Ploafmaster General

This past Friday I had the good fortune of accompanying my daughter and her Girl Scouts troop to Washington DC by train. The main event was a visit to the National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall. I’d never yet made it to this museum and WOW, it’s incredible. From David Adjaye and Philip Freelon's building design to the breadth and depth of the collection and exhibits, it was nearly overwhelming. Black history IS American history, and Black culture is a critical component of American culture (whether acknowledged or ripped off), so exhibits ranging from Black innovators to educational history, from the performing arts to the world of sports, presented a rich assortment of artifacts and informative displays.

I really need to revisit when I'm not with a large group of largely elementary school girls. When half of your attention is ensuring that everybody stays together and behaves, you cannot fully appreciate all this museum has to offer. I could spend an entire day just exploring the exhibition hall for Black contributions to music, for example. Which is where I stumbled upon The Mothership:

I was also delighted to stumble upon a display all about Richmond's own Maggie Lena Walker, complete with a number of artifacts and news clippings on loan from the Maggie L. Walker Historic Site, somewhere in a hall about Black entrepreneurship and innovation (3rd floor, I believe).

The weather was otherwise kind of crummy that day, so our secondary plans to have a scavenger hunt around The Mall were scuttled. But it was a great day traveling with my kid and her troop.

In June my family and I will travel to Maine for a week. Using the Every Kid Outdoors program as a thin excuse, we're going to spend a week between Bangor, Bar Harbor, Portland, and a few places in between. Also, my best friend Robert lives up there until he moves down to PA for his new professorship, so we’ll absolutely hang out with him as much as possible.

Acadia National Park isn't exactly the most mountainous, but Robert is used to hiking all over the pace doing field work. And I suspect we’ll have more fun in Acadia and elsewhere if we're all a bit more comfortable hiking for more than a few miles on moderate terrain. I wanted to make sure that my whole family understood that visiting national parks is more enjoyable when you can venture farther from your parking spot, so I decided we should start a series of family practice hikes.

The ironic bit here, for anybody who has known me for more than a few years, is that I may previously have been the least likely to suggest hiking at all, let alone a preparatory regimen. But since I ride my bike all the time now, I'm in quite a bit better shape to wander up and down hills than I’ve ever been. And these days, it’s actually the rest of my household that doesn't regularly get much exercise (excepting Maddie, but really only on Fridays at gymnastics).

With that, we parked by the Oregon Hill overlook and walked down the hill to the North Bank Trail, part of the James River Park system. For the first half of our adventure my daughter kept pace with me while my six-year-old hung back with Valerie, constantly talking about how "skinny" the trail was, and wondering why there were no railings. But he loves nature, so he wasn't complaining that hard.

Once we reached the fork between the Texas Beach parking lot and continuing on toward the pump house, I gave the family the choice of walking up and back via neighborhoods back to Oregon Hill, or continuing on a little further and walking back the way we came. Everybody wanted to get off the trail and walk back through the neighborhoods, hoping for mostly flatter terrain.

The walk back through the Maymont area, Randolph, and Oregon Hill was pleasant in its own way, but at this point both kids dragged behind so much that I frequently had to stop in order to let everybody catch up. I'm no athlete, but I guess being regularly active gives me a bit of a speed advantage that I wasn't expecting.

We finally made it back to the car, about 3.75 miles and 2.25 hours later, and I think Valerie agreed we needed more practice hikes ahead of our summer trip! But it was a great way to spend a brisk February morning outside with the family.

At the suggestion of my friend Ross, I headed north to Pine Camp this morning to ride some really light, non-technical trails through the woods. I don't typically ride single track or any sort of mountain biking (I'm more of a party pace, chill rider), but I do enjoy pointing my wheels off road and into nature. The weather was gorgeous, and I only got ensnared by thorns once, so I call it a win!

Today was pretty foggy in Richmond in advance of some rain, so I did what many photographers do and headed out with my camera. I got a late start, though, so most of it was cleared around my neighborhood by the time I hit the bike. So I headed south toward the James River where I was rewarded with an entire river of fog!

