Misc.

1. I really need to work on some art:

 

A. I have Jill's mural-thing to finish, and it won't take much more to get it done. I could paint a border on it and call it quits, although I'd sort of like to add another butterfly. Besides that, she deserves something else in her room. I should do another little one for her, a quick one with bright colors.

 

B. I also have my unfinished Halloween costume to work on. It's pretty arty. I should get the scary head built up to a nearly complete state, and then work on the frame.

 

C. Brooke and David, your painting can be hung on a wall. I put wire on the back of it. I haven't put any more paint on it, but as I said previously, if I ever find the time I could just ask for it back to work on, right? Gosh, how lousy of me was it to give it to you and then keep it in my garage for four months? I'll give it to you the next time I see you.

 

D. I have not finished the landscape I started in Cherokee Park in October. It is lying in the garage, too, waiting for me and my brush.

 

E. I really want to start something new, too.

 

2. I will have a few uncleaned ancient coins to show around soon. I'll take before and after pictures. I'm pretty psyched; I foresee lots of detective work.

 

3. The past few lunch breaks on which I've gone metal detecting, I've found coins. They've been almost all pennies, with I think one dime and one nickel. It's a paltry sum, but at least I'm finding something other than pull tabs and nails.

 

Today I went to Hounz Lane Park and found a few pennies. It was a very pretty afternoon to be there, although there was a smell of sewage in the air. I think it had something to do with the acre of bulldozed earth in the middle of the park.

 

I put a cardboard box in the back of my car to hold my detecting refuse until I can throw it away. I was dumping junk into an old glass, but it quickly overflowed.

 

4. I have achieved nothing in my garden yet this year, except for having fun with Erin and Jill, who like looking for worms. Judging from the weather forecast, I will not be gardening any this weekend, either.

 

5. "3:10 to Yuma" was pretty good. I found the writing a little disappointing, becoming at times a little too unrealistic or predictable, but Russell Crowe and Christian Bale held it all together very well. The director did a great job of building dread and tensi

 

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It's all in how one phrases it

During lunch yesterday I went again to the children's home grounds and hunted with my detector. The site produced its first coin! Very exciting—it bears the likeness of Lincoln, and dates back to the 1900's. To the Clinton era, in fact. For a zinc coin, it was in excellent shape.

 

I also found some exciting artifacts. Two nickel-plated fence post brackets, I think, and both looking like they were buried yesterday, which they might have been.

 

I also found a bottle cap, but it was so rusted that I couldn't even tell what beverage it might have come off of. I bet it was older than the one that Brian found! It might even date back to the Cold War.

 

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Star Wars humor

Kelly showed me this video, and it cracked me up.Darth Vader

I'm a little confused regarding the various definitions of "irony," but I bet it fits here somewhere--maybe in Chapter 10: "Confronting Creationists"

This afternoon I had sat down to a late lunch and was browsing through my copy of Michael Shermer's Why People Believe Weird Things when the doorbell rang. I jumped from my seat quickly,endangering the integrity of my book's spine by laying it face down to keep my place, hurrying because Jillian had just fallen asleep for her nap and I didn't want the doorbell to ring again and wake her. I had a hint of what to expect, because out of the corner of my eye I thought I had glimpsed through the window a couple of sets of white shirts and black pants.

It was a couple of Mormons, Elders Someone-or-Other and Someone Else. They were the typical clean-cut young men who do their church's door-to-door operation.

There was a time when I would have been very annoyed; I take a dim view of door-to-door proselytizing in general, but I've mellowed in recent years. It used to offend me somewhat, and I entertained the idea (but never acted upon it) of causing trouble and vexation for people engaged in this activity. I really don't have a desire to do that anymore, though.

Also, the Mormons used to weird me out a little more than they do now. Sure, their oddball heritage and theology stand out in a broad field of weird things people believe. Over the past ten years, though, I learned more about them and met a number of them. Also, Salt Lake City is a neat town.

Theological disagreements and our strong differences regarding important social issues notwithstanding, I've found those Latter Day Saints to be pretty good folks. I wouldn't mind having them as neighbors; in fact, I've had some, and they were swell. In many ways, they really tend to have their acts together.

Anyway, the two Elders at my door engaged me in unwanted conversation. One of them had noted the "Feed a Starving Artist" bumper sticker on my Festiva, and asked about my art. It's hard to find a polite way to cut out the small talk, so I chatted for a few minutes, waiting for them to get to stop beating around the bush. Finally, they asked about religion and whether I was interested in learning more about Jesus--they gave me a card with a picture of the Saviour on one side and information on the reverse for ordering a free Jesus DVD. When I told them I wasn't interested, they inquired as to why, but I refused to answer. It's very true what they say about the wisdom of avoiding discussion of politics and religion in polite conversation, and I wanted our relationship to remain amicable. Even if I had been honest and forthright, I'm sure we could have spent a delightful couple of hours chatting, but my lunch was sitting on the table getting cold.

I told them I hoped that they would continue to enjoy the very pleasant weather, and wished them a good afternoon. I kept their card, and realized as I walked back to the table that it would make a perfect bookmark. It's now marking my place in the chapter on witch trial crazes.

Here is a picture of it. I think the artist captured Jesus' likeness remarkably well. I could tell who it was right away!
"Rejoice! For I have marked your spot."

Black walnut ink lightfastness test: The results are in!

Here is the result of the lightfastness test with my homemade black walnut ink. I’m pretty happy with the results. The ink that was exposed to sunlight shows some fading, but it’s not severe. There probably aren’t conditions much harsher, light-exposure-wise, than a car dashboard. I don’t know technical terms or categories, but I’d call this ink pretty lightfast.

Winter was a good period for this test, because it was cold and my windows were rolled up. I couldn’t conduct this test in the summer because the paper would blow around.

