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5
Feb 24

For a brief moment, I was ahead, and now I’m behind

On Saturday, a finer day was never made, I tried the Cascadian Farms blueberry granola with a box of store brand raisins. Once again, the raisins were undefeated in augmenting the flavor profile of what I put in the blue breakfast bowl.

This morning, I tried mixing the first two varieties, Bob’s Red Mill Honey Oat and Bob’s Maple Sea Salt. I added raisins, of course. And, so far, the mix of these two have been my favorite. But I have also learned something uninteresting today.

Basically, photos of granola in a bowl all look the same. So my breakfast experiment will continue — this week I have to try other mixes and then soon I’ll perhaps go pick up some other brands and flavors to try.

You’re broken up by this decision, I know, but the kennysmith.org visual editor has sent out memos. Memos.

Another memo has just come down, in fact, reminding me to get on with the most popular weekly feature on the site. So let’s check in with the kitties.

It’s so cute when Phoebe covers up her eyes to go to sleep. She’s very serious about her relaxation.

Poseidon does it, too. Though, lately, he’s been interested in balancing on legs and feet.

We have a joke about the two of them, siblings. My lovely bride notes when they’re doing the same thing.

Come play with us. Come play with us.

Then I say, “You’re freaking me out!” Because it’s weird when they do the same things together. And she laughs. The cats are unimpressed, because they’re cats.

But, as you can see, they’re doing just fine.

We’d all be doing better if we were diving, I’m sure. Today’s feature from our recent trip to Cozumel is a video. There’s some great footage here, including a closeup of a turtle.

And, of course, we’ve many more photos and videos to enjoy in the days to come.

I’m now on a nice little streak of consecutive days in a row on the bike. This weekend I set a personal best in that regard. Today, unrelated to that entirely useless notation, I received the monthly email from Strava. I always love this part.

That’s about right.

On Saturday I had a big ride. A long climb from virtual sea level up beyond the virtual snow line. This, Zwift calls the Epic KOM. It’s 5.9 virtual miles up hill. None of it is particularly steep, but it does not relent. About five miles in, you get above the virtual hot air balloons.

And then you reach the top of the climb. After that, there’s a bonus climb, a .68 mile ascent averaging 13.6 degrees. If i am not mistaken, that’s still the steepest climb on Zwift. Strava tells me I’ve done it seven times now, and regret each visit. Saturday was my second time up that climb in a week, and perhaps my third best effort up the thing. (In January of 2021 I was minutes faster, according to my ride notes.) Also, the view at the top is pretty nice. If you can still see straight when you get there.

So that was 30 miles Saturday. I got in 28 miles late last night. And I did 22 miles this afternoon. Somehow, this is how the day got away from me. So, now, I must return to campus.

If you’ll excuse me …

Cozumel / markers / photo / SCUBA / video / We Learn Wednesdays / Wednesday — Comments Off
31
Jan 24

And so long to January

This is today’s granola selection. Humorously titled, or scandalously titled, depending on the mood you are in when walking down aisle number ~~four~~ one of the local grocery store. This was the third variety I’ve tried since this little experiment began last week. My skin is positively glowing from all of this healthy eating.

The label promises a triple berry crunch. “Take that, Mostly Naked granola! We’ve got THREE berries!”

It’s not my favorite. It tastes like an imitation of the Captain Crunch berry flavor, or perhaps the opposite is true. It’s a bit of a sickly sweet flavor. It might have been one berry too far. The back of the package tells you that “sweet strawberries” and “bold blueberries” and “cranberries” are inside.

First of all, the cranberry lobby has to work on this. They’re falling behind on the branding. Also, there are toasted pumpkin seeds, I’m sure that’s meant to counter the berries which, again, the label promises to be “UNAPOLOGETICALLY AMAZING.”

What if my taste buds are changing? What if the too sweet thing is now too sweet for me? This is quite existential.

Tomorrow, I’ll add raisins to that variety. When three dried fruits are too many, four may be just right.

This is the 23rd installment of We Learn Wednesdays, where I ride my bike across the county to find the local historical markers. This is the 42nd and 43rd marker we’ve seen in this series. Both have to do where this modern county office building resides.

Prior to being a place where important government bureaucracy takes place, it was a jail. This very building. And before that, an older building was the town’s slammer.

And prior to all of that, the first jail was just down the street. The first jail was established in 1692. Tough on crime since the 17th century. But that was just down the road, which was, I’m sure, a sandy, dusty path.

Before it was the jail, this lot was the old market. Indeed, this is where the stret name comes from. And it might be hard, from this distance, to determine which precipitated the other. The old store, or the now historic building that sprung up around it. It’s a weary little area, weary but proud.

Between that, the late night of this search, the centuries-ago timeline, and the incredible ubiquity of the term “Market House” I’ve come up empty here.

