TV show he was streaming on his infinitely-more-technologically-advanced European phone before it occurred to me. It was THAT ringtone! I laughed along with the students and said, “Yeah, I think it only works if I’m over forty …” The student had a sheepish look on his face and everyone else continued to laugh.

The whole incident actually had a net-positive effect on the class. So often it’s difficult to break the ice with these students, especially as the weather warms and they get sleepy in rooms where building-wide heat is still on. Today’s class went well, and I got the sense that the students were actually beginning to understand the difference between me and their actual teachers. Just in time too, as I only have that class one more time before I’m done here.

Also, as an addendum, I should note that the ringtone supposedly actually works. Leo Laporte, one of the guys on the podcast I heard about it on (TWiT), is in the age-range where you supposedly begin to lose the ability to hear high-pitched tones and he couldn’t hear anything when they were testing it. What a hilarious and innovative use of science. Though, personally, my favorite story about sound frequency remains the comment in the sound.h file for the Borland C++ DOS compiler which gave an example setting for sound output as (and I’m making this number up, so don’t quote me) “550 Hz – harmonic frequency of a chicken’s skull.”

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Revelations

2007-03-28T00:00:00+00:00

Revelations

France

28 March 2007 – Besançon, France

What’s this? Another post, so soon!? Perhaps this is a new format for Kapowell? Shorter, more frequent posts? We’ll see. In the meantime, I have another grand observation.

The Franche-Comte has been good to me and Emma. It is a very temperate, chill area of France which gets sometimes as cold as the Midwest (but not often). It is heavy on the agriculture, and as such has fantastic regional cheeses which, if we had wound up in any other part of the country, we probably wouldn’t have gone out our way to try. More and more it is beginning to feel like home.

Now, look back quickly at a conversation I had with a subsitute teacher last week. I asked her if she was originally from around here. That question didn’t seem important when we first got here, but now seems like the first quesiton to ask a new person you meet in France. There are some profound differences between people from Nice, people from Dole and people from Paris. So Virginie answers that, yes, she is Comtoise, though she spent the last year in Northern England. I commented on how much I liked the area, how peaceful and beautiful it is and she laughed and said, with her nearly-rolling Comtoise ‘R’, that she really enjoyed it too. Then it hit me like a pillowcase full of doorknobs: Wisconsin == Franche-Comte! ‘==’ is a computer term that, because ‘=’ is often used to assign values to variables ( x = 4 ), means ‘equal to.’ That’s right. Somehow, the people in the French government managed to put us in a very similar region to where we had just come from. Whether this is an accident or not is up for debate (there are an awful lot of assistants from the Midwest here …), but one thing is for sure, we are actually living in the Wisconsin of France.

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Franglais

2007-03-26T00:00:00+00:00

Franglais

France

26 March 2007 – Besançon, France

So contrary to my greatest hopes and dreams, my French has not progressed nearly to the point of fluency. Perhaps if I’d made more of an effort, or if Emma and I hadn’t come here together it would be better? This game can be played till the cows come home though. In the end, I’m sure my French is better than it was when I got here, and I can take some consolation in that. Plus I’ve discovered a neat little side effect to my living for so long in France.

My Franglais has actually gotten much more accurate. Franglais is the process of turning English words into French, and is only possible because some thirty percent of all English words have French origins. I’m sure the same process works in German (in fact I know it works better, because English is more heavily Germanic). The important thing here is that I’ve actually gotten better at knowing which words I don’t know in French will probably be similar to their English counterparts. One could probably chalk this up to my increasing vocabulary, meaning that I actually know more words in French now than I ever have before. I prefer to think of it as a distinct new ability, akin to Iceman’s ability to blaze his own speedy ice trail through the sky for transportation while deftly avoiding falling off by creating some sort of ice-wall on the edge of his on-demand skyroad. You see, I could always do Franglais, but now I can do it while deftly avoiding falling off the edge into the abyss of insignificance.

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Le Style

2007-03-23T00:00:00+00:00

Le Style

France

23 March 2007 – Besançon, France

I felt vindicated when my sister and I were walking around Dijon while she was here and said exactly what I had been thinking for the past four months. Europe may be more on top of new trends in style than us ‘Mericans, but it comes at a cost: being wrong a lot.

Seriously, quite often I’ll see someone wear something crazy but really pull it off; the whole ensemble actually works somehow, and they are ahead of the fashion wave. But this is one monster of wave. It’s like the Pipeline, pulling up so much water that as you ride you are actually suspended over exposed sand. If you fall, you fall far and you fall hard. A lot of the French fall hard when it comes to fashion. Ask any surfer, it comes with the territory of riding big waves.

One such trend is matching jumpsuits with the elastic cuffs tucked into your socks. I want to explain to my students how dumb this looks when they do it. But then I suppose that would be like telling a surfer to get down off those waves because they might hurt themselves. I sure as hell don’t want to get up there though. I’d just look like an ass.

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On Strikes

2007-03-20T00:00:00+00:00

On Strikes

France

20 March 2007 – Besançon, France

For the past two weeks I have worked (actually stood in front of students and done a lesson for an hour) a total of four hours. While that seems amazingly small, do keep in mind I’m only scheduled for twelve hours. Still, this is quite low. The reason? A strike.

That’s right, the myth is not actually a myth; the French love to strike. Of course, putting it like that suggests there is some levity to the French notion of a “greve,” which there certainly is not. The French take their striking very seriously, and it’s usually reserved for things like lay-offs and compensation adjustments.

It’s also worth mentioning that, much like all things in life, some people support the idea of striking while other (at my lycee actually quite a few) do not. Of course, only the teacher or the students needs to agree with the strike for me to not have class, so while many classes were canceled because the teacher was sympathetic, a few were actually canceled because no students showed up.

One of the teachers was explaining to us assistants how there is no compensation for work not done if your party does not come out on the winning side of the strike. This means that if you do not succeed in striking you just don’t get paid for the week or two you weren’t working. Of course, you do get paid if you succeed. Thus, there is a bit of gamble in striking which stops people from striking because the principle refuses to wear shoes.

