Rediscovery

Being semi-retired (unemployed) at 27 results in boredom... a LOT of boredom. I really had no idea there were so many hours in a single day until I had no job to occupy a good third of it. So, to prevent my own mental and spiritual decay, I adopted the use of a daily planner.

Then I immediately abandoned it. I mean, I fill it in, but I never look at it (I know what I'm supposed to do every day). So, I'm still frequently fighting boredom. Did I mention that I have no TV, internet, dvds, or videogames? That doesn't help! I digress... I'll rant about videogames on some other post later. Right now, it's about my experience yesterday riding around my home town on my bike.

I'm not sure to what special niche of cycling I belong, but I have had a special spot for touring. The idea of exploring unknown territories from the vantage point of a bicycle has an allure to me. It's the whole “venturing into the unknown” thing, I think. I mean, I know the route I'm taking, I know my ride, and I know my body. What I do not know is the texture of the roads, their makeup, what their particular signature of gravel feels like beneath me! You learn what hills deserve your curses, which yards and parking lots you can cut through, and where those rare spots of shade always happen to be. And who knows, you might just end up passing by a winery you didn't expect (totally happened to me!).

Sure, I could drive through many of those routes, but that is nowhere near the same (and you know it!). Consider the following: I grew up in Green Bay, and have been driving its streets for the better half of a decade. But yesterday was the first time that I rode down them at any length. It's what I would call an Urban Tour, in which I pretty much just rode along the city streets, more or less aimlessly. I took routes I've driven for years and years, but they were entirely new to me from the perspective of my bike. Because I rode, I got to experience their subtleties in a new and very intimate way (If there's a bump, I feel it. If there's a patch of gravel, I swerve). Example: I rode almost the entire stretch of Broadway, a route I've driven plenty, but I never noticed until yesterday that it was at a slight slope. It's what's called a “false flat” that appears flat, but in fact is not. These things are amazing, or grueling, depending on which direction you're facing.

Fortunately for me, I was facing downhill and I had the wind at my back. So I was pretty much flying down that sucker! And it went through downtown and an industrial district, so I was flying while weaving around gravel and broken glass (more fun!).

But yeah, I learned that there's always more to discover out there, wherever you are.

In a final note, I would like to say that I actually enjoy riding around cars in cities. Cars out in the country are sneaky and fast, so they're like bad Strong Safeties (they never actually hit you, but they are loud and fast enough to scare you into screwing up). Whereas, in the city, cars are predictable and slow; you know where they're going and you know that you are far more agile than they are, and can fit wherever you put yourself. So they're slow, predictable, and way more afraid of you than you are of them. They're like (seriously, it took me a half an hour to think of a good analogy) student loans: as long as you're careful and keep your head on a swivel, they're harmless.

The tipping point for me, that moment I realized that it was no big deal riding around cars, was when I was riding singletrack. It occurred to me that I only needed about two feet to ride safely, and there's WAY more than that on roads!

It puts the lotion on its skin and clicks the ads again!

Literally The Best Meal I've Ever Had

Quick, think of the best meal you ever had!

…

…

Time's up!

Did you think of something? Was there one meal, one bite that you specifically remembered, right away? As if it were right on the tip of your tongue?

When I do this with people, it's a rarity for them to have something in mind right away. I've gotten a lot of responses involving the company kept at thanksgivings and other holiday meals, but not a whole lot about a truly stellar eating experience.

But I have one specific meal in mind for myself. It was that good that I still remember it... there's a story (of course).

It was from when I was living in Arkansas. My fiancee was visiting for a week, and we decided to go for a weekend getaway to Eureka Springs. Fantastic little town built into the cliffsides of a narrow valley in northern Arkansas. Very quaint place, very colorful, and a surprisingly high ratio of lingerie shops. The town was clearly built well before cars existed, as the streets and avenues were quite narrow, and teeming with people. We navigated our way through them all, and found our hotel smack dab in the middle of town. It was Flatiron Flats, a three-sided building in the vein of the Daily Bugle.

Finding parking was a minor ordeal, and we had to make a few phone calls to get someone who could

check us in to our hotel room, but otherwise they were great. I asked our guy (who was one of the owners) if he had any recommendations for places to eat. He directed us to a few places, and we settled on the fanciest of them... I think it was called The Bavarian Inn... dammit, I hate that I can't remember the name! [turns out, it was The Grand Taverne] That really throws off the believability of my story if I can't even remember where the hell it happened!

