Guitars and Ukuleles

When I was in high school I played bass guitar in a couple of punk bands. I was never a good musician, but I had a little rhythm and could drive a 3-chord punk song along pretty well. I gave it up when I joined the Corps, but have always missed it a little.

In the meantime I’ve develop a broad range of musical interests. I’ve pored over Alan Lomax’s historical recordings, followed the history to Chicago and through the invention of electricity. I’ve listened to Armstrong, Coltrane, Porter and Davis. Covered Ragtime, Swing, BeBop and Cool. I’ve found that I prefer guitar driven music with strong harmonies and blues rhythm. Surf, Blues, Punk and Rock and Roll all sound great to me. Oh yeah, I love Eminem and RZA as modern musical poets.

Now, some 30 year later I decided to resume my practical musical education. I borrowed a beautiful Gibson ES-325 6-string to get started on. I played it about 45 minutes nearly every day for a month – focusing on getting stronger and more flexible. That was my metric – If I could practice every day for a month and not get bored then I have integrated the habit into my life.

Fender Custom Shop Pro model with DiMarzio pick-ups

So I bought myself a guitar. It’s a reward for a really good year consulting. It’s a used Fender Stratocaster in Lake Placid Blue with a maple neck. I thought I built up some pretty good calluses playing the Gibson. Not enough. The first day I played the Strat for about three hours and had to quit because my fingertips were raw. I’ve had it a few days now and can now play as long as I want (thank you barre chords).

Kathy is also getting into music. She play weekly with a local Ukelele group and seems to be having a grand time.

I think we are both really inspired by Jackson and want music to be part of his life.

Monster Jax and his Da'

About Jackson...

Another 5 months have come and gone and again no updates. This time I have a real excuse. We had a baby.

Jackson came quietly into our world at the end of July. We have been going through all the typical new-parent trials; the lack of sleep, the endless feedings and changes. Actually since I'm working from home again it's not been as bad as I had feared. Not at all. 

Here is the Jax photo blast:

Here he is about 20 minutes old. Note my gigantic
fingers -- almost as big as his arm.

With papa at three days

Here he is with Mom at about 2 months.

Matching hoodies -- three months.

TechShop

I recently started a membership at TechShop, a facility that provides a full machine shop including 3/4 Axis CMC Mill, a FlowJet, Sheetmetal, a full wood shop, 3 different 3d printers, and the list goes on and on.

I've been like a kid in a candy store...

I started with the complete MIG and
TIG welding courses. I'm pretty good
now but I'm not sure I'm ready to trust
my life with one of my jobs. Steel -
even pretty thin is pretty easy after
enough practice. Aluminum on
the other hand is always hard. 

Turning 7/8" 316 stainless steel
on a 14-40 Gearhead lathe.
After tapping each end for
1/4-20 cap screws, this became
a 135mm dummy axle used
 to align bicycle frames.

A scale replica of Obi-Wan Kenobi's lightsaber
from StarWars Ep 4 "A New Hope" Started as
a 2.5" 6061 Aluminum rod.

Jet Mills

Prototype pawns for a chess/
checkers set for Jax.

Prototype bishop and rook
(in background). 6061AL with
Single knurl at the top and double
at bottom. These were both too
large (over 5" tall). The Rook was
later turned down into 2 smaller
rooks that are probably keepers.

Turning 360 Brass -- this stuff rules.
Turning aluminum creates a concertina-wire
of hot, razor-sharp swarf. I nearly always
burn or cut some part of me while
working with it. 360 Brass
however, creates a nice, tidy little pile of
sand. I'm going to turn more brass.  

More 360 Brass. This became
4 grooved zipper pulls and
a set of cuff links.

of Toast and Tea

I’ve had a lot of free time as of late and have spend some of it baking a little homemade bread and custom blending my own tea. And going to TechShop but that’s for another post.

After tasting some great bread from the Manressa Bread Project I was inspired to attempt my own.

About a month ago I started a wild yeast pre-ferment called a “Levain” that forms the basis for baking bread. Its pretty simple, mix 100g of Rye flour, 400g of All Purpose White flour and 500g of water in a container, cover and let stand for a couple of days.

Wild yeast that arrived on the flour begins to reproduce and along with rapidly developing Lactic Acid Bacteria turn the Levan acidic preventing the growth of undesirable mold.

