I don’t know where it happened. Maybe it was a gradual thing. But somewhere along the way I came to terms with my inability to turn out a tasty meal.
When you try to be precise about preparation and cooking times, go for the high quality ingredients, and things still turn out blah… well, what other conclusion can you reach? Sure, my cookware is not something you’ll find on Iron Chef or in the cupboards of kitchen artisans like Lesley. But still.
So obviously the problem had to be me. The only other concievable culprit would have to be the actual oven. And who blames their oven when food doesn’t turn out right? (continue reading…)
Paul and I played nine holes today at Aliso Creek, a golf course tucked in a small canyon just off Pacific Coast Highway in South Laguna Beach.
Our timing was perfect: right after a long weekend. There were very few people there and we were able to play the course as a twosome instead of being paired with other players.
Though I used to hit the driving range near my house on a semi-regular basis, I think this was only the third or fourth time I’ve played on an actual course. Was it fun? Hell yeah. Was it pretty? Hell no. It’s embarrasing to keep chipping balls into the water while some 90 year old guy who can barely stand up straight puts them right on the green. Or drives a ball 200 yards off the first tee. Thankfully, I’m not proud. My driving sucked, but I did manage to sink a challenging 35-40 foot putt on the 4th green. We smoked cigars and just enjoyed the nice weather.
This evening I went back to Punchout Fitness to resume boxing classes after a two year layoff. Things have changed a bit over there, and I’m not just talking about the prices. They’re moving the entire gym to Irvine in August and expanding their facilities to four times the current size. I suppose it’ll be closer to my house, but I’ll miss the tiny sweatshop of a space they have now in Tustin. It’s sort of grungy with nothing in the way of frills, just like a boxing gym should be.
The class was a killer–just about what I expected. But it felt great afterwards to have worked off a thousand calories in an hour. Many gyms have these classes, but I don’t think they’re quite the same as taking it at an actual boxer’s gym.
Speaking of kickboxing, for some reason those classes are always packed while the standard boxing ones are rarely full. I’ve never considered kickboxing because most people that are into it have huge muscular legs. If you’re bodybuilding it’s okay, but for normal people it looks a little… odd.
Well, it’s official. God has forsaken the civilized world. I know this because I just saw the first Christmas decoration of the 2004 season in a store.
On July 7th.
To be fair, it was an online store. Specifically Hallmark.com’s free e-card section. But if it’s being done online today, you know it’s only a matter of time before early July becomes the accepted start date for holiday merchandising in the malls.
You know the little miniature advertisement you have to watch while your e-card “loads”? This was an ad encouraging the viewer to be the first to get a look at the highly coveted, must-have, don’t-care-that-Christmas-is-as-far-away-as-it-ever-gets freaking keepsake ornaments. The Hallmark marketing guru who ok’d this ad probably never considered how it would raise my blood pressure by 50 points, but there it is.
Feh. Perhaps I’m overreacting. After all, there are only 168 shopping days left until Christmas…
Perhaps it was David Brooks who summarized Michael Moore best. In a June 26th op-ed column for the New York Times, he wrote:
Like Hemingway, Moore does his boldest thinking while abroad. For example, it was during an interview with the British paper The Mirror that Moore unfurled what is perhaps the central insight of his oeuvre, that Americans are kind of crappy.
“They are possibly the dumbest people on the planet . . . in thrall to conniving, thieving smug [pieces of the human anatomy],” Moore intoned. “We Americans suffer from an enforced ignorance. We don’t know about anything that’s happening outside our country. Our stupidity is embarrassing.”
That’s quite a worldview, Mike. I hope you’ll forgive “dumb, conniving, thieving smug [piece of the human anatomy]” for trying to improve ourselves, but in a quest for enlightenment the likes of which only you possess, perhaps we can look with a critical eye at your latest opus.
(continue reading…)
There’s nothing quite like the feeling of accomplishment that comes when, after a tough checkride, an examiner reaches over from the right seat to shake your hand and says, “Congratulations — you passed!”
That’s the feeling I had this past Tuesday when I recieved my multi-engine rating. I’d almost forgotten how nice it was.
(continue reading…)
My hangar is kind of a melancholy place these days, as it seems I’ve found a buyer for Nine-Four-Mike. A nice guy whose name also happens to be… Mike.
Anyway, I’ve been thinking about what I’ll miss most once she’s sold. “Ground visibility” is definitely near the top of the list. For sightseeing, there’s nothing quite like a 100 or 200 series Cessna. You can fly low, slow, fairly quietly, and open up the window to enjoy the breeze. In fact, if you take the window off the rail, it will hang just below the wing and give you an unfettered one-by-two foot opening from which to view the world. It’s like a Stearman, but without the 100 mph breeze.
(continue reading…)
Congratulations, Sen. Schumer. You’re now at the top of my shit list.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) claims New York City is being shortchanged on security by the existence of the uncontrolled VFR corridor and he believes the Big Apple deserves the same sort of GA ban that Washington, D.C., has. “If they can do it for Washington, they can do it for New York,” he told a news conference. Now, we’re not sure if Schumer is envious of the 15-nm no-fly zone in Washington or the Air Defense Identification Zone (neither of which has bagged a single criminally minded pilot to date) but he’s particularly upset with the Hudson River Corridor (which he calls the Hudson River Approach). The corridor is open to uncontrolled traffic below 1,200 feet and takes pilots past the heart of New York City (and under some of the busiest IFR airspace anywhere). Schumer says there’s nothing to stop a pilot using the corridor from taking a short detour and wreaking havoc on the Statue of Liberty or other vulnerable landmarks. What he didn’t mention is that there’s also nothing to stop the pilot of an airliner from doing the same thing. In any case, the FAA is closing the corridor as part of its security clampdown during the Republican National Convention next month and Schumer doesn’t want it to reopen. In addition to holding a news conference, Schumer has also sent letters to the FAA and Transportation Security Administration.
That’s just brilliant, Senator. Let’s destroy the multi-billion dollar general aviation industry so you can score some political points.
And that’s exactly what would happen, too. If Schumer gets his no-fly zone, Daley will re-demand one over Chicago. And at that point there are enough precendents that VFR flying would disappear completely. And since the IFR system does not have anywhere near the capacity to handle the entire general aviation fleet (as the Washington D.C. ADIZ so clearly demonstrates), it would mark the virtual end of general aviation.
Just so we’re clear, GA encompasses law enforcement, medevac, public benefit flying, tourism, environmental conservation, traffic reporting, disaster relief, and a lot more. I’m sure we could count on Sen. Schumer to loudly demand all those benefits for New York even as he clamors for shutting out the folks who provide them.
Sure, the planes flying the Hudson corridor have so little kinetic energy that they’d barely break a window, let alone do any notable damage to a landmark. But why let something as annoying as facts, truth, or freedom get in the way of your crusade against successful, law-abiding Americans?
Idiot.