Nice weather

Today was a great day for a walk in the park. We played at the playground in Brown Park, then went over to look at the ducks. After that, a stroll by the creek.

not detecting at Hounz Lane Park

I noticed that recently, bulldozers have stripped away the sod in a large section of Hounz Lane Park. At least, I think that's what they've done. It looks like the top couple of inches of soil is gone near the front of the park. I don't know what the plan is. Maybe they are re-grading the area, or putting down new sod or re-seeding. Whatever the case, I think that would be a nice place to detect; I wouldn't have to worry about damaging the turf, and the garbage near the top would be gone, leaving only old stuff. There might not be any old stuff, and it might be a totally fruitless search, but it would still be simple and easy.

 

Unfortunately, at the moment, any attempt to hunt that area would probably result in me sinking up to my knees in mud.

 

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Arthur C. Clarke

Arthur C. Clarke has died. It's been a long time since I've read any of his books, but they've stuck with me. 2001 and 2010 were great, although 2061 didn't have quite the same impact. Rendezvous with Rama was memorable. None of them were as good, in my opinion, as Childhood's End, which Santa brought when I was 11 or 12 years old.

 

You know that one scene in the movie "2001" when the researchers on the Moon are having their pictures taken in front of the monolith? One of my favorite sci-fi scenes ever. I don't think I'd want to listen to the soundtrack to the scene over and over again, though.

 

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Coin Club Meeting

The monthly coin club meeting was held yesterday, and it was packed. I don't know why there was such a large turnout. It was the most crowded I've ever seen it (47 attendees), and judging by the comments of the elected officers, it might have been the most crowded ever. Perhaps the large turnout was due to a combination of the nice presentation on large cents, the pleasant spring weather bring people from their homes, and an upsurge in interest in coin collecting. Also, anyone who didn't pay their dues by yesterday was going to be booted off the rolls, so maybe a desire to hand over a check motivated some people to show up.

 

I auctioned a small item for $2.00, and purchased a Fine 1931-D Lincoln cent for $3.50.

 

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Probably not a good sign

Last evening, as Jill, Erin, and I ate dinner at the picnic table in the back yard—with a little snow still on the ground, and it being just March 13—I swatted and killed a mosquito. A mosquito.

 

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The Secret History

The night before last I finished Donna Tartt's The Secret History. It was a selection for the book club that some Otter friends started. Unfortunately, it was a selection from four years ago, and I just now got around to reading it, so I really don't have anyone to discuss it with. And that's a real shame; in many ways, the group of friends portrayed in the book reminds me of my college friends. Well, sort of. I don't recall many of my friends snorting coke, spending quite so much time drunk, or plotting a murder.

 

I found the book engrossing and suspenseful. I also had a mixed reaction to the characters; I don't recall many fictional characters from other books who evoked such a strong mix of attraction and revulsion.

 

So, in short, wonderfully written. My attention never flagged.

 

I feel like I'm on quite a roll, as I mentioned in a previous post. I've been reading more fiction than I have in years, and it's ranged in quality from very good to excellent. I can recall, a long time ago, when I used to read more, and occasionally I'd get a bum book. That was, of course, before the Internet provided me with easy and quick book reviews. It also helps that I've sort of save up books and recommendations for years.

 

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state quarter designs

http://www.quarterdesigns.com/index.html

 

All fifty state quarter designs.

 

Some I find quite striking, and some are horrendous. I really like the new Oklahoma one with the scissor tail flycatcher.

 

It's hard for me to say what makes a coin design appealing, but I think simplicity is fairly important. Balance is obviously key.

 

It's easier for me to say what makes a bad design. Anything with a state outline immediately gets points taken off. What a totally lame idea. There is no state quarter, or any other type of coin, that looks better as a result of incorporating a map.

 

Clutter looks bad, and many of the coins suffer from that, although some of the busiest coins (like Nevada's) still look great. Also, there's such a thing as too much simplicity. The Wyoming quarter is terrible in this regard.

 

Some of my favorites: Connecticut, Nevada, Utah, Oklahoma, New Jersey

Alaska, Montana

 

Some of the worst: Wyoming, Indiana, Louisiana, Florida, New Hampshire, Michigan

 

I haven't really made an effort to collect any of the state quarters, though I have kept some of the ones that I like the best.

 

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Obsolescence: A Tire-ade

After my car developed a vibration, I looked at the tires and underneath the car for signs of the cause. I'm not very good at that kind of thing, and I didn't notice anything at first. But after another week of the vibration, which seemed to increase and decrease in severity, and which was most pronounced at 5-20 m.p.h and over 60 m.p.h., I formed the opinion that it must be a tire.

 

I looked at the tires again, and noticed that the front driver's side tire had a subtle bulge that ran about half the tire's circumference, right at the edge of the tread.

 

That seemed like a dangerous thing, so I took my car and its seven-year-old tires to Goodyear, where the tires had been purchased.

 

It turns out that 1990 Ford Festivas are now difficult cars for which to buy tires.

 

"Those are 12-inch tires, and I can tell you right now we don't have any of those in stock," said they guy at the counter, after he had looked at the bum tire and announced that it was a manufacturer's defect that had caused my concern.

 

He checked his computer, and it told him that his Cincinnati warehouse showed a stock listing of "1."

 

"You only want the one, you said, right?" he asked.

 

"Yeah," I said. All the tires are a bit worn ("and show signs of dry rot," said the guy at the counter), but with my car, I don't see the sense in replacing anything until necessary. I put on a new windshield wiper last week after the rubber blade of one of them flew off, and that made me feel like I was sinking a lot of money into it.

 

He said that since it was a manufacturer's defect, he could prorate the cost of the tire, but since the tire was so old, he would only be subtracting one-ninth of the new tire's cost.

 

That though bummed me until he announced, after clicking on his computer a little more, that the tires only cost $26.00 each. "Prorating it will take three dollars off of that," he said.

 

So he called his warehouse, but they could not find the tire. It's just one little tire, he explained, and in a warehouse full of 60,000 tires, it's hard to keep track of.

 

Then he called Ken Towery, and they didn't have the tire either. All his leads came up dry. "A twelve-inch tire is just hard to find," he said. "They don't even make wheels that size any more. They started phasing out that size years ago."

 

He suggested that I contact the dealer and find out about having thirteen-inch wheels put on the car. <i>No thanks</i> I thought to myself. I decided to visit Big O Tires, which is where Kim went after becoming dissatisfied with Goodyear a few months ago.