All this amounts to is me sitting in the teacher’s lounge wondering when I might have to teach and checking the rooms I’m supposed to be in when the time comes, only to shuffle off again once I see no one has turned up. I can live with that. If there’s one thing I’ve always been good at, it’s entertaining myself.

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Southern France

2007-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

Southern France

France

08 March 2007 – Besançon, France

Emma and I just returned from a trip south to Avignon, Nimes and Carcassonne. We wanted to make it to Toulouse as well, but we just got tired of traveling (also we’re trying to conserve money for the month of May, when we’ll be traveling without the promise of more money from the French government). The trip was excellent and was basically a serious lesson in French history. The Papal Palace in Avignon was home to six different popes starting in 1309 and lasting for one hundred years. The end of the papal sojourn in France ended with the Western schism where there were actually two popes for a time. Thus, to the non-Catholic amongst us, Avignon is a pretty good example of how fragile the Catholic church was for a time.

For contrast, we then stayed two nights in Nimes. Nimes is a laid back, very Mediterranean-feeling city with some really impressive Roman ruins. There’s an arena from the second century and a large square house (or maison carre) that used to be part of the forum. It’s a great city to relax in, with a giant, sprawling garden that’s on par with some of Paris’s great parks and a great old city area with twisting streets and little shops. Our hotel was pretty crappy, but also inexpensive. Our Rough Guide gave us the wrong number for the hotel we wanted to stay at and everything else seemed closed or expensive. It almost felt as though the guests in our hotel was an afterthought to the owners, as we got the second degree for asking for a third role of toilet paper (that’s right, they didn’t refill it when they made up the beds, we had to ask for it). Hotel aside, Nimes was a great stop for some amazing Roman history. The arena audio tour was quite a bit more informative than the one at the Colosseum (you would have loved it Al), explaining the different types of gladiators and knocking down some of the myths (like the one where gladiators were POWs or slaves, those people were actually just straight up fed to lions without the benefit of weapons for defense).

Our last stop was Carcassone, a well-touristed area, to be sure, but also an amazing relic of Medieval France. The upper city of Carcassone is actually a fortified city that was massively reconstructed in the late 19th century for historical preservation. The actual history of the city is amazing, and fit nicely between the Roman history of Nimes and the papal history of Avignon. Carcassonne, in it’s heyday was a hot bed of a group of heretical Christians called Cathars. Cathars existed all over Europe, but the people of Southern France, Languedoc in particular, were okay to coexist with them. The Catholic church, however, was not okay with it. Starting in the beginning of the 13th century (don’t quote me), Pope Innocent III authorized a crusade against the Cathars. The people of Carcassonne, having advanced warning from the near-total destruction of nearby Beziers, mostly escaped though a tunnel, leaving the city for the Catholics to occupy. There’s much more to the story, but I’m sure Wikipedia has a good synopsis of the Cathars with more accurate dates. Our stay there was marvelous. We stayed in the nicest hotel of our trip, while paying only marginally more, and also treated ourselves to a dinner out (on the rest of the trip we’d been doing picnics from the local grocery stores to conserve money). The regional dish in Languedoc (pronounced ‘long-dock’) is cassoulet, a bean, sausage and duck casserole served in a cassole, or thick ceramic dish. It was amazing how something so simple and rustic could be so delicious. I also tried some Pastis, finally, and it was delicious. Hannah got an appertif that was some medieval recipe for spiced red wine, which was amazing. We subsequently bought two bottles of it to take home.

All in all and very successful trip. Hannah departed for the UK from Carcassonne, and Emma and I took three all-too-long train rides to get back to Besancon.

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Laid Back

2007-03-02T00:00:00+00:00

Laid Back

France

30 January 2007 – Besançon, France

My first few impressions of life in France were quite mixed. Many things were different, many things were the same. The things that were different felt a little funny, and the things that were the same felt dirty. Strictly manual transmission, diesel vehicles and the fact that everything closes over lunch rubbed me the wrong way. Massive “hyperstores” and fast-food restaurants (and many, many people patronizing both) made me feel bad about what I perceive to be America’s contribution to the world.

Now that I’ve discovered that the latter doesn’t have to be a part of your life if you don’t want it to and have grown accustomed to the former points, I feel like I’m going to miss aspects of France. While the everything-at-lunch-time-is-closed problem seems bad from the outset, just today I got a warm feeling watching everyone in my neighborhood walking back to school/work after lunch. I felt in touch with the humanity of those around me. As it turns out there are more things than death and taxes in life which are certainties. Food and eating food is one of them. I’ll try to avoid too many grandiose or generalizing statements here, but it seems that many people in the US eat purely out of function, while here in France there is some pomp and circumstance surrounding most meals (though I’ve yet to see much around breakfast). That is not to say such things don’t exist in the US, but it seems that enjoying the more basic aspects of life is simply not part of our cultural philosophy. Just don’t ask me what is a part such a philosophy or I’m liable to start pissing people off with generalities (and they’d be pissed for good reason).

Regardless, the point of this post was not to whinge poetic on the current statelessness of American culture, but just to point out that I’ve really grown to love the near-total shutdown that accompanies the lunching hour in France. Also the cheese. Oh hell, the wine is really delicious too. Speaking of cheese, anyone visiting us must remind us to introduce you to “Cancoillotte”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancoillotte (the coill is pronounced ‘qwee’). It’s pourably creamy and tastes like a little bit of heaven was left to ferment in a smoke-house. The vin jaune flavour is particularly fantastic. We need to find a way to procure this in the US . . .

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Learning?

2007-02-25T00:00:00+00:00

Learning?

France

25 January 2007 – Besançon, France

I’ve become bent upon self-learning recently. This has little to do with France, per se (unless you count the fact that it’s happing to me in France), but is, I believe, related to my having to learn French “for real” this year.

