Splat Action!

It’s Monday morning, and I’m exhausted. I haven’t been sleeping well, though I can’t put my finger on why this might be the case. My allergies aren’t bothering me. My diet’s fine. I’m getting plenty of exercise. Regardless, I’ve been waking exhausted. I had hoped to get up at 4am today, as I’ve been trying to do most mornings, but opted for 5:30 instead.

As I mentioned, exercise hasn’t been a problem for me lately. In fact, for the first time in a long time I’m sore.

On Saturday, we joined Celeste and Nikki and ten other people in the woods outside Molalla for some paintball action. It’s been five years (!!!) since we last played with Joel and Aimee and Mac and Pam. I’d forgotten how much fun I had last time, and how harrowing the experience can be. It gives me some small understanding of what combat must be like.

Though it seems odd even to me, I’m actually fairly aggressive as a paintball player. I know I’d do better working with my teammates, but I usually play the maverick, striking out on my own, boldly stabbing deep into the heart of enemy territory. Sometimes this yields great success — as in the game that I mowed down four of the other team’s six players — but other times I die a foolish death, pinned behind a narrow tree, unable to retreat.

Nikki was my nemesis. I took her out in the second game with a nice shot to the gut. In the third game we came to a point-blank face-off draw, John Woo style. In game four, Dan and I teamed up to pin her behind a barrier until he could pick her off. But in every game thereafter, she pegged the hell out of me. I shall have my revenge!

Four hours of charging back and forth is plenty of exercise, especially when cloaked in heavy clothes. But what really made me sore was the diving and rolling. My knees are sore, but from scrapes, not from strain. My quads, on the other hand, are sore from strain.

To make matters worse, I went biking yesterday. Matt and I took a casual ride from Rosings Park into Portland along the Springwater Trail. We didn’t really push ourselves (it wasn’t the intent), but even so: with quads that already hurt from paintball, the result is a stiff and sore J.D. on Monday morning.

Not to mention a J.D. that is so tired that he just wants to crawl back into bed!

Contest: The Cowgirls of Trace Evidence

Mike Banks writes:

Isn’t this photo worthy of a post? Maybe a “caption this” for a prize?

He’s right. Here’s the photo:

[photo of Rhonda, Celeste, and Kris posing as cowgirls]

Here’s the prize: your choice of one Bob’s Red Mill product. I’ll pick up a case of it from the Bob’s Red Mill store and either deliver it the next time I see you, or mail it to you (in case the winner is in Bogota or something).

Giddy-up!

Sunriver Weekend 2007

The MNF group made its annual pilgrimage to Central Oregon last weekend. Kris and I joined:

  • Kim and Sabino Arredondo
  • Ron and Kara Kropf (Ron is Kim’s brother)
  • Kristin and Roger Oakes
  • Jeremy and Jennifer Gingerich
  • Jeff and Stephanie Roth (Jeff is my brother)

I think this is the tenth year that Kris and I have joined the group, though some of them have been making trip since the early nineties. We always rent a house and then spend the weekend sleeping, cooking, chatting, playing, and laughing.

In recent years, Kris and I have felt the trip was almost more trouble than it was worth. We were surprised to hear several other people express the same opinion this weekend. Fortunately, this year was relaxing — it was a wonderful trip.

On Friday evening, those of us who arrived early went out for Italian food. I ordered mussels and clams, but was unimpressed. They were cool. They hadn’t much flavor. There was very little broth.

Saturday morning, we were all up surprisingly early. It used to be that most of us slept in, but we were all up by 7:30, and were finished with breakfast an hour later. Kris and I then drove in to Bend to watch our nephew, Michael, play soccer. Michael’s an athletic kid — he’s muscular and wiry at the same time. He scored his team’s two goals. After the game, Kris and I helped Tony work on Michael’s pitching. (He had a baseball game in the afternoon.) Mostly he was too unfocused to pitch like he ought, but when he put his mind to it, he did a good job. Considering he’s only eight years old, I think he’s going to do well.

In the evening, the group assembled at The Blacksmith restaurant. This place is fantastic. I ordered mussels again; they were creamy and delicious. For dinner, I was adventurous: I tried the swordfish, and was pleased to find it a thick, meaty fish. Very good. But dessert was best of all. Kris and I ordered a chocolate sampler plate for two.

“Oh my God,” she moaned at the first taste of chocolate fondue.

“You don’t believe in God,” Sabino teased.

“I do now,” she said. “And it’s in this cup.”

