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cycling

The month’s workouts

This is what I did on the bike and on my feet and in the pool. It was not the kind of month I want to have. I can do better.

At least I rode my bike (red) more this month than I did last month, but they were all short rides. There is very little swimming (light blue). I didn’t realize that until just now. So I’ll fix that. (red) to be found. I just started swimming (light blue). And I need more running (dark blue). All units are miles. (Ignore the numbers above the calendar, which are wrong.)

Taken another way: I wasn’t doing this spring, so there’s that.

cycling / movies / photo / Thursday / video — Comments Off
31
Oct 13

The non-Halloween post

The neighboring yard has a red maple. Shot this this evening:

Had the opportunity to ride a few hills before it got dark today. It was misting and sprinkling a bit, a few hours before the meteorologists said it should. Perhaps this kept away the early trick-or-treaters. I didn’t see any while I was riding. I was the only person in a costume, a sorry cyclist huffing up little hills. The trick was on me.

Watched Oz the Great and Powerful, where James Franco was dressed up as an actor.

This explains that:

Because Time Warner owns the rights to iconic elements of the 1939 MGM film, including the ruby slippers worn by Judy Garland, Disney was unable to use them nor any character likenesses from that particular film. This extended to the green of the Wicked Witch’s skin, for which Disney used what its legal department considered a sufficiently different shade called “theostein” (a portmanteau of “Theodora” and “Frankenstein”). The studio could not, however, use the signature chin mole of Margaret Hamilton’s portrayal of the Wicked Witch of the West.

It was a fine movie. You can see the 3D elements, even on your TV, which is to say the many obligatory things that are rushing out of the screen to “immerse” you into the film. The poster probably read “Some of the effects are better than others.” It was a kids’ film, and it plays that way. But it was humorous if you’re in a light mood, and Franco inhabited the role, as they might say. He’s laughing all the way to the bank.

You know, there are many adaptations of the Oz universe, but this one makes less sense than most. Some could exist in their own universe, like The Wiz, for example. Others, like the Muppets and animated versions, were just cashing in with other franchises or audiences. Great and Powerful, though, has allusions to the popular 1939 Judy Garland version (which was not the first Oz on screen) despite a different company owning the rights, as discussed above. So if you assume this one is referring to the Judy Garland-universe of Oz then it is something of a prequel. A prequel of her concussion-induced dreams about a place and people that didn’t exist.

OR DID THEY?

You’d think, more than 80 years on, we’d have some answer to that question.

And so it begins: the annual Parade of Sullen Ingratitude.

— James Lileks (@Lileks) October 31, 2013

We didn’t do Halloween tonight. Singlehandedly we are responsible for the poor candy sales this year.

It is a good neighborhood, though, none of the little ghouls and princesses had to go without. Kids have their parents drive from the next town over to case this subdivision. Apparently all of the good candy comes from our nearby grocery store.

So we left off the lights and sat in the back of the house, hiding from the children, of whom we were not scared.

After an appropriate amount of time I went out to pick up some dinner at the Chinese restaurant of choice. The owner knows us by name now.

When I returned home there was a clutch — Or was it a gaggle? The costumes make it hard to tell. — patrolling down the street. I swept into the garage before the door was all the way up the rails. Waited until the kids were out of sight before I turned on the lights in the kitchen.

We’re not scared of those kids.

I got my fill of the costumed little ones on Facebook. This is, for my money, the best day of the year on that site. One guy has a boy and a girl. He posted their front door shot and their Halloween conversation.

“What do you want to dress up as for Halloween?”

“A fairy princess butterfly! … (Pause for dramatic effect.) And he could be a dead butterfly!”

So, he concluded, in the spirit of keeping his son alive, he went as a miniature John Wayne.

Another lady has two little boys, who dressed as Luke and Yoda — green knit cap with great ears, felt feet already rolling up on his shoes. The youngest said his “lightsaver” was the best part.

Now I feel like I have to go pick up candy to go give those children. But I saw the pictures. They cleaned up.

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24
Oct 13

You’re going where again? Canada?

