Doughman 2011 race

March 16th, 2011

We’re in! I registered the 11-foot-8 Doughman team today – Team Overheight When Flashing!

We’ll be competing on Saturday May 28th with 75 teams from all over the country in the DOUGHMAN race – the world’s premier Team Relay Quadrathlon, combining competitive eating with a traditional triathlon.

Part of the challenge is also to raise funds for SEEDS – a local non-profit. So please consider contributing to the cause. Your contribution will support a worthy local cause AND it will help our team in the race!

SEEDS is a non-profit community garden whose goal is to teach people to care for the earth, themselves and each other through a variety of garden-based programs


Disasters

March 13th, 2011

Friday morning, around 2:00 AM, I was at work dealing with a major email server problem, when I started noticing the news headlines about the disaster in Japan. It sounded bad, but I was too tired and too preoccupied with my work for the magnitude of that disaster to really sink in.

Later that morning, after a couple hours of sleep, I had to explain to folks at work that half a day’s worth in emails had bounced. At the same time the extent of the situation in Japan came into focus. Some of my co-workers – including my boss – pointed out that the news about Japan really does put our email problems into perspective. Even though I know they were unhappy about the losing a bunch of emails.

As the situation in Japan unfolds and people there scramble to deal with a real disaster, I hope this also serves as a reminder for us to not take our comfort zone for granted. For the most part, we can only watch and recognize the amazing magnitude and intensity of this double-whammy disaster, plus the impending man-made peril to top it off. The threat of a nuclear disaster should also give pause to all of us who are consuming electricity from nuclear power, and especially to all of us who live near a nuclear power plant.

Let’s also not forget the ongoing, man-made disaster in Libya. I really hope that the international community (and the Arab League in particular) soon decides to intervene and try to stop Gaddafi’s troops from killing the Libyan rebels.

We all need to keep our own struggles in perspective. And we all need to give our kids and our loved ones a hug. And we have to try to be there for our fellow man when they need our help.

Ka-lunk

March 9th, 2011

kalunkalunkalunk ….

That’s what that truck said on Sunday. I knew it was a bad sound. Expensive. The sound of money down the drain. Well … this is the 1″x2″  hole where 5 grand of my hard-earned cash disappeared Sunday morning.

My mechanic says it was a connecting rod that broke and punched that hole in the bottom of the engine block. Turns out, on Powerstroke engines, connecting rod failures are not unheard of. Google it. I am pissed off. For a core component of an engine to fail like this is NOT acceptable. There are only 2 explanations I can think of: bad design or poor quality control. Bad maintenance does not produce catastrophic failures like this. I am DONE with Ford. DONE. I put up with their crappy shit … knobs falling off, door locks not working, the WORST cup holders in an American-made vehicle ever! But our Ford Taurus blew a head gasket at just under 90,000 miles and now a POWERSTROKE engine dies at just over 255,000 miles??!!

Why can I not get a Toyota diesel engine here? Why does VW not make a full-size pickup with a big ole TDI?? I guess I’ll try a Dodge with a Cummins engine next. I hope I have better luck with that.

Big John

March 6th, 2011

Yeah – another one of those weeks were “challenging” was just not good enough. At work we have to re-build our main file server and so we’re shuffling Terabytes of data around the networks, checking file permissions, backing up data, bla bla bla … Julia had a viola recital today with all the other students of her strings teacher. Next week she auditions for the Durham ScBig Johnhool of the Arts AND she performs at Duke in the Durham Honors Concert. So she’s a bit wigged out. On top of all that, the damn truck broke. I drove into town this morning to pick up some veggie oil, and as I hit the Interstate, the truck starts making weird noises. I fiddle with the transmission and the truck says CLUNK … kachunk kachunk kachunk kachunk kachunk kachunk kachunk … oh shit, I  think , and pull over. Oil is pouring out of the bottom of the truck and something is clunking and rattling like crazy.

So I called Laura, and she got me the phone numbers for some towing companies. Since I’ve had ample opportunity to watch Big John’s Towing at work, I pick them. They sent one of their “smaller” towing trucks, and the guy hooked up my pickup and towed it to my mechanic. We had a a nice chat, and we discussed the towing and recovery business, the cost of fuel and, of course, the business of yanking boxtrucks out from under low railroad trestles.

Read the rest of this entry »

277777

February 27th, 2011

277777 milesToday, 2/27, on my way home from work (!) I saw the odometer roll over to 277777 miles (=447038.748 kilometers) on my 1991 Mercedes 300D. Cool number – especially on today’s date :)

So that’s now 33,000 miles on my homebrew  biodiesel in the last 3 years, and she’s going strong.

