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Sunday, January 29, 2012

Sourdough bread, part 1

A while back, I was given a book of recipes from Artisan bakeries in America - one of these was operated by Thom Leonard, who included a recipe for a country sourdough loaf.  What intimidated me about the recipe was the week and half it took to make the starter / levain and learning how to rely on a little water and rye flour, allowed to ferment for 24 hours, to rise the loaves once they had been shaped and placed into their loaf pans.   

"Professional bakers refresh their starters every eight hours"  - Artisan Baking, Maggie Glezer

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/3934/thom-leonards-country-french

This blog looks like they've already worked it over once or twice already, so I'll spare the carpal tunnel and add a couple of photos of my own Thom Leonard adaptation. 
Turned out pretty good...water, flour, salt and a pinch of yeast. 

Artisan Baking Across America: The Breads, The Bakers, The Best Recipes

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Thursday Afternoon







We used to meet every Thursday
Thursday
Thursday in the afternoon
For a couple a beers
And a game of pool

Morphine, Thursday from the album Cure For Pain.

Morphine had a great live show I had the privilige of seeing once at First Avenue, a few months before Mark Sandman died onstage in Italy...I think it was Italy.  The two string slide bass enjoyed a brief illustrious resurgence...Presidents of the United States of America, (think Peaches and Lump), also had a singing two string slide bass player.  That's a mouthful.

Anyway, today, Thursday January 26th had a 40 degree Fahrenheit high.  Remarkable.  I went for a run and mapped it on mapmyrun, and listened to the following music:

You Can Get it if You Really Want, Jimmy Cliff
Youth Culture Killed My Dog, they Might Be Giants
Chicken Payback, A Band of Bees
Twilight, The Raveonettes
Toddler Hiway, They Might Be Giants
John Hardy, Uncle Tupelo
Who Made Who, AC/DC
Get Off This, Cracker
Pieholden Suite, Wilco
A Little Light, Bob Mould
What's Going On, Marvin Gaye
Wait So Long, Trampled By Turtles
True Dreams of Wichita, Soul Coughing
The Way You Do The Thing You Do, Earl Van Dyke
Again, Alice in Chains
Flying Saucer, The Wedding Present
Believe What You're Saying, Sugar
And Your Bird Can Sing, The Beatles
Pardon Me, Incubus
Panama, Van Halen
My Mind is Ramblin', The Black Keys
Learning to Fly, Pink Floyd
National Disgrace, Atmosphere

I haven't been paying too much attention to whether or not the playlist matches the time spent running...here's an ambitious idea, maybe in the spring I can take off the headphones and listen for different birdsong.  

Sunday, January 22, 2012

Sunday Night Dance Party

You might have seen one out in Minnesota
Or maybe down by the sea in Sarasota
But they were made back in Worcester Mass
Of aluminum and bakalite and glass
- Martin Sexton

Immediately after completing this run, I got a voicemail and a couple of text messages telling me I had an opportunity to see Martin Sexton at the Fitzgerald theater, in downtown St. Paul.  He opened his show with the song Diner, from the album Black Sheep.  I've seen him at the Cedar Cultural Center, the 400 bar and now this, making three concerts I've witnessed his scatalogical singing and blues hammering guitar playing.  Totally enjoyed myself and still enjoy his ability to nail incredible vocal ranges as well as percussive-like syllable phrasing amidst gutsy and folksy ballads. 






While running tonight, I listened to the following music;

Something, The Beatles
Lime House Blues, Birelli Lagrene
Vamos, The Pixies
Crane Wife 1 and 2, the Decemberists
Miles and Miles of Texas, Asleep at the Wheel
Voodoo Child (Slight Return), Jimi Hendrix
Pot Kettle Black, Wilco
Wall of Death, REM
Little T & A, The Rolling Stones
Be Be Your Love, Rachel Yamagata
Prodigal Son, The Rolling Stones
Hoodoo Voodoo, Billy Bragg
ELT, Wilco
The Late Greats, Wilco
Viva la Vida, Coldplay
Rain King, Counting Crows
Start me up, The Rolling Stones
That's not my Name, The Ting Tings
Bone Machine, The Pixies
The Woods of Old Limerick, Patrick Street
The Smoothie Song, Nickel Creek
Wave of Mutilation, The Pixies
Yellow Ledbetter, Pearl Jam