I managed to sneak out for a late day ride today. I probably won’t get another one for a few days, so it didn’t seem important to go far or ride hard. So I stopped and took two pictures, which I should do more. It isn’t like I’m setting any great records or chasing anyone anyway.

Above is a stretch of road on the local time trial circuit. I tried the race against the clock one time. I am no good at it. So I just ride it as part of most every other route. Today I did it on the bike half of my ride, a measly little 15 mile circuit. But I got all the good curves and some of the better hills in, at least.

This one is a bit closer to home:

You ride on down the road, turn into a subdivision and then out the other side. You go over a little roller and turn again there’s a little hilltop finish that I always imagine is a big race finish. Except I never really beat my best time. Tonight I was pedaling and it was apparent there was nothing in my legs and yet there I was, straining and trying and wheezing and there was a car waiting patiently behind me.

Which is fine, because he passed me, a few more turns were taken and I managed to pass several cars. Sometimes, now, I can do that. It usually involves a downhill tailwind and a distracted driver who is out for a Sunday stroll to admire the scenery. But still. I did it on a Thursday night, and that’s something.

Called my grandmother this evening, to check in after a recent doctor’s visit. She told me all about the football she watched this past weekend.

Also, she’s now planning a trip to Canada in the spring. It seems my mom and step-dad mentioned this scenic place they’d discovered. “I figure I deserved it by now,” she said. Now both my folks’ mothers are going on this trip.

Both ladies are in their 80s.

Things to read …

This is pretty tough to hear. Many middle-class Americans plan to work until they die:

A growing percentage of middle-class Americans say they have saved so little for retirement that they expect to work into their 80s or even until they either get too sick or die, according to a recent survey.

Nearly half of middle-class workers said they are not confident that they will be able to save enough to retire comfortably, according to a Wells Fargo survey of 1,000 workers between the ages of 25 and 75, with household incomes between $25,000 and $100,000.

As a result, 34% said they plan to work until they’re at least 80 — that’s up from 25% in 2011 and 30% last year. An even larger percentage, 37%, said they’ll never retire and plan to either work until they get too sick or die, the survey found

It seems like every survey similar to this finds some slightly different numbers — perhaps someone should do a meta-analysis — but there are some common themes emerging. The role of news on Facebook:

(A)bout half of adult Facebook users, 47%, “ever” get news there. That amounts to 30% of the population.

Most U.S. adults do not go to Facebook seeking news out, the nationally representative online survey of 5,173 adults finds. Instead, the vast majority of Facebook news consumers, 78%, get news when they are on Facebook for other reasons. And just 4% say it is the most important way they get news. As one respondent summed it up, “I believe Facebook is a good way to find out news without actually looking for it.”

However, the survey provides evidence that Facebook exposes some people to news who otherwise might not get it.

Here is some navel gazing about web design. Ignore the headline. WYSIWTFFTWOMG!:

Since we’ve been using computers to make websites we’ve tried to make them like print. Of course, early on, that was fair enough. It was familiar. We knew the rules and tried to make the web like it. Even now, with the realisation that the web has changed – or rather, we’re being honest to the way the web is. It never really changed, we just tried to make it something it wasn’t – we’re still enforcing a print-like mental model on it. Not necessarily us designers and developers, though. This is coming from people who write and manage content. Just like printing out an email before they send it, they will want to preview a website to see how it looks.

The problem is this: The question content people ask when finishing adding content to a CMS is ‘how does this look?’. And this is not a question a CMS can answer any more – even with a preview. How we use the web today has meant that the answer to that questions is, ‘in what?’.

Here is the only thing in America getting smaller. The Incredible Shrinking Plane SeatPeople have an idea in their head, given the cost and security and the herding indignities and now the shrinking seats, of how far they are willing to drive before they’ll resort to flying. You have to think those numbers are going to slide a bit more when people enjoy these … intimate … tiny experiences.

Well, tomorrow is Friday, and I hope yours is as big as possible. Do stop back by when you can. And, of course, there’s always Twitter.