Kim and Sabino rode home with us. We spent the entire twenty minutes rehashing old episodes of The Office, recalling funniest moments and favorite lines. Back at the house, we watched one of our favorite recent episodes, in which the employees are subjected to safety training because Michael, the boss, caused an accident in the warehouse. When Michael decides that office workers don’t get enough respect for how dangerous their jobs are, he decides to feign suicide. Meanwhile, the staff has begun to bet on various things. The funniest bet involves Kelly’s litany about how Netflix works.

Then we all went to bed early.

On Sunday morning, Kris and I went horseback riding. We did this several years ago at Diamond Lake, and we loved it. It’s expensive, and you don’t really get to do much besides sit on the back of a horse for an hour as it wanders well-worn trails, but it’s totally worth it. My horse, Doodle, was belligerent. He kept stopping to eat the new grass. No amount of tugging or kicking could convince him this was a bad idea. Kris’ horse, Warrior, was well-behaved, but a dawdler, always lagging behind the group. On our ride, we got to see a bald eagle perched high in a pine. We were also startled by a herd of deer. Doodle was surprised by them, and started to bolt, which scared the living daylights out of me. Fortunately, he stopped after just a few feet.

In the afternoon, we lounged around in the warm spring air. Most of the men soaked in the hot tub. The women drank mojitos and ate bean dip.

In the evening, Tony came by to see the gang. He stayed for dinner, and we all recounted old stories. Then, again, we went to bed early.

We were all up early again this morning, and it made us realize that we are getting old. “In a few years we’ll all be getting up at 4:30,” somebody said. On our drive home, Kris and I stopped to see Tony and Kamie at the horse cookie factory in Redmond.

We came home to a couple of mysteries. The kitchen chair was placed — seemingly at random — underneath our pot-rack. The basement light was on. A lamp in the living room was knocked over. The cold water in the bathtub was on full-blast and, from the looks of it, had been on for several hours (and likely a couple of days). When we checked the basement, water was coming from somewhere, but we could not find the source. (Naturally we assume that the fact the tub was running for so long had something to do with it.)

We’ve only solved one of these mysteries. Tiffany came over on Saturday to take a bath. She moved the chair so that Max could sit with her. However, she turned off the bathwater before she left. It is my suspicion that Max was playing in the tub (which he does often), and managed to turn on the faucet. This then caused the water in the basement. I also suspect he’s responsible for the broken lamp in the parlor.

In all, it was a great weekend. I did a little writing, but not much. Now I find that I’m behind. I have nothing to post at GRS in the morning!

A Three-Foot Monster

My nephew, Noah, came to work with Jeff the other day. His baby-sitter was sick, so he hung around his dad’s office playing with Hot Wheels and generally being a four-year-old. At one point he decided to tiptoe down the hallway, throw open my door, and shout, “BOO!

Being a four-year-old, he wasn’t exactly sneaky. I heard him coming. Still, I did my best to act scared. “Ah!” I said, holding up my arms in fright. Oh, how Noah laughed. He thought this was a riot. He ran to Jeff and died laughing on the floor.

“What are you doing?” Jeff asked.

“I’m doing my job,” Noah said between giggles.

“Your job?”

“That’s my job,” explained Noah, “scaring Uncle J.D.”

When his giggles had subsided, he tiptoed down the hallway, threw open my door, and shouted, “BOO!

Again, I acted scared. I leaped back in my chair, flung my arms in the air, and put on my best show of fear. Again, Noah thought this was great. He ran to tell Jeff: “I scared Uncle J.D. a lot. He went backward in his seat!”

Things were quiet for a few minutes. Maybe Noah was playing with his Hot Wheels. Maybe he was drawing. Whatever the case, eventually he decided enough was enough. He announced to Jeff, “I’m going to go scare Uncle J.D. again.” And so he did. In fact, he continued to scare me for five or ten minutes, by which time I’d long since given up on play-acting every time. (I had work to do!)

I did, however, take time to convince Noah that he could scare all of you

One Small Step

Max (aka Meatball) has a bad habit. He likes to lay on the stairs, stretched long so that he takes up an entire step. This might not be such a big deal except:

  • He is grey and the stairway is often dark.
  • He doesn’t move when a human steps on him.

As you can imagine, this presents some difficulties.