That’s no way to end the month, but if you’ve missed any markers so far, you can find them all right here.

Let’s wrap up January this way. Here’s my dive buddy in Cozumel, and some great shots of some yellow grunts, an angelfish if you look in the right spot, a terrific flounder specimen and much more.

Don’t worry, at this rate I’ve still got days and days of underwater material to share. February is going to be colorful around here, too.

Cozumel / music / photo / Re-Listening / SCUBA / Thursday / video — Comments Off
25
Jan 24

Everything you want: food, meditative video, fish, music

I made a culinary innovation this morning, the likes of which will surely land me my own cooking show.

This would be my second cooking show pitch. The first one was, in my estimation, even better. The host is a character who plays an earnest, straight up sort, but he can’t cook. He’s also a bachelor. So the entire show is a dry humor examination of what that guy does to subsist, nutritionally. It’d be a short show, because he’s a bachelor who can’t cook, see. But there’s a lot of comedy in cold cuts and Hamburger Helper, I’m certain of it.

Today’s move — and if you happened to be in your kitchen at the same I was in mine and making this happen, you might have felt it too — isn’t earth shattering, but it is destined to change breakfast paradigms everywhere.

In an attempt to cut the taste of the maple syrup in the new granola, I did this.

Grapes! Dried raisins! The store-brand even!

It worked perfectly, HGTV. Now where do I sign?

If you’re wondering, this is the granola brand, which kicked off this new breakfast experiment yesterday. The serving sizes on the back of the bag aren’t for normal human beings, but there’s at least another day in here.

What I’m thinking of doing, because I bought four different varieties from three brands, is mixing the last ones together. That day, in a few weeks, some random Wednesday when I don’t see it coming, is when I’ll stumble on the perfect mixture. The flavor profile will send me to the studio to right songs about the experience, and I’ll spend the rest of my days chasing that mixture, the mad breakfast alchemist who can’t ever quite get it right again.

I forgot to include this here, but one of the big sheets of snow that slid off the roof was hanging at almost eye level over the back door. It was the perfect height to admire and fear. And so I give you 58 seconds of zen.

Even though it has warmed up and the snow is now all gone, it’ll be days before I can go out that door without thinking about an avalanche of mushy, days old snow landing on head, getting down my shirt, into my shoes.

Much better than that, picturing myself being underwater. When we were in Cozumel recently it was the low 80s every day. Just perfect.

Here’s my favorite fish.

It just occurred to me that these are the photos I like best, and I don’t take many of them. So I have to diving again. Drat!

You can’t see this ray, because this ray is hiding from you. Keep moving, stranger.

Here’s another shot of our old friend the black triggerfish. This fish is the pinstripe, skinny tie wearing fish of the sea, and you know it.

He might know it, too.

I don’t think we’ve seen the spotted trunkfish (Lactophrys bicaudalis), or boxfish, on this trip yet. If the triggerfish wears the fashionable suits, the trunkfish is the guy who really thinks he’s a hipster, but he’s trying too hard.

The trunkfish is a slow mover, owing to its size. It eats shrimp and mollusc and sea urchins and sea cucumbers. It has a toxin that is dangerous to ingest. The spots are actually a “stay away” warning for predators. Wikipedia tells me that predators as large as nurse sharks can die from eating a trunkfish.

Oh, look. A lobster. “Keep it moving,” he says with his antennae. Peering in at lobsters always feels intrusive, somehow, even moreso than just floating over his home, as we do.

No wonder they are always pointing the way toward the best currents. He does not want you to see what he’s warming up the butter for back there.

We haven’t visited the Re-Listening project in a while. This is where I’m playing all of my old CDs in the car, in the order of acquisition. These aren’t reviews, but ways to pad out the site with videos, and, occasionally, a trip down memory lane. The prevailing memory here is from the summer of 2004.

This song came on MTV or VH1 or whatever was on and within 60 seconds I realized I needed to buy the record.

And so I did. This is the only Keane CD I have, which is a shame. In terms of British fame it’s the Beatles, Oasis, Radiohead and Keane. This debut album was the eighth most sold of the oughts in the UK, where it lodged at number two on the year-ending charts. On the weekly charts here in the U.S., “Hopes and Fears” peaked at 45. The debut single didn’t chart here, apparently, but hit the top 10 in a half dozen other countries, and was certified double platinum in the U.K.

None of this seems to fit my memory, but the web isn’t wrong about things like this.

The second single’s video went minimalist. I’m sure this is the Beatles and Apple influence.

Anyway, it was good for car singing, and I don’t seem to have a lot of specific memories attached to it, otherwise. Other, that is, than the observation that pop music had (with the exception of Ben Folds) all but turned the piano into an exotic instrument by then. This is the alternate video for the fourth single, because labels were still doing that back then, and it is a study on the limitations of media technologies.