While there are copious amounts of space to fill around this so-called job, I’ve found that having to actively learn a language is fueling in me a desire to learn all manner of other things. And idle time is the best time in which to do that.

This is not to say, though, that I haven’t always sought to learn new things, just that I’ve been really buckling down and trying to figure out what, how and why certain things, like computer languages, law and classic literature, appeal to me and allowing me to take actually reading things more seriously.

Exploring new music fits into this category as well. May I recommend some French experimental pop? “Chocolat Billy”:http://lespotagersnatures.free.fr/catalogue/disques/PoNa014.php are entertaining. Also, non-French but kicking ass are The New Lou Reeds. Listen to “You Don’t Have to Die” really loud with headphones. I swear to god this Cleveland band traveled back in time and kidnapped Jimi’s Experience band … I’m mean, damn!

I’m gonna go back to listening to French radio. My biggest problem is simply not understanding people when they speak. Maybe it will help a little?

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ParYs

2007-02-22T00:00:00+00:00

ParYs

France

22 February 2007 – Besançon, France

So my newly-engaged sister and her fiancee blew into France for a week and treated us to a side of Besancon we didn’t know existed. Namely, restaurants. We are always trying to scrimp and save for big travels while we’re in our home town, so we don’t often get to sample some of what, we assume, are delicious places to eat. Now we can add L’Poker d’As to our list of places we have, in fact, eaten at. It was a bit rustic and elegant in that country way (Franche-Comte literally means ‘French Shire’). I had steak tartare, which I ordered without giving much thought to what it actually was composed of. When a round of raw meat was being mixed in a bowl in front of me with a raw egg, my stomach started punching me from the inside. In fact, it was amazing. Very fresh, as one might imagine, and I managed to prove the first rule of American paranoia incorrect, raw food does not automatically kill you, or even leave you miserable for a few days. Really, I think raw food is probably the greatest test of the freshness of a restaurant.

Fine dining in Besancon aside, Emma, Hannah and I then proceed to follow my sister and her fiancee back to Paris for the weekend. We walked around Montmartre and saw the excellent Dali museum up by Sacre-coeur. Our dining was fantastic and was capped off with a meal in what claims to be the oldest restaurant in Paris. Regardless of it’s age, it was fantastic.

For all the cool things we saw, the visit was most important for me as a time to talk with my sister, whom I don’t see nearly enough these days. Also, for the record, getting engaged does help avoid having to explain the extent of one’s relationship, as her fiancee rightly pointed out to me.

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Slowslowslowly

2007-02-13T00:00:00+00:00

Slowslowslowly

France

13 January 2007 – Besançon, France

Time is moving a little slowly right now. And to think Emma and I scoffed at someone’s recounting how she filled all her free time in France. Free time, we thought? How about travel! Well, it turns out that one trip a month is pretty much all our salaries are good for, so there are these massive lulls in our lives in France.

It’s really no big deal though. I’ve taken up reading “classic” texts in eBook format, mostly because of Rome and a brief exhibit on the Iliad at the Colosseum, but mostly because of my own desire to be “better read.” Whatever that means. Maybe once I’m done with some of this stuff I’ll understand five percent more of Ulysses. A man can dream, can’t he?

I’ve also posted signs for side jobs to help supplement our meager income. I have had two bites so far for English conversation practice. It’s not a bad gig, really. I talk with someone about anything at all using the English language and it pays ten euros an hour. I haven’t actually done this yet, though, so I’ll see come Monday how it all works exactly.

This was a pretty long post when it’s job was to transmit the utter boredom that has gripped our tiny apartment in the attic of a building in Besancon, France. But sometimes the most banal and ordinary parts of life just take the most time to explain. How odd . . .

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To Southern France!

2007-02-08T00:00:00+00:00

To Southern France!

France

08 February 2007 – Besançon, France

Undaunted by the collapse of our Morocco plans (damn you Ryanair and your shifty pricing scheme, 43 euros in taxes my ass), Emma and I have begun planning a sojourn to various parts of Southern France. We’re hoping to make it to Morocco later on during our “May is for Traveling” month.

Not much else to update. We finished our oral rendition of the Odyssey a week or so ago and have now begun to read aloud the Iliad. Much more boasting in this one and more shout-outs to the actual people in battle. Ulysses actually only ran into about 20 (important) people total in his travels, while it seems that there wasn’t a single unimportant person fighting in the War.

Also noteworthy, my sister is coming to Paris for her spring break next week. She’ll be making her way out here on Wednesday and then Emma and I will accompany her and her boyfriend back to Paris next Friday. Excellent.

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Dickensian

2007-02-08T00:00:00+00:00

Dickensian

France

08 January 2007 – Besançon, France

We entered the Eternal City via Roma Termini, a modern-architecture afflicted train station that, whether by poor planning or beautiful civil engineering greets the weary traveller with not a garden or fountain or some such frivolity, but a massive slab of pavement full of buses and no discernably pedestrian-safe way to navigate through them. If I had been hoping to live in this city, I believe I would have just gotten back on the train to Florence, but instead the sights are my goal, and I don’t have to like the city to enjoy some of the greatest achievments in human history.

As our visit landed us near New Year’s Eve without us realizing, sleeping arrangments were difficult to come by. After following a recommendation from a full hostel, we arrived at the Stargate Hotel which proved to be not nearly as seedy as it looked, thank god.

And that, my friends, is all I’ve got time for right now. More embittered 19th century travelogue-esque writing may follow, who knows?

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Sharing

2007-02-05T00:00:00+00:00

Sharing

France

05 January 2007 – Besançon, France

Apparently Portland’s Chinatown is embarking on a brave new “experiment”:http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2006/12/where_the_sidewalk_ends.php in urban planning: squares usable by both pedestrians and vehicles. Turns out Besancon, France beat them to the punch on this one. Honestly, so many streets around here are not-quite-pedestrian-malls that it can make walking stressful at times.