It’s official: I’m cutting back to just three blogs. I’m not sure that I shared the plan Kris and I came up with last week, but here it is for the curious:

  1. Cut back to just three blogs right now: foldedspace, Get Rich Slowly, and Animal Intelligence. GRS is most important, as it is now producing almost as much income as I make from Custom Box. I’m not cutting AI because I love it, and because it takes very little time.
  2. I’ll continue to write about comics and vintage pop from time-to-time, but I’ll post about them here instead.
  3. Next year, on my 39th birthday, I plan to reduce to part-time at Custom Box.
  4. At that time, I’ll start another site since, in theory, I’ll have the time to do so.
  5. On my 40th birthday, I’ll quit Custom Box completely.

These plans are tentative. Any number of things might change them. I might decide it’s foolish to quit. My web income might dry up. I might move to Australia. Who knows? But for now, this is the agenda.


Friday was gorgeous, just at the upper-end of my heat tolerance: sunny and 24 degrees centigrade (that’s 75 Fahrenheit for those of you who live in Oregon City). I met Matt for lunch, and then we headed to the tulip fields to take photos. Matt moved from California to Oregon a couple years ago. He’s a long-time professional blogger, and is full of great advice. Plus he likes photography, bike-riding, computers, etc. I’m pleased to have made his acquaintance.

Taking photos of tulips in the midday sun is an exercise in futility. The colors don’t photograph well under the best conditions; they’re a nightmare in the glare of the sun. The colors are so bright that they get “blown out”. Still, here are a few shots from the trip.


Two examples of “blown out” colors.


I love old oak trees. They’re beautiful.


The tulip farm was very crowded. (I saw Karen Kropf.)

In the afternoon, Kris and I were going to visit the rhododendron garden, but we opted to do yard work instead. We made a trip to the hardware store to load up on mulch. Later, she worked in her flower beds while I popped dandelions and then mowed the lawn. Together we tied the blackberry and raspberry canes in bunches, which makes for a much neater presentation. My grapes look awesome. I love all the buds on the vines.

Because it was so beautiful, and because the weather is getting warmer, Kris opened the French doors in the bedroom and latched them down. In theory, they’ll stay open now until October. I say “in theory” because at 2am Saturday morning the rains set in. It rained for eight hours. It’s a wonderful, comforting sound (exactly like the “Hawaiian rain shower” I listen to on my iPod sometimes in order to get to sleep).

On Saturday we got a very early start, running all sorts of errands by noon. We stopped by to see Andrew and Courtney before 9am! Kris and Courtney discussed gardening while Andrew showed me his new Super Deluxe-o-Matic 12″ compound miter saw. I’m not much of a tool guy, but even I had to drool over that machine. (I’m drooling just remembering it.)

It’s been a great weekend so far. Now, early on Sunday morning, the sun is back, and I think we’re going to be able to finish our yard work while keeping dry. I’ll spend most of my day, of course, writing weblog entries for the coming week. It’s been a long time since I was ahead on my writing, but I sense that I can get there today.

The Pleasures of Hot Food

Kris and I went out to Gino’s for dinner on Friday night. Since Amy Jo introduced us to the place a couple months ago, it’s become one of our favorite restaurants. It’s relatively close to home, the food is good, and the booths are private.

Ostensibly our purpose was to discuss my possible transition from the box factory to stay-at-home, full-time blogging. In reality, we wanted some of Gino’s hot food.

Most restaurant food is served tepid. It’s warm, but either the food has been sitting under a heat lamp, or it was never truly hot in the first place. (Often both.) This isn’t anything we’d ever really noticed until we found Gino’s. At Gino’s, the food arrives at the table piping hot. It’s a revelation.

On Friday, for example, Kris ordered an Italian herb-encrusted chicken on a bed of potatoes. When she cut through the bird’s crispy skin, steam poured from inside. She took a bite. She closed her eyes and sighed, “Mmmm…. this is so good, so hot.” The entire meal was like that.

For my part, I had a bowl of clams and mussels in a broth of wine, butter, and fish stock. When I met Tom and Paul at Gino’s in February, we’d ordered this for the three of us, and I had been shocked by how good it was. Sometimes you order an unassuming dish in a restaurant only to discover it’s one of the best things you’ve ever eaten — this is one of those dishes. My bowl came hot, too. It was delicious.

On Saturday we attended an impromptu dinner party at Jeremy and Jennifer’s. Yay! It’s been more than three years since we last experienced a Gingerich dinner party — this was the best yet.

For appetizers we had:

  • puff pastry with melted blue cheese
  • lime-pepper dates stuffed with almonds

The first course was, to my delight, a close facsimile of the clam dish I’d had at Gino’s the night before. Jeremy reduced some wine and fish stock with a lot of garlic and a little pork of some sort. He added a bunch of clams to the liquid and boiled them ’til they opened. After reducing the liquid further, he served each person 7-8 clams, a cup or so of sauce, and some garlic bread. It was awesome. (Gino’s version is more of a broth; Jeremy’s was more of a sauce.)