The last single on the record enjoyed a bit of success in the United States. “Bend and Break” landed at 20 on the alternative charts. And the video is enough to make me regret having never seen them live. It looks like it could be a good show.

Keane have released four more records over the years, three of which hit the top 20 in the US, and two in the top 10. The oversight of my not having them in the personal collection are mine alone.

And Keane are still going. This year they’re celebrating 20 years of this record, which is a thing bands must do now. They’re touring extensively across Europe for the first part of the year, but they’ll be visiting North America late in the summer. I could see them in September.

How many shows are too many shows in September, anyway?

cycling / markers / New Jersey / photo / SCUBA / video / We Learn Wednesdays / Wednesday — Comments Off
24
Jan 24

I am trying a new thing, a shocking new thing

I’m trying a new thing. That’s unusual. But let me back up. I don’t know anything about this. But let me back up further. Maybe two Christmases ago, I got a gift package from the Butterfly Bakery of Vermont. It was the Guster tie-in, you see. I had received the Gustard the year before, and it was good. I didn’t think I would like it, but it’s great on burgers. The complete gift package includes a hot chocolate, the Gustard, the Fa Fa Fire hot sauce (maple rum chipotle) which I’m working up to trying and Gusternola.

Let’s learn about Gusternola.

We made this warm hug of a granola in collaboration with Ryan Miller, Guster’s lead singer and fellow high functioning weirdo. A portion of all proceeds benefit Zeno Mountain Farm, one of the greatest places on Earth.

Organic gluten free oats*, pure Vermont maple syrup, organic coconut, organic coconut oil, organic pumpkin seeds, brazil nuts, organic quinoa, vanilla, organic brown rice flour, sea salt, organic cinnamon, organic ginger, organic cloves, organic cardamom, organic fennel, organic fenugreek, organic nutmeg. Contains nuts.

A few weeks ago I finally got around to trying it. First off, it’s a 9.6 ounce bag, and the service size is ridiculously small. I got a couple of breakfasts and an odd late dinner out of it.

But the granola was quite tasty.

I was about to order some more from the bakery in Vermont — and I will — but I decided to try some other granola varieties, because Gusternola was my first ever granola.

So, yesterday, I went to the grocery store and stood in the breakfast cereal aisle and studied the offerings. There was a whole section. I got several different kinds. Today, I tried one, which is the first one I picked up.

I tried it first because I picked it up first, and firsties mean something. Also, I figured, it would be most like the Gusternola. And it’s pretty close.

It’s not as good, but pretty close. It’s mass produced, and cheaper. And the ingredients list is close, but there are a few things missing that is in the now high water mark of Gusternola. Plus, it is made somewhere in Oregon. I’m sure Oregon has great granola, but what if Vermont’s granola is just better?

If anything, the syrup here might be a bit too sweet. (This is a big note coming from me.) It is almost acrid. But I have an experiment to try to counteract that for tomorrow.

Anyway, I picked up four different types of granola. This should give us something to dissect for a week or two.

Unrelated, we sure do get some strange looking icicles around here.

We heard one of those fall, during a particularly intense part of a television show — the new and overwrought True Detective — and that didn’t set every human sense to “hyperalert” or anything.

But wait’ll you seem them melt!

This is the 22nd installment of We Learn Wednesdays, where I ride my bike across the county to find the local historical markers. This is the 41st one we’ve seen in this series.

And this place is named after John Fenwick who opened the first English settlement established in this region. He came from money, got married, had three kids, lost his wife, got remarried. He landed here in late 1675. Three days later, on October 8, 1675 Fenwick, a Quaker, recorded a land deed with the local Lenape Indian tribe. He gave his new home the name of New Salem, meaning peace.

It wasn’t always named after him. This place was built as Ford’s Hotel in 1891. In 1919, it was converted to Salem County Memorial Hospital to memorialize WWI soldiers and sailors. The hospital was opened with 30 beds and 12 physicians and surgeons worked there. They treated 1,093 patients in their first year. The hospital was moved in 1951.

In 1989 the building was renovated as the “Fenwick Building.” It’s used now as county government offices. Thirty-five years is a long time after a renovation for local government office space. But it has the all important plaque.

In the next installment of We Learn Wednesday’s, we’ll visit the location of an old jail and market house. If you’ve missed any markers so far, you can find them all right here.

Before that, though, let’s go back underwater. Here, you’ll find a ray, a puffer, a butterfly fish, a black triggerfish, a beautiful scrawled filefish and much more!

If that isn’t enough, we’ll have more photos from the waters off Cozumel tomorrow.

I haven’t mentioned it, but I have been able to spend a fair amount of time on the bike recently. On the bike, which is on the trainer. Anyway, 80 easy miles in the last three days, which isn’t that much.