The T. Tyler Potterfield bridge gave me the perfect vantage point for some exciting views up and down the river. I would have loved some foggy scenery in a few more places, but I'll take what I can get these days.

So after a few years of pandemic and all attendant precaution, I let my guard down in a predictable way with predictable results. My office had their holiday party on the 15th, and I attended without a mask, including a tightly-packed after party where everybody had to yell to be heard. And yesterday on the 23rd I tested positive for COVID. My family was planning to visit my mom and grandmother today for Christmas Eve (this, before the extreme cold front knocked out their power for most of the day, threatening those plans anyway), and I wanted to be careful; my grandma is in her 80s, and my mom has had some chronic respiratory issues. So I took a test - the first one of many prior tests to clearly indicate a positive result.

I’m pretty lucky. I’ve had every vaccination and booster I could including more recent bivalent booster. I believe this is a major contributing factor to the mildness of my case. My symptoms feel more like an upper nasal sort of cold with a bit of sinus pressure, clear runny nose, and very faint headache. No fever whatsoever. I can still taste and smell everything just fine.

HOWEVER.

Because my nuclear family has generally been (and generally remains) pretty careful about COVID, I’m now isolating in my room through Tuesday. That means I’ve been up here all day today on Christmas Eve. That means tonight I’ll be crying at the end of It’s a Wonderful Life all alone, watching it on my iPad, sitting in my bed. That means tomorrow I’ll be watching my kids unwrap their gifts on Christmas morning via FaceTime call with my wife downstairs.

I know how I got here, and I know my own part in it. But it still sucks.

Through some combination of various folks using consumer genetic testing and genealogy research websites, my family found out that my maternal grandma has a half sister that’s not quite a year older than her. This past Saturday, my family was visiting my mom and grandma on a day that coincided with my Uncle Scott visiting from New Jersey, and this newfound great aunt visiting along with her daughter (who is around my own mom's age), my first cousin, once removed.

My mom and her brothers, along with my grandma, had already spoken to them several times over the phone and were excited for this visit, and I was pretty excited to meet them, too. Sure, I'm still on-balance an optimist, so I recognize what may be inherent awkwardness in this sort of first encounter. But my new relatives are wonderful. Truly wonderful. My grandma, the oldest of four (and the only gal) in her household growing up, is thrilled to find that she has a sister. It’s already a celebratory time of year, and we were already happy to visit family close to the holidays for a get-together. Meeting up with new family and having a terrific time learning about each other and sharing some laughs was the most unexpected extra gift.

Last night I waited in line for 30 minutes to get into "Miracle on Cary", a Christmas-themed pop-up bar hosted at The Jasper (and other participating bars around the world) for the past few years. Because I am An Old who has kids that can't stay home alone, my wife and I have heretofore been unable to experience this seasonal event at our favorite bar. But with some of Valerie's recent out of town travels, she let me have a night to myself which finally gave me the opportunity.

The entire bar was positively dripping with decoration from the ceiling to the floor, and I could not have captured it all unless I’d taken 100 photos, but I did at least get a few fun shots of my beverages and other stuff around The Jasper. The drink menu for Miracle is, frustratingly, an image instead of text. Rather than link to something inaccessible I'll at least provide the description of each cocktail I enjoyed. But first, some of the decor!

Santa's Tipsy Village

Like I said, dripping with decoration. There was a TV at the far end of the bar playing Christmas movies (Elf was playing during my visit), and there were little nooks of classic Christmas movie paraphernalia all over, from the Griswolds' hockey jerseys to Ralphie's air rifle wrapped in lights (and lights extending from the barrel as if shooting). This kitschy, nostalgia-laden decor would put even the Grinch in a holiday frame of mind.

But I didn't just go for the decoration! This is The Jasper, to me the best bar in town, so I wanted some of these holiday drinks. The menu appears to be standardized across participating locations, but not to the level of specific brands of spirits (at least as printed on the menus). I imagine this allows for participating bars to use whatever is available to them in a given category (e.g. whatever Trinidad rum they have/can get), but it also, theoretically, provides a bit of latitude for those bars to interpret the menu how they see fit. Anyway, what did I drink?