 

The guy at Big O looked at my tires, furrowed his brows, and exhaled deeply. "Boy," he intoned, "That's a tough one."

 

He didn't think he had any of those in stock, and a quick check confirmed it. Then he made a phone call.

 

This call was a success. "Oh, you do have some? Great!" he said into the phone.

 

They ordered the tire, which ended up costing me $76.00 (I guess it's now considered a specialty, novelty item now) and had it the next day.

 

If it gets to the point that I can't find the tires I need, I will complain to Ford. How dare they sell me a car with a tire size that eventually becomes obsolete? Whatever happened to product support, to standing by your merchandise? It hasn't reached that level yet. But it might, soon. My car is only 18 years old, dammit!

 

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chili

This weekend I made my first pot of chili ever. That's pretty weird; as much as I like to bake and cook, you'd think I'd have lots of chili experience. I've even talked about it a lot, but my talk has never led to action until the middle of this weekend's snow storm.

 

I pureed a can of kidney beans and dumped it in; Kim said she would try it that way.

 

And she did. It was the first time Kim had eaten chili.

 

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Snow 2

And the view from our front door.

Snow

My garden space, about twenty minutes ago. No spring planting today!

detecting

Over the past two weeks, I've spent three lunch breaks metal detecting--once at Hounz Lane Park, and twice at the grounds of the former orphanage/children's shelter. My tally for the past two weeks: One corroded penny.

 

I have, of course, found lots of garbage. My most exciting find yesterday was a nail.

 

Today, though, I had a very nice "hit" on my machine and commenced digging. About six inches down I finally found a convex piece of metal with lots of round holes in it. Yes, you guessed it! Cool. An old drain cap.

 

At least, I suppose that's what it is. I'll clean it up and have a closer look before forwarding pictures to the Frazier Museum.

 

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Baking

Last weekend we made some pizza. The recipe for dough that I used this time was the easiest yet, and it came out very nicely.

The girls really seem to enjoy helping in the kitchen, and working with dough is one of their favorites. I don't use the bread machine as often as I used to, and one of the main reasons for that is their great enjoyment of kneading with their hands. They also liked the rolling pin.

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On another geek note:

I received three different e-mails from friends notifying me of the death of Gary Gygax, co-creator and founder of the D&D game. Each email included a joke; two about Gygax failing his saving throw, and one about the need for a cleric. Oh, and one also contained a joke about 45-degree corridors.

 

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Zoo trippers

Both my dad's hat and I have the cardboardy appearance of having been Photoshopped into the scene.

Lost

Hmm. I was a little disappointed in "Lost" last night. It was still pretty good, but I'm a little worried that the whole time travel thing will become too much of a focus for the show. And, for me, time travel is so overdone in scifi that unless it's really done in a novel way, it just aggravates me. Fortunately, the time-jumping element might be a somewhat minor thing, plot-wise. It might be primarily a means of isolating the island, and if that's the case, the mechanics of those means are less important then the effect.

 

The whole nosebleed/aneurysm/constant thing was a bit of a stretch.

 

What was the deal with Faraday's note about Desmond being his constant? Doesn't that imply that Faraday loves Desmond? Huh?

 

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Woo-hoo! & such. "Lost" is on tonight.

 

I am deeply engrossed in the novel The Secret History by Donna Tartt. Our Otter Book Club read it a few years ago, but I never got past the first few pages then. At the time, with Erin (and maybe Jill? I can't recall the time frame) new in the family, the very idea of attempting to read a 600-page book left me feeling incredulous. Lately, though, I've been on a bit of a roll. I've read more novels in the past six months that I had in the previous six years. That's not a lot of novels, mind you.

 

The Secret History is turning out to be very good. I figured it would be; I recall my friends who had read it saying that they really enjoyed it. I'm only about a hundred pages in.

 

I almost went metal detecting at lunch today, but I talked myself out of bringing the detector to work with me. It's still pretty cold, and I thought it was supposed to rain this afternoon, and I liked the idea of reading my book on lunch break, so I left it.

 

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Dream

Last night I dreamed that I was playing with one of Erin's small elastic ponytail holders. I decided to wrap it around my eyebrow, and stretched it across my fingers to do so, but it shot off and lodged itself in my head. It deflected somewhat in my sinus cavity and ended up with its front end poking through the skin on the side of my nose, and its back end still poking out above my eyebrow. There was no blood.

Most of the elastic band was behind my left eye. I showed it to Kim whose attitude was pretty much, "Well, that's what you get for horsing around with elastic bands."

I decided to try to pull it out from the nose end. I pulled it tight, and some of it came out, but my vision started getting weird and I realized that the loop of the band was snagged on my optic nerve.

So I cut the band, so that it was simply a straight piece of elastic, not a circle. I pulled on end free, and kept pulling. Almost all of the band was out, but the end of it was still caught on something. I wrapped the band around my fingers to strengthen my grip, and pulled very hard. I could feel things shifting a little in my sinuses, the way they do when there is change in sinus pressure with congestion, but still the string didn't come out. I decided that it might be dangerous to pull any harder than that.

The I awakened and, with some relief, felt my face.

Lost

So I copped to the fact that they weren't saying the baby's name all through the last episode, and deduced that knowing the name would give something away. I wasn't expecting the baby to be Aaron, though.

 

I've lately found myself caring less about an encompassing explanation for the nature of the island; I suspect that if someone tries to explain it too thoroughly, it will be unsatisfying. I've mostly stopped theorizing, myself. Now I really just want to see how the characters manage their own desires, conflicts, loyalties as they maneuver their paths through the dangerous ambiguity.

 

Also, I have a suspicion that this ship is going to 'splode pretty good before all is said and done, and I want to see it.

 

I suppose the fifth member of the "Oceanic 6" was Aaron. Who is the sixth?

 

In last season's finale, at the very end, Kate said something like, "I better get home. He'll wonder where I am." I guess now the best guess is that she was referring to Aaron.