Next came an asparagus salad with tangerine aioli and hazelnuts. This was followed by a butternut squash ravioli with browned butter and hazelnuts. (Jeremy and Jennifer have a filbert orchard, so hazelnuts are plentiful.) The entree was rack of lamb served with green herb-butter mashed potatoes. The lamb’s presentation was great: it featured three chive stalks jutting from the potatoes. The evening wound down with a cheese plate, and then a banana bread pudding with chocolate and caramel sauces.

The food was delicious. The wine was excellent. The company was delightful.

But all I can think of in retrospect is that I WANT MORE CLAMS! I’ve never been a huge seafood fan, but the older I get, the more I learn to appreciate its charms. (Here’s a promising clam broth recipe from Giata.)

Music for Nine-Year-Olds

Naomi is a writer. From time-to-time she sends out stories of her family life via e-mail. (She really needs a blog, but she won’t listen to reason.) Last weekend she sent out a bit entitled “Sk8er Boi on God’s Planet”, which describes the challenges of guiding her oldest daughter, Lydia, safely into the world of rock music. Naomi writes:

So suddenly my 9-year old daughter has become fascinated by the rock music scene. I had anticipated this, of course, but I was hoping that our Machiavellian plot of making her an early reader would serve to make her a late bloomer in the realm of teenager music. No such luck; she is apparently multifariously precocious.

But despite my misgivings, I was (at first) greatly comforted by the fact that her first love is Avril Lavigne and not Britany Spears. For those who don’t know, Avril is on the dark-eye-liner, black-clothes-wearing, pouty-lipped, politically cynical angry-at-the-entire-world end of rock music women, balanced on the other end by Brit’s cheerleader act. (no prejudices here, folks; as a Christian I love everybody equally. Really.)

As a fellow who loves music, I’m very excited that a kid I know has finally reached the age to be interested in rock. I don’t know Lydia well, but Naomi’s message still prompted me to spend two hours on Sunday (two hours that would have been better spent writing) gathering together songs that I hoped a nine-year-old would like (and that a nine-year-old’s mother might approve of). I was careful to choose songs that sounded “hip” without being risque.

But when Kris found out my plan she said, “What are you doing? You can’t make a mix for a nine-year-old girl. She’ll think this is her parents’ music. She’ll think this is lame.” I was mortified to realize that she was right. Still, I remember that I liked some of my parents’ music when I was a kid. And they listened to some of the stuff I liked. Maybe there’s hope.

I wrote to Naomi asking her advice. She replied:

I checked with Lydia, and she’d love to get your “Lydia mix.” She is not nearly as snobbish as she could be, partly because of her terrible isolation from anything pop culture. I kid you not, only a year ago she came home from school and asked “Mom, what’s Pokemon?” The scariest thing is not that she didn’t know Pokemon (scary enough) but that she still sees me as a source of accurate information about kid culture. That one will change soon enough!

So, in order to vet this mix for Naomi and for those of you hip to nine-year-old culture, here’s the pool of songs that I’ve managed to collect. This is slightly longer than a CD, so a couple of songs have to go. Which ones? Are there others that might be included? For each song I’ve listed the artist, provided a link to the lyrics, and posted a YouTube video. (I hope the latter doesn’t kill things for people.)

Lydia’s Mix

Kelly Clarkson – Since U Been Gone

Gnarls Barkley – Smiley Faces

Hilary Duff – Come Clean

Wilson Phillips – Hold On

Kylie Minogue – I Believe in You

Vanessa Carlton – A Thousand Miles

Green Day – I Fought the Law

Go-Go’s – We Got the Beat

Girls Aloud – Sound of the Underground

Rick Springfield – I’ve Done Everything For You

Sarah Washington – I Will Always Love You


This isn’t the version I’m putting on the CD

Natalie Merchant – Wonder

Diana Anaid – Last Thing

Jewel – Intuition

t.A.T.u. – How Soon is Now?

Avril Lavigne – Take Me Away

Us3 – Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia)

The Decemberists – The Chimbley Sweep


This is not the official video, obviously, because there isn’t one.

Apples in Stereo – Signal in the Sky

The Might Be Giants – Why Does the Sun Shine?

R.E.M. – It’s the End of the World as We Know It

A*Teens – Mamma Mia (ABBA cover in Spanish)


Actually, I may send Lydia a copy of this CD. I love it.