Of course, the advantage of pedestrian/vehicle streets is small streets and even smaller sidewalks becomeing larger by becoming vaguer. I don’t think it will work in the States though. Too many well-laid-out cities and not enough concentration of population. Seriously, Besancon is about the size of Appleton, WI and has a decidedly larger and busier downtown area with older, smaller streets. (Emma may disagree with me on this last point … )

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Morocco?

2007-02-02T00:00:00+00:00

Morocco?

France

07 February 2007 – Besançon, France

So we’re thinking about paying a visit to Morocco for our Winter Break (which, given the weather around here lately feels more like it will be a spring break) at the end of February. Pretty exciting stuff. My sister, who is visiting next week is going to bring us a book on it and then it’s off to Fez or Marrakesh!

Also a little pointer for this whole online journal (or blog _shutter if you must) thing, check out “Google Reader”:http://www.google.com/reader for a nice online feed reader. You can then stop actually visiting sites and have them just land in your lap.

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Successful

2007-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

Successful

France

02 January 2007 – Besançon, France

Without turning this weblog into some sort of perverted Daniel Defoe accounting epic, we’ve managed to bankrupt ourselves for the second time in as many months. So goes traveling in Europe I suppose.

Christmas and New Year’s were excellent fun and perhaps if I feel like it I’ll post some details, but honestly who wants to read exactly everything we’ve done? Perhaps a list is the best way to at least catalogue the events for my own musty head:

Sochoux football match for the boys / Strasbourg Christmas market for the girls
Season two marathon of the Office on Christmas (nothing is open in France)
Train ride through the Western Alps on our way to Florence
Duomo, Uffizi Gallery and Accademia Gallery in Florence
Vatican Museums, St. Peter’s Basilica and the Fortress of Saint Angelo
Colosseum and the Ancient City of Rome

Of course, a list does little poetic justice to how fantastic all our traveling was and also cannot communicate the delicious meals and gelatos of which we partook. Suffice it to say it was a great trip. I have some photos that I will post soon. Given the previously mentioned lack of funds, the second week of Christmas break will have to be spent using free Internet, reading the copious books my mother sent and looking for side jobs tutoring English.

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Safe Arrivals

2006-12-16T00:00:00+00:00

Safe Arrivals

16 December 2006 – Besançon, France

Emma’s sister arrived here safely from Scotland a week or so ago, and we began to discover how big our apartment truly is (the photos on Flickr are deceptive). But, on the plus side we also discovered the natural beauty that is Raclette. Well it’s not so natural, but it is hot cheese drizzled over boiled potatoes with delicious meats. It’s kind of like Fondue in many respects.

Anyway, Emma and I stocked up on the above mentioned cheese, a whopping 2 kilos of the stuff (if it were cocaine we’d be millionaires), and also a lot of meat. At the deli counter, the woman, surprised by our previous request of 2 kilos of salami thought we wanted 4 kilos of smoked ham! Imagine our surprise when she just kept shaving off more and more and more … Needless to say we only wanted a quarter kilo, but had trouble saying as much. We ended up with nearly a kilo of three types of meat, which should tide us over for a while. Especially considering that Emma and I are both trying to eat more vegetarian … Ugh.

We have friends visiting us for Christmas and they arrive on Wednesday. That’s the other safe arrival, or rather a hope that everything goes smoothly for them. We can’t wait to show them the Christmas markets which are everywhere in France. Maybe even jump up to Freiburg, Germany if the tickets are too expensive. Yes, it will be a good Christmas.

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Eric Foner

2006-12-04T00:00:00+00:00

Eric Foner

04 December 2006 – Besançon, France

You’ll notice that, while this journal is meant for things specific to France and our travels within it, I have already posted once about the political environment in the US. I am about to do so again, and I apologize.

You see, that last post was about ignorant French people and I don’t want to give the impression that ignorance is unique to France or that the ills of ignorance are more acutely felt in France. Enter “this”:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/01/AR2006120101509.html op-ed piece in the Post by Eric Foner. Yes America, if we had a word in English like Franchouillard, it would become exhausted by use on our current president.

That is all.

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Franchouillard

2006-11-30T00:00:00+00:00

Franchouillard

30 November 2006 – Besançon, France

Def. A typically narrow-minded french person

As I had a nice conversation with one of my classes about the merits of California wines, the teacher busied herself with a dictionary in the back. She then shows me the word above and, at the end of class, apologizes, saying that she’s originally from Paris and is constantly amazed at how arrogant and narrow-minded people from the Franche-Comté region can be.

Me? I thought it was funny, and didn’t realize quite how adamant the guy was that French wine is, and always will be, superior to California wine.

It seems Franche-Comté in general may have an inferiority complex, and I hear those don’t help problems with arrogance. A few weeks back L’Est Republican, Besançon’s regional newspaper, ran a story with the headline: What do Parisians think of Besançon (In French, of course). I can only imagine they think they are a bunch of country bumpkins. That seems to be the general consensus in France. Not that it’s true, mind you.

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Rouen to Carnac

2006-11-29T00:00:00+00:00

Rouen to Carnac

29 November 2006 – Besançon, France

So to continue where I left off … We left Rouen for Mont-St-Michel, one of the major tourist sites in France, but one Emma and I knew very little about. Arriving was a little bizarre because we were not really sure how to get from the train station to the mountain. Vernon to Giverny was better advertised, though the longer we waited at the station the bigger the crowd going to MSM got and that made it fairly easy to find our way. Mont-St-Michel is gorgeous, but even near the end of the season it was still absolutely packed with people. After the sedate Bayeux Tapestry experience, the crowds at the church on the island made it difficult to hold back the cynicism. Despite this, it was still a magnificant place to be and, while we wont be going back anytime soon, it was something that we both appreciated seeing.

