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We have returned from just shy of a week at “The Inn” at “The Homestead,” which is up in Glen Arbor, Michigan.  Here’s a link to a Flickr set of pictures.  Some thoughts more or less as they occurred on the trip/occur in the photos:

• We stayed at The Homestead, where Annette made a reservation back in May or June in a fit of “Argh! I need a vacation!” It is a huge property of condos, cottages, time-shares, private homes, and a couple small hotels which is part real estate scheme/part resort, a place where many things are named with a pretentious “The” (e.g., “The Homestead,” which includes a few shops and such in “The Village,” an area of rentals called “The Cottages,” and the small hotel where we stayed called “The Inn.”) I was sort of prepared to not like it because it’s too expensive and a lot of the reviews online are mixed at best.  But just about anyplace in this area of northern Michigan “in season” is too expensive, and since we wanted a comfy room with Internet access and close proximity to the beach (maybe 200 yards away from one of the best in Michigan) and a pool, this worked out great.  We had a room with a gas fireplace, a nice sitting area, plenty roomy, and it also included a great patio.  It was quirky though– for example, none of the doors quite opened or closed right.
• This was designed to be a “vacation,” as opposed to a “trip” like the one we took to California and Oregon in June.  Will was away at Camp Lookout just down the road, so the idea was to mostly do nothing– sleeping in, hanging around the beach and the pool and the patio, reading, going out for nice dinners and drinking cocktails.  You know, camp for grown-ups.
• We did go on a hike that was about seven miles long one day along the Bay View trail.  It was quite nice because it was beautiful views and because it gave us a chance to try out our new picnic/wine backpack (we bought at “the store” or whatever it was called at The Homestead– a good deal, too).  But that was the hottest day up there, so not necessarily the best timed trip.
• That night we met with a friend from our PhD program who teaches up at Northwestern Michigan College, John, and his wife and all-around groovy person, Karen.  We also ended up out there with John’s parents, who were visiting, and some local-yokel friends of theirs too.  Low-key up-north fun:  sit around, drink a little wine or beer, light a fire, and wait for the stars to come out.  And we saw lots of stars, including the Milky Way pretty clearly.  It’s nights like that which make me think that the ancient’s belief that the sky was a roof high above the earth was logical under the circumstances.
• But there was work on this trip.  For starters, I was (and am!) still teaching two classes online and Annette, despite her best efforts, just couldn’t stay completely away.  We had ethernet connectivity in the room, but no wifi (note to self:  next time I go on an extended trip like this, bring one of my Airport Express modems).  But there was wifi in the lobby area, which was probably better because we pretty much had the place to ourselves, room to spread out, and a tremendous view.  Older vacationers would look at us scornfully and mumble how we were “wasting” such a pleasant time.  Younger vacationers asked questions about how they too could get good wifi in this place.
• We had a couple of hours of “drama” on Thursday when I thought I had lost my keys to the car, the only set of keys we had.  We turned the room upside down, looked through every stitch of clothing, walked on the beach and searched under chairs by the pool.  I had called a lock guy with the theory that I could get to a valet key in the glove box, though we were dreading that key not being there and having to get towed to Traverse City and spending lots of time and hundreds of dollars to get back on the road.  And then I picked up a bluetooth keyboard that was on the desk area, a keyboard that I am certain that both Annette and I had moved in the course of the last two hours, and there they were.  We both gasped as if I had just pulled off the greatest magic trick of the century.
• We ate well on this trip:  two times at a place at The Homestead called Nonna’s, mainly because it was close, very good, and reasonably priced for this quality of food.  And then the last night we went to a place in Glen Arbor called Blu that was really really good, certainly as good as any really good restaurant I’ve been to just about anywhere.  Don’t tell Will, but that even includes Bouchon.
• We picked up Will on Friday a little early, and then made a stop at Cherry Republic for him (and us too) before getting back on the road.

And then as soon as I got back to town and was running errands, I sensed the end of summer.  The grocery store had fall plants for sale out front.  A pile of end of the term grading awaits.  Fall term will start soon….

I’m not entirely sure what inspired this, but I got an itch recently to try to do some canning and/or pickling.  It’s one of those cooking/foodie things I’ve been interested in for a while now, and when we were in Iowa about a month ago, my mom gave me her old canning pot– the giant pot and rack you use to boil the jars to preserve them.  And about two weeks ago, I bought both a book on canning and a book on building an “earth oven.” (That’s right, folks– a pizza oven is still a possibility. Stay tuned for details).