The Christmas Spirit(s)

My first drink was the Holiday Spiked Chai which, according to the menu, contained:

• brandy
• Jamaican overproof rum
• coffee liqueur
• amaretto
• chai
• almond milk
• egg white
• tiki bitters
• grated nutmeg as a garnish

All of this was served on ice in the adorable barrel-shaped mug in the photo above. It was delicious, and a bit too easy to drink. Great texture from the egg white, and despite the presence of coffee liqueur, the drink really did taste quite like an iced chai latte. A pretty delicious tiki-esque start to the evening.

Round two was the Snowball Old Fashioned, which was made of:

• rye
• "gingerbread" (I suspect this was some sort of ginger Demerara syrup)
• aromatic and wormwood bitters
• orange essence

This was stored and strained over an ice ball which looked like it was made of compressed, crushed ice, which really sold that snowball effect (The Jasper typically serves old fashioned cocktails over a large clear cube with their logo stamped on one face). The illustrations of tipsy Santa on the glass were cute and, well, old fashioned looking! And the drink was a perfect late fall/early winter twist on the classic.

My third drink was called the...uh...Yippie Ki Yay Mother F****r! Heh. Yeah. Sure it’s the name of the drink that will get your attention, but this was deeeelicious. It had:

• Barbados rum
• rhum agricole
• Trinidad overproof rum
• ube and coconut orgeat
• acid-adjusted pineapple juice

It was served over coarsely crushed ice in a Santa pants mug and garnished with some powdered sugar and fresh mint. More holiday tiki! Absolutely delicious.

I had one more round before walking to dinner and getting a ride home, but it was "only" a Sazerac (my favorite classic cocktail, and made to perfection last night). It’s challenging for my wife and me to find time and a babysitter to do this sort of thing, but if I can make it happen, I will, because this was the most fun I’ve had at a bar in a long time. It would be ten times more fun if I can share it with Valerie. At any rate, I highly recommend it to anybody who can safely/comfortably drink in the Richmond area at least - though I imagine similarly excellent bars are participating elsewhere.

Happy holidays, and drink responsibly!

Here are a few unremarkable photos from my ride on the Oak Leaf Trail in Milwaukee County, WI. I rode a healthy chunk of the Menomonee River Line while exploring Wauwatosa, where my sister-in-law lives with her family. The whole trail network seems incredible, and I fully intend to bring my bike every time I return to Wisconsin so I can explore more of this system. I was lucky to see it with enough snow to add some beauty without being so much as to interfere with my ride.

The entire trail was paved and pretty well maintained, with enough winding pathways and river crossings through the landscape to keep it interesting.

My favorite part was the Hoyt Park Footbridge, which I think was a WPA project:

On my way back from Wisconsin this past weekend I tried to catch a few screenshots from the maps app on my smartphone (safely!) as I noticed some fun street names.

And finally, I noticed a nifty little detail when I was closer to a major metropolitan area (Chicago in this case): the map gained more 3D detail and, to my surprise, the route line passed beneath overpasses with color and opacity adjusted accordingly:

Not seen is that the indicator for my current position would also adjust when passing beneath an overpass. I’m sure people would rather have more accurate data and directions within Apple Maps, but I’m sure the visual design team isn’t responsible for that functionality, and I always appreciate these sort of details. They aren’t strictly necessary, but they add a nice bit of fun and a subconscious signal of attention to detail.

I’m up in the Milwaukee, WI area with my family for Thanksgiving. Earlier this week we went out to dinner at a restaurant called Organ Piper Pizza in Greenfield, just outside of town. It’s been open since 1976 and is, apparently, only one of 3 places like it left in the states. This place had me smiling ear-to-ear from the moment I saw the old sign with flashing lights and its mock Tudor exterior. The smile only widened as we heard the classic organ sounds and watched the flashing lights, quacking ducks, and mechanically-actuated percussion around the room.

Was the food any good? It was fine - exactly what you’d want at a family pizza place. Tavern-style pie that was crispy and tasty, and soda by the pitcher. The kids loved it and so did all the adults. If I lived near this place I’d be here every few months to be sure.