From Mont-St-Michel we took a bus directly to Rennes and stayed there long enough to catch a train to Vannes. It was at this point Halloween, and walking around Vannes after treating ourselves to a delicious Atlantic seafood dinner was very festive. There was a carnival in town (carnivals seem much more frequent and spur-of-the-moment in France) and there were even some people in costumes … weird. In the morning we headed out for Carnac, and megalith site that rivals Stonehenge in it’s scale (it is at least a few miles of giant stones all tipped up on edge). It being not exactly high season in Carnac, the bus was almost empty when it dropped us off in the middle of town. With no idea where to go, we started walking towards where it looked like the stones were, thinking all the while that if there wasn’t some sort of visitor’s center to warm ourselves up we were screwed. There was and we weren’t, and it actually became a really nice day. It turns out if we had come at high season we would not have been able to walk amongst the rocks, and much better experience than it would have been to walk along the fence and peer in at them. I have to run to class now, but the best is yet to come.

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Giverny and Rouen

2006-11-16T00:00:00+00:00

Giverny and Rouen

16 November 2006 – Besançon, France

So Emma said she would post some details about our trip a week and a half ago. But between you a me, I don’t think Emma really knows how to log in, let alone post, to this site. So now it’s my turn.

We left Besancon via 1st class TGV an hour later than we were expecting — thank you so much day-light savings time — and discovering what peak-time means on the TGV (that’s why we had to travel 1st class). If this were a novel I believe our surprise at the cost of our tickets to Paris might count as foreshadowing. Indeed, trains have become qutie expensive, even with an under-25 discount. So, with a creeping dread over transportation costs I climbed aboard the train and watched some beautiful French countryside fly past at 200 mph.

Here’s where I talk about how amazed I was at the agricultural state of much of France. In my gut I feel like I knew a lot of France is farms — cheese and wine are both made on farms — but I hadn’t really put two and two together to make four. So after being amazed at the countryside and transfering train stations in Paris we arrived at Vernon, the gateway to Giverny and Monet’s impressionist enclave.

Needless to say, Giverny was a cute and beautiful little town. Given how late in the season we visited, we were delighted to see so many flowers still in bloom (including one, count it, one water lilly). We ate lunch at one of Monet’s favorite haunts and sat next to three nice Americans from Florida who were being shown around by a Parisian friend of theirs. The lunch was a delicious combination of roasted goat cheese for me and a stuffed crepe and vegetable soup for Emma.

We then set out to view Monet’s house and the impressionist art museum nearby. The house was fascinating and, to my suprise, very livable. It wasn’t garishly huge though it did have space for maybe 22 dinner guests at the dinning room table. A place where one could be very comfortable just hanging out, which I suppose was the point of an artist colony …

Mistiming our bus back to Vernon we discovered the next train didn’t leave for Rouen for another four hours and so set off on foot to explore Vernon. The result was discovering that the town had some really cool parks and a nice riverfront on the Seine. We also got to see some Italian students playing chess on a giant chess board (something you see quite often in France).

We arrived in Rouen after dark with no place to stay and discovered quickly that Sundays are a terrible time to try and find a hotel in France. After some guide book misadventures, we found one that was open and had a room. We counted our blessings and then set out to wander around Rouen and find some dinner.

In the thirteenth century, Joan of Arc was tried and burned in Rouen. She was later made the patron saint of France so you’d better believe there’s a cathedral in Rouen with her name on it. It wasn’t built, however, until the 1970’s and actually has a very weird post-modern swooping-roof thing going on. We’ll post pictures because I just can’t describe it very well. Speaking of which, we’ll post pictures of all this stuff really soon, I promise. Rouen was a really interesting city that felt very much like Besancon to us, very livable. The man at our hotel was fantastic and it seemed like the kind of place people who come through Rouen on business frequent. When we came downstairs in the morning, one of the guests was having breakfast by himself and chatting with the owner as though they knew each other. I liked it.

Anyway, that was long. I’ll continue in this vein until we’ve gone through our entire vacation (or maybe something better will come up before I’m done, you never know). I’m really not a fan of these summary posts, I would much rather you could all have just joined us on our trip. Oh well, there’s always a next time.

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And on the eve of ...

2006-11-09T00:00:00+00:00

And on the eve of …

09 November 2006 – Besançon, France

With the congressional elections ongoing in the U.S., it becomes difficult to recount in vivid detail the wonderful week-long break Emma and I took recently. Our trip took us through a lot of tourist spots in Normandy and Brittany; we visited Giverny, Bayeux, Mont-St-Michel, Vannes, Carnac, Quimper, and Pointe du Raz, in that order. We saw many amazing things and a lot of France’s beautiful countryside by train. Of course, there are pictures too.

And all this stuff will be noted and posted in time, but for now, because our lives have gotten quite hectic and we still don’t have Internet in our appartment, I just had to at least make mention of the elections. While I actually consider myself somewhat of a conservative on fundamental issues, I must congratulate the Democratic party on a job well done. This will make Bush a lame duck for the next year and a half and force him to actually address the flaws in his arguments and positions. At least I hope. Thank you to everyone who voted, and I’m ashamed to say it, but I didn’t vote absentee, mostly on account of not knowing which state to claim residency. Oh well, thanks again, and this makes the 2008 elections that much more interesting.

(Also, can I just say that I like Montana’s choice of Tester? He seems like a great breath of fresh air.)

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Sofa difficulties

2006-10-25T00:00:00+00:00

Sofa difficulties

25 October 2006 – Besançon, France

Emma and I have been quietly plugging away at our jobs, waiting for our couch to arrive. We called Fly, the furniture store, last night to see where that couch may be (they told us it would arrive Wed. of last week) and the nice women on phone, after saying it four times too quickly, finally slowed down and said “You bought it on 6 October? 7 November.” I understood that. I wasn’t happy with it, but I understood it.

So no couch until after our All Saint’s Day vacation. But you know what, the joke is on Fly because we’re hoping to travel extensively over this vacation. We don’t even need their stinking couch … at least until the 7th.

And of course, worse things could have happened to us in France than a delay in sofa-delivery. You have to think of the positives. Emma and I have begun taking Sunday walks through the, as expected, beautiful parks in Besançon. Our neighborhood also gets more and more delicious with each new road we explore.

