I just finished updating the Grand Rapids Crime Map here at es.o. There are 14 new incidents, bringing the total to 64. After a relatively quiet early autumn, things are back in full swing here in the Big City with the Small Town Feel
Muskegon State Park
At the beginning of the month Cynthia and I drove to Muskegon State Park and spent a beautiful Sunday afternoon wandering the dunes, looking at the lake and chasing birds.
The WWII submarine USS Silversides is moored to the south bank of the channel which connects Muskegon Lake to Lake Michigan.
The right place at the right time: I just happened to snap a photo of some terrists infiltrating our defenses. Let this be a demonstration that a patriotic American Citizen, armed only with a semi-obsolete digital camera, can be a buffer between the Axles of Evil and the Free World!
The clear sky and late fall sun made the dunes bright enough that they were hard to look at.
The lee side of the dunes had a little more variety. In particular, lots of plants covered with tiny burrs.
This is the Muskegon-to-Milwaukee ferry, sitting undefended at the edge of Muskegon Lake. If those terrists capture the Silversides, they could cause untold damage to our Freedom (© 2006 USA) — No! Our God Given Right (© 2006 USA) — to cross the Big Lake on a boat! I will immediately propose a bill to extend the Terrists Dressed Like Ducks season to the entire year!
The knife-edge of a dune. This photo does a good job of demonstrating how bright and contrast-ey everything looked.
A view from the big lake, looking back along the channel to the east.
Cynthia and I decided that this is a snow bunting.
Facing north from the breakwater. State park, as far as the eye can see.
Cynthia walking along the dunes on our way back to the car.
A Walk by The Lake
A few Sundays ago Cynthia and I went for a long walk around Pickerel Lake, near Cannonsburg Ski Area in West Michigan.
We picked a beautiful day — clear skies, light breeze, with an invigorating chill in the air. This shot is facing North from the walkway.
I didn’t know there were beavers in this part of the state. This one appears to have been busy.
The trees the beavers knock over are quickly turned into sustenance for all sorts of strange things.
On the north side of the lake is a large pine grove, thanks to the Army Corps of Engineers circa the 1920s.
Earlier this fall the grove was turned into a labyrinth. Cynthia and I wandered into it, and decided to obey the rules and find our way through to the other side. It took us about half an hour. Though we could see the whole maze from any point in it, the rope which defined the boundaries was difficult to see clearly. A path which appeared promising from one angle often tapered down to a point with no way through.
At one point a single thin sunbeam made its way into the maze at the perfect angle to illuminate a single strip of bark on one of the trees. From a distance it looked like a flame.
Another shot of the lake from the East end, facing into the breeze.
Mmmm…Little Tiny Birds
Thanksgiving: Cornish game hen, cornbread stuffing, sweet potatoes, salad with home-made dressing, French bread, cranberries, and mincemeat and red raspberry pies.
And Sleep. Lots of sleep. And quiet. And skies so clear the Milky Way was bright enough to navigate by.
And family.
And more food.
And more sleep.
Happy Anniversary to Me … and my house
Yup. One year ago I signed the papers, forked over the cash, and added several keys to my ring.
My only opinion on the subject at the moment?
“Maybe I should vacuum something.”
The Latest News in Books
Things have been pretty busy the past month or so, but I have managed to find time to crack open a couple of new books.
The first one was The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick. This is not the first alternate history book I have read, so it felt just a little cliche. Then I remembered that this was one of the first of that sub-genre, and in that context is was BRILLIANT! Basically, America lost WWII and was divvied up between the Germans (east of the Mississippi) and the Japanese (west of the Rocky Mountains), with a no-man;s-land in between. The stories are told from the point of view of several characters, Japanese, German, and American.
Next — and one I am still working on — is the ecological thriller The Swarm by Frank Schatzing. The overall plot is nothing new — the abused Earth begins fighting back against her tormentors — but the specifics of the story are fresh and engaging, and the characters are sympathetic without being preachy.
Finally, the one I just finished, and one which caught me by surprise: The Road by Cormac McCarthy. Normally I am aware of when interesting books are published, but I didn’t hear about this one until after the fact. McCarthy has (finally) published a post-apocalyptic novel. He has written several apocalyptic novels — Blood Meridian being the most obvious — and now he has written the book he was meant to write. The entire novel follows an un-named father and son as they travel west from the mountains to the coast of southern California in an America gone to nuclear winter where nothing is left alive but human beings. Gangs of cannibals roam the remains of the world and a can of peaches is the most magnificent meal to be hoped for.
