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Filk chains
Oct. 29th, 2010 09:07 pmIn response to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
allisona's post about filk influences, certainly there have been some influences on me.
As far as actually getting involved in filk as a performer all the Milwaukee filkers and the monthly housefilks here were what got me started. I had some fairly serious stage-fright issues, and besides the friendly and welcoming (and tolerant) filk audience the monthly housefilks were really an important thing for me. If I'd been going to one con a year I'd probably never have gotten enough experience to learn to relax. Having a gathering roughly once per month made a very big difference.
Of course, thinking ofallisona, another connection for me was made by her. Shortly after Urban Tapestry went to FilkContinental in Germany I ended up meeting aryana_filker in the comments thread to one of Allison's LJ posts. If we try hard enough we can trace directly from that to me at a Live-Action Role Playing game in Germany singing in German (while somewhat drunk) in the middle of the night to a group of German gamers. My life, it is wonderful.
allisona's post about filk influences, certainly there have been some influences on me.As far as actually getting involved in filk as a performer all the Milwaukee filkers and the monthly housefilks here were what got me started. I had some fairly serious stage-fright issues, and besides the friendly and welcoming (and tolerant) filk audience the monthly housefilks were really an important thing for me. If I'd been going to one con a year I'd probably never have gotten enough experience to learn to relax. Having a gathering roughly once per month made a very big difference.
Of course, thinking of
allisona, another connection for me was made by her. Shortly after Urban Tapestry went to FilkContinental in Germany I ended up meeting aryana_filker in the comments thread to one of Allison's LJ posts. If we try hard enough we can trace directly from that to me at a Live-Action Role Playing game in Germany singing in German (while somewhat drunk) in the middle of the night to a group of German gamers. My life, it is wonderful.I think this this morning was the first morning of the season with a temperature just slightly below freezing. That's noticeable when out on the bicycle just before sunrise. Reasonably comfortable when dressed right, though. Sunrise is pretty, though, really, I'd rather be sleeping. On a bicycle it's easy to stop and take a photo, here are two from this morning and one from two days ago:
( photos! )
( photos! )
Like A Lake
Oct. 18th, 2010 08:38 pmMore nice weather last weekend, and Joyce and I got out in the kayaks again. We went down the Milwaukee River into the harbor and since the winds were very light and the weather all-around nice we set out across the harbor to the Milwaukee Breakwater Lighthouse, about 1km from the river. I got some photos of that, and we nosed out around it and into the actual lake, though only a hundred meters or so from the breakwater and near the gap. There is a big difference as soon as you get out of the harbor and into Lake Michigan, even with the very light winds and gentle waves. This video shows the gentle rolling waves. Mostly under a meter crest-to-trough, but some probably over a meter. Sitting in a kayak you get up on the crest and suddenly you're way up high, then down in the trough all you can see is water. The motion wasn't too disturbing at the time, it's sort of fun, really, but Sunday night lying in bed I kept thinking of bobbing up and down and up and down and up and down.
People sometimes describe flat calm water as "like a lake," which always seems very odd to me, since the first lake that comes to my mind is Michigan, and those rolling meter-high waves are the sort of thing you get on a fairly calm day. It can be calmer, sure, but then again some days thousand-foot ships get pounded into submission and the kayakers stay the heck home. The harbor is an irregular shape roughly one kilometer from shore to breakwater and four or five kilometers north-to-south, and it gets fairly churned up on a windy day. We don't have the gear or skill to be out in the lake in any serious way. Hanging out right by the harbor breakwater on a very nice day is as far as we push it. Winds tend to come out of the west, and nearest land to the east is around Muskegon, Michigan, 125km or so to the east-northeast, which is a rather longer way to be blown than we want to risk.
More photos on flickr.