After three days I began to feed the Levan 500g AP Flour and 400g of water every day. Prior to feeding I remove about 90% of the old Levan, which I can use for baking or pizza dough. As the Levan ages, the depth of flavor increases as different yeast strains colonize and mature within the starter. One San Francisco bakery claims their Levan has been alive since the mid-1800s!

When I first started the daily ritual of feeding the Levain I dirtied 3 bowls a silicons scraper and a chopstick and it took nearly 20 minutes. Now I do it in about 5 minutes with one bowl and a chopstick. During heavy baking I’ll feed it twice a day.

My baguettes have turned out beautifully because they rise in the same pan as I bake them. Boules however are still a work in progress. They cook in a pre-heated Dutch oven. I’m trying to successfully transfer the risen dough from a stainless steel bowl to the 500+F Dutch Oven without letting out all the CO2. If you are ham-fisted with the dough and it deflates, you end up with a 4” tall baked loaf not a 8” tall loaf.

Even without a full rise the bread is totally edible. It has a mildly sour flavor, a hearty texture and a crispy, crunchy crust. I often have it for breakfast; toasted with a little butter and blackberry jam from a batch I made last summer.

Here in the Bay Area we have easy access to spectacular Artisan bread. On Sundays the team from Michelin-Starred restaurant Manressa have a weekly booth at the Campbell Farmer’s market.  There you can get fresh white and whole-wheat Levan boules baked by a master.

I’ve also recently made the trip to the Mill, where bakerJosie Baker and Four Barrel operate a collab serving prepared toast and coffee in the City.

During our visit I had Whole Wheat with Butter and Almond Butter. It was awesome. Not exactly a meal, but an epic nosh none the less.

I’d love to wax poetic about the Four Barrel shot, pulled on one of two beautiful La Marzocco Stradas installed there. Unfortunately it was a sour-bomb not worthy of comment. As we were leaving we picked up loafs of Josie’s Wonder Bread and Country. We enjoyed them tremendously, the latter ending up as a Stirrer/Crouton for Kathy’s Squash Blossom/Corn soup.

On the other hand, Avery, the head baker at Manressa’s Levan Boule is baked perfection. Perfect crust and crumb. Just the right amount of flavor and the sound it makes is a symphony of crackling goodness.

One key thing I learned for these inspiring sources is how dark to bake the crust of the loaf. Boules from both sources looks almost burnt on the outside – much darker then I would ever go. I used to think it was baked when it was “golden” brown when the right color is much darker – almost burnt. It makes a huge difference in flavor – those extra few minutes caramelize a lot of sugars and adding depth to the flavor. 

Teabagging

Our espresso machine is down until we get an electrician to make a wiring change so I’ve been drinking tea instead lately.

I traditionally drink “English Breakfast” tea. I acquired a taste for Tetley’s during trips to the UK early in my career. It’s easy to find and thus became my tea of choice. Just a few years ago I discovered that along with my favorite, Black Cat Espresso, Intelligentsia also sells a line of teas. I ordered a bag of their whole leaf English Breakfast tea and really liked the strong flavor over Tetleys.

At that point I started reading a bit about tea and have come to better understand levels of quality and types of leaves.

As my knowledge level grew I began to seek out the stronger, more flavorful teas. I’ve since ordered tea from many online sources and have pretty much settled on Mighty Leaf as my primary source. I love their OrganicBreakfast blend. It’s my favorite commercial tea blend.

For a while I was blending my own Breakfast-style tea, a combination of Assam Estate, Ceylon and Golden Pu-erh.  I love it. However it costs a mint to make and many of the included teas are only available seasonally. I’ve got about a pound of perfect blend that will last a few months.

One of my favorite tea discoveries has been Sapsang Souchong. It is a fermented black tea dried over a pine fire. When fresh and of high quality (for LS), it smells and tastes like an Oregon campfire. Sharp and smokey.  I often add a teaspoon or two to my cup.

I never liked those little cup tea strainers, they always seem to let leaves escape into the tea. For many years I made my own Origami tea bags from unbleached coffee filters.

My brewing technique has also changed since I discovered single-service tea-bags at Mutsua. They are little fold-to-close polyester bags that hold 2+ tablespoons of tea. Amazon has them here. I like them because they hold a lot of tea – probably the equivalent of 6-8 commercial teabags.