And hats off to Perry Petta, the organist. That man is a treasure.

This past Saturday I took a drive down to Farmville with my bike. I wanted to test my cycling endurance a bit with my longest ride yet: out and back to Burkeville, the eastern end of the High Bridge Trail. This was just over 30 miles and it left me a little bow-legged, even with some nice cushy chamois liners.

The trail itself leaves a lot to be desired. Don't get me wrong - the weather was gorgeous, and being outside on my bike (especially without having to dodge traffic) is better than not, but the trail isn't all that exciting. Excepting the eponymous high bridge and its views, there wasn't too much to see.

A persistent tree canopy rose over my head, just a week or so past peak fall foliage, and the path only turned occasionally. Most bewildering was the end of the trail in Burkeville - nothing but a lonely picnic table and no clear way to reach the trail directly at that end other than the trail itself!

Still, I feel a sense of accomplishment for having ridden that far. My previous longest ride was a little more than 22 miles (On a single speed! Around the city!), and I really get the effort on this one. The grade was pretty easy over the entire ride, but pedaling that long and sitting my obese frame on a bike saddle for over 3 hours was as much a mental exercise as physical.

I only wish I’d had more to photograph!

This past Friday was my birthday and I decided to walk the 2.5 miles from my home to the restaurant where my family would later meet me for dinner. The weather was gorgeous, so I took my DSLR with me. I didn't get much, but I figured since I had the time and no pressure, I’d rather have more than my iPhone on hand if I saw something interesting.

I’ve been quite a bit more active lately taking strolls around town. Yesterday, while my car was in the shop I was able to enjoy a particularly beautiful morning and snapped some photos along the way around Richmond’s Fan District

I recently had some time to hang out with my son at a park in town and he let me take some pictures of his handsome self.

Jill Bearup is a stage combatant with training in the art of fake fighting. Her YouTube channel has evolved over the years from from an assortment of topics to a tighter focus on all things stage/TV/cinematic fighting, whether it’s about weapons and reach, the absurdity of certain stylistic/armor choices in a fight, or how to defend yourself with a hat pin.

But my favorite format of Bearup's videos are those which appear to be analysis of particular fights from TV shows or movies, but really end up presenting a thoughtful video essay on characters, themes, and story within that media. Take the Avatar example at the top of this post: yes, Bearup speaks to the styles of combat and the shifting nature of the fight. But Avatar: The Last Airbender isn't an animated documentary about martial arts; it’s a dramatic story with dynamic characters! So Bearup details how each combatant's circumstances and character arcs inform their behavior and choices in this climactic duel. She speaks from a position of deep understanding of the show and the the motivations of each fighter. Watching this video gave me newfound understanding and appreciation for what was already my favorite sequence from the entire series.

It’s worth checking out her channel in general, but if you like media analysis/video essays and want a heavy dose of fight deconstruction along for the ride, you could do a lot worse than her examinations of Inigo and Wesley's fight in The Princess Bride, or the throne room duel in The Last Jedi.

Lately I’ve had a few things kicking around in my head that seem obvious, but I feel the urge to put them down in words on my blog for personal record and clarity. This one's about friendships.

I'm 40 years old now and have seen quite a few relationships come and go, blossom and whither. I often think about what can help friendships get started and, more-so, what it takes to keep them going. Even if the right pieces are in place, some friendships eventually fade for a variety of reasons, but I feel like I’ve gained some insight since childhood on what has the capacity to sustain friendships for the long term. I still fail at this often enough myself, of course.

How it Started

Most friendships seem to be instigated by either a chance encounter, life circumstances, or some unifying social group. I think about a chance encounter like striking up a conversation with a stranger in a coffee shop that turns into an extended conversation, which results in the exchange of social media profiles and eventually a long-running friendship. We just happened to be in the same place at the same time and happened to interact.

Life circumstances accounted for most of my childhood friends. My best friend during elementary school was a boy who was in the same class with me, and we mutually tolerated/enjoyed each other's quirky personalities and shared some common interests. Even if we weren't always in the same class, we still attended the same school and lived in the same town, so it was easy for our parents to drive each to the other's house, or meet up on the playground at recess.