Anyway, it was a nice place, and we were pretty much the only people in there, so service was fantastic! I ordered the roast duck because I never had duck before, and I had a Manhattan to drink along with it for the very same reason. Turned out to be a stellar combination! A Manhattan, for those who do not know, is a cocktail involving bourbon and grenadine (a few other things, but those two are essential for the story here). The bourbon is delightfully bitter, oakey and smokey in flavor, and the grenadine leaves a nice, lightly sweet finish to the drink (all of this is of course when made properly). The experience is a rolling taste that evolves over the course of just a few moments. The duck, it turns out, matched very well. It too had a deep, smoked flavor to it, along with the gamy and rich nature of the duck meat itself, but there was a cranberry sauce drizzled over it that really made it something special.

Essentially, I would take a bite of duck, which would start sweet, then salty, then earthy and smokey. That I would follow with a sip of the Manhattan, which would match the smokey sense and follow it up with straight bitterness that, just before it would be sharp, would turn sweet and fruity with the grenadine. Then, following that with a bite of duck would start it all over again. The flavors would build on one another, in a rolling campaign over my tongue until I was finally finished, exhausted from the orgasmic ordeal.

So yeah, that's the best meal I ever had.

We finished our weekend nicely, touring the town (up and down many, MANY stairs) and doing a little shopping. Any more than two nights would be pointless, though, as the town is so small that there's not much to do beyond eat and shop and walk. There wasn't even any swimming to be had!

Anyway, I'm out; click ads!

My Fish Died and I Misplaced my Legs

Yeah, my fish died. His name was Blue Moon Two, and he was (is?) a Betta, blue with red coloration in the fins and a jet-black face. Very intimidating, and he was a bit of a badass (still is, in fishy Heaven). I picked him up in a local Petco back in Arkansas, to replace Blue Moon, who died when I moved to a new apartment. THAT was a tragic death! I actually watched his last moments, unable to do anything as he freaked the hell out and then... just... stopped.

That sucked.

But, after an appropriate mourning phase, I replaced him, because, well he's a fish and a cheap one at that. So I got Blue Moon Two, and let me tell ya, he was a fighter. Like, literally, he had scars from squirming around massive (proportionally) boulders in his tank. And he made it with me for a year and a half, when I had to move. I didn't just flush him, and I couldn't give him away, not when there was a chance that I could take him with. The chance was a most ingenious plan: put him in an insulated cup of properly treated water for the drive.

It worked, too! alllllmost... See, he made it to my new home, Green Bay, WI. And that was a 850-mile trip, so THAT was certainly a testament to his fortitude and determination. But, after I had everything unloaded, i went to check on him, and nope. He was just floating there, suddenly lifeless.

I'm glad I didn't see him die; that would have been too much for me to handle at the time. But, BM2 went through the effort of seeing me safely to my new home, and I wish I could have done the same for him. It's strange how we can become attached to things that have such inhuman characters. But still, there it is; my brother from Arkansas (kiiiinda southeast Asia) died, and I was unexpectedly broken up about it that night.

On another note, I went on the first leg of my epic journey today, a practice run. It was a nice ride, but my legs are useless now, and I expect they will be tomorrow, too. Like, this is the first time that I was so exhausted from a workout of any kind that I almost fell asleep in the middle of it! Really, right there, on the bike, I almost dozed off near the end! That was a big first. But, the one thing that is apparent is that I have more conditioning to do, and if I wanna go on rides this long, bring more food than two cheap granola bars... or eat more than cereal before hand.

Anyway, see what happens when you click the ads... I think you'll be pleasantly surprised!

The Dare and The Crunch

So I talk a big game about living a life that's inspirational, adventurous, and exciting. When it comes down to it, though, Is pend a lot of time at home, surfing the interwebs, and watching TVshows whilst playing videogames. That's ninety-percent of my life.

Well it had been.

I've moved into my mom's house (temporarily; oh please, God, make it temporary!), and she has no internet. I could pay for internet service, but honestly I am quite excited about the experiment it will be with me having no internet and leaving my Xbox in storage. I may go insane, or I may become the genius that I think I am (or more accurately, the genius that the voices in my head say I am). Part of the purpose of this blog is to ensure my own productivity during this time of temporary retirement, which it has to some extent. But another purpose of this blog is to give me a reason to be daring with my own life. It's here to act as a soap-box on which I stand to declare my utter awesomeness and badassitude.

To do that, I need to take dares. And what would be a better dare for a blog that used to be about cycling than a tour?