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18
Oct 13

Art off the bike

I managed to get on the bike just in time for a quick 20-mile evening ride. When I got home there was about 15 minutes of daylight left, so that was well-timed.

I rode my bike to the bank. (I’m doing errands! On a bicycle! So ecologically sound!) I did the local time trial route and then climbed up one side of the town’s biggest hill. (Big is relative. It is actually fairly small.) At the top of that hill I changed my plan and turned left instead of right. And, before long, I saw this:

What is that? And where is that? You can almost make it out in the pond’s reflection. The building behind the art is the local art museum. It is now 10 years old. It is a fine museum. It has this weird, rusted, house.

And the house seems to have thrusters attached. Which explains the satellite dish on the side.

But not the spare tire or the cinder block on the front porch of the rusted house space ship.

Or the chicken wire and large (for scale) water valve:

The medium is, in part, called Found Objects. Which means the artist, professor Robbie Barber had this stuff in his or his neighbors’ yard or an abandoned lot, repurposed it, or recycled, or re-used it to earn an honorable mention in this juried art contest. And we’ll get to see it for a year.

About the art, called Dreams of Flying:

Influenced by science fiction, toy design, both folk and outsider art, and found objects in general, Barber fuses these influences to create hybrid objects of fantasy, the results of which are often humorous, ironic or visually poetic in nature. Dreams of Flying depicts a shotgun shack that is transformed into a spacecraft of dubious reliability. While reminding us of the inherent dangers of space travel, this sculpture also depicts the ultimate escapist dream of flying.

What did you get out of it? I perceived the inherent dangers of going into space in a poorly conceived home. (This was Prince Lonestar’s other spaceship, I guess.) I liked the curved display stand best of all.

Earlier this week Lileks said:

I was going to say something broad and silly like “every type of modern art has failed, except architecture,” but that sounds simplistic. Except it’s true. Atonal music? No one cares. Abstract painting? It had its vogue, reduced everything down to a canvas consisting of one color (Red #3 – a title of a Great Work, or an FDA additive designation?) Modern literature flirted with styles that required no particular aptitude – automatic writing, cutting up bits of newsprint and rearranging them – but words require structure, or it’s phoneme salad. Modern sculpture masked its irrelevance by substituting size for detail, so you’d be overwhelmed into thinking this enormous hunk of metal that looked like the Hulk broke out of a boxcar had significance, but eventually it turned into “installations” and “assemblages” that relied on the artist’s ability to recombine instead of create.

And you nod in understanding, even if you don’t agree. But most of us do. And the rest of us are just too good to acknowledge it, maybe, or smarter than others. You may not know what art is, but you know that an assemblage of pipes, siding and shingles and rust. You know that stuff when you see it. And now you know it can remind you of the perils of interstellar travel

Other works are on display outside the museum. I’m going to show them off on Sunday.

We ran into the owner of our local bike shop out and about tonight. It was every bit one of those situations where your mind recognizes some facial aspect in an encoded memory file. But the file is locked away because you are actually in the next town over. It is night. He’s in a nice shirt. This is a Chinese restaurant (I wanted soup) and he belongs in a polo behind a counter tapping keys and turning wrenches and talking about races.

Context means so much, but you’re relieved because you can see the neurons in his head scrambling to make the exact same connections.

We’re all constructs to one another, in some ways. We were at a dinner party last week and talking about this very thing. When was the first time you saw a school teacher of yours in some place that didn’t have “School” at the end of the name? Mine was at a movie theater. Changed my relationship with that lady forever. She was suddenly more than the person with a classroom at the end of the hall. Now she had interests, great passionate pursuits and a crystalline sense of humor.

I was young. It took a lot to overcome that teachers-exist-only-at-school construct, but only a little to prove the point.

Then earlier today we saw one of the other guests at that dinner party walking down the street. “She looks familiar … Oh that’s … ”

I wonder if she knows Danny, who runs the bike shop.

I wonder if either of them have seen the art at the museum. Probably the woman has. She was an art professor.

Things to read, which I found interesting today … One of our students wrote this about another student. It is a moving piece on a challenging topic. I’m pretty proud for her. Breast health: sophomore’s high risk leads to tough choices.