Unifying social groups could be topical conventions which bring together like-minded and commonly-interested folks, predisposed to have at least a few things in common with each other by virtue of attendance. Whether it’s the campus ministry I participated in during undergrad, or a conference for people who make websites, these settings provide a lot of social shortcuts that can help strangers accelerate the whole getting-to-know-you part of a new relationship. I’ve made friends online this way where the unifying social factor was a mutual friend that started a podcast. I'm not religious anymore, but I still have quite a few friends I made during those college ministry days or in past church congregations.

I'm a Firestarter

"We have a lot in common."

Common interests are like starter logs. They can get a friendship going, but you need more than that keep the fire burning. Most of the friendships of my youth and early adulthood were defined by common interests because so many young people wrap up their identities in their interests. Grunge rock. Making stuff. Beach life.

But most people don't like all the same bands for their whole lives. Most people don't want to do all the same activities, visit the same places, read the same genres of fiction. People change, and with personal change comes a new, or at least shifting, sets of interests. It’s entirely possible that your interests may shift with your friend's, but it’s also possible you’ll run out of things to do and talk about if that’s most of the scope of your friendship.

I'm pretty sure that’s why my best friends from high school aren’t even acquaintances of mine today. We all went to separate colleges at different times and, when we came back together after an extended time apart, we’d all been shaped by new experiences, influenced by new people, and our tastes had changed in different ways. Those common interests were just about all we had between us, so there wasn't much left when they no longer aligned. I don't morn the loss because I recognize that none of us really did anything to split up the group. We just grew up and grew apart.

"Well, I gotta keep it going keep it going full steam"

If common interests are the fire starters, shared experiences and proactive communication are the fuel and oxygen, respectively.

With legal adulthood came increasing autonomy. Now I could travel, make some (limited) financial and social decisions on my own, and generally explore the world around me a bit more. I didn't need my mom to drive me to my friend's house to socialize. My friend and I could decide, together, that we wanted to drive up to New Jersey to see Weezer in concert one college summer. I'm not in to Weezer as much anymore (though their first two albums will always be some of my favorite music) and my friend was never as big a fan as I was, but we will always have that trip. We will always have that time spent traveling, sharing in the choices, consequences, and rewards of those days. Shared memories have the ability to unite us in ways that don't change with our tastes.

But that same friend and I rarely talk anymore. We were best friends for years (and I dare say we could still pick right back up and have a helluva time together), but because the lines of communication have long run silent, we just don't keep up with each other. There are loads of factors that can disrupt communication; with this friend I think it’s because we shifted into different stages of life. But what differentiates that friendship from the ones I still count as strong and active is that my still-healthy friendships include regular, two-way communication.

"I felt so symbolic yesterday"

I don't think I'm saying anything profound here, and I'm certainly not speaking from a place of expertise. But I dunno, maybe it’s the kind of introspection that comes with the awareness of one's own aging.

Thanks for reading, friend.

Yesterday my family went to Fort Fisher State Recreation Area in North Carolina, in the Wilmington area. We wanted to hang out by the ocean in the unseasonably warm weather and test out a new kite that my sister-in-law and her husband gave the kids for Christmas. As we approached our destination my wife checked the weather and saw a special advisory statement for dense sea fog rolling in from the ocean. I don't think there's anything more alluring to an amateur photographer than fog, except perhaps decaying buildings.

I don't have a whole lot more to say about this other than the kite was terrific, and the chill of the fog was an oddly welcome break from climate change's late December spring temperatures.

It’s commonplace in liberal circles to talk about friends and family "lost" to Fox News. There's "Fox News brain", "Fox News brainwashing", and other variations of what I'm starting to feel like is a form of denial. I'm sure there are folks who really have been duped by false and/or misleading information from that god-awful TV network, but I suspect the truth is more depressing. We just don't want to admit that Fox News has merely provided pithy soundbites and new dog whistles to our loved ones that have always believed some terrible things.