People sometimes describe flat calm water as "like a lake," which always seems very odd to me, since the first lake that comes to my mind is Michigan, and those rolling meter-high waves are the sort of thing you get on a fairly calm day. It can be calmer, sure, but then again some days thousand-foot ships get pounded into submission and the kayakers stay the heck home. The harbor is an irregular shape roughly one kilometer from shore to breakwater and four or five kilometers north-to-south, and it gets fairly churned up on a windy day. We don't have the gear or skill to be out in the lake in any serious way. Hanging out right by the harbor breakwater on a very nice day is as far as we push it. Winds tend to come out of the west, and nearest land to the east is around Muskegon, Michigan, 125km or so to the east-northeast, which is a rather longer way to be blown than we want to risk.
More photos on flickr.
Land of Underwear
Oct. 13th, 2010 01:07 pmWhile getting dressed I noticed the label on my underwear and thought how very odd it is now to think that just a few decades ago the United States engaged in a protracted, destructive war in Vietnam, a land now known primarily as the place where underwear comes from. It seems hard to imagine, these days, going to war with your supplier of underwear. How difficult it must have been for the American soldiers, fighting in the jungle, wearing camouflage and carrying heavy gear, and all without benefit of underwear, supplies of which would presumably have been cut off. I can only assume the term "commando" is somehow derived from this.
Deep Fried Beer
Oct. 1st, 2010 07:03 amI am so very proud of the great state of Wisconsin. You knew it would be available here someday: Deep Fried Beer. "Deep Fried Beer, debuting Friday at Miller Time Pub in the Hilton Milwaukee City Center, is the perfect Wisconsin marriage of fried food and beer dipped in cheese." "'It screams Wisconsin. When you bite into it, the beer comes flowing out,' said Hilton Milwaukee executive chef Brian Frakes, who developed the pretzel-ravioli pocket with a beer filling after hearing about a similar creation at the Texas State Fair."
More photos from the rivers
Sep. 27th, 2010 08:21 pmSunday was cool but clear and sunny, Joyce and I went up the Kinnickinnic River in the kayaks. This is the sort of weather we wear the wetsuits in. 10.8km in 3:12 this time. More photos! We saw the tug-barge combination Dorothy Ann and Pathfinder unloading what looked like gravel in the port, I have set of photos of them here, and a set with those photos and more from the trip here.
River Challenge
Sep. 21st, 2010 12:46 pmI have a set of photos up from last Saturday's Milwaukee River Challenge rowing race.
Sort for proper disposal
Sep. 21st, 2010 12:42 pmThis is on Boing-Boing so half of you have no doubt already seen it, but..
Anyone who has been to Germany knows that they are very serious over there about carefully sorting their waste material for proper disposal. Maybe too serious.
Anyone who has been to Germany knows that they are very serious over there about carefully sorting their waste material for proper disposal. Maybe too serious.
River photos
Sep. 14th, 2010 07:28 pmSunday was very warm and sunny in Milwaukee, and Joyce and I spent the day out in the kayaks in Milwaukee. We covered 14.6 km in 4:15, and since I have a rather cheap new camera (and a water-tight box to store it in when I'm not using it) I took some photos.
The Flickr set is here or you can go right to the map view here to see the approximate locations.
The Flickr set is here or you can go right to the map view here to see the approximate locations.
Things done
Sep. 9th, 2010 12:50 pmSaturday I went up to Pike Lake by bicycle. It was a lot cooler than it's been most of the summer, and there was a pretty strong wind. After fighting the headwind all the way there, I finally realized just how strong the wind was when I finally stopped on the east side of the little lake and felt the full unobstructed wind while standing still. I found it hard to get my light jacket on because it was flapping in the wind so hard I couldn't get my arm into the sleeve. I guess that explains why I was so tired. Pretty well only the windsurfers were at Pike Lake
( photos, and more text )
( photos, and more text )
It is wrong to encourge Eric
Aug. 24th, 2010 05:50 pmBut Folsom Prison Nightmare was stuck in my head...
I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die
Prison is a nightmare and I will tell you why
This song that tells my story can get stuck in your head
And the tune keeps a-playing with other words instead
The oddest thing I felt Sunday after three and a half hours in the kayak with my hands on the paddle pulling myself along was in the car afterwards. I got into the car and put my hands very close together on the tiny steering wheel, which is turned with the very gentlest touch. Cars are everything technology can offer to laziness, the steering mechanism has a motor in it to take care of any actual effort that might be required. It felt really strange for a few minutes.