 

In that episode, maybe the person who's coffin Jack saw was Ben's. Ben could have been living under a different name, having escaped the island with the Oceanic 6. Then he fakes his own suicide to avoid the tall creepy guy and his organization (I'm forgetting the names of the companies involved) and finance Sayid.

 

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Wind damage; house flattened! Sort of.

This is what one of our January storms did to the play house in our back yard a few weeks ago:



The house rolled end-over-end and broke apart. That was the only damage on our property, although there were shingles from the neighbor's roof in our back yard, and there were trees down in our neighborhood.

I successfully put the play house back together, redrilling some holes where the plastic had been torn, and adding some washers to the screws for added durability. It is now stronger than it was before, and I think it could roll end-over-end and not break apart until it slams into the neighbor's blue garage. Let's hope we can avoid that.

Hmm. Gardening.

Spring is near, and the thoughts of a young man such as myself turn to-- peas and broccoli. And romance, of course. I love Kim! She's sweeter than any snap pea, sharper than a rose thorn, and hotter than a tomato patch on a sunny August afternoon. Please imagine at this point that I have used some clever gardening terms with double meaning; I'll leave that to you.

 

Some of my Springtime fantasies don't involve double èntendres, and are sincerely centered on plowing furrows with furrowed brow. I think that March might be a planting month for some cool weather crops. I'll have to look into that. Some obsessions are giving way to other obsessions, and although trying to make time to paint, scrape together thirty or so bucks to order a small lot of uncleaned ancient Roman coins, and using a metal detector to clean all the gum wrappers from the neighborhood park will all maintain great currency within my cranium, the imminent arrival of warmer weather is again drawing forth from me a deep desire to plant vegetables. Ah, March. Peas and broccoli.

 

As it has each year for several years now, my garden fantasies far outstrip my means. My thinking goes along the lines of: "I want to plant a lot of pumpkins. That will be sooo great in the Autumn! They take up a huge amount of room, though, so I'll have to plan carefully. Also, we'll need watermelons because the girls love that; but we need to look for a seedless variety, because the seeds last year really offset some of the joy. I'll start early with beans, peas, maybe some broccoli. Jill loves that broccoli, and so do I. And I've wanted asparagus for years now; it's perennial, and the plants themselves are pretty, and even Kim will eat some. Of course, we must have tomatoes. Hot peppers would be fun, and they always make beautiful plants. I'll have to save room for them. And some herbs are essential--it's likely the dill volunteers will return, so I'll save a little room for them. Basil is a must. Cilantro is a must, and that will probably be back voluntarily, too. Potatoes would be so cool! I've wanted those for years, too."

 

And so on. I quickly go from hardly having room for my pumpkin desires, to a long and uncertain list that resembles a Paul's Fruit Market inventory.  Oh, and I forgot to mention gourds. And lima beans. Maybe a little zucchini. And the blackberry bushes keep expanding.

 

My garden space is yet pretty small. I plan to enlarge it significantly. I'd like to double what I have right now.

 

The girls are bigger and more able to both care for and amuse themselves, which means I might be able to spend more time at it this year. Erin has her own garden spot (which needs a lot of work; by the end of last Summer, it looked like a small rectangular wildlife reserve) and Jill is due for one. So they'll both be helping, in their own ways.

 

On a distantly related note (potential obsessions, hobbies, and things that one must wait for patiently), David and I want to convince Aaron that he should allow us to set up a brewing operation in his nice basement.

 

I will email Ed right now to see if he has any of his old equipment. I can't recall if I have asked him that already.

 

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Never miss a thing. eidted for yucky grammar.

Coin Club

The coin club met yesterday, and we had a very nice presentation from Mr. Miller, one of our new members. He focuses on Louisville memorabilia, and he has some very nice items relating to the Southern Exposition that ran in Louisville from 1883 to 1887. It was the second largest exposition in US history up to that point, exceeded only by Philadelphia's Centennial Exposition in 1876.

 

There were some very nice tokens and medals (as well as photographs and engravings) that we got to view, and it was all pretty interesting.

 

The Expo took place primarily in an enormous 12-acre building that stood where now lie St. James and Belgravia Courts. Central Park was sort of a promenade/midway.

 

I've kind of glommed on to the fact that Central Park has been raked over pretty hard by detectorists in the past few decades, by the way.

 

At our coin club auction, I bid on a reference book for Hard Times Tokens, but I didn't want to go over five dollars. It ended up going for six.

 

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Playing in the crusty snow.

 

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Oh, and I apologize...

...if the picture in the post below looks a little, how show I say it...scatalogical. I think it might be better if I wait until the items are dry before I photograph them next time.

 

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Rusty relics

Here is the junk I found last Friday. The items in a row at the bottom are square nails or small spikes. The thing to the bottom right of the golf ball is not metal; it just came up when I dug up one of the other things. I think it's a piece of tile.

 

The thing to the bottom left of the golf ball is very heavy and shows, perhaps, traces of white paint. I think it might be lead. I have no idea what it is.

 

The golf ball was just lying around.

 

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My normal job ends at 4:30 each day, and last night Kim and I had to work at church at 6:00. I didn't have enough time to go home after work, but if I had gone to church I would have been there too early.

 

I figured that it was a perfect time to go visit some friends I hadn't seen in a long time, since they live near the church. I called, then went over. We had a very nice, albeit short, visit, in which I finally met their one-and-a-half-year-old daughter. She was very sweet and cute.

 

Working at church went well. Considering that there were only three children, it was very loud.

 

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Once again I had to drive to work holding my driver's side door shut with my arm. The door wouldn't latch because of the ice inside it. After I arrived, I couldn't get the door shut enough for the dome light to stay off, so I park with the left side of my car up on a curb, then tucked an old glove between the door frame and the door in such a way that a finger was holding down the little black button that shuts off the light.

 

Also, one of my wiper blades ripped off when I hit the wiper with my ice scraper, but that should be easy enough to fix when it warms up a little.

 

On a happy note, the advice I took to put cooking spray all around the door seals allowed me to easily open the door. I'll have to remember that trick. Smart Balance with Omega-3 Fatty Acids worked well.