I use a 14oz cup of spring water heated to 190F. I use 2 tablespoons of Organic Breakfast and steep to 2.5 minutes.  The short steep prevent astringency, although it’s not common with high quality tea like this, I really dislike it. I sometimes forget the tea with a bag in leading to over-steeping. A dash of milk can soften the tannic acid the can develop when over-steeped.

I sweeten with a little pinch of German Rock Sugar I get at Tevana. It’s a crystalized form of rock sugar about the size of pea-gravel.

The resultant brew is dark, almost coffee-like in appearance with a very strong, rich tea flavor and no astringency. The sweetness of the rock sugar balances the unusual strength of the tea.

I double the sugar and pour over a tall glass of ice for Iced Tea in the afternoon.

Tools

Over the years I've acquired quite a collection of Park Cassette Lockring tools. At one point I must have had a dozen of them. I can only remember buying 4-5, yet the drawer was full of them. Then came the Dewalt 18v cordless impact wrench.

I bought it to remove lug nuts from the race car at the track. I has over 600 Ft/Lbs of removal torque. Then I used it to remove a cassette. The impact feature means the chain whip stays in the drawer, it easily removes the lock nut with just a short the pull of the trigger. Unfortunately it also tends to break the removal tool -- typically shattering the business end.

Last weekend I finally broke my last one. It was pretty new and Park specifically warns against it, so I think it's best if I stop using the impact wrench. I was going to get another when my mechanic showed me what he uses for that job. A custom Crombie from Abbey Bike Works. The one I held was the solid handled version, but I ordered the SL which has a hollow handle. With custom engraving -- No, this is not a hammer! -- it will take a few weeks to arrive.

The La Pavoni at work

La Pavoni Pub Espresso Machine

The company for which I work takes great pride in supporting the "Coffee Culture" at the office. They provide very nice La Pavoni Pub commercial grade espresso machines and matching grinders in each of the buildings in our campus. I sit in an Engineering building, close enough to the kitchen to hear our macine and estimate it regularly pulls 10-15 shots a day. Until recently I avoided them totally, here's why.

When interviewing here 6 months ago, I tried to pull a shot on one of them and, as usually happens with no time to work up a proper shot on a new machine, it was shit. Still I was impressed at the sight of a commercial machine. After starting, I took a good long look at the La Pavoni in my building and realized it was absolutely filthy. It was beyond filthy -- it is easily the blackest, most scum covered espresso machine I've ever worked with. The grinder was also in sad shape with so much build up around the adjusting collar it was frozen in place. I ignored the machines for months, drinking tea instead, resigned to the fact that anything it produces will taste of rancid coffee oil and little else. 

I'll admit is was probably the sound that got me. The siren song of grinder, pump and the scream of the steam wand. It called to me. So I started to clean it up -- working in the mornings before anyone else gets in. I brought some Cafiza and a back-flush basket from home and started using them a couple of times a week. The first session with Cafiza was disgusting. Large chunks of black -stuff- started coming out and the water was black. I ended up flushing a more than a dozen times just to get all that -stuff- out. I cleaned both portafilters thoroughly; I don't think the baskets had ever been removed as there was a 1/4" of scum under both of them. I used dental tools to clean the grinder collar and free it so the grind can be adjusted. It's taken a couple of weeks to get most of it cleaned up. On Friday afternoon, after a good clean, I spend a little time dialing in the grinder and produced my first "good" shot -- it was the first one that doesn't taste like a dirty machine.

This morning I pulled another pretty good shot, not best shot ever, but made a little sweeter by the clean machine. I'll admit a little satisfaction from the effort. Now if we can just get some freshly roasted beans to grind we'd be in business.

Coe Monstercross 1 Ren 0

With just a weeks time to prepare, I was a little concerned that I would not be ready for the Coe Monstercross. I was right.

With a busy work and travel schedule I got exactly Zero training in before the event. In fact, the event was only my second ride since the Spring Classic nearly a month ago. I figured that if I could get to the to of Hamilton still feeling pretty good, I'd be good for the whole ride. On the climb up Mt Hamilton I was harshly reminded that I would not be feeling good. On the summit, I realized I was totally spent; my legs jello and my oxygen deprived brain screaming for relief. There was no hope in going on, so I quit, thinking about the line: "Once you quit something, you just make it easier to quit next time", and Andy Schleck's racing season so far. Neither was enough to inspire me to push on.

