Month: April 2016

Intellectual Honesty

Some Facts.

Fact 1: I will not vote for Donald Trump for POTUS.

This bears repeating: I will not vote for Donald Trump for POTUS.

Fact 2: The statement, “X is usually wrong,” DOES NOT mean, “X is always wrong.”

Example: I do not generally approve the policies of Obama. However, I do specifically approve his  foreign policy decisions over the last (roughly) 8 years. This, I hope you understand, is an expression of  intellectual honesty; I believe it is right to give credit where credit is due.

Similarly with Trump (please review Fact 1). Consider a paragraph from a recent report that appeared in the New Yorker, regarding a supposed “agreement” between Cruz and Kasich to prevent Trump from winning the nomination

Collusion is an ugly word. In his statement, Trump said that “collusion is often illegal in many other industries,” which is true, in terms of price-fixing and other antitrust violations, but politics is not one of those industries. As many observers have pointed out, political parties get to set their own rules. But that does not mean that voters like those rules. The problem for the public is that these days there is generally no effective way into the political process except through one of the two major parties. The Democrats and Republicans have become duopolists—too big for anyone else to succeed. That reality creates an expectation that the parties themselves will be reasonably democratic. Collusion is the new “rigged,” the word that Trump uses to argue that there is not a free market in elections, that he is not getting the delegates he deserves, that Party insiders want to steal what’s his. He is trying to make Cruz and Kasich sound like a couple of cartel-backed price-fixers.

Trump is right, the reporter wrong, if she really believes this isn’t an example of collusion. It is an example of collusion, that is, if the definition of words really matters (emphasis mine)

noun: collusion:

secret or illegal cooperation or conspiracy, especially in order to cheat or deceive others.

Here, “others” refers to all the primary voters who voted for Trump (and  thus secured his delegates) .

“Secret” refers to the nature of the deals agreed to by Cruz & Kasich, and the machinations many fear will be carried out by Republican party operatives at the convention, to deny the putative Will of the People.

Where, Will of the People = We vote Trump to be the Republican nominee.

You may not like the People’s Will, Kasich and Cruz may not like the People’s Will, party operatives may not like the People’s Will — I may not like the People’s Will! But an effort to subvert the People’s Will (“others”) via mysterious (“secret”) rules/agreements – sorry folks, that’s Collusion. And so far as I recall from High School civics (very little to be honest), it’s exceedingly un-Democratic. Trump is right about that much.

To summarize:

Fact 1: I will not vote for Donald Trump for POTUS.

Fact 2: The statement, “X is usually wrong,” DOES NOT mean, “X is always wrong.”

Back Home

HW in her sh*t kickers. Our last day in Texas I think. You do not want to end up on the wrong side of a kick from one of those bad boys.

We had a good time in the Texas Hill Country. Though it’s always a little sad at the end of a tour. I’ve been on many over the years.  At the start you’re pressed together with people most of whom you’ve never met before, and for a week or more you do everything together – cycle, eat breakfast, meet each night (to discuss the next day), sleep in the same hotel, etc.. Then before you know it – Poof! – the tour’s over. There’s the hugs, the goodbyes, the great-to meetchayas, and the everyone goes their own way. It feels a bit like drive-by friendship. Although, like the others I suppose, it does feel good to be back home.

Never before had a dog with a built-in carry handle

He likes to run the tide line trying to catch himself a gull. Just once I wish he’d get one. He’s a young dog so who knows, maybe one day one of them birds gets a little complacent, misjudges the dog’s distance or speed, lifts off a bit too late…who can say for sure.

Moving up the food chain

Going Home

Happy Wife complained at the Starbucks this morning of having high interstitial fluid. (It’s the heat). I reminded her that her latte was a good diuretic. She proceeded to school me that diuresis (the reduction of interstitial fluid) is more involved than merely peeing out coffee.

“Sorry honey,” I said, “I got nothing.”

And so our day began.

One of those days you feel captive inside the airport hotel with few places to venture to on foot. Last night shortly after we arrived we crossed the gauntlet of traffic entering and exiting a major freeway and managed to find a decent Tex-Mex restaurant. We spotted the Starbucks next door. That was about it. Nothing else, really, except freeway and anonymous concrete as far as the eye could see. At least it beat hotel room-coffee and calling out for pizza.

Another few hours before we lift off for Portland. And then a couple more hours there before we lift off for the Greatland. Home after midnight.

But… But!  Eventually, on the pentultimate day of the tour, we found ourselves among the Bluebonnets

HW and I started the tour woefully out of shape. The last time I rode my road bike was probably September of last year. Longer still for HW. I think we were possibly the two youngest people on the tour, yet most days we came in last or near last. Not that there’s anything the least bit competitive about these tours, there isn’t, nobody really cares how fast or slow you are. But when people 10-12 years your senior finish the day a half hour or more before you, you do begin to wonder 1) how the hell they stay so fit, and 2) why they are not reaching for four ibuprofen the second they dismount their bikes.