We also recently completed the process to set in motion our resident alien cards (these allow us to work, and by extension get paid, in France). Any time you approach one of these “paperwork sessions” in France you have to hold your breath, because you just never know what they might ask for which you might not have. The door swings both ways, of course. I only had two photocopies of my birth certificate, and they wanted one original and one copy. The lady took one look at the beat-up photocopy from, it would appear, 1982 and had no trouble accepting it as the original.

So things are looking up and slowing down here in Besançon and our thoughts are now turning to travel and friends. It’s hard to think about traveling when you’re still getting settled, but as our apartment begins to feel more like home, we are beginning to think about venturing outside its walls to places like Dijon, Paris or even Greece. Also, the thought of having our families and friends visit us keeps us warm in our, as of yet, unheated apartment (the heaters are electric and apparently just burn through money; Meriby, you would be proud to see us bundled up in our own house).

There are no new photos, as we keep forgetting to bring the camera with us on our walk, plus its hard to just keep showing photos of one city without feeling a little redundant. That should all change as we begin seeing some other cities in the area. Speaking of which, on the 7th of November we will be venturing to Strasbourg (in France still) with a school trip and will have an opportunity to visit the European Union Parliament building and a Kronenburg brewery … Yes, they’re taking high school kids on a field trip to a beer factory. We’re very excited as this is an all-expenses paid day-trip!

(Also, Drew, I saw an add in the paper the other day for the European release of the Wii and let out a little gasp, which drew Emma’s attention, and then her disgust. It saddens me that we haven’t budgeted for such things … oh, well.)

So everything is going smoothly here, I hope all of you are doing well wherever you find yourselves, and to our family and friends, Emma and I send our love.

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A quick update

2006-10-13T00:00:00+00:00

A quick update

13 October 2006 – Besançon, France

Things are getting more busy as Emma and I both have begun working at our schools. Next week we will cease being observers and take on the responsibility of talking with and educating our kids in English. It’s a daunting task, and no one has to do it, but we’re being paid so we probably ought to.

As such, you will notice posts getting shorter, perhaps, though we will try to keep updating on a regular basis. It will become much easier once we have Internet access at our apartment. Right now I spend most of my precious time on the Internet preparing activities for my students and managing two different fantasy football teams. I know, I know, preparing for class isn’t that important, but the kids will appreciate it.

Also, I would like everyone to know that the Chicago Bears are now 5-0 and Rex Grossman apparently just needed me to leave the country to stay healthly. Don’t worry Rex, I’ve already begun my ex-patriation paperwork.

As usual, there are some photos up on flickr. I’m going to add something to the top of the page that will simply turn colors when new photos have been added. That should be easier than constantly providing the link at the end of every post.

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Real work

2006-10-04T00:00:00+00:00

Real work

04 October 2006 – Besançon, France

Yesterday, Emma and I began our period of observation. The lyceés and the primary schools are doing things a little bit differently though. Emma was sitting in on a class with all the other primary school assistants in the city while I was simply moving from class to class by myself and watching the teachers teach.

The observation period is to allow us a chance to learn the level at which the students we will eventually assist with/teach are with their English. Emma was surprised to find her student understood quite a bit more than she expected, and I, except for one class, was surprised the other way. Either way, the jobs don’t seem impossibly difficult — full of challenges, sure, but not impossible.

There are some photos from the faculty lounge of my school as well as the apartment which we are hoping to have moved into by Friday. Perhaps there will be another post detailing the lesser-of-many-evils choice which that entailed. (Seriously though, it wasn’t that bad, and it’s a great apartment.)

“Colin’s flickr account”:http://flickr.com/photos/powellc/

Addendum: Emma felt that lesser-of-many-evils gave the impression that our final decision was a compromise, when in reality the apartment is really great. I only meant to say that when apartment hunting, and I’m fairly sure this is true in most cases, we wound up having to narrow the apartments down based on the quality of their negatives. For example, we found a nice furnished apartment in the old town, but it wasn’t a true two room apartment as advertised. The one we finalized on is fantastic, but it is unfurnished and on the fifth floor without an elevator. These are negatives we can live with and were, in fact, the lesser of the negatives from the other four apartments we looked at. Also, it is reasonably priced and the landlord is the second nicest man we’ve met yet in France (the first being Mr Marie, the intendant (aka business administrator) at Jules Haag). Enjoy your weekend everyone, and forget I ever had to write this addendum, things are great.

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Nous sommes arrivés

2006-09-26T00:00:00+00:00

Nous sommes arrivés

26 September 2006 – Besançon, France

After three planes, a bus, a train, one car, and a total of nearly 24 consecutive hours of travel, Colin and I arrived in Besancon last Wednesday night. Though our initial entry was a little bumpy (that first night we were so apprehensive about what we had gotten ourselves into that Colin almost threw-up and I cried myself to sleep), we’ve had a week to get used to the city and are absolutely loving it. We’ve been subsisting almost exclusively on baguettes, cheese, and $3 bottles of French wine, and are currently in the throes of apartment hunting (the high school where Colin is teaching has been kind enough to put us up free of charge in their student dormitories until we find a place of our own). We have our first apartment viewing this afternoon and are trying not to let our enthusiasm get the better of us before we’ve actually seen the place. We’ll let you know how it turns out, either way.

Besançon (pronounced buhz-eh-ZOH) is absolutely charming. The ancient stone buildings are set close together overlooking narrow stone-paved streets. There are bakeries seemingly on every corner where you can buy your day’s bread or a chocolate croissant. The French take their bread very seriously; so seriously, in fact, that, despite the fact that EVERYTHING closes on Sundays, the French goverment mandates that in every quasi-major city in the country there must be a bakery open every day of the week (you don’t hear us complaining!). The government also subsidizes the cost of food, so we can get out of the local grocer’s with milk, juice, baguettes and cheese, a respectable bottle of wine, hummus, and a basket of fresh fruits and vegetables for less than $20. There are outdoor cafes and garden parks thick with ivy and Roman ruins and, yes, Karen, there are Nutella crepes.