When I reconnected with the group at the summit, the last to arrive,  I let them know my decision. As they pedaled off to complete the adventure, I felt the brisk wind on my cheek and realized; even with my choice to turn back now I was still looking at a couple of hours of riding to get home. I pointed the Haka downhill and let her run, wishing I had left on the smooth 30mm slicks I used on the Spring Classic, instead of swapping to the knobby Rocket Rons for all the dirt I had expected to ride today. So with more than a little caution I descended all the way to the bottom -- which, if you know Mt Hamilton, you know involves more than a little climbing. An hour later I was back in San Jose, but on the wrong side of the valley. Another 45 minutes got me home. Strava says it was 55 miles and 5500ft. Seems like it was a lot more.

The next day was a testament to the effort and lack of preparation. I was really sore and it stayed that way for 2 days. Finally today (Monday) the legs don't feel like stuffed sausages. Although nobody like to quit, but I think my decision was correct and I'm glad I did. That said, I still really want to do that Hamilton - Coe ride and how that I have a buddie who has done it and a good map I'm sure I'll get to it in the next few weeks -- this time with a couple of training rides to prepare.

I think the highlights of the ride was having the right spare part to saving another rider's ride. Half way up Hamilton I ran into one of the riders in our group on the side of the road with a broken chain. During the planning for the Spring Classic I ordered some SRAM PowerConnect chain links and only the night before I added one to my seat bag. Luck was with us and that little link saved his ride and providing it was the highpoint of mine.

2013 Coe Monstercross

http://californication.mtbguru.com/CoeMonsterCross/

2013 SF Spring Classic

So, the SF Spring Classic is over. What a disappointment. The route came out late the night before and unlike last year, it features no mixed terrain whatsoever. No fire road. No gravel. No broken pavement. It was just another road century. The nicest thing I have to say about the event is that the people working the rest stops were really nice. Takeaway: Won't do that one again.

Not yet...

Somehow this event went from fun to suck in just a couple of days. If this is how these events are run, this is my last. 

We got another email last night. Still absolutely nothing about the route's location. Just a plug for all the good food they are planing and a vague promise of details on Saturday. Seriously, the night before the event we get the location? Like I said, this just doesn't feel like fun any more... Just stress over start/finish logistics. If I hadn't just spent two months training for this, I'd bail today and just go for a ride without these jokers.

Spring Classic?

With less than 3 days until the SF Spring Classic event and still no details on the route (other than 110 miles, 10k feet). 

 

A 110mile circle with SF at the center covers a lot of ground (North Coast, Sacramento, Stockton, Modesto, Monterey). Many riders are enlisting the support of family and friends for logistics that day and "No, I really have no idea where we are going to finish" gets old with just a few days to go.

I'm starting to wonder if the "suspense-building" is really just disorganization. 

49ers Stadium

Int he next 5 shots the framing on the left starts in the distance and moves closer. The ramp on the right gets taller and a new small mobile crane shows up on the left.

49ers Stadium - September 6th, 2012

49ers Stadium - September 7th, 2012

September 11th, 2012

More vertical steel appears on the right.

September 13th, 2012

September 20, 2012

New 49ers Stadium

Last summer I started commuting past the new 49ers stadium site in Santa Clara. It was still just foundational steel at that point. Since then I've taken a couple dozen shots, all for the same location.

49ers Stadium August 21, 2012

Here is what the stadium looked like on the 21st of August 2012. This location is different than all the subsequent photos. It was taken about 20 feet from the location of the remaining photos. Here you can see the four construction cranes lowered for the evening. The white columns on the right are the beginning of a ramp behind the score-board.

Here is the first photo from "The Spot"just two days later. This location covers the entire stadium. One crane is still working. On  the left is the beginning of a block of offices and boxes. It appears it will have a multi-story glass wall framing a series of escalators as a central architectural feature. In the center is the beginning of the first tier of seating. On the right the ramp is nearly three stories now and more of the scoreboard foundation is showing.

49ers Stadium August 28, 2012

Woodchippers

I love Woodchippers!