  • Dandy Warhols – Bohemian Like You
  • The Postal Service – Such Great Heights

    Pat Benatar – We Belong

    Sixpence None the Richer – Kiss Me

    Basically, I’m looking for fun songs that I can imagine a young girl dancing around to. I tried to picture a young Kris Gates bellering along to these songs. If I could picture it, they stayed. (Of course, I had to draw the line at Helen Reddy, which I know Kris used to sing along with.) I really wanted to put on some other songs, like The Black-Eyed Peas’ Hey Mama, but I recognize they’re inappropriate. Please, readers, I beg of you: help me create a CD that a nine-year-old girl would love. (I hope to be able to use this for other nine-year-olds as they crop up during the next few years.)

    Liam Mackenzie!

    Whoa!

    I’ve been in negotiations with Mac and Pam to go to The Great Wall, a Chinese buffet in Salem, before Pam gives birth to their second child in late March. Looks like we’ll need to change our dinner plans.

    Mac reports that at 10:12pm on the evening of 18 Feb 2007, Pam gave birth to Liam Mackenzie Smith. He arrived five weeks early.

    He is 19 inches long and weighs 5 lbs 12 oz. Considering he arrived 5 weeks to early, he is doing very well — no tubes or ventilators, just monitors. He’s eating well and seems to be adjusting well. Mom had another unconventional birth, but she is doing very well and is happy that Liam is doing as well as can be. Megan is a little dumbfounded, but she already loves her little brother.

    Congrats, Mac and Pam!

    A Salty Snack

    We had dinner with our friends Chris and Cari on Saturday night. Michael and Laura joined us. And, of course, the kids were there: Kaden, Ethan, Emma, and Sophia.

    Kaden is nearly seven, and has begun to exhibit strong personality traits. He was born on Leap Day, and so I always kid him about his age. “You’re still only one,” I say. “You’ll be two soon.” The other night he frowned a little and told me, “That’s not really funny anymore.” Touché! He likes his tropical fish, and he loves his Legos. I think he’s a great kid. (The other three kids are great, too, but this entry is about K.C.)

    While at dinner Kaden commented that he liked salt. Kris told him how I have a habit of eating salt when I’m very, very hungry. We’ll be sitting in a restaurant waiting for our food, and I’ll tide myself over with a touch of salt from the shaker. Kris thinks it’s strange, and I suppose she’s right.

    Anyhow, K.C. was effusive in his praise of salt, so I took a page from Craig‘s book. I’ve created a salt sampler for him from the various flavors in my library, and I’ll mail it to him later today.

    The flavors I sent him include:

    • Top row: sea salt, real sea salt (very salty), sea smoke salt, garlic salt.
    • Bottom row: herbed salt (from Italy — very good), seasoned salt, Caribbean salt (from Connecticut), hickory smoked salt (I use this all the time).

    The herbed salt came from Amy Jo (who has recently resurrected From a Corner Table). Craig and Amy Jo appreciate my love of salt, and encourage it with salty gifts from time-to-time. And now I’m passing these gifts on to the next generation of salt-lovers.

    Minor Miracles

    Do you hear that?

    Across the back yard, past the neighbor’s house? That rumbling sound? It’s a lawnmower! A lawnmower! It would never occur to you that one could mow his lawn in January, and yet it’s true. The weather has been sunny and dry for the past several days. The grass is long (because you never got the end-of-year mow in that you wanted), and giving it a trim sounds like an excellent way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Time to hang up your blogging cap and put on your yardwork cap instead…


    Speaking of minor miracles: when I came home today, all the cats but Nemo crowded around for attention. I sat in the parlor to write. Simon jumped on the bench in the bay window. Toto hopped onto the arm of my chair. Meatball climbed onto my lap. They sat together and purred peacefully — Toto didn’t hiss once.

    It was a fine weekend in which we got to be social, but we also got a lot done. I’m pleased when my Sundays set up the week for productivity.

    I hit a wall today, though.

    I’ve finally been importing the seven hours of video I took during our 2004 cruise to Alaska. Now that my hard drive is nearly full (video takes a lot of space), I’ve begun to edit the footage. Here’s the first part:

    I’m compressing each hour to ten minutes (or preferably less). I don’t really know what I’m doing, but I’m having fun. The real problem is that it takes time, and lots of it. I spent all day today editing parts two, three, and five. I didn’t get any box-work done. I didn’t get any blogging done. I only edited video. This is not good. Now I’m no longer ahead in my work. If I do this any more, I’ll actually be behind.

    I can tell you this: I want to take a video camera on our European vacation this summer!