There is nothing dignified or romantic about the end of the world here — everything is ash and rain and snow, and a simple thing like a shopping cart losing its wheel can be a life-or-death experience.
I read The Road too quickly the first time — punctuated by moments of having to put it down and let my emotions settle — and I will probably pick it up again around the holidays.
Thomas Harris has a new book coming out in three weeks: Hannibal Rising, the story of how Hannibal Lecter became one of the greatest literary monsters of the twentieth century. Saying I am looking forward to this one is an understatement.
That’s all for now. I want to get in a solid hour of reading before I go to bed. I suggest you do the same.
Back Again
Chaos, contrary to what you might think, is easily predictable. If many different areas of my life have a tendency towards instability, they will all become complicated at once.
Take my computer. The old one died a month ago. This is the first thing I am doing on my new machine. The build process went something like this:
-buy computer parts
-build computer
-install Windows XP, 64-bit edition
-install wrong drivers
-format hard drive
-install Windows XP, 64-bit edition
-install is corrupt
-format hard drive
-install Windows XP, 64-bit edition
-find 64-bit drivers
-discover that USB wireless adapter has no 64-bit drivers
-discover that antivirus and personal firewall software for 64-bit machine are rare and expensive
-format hard drive
-install Windows XP, 32-bit edition
-stare in confusion at notice that windows can’t find CD drive in the middle of Windows installing from CD drive
-format hard drive
-install Windows XP, 32-bit edition
-stare in confusion at notice that windows can’t find CD drive in the middle of Windows installing from CD drive
-copy files form CD to USB Flash drive, which now somehow is the D: drive
-stare in confusion at notice that windows can’t find USB drive that is says is now my D: drive
-format hard drive
-copy Windows install CD to new 4-gig USB Flash drive
-change boot order to USB FIRST
-install windows XP, 32-bit edition from USB drive
-stare in confusion at notice that Windows can’t find USB drive etc. etc.
-cross fingers and hit Enter
-stare in confusion as Windows finishes installing
-install drivers
-install Oblivion
-bask in the awesomeness that is Oblivion on a 64-bit, dual-core, 2GHz Athlon running 2Gb of RAM and a 512Mb NVidia video card
whew
Also, I started a new job at the beginning of the month. After a year and a half away, I am back at BBK Studio in its new, more developer-friendly iteration.
Funny old world, innit?
Crash
Find a light switch in your house. A good stiff one, which is just a little hard to move. Now click it about twice a second for several seconds.
That is the sound which came out of my hard drive last night.
Yup. My 5-year-old personal computer is dead. It’s bleedin’ deceased. It’s shuffled off this mortal coil. Etcetera.
Fortunately I backed up everything a couple of weeks ago, just after a virus scare. So all I lost was a few photos and my email archives. Nothing earth-shaking.
I have already, with the help of co-worker Jeremy, put together a shopping cart over at New Egg which I will soon submit, and then, for the first time in about eight years, build my own computer.
But this weekend I will enjoy 48 hours without a computer. Maybe I will read a book, or something.
O God It Burns, part II
This is the most recent harvest from my pepper plants. 29 cayennes, 6 jalapeños and 8 habaneros. The cayenne and jalapeño plants are done, and there are maybe 40 more habaneros still turning orange, awaiting harvesting.
This will bring the total for the whole season to, I think, nearly 100 peppers from three plants. I am already planning a pepper garden for next year; at least a dozen plants and maybe half a dozen different kinds of peppers.
Point of interest: If you need to harvest peppers before they turn red, put them in a paper bag with a tomato. For some reason this will cause the peppers to change color.
Trees!
Consider the above photo.
The blue house on the left is mine. The house immediately to the right belongs to my neighbor Jeremy. Immediately in front of our houses is a row of four new Red Maple trees. Jeremy and I spent most of the day Saturday, and part of Sunday, digging out old sod, digging holes, planting trees, leveling ground, and laying in new sod.
Is It Not Magnificent?
Actually, Jeremy did the lion’s share of the heavy lifting; he had the trees in the ground before I returned home from Saturday morning practice. And he placed them so that, from a certain spot on either porch, none of our neighbors across the street are visible.
So now is the long, breathless wait to see if new leaves come in next spring.
As a side note, the paint job on the blue car to the left of the photo confounded me for a little while, until I realized that the different shades of blue are there to break up the visual outline of the car. The logic there being that if the owner happens to be driving the car in, say, the north Atlantic in late 1942, German U-boat skippers will have a hard time seeing how big the car actually is and which direction it is traveling, and will therefore have a difficult time aiming their torpedoes.
Pretty smart, that fella.