I was excited about coming back home (and in many ways, I still am excited, here on day three), and I started making plans to see my old friends. And I realized that they all live in a straight line down Wisconsin (more or less; if Wisco were a body, it would be the digestive track). So of course, I immediately thought up the idea of riding that line, visiting friends I haven't seen in years!

I've never been on a tour of any length before, not like this. It is a daunting task, here, sitting on my mom's couch, but I want to do it alone so I can see how I handle the crunch when it lands on me. Right now, I am mentally planning for it, but I need to start physically conditioning soon. Not really sure what all that will take, but I don't wanna by dying out there in the middle of nowhere, looking for a field to curl up in because I couldn't make it to my hotel/campsite. Speaking of, I should really start making a route, and determine WHERE I will be any given day, so I can actually make plans to see people! And I need to try riding with equipment, because I've only rarely done that. In short, there's a lot of prepping to do...

Or I could just throw that all out the window and assume I'll handle the crunch when it happens. I like that plan better.

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Going Back Home (Musings)

They say you can never go back home. I think that was before cars, though.

Yeah, I'm a smartass. The point of that saying, of course, is that you'll have changed so much in the time that you were gone, that home would have transformed into "Home" through homesickness and personal growth. You change so much being away, that your home doesn't affect you the same. Being gone, you think about your home and compare your new place to it, which magnifies and intensifies your memory-experience of home into Home.

Example: nothin tastes like mama's barbecue. You grew up on it; it became your framework for all barbecue you've ever tasted. Then you move from home. You get homesick, so you start eating (it'll happen), and you eat specifically things that remind you of home: barbecue. But none are mama's recipe, so none satisfy your homesickness. Nonetheless, you keep searching for something to scratch that itch. Over time, you've tasted all your new area has to offer for barbecue. Because of this, you become a connoisseur of all things barbecue. None taste like mama's barbecue, but merely because you're searching so hard for that specific flavor, you learn all about the subtleties of each and every barbecue you sample. There are traits you find in each sauce you experience, traits which you learn to love. So you get along, day after day, loving the life you made. Until one day, you go home. And of course, your first time Home, you get mama's barbecue. You expect it to be everything you were searching for all those years. But you find that its just not the same as you remembered.

You grew:
Your search for mama's barbecue over the years has transformed it into the ideal Mama's Barbecue. It became this mysterious and perfect thing that beat all competition so long as it never entered the ring (your memory of it overwhelmed all other barbecue sauces and rubs, so to speak). So when you get home, and actually have it again, it's not the thing you built it up to be. And because of that, it fails, and you're left with a haunting memory to reconcile with reality.

Now that hasn't been my own experience so far with my return home (for the most part). I remembered it and lived where I was for the past two years without comparing too much, apparently. On returning, it was as if I had traveled back in time to where I was two years ago, with nothing different except that I lost a few years of my own life.  And that's kinda horrifying.

Kinda really horrifying.

The idea that two years can go by and nothing has to change scares me. I'm not entirely sure why, though. Perhaps it's the implication that I, therefor, have not changed much over my absence. But I have plenty of evidence to the contrary, so I don't think so. It's more that it indicates how short life is, and how you can sleep through it all, if you just have your eyes closed long enough. And my fear, I suppose, comes from who I grew into while I was away. I liked that guy, and I'm afraid that I'll lose him, being away from that place and in this old one. That act would therefor wipe out two years' time of my own life, and I will have accomplished nothing but accumulating Stuff and wasting a chunk of my own life.

Now that is something worth fearing. Every year matters when you're approaching thirty.

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The Best Cup of Coffee Ever (and running outta adjectives)

For this past week, I have been gradually moving to Wisconsin from Arkansas. It's a long enough move, and there's so little to draw me 851 miles to Arkansas, that I sincerely doubt I'll ever be coming back here. So, I've been preparing myself for that on a mental and emotional level by visiting all the restaurants I won't find anywhere else. Yeppers, I will be missing food more than anything else here (time will ultimately tell, but good eats is what I expect to miss).

So far, I've had Jade China (fantastic little hole-in-the-wall Chinese stir fry that may literally have a hole in its wall), McAllister's Deli (a chain, but I've not seen it anywhere else, and I am addicted to their pastrami on rye), and David's Burgers (I don't know how, but the best burger I've ever had, hands-down). All that's left is The Whole Hog, which is this fantastic small-ish chain of barbecue that makes a fantastic beef brisket. Saving the best for last, there.