Installing Woodchippers and TRP Mini-Vs

The "dirt-drop" style handlebars from Salsa are my favorite handlebars by far. I selected them when I build my MonsterCross bike a couple of years ago and fell in love with the shape. Their shallow drop means I spend more time in the drops and the outward flare creates a super-wide base for climbing in the drops. They have a very wide flat-bar section and the angle of the brake levers seems a natural fit for my hands.

I'd been riding a number of ancient WTB Dirt Drops of varing shape and width. These were all swap-meet or e-bay finds. Until the wood chipper I had never found shape I liked as much as those old WTBs.

Over the last two years I've converted nearly all of my drop-bar bikes to Woodchippers. The only bike still running "regular" drop bars was my Ibis Hakkallugi cross bike. I didn't want to change anything on that bike during cross season but now with the SF Spring Classic looming I was ready to make the change. I also wanted to replace the front Cantilever brakes with my favorite TRP CX-9 Mini V-brakes.

For a heavy-er rider like me, front brakes are always a bit of an issue These are a great front brake upgrade for many cantilevers equipped cyclocross bikes.

My Haka', like many cyclocross bikes, uses a cable hanger that mounts to the steerer tube near the stem. For a tall guy like me this means the cable is almost 12 inches long - stretching from the stem to the fork. You can see the cable hanger (sans-cable) in the picture.

The front of the Haka' is really stiff, but it only takes a little fork flex to cause "shudder" under heavy braking. When the fork flexes, the distance from cable-hanger to cantilever stud changes which changes brake pressure.

The TRP Mini-Vs don't need a hanger so the shudder is completely eliminated. Like Woodchippers, I've installed them on the front of all my cross/road bikes.

The picture also shows (half of) my current favorite tire setup. That front tire is a (now discontinued) Schwalbe Marathon Extreme 700x42 and the rear is a Clement MSO 700x40. These are about the biggest tires that fit a Haka and my AlphaQ fork. This set up works perfectly for mixed-conditions spring riding. The agressive tread of the Schwalbe works everywhere and is a good match for the MSO in the rear. I started using the Schwalbe in the front to deal with mud. The Clement is great tire everywhere but mud. After a couple of terrifying muddy descents, the Schwalbe offers great mud performance. When things dry out, I tend to go back to the lighter, smoother rolling MSO at both ends.

Do I really need a new mountain bike - Part 2

After a wonderful weekend with the Ibis Mojo SLR I wanted to try a modern 29er so I rented a Santa Cruz Tallboy from Passion. It was set up a little different than the SLR; it has a Fox Talas fork instead of the Fox Float on SLR. I've always preferred the feel of the float over the travel-adjust feature of the Talas, since I never seem to make the travel adjustment during rides. It also lacked the Ibis's dropper post.

The Tallboy is a little more flexible than the Ibis, which may be due to the larger 29er wheels. It's still much stiffer than my Tracer, just not as stiff as the Ibis. It also seems to have a lower bittom bracket -- I hit the ground with the pedals a couple of times - something I've never noticed before.

My canyon lap as a little slower on the Tallboy, but that is due to a hard the day before rather than the bike. I have to admit I missed the dropper post a bit on some of the more technical sections. At the end of one of those sections, V noted that the trail would have been ridable on cross bike -- it would have been miserable -- but it was ridable none the less.

One thing I noticed is that after a couple of years riding cross bikes on hard terrain, I have learned to select and ride my line with "skinny-tire-preservation" in mind. So when I climbed on bikes that can just go straight down the hill with absolutely no concern for tires and pinch-flats, I still used the conservative line. My riding partners pointed this out at every opportunity. Gotta work on that.

So, two weeks with two awesome mountain bikes. What have I learned? Both bikes did everything I asked of them with ease. Both climb beautifully with no pedal bob and limitless traction. The rear suspension geometry allows them to climb without the front end lifting -- a good thing considering their 24/36 low gear (I ride 30/36 and 34/36 on my cross bikes. Descending is more like riding a 125cc motocross motorcycle then a bicycle.

Do I need a new mountain bike? I don't know yet. I still need to rent a Niner Jet9 RDO for the final comparison before making a final decision.

SRAM Shifters

SRAM shifters are MUCH harder to re-cable then Shimano.

Note to self: If you take on rebuilding your bike on a Friday night before a Saturday morning ride, make sure you know how to get those new cables through your shifters.