During the run I tried picking up my pace between lightposts, for about a mile and half.  I remember reading that book, Into The Wild, about Christopher McCandless - one of the things Jon Krakauer mentioned was his passion for cross country running, his ability to take a cross country training run that had become mundane, and turn it into an adventure, with sprints, new trails and occasionally deliberately getting lost, just to keep running long enough to find his way home again - as captain of the team, his workouts were legendary.  The lightpost sprints is an idea from another captain, from a long, long, time ago.  Thankfully, neither of us have starved to death in an abandoned VW bus.



Friday, January 20, 2012

Juxtaposition

I got a case of writer's block, if you want to call it that, about a month and half ago.  Similar to the clogged toilet of October 2011, I decided to ask Craigslist.  There follows three separate threads of discussion, with postings from Craigslist users who might prefer not having their posting shared on my blog.  Sorry about that, I removed the user handle / ids except my own, (mlmck).  I eventually remembered the word, while showering.

Aqua Vitae. 

However, I am still not convinced using it as a way to describe an ironic parallel between two disparaging parties or ideas is a suitable use. 


Word Association Discussion Forum




min paradigm shift § < mlmck > 12/05/2011 13:50 
      : . . Morals §
      : . . : . . paradox § 
      : . . : . . dichotomy § 
      : . . : . . dualism § 
      : . . : . . open marriage §
      : . . : . . morale §
      : . . : . . Morales, §
      : . . : . . ethics §
      : . . : . . : . . juxtaposition §
      : . . : . . : . . : . . adjacent §
      : . . : . . : . . : . . : . . antacedent §
      : . . : . . : . . : . . : . . : . . antecedent § 
      : . . : . . : . . : . . : . . : . . : . . precedent §



Education Discussion Forum



another word for < mlmck > 12/05 13:51:13
what fifty cent word with three syllables means paradigm shift, paradox, dichotomy or dualism?

-here are some
But these are only 10 cent phrases, so you might have to use five of them to convey the same point.
conundrum

dilemma

reframing

bifurcation

gordian knot

-Are you writing a really boring haiku? §

-no
I'm trying to remember a word somebody used that impressed me. And then trying to decide if I was impressed by their accuracy or their ignorance. I am juxtaposing my own ignorance with theirs, in order to compare and contrast my own shifting paradigm.

-
hard to say
those words don't mean the same thing


Literary and Writing Discussion Forum

another word for paradigm shift < mlmck > 12/05 13:53:09
Hey- I am wondering if any of you literary types know of another word for paradigm shift, besides paradox, logical fallacy, dichotomy or dualism.

-My understanding would equate it more
to transition or metamorphosis than the nouns you used.

-Maybe
model shift, change of form, new recipe for; removal of pillars from the old cathedral; a phnomnenal algorithm (yikes!); deconstructing the unworkable model; putting more bones into the body of the plan, so it can run twice as fast; etc. The main idea would be change. Check your Roget's Thesaurus under change and related ideas of model, form, growth, etc.

-Mlmck asked for another word, not expression

-but I admit your list is impressively good

-agree with swamp, mlmck your sysnonyms are not

-Paradigm can be Shifty, but
"paradigm shift" merely means change in the status quo. It's a catchy phrase and the Ad-Man are working it to the bone during the Silly Season--or political campaign year and a half.

Republicans abhor change in a forward direction; they want to return to that mythical yesteryear of Lone Rangers and two-bit actors like Reagan. The last thing they would want, if they comprehended its meaning is a "paradigm shift."

-juxtaposition
I was looking for Juxtaposition, in the Dan Akroyd / Eddie Murphy sense of the word. Trading Places. I guess there's a literary use as well as an abstract space definition.