Weekend activity
Jul. 18th, 2010 09:35 pmBack to the beach Saturday, 65km up to Harrington Beach in 2:50. The lake was slightly less cold, I actually did some wading out to knee depth and even briefly was sort-of swimming. Too cold to spend much time in the water in a bathing suit rather than a wet suit (or maybe a dry suit) but still at least more than a moment at ankle depth before running back out. I finally did walk all the way around the quarry lake. Back home in 2:48. The weekly trip up there I've been making is good for the legs.
Today the weather was better than forecast, and I did get out on the river in the kayak. 12.8km in 3.5 hours. Normally the rivers in the city have only the faintest current. You know they must be flowing downhill to the lake, but you can hardly see it. We had some serious rain earlier in the week, though. The Milwaukee River wasn't running much stronger than usual, but the Menomonee was obviously flowing much faster than usual. Normally we give up just after the low railroad bridge where it gets very shallow, but with more water it was deeper, and I got a good but farther upriver than before. I ended up turning around when I reached a point where the current was as strong as I was. The GPS was reading 0 speed, looking at the shore I could see I was making just very slight progress while working quite hard. Working out on a stationary paddling exercise machine located in the middle of the river seemed likely to get old fast, so I turned around and made amazingly fast progress downriver (and with the wind). I also went to the ends of the South Menomonee Canal and the Burnham Canal.
The South Menomonee Canal receives cooling water from Valley Power Plant. I commented on how warm the canal was last year in fall when it was wet suit weather. It's very warm now in summer. I saw a few other people on the canal, in powerboats. The Milwaukee and the Kinnickinnic have a lot of recreational boating traffic, the Menomonee and the canals much less.
My arms are tired now for some reason....
Today the weather was better than forecast, and I did get out on the river in the kayak. 12.8km in 3.5 hours. Normally the rivers in the city have only the faintest current. You know they must be flowing downhill to the lake, but you can hardly see it. We had some serious rain earlier in the week, though. The Milwaukee River wasn't running much stronger than usual, but the Menomonee was obviously flowing much faster than usual. Normally we give up just after the low railroad bridge where it gets very shallow, but with more water it was deeper, and I got a good but farther upriver than before. I ended up turning around when I reached a point where the current was as strong as I was. The GPS was reading 0 speed, looking at the shore I could see I was making just very slight progress while working quite hard. Working out on a stationary paddling exercise machine located in the middle of the river seemed likely to get old fast, so I turned around and made amazingly fast progress downriver (and with the wind). I also went to the ends of the South Menomonee Canal and the Burnham Canal.
The South Menomonee Canal receives cooling water from Valley Power Plant. I commented on how warm the canal was last year in fall when it was wet suit weather. It's very warm now in summer. I saw a few other people on the canal, in powerboats. The Milwaukee and the Kinnickinnic have a lot of recreational boating traffic, the Menomonee and the canals much less.
My arms are tired now for some reason....
The Emerald Ash Borer (among other pests) has been causing problems, and to slow the spread people are advised (or in some cases mandated) to not move firewood long distances. One sees signs saying "burn it where you buy it." This is all good, but somehow it just seems wrong to have a sign saying "burn it where you buy it" in front of the Brown Deer Public Library. That message is for the firewood, not the books!
The weekend
Jul. 5th, 2010 08:23 pmSaturday was warm and sunny, a great day to hang out by Lake Michigan. Big tailwind made for a 26km/hr average speed headed up north to the beach. The water was, as usual, very cold, plus there was a water quality advisory for the south beach, so I didn't do any swimming. The new campground there is now open, that looks like a great place to spend a little time. From Milwaukee it's only around 60km and mostly quite flat (some hills going through Port Washington) so it would be a great trip by bicycle. For all the people there the south end of the beach was deserted (the north beach presumably had all the people interested in swimming, since the water samples from there tested cleaner), and it's always nice to sit around on the beach watching the waves with no one else around. The trip home along a different, 5km longer route and into the wind, averaged only 20km/hr. 132 km total.