 

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detecting, films, and reading

Last Friday I spent about three hours detecting at a place where there used to be houses (according to a 1912 topographical map). The place is now fields and trees.

I found evidence of old use, but nothing worth keeping. There were lots of things buried 3-6 inches deep, and most of them were very rusty spikes and nuts. If I had dug up everything that sounded like a nail, I'd have 200 rusty nails. I shall post a photo of what I did dig up.

That was disappointing, but it was good to be out.

I notices quite a few trees toppled in the area from our recent storms. At A. B. Sawyer Park, there were trees down and one of the baseball dugouts was missing its roof.

Saturday night I stayed up much too late re-watching "The Big Lebowski." I love those Coen Brothers. I love all the little things they pack into their movies that are fun to pick up on with repeated viewings.

I tried to watch "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," but I gave up after about a half hour. I decided that, instead of getting annoyed with lack of story and character depth, I may as well just give up on the movies and read the books.

I'm half way through a Stephen Jay Gould essay on catastrophism vs. steady-state geology. That guy is a joy to read. I aways get a kick out of it when he quotes some ancient scholar, such as Pliny the Elder, and appends his quote with "[translation my own.]"

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More regarding the presumed pin I found

My parents saw the pin today and, without any prompting from me, my dad said, "You know who that is? That's Joe E. Brown." My mom agreed. They'd never seen a pin like that before, but they thought it looked like him.

 

So…I don't consider this to be resolved, but the Joe E. Brown theory has legs.

 

2-7-08:

I just read some more about Joe E. Brown. Another piece of supporting evidence: Brown served as president of PONY League Baseball from 1953-1964, and he traveled around the country trying to get adults involved in starting baseball leagues for children.

 

Like I said, this pin was found next to a baseball diamond at an orphanage.

 

That might be the tie-in. I'm not 100% convinced, but I think the Joe E. Brown theory has legs that are strong enough for it to walk around without crutches.

 

Perhaps the "B" designates a division, team rank, or something similar.

 

Coincidentally, I was looking at a book of old Louisville photographs and Joe E. Brown's picture was in it. He was described as a frequent guest for the Kentucky Derby.

 

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Goddard Avenue: Safe in Union Hands

Brian reported on this a couple of weeks ago, and it was something I’d never been aware of before. He saw it referred to on Wikipedia, I think. Then I was reading about something else book about the history of the Cherokee Triangle area and came across a section of a map reproduction. That gave me another lead, allowing me to find a large, full-color, and very nice map on the internet. Here is a section of it.

Yes, sir, it looks like if I could go back in time 140 years and stand on the site that would later be the home of my parents’ front porch, I could throw a rock and hit a Union cannon. Or, at the least, chip a golf ball into a rifle pit.

the location of Fort Hill

Smiling Guy and Two Rad Rides

This might be my favorite find so far:It’s pretty small—about ¾ inch tall. The back side merely has the concave impression of the front, and a divot in the metal that perhaps was where a pin or clip was soldered on. I suspect this was a lapel pin or small award badge of some sort.

I found it yesterday at lunch on the grounds of an orphanage/children’s shelter that was started in the 1920s.

Doesn’t he look like he wants to sell you something?

And here are two swell vehicles that I found when I was at a park with my brother last week:

Lost City pumps life-essential chemicals at rates unseen at typical black smokers

-- I had to read that headline, like, five or six times before I could figure out what the heck it was trying to say. With no context, it looks like three or four headlines cut up and scrambled together.

Oh, THOSE black smokers.

The most important thing I’ve done in weeks

…and no, it has nothing to do with metal detecting.

My parents bought a tall corner cabinet at a yard sale, painted so that it looked cute, and gave it to us to put in Jill’s room. It’s a nice, and quite useful, bit of furniture, and we finally placed it in her room the week after Christmas.

However, it was not bolted to the wall. That was a constant worry for me. Really, it was quite negligent of me to have allowed it to stand unbolted for so long, since it toppled quite easily (Erin or Jill could have done that without straining themselves) and no doubt was quite capable of killing a small child outright on its way down.

So last night, while home alone for a little while, I cut a couple of lengths from a 1x3 piece of pine to use as brackets, got out the drill and a couple of tool boxes, and screwed it to the wall.

It’s nice to have an hour or so where I’m actually doing something useful.

in the rain and mud

Lunchtime today:

1 dime, 8 or 10 pennies, and an Avon watch that I just threw in the bag without inspecting, but which looks a little dinged up.

The detector only found three of the pennies. The rest I found just looking at the ground nearby. I only had to dig for one of the pennies.

The dime and one of the cents I spotted sitting next to the sidewalk as I walked back to the car.

The watch was sitting on the grass near the playground as I walked by.

In most places, the ground was still frozen, except for the top inch or two.

I went with Brian yesterday to one site I was enthusiastic about hunting, but for the most part the ground was so frozen that it was like digging in brick. I found nothing to speak of, but after it warms up a little I’ll go back. I had a nice walk around that area, though.

Then we went over to a nearby park. The ground was frozen there, too, but there were sandy spots around the bleachers of the ball fields, and those spots were easy to dig in. I found 79 cents (some of that was not found with a metal detector; it was just sitting around when I walked past.) I also found two toy cars.

Then we plunged into the underbrush to look for an old home site. We found it, but it was getting dark, so we weren’t there long. I’d like to go back and take some pictures, because it was kind of interesting.

Today at lunch I went back to the same park and found 61 cents. There was at least one spot where I’m pretty sure a coin was buried, but I couldn’t chip my way through the rock-hard soil to find it.

One of the coins I found yesterday was a penny, sitting on top of the sand as I walked up. Next to it was another dirty-looking disk of the same size. I picked up the penny, then picked up the other disk. It appeared too corroded to be a coin, and I thought that maybe it was a rusted iron slug of some sort. I tried to bend it, and it snapped in half, revealing a white center; that’s when I knew I’d found a dirty, flattened, frozen Junior Mint.

a cold walk, part 2

Holy cow. It’s cold. My lunch break walk was rather short. Once I turned into the wind, I felt like I had an ice cream headache confined to my eyebrows and eyeballs. My pants throbbed and my fingers recoiled.