Twenty of them were in London yesterday, 43 of them were in a fake world, today, but I did a very real 20 mph pace over the route which, for me, is substantial. Tomorrow, then, is a rest day. After which, I’ll try to achieve another long streak of consecutive days in a row — a humble number I set last November. You will, no doubt, be riveted.

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23
Jan 24

Getting ahead of myself

We are still in winter mode. Though it seems like I’ve been there for a while. It’s more of a feeling than a concession to the calendar. And it’s not a glum feeling. Not a “Gah!” for a change. Rather, it is this feeling that spring is just around the corner. Weekend after next. I blame early commercials for the Master’s and auto racing, the earliest signs of spring. This is, of course, where the trouble kicks in. I think it is almost spring, but we’re nowhere near it.

Back home, they’re still three weeks out, minimum. And this is the real problem. The part of my spirit that thinks about the southland in the springtime knows when that is coming. It knows that, mid-February, a big, impossible, miraculous transition will be upon upon us, that nature’s fanfare is set to provide a paradigm-shifting crescendo early in the act. But only there. Not here.

Being my first winter here, I am also looking forward to my first spring here. I have no idea when that will be. But I found a site that suggested the coldest average historical day of the year is in February. Right about that time it turns to spring back home. So it isn’t a glum feeling today, but give me three weeks.

The thing about the weather is that it sticks around. We still have icicles in the air.

And all of the snow is still on the ground.

It’s supposed to warm up a bit today and tomorrow. This will all start to disappear. It’s only been around for four or five days now.

I had a class on campus this evening. My first in-person class of the semester, which began last Tuesday. It is an evening class, the last class block of the day and, as such, it was the last first class of the term.

I did my song and dance, learned the names of a third of the room and the something interesting about almost everyone. In a few more weeks I’ll have most everyone’s names under control. This semester is going to be my best one yet for matching names and faces.

I showed the class this video, which is always more impressive to me than any class that has ever watched it with me.

I think this was the first time I’ve ever watched that where I didn’t see something new, and I’ve watched that video a lot.

We talked about the class, and that felt rushed. I also gave a 36-slide presentation that covers, roughly, 3,000 years of human communication. So we went from Egypt to Martin Luther — with brief stops in Japan and Ghana — in a hurry. Next week, we’ll discuss the late middle ages and the early modern era of Europe. It’s a class called New Media, and this is the curriculum. We stare at all of human history for two weeks, and for the next month or so we’ll read a bunch of brilliant 20th and 21st century scholars discussing all manner of communication concepts that will get distilled down to television and social media.

I’m looking forward, most of all, to the sidebars. I taught this class last term. Occasionally the conversations ran off the rails. Each time it did, that was the best part of the class that day. I’m curious to see if that will be at the same places as the fall, and if this group of students’ comparisons and explanations will be same as last semester’s comparisons and explanations.

Anyway, if there’s snow outside, there are the warm waters of Mexico on this page. Please enjoy with me a few more photos from our recent trip.

The other day I said I’d never seen a filefish, which may as well be a generic a name as you’ll find on the sandy ocean bottom, that looked quite like this. And then, suddenly, I started seeing them everywhere.

The other fish is the black triggerfish (Melichthys niger). In Cozumel, you’ll bump into them quite a bit, but usually only in ones or twos. They’re beautiful, and they only look black underwater. With proper light they take on a complex color scheme. They can even modify their color somewhat. I don’t know where they fit in the Disney hierarchy of fish and underwater creatures, but they seem like they should be in a stately position to me. Something about those two little stripes.

But then you read about them, how they are aggressive looking for food, how they hunt in packs around Ascension Island. Mob feeding, they call it. How they’re opportunists and relentless, and while that probably hurts them in the saltwater caste system, I admire them even more.

One day on this trip, after our dives were done, I confessed to my lovely bride my unpopular opinion of reef diving. I don’t get agog over lobsters as everyone else does. They just … sit there … waving their antennae at you. Now, those times when you see one crawling along from A to B, that’s interesting, but otherwise, meh.

And so she took it upon herself to make sure that I saw every lobster anyone found for the rest of the week. That’s what dive buddies are for. Here are two of them now.

She’s still my favorite fish, though.

I felt like I saw fewer yellow tube sponges (Aplysina fistularis) than our trip last year. This is purely observational, of course, as I was not taking census survey data. I love these little things, and not because of Spongebob. That color really pops, as you can see, and the formations that the sponges make are sometimes highly ambitious.

The hawkbill turtle is a big yellow tube sponge predator. And that’s probably the cause here. As we’ll see in some other photos later, the turtles living on the Palancar reef are quite impressive.

As are the brown bowl sponges. This one needs some scale, and it didn’t work out that anyone was nearby at the moment. But do you see that fish in the bottom-right corner of the photo? That will at least give us some sort of perspective.

A small person could hide in this sponge. I am sure of it.

And we’ll hide from January with more photos, and a video, tomorrow of course. See you then!