By night we roamed Main Street in Fredericksburg in search of a decent place to eat. The city was originally settled by Germans in the late nineteenth century and so not surprisingly many restaurants feature German inspired fare. Somehow, though, schnitzel and potatoes over red cabbage doesn’t make the mouth water after 50 miles in the saddle in 82 degree heat. (I think we were also the only two on the tour to refer to an 82 degree day as hot). We tried a German restaraunt one night and the food was awful. The meat was absolutely flavorless, like it had been boiled in gray water. The noodles and fries were equally tasteless with the texture of wet cardboard. I added salt (a lot) to my (so-called) chicken-fried steak. No difference. All I tasted was salt. Which I have to admit was an improvement. A similar disaster played out on HW’s plate. To her credit she was brave enough to try the “blue cheese” dressing on her dinner salad (such as it was). Not me. The stuff came separate from the salad in a small plastic cup. Pretty typical, until you looked closely – small white curd-like clumps of who knows what sunk to the bottom of a milky-white oil substance. Whatever it was it looked to me like it had spoiled. The look on HW’s face after one mouthful indicated maybe it had. I hailed the waitress and asked that she bring us the ranch dressing instead. That, at least, was passable.

On our last day in Fredericksburg two women, at what came to be our favorite wine bar, where cowboys come to Tweet and drink Rose, turned us on to Ottos.

And Otto’s? OMG.  The venue ain’t much larger inside than the living room of a large house, but don’t let that fool ya.

For starters we shared the Foie Gras “BLT”

seared hudson valley foie gras, tomato jam, candied bacon, quail egg

HW’s entrée,  Duck Schnitzel

hand-breaded duck breast, spätzle, rotkohl, kirsch demi-glace, duck cracklins

Mine, locally-sourced Quail with potatoes voulere over broccoli

(special of the night so couldn’t find the fancy description online)

For dessert, a slice of sinfully delicious cheesecake with caramel drizzle and salted pecans

Better yet, one of the women at the wine bar who turned us on to Ottos called the restaraunt while we were eating to tell our waiter she wanted to pay for our drinks! Blown away we were by that Texas-sized generosity, I wanna tell ya’ll.

Fun in the Hill Country

Waiting for the starting gun at the start of the LBJ 100. Must’ve been 1500 cyclists

Sensational day for cycling. Cool in the morning and 70 by midday. Free food and beer at the end. Impressive organization. I’d do it again for sure. This women rode thirty miles on this bike, in those clothes. It’s not visible here but there is leather saddle on the bike. Impressive effort. Captured her here performing for onlookers after the ride

Yes, Texas

Stopped at the Whole Foods flagship store in Austin while out shopping for a pair of sensible walking shoes for Happy Wife. She’d forgotten to pack flats or flip-flops. The healthiest food, the store claims, is near the entrance. The abundance is overwhelming

We didn’t intend to stay long, just wanted to check the place out. Then HW said, Hey, why don’t we pick up some cheese, hummus, crackers, and olives to eat back at our room? Brilliant! So far so good. Until we spotted the wine bar. Instantly we looked at each other, raised our eyebrows and nodded simultaneously. Not a word went between us. We tend to be of one mind in such matters. Before we knew it we were seated at the bar, the groceries paid for, opened and spread out in front of us like a picnic lunch. We were into our second glass of wine before we took note of the cheesy movie showing on the TV behind the bar: Circle of Iron. NYT review here. Think Quest of Fire but with more dialog. The lead dude looked like Peter Frampton but was actually Roddie McDowell, plus David Carradine, who played four different roles in the movie, and Eli Wallach, who had to sit in a barrel of oil for ten years to get rid of his genitals. I asked folks around the bar why, but nobody was sure.

If you want to shop while you drink you can. The bartender was happy to decant your beer or wine into a plastic cup. If I’m not mistaken the shopping carts had drink holders. What a country.

 Like in other cities the abundance in Austin is not evenly distributed

For those of you trying to guess where we stayed, The Driskill. Happy Wife paused to point out the obvious, Dude, that’s Mr. Driskill

Later it was back to Tim Love’s Lonesome Dove restaurant to celebrate HW’s birthday

We enjoyed the food so much the night before we went back for more.

Wednesday we packed everything up and headed west to Fredericksburg to begin the bike tour. Hill country! Pretty country. Bluebonnets! The landscape sorta reminds me of a cross between Pasa Robles, CA and the hills outside Santa Fe, NM. More later from the first day of the ride.

Today (Friday) was supposed to be the second day of riding, except we woke to heavy thunderstorms and sheets of rain. So the tour leader cancelled the ride. It was 84 yesterday. This morning it was 55. Not expected to reach even 65 today. Starting tomorrow, 75-85 and sunny for a week or more. Tomorrow we’re all entered in the LBJ 100.