I did note that an old farmhouse near my work, which Brooke and David mentioned to me over the weekend, appears to be slated for a zoning change. I might have to watch that.

a cold walk

Going out to look at potential detecting sites at lunch in a few minutes. I had just about decided not to because it’s freakin’ 20 degrees and windy. But then I though, phooey on it, I really want to. Maybe if I cause myself some physical pain via a bitter wind, I’ll diminish my obsession somewhat and be able to focus on other things.

So I will attempt to go walk in a frigid field. I need the exercise. I will try to take some photos.

Another book report: Gentlemen of the Road

A couple of weeks ago I read Gentlemen of the Road by Michael Chabon. Quite a nice little book. Also a quick read, despite Chabon’s juicy verbosity. He rolled out word after word that caused me to want to reach for the dictionary, but I didn’t because I’m lazy and because the story reads just fine anyway.

In the spirit of classic adventure yarns, the novel concerns two dissimilar traveling companions near the Caspian Sea, circa A.D. 950. Despite psychological and physical differences, they’ve formed a connection that has kept them together for years as they eke out a living, surviving with their wits and their weapons.

One, Amran, is a huge African bearing a Viking battleaxe. He is well-traveled and has seen years of service in the armies of the Byzantine emperor. The other is Zelikman, a slim Frankish physician prone to brooding. Both are Jewish, and become embroiled in a plot to return a young man to the throne of the Jewish empire of Khazaria after his family was overthrown in a coup.

Chabon grounds his novel in real-world grimness and violence, yet rarely strays far from a low-key wry humor. Amran and Zelikman have had hard lives and deep sadness, driving out any overt expressions of sympathy or philanthropy they might otherwise have shown; they are jaded “gentlemen.” Yet their own rootlessness and lack of attachment to anyone but one another (and even that is somewhat shaky) allows them to take risks to help others in need. They’d probably be right at home among Robin Hood’s merry men.

Fun book.

I learned a new bit of metal detecting slang: “Canslaw.” Canslaw is the little bits of aluminum can that are spit out by the big mowers that are used in parks. I have only a little experience with it, but in that short time I became quite annoyed by it.

More on Eleven Jones

Cool! Eleven Jones Cave now has a Wikipedia entry.Here.

Where the sidewalk ends

This is where Lagrange Road and New Lagrange Road come together—almost, since they don’t really meet but instead run parallel on opposite sides of the railroad tracks.

New Lagrange Road follows the old path of the Intraurban Railway that ran to Lagrange, and which stopped running in 1939. A road was put in its place at some point. What we now think of as New Lagrange Road once ended at Lyndon Lane.

1. An old white-painted concrete post with a “9” on it. I suppose it’s mile marker 9. It is old.

2. A turnoff that peters out before it gets to the tracks.

3. Long sidewalk that seems to end at the turnoff.

4. The start of another turnoff, but it’s even more abbreviated (or covered over) than point #2.

5. An asphalt path that seems to follow the same direction as points # 2 and 4.

I looked at #5, and the asphalt path is old, but not really old. It might be on top of something older, but I noted that the rises and dips in #5 correspond to the drives of the parking lot it passes across, telling me that it was laid at the same time. So it might be a coincidence that it lines up with #2 and 4.

Why is this sidewalk here? It can’t get a whole lot of foot traffic. And where did this little drive, #2, go? The sidewalk and turnoff are old, but I don’t know how old. I can’t tell if they are 30 years old, or 80.

Might there once have been a driveway or private road that stretched from Lagrange Road, over both the RR and the Intraurban RR, and onto someone’s property? Or might there once have been a little Intraurban boarding station there?

Dash my curry

Last night I dreamed that I went to a little roadside house-turned-eating establishment that, at night, hosted bands and large gatherings attended by college students and the adventurous in search of loud music and alchohol. It was my lunch break, and I had not been able to pack my lunch, so I went there to buy some absolutely delicious giant cloves of roasted garlic that you could eat, still warm, right out of their papery garlic wrapping. I also picked up some potatoes, chicken, and rice, in aluminum foil bunches on an outside grill.

I went inside to see M.I.A, who owned and operated the place. She was cleaning the floor in front. I suddenly realized I had forgotten my wallet. I told her my situation and asked her if my credit was good with her. I was a regular there, and she sort of knew me. She said it was no problem, and I told her I would pay her back the next day. I accidentally spilled something from my food on the floor, and spent a moment cleaning it up with a damp paper towel, hoping that the extra cleaning I was doing (the floor was pretty dirty, as one would expect in such a party spot) would meet with M.I.A.’s approval.

Site research update

Well, I’ve been in contact with the director at the second site I mentioned. The response was better than I expected, but not as good as I hoped—but there might be potential for some detecting fun. He said detecting on the property was permissible, but that I must stay away from the buildings, since some of them (often or always? I don’t know) have children that I shouldn’t be near. He said that just to be safe I should stay away from the buildings.

Areas near buildings are the best places, since they had the most foot traffic, so that is a bit of a bummer. However, there still might be something worth looking at there: There is a sports field around which I could probably detect, and some detective work might reveal sites of structures long since vanished. I think it certainly can bear more investigation.

Book review

I finished reading Tolkien’s Children of Húrin last week, and I liked it quite a bit. The first 70-80 pages dragged a bit, as the main character is a child and events all feel like a set up for the main part of the story. But once the central character, Túrin, gets a bit older and starts hitting people with swords, the story really takes off. It’s much shorter that LOTR, and much darker than The Hobbit. Anyone with no familiarity with Middle Earth might find it too inaccessible, but it’s much easier to get into than The Silmarillian, which I have never finished and have no desire to pick up again.

Site research

At lunch today, I visited two potential sites for metal detecting. The first site has a building on it dating to the 1830s, and in 1896 became a military academy with numerous buildings. It also functioned as a day camp, middle school, and college prep school, lasting until the just a few decades ago. I spoke with a gentleman in the engineering department of the organization that runs the site now, and he said he would check with someone “in administration.” I think I have a reasonable chance of being allowed to detect there. I sure hope so, because that should be a really great place for it. There are loads of old buildings and foundations, sports fields, and hang-out spots.