Saturday night I had some Miller Light beer for the first time. It's, um, not really very much like Köstritzer. If you're looking for something vaguely bitter with no particular other flavor that contains ethanol, I guess it's an excellent product. The beer might not be very good, but the screw-cap aluminum bottle is different. The current trend in American beer is marketing efforts focused on the packaging. Better not to talk about the drink.
Sunday we went Kayaking finally. Starting from across the road from the Public Market we headed up the Menomonee until we ran out of water depth sufficient even for the kayaks, then back and down the Milwaukee to near the junction with the Kinnickinnic. Someday we might stop and eat at one of the restaurants there, either the seafood place or the pizza place. I think they have people in bigger boats in mind with their docks, but on the other hand people who arrive under human power probably tend to eat more! The trip totaled 9.5km in just under three hours.
This trip was my chance to try out my new paddle that I purchased at the early spring paddle sports sale. It's a glassfiber bent-shaft paddle from Adventure Technology. It's light and very nice to use. My old paddle was a cheap and heavy as they come. There is an adjustment to having to remember which way around the paddle goes—the old one was was fully symmetrical. The thing is somehow cleverly shaped to tend to twist itself perpendicular to the stroke even if you're not so good with your technique.
The other thing I noticed was that getting into my car and driving Saturday night after six days not usingthe car (and 275km of cycling) sure felt odd. That thing is huge, and goes very fast, you it seems like you could easily kill someone with it. Statistically, of course, we see that you can indeed easily kill people with a car. (You'd think that would bother people, but the moral scolds mostly focus on sex, and killing people is apparently pretty much ok if you do it with a car, as long as you weren't drunk).
Saturday night I had some Miller Light beer for the first time. It's, um, not really very much like Köstritzer. If you're looking for something vaguely bitter with no particular other flavor that contains ethanol, I guess it's an excellent product. The beer might not be very good, but the screw-cap aluminum bottle is different. The current trend in American beer is marketing efforts focused on the packaging. Better not to talk about the drink.
Sunday we went Kayaking finally. Starting from across the road from the Public Market we headed up the Menomonee until we ran out of water depth sufficient even for the kayaks, then back and down the Milwaukee to near the junction with the Kinnickinnic. Someday we might stop and eat at one of the restaurants there, either the seafood place or the pizza place. I think they have people in bigger boats in mind with their docks, but on the other hand people who arrive under human power probably tend to eat more! The trip totaled 9.5km in just under three hours.
This trip was my chance to try out my new paddle that I purchased at the early spring paddle sports sale. It's a glassfiber bent-shaft paddle from Adventure Technology. It's light and very nice to use. My old paddle was a cheap and heavy as they come. There is an adjustment to having to remember which way around the paddle goes—the old one was was fully symmetrical. The thing is somehow cleverly shaped to tend to twist itself perpendicular to the stroke even if you're not so good with your technique.
The other thing I noticed was that getting into my car and driving Saturday night after six days not usingthe car (and 275km of cycling) sure felt odd. That thing is huge, and goes very fast, you it seems like you could easily kill someone with it. Statistically, of course, we see that you can indeed easily kill people with a car. (You'd think that would bother people, but the moral scolds mostly focus on sex, and killing people is apparently pretty much ok if you do it with a car, as long as you weren't drunk).
"Tiefenschärfentabelle"
Jun. 26th, 2010 01:48 pmBob describes his latest old camera, a Voigtländer Bessa. Those of you who have some sort of interest in the German language might find it amusing.
I am home, I am safe, I had a very nice time at Duckon. I have a very very few favorite photos up already:
( Read more... )
( Read more... )
Global Wind Day!
Jun. 16th, 2010 12:33 pmI had no idea, but yesterday apparently was Global Wind Day. Really! It is an effort by the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) and the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) to attract attention to themselves. So if you noticed any extra wind, it must have been them.