So, following a very basic pickling recipe, I tried my hand at a few pickled vegetables. From left to right:

• Green beans (which I really like pickled a lot, and we have an abundance of them around here and/or from the CSA share from Tantré Farms).
• Carrots (this was kind of a last-minute thing– I had an extra jar and some extra brine, so I figured what the hell?  I also added onion and a hot pepper to this mix).
• Green peppers (Annette’s request, based on a recipe from her grandmother).
• Cucumbers (you know, “pickles”).
• Beets (I have high hopes for this one because we have gotten a lot of beets from the farm this year).
• Green peppers and onions (I think…).

Now, I have no idea if any of this is going to turn out and/or if it is not going to kill us when we try to eat it.  That’s why this is “part 1″ of the pickling post.   I’m pretty optimistic, and it was surprisingly easy to do, but I am still up in the air about the extent to which it is “worth it.”  It seems to me that if you’ve got a lot of something that is going to go bad otherwise (beets, for example), then it might be worth it.  We’ll see in a couple weeks.

We were in Cedar Falls, Iowa this past weekend, dropping off Will for a few days to spend with his cousins and grandparents.  So on the return trip, minus our minor and with the dog safely stowed in the kennel, Annette and I did something we never do:  we gambled our way home, stopping at three casinos along I-80 and I-94 in Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan.  Here’s a link to a few gambling picts.

I should point out that neither Annette nor I are exactly “high rollers.”  I’m pretty sure we gambled less than $50 between the two of us, all of it at either video poker machines or slots.  I should also point out, for those of you thinking “casinos?  in the midwest?” that we could have easily stopped at eight or nine different places, maybe more.  Once you start looking, you realize there’s lots of gambling out there.

We started at Jumer’s Casino and Hotel, in Rock Island, Illinois, just across the river from Iowa. This was mostly a breakfast stop for us, a little over two hours from my parent’s house.  I give this place high marks for convenience, with “easy on/easy off” of I-280.  It was all shiny and new, and probably not a bad place to stay on a road-trip– while we were eating breakfast, we saw a lot of people on the way out of the hotel part and back onto the Interstate.  I also give this place high marks because the whole thing was non-smoking.  I could see us stopping here on the trip to and from Iowa again. But the down-side for me was that I screwed up in my betting and managed to lose about $10 on one bet on a quarter poker machine.

Stop number two was at Blue Chip Casino, Hotel, and Spa in Michigan City, Indiana.  While there are lots of gambling options in the midwest, there are some kind of screwy laws on this, and in Indiana (apparently), gambling has to take place on the water.  So what you’ve got with this place is a giant and shiny hotel, theater (upcoming acts include Paul Revere and the Raiders), and a parking deck, right next to the casino, which is actually a giant barge floating in a pond right next to the buildings.  But you’d never know this if you weren’t looking– the connection between the building and the boat is permanently in place, and the boat clearly never leaves.  Where would it go?

Anyway, I give the Blue Chip a definite thumbs down.  Far too off the Interstate to make it worthwhile as a roadtrip stop, and you show me someone who makes a point of going to Michigan City to play slots and I’ll show you someone who has a bit of a “gambling problem.”

We wrapped things up in Michigan at FireKeepers Casino in Battle Creek (btw, sorry for the noises on their web site), where we stopped for a little gamin’ and dinner.  By this point, I think it’s fair to say that I was reminded of something I already knew:  every casino everywhere I have ever been– Vegas, Iowa, Michigan, wherever– pretty much is the same.  They all have that same kinds of blinking lights and things, the same games (with a few very subtle variations), the same hypnotic background noise of jingling machines, the same crazy-patterned carpets, the same smell of cigarette smoke (well, except for Jumer’s) and piped-in air/oxygen/air-freshener.  Annette and I did enjoy the nickel poker machines here though.

So, what did we learn?

• Midwest gambling is dominated by old people– in some cases, very very old people.  Though to be fair, I am sure all of these places attract a more youthful clientele after 8 pm.
• Midwest casinos are located in places where people would not otherwise go and/or stop– Rock Island and Michigan City, for example, not to mention a number of parts of Detroit.
• One trend I noticed was a number of “machines” that were there to replace/replicate table games.  At one of these places (the specifics all blend together), I noticed a computerized version of a three card poker game; at another, it was a roullette game.  In both cases, it was people sitting around a gaming table like they would be if it were being played with real cards and/or a real dealer, but it was all computerized instead.  Sort of like the casino equivalent of those machines where you scan your own groceries.
• Casinos seem to generally attract rather unhealthy-looking people, some who might even be zombies, cocktail-drinking, smoking, trucker-cap wearing zombies.
• A closely related observation– midwest casinos seem to attract extremely fat people, the kind of fat where my response, as someone who is himself clearly overweight, is “hey, there’s nothing wrong with me because I’m not that fat.”  This was particularly true in Michigan, where I recall seeing at least two people being wheeled around because they were clearly too fat to propel themselves and where Annette and I witnessed a rather grotesque scene in the restaurant that had us making cruel jokes about Mr. Cresosote requesting a bucket and being offered a “wafer thin mint.”
• Finally, stopping at the casino on the highway is not the same as Vegas, no matter how hard those Midwestern casinos might try.