But, of all these, the one place I'm going to miss the most is the one cafe that makes coffee right in all of Arkansas (to be fair, the only one I could find; I assume there are more, but they just don't have proper websites and listings for me to find). If you're ever in Little Rock area, hit up Guillermo's Gourmet Grounds.

It's the one place that knows what they're doing, and the only place I have been able to find Ethiopian Yirgacheffe beans roasted so well. So of course, I stocked up on the stuff before I jumped ship.

The scent, where the experience starts, is powerful. For several hours after brewing, it takes control of the room with its deep, nutty aroma. Then, as you near the brew, it shifts to a clear, bright, and a little tart zestiness (all of course with the deep roasted smell lingering above). The flavor follows suit, but the acidity, that sharpness in the smell, it stays quite mellow throughout the taste. It's there, but only at the very first tip of the tongue; as the sip rolls along, it increases with depth and evolves much in the inverse of the sniff-check. It gets deeper, and the darkness of this brew comes up and dominates the experience. Dark chocolate, that is the overwhelming sense-experience I found to live just at the last moment of swallowing, and on afterward for several minutes. It's curious, how I get excited about coffee that does not taste like coffee. To be fair, it doesn't taste exactly like dark chocolate (none of that stabbing in the mouth feeling I get from something so overwhelmingly bitter), but what's so fascinating is how it reminds me of something else. Like a feather dancer that doesn't look at all like a bird, but hey, feathers! On a woman! That's unexpected! And as much as I would like to claim that it's that surprise, that unexpectedness of a blended sense-experience that makes it so powerful, I doubt that. If that were the case, I wouldn't enjoy this coffee much past the second sip, by which point I'm expecting roasted chocolate. Rather, I believe it to be the blend itself, triggering more experiences in the mind, that makes it so exciting. Then, by creating a new sense-memory with such powerful links, that flavor is remembered even more zealously, over time. But then again, I liked the stuff.

I will always be a fan of drinks and foods that come to life in the last parts of the mouth, back where the tongue meets the throat at the tail end of the nose. Those flavors linger and stay with you well past the meal itself; they're the faithful flavors.

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Packing & The Best Wine I Ever Had

I am awesome at packing!

Like, really good.

I don't mess around with any of that "sorting by room" crap. I just throw whatever into boxes over and over again until I'm done. Boom: awesome. I felt like a genius when I discovered that I could use clothing as padding. So yeah, that's why my champagne flutes are wrapped in socks. Don't give me that look!

Seriously though, I'm terrible at packing and am not looking forward to having to unpack any of this (I'm moving a few states over, for those of you who don't know). I've had a week to pack and it in no way would take me an actual week of time to pack it all, so of course, I put it off. That and the cleaning (mold is pretty much all over the place here in Arkansas). And of course, now, I only have a few days to pack everything and clean everything too. So I got most of it done in one day, like ya do. The side-effect of this particular method, though, is that everything's a jumbled mess and I already forgot where the hell my stamps are!

not cool, Chance; not cool

The first step, of course, is donating all the stuff I don't want or use any more (done twice so far). Next, is the throwing away all the stuff that's trash, but collectible, or memorable, but essentially junk for which I have no use. Most of that process is easy, but there's the memento value in these objects. The best example I have is bottles of wine and liquor I really liked. Once drank, little remains of the liquor but the memory of it tingling our tastebuds. Nice line; quote that shit. I was carrying out those empty bottles, when I recognized the one small one remaining in my hand. It was wine from Parallel 44; their "Meditation" wine from 2007. This stuff was the best wine I've ever had, hands-down and no contest. This amazingly luxurious texture accompanied a deep, dark cherry and chocolate flavor that lingered for hours. It was good, and I will never forget the first time I had it. I won't forget any of the other times, either, but they were all a little off, and never quite matched the explosive experience of that first bottle (the cheesecake accompanying helped, too, but that's a small detail). Not only can I never find that wine any more, but even if I can, I do not expect the same overwhelming flavor of that first bottle.

Sad as that is, I will never forget it, and the fact that I cannot repeat it again makes it even more powerful a memory. It becomes all the more beautiful an experience for that one moment it existed.

So that was in my mind, as I was about to toss the bottle away. I knew I wouldn't forget that amazing flavor, that the bottle would be an idle memento. But still, it was a good moment, and it deserves its idol. So that trash, I will pack and take with me, along with its memory.

Good night, all y'all's, and click some ads (close them the moment they open a new page).