Bomb squad

February 21st, 2011

Bombsquad

Today, around 10:30 AM, the building where I work suddenly was swarming with cops and security guys who were telling people to get out of the building. In a locked mail room at  Duke Press, someone had found a package wrapped in electrical tape, no return address, no postage. So they called the police, and the within a few minutes the Durham County Sheriff’s Department Bomb Squad showed up.

No fancy gadgets, just a bunch of cops – one of them in a “fat suit” (robots are for wimps, anyway). He suited up and went in. Five Minutes later he’s back, and the cops get orders to widen the evacuation area! So we went behind the train trestle and watched him get ready to go in again.

At that point it was lunchtime, though, and we decided to go to Tylers for lunch. Around 12:30 we got word that the evacuation was lifted and we could go back to work. Oh well … bummer. And the package turned out to be harmless, despite the electrical tape.

Of course this excitement did make the news

First trail riding excursion

February 13th, 2011

Laura riding WallyWe’re now about 6 months into our horse-ownership adventure and today we did our first real trail riding adventure with Wally and Cleo. We’ve been riding them in and around the pasture. We built a small trail through the woods for riding, and we’ve taken them around the neighborhood.  But today we went a bit further and took them down to Winkler road (the other neighborhood we’re now connected to) then down a private drive (only a minimal amount of trespassing there) and then along a power line easement all the way to Terry road.

The terrain was not too difficult, but there were a couple of steep hills and a couple of creeks to ford.  Wally plodded right through the creeks  – no problem. Cleo, however, was not going to climb through the muddy creeks, so she jumped them. Laura tried to get her to walk though the creeks, but knew that Cleo was likely to jump. So she was ready, and they did really well. One of the creeks was probably 4-5 feet wide (1.5 meters) so that was a pretty substantial jump. I’m glad that Wally did not try to jump the creeks, because I don’t think I would have been able to hang on.

Altogether we were riding for about 2 hours today, and that tired out the horses and the riders. It felt great, but now my butt hurts. And I know that tomorrow my legs will be sore. But it was fun, and I think the horses, too, enjoyed getting out of the pasture a bit and getting some exercise.

Congratulations, Egypt

February 11th, 2011

Historic day in Egypt! Amazing turn of events … congratulations to all those stubborn activists on Tahrir square and all over the country.

Free Jazzmatazz

February 9th, 2011

Yeah – that’s a pretty good song. I like it – not just because my website 11foot8.com gets a shout out at 00:22 in the Das Racist piece.  No – it’s really a cool song – better than Juicy for sure. And now we have some real hipster cred.

Free Jazzmatazz is a collaboration between Das Racist and pianist Vijay Iyer – from their album Sit Down, Man.  Download it for free from the Village Voice. Listen to the music. Shut up and have a PBR!

Sit Down, Man

Hayburners

February 6th, 2011

Yes, horses like to eat hay, but my god – these guys EAT HAY! Lots of it! Each of our horses can eat several hundred pounds of hay a week.

Wally the hayburner

hayburners

We have had a pretty cold winter, so far, and so they eat even more than they usually would because when it’s cold their metabolism kicks it up a notch to keep them warm. In the fall I started buying 1,300 lb/650Kg  hay rolls of nice fescue hay from a local farmer. The last one (number 5, I think) they ate up in 2 weeks.  That’s 300 lbs per horse per week! The quest for hay – good quality hay – for our horses has become a significant part of my life. That’s fine – I am not complaining. I am just amazed at their ability to chew through huge amounts of hay.

My previous supplier ran out of hay, and so we’ve been buying square bales of hay at the feed store, which is pretty expensive ($5-$10 a bale). Last week I found another local farmer who still has some for $60 a roll. It’s a bit more expensive than the other guy, but it’s a very nice fescue/orchard grass mix. I got two rolls last week and today I put one out in the pasture today.

1,800 lbs of hay

These are 900 lb rolls, which is nice, because they are a bit easier to manage than the enormous 1,300 lb rolls. I dropped one roll in the pasture and Wally and Cleo got right down to business and started ripping huge mouthfuls of hay from the roll and munching on it with great gusto.

Read the rest of this entry »

Assalaamu alaykum

February 3rd, 2011

“Peace be with you” – that’s how Barack Obama greeted the audience at Cairo University in June 2009. During his speech in the “timeless city” he said

I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things:  the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn’t steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose.  These are not just American ideas; they are human rights.  And that is why we will support them everywhere.
President Obama, June 4, 2009

So where was that support for democracy and the rule of law during the last 10 days, Mr. President? Where was your commitment to democracy when a million Egyptians took to the streets and demanded just that: “the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn’t steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose.”