The Mortimer brothers create a juxtaposition by hiring street beggar Eddie Murphy, (Rudolph Valentine) and giving him Wall Street Executive Dan Akroyd's, (Louis Winthorpe III), job. Their juxtaposition is mitigated by a simple wager, can rich well educated Winthorpe survive on the street, and can Valentine be their new syncophantic yes-man? The Mortimer brothers bet a dollar.

I assume a paradigm shift would be a little more all encompassing, and likely void of singular entities...like the gradual change in thought about the theory of relativity, neutrinos and dark matter.

-juxtaposition 
The word I was trying to remember, and thought was a synonym for paradigm shift, was juxtaposition. thank you for your input.

For some reason, this word rings a bell in my memory, maybe it was used out of context or something? But it,(in my memory) seems to have related to a contrasting of ideas, or a competing set of ideas that change in conjunction with one another, more than the actual definition of juxtapose.

As in, Mitt Romney's change of political stance has juxtaposed the political viewpoints of those loyal to him, and not his politics - which doesn't make sense at all, considering the actual definition of juxtapose.

- Mybe the word
for "uxtaposed"should have been "adopted".

"As in, Mitt Romney's change of political stance has (juxtaposed) adoptend the political viewpoints of those loyal to him, and not his [own sense of] politics"

- This is likely the definition I was looking for
Let's take a situation from any generic film. A very poor woman gives birth to twins and dies immediately after. The sons get separated at birth. While one son finds himself adopted into a wealthy factory owner's house, the other is a street child who turns into a petty thief. The film story traces their journey through life. At a crucial moment, the son who is a petty thief corners the other son in a dark alley and mugs him.

Thus a juxtaposition is drawn here which shows the contrast that both sons, born of the same mother and identical to look at, are yet so much different in their motives, lifestyles and characters. Thus the literary device of juxtaposition is used to draw a contrast between the two, but it is still connected somewhere and it is possible to place them side by side to draw a contrast.

From Buzzle.com

-polar shift

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Favorite bike ride, 2011





I didn't post anything about this on or near the day that it happened, so I think, in retrospect, it would be good of me to post a short blog entry about the 2011 Red Ride. Tom Lais, a cyclist I met while riding on Lexington Avenue, who is somehow related to my friend's sister's cousin's uncle, suggested I join his century ride to Saint John's University in 2011. The previous year, the ride left at 8:00 AM from the Minneapolis Basilica, and eventually made it to Saint John's, after riding through tornadic wind conditions, hail, lightning and some pretty substantial rainfall. I, true to form, slept in that morning and missed the ride, though the storm hit the area I was residing in at the time - the downed trees, knocked out power lines and damaged houses told me I had made the right decision.
After some preliminary planning with Tom and a few of the other riders of the 2010 Red Ride in January of 2011, and occasionally seeing Tom on his bicycle throughout a very snowy and prolonged winter, I awoke on the morning of June 25th, got my lycra and cleats together and rode over to Minneapolis, catching the group as riders were leaving the Minneapolis Bascilica for the 100 mile ride to Saint John's University.
The group started as nearly twenty riders, and throughout the course of the day, varied from a dozen to again, nearly twenty riders. A section of road was under construction, a crash occurred, there was a flat tire immediately, a strong tailwind at one point had the peloton, (group) traveling at a very casual twenty seven miles an hour, somebody went the whole way without a helmet and somebody from a state school showed up and tried to make all of the small private liberal arts school alumni feel like overly educated pansies, (he had lots of tattoos and smoked and drank a Leblatt's on the saddle of his custom titanium frame cross bike), I'm pretty sure there was a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air Sedan he and his friends were in the process of chasing down.
Having ridden group rides before, but not from the perspective of being an accomplished and confident rider myself, or specifically on a road bike, I felt strong all day and finished the century well. I made some new friends during the course of the day, and found out later Tom would ride a double century on his 70th birthday...maybe it was his 72nd. He also rode the Arrowhead 135, on a Salsa custom Mukluk. I think my favorite memory of the day, in all, was seeing the Saint John's campus again, and laughing at the memory of hauling my Raleigh Technium Obsession onto campus, in 1993, hanging it upside down in my dorm room and riding it less than a hundred yards a day to the science building, for a couple of weeks...with my Biology and Chemistry books in paniers.
Also notable and ultimately more significant than my personal memories of that day, are the Benedectine Values that surrounded the ride and the day itself. They are,

Awareness of God
Moderation
Hospitality
Dignity of Work
Community Living
Listening
Taking Counsel
Common Good
Truthful Living
Stewardship
Respect for Persons
Justice

Thank you again to Tom and the Saint John's Alumni Association.