SF Spring Classic 2013

I'm in. Training starts today.

http://springclassic.wordpress.com/

Do I really need an new mountain bike?

A few weeks ago one of my regular riding buddies, V, got a shiny new mountain bike. Now V and I have been riding road and cyclocross bikes together for a few years and we have been searching out more and more difficult terrain -- Skeggs, Demo, Etc. Routes that saner riders tackle on full-suspension mountain bikes.

Last weekend we rode the classic Montebello/Stevens Canyon loop, a 2.5 hour, 20 mile ride with ~2800 feet of climbing. Since V's cross bike was down for maintenance he showed up on his mt. bike.

Locals will know that it has been raining pretty regularly for the last few weeks and we have had a series of strong Pacific storms. The canyon descent is in pretty rough shape, lots of downed trees and branches and rivulets like small canyons to that try to suck you in. Pretty tough going on a cross bike. Even a cross bike with fat 40mm tires.

So, in a vain attempt to keep up with V, I crashed. I lost the front end awkwardly during a muddy creek crossing that involved a downed tree. V saw the whole thing. It looked much worse that in was -- over the bars and head-first into a rock filled creek bed. I emerged a little wet but without too much damage. I blame the bike. My wonderful Clement MSO tires were covered in a smooth, solid coating of mud rendering them pretty useless. I've looked for more agressive treaded tires in this size for years without much luck. So, for the remainder of the ride, my thoughts turned to my old mountain bike with massive 2.5" mud tires, certainly a better tool for this kind of job.

I haven't ridden my Mt Bike much since I returned to CA. In fact I only rode it once during 2012. It's been so neglected that the rear shock seems to have locked up. As a christmas gift V took it to a shop to have it overhauled. the shop suggested that it would be cheaper to replace it then to overhaul it.

Well, I guess it is almost 13 years old so I took a critical look at the parts and have to agree that both front and rear shocks and the brakes are in need of replacement. The wheels were rebuilt just a couple of years ago and the drivetrain has a new XTR cassette and CN-7700 chain.

So I conducted the classic exercise -- searching for discount replacement parts on-line. I created spreadsheet, found a number of forks, shocks and brake options. In the end, the bike shop guy is right, every upgrade model I built showed prices that were just a few hundred dollars less then a complete new bike.

Then I spoke with an old friend who owns Passion Trail Bikes, a Mt. Bike specialty shop in Belmont. He suggested -strongly- that I go with the whole new bike. He pointed out the significant improvements in every performance category over the last 13 years. Suspensions are much longer, frames lighter and stiffer, brakes stop harder and feel better.

I'll admit that I bought my previous bike, an Intense Tracer, without riding it. I had ridden a bunch of Specialized FSRs that use the same suspension design so I assumed that the Tracer would feel the same. After I got it I realized that the Tracer had a couple of handeling traits that I later found quite annoying. I livend with tem for 13 years so I don't want the same thing to happen this time.

So, to get a feel for how improved current bikes are, I rented a 2012 Ibis Mojo SL-R for the weekend. It's a 26" wheeled trail bike that weights about 28 Lbs. fitted with Shimano XT parts. Next weekend I'm going to rent a similarly equipped Santa Cruz TallBoy to try out a modern 29er.

Last night I rode Montebello/Steven's Canyon on the Mojo and knocked almost 10 minutes off my best time on a cross bike. The Mojo was 4 minutes slower on the climb but almost 15 minutes faster on the descent. This is especially impressive give I was riding solo on an unfamiliar bike so I was pretty cautious on the descent.

This is my first time riding a "dropper" seatpost since I took the Hite-Rite of my Yeti in 1992. I like the control mounted on the bars, but I have to admit that I was a little tired on the descent and I hade to raise the seat a couple of times just so I could sit a little and rest the legs. Also the Steven's Canyon descent isn't really technical enough to actually need to drop the post. I've descended it over a dozen time this year alone on a cross bike with a full-height saddle.

I have run short bar ends on every mountain bike since the late eighties. I really like having alternative hand positions that mimmic hand positions on a road bike. As I type this my wrists and hands are a little sore from the 2.5 hours ride last night on just a straight bar.

So all in all, I really like the Mojo. It handels well, climbs well and descends better them I can. I've got a couple more rides on it, then next weekend we will see what a modern 29er feels like.