For the US President (or the VP) to tip-toe around the issue of the people of Egypt demanding an end to the oppressive 30-year rule of Hosni Mubarak is an embarrassment. That regime has been supported way too long with Billions of taxpayer dollars. But, yet again, “peace” is defined by the administration’s political comfort zone, not by the rights of the people to self-determination. Yet again, “peace” is what’s convenient for the “international community” – just like in Cote D’Ivoire. In Egypt the status quo is convenient, because Mubarak promised not to threaten Israel. I understand that Israelis are nervous about Egypt’s unrest. And I unequivocally support the right of Israelis to live in peace and free from oppression. And I also support the right of Egyptians to do the same. I really don’t think that that’s mutually exclusive. On the contrary – I am certain that a democratic Egypt is a much better and more reliable neighbor to Israel than an Egypt that’s run by a corrupt dictator.

The situation in Cote D’Ivoire is the exact inverse of Egypt. There, a corrupt ruler – Gbagbo – is clinging to power and the UN wants his opponent – Ouattara – to take over, even though his opponent’s democratic credentials are no better. But Ouattara is much more convenient to the “international community” than the current ruler, who has been hostile to the AU and the UN.\

In Egypt, change is a risk. But change is coming. It would have been a great opportunity for “President Change” to say “Yes, you can!” to the Egyptian people and politely asked Mubarak to get out. One simple signal like that would have done more to encourage open, democratic society in the Middle East than years of war and forced regime change. Yet, President Obama chose to be president “small change” – once again. What a shame.

May Peace be with you, people of Egypt. But we have now seen that when you must, you kick butt! Good for you! Hang in there and good luck! Assalaamu alaykum!

More Identity Theft

January 20th, 2011

This week was not difficult enough with both kids at home with the flu … no, today this guy calls and explains he’s trying to collect on a $250 loan someone using my name and SSN  took out last year somewhere in California. Great … another one! I explained politely that 1) I have never been to California and 2) I certainly have no California driver’s license and 3) most types of payday loans are illegal in North Carolina and unenforceable.

He pushed back and suggested I just pay the $250 to make sure it won’t ruin my credit. Yeah, right. The bank is too lazy to check whether the SSN matches the driver’s license, but NOW they are going to report the bad debt. I mean, they could Google my name and figure out I don’t live in California. But that’s their problem.

Still – I called Equifax and placed a 90-day fraud alert on my credit file. And I also placed a freeze on my file with all three credit bureaus. NC residents get that service free of charge, and all three have websites for placing a security freeze on your file:

Equifax Security Freeze / Trans Union Security Freeze / Experian Security Freeze

In addition, I am also now paying Equifax $7/month to email me whenever there is any change to my credit report.  I hate to do this, but who knows what that jerk who is using my SSN is up to next. The entire “credit bureau” system is a huge scam … they collect all kinds of information about you and then  you have to pay them to manage it. OK – so you get a free credit report every year (when did you last check your credit report?) but when someone is running around committing crimes using your SSN, that’s not enough. I wonder what’s next in this little saga?!

The Good, the Bad and Some Ugly Crashes

January 18th, 2011

Time for a new truck crash video compilation. This is the Sergio Leone remix of the 2010 truck crashes at the Gregson St. railroad trestle. Enjoy!

Es ist mal wieder Zeit fuer einen Kompilationsfilm der LKW-Enthauptungen an unserer beruechtigten Eisenbahnbruecke hier in Durham in North Carolina. Diesmal ist der Film Sergio Leone gewidmet undf seinem Klassiker ,,The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” … auf Deutsch: Zwei glorreiche Halunken. Viel Spass!

Another snowday

January 11th, 2011

Last night it snowed again … while Julia was at her viola lesson. On the way home I had a bit of trouble because the heater in the car does not work and so the wiper would just schmier the snow across the windshield, where it would then freeze. I had to deploy lots of washer fluid (with cleaner) to keep the windshield relatively ice free.

The sleet last night froze and then it snowed on top of that, making for a fairly slippery affair on the road. Schools called a snow day, Duke is on a severe weather plan and so we stayed home – except for Laura, who went to open her store in the afternoon. I worked from at home and shoveled the driveway. And then I took a walk through our woods.

Kitty Fountain in the snow

Kitty Fountain in the snow

1-11-11

January 11th, 2011

Lots of ones today – 01/11/11 at 11:11 ( or 11/01/11 for the rest of the world …)

Happy one-eleven day!

Any ideas for how to celebrate 11/11/11 in 10 months? Maybe a party!

Atta Mills opposes war in Côte D’Ivoire

January 9th, 2011

Finally – a voice of reason in the presidential tug-of-war in Côte D’Ivoire: Ghana’s president Atta Mills refuses to take sides, the BBC reported on Friday.

Mr Ouattara called this week for a special forces operation to remove Mr Gbagbo.

But President Mills appeared to reject such an idea in a speech on Friday. “I personally do not think the military option will solve the problem in Ivory Coast,” he said.

“Ghana is not taking sides,” he said, pointing out that:

“We have about one million Ghanaians living in Ivory Coast who could be victims of any military intervention.”