We start work next Monday and until then are still exploring the city. Photos from these first few days can be viewed at “Colin’s flickr account”:http://flickr.com/photos/powellc/tags/besancon/

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Pieces come together

2006-09-12T00:00:00+00:00

Pieces come together

12 September 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

Slowly our plans for France are becoming more concrete. Often it is happening quicker than we would like, but I suppose if things like insurance were up to me I’d never actually get around to paying for it.

The summer is winding down and I only have two more articles to write for Penobscot Bay Press before my tenure with them is over. My boss has been so accommodating and nice that Emma and I are planning on bringing some baked goods over to Stonington tomorrow (the 13th) to thank him and say our goodbyes.

I made my first contact with an English teacher at Jules Haag. Her English is excellent and she has asked if I know anything about physics because one of her classes is also taking physics lessons in English. I can only assume this means they speak better English than I do. So now I need to brush up on my high school physics and French.

T minus 7 days till we leave, and I can’t wait, if only to get the transition over with and grow comfortable with living in Besançon.

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State Fare . . . Delicious!

2006-08-07T00:00:00+00:00

State Fare . . . Delicious!

07 August 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

Yes, yes, yes. All the things you’ve heard about the state fair of Wisconsin are true. Food, animals and carnival rides abound. And while the price for all is truely absurd, at least the food was worth it. Let’s see, I think my Saturday went something like this:

Duck Fajitas
Chocolate-covered Marshmallow
Wines of Wisconsin tasting
Heferweizen
Corn on the Cob
State Fair Cream Puff
Chicken Tamales
Funnel Cake

I got to hang out with the new hall directors at Lawrence for a little while too, and I can heartily give my approval now. And even though the carnival games were all corporate and not interested in a good haggling, Roman still won a panda bear for Dawn, which I believe is now called “Girlie.” At least that’s what the people operating the games kept yelling at us.

So after all the whistle-stopping, we didn’t get to say bye to nearly as many people as we’d of liked to, but it turns out very little can be accomplished when you’re in town for just one day.

Now Emma and I fly back to Boston on the 8th and get to say hi/bye to an old friend from back in the day at Lawrence and then start driving back up and see just a few more friends before settling into a routine for a month and a half up in Castine.

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Real Journalism

2006-08-02T00:00:00+00:00

Real Journalism

02 August 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

Well, maybe. I’ve gotten a job writing freelance copy for a local paper this summer in Maine. It’s a tiny paper with a circulation of 1500 and it was a novice piece on the new library catalog system, but it has been published. If you promise not to laugh you can read the article at the “Castine Patriot”:http://www.castinepatriot.com website. Its a bit dry, but what are you going to do; it’s about a library for god’s sake. Emma should also have an article appearing this Thursday (the 3rd).

On a side note, Emma and I, today, completed our first stop on our Midwest whistle-stop tour. Indiana is just as hot as Boston was, but I did manage to play a little bit of summer league ultimate. Plus, we still have one almost-complete day to spend tomorrow. Then it’s up to Chicago to visit the French consulat, up to Appleton to visit friends, down to Milwaukee for the State Fair, down to St. Charles to visit parents and siblings, then back, via air travel, to Boston and eventually back up to Maine. Hopefully it’s all completed safely.

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Oh, Ca-nada!

2006-07-18T00:00:00+00:00

Oh, Ca-nada!

18 July 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

Emma and I returned a few days ago from a trip to the untamed north of Nova Scotia. We embarked on a six day epic adventure with friends from Lawrence who all, in some capacity, either are working or have worked for the residence life department.

Thankfully the collective experience of mediation and group management were only needed approximately once during a particularly dark period. It seemed our campground reservation that night was in a park that was damn-near in the downtown of Louisburg and catered more towards RVs than tents. Of course, we didn’t know this on the phone. So after checking out one other seedy dive, we finally found a state park and had a grande olde time with some wine we’d purchased from a vineyard near Tamagochi, Nova Scotia. Well, the town wasn’t really Tamagochi, but it was so close as to be unpronounceable to Patrick’s and my pop-culture rotted brains.

Beyond that we managed to avoid all the obvious camping blunders. Plus, it only briefly rained one night, saving everyone but me too much embarrassment for having not brought any sort of raincoats. We also went on a couple of fun hikes in Cape Breton National Park, where I didn’t almost die by falling into a waterfall.

Our trip was deliciously capped off with a two-night stop in Halifax, a city none of us had ever been too. Despite the trepidation of knowing what attractions the city held for us, we plunged into a one-day, two-night stay during which we even managed to catch a movie (Pirates 2). As it would turn out, Halifax is a charming city on the ocean that has just about everything a young urban semi-professional might want, including, but not limited to, a used/indie record shop on every corner, about 6 used bookstores using the piles-on-the-floor method of organization, a cool music instrument store and one gnarly comic book store. Needless to say we were happy for a day.

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Badger State

2006-06-25T00:00:00+00:00

Badger State

25 June 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

Badger State Games, an olympics knock-off for the state of Wisconsin, held it’s ultimate tournament this weekend. It’s a two day affair that involves two divisions of co-ed teams. This year I participated as an Appleton resident on their team, named Adult Entertainment.

The name is rooted in Al Reiser, though a number of people this tournament complained that it was a little to long-winded. Other names up for discussion were: ‘Woody’ or ‘The Valley.’ I personally like Woody for a team name. It doesn’t mean anything, really, but it just has a good one-word ring to it.

On our first day of this, the 2006 games, Adult Entertainment went 4-0, rolling over two high school teams to start. We then got a little bit of a thrill against a better team, but still pulled away at the end for a 13-9 victory. The last team of the day had a lot of mutal acquaintances on it, so we had a lot of fun while still playing competitve.

