Author: cdwan

While out getting the firewood, we got a little bit lost and happened to drive past a warehouse lot with banners hung up advertising “wine grapes.” I decided to wander over there today and check it out.

It’s clearly a seasonal business. Here when the grapes are available, gone when they’re not. There were two old dudes sitting on a loading dock, surrounded by stacks of crated grapes. I wandered up, said ‘hi’, and basically said “I don’t know anything. I want to make wine. What do I want to do?” I was immediately back in the country. These were good ‘ole Italian boys … relaxing … chatting … and selling the occasional hundred pounds of grapes.

The older of the two said “you don’t want grapes the first time, you want juice,” and led me into a walk in freezer containing 6 gallon plastic pails. He explained that they’re sealed with a tight lid which includes a fermentation lock. All I have to do is leave the bucket someplace where it’ll stay about 70 degrees. In about 10 days the fermentation lock will pop up “like a turkey timer.” At that point, I siphon the wine into a clean carboy, put an airlock on the top, and “wait until Christmas.” I asked about bottling … and the less old dude laughed and pointed to his friend: “This guy here doesn’t even rack his wine. He just siphons out of the bucket into a carafe!” There was no more talk of bottling.

They asked what style I like. I said “Cabernet.” Dude laughed again and said “I won’t sell you Cabernet. You gotta age cabernet at least a year … and this is your first batch! You’re gonna drink it all before Easter. You get Barbera. It’ll be great in 3 months.” $38 later, I had 6 gallons of juice in my truck and was headed home.

If this works out, maybe I’ll expand into the wild world of crushing whole fruit later on … but there’s no shame in having 5 gallons of house red on tap.

Solid workout today. On monday evenings, the senior instructor (Tara) leads her advanced class. She’s studying at another school in town right now, and brings back some neat material. Tonight, she brought back pain … but it was a good pain.

We started off with a ladder. In this case that worked out to sets of [N jumping jacks, N push-ups, N sit-ups], with N decreasing by some K after each set. We did 25 of each, and decreased by 5’s. It hurt. Pride kept me going. As we were going through, Tara kept up a banter about how at her other school, they did a drill of 150 front punches, while holding bricks.

Then the competition started. There were four of us in the class. Two teenagers (maybe 16 and 18), me, and John, who’s maybe 10 years older than me. We counted how many kicks we could land on a heavy bag in a minute, with the loser having to do push-ups. I won my round, and John won his. After that, we did some grappling, with the goal being to knock your opponents over. John and I (by virtue both of mass and guile) kept knocking the kids on their butts. As it became obvious what was going on, the mockery got more and more extreme. Class concluded with a 3 on 2 soccer game. John and I vs. the two kids plus Tara. We beat them 1 to 0.

Both John and I managed to get back to the locker room before collapsing, gasping for breath. We agreed that we had signed up for serious pain tomorrow, but that it had been totally worth it.

A little competition is good for the soul.

Attention literate consumers!

If you’re reading this, then you know someone (me), who knows someone (aledonne), whose spouse has published a book.

First read a disclaimer, then check out the book website. After that, buy the book.

Wood obtained. Rented the Home Depot truck, loaded it up, unloaded, returned the truck, stacked. W00t.

Then went to see Protector. Tony Jaa rocks my world. I would love to be able to do a standing flip, much less a 720, much less land a two footed kick to the shoulders at the tail end of my 720. The man has moves.

Many, many, many pictures are now online. I split them into three albums. Peruse as you see fit:

The deck and the garden
The mighty road trip to NC and back
The trip to Michigan with pictures of a baby.

What I’ve been up to

* Buy a cord of firewood. Seasoned hardwood if at all possible.
* Purchase a 20lb watermelon. Pickle its rind.
* Harvest cabbages. Ferment their shredded heads.
* Brew 5 gallons of beer, inaugurate the keg.
* Show up at Dustin’s keg party
* Grill the remaining filet of striper.
* Do not offend my back in any way.
* Contemplate world domination.

Dear body: Please stop the hurting. Love, Me.

My lower back is tweaked out again. The painkillers have worn off, and I’ve maxed out the dosage for this 24 hour period. I had thought that I was healing while walking around Boston with technolope, but no … I was simply distracted by good conversation for the moment. I am not currently distracted. Even the near legendary stretching techniques which redmed taught me the last time this happened do not seem to be having much effect … though I really like saying “moo” and “meow” in time with the “cat” and “cow” stretches.

Perhaps worse than feeling like something that hurts a lot, I also feel like a moron. Pathetic how a little distraction like muscle pain drops my capacity for coherent thought by a sizable chunk. Maybe I’m being encouraged to find empathy for people who live with this sort of thing all the time. Maybe this will give me an opportunity to learn greater mental focus.

Maybe I just need to avoid tweaking out my back at karate in the future.

Moo. Meow. Goodnight.

Although in every religion there is an emphasis on compassion and love, from the viewpoint of philosophy, of course there are differences, and that is all right. Philosophical teachings are not the end, not the aim, not what you serve. The aim is to help and benefit others, and philosophical teachings to support those ideas are valuable. If we go into the differences in philosophy and argue with and criticize each other, it is useless. There will be endless argument; the result will mainly be that we irritate each other — accomplishing nothing. Better to look at the purpose of the philosophies and to see what is shared — an emphasis on love, compassion, and respect for a higher force.

Kindness, Clarity, and Insight. The Dalai Lama.

Input is hereby solicited on the following topics:

* A name for my line of homebrewed, preserved, and domestically produced edibles and drinkables. One current contender is “sign of the goat.” Think of things that would go well on a brewpub sign, or on the label of a can of pickled beets.

* Effective ways to combine my interest in humanitarian outreach to impoverished people all over the world, with my interests in and talent for technology.

* Ways to determine the quality of a tattoo shop, without getting a potentially mangled tattoo as a test case.

* Metrics one could use to decide whether to keep living on the East Coast, vs. moving elsewhere

* How to tell when cabbage and or hops are ripe.

Thank you.