Ghanaians, Ivoirians, Bukinabe … everyone living in that country would suffer tremendously from a war – except the people who are calling for military action. I am appalled by Ouattara’s call for UN military intervention to remove Gbagbo from power. Ouattara is sitting pretty in his hotel in Abidjan, but the ordinary people who are not protected by UN tanks are the ones who would suffer.

Read the rest of this entry »

Caturday

January 8th, 2011

Deha on caturday
Deha – our 18-year-old siamese on caturday.

Friday lunch at Dain’s

January 7th, 2011


Lunch at Dain's

Photo by Zack Wheeler

Lunch today at Dain’s Place on 9th St. in Durham. I had a “Defibrilator” – a 1/2 pund burger with bacon, sweet chili, cheddar cheese, cole slaw … and topped with a hot dog … except I had mine with goat sausage. :)

Our horses in the snow

January 3rd, 2011

We uploaded some videos of the Wally and Cleo to Laura’s YouTube channel. I shot this one on Dec. 26 after the snowstorm. Cleo was very excited about the snow. This might be the first time she experienced a real snowfall because she lived at the coast for most of her life.

Wir haben ein paar Videos unserer Pferde bei Laura’s YouTube Seite eingestellt. Diese Video habe ich am 26. Dezember gefilmt nachdem es die ganze  Nacht geschneit hatte. Cleo war ganz aus dem Haeuschen wegen dem Schnee. Wahrscheinlich hatte sie noch nie so viel Schnee gesehen, da sie den Grossteil ihres Lebens bisher and der Kueste verbracht hat.

2010

January 1st, 2011

Waldo and CleoBoy – what a surprise that year had in store for us! Perhaps the greatest change in lifestyle for Laura an me since we had children … and a much bigger surprise than the children! Of course I am talking about our horses, Waldo and Cleo.

While building our horsefarm and figuring out the ins and outs of horse-ownership was our big adventure this year, Laura and I were also pretty busy with work, and the kids were busy with school. Laura’s store had a good year and has weathered the economic troubles of the last three years quite well. I think that One World Market‘s  success shows the success of weaving a business into the social fabric of a community, and integrating social justice and community building into the business model. And of course her store’s success is also a direct result of her’s and April’s hard work keeping the customers happy.

My work is going well, too. I expanded my team and we’re getting ready to launch a new, thoroughly overhauled version of one of our lab’s key research tools.  The biggest excitement this year was probably when one of the labs we support moved out and another researcher and his team moved into the vacated space. My little side-business of licensing truck crash videos is also still doing fine. This fall I did 2 licenses with production companies for Japanese television shows. And I am still brewing fuel for my cars (and the truck, of course, which also runs on biodiesel), even though it is getting Farm Truckincreasingly difficult to get enough oil. Still, I just started drying batch no.  60, so that brings me to a total of about 3,000 gallons, or 12,000 liters of fuel I made from used fryer oil.

Jacob is doing well in school – he is now in 5th grade and the last year in elementary school and the last year at the charter school where he has been since 3rd grade. He has made some good friends and he also likes his teacher a lot. In the fall he took a break from karate, but in December he started going to classes again. I hope that in January we can start working on our next belt levels. For his birthday, he got a kajak, which he mostly paddles around our pond. But we did take it out on the Eno a couple times as well.

Julia is still a straight-A student at school and has a tremendous work ethic. She is also getting really good at her viola play, thanks to her tenacity and our friend Barbara’s patient and skillful teaching. For Julia, the big event of the year, of course, was getting her horse. She and Cleo hit it off right away, and while we all bonded with Cleo, she is definitely Julia’s horse. And since so many of Julia’s friends are also horse-crazy girls, owning a horse has also been a tremendous opportunity for her socially.

To us, our horsefarm project was remarkable in many ways. For Laura, it was a lifelong dream to own a horse. Now we own two and they live right in our back yard. Backyard farms like ours are not uncommon around here, but still – most horse-owners board their horses. That’s a perfectly good approach, although it can be difficult to find a good place for your horse. And keeping the horses at your own place has some real advantages, as you interact with the animals every day and so you bond with them more. Most evenings we spend at least some time out there with them.

bulding the shelterSetting up our horse habitat was also the biggest DIY project either of us had ever undertaken. Heck – it’s so big, you can see it from space! It was fun and exciting and Laura and I had very few disagreements throughout. We divided up the jobs and even managed to get the kids to help. Just the timing was a bit of a problem … if you plan to build a pasture fence, really try to do it in the spring or in the fall, when the weather is less hot. Doing this over the summer was how it worked out, but tamping fence posts in 100-Deg-F heat is not recommended. So what happened? How did we end up on a horse farm, after moving from the country to a subdivision 3  1/2 years ago?

Read the rest of this entry »