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Friday's run, Wilson




Unseasonably warm temps, so I got out and went for an evening run. Having eaten a late lunch of Himalayan buffet was not the smartest thing, and I contested an upset stomach for 8 miles before lighting a thermonuclear device upon a defenseless port-a-potty. The remaining 2 miles were a little less uncomfortable. I've heard of Montezuma's revenge, this was Tenzing Norgay's revenge. Also noted, a well used foot and bicycle path running closer to the river, though on the Minneapolis side, would be ideal for trail running...when there is a little less ice.

Music listened to:
Trampoline, Joe Henry
The Lover, Medeski, Martin and Wood
Hang Wire, The Pixies
Back up and Push, Bryan Sutton
Viva La Vida, Coldplay
Debaser, The Pixies
I Can't Stand Up For Falling Down, Elvis Costello
Pot Kettle Black, Wilco
Hoodoo Voodoo, Billy Bragg
Achilles Last Stand, Led Zeppelin
Test-Tube Baby / Shoot 'Em Down, Morphine
Wall of Death, R.E.M.
Allegria, Gypsy Kings
Valerie, Beau Soleil
Canary in a Coalmine, The Police
Voodoo Child (Slight Return), Jimi Hendrix
Corduroy, Pearl Jam

I would include an estimated time too, but my watch became like unto one as Lazarus. So I replaced the battery, and lo, the dead have risen. "I saved thirty bucks!" Said Lazarus as he put his now functioning Timex Ironman back on his wrist and rode over to the St. Paul Cathedral to take a panorama photo of what is either the most epic wedding arrangement EVER or the Red Bull Crashed Ice / hockey derby / blades of glory / downhill ice skating / cross thing. I keep thinking wedding, but I'm sure it's gonna have lots more checking and elbow smashing. Here's a couple of photos - enjoy.











2011 Artcrank submission


Last year, after moving from a storage locker in Washington County, I moved into an apartment on Grand Avenue. I didn't ride my bike there, or cart my belongings in an xtra-cycle through the streets, or receive sponsorship to live there, or in some way benefit in any way from having a bicycle on my wall that I also rode on occasion. With no job and no income, I had little to rely on and often found myself scrounging for bus fare or vegetables from the Farmers Market, things I might have taken for granted months earlier. In December, after selling parts off of a decommissioned cyclocross bike, I was given a re-built 58 cm Centurion road bike, circa 1980, with new tires. Salvation from the bus lines and a way to get to work as a seasonal Nordic ski instructor with the city of Saint Paul. Bent handlebars, Suntour barcons, bent wheels, bent frame and one purpose. After the epic winter, the massive snowfalls and the spring season that wasn't, I kept riding it until September, when the frame was replaced with a Schwinn steel frame. The parts are all the same and it rides well, but I saved the frame after being told it was a previous wreck, and having ridden it so long without total failure was commendable in and of itself. The barcons lesson was fun, when I lost a camming action nut that keeps tension in the shifter, and rode around town, trying to find parts. Riding on the ice cube quality ruts of Summit avenue, not so much. I now have three frames, dating back to 1987, that each carry the burden of some hard earned lesson, yet no longer carry the burden of my velocentricity.

julian casablancas, 1-7-11

Last night, I went out for a run, and my Timex quit on me. It is the first week of 2012, and so far, I have had a flat tire, lost my watch and have seriously begun to question if my habits are more indicative of Emelio Estevez in the Breakfast Club, John Cusack in Say Anything or Bill Paxton in Weird Science. I was hoping more for the Reality Bites, Ethan Hawke sort of anti-hero, rather than the bully, the sociopath or the world's worst brother...meh.