The trailer for Pixar's upcoming scit-fi feature Lightyear has been out for a little bit now, and I’ve been mulling over why I'm so excited about it. Because seriously, I am super excited for this movie. There was a lot of weird confusion and questions around the Extremely Online set following this trailer mainly because folks were trying to figure out whether this is supposed to be the backstory for the toy in Pixar's Toy Story franchise, or if it's simply a spin-off based on the character.

I don't actually care how and why it connects to Toy Story. I know trailers are frequently made by different groups that have nothing to do with the movie production and they're working from incomplete footage, but the tone of this one has all the wonder and excitement of a classic space adventure story. A beautifully grandiose take on Bowie's Star Man plays behind shots of launch preparations, spaceports, longing stares out the window, action and adventure in strange locations. There's even a shot of Buzz's ship on a marshy planet reminiscent of Luke's X-Wing on Dagobah.

If you grew up watching anything Star Wars or Star Trek, how could you not be excited by this? Yeah, I know this will likely have plenty of silly humor and call-backs to Buzz's haughty toy persona from Toy Story, but I'm hoping it can also be an exciting sci-fi adventure film that’s accessible for kids, but enjoyable for anybody who dreams of traveling between the stars.

Today the weather was BEAUTIFUL. And it was a walking kind of day. We walked about 5.3 miles, actually. It would have been more but we took advantage of the free and excellent downtown bus service several times. In the morning we left the B&B after pancakes and headed for Waterfront Park. It was almost chilly that early and the wind by the ocean certainly added to the feeling of autumn's late arrival.

We were simultaneously enjoying the outdoors and killing time until the opening of Robert Lange Studios where we could see a painting by our friend Cassandra Loomis Kim. It was wonderful to see our friend's work in a group show (her work is "King Grizzly") away from home, but it was also a really cool gallery in its own right. I'm a particular fan of Nathan Durfee's work which reminds me a lot of children's book author/illustrator Dan Santat.

After the gallery we wandered uptown toward the College of Charleston, grabbing an okay lunch at Basic Kitchen before visiting a disappointing triceratops-themed coffee shop. It’s called Tricera Coffee, but it’s really just a sad, slow business with a bunch of triceratops toys in random places around the interior.

We made up for the disappointment by meandering through Marion Square before grabbing some truly delicious pastries from La Patisserie at Hotel Bennett.

Here is where we grabbed our first bus to the western end of the old market, after which we walked a short distance to our true caffeine destination: Second State Coffee. This place just straight up delivered. The espresso was delicious, the cappuccino was perfect. I bought a bag of beans to take back to Virginia, it was so good. The barista was terrific and even tipped me off on a different way to try brewing a Chemex (going to look up "double blooming" when I get a chance). Turns out they have a second location now just across the bridge from Charleston, so we’ll likely grab some brew on the way back to NC to get the kids tomorrow.

The afternoon consisted of meandering around a bit more, killing time before our dinner reservation at 5:30 (reminder: we are olds). So we walked by the old Dock Street Theater and the French Huguenot church, hit the market so Valerie could get souvenirs for the kids, and even snagged a little cocktail before din-din. We supped at Poogan's Smokehouse - part of the same group as Poogan's Porch where we ate so many years ago. The food was pretty good, but the service left a lot to be desired. The one cocktail I ordered? Truly abysmal.

We didn't want as early a night as yesterday so we grabbed another bus to head up Meeting Street to Little Palm, quite possibly the coolest bar I’ve visited in a long time. There was a real Miami Beach club vibe in this bar at The Ryder Hotel without feeling kitschy, and the drinks were super inventive. Great staff, great interior, even greater drinks.

We caught one more bus further downtown so we could finish the night with some fantastic frozen treats from Off Track Ice Cream. Bellies full and tiredness setting in to our aging bones, we headed back to the B&B where we're now recuperating and winding down. We head out after breakfast tomorrow, but it’s been a spectacular return to this old city in The South. There's a lot of fun to be had and sights to be seen without feeding the Plantation Tourism Complex, and I hope we can make it back sooner than another 10 years.