The second site is near the first. It’s part of the same old estate, and later became an orphanage in the early 1900s. There are numerous old buildings, but I don’t know how old—I’d guess they were built between 1920 and 1940, with some other very new ones. Not as much potential as the first site, but still very good. It is no longer an orphanage, but is run by the state for other programs. I met the regional director at his office there. He seemed very nice, asked me a few questions about my intent, and said that he would inquire with someone else in state government. If it were simply up to him, I think he’d have said, “Go ahead!” but since we’re dealing with a bureaucracy I don’t know what answer I’ll get.

Both places would be pretty cool, I think. I hope I get the answers I’m looking for. Brian—if I get an affirmative response, I’ll ask if I can bring my brother.

I keep thinking of more and more places I want to go, but I sure don’t have much time to capitalize on it.

If any of you lovely readers have any missing rings that you want me to hunt for you, let me know.

backward and forward

I just found a dollar bill that was numbered F 64440446 H. That is the closest I’ve ever come to finding a radar (palindromic) note.

Erin's "craft"

Erin likes to work on craft projects, which when initiated by her involves cutting and pasting whatever items strike her fancy and that she has permission to work with (she’s very good about asking permission to use things, thank goodness.) I’m quite impressed with her mixed-media tendencies. On Christmas, she decided that some of the foam packaging from some of the gifts would form a good basis for a craft. She started cutting it, and then she glued parts back together, and then cut up construction paper and glued it in place. She recruited me to help cut some of the paper in the artwork pictured here, but most of the work (and all of the placement) is hers.

The couple of foam/construction paper collages she worked on around Christmas mark a departure for this young artist from previous efforts in that she has started mixing together multiple colors; her work was more Louise Nevelson-ish before, and has recently turned late-career Matisse.

Perhaps my tongue is somewhat in my cheek. But I insist that I am both proud of, and intrigued by, her artwork.

The three leftmost items were discovered in my back yard today. An hour or so of searching revealed these, as well as the badly rusted and corroded remains of tin cans and some aluminum foil from some disco-era cookout. Or Reagan-era.

The three items were some kind of a metal bracket or brace, a pink car, and a cent.

The other stuff was found at a local elementary playground. I poked around for an hour until it got dark. Half of the coins were found in the first ten minutes, in one little spot.

Looking at the picture in the post below makes me wince. The Pixies and The Fall tapes that Mike French gave me were excellent. Will I ever again get to hear the Hula Hoop album “My Sweet Amputee”? There were two or three songs on that which I loved. The Lou Reed tapes given to me by Al. The misc. rockin’ collection from George. Even the puffy but thoroughly enjoyable Big Dipper tapes. It was all so sweet. How could I have dumped it in the trash?

Heartbreak

For Jillian's birhtday, Kim and I worked on fixing up her bedroom while she spent the night at her grandparents' house. My first task was to empty out the cardboard file drawers full of my junk that I'd been keeping in her room. To make room for all the shuffling, I had to clear space in a closet. I decided to throw these out, although it hurt to do so.

Some of these tapes I've had for twenty years, maybe longer. There is some fantastic music here. But I just don't listen to tapes much any more.

So sad.

I did a short bit of metal detecting on my lunch break at Hounz Lane Park today. I found a Mike's Hard Lemonade bottle top and an old pull tab. I also spent fifteen minutes hunting for something that was showing up as a dime 6-8 inches deep, but had to return to work before I fount it. I suspect it's junk metal, a hunk of it, and it's deeper down than I dug.

Misc.

Busy Holidays coupled with inconsistent Web access equals no posting by me. And it sounds like Erin will wake from her nap (on the floor of the hallway) soon, so this is likely to be brief.

All yesterday I worked on a painting for Jill's bedroom for her birthday. Pictures forthcoming. It is not done, but is nearly so, after about twelve solid hours of work. 28 x 40 inches of kitty cats and butterflies.

Like my brother Brian, I got a metal detector for Christmas. It's a Garrett Ace 250, which is a good one. Lots of fun so far, but the time I've been able to spend with it is limited. According to his blog, he's found a dollar in change, and I'm only at 48 cents. 18 of that came from my yard or the yard next to mine (the house is unoccupied). The rest came from my parents' back yard. I've found bottle caps, nails, construction material, and misc. bits of crud, but the major component so far has been coins, so I guess that bodes well. I find myself mentally tracing driving paths across town, trying to remember places I've seen that might be good hunting grounds.

I'm reading Tolkien's Children of Hurin. Good so far.

Two D&D games this month. Friday night we left off with the three PCs present entering the forboding and fortified lair of goblins and ogres, looking for two missing comrades. Last time they tried this, two party members died. However, they succeeded in killing dozens of goblins and ogres, including some really tough ones. This time out, the PCs are trying to be a little less frontal assault-ish. We'll see how that goes. I'm very interested in seeing how this plays out.

Today I raked the front yard and crushed aluminum cans.

More D&D

This takes way too long, but how could I not?
What D&D character are you?

I Am A: Neutral Good Human Bard/Sorcerer (3rd/2nd Level)


Ability Scores:

Strength-12

Dexterity-15

Constitution-12

Intelligence-14

Wisdom-13

Charisma-13


Alignment:
Neutral Good A neutral good character does the best that a good person can do. He is devoted to helping others. He works with kings and magistrates but does not feel beholden to them. Neutral good is the best alignment you can be because it means doing what is good without bias for or against order. However, neutral good can be a dangerous alignment because because it advances mediocrity by limiting the actions of the truly capable.


Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.


Primary Class:
Bards often serve as negotiators, messengers, scouts, and spies. They love to accompany heroes (and villains) to witness heroic (or villainous) deeds firsthand, since a bard who can tell a story from personal experience earns renown among his fellows. A bard casts arcane spells without any advance preparation, much like a sorcerer. Bards also share some specialized skills with rogues, and their knowledge of item lore is nearly unmatched. A high Charisma score allows a bard to cast high-level spells.