The last part of our trip was the super-nature-y part, the part which defines terms like “sublime” beauty, the southern Oregon/northern California coast. When we lived in Ashland, we made a couple of trips to the coast, though only a couple because while Ashland is maybe 100 miles from the Pacific, there are mountains and foothills in the way.

I posted some pictures the other day; here’s a link to the Coos Bay/Bandon part of things, and here’s a link to the Redwoods part. One of these days, I’ll have to pull together a “highlight” reel of these zillions of pictures, though I have to say it’s tough to take a bad looking picture out there.  More than you want to know after the jump. Continue Reading »

I know I have some relatives and friends who might be interested in seeing some pictures for now; more of a post later though….

Bandon and Coos Bay 2010

Redwoods 2010

We are at the main destination/reason for our westward trip, Ashland, Oregon, the town where Will was born in 1997 and where I took my first tenure-track job in 1996. We were only here two years, frankly because my job at Southern Oregon University was bad and also because Annette’s job prospects at SOU and in the area were poor. I’m leaving a lot of details out of that last sentence, details I’m not going to dwell on for mostly obvious reasons. Let’s just say that if we had stayed here, I’m pretty sure neither one of us would have stayed in academia.

Anyway, I’m happy to visit now as a tenured and content professor at EMU, one who happens to be married to someone who was just granted tenure, and I’m happy that we are sharing our trip down memory lane with our 12 year old son who left this town where he was born before he was one. Here’s a link to a bunch of flickr pictures of the area (including Crater Lake) so far; more details after the jump.
Continue Reading »

We’re about to conclude the first leg of our trip out west, the Napa Valley part of things. Here’s a link to the Flickr set of photos and one video; Annette also uploaded a bunch of stuff to Facebook, but I’ll worry about getting those pictures downloaded and uploaded to Flickr when I get home.

A couple of quick thoughts before Ashland:

The idea of this trip, more or less, was to cash in our frequent flyer miles (meaning the flights cost us about $40 or so) and to take a trip to see where Will was born and where Annette and I started our post-PhD program lives, Ashland, Oregon. But first, Napa.

Our flight into Sacramento was uneventful, but we didn’t get to the hotel/motel until almost 1 am west coast time or 4 am east coast time, so our first day in Napa was pretty quiet, actually. We stopped in downtown Napa for lunch– good food, but not much reason to stop there tourism-wise. Drove past wineries, stopped at Bouchon Bakery for lovely pastries and coffee, and then got to our hotel, a Best Western in Calistoga, CA. Great place, actually– lovely little town, nice hotel, reasonably priced, etc.

Tuesday night we went to Bouchon, which is a Thomas Keller restaurant in Yountville. I would have preferred going to Ad Hoc (because I have a cookbook from there), but it was closed both Tuesday and Wednesday. And The French Laundry, well, that would have been a little out of our budget. Bouchon was great, and surprisingly accessible and not crazy expensive. We have spent as much or more in a couple of different restaurants in Ann Arbor, and this was much better. Will had a great mussels dish, Annette had a bib lettuce salad that she thought was the best ever (and some good lobster bisque), and I pigged out over some deliciously fatty pork shoulder.

And then Wednesday, we got up and really had tourism proper. Napa Valley is a little tricky with a 12 year-old; as Annette put it, it’s sort of like how adults feel about a place like Chuck E. Cheese: sure, there’s stuff adults can do there, but the place is really made for kids. So is the case with wine country. As a result, we ended up keeping it pretty simple and mostly kid-friendly. We went to the California petrified forest and the “Old Faithful” of California; both were pretty much tourist-traps, but kinda fun. We went to the Sterling winery, which has the kid-friendly attraction of a gondola ride from the parking lot to the winery itself– that was pretty cool, and the views from that place were spectacular.

But the real surprise and hit of the day was Castello Di Amorosa, which is basically this pet/vanity project of a guy who has been active in the Napa Valley wine world for a long long time. Check out the link and the pictures to see what I mean; but basically, I would say it was an all-around hit for our group. I thought it was going to be super cheesy, but actually, it was a really well-done castle reproduction, and as some of the picture suggest, it looks quite a bit like quite a few things in Italy. We had a great guy serving us up too much wine in the tasting room, and it was pretty good wine, too.