I guess allowing one's voice to be heard has the potential for both approval and dis-approval.

I think I'll say something about the run and the Timex in another post, as I am trying to fix the watch. Here's something interesting, that I posted on Craigslist, as innocuously as possible, because for some reason, the question was profound and simple and struck me as coming from somebody who may have at one time, wondered the same thing. A barista asked me if I was happy with what I had, as in, was the coffee roast sufficient? All I heard was, "Are you happy with your life?" After thinking about it for a few minutes, here's what I decided to do, to write, about that feeling. Hopefully it's just another place marker in the void of cyberspace, and not something taken too personally.

Are you happy with what you had?
Let's start with my Itunes library. Let's talk about how many times I've deleted the whole fucking thing, started over and hawked cds from local libraries, pilfered my parents music library for classical music I used to enjoy, begged radio stations for the name of that song, found the greatest playlist I could ever have made on my own time, only to delete it and try to forget I ever had started collecting that genre in the first place. Let's talk about how many times I've reloaded my compact disc library onto my laptop, in order to re-build that Itunes music library, to download that music onto my ipod, in order to feel more comfortable in my own skin, to more easily ignore the stares, the comments, the vague and unpredictable coughing or clearing of the throat that denotes a stranger's discomfort near me and my pervading odors. Let's talk about the ipod, the iphone, the macbook, the subscription to Macworld that alerted me to sell my CDs in 1999, in order to build an MP3 library, let's talk about what happened to enjoying music. Let's talk about what is mine and what is yours, and who should be able to listen to the music I purchase, or the music I hear when I turn on the radio, let's talk about what really makes me happy, with what I had. Do you know what I had? Let's talk about the portable compact disc player I frisbeed out my car window at seventy miles an hour because it skipped, the computers I've smashed to pieces because the operating systems were too slow, the music I've never listened to, the love I've never had. I'd sell it on E-bay, everything I've ever had, for a guarantee that tomorrow would be better than today, that maybe you could ask me that question, every day for the rest of my life, and I could feel the same way, so conflicted with instant gratification to be asked so nicely, if my contentment with what I had, was sufficient to do it all over again. To be able to consider that question, to be able to see something so profound and simple pass between someone I don't know and myself, just for a moment, and then laugh at it all. Would I do it all over again? Am I happy with what I had? No, I'm not. It led me here. And I have never been more unhappy with where I am, than in this moment. It's every humiliation I've been made to suffer through people who believe they know me, brought out in front of people I don't know and will never be able to communicate with. Being told I am sick and being punished for feeling not sick but indignant, being told that your interpretation is inherently worth more than mine, being told, told, told, what I should have been happy with. How I should have stopped trying, and been happy with what I had, because I'm worse off now, and will be worse off in the future, because these friends of mine will trot out more gossip and ennui and slander to define what I should have been happy with, who I was or who they thought they knew. I was a better person ten years ago, before deciding to change my music library into an itunes account, but I was also not the person I am today. I'm not happy with what I had. I will never be happy with what I have, I will never be happy with who you think I am, or was, or could have been, or with who I will be ten years from now. But hey, you just wanted to know about my coffee, right? It was perfect. It was warm, it was dark, it was a diuretic. Now I just wanna use the toilet and go home. Then I'll be happy with what I had. Now that I'm home, I want you to know, I had a job, I had employment, I was able to support myself. I had a car, insurance, and a few friends I trusted. Then I had two jobs, three jobs, then four jobs, then stress, then I told this story to the social security agency, then the welfare office, then I screamed and ranted this story for a few months, and people told me it would get better. Now I have three bikes, hundreds of friends and no job, dirty hands, constant anger and five or six or seven women who are way too interested in me to be potential girlfriends, isn't it, "...three that wanna stone me, two that say the know me and one says she's a friend of mine?" Who ever it is I'm trying to impress is obviously so unbelievably arrogant and self consumed that seeing me go through this, for years, hasn't been enough of a reward to him or her, so I implore you, beautiful, unknown barista serving me coffee, am I happy with what I had?

Posted in Craigslist as a rave, addressing the PMRC.