On the second day AE fell flat on it’s face. I, for one, play worst in the first game of the day. A bye in the first round doesn’t help that. The team we played had already been warmed up and we were as from from warm as I can possibly imagine. The playmakers from the day before were making stupid passes and dropping discs and we lost some of our more quality girls. All in all it was a disappointing tournament, performance-wise, but a really fun time and the weather was just fantastic. Madison does it again.

Also, as a result of being eliminated early, we got to watch the Portugal v. Netherlands game at State Street Brats. The volume was just booming and the emotions were high for what has been the best match of the World Cup thus far. Thank god we lost, that’s all I can say.

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All Aboard!

2006-06-20T00:00:00+00:00

All Aboard!

20 June 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

For any who might care, Emma and I are making a farewell tour of the Midwest. Much like the whistle-stop tours of dead politicians we will be making scheduled stops in Bloomington, IN, Chicago, Appleton and Milwaukee. Of course, we wont be signing autographs or pitching bullshit that we’ll never actually do. Instead we’ll be visiting newly purchased houses, acquiring travel visas and attending the perennial State Fair of Wisconsin. If you would like to book us in your area, send an email with all pertinent information.

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Oh, Canada

2006-06-18T00:00:00+00:00

Oh, Canada

Travels

18 June 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

In what seems to be a never-ending flurry of life-disrupting vacations (how bad could that possibly be?), Emma and I have recently returned from a trip to our neighbors to the North.

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Sickness

2006-06-13T00:00:00+00:00

Sickness

13 June 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

I must preface this entry with my official position on sick time. I consider myself to be a fairly moral person. As such, I have a hard time using sick time unless I’m prohibited from leaving the house without a garbage can for “insurance.” Despite this, I was left with a conundrum when Emma asked me if I wanted to go to her sister’s high school graduation. Naturally, I wanted to, but I had recently burned my remaining vacation time on an event which was no doubt selfish — I said I was moral, not selfless. On the other hand, I still had 137 hours of sick time available to me, and I also learned a few weeks ago that sick time is not paid out at employment termination. Problem solved, right?

Well, I used my sick time on Thursday with no major incidents and boarded a plane for Boston. I still felt bad about calling in and nearly made myself ill trying to muster up the courage/shame to call my boss when I woke up. Of course, this was only step one of a two step process. On Friday I had to have Emma call him to explain that, “there is just no way he can come to work tonight.” This, my friends, is deceptive language. Emma loves it, and insists that it’s not nearly as bad as lying. Really, at 8 PM on Friday there was no way I was making it to work by 10 PM from Boston.

Well, apparently I nearly gave my boss an aneurysm with this second day of feigned sickness. The whole time he did not know whether I was truely sick or not. And, in a cruel twist of fate, our car was parked in a parking ramp for the weekend because of a broken window stuck in the down position. This left my boss with the distinct impression that not only was I not sick, but I was also an awful liar and had driven somewhere. Of course he was partly right, and I wasn’t about to correct the other part. I just took the verbal “lashing” when I got back with the smug satisfaction that I only had to work four more days for the man. I suppose a small amount of that satisfaction was also borne of the fact that I had bailed my boss out of numerous scheduling nightmares with my easy-going attitude and flexible schedule.

Ultimately this all came down to the fact that my boss is not a terribly effective administrator and managed to paint himself into the proverbial corner such that any minor hiccup in the work order and all hell broke lose. I should also note that this hell was contained entirely in my bosses head, as none of the other officers seemed all that irriated/worn out by having to pick up my two shifts.

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The Big MT and Haiti

2006-06-06T00:00:00+00:00

The Big MT and Haiti

06 June 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

Mother Theresa once shook hands with a dictator and praised his wife for her community outreach. I realize it takes a lot to be good in this world, but clearly Theresa, here, was more of a politician than a saint. That is, if she ever attains sainthood. I would like to see those three miracles. I bet they are all going to have been in third world countries, carefully out of the sight of any sort of electronic historical documentation devices like a camera.

I got that little tidbit of Theresa trivia from the book «Mountains Beyond Mountains» which is about a man, his mission and Haiti. It really is fantastic and can either serve as a stimulant to encourage one to go out and help change the world. Or it can work as a depressive agent, showing just how little the things one does for entertainment matter to the 3,000,000,000+ people living in abject poverty in the world.

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Disc Golfing?

2006-06-05T00:00:00+00:00

Disc Golfing?

05 June 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

A few days ago I completed my second-ever 100 Holes tournament in Appleton, WI. It was originally concieved by a close friend of mine as an excuse to waste an afternoon and also test the endurance of local disc golf players. Three years ago I was one of a handful that actually completed the round. This year we had a marginally better eight people complete the tournament. We only lost one to illness.

The tournament started at 9:30 AM — of course it was supposed to begin at 8 — and lasted until 8 PM. We had some really slow golfers on this outting and it probably didn’t need to take that long. I seem to recall the last 100 Holes going until only about 5 or 6, but my memory is known for it’s holes. At any rate, I finished second to last. Having only played one other round of 18 holes of disc golf this season I don’t see that as too much of a failure. Also, I think I finished about 37 over par. An admirable score by my account. Plus, there is plenty of room for improvment. Set the bar low, that’s what I say!

Waking up the next day I discovered that, while my driving arm hadn’t gotten tired the day of the tournament, I had, indeed, used it far too much. The ache felt as though I had been punched repeatedly in the shoulder. Maybe working my way up to 100 holes is a good goal for future years. Of course I compounded the whole thing by going bowling on Sunday night, but what are you going to do? Not bowl? I don’t think so…

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Packaging

2006-05-23T00:00:00+00:00

Packaging

23 May 2006 – Appleton, Wisconsin

It seems packing is a theme in my life these days. Well, to be fair packing is usually an activity the precedes moving, of which a number of people in my life are in the process currently.

When I begin to move I am also bound to rediscover the beauty of Ebay. I accumulate a lot of redundant items over time. Multiple digital cameras, video game consoles that are never played and books — oh my, the books! As a result I’m left packing and packing, not just for myself, but for all my countless, and probably needless, things.

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