We didn’t get to see a lot more than that, unfortunately, but what we saw was lovely. Oh, almost forgot– we did get a chance to go into the the west coast branch of the the Culinary Institute of America, which has about the best kitchen tool/toy/porn store I’ve ever been in. I ended up buying a couple of great looking CIA cookbooks, which are not the kind of thing you can typically get at a Borders or something.

And now on to Ashland. I’m finishing this post now from here, and I am sure I’ll photos to upload in a few days.

I have been “running” for two years or so now, and earlier today, I ran my second Dexter-Ann Arbor 5K. I always make a point of saying “running” because I am extremely slow, so slow that many would say that I am not so much running as I am walking kind of quickly and with exaggerated running-like movements.  Last year, I finished the 5 K in 42 minutes, and this year, it was 43.  Just as a point of comparison, Steve B. finished in around 30 minutes, and I think that Bill HD (who had rode his bike 100 miles yesterday as part of a fund-raiser for diabetes) finished in the low 20 minute range.  So, yeah, I’m slow.

I’m slow mainly because I’m fat, though I have to say I think that while I could run faster if I lost 20 or more pounds, I don’t think I could ever be “fast” as a runner.  I just don’t think I have that sort of build or desire. But hey, I don’t care if I’m in a race like this and getting passed by little kids and old ladies; besides being a great way to exercise (I try to “run” 3 times a week for 30 minutes, which is for me a very good and efficient workout– and then I ride a stationary bike or the elliptical machine and also mess with wight machines two times a week), the Dexter-Ann Arbor run is a lot of fun.  I’d recommend it to anyone, even if you just want to walk it.

Anyway, this year’s race was was made a little more interesting, amusing, and even competitive by someone who Bill HD nicknamed “Mr. Coronary.”  An appropriate nickname, though I also thought this guy might stroke out and/or drop dead just from being crotchety at a couple of different points.  He was more or less with me for two-thirds of the race.  I’d guess he was in his sixties, maybe seventies.  At first, I didn’t actually see him; rather I started hearing him making these Tourette’s-like noises– just screaming out stuff like “GAAA!” and “SHIT!” every once in a while. Then he got close enough to me for me to hear him gasping crazily. He really did sound like he was in trouble.

The last 1.2 miles of the course is Main street off of Huron River Drive, and it is mostly uphill, not the easiest finish for a friendly 5K run-walk event.  Mr. Coronary and I kept passing each other; I basically kept my steady but turtle-like pace, while Mr. Coronary would go past me then slow down and scream out crazy stuff and sound like he was going to die.  He kept asking people on the side of the course “how much further?” and he never liked the answer.

And then, after he stopped for a moment, bent over and leaning on his knees (never a good sign to get into what can only be described as the “ready to hurl” position), he took off his shirt. Not a pretty sight, but oddly motivating to me.  The last tenth of a mile or so, something about the wheezing, foul-mouthed, angry, fat, old, and now shirtless man inspired me.  I thought well jeez, I can’t lose to this guy. So I kicked it up just a tiny notch and got past him, as the picture above suggests.

Victory is sweet.

As I mentioned in this post a couple weeks ago, I decided that I was going to try to not take my laptop but just my iPad with me to the Computers and Writing Conference at Purdue.  I will admit that this was a bit of a “stunt,” mainly because I had about four or five back-up plans if something didn’t go right, and the truth of the matter is I probably could have gone to the conference with no computer and been fine by borrowing, using the hardware/software set-ups in presentation rooms, etc.  Stunt or not though, it was an interesting experiment, and there were a couple of interesting iPad moments. Continue Reading »

Before I get too far along but also without going into a lot of detail, let me say a few things about my general “writerly” locale habits and how they’ve changed.  When I was in my PhD program, I worked with a tiny laptop (a PB 100!) at a very large desk set up in Annette’s and my “study” in the second bedroom of our small apartment. Then for years, my writing locale of choice were area coffee shops and my primary writing tool was my laptop.  Even at home, I had a small desk and a laptop.  Then both my interests in working with video and my work environment changed, so now I have quite a large desk area again, this one quite a bit nicer than that Bowling Green apartment. My primary writing station is an iMac souped up with extra RAM and such, and with a second monitor.  With this space, my writing habits have changed in that I now routinely have a dozen different windows open, two or three different applications going, etc., etc.  Plus I do about 80% of my work at this computer and this desk– teaching online, writing, commenting on student work, etc.

So, for the foreseeable future, my iPad is going to remain a sort of “second banana” as a writerly device, something to use when I’m writing and not here, which is to say not that often. Continue Reading »