Matt Waite flies his drone at a journalism conference, and he makes a keen observation.

Here is Waite’s drone journalism manual, if you are interested.

Three tremendous paragraphs, in Life Magazine, written about one of the most contemporaneously important photographs published in the middle of the 20th century. Still important, too.

Why print this picture, anyway, of three American boys dead upon an alien shore? Is it to hurt people? To be morbid?

Those are not the reasons.

The reason is that words are never enough. The eye sees. The mind knows. The heart feels. But the words do not exist to make us see, or know, or feel what it is like, what actually happens. The words are never right. . . .

Quick hits:

Hard numbers, chilling facts: What the government does with your data

Teaching media entrepreneurship: What works, and what gets in the way

And one from the multimedia blog. You saw that one here, first.

Hope you have a great weekend! Come back here tomorrow for football. More in between, of course, on Twitter.

cycling / friends / iPhone / journalism / links / things to read / Wednesday — Comments Off
16
Oct 13

I found a new photo tool

This is from some recent ride. Certainly not the one I had this evening. I know where the side roads on tonight’s ride go. I did not know where this road went.

I’m going to post that photo again as a test of a new tool I’ve just discovered, an immersive, interactive photo sharing tool called ThingLink.

There’s something of an unwritten rule (and we have many rules) about the unknown road. You don’t look on a map. You don’t ask a fellow rider. If you want to know where that road goes, you travel that road. And before you do that you stand at the head of it, take a photo and then run it through a filter. Then you ride down the road.

It was a dead end.

If you please, put your mouse over that photo. See those little circles? They are all interactive. Most are just notes. There’s one link and one video. And so it is apparent to me right away, this is a useful tool.

Anyway, I rode 20 miles today, I discovered a new tool there and did some other things, all less interesting than those.

Things to read, which I found interesting today …

Speaking of useful tools, this is a link to save: New Google site highlights journalism tools on offer

Smart people doing amazing things, right up the road. Here’s how Alabama scientists helped prove that Voyager 1 has left the Solar System

Also in Alabama: Nearly 200,000 Alabamians will fall into Affordable Care Act ‘coverage gap’. It seems the Kaiser people have cornered the market on this research.

I’ve been wondering lately, if you were building from the ground up, what would your marketing/newsroom/studio/entity’s goal be? Or, what era are you building to? Online TV/video market to be worth $35BN by 2018

You find a century-old film in a barn. What do you do? Restoring Mary Pickford’s Lost Film.

The government is “back”? The government is back. $174,000 to a Senator’s Widow and Other Surprises in the Fiscal Compromise Bill. Not that it ever left.

I had a terrific conversation this weekend, one of those where the other person really crystalizes your thinking in a spare sentence or two. That conversation, with an Army major of strong personal convictions, had to do with standing up for the smaller, weaker, more vulnerable person, and it applies to this terrible story, a sad tale where that did not happen. Felony Counts for 2 in Suicide of Bullied 12-Year-Old:

Brimming with outrage and incredulity, the sheriff said in a news conference on Tuesday that he was stunned by the older girl’s Saturday Facebook posting. But he reserved his harshest words for the girl’s parents for failing to monitor her behavior, after she had been questioned by the police, and for allowing her to keep her cellphone.

“I’m aggravated that the parents are not doing what parents should do: after she is questioned and involved in this, why does she even have a device?” Sheriff Judd said. “Parents, who instead of taking that device and smashing it into a thousand pieces in front of that child, say her account was hacked.”

[…]

“Watch what your children do online,” Sheriff Judd said. “Pay attention. Quit being their best friend and be their best parent. That’s important.”

And, finally one post on the multimedia blog.

We had deer burgers on the grill tonight. First time I’ve had deer that way. Adam came and prepared the patties, an animal he’d taken himself. The Yankee made fries and sauteed onions. I started the fire, easily the weakest part of the meal. But the burgers were incredible.

We watched Game of Thrones. He is now through the end of the second season. Don’t spoil it for him.

It was a good day.