Secondary Class:
Sorcerers are arcane spellcasters who manipulate magic energy with imagination and talent rather than studious discipline. They have no books, no mentors, no theories just raw power that they direct at will. Sorcerers know fewer spells than wizards do and acquire them more slowly, but they can cast individual spells more often and have no need to prepare their incantations ahead of time. Also unlike wizards, sorcerers cannot specialize in a school of magic. Since sorcerers gain their powers without undergoing the years of rigorous study that wizards go through, they have more time to learn fighting skills and are proficient with simple weapons. Charisma is very important for sorcerers; the higher their value in this ability, the higher the spell level they can cast.


Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus (e-mail)

थे आर्डर ऑफ़ थे स्टिक।

Hmm. It seems I've tripped some switch for Hindi.

Anyway,

I’d guess that everyone who is interested in such a thing has already seen The Order of the Stick, a D&D online comic. But just in case you are interested and haven’t seen it, here is the link. I think it’s fine geeky entertainment and provides an excellent view of the D&D Experience.

I’m only up to episode 163.

OOTS

Inside this skinny person is a fat person trying to get out.

The past couple of days I’ve not been well. I’ve had a head cold with a cough and congestion (and that has been the status quo for a couple of months, except for a 1-week break from it last week.) And for the past day or two, my stomach has been a little off; whether from Crohn’s disease, or cold medicine, or related to my head cold in some other way, I don’t know, but it’s just been sort of yucky. And I’ve been tired and run-down.

I say all this to explain why, as I was driving to work this morning, it occurred to me that I should really lay off the holiday snacks for a day. I said to myself, “OK, no cookies or candies or whatever at work today.” This office, you know, is zonkers for snacks. It is definitely worth checking the break room every morning to see if anyone brought in donuts or a cake or cookies. This time of year, we’re up to our incisors in sweets.

So I issued my own little moratorium, and yet I walked through the break room and saw Krispy Kremes and a tray of candies. I ended up taking a chocolate-dipped Oreo and a chocolate-covered pretzel. The Oreo was especially good.

I don’t gain weight because the things that make me gain weight (that is, food in general) make me sick. But I have no will power. Or very little. I just successfully fought a fifteen minute battle with myself to resist the strong desire to get a donut. “There are only a few left!” my glutton self said.

“They should go to someone else,” my wise self replied.

“Well, let’s compromise. Go get another Oreo.”

“Good idea. A compromise. Yeah, that Oreo was better than a donut, anyway—hey, wait a second. I said no more, and I meant it.”

“Well, how about just one of those little cookie bar things. They were small. Really small.”

“Yeah, they were. But, umm, no. Nice try. I feel like crap already.”

“I’ll be back later.”

“I know.”

The funny thing is, now that a half hour has elapsed since my inner contest, I have almost no desire for sweets. It doesn’t sound good. Like many other things that I find very hard to resist, if I can hold out for just a little while, the impulse subsides.

Leonard Cohen waltzes back in

Once, a few years ago, I decided to listen to my Best of Leonard Cohen CD, but the case was empty. I checked the CD player, Kim’s old one that hadn’t been used too much in a while, and it wasn’t there either. Then I remembered, “Oh, yeah, I put it in the CD carrier I took with me to Oklahoma City when I went for training a while back.” I looked in the CD carrier, in all the CD carriers. Not there either.

After searching some more, I pretty much concluded that I had left it in my rental car in OKC. I’d looked behind book shelves, behind the entertainment center, everywhere. Very sad, although I was amused by the idea of some dude in OKC sitting down in the rental car, and suddenly hearing “So Long Marianne” or “Sisters of Mercy.” He’d have to think, “What kind of weirdo had this car before me?”

I don’t know what trip to OKC this would have been. I’ve been out there twice in the past five years: Winter 2003 and Spring 2005. I can’t recall which trip this would have been, although I really feel like it was before Erin was born, making it 2003.

This Leonard Cohen CD had not been what I expected it to be when I got it. I thought it would be more brooding and electronic, but this was much older Cohen and sounds acoustic and, I don’t know, dippy. Brooding but with a slightly whiny voice. But I listened to it and tried to like it, and pretty soon I did. I began to like it quite a bit.

I’ve missed it from time to time, but never replaced it. The empty CD case hung around just in case, somehow, the CD turned up.

Last night I was switching out our computer monitors, and knew it would take a little while to do. It was late and everyone else was in bed, so I decided to put on some music. Nothing too intrusive. As I skimmed the CDs, I saw the Leonard Cohen case and pulled it out. I could tell by its weight there was nothing in it. I opened it, looked, closed it again. “I suppose,” I thought, “I should throw away the inserts and use this case to house one of our other music or picture CDs. There is plenty of stuff here I can get rid of to make a little room, and this case is at the top of the list.”

Then I skimmed a little further, and saw Radiohead’s Amnesiac. It’s been a long time since I listened to that, maybe a couple of years. That would be perfect. I opened it and there, on top of the Radiohead CD, was The Best of Leonard Cohen.

What’s weird is that I feel quite strongly that I have listened to Amnesiac since the other CD went missing.

Hmm.

No more leak

Oooh, I forgot to mention. The back of our house no longer leaks. The gutter guy put in a nice new drip edge, and that took care of it. The contractor’s advice: The damage inside the walls is minor and non-structural. It has dried out now that the water has stopped leaking into it. Instead of spending thousands of dollars to fix it, just whistle a happy tune and be glad you caught it before it got worse.

Warhammer 40K

It was Warhammer 40K on our dining room table last weekend. My small detachment of Space Marines evaded David’s semi-sentient floating mines and torched the three small bio mine factories in the area, allowing for the safe escape of the lieutenant who bore the valuable gene seed that would aid in our eventual victory against the encroaching Tyranid enemy. The models were all David’s. I had a lot of fun, and it was a quick little skirmish.

Space Marines, using a lone flame thrower, head towards the first of three mine factories. The mine that is hitting them in this picture shook them up a little but caused no fatalities.

There is glee in mayhem.