MTheads

Day Four Red Hat

foot people

A foot is a person

a foot is a thing

a foot can wear hats

so can I.

- SMT  

Day Three Red Hat

  red hat red matroshka

red hat red matroshka

     red hat red matroshka

 red hat red matroshka

                                 red

hat            re d matroshka re

      d ha     t  ma  t ro shk a

r e        dma t  o s                             kare

 

Adorable Animal Pic Tuesday!!!

When you don't have hands, you have to use your tongue to make shadow pics.

Day Two of Red Hat

this is the other me

i still have the same hat

my dog is right there

- L

The Perfect Coffee Maker

I can't remember when I didn't make coffee using one of these little guys.  Those must have been dark days.  For those who have never used a moka coffee maker, they are cheap, simple to use, and make great coffee.

The only downside is they can't be left on the stove unattended.  I have to replace the little rubber gasket inside every so many months because I'll lose track of time and cook the gasket to death.  Every now and then, I'll leave the pot on the stove for so long I destroy the entire thing. 

As you can see, this blue guy has lost some hit points through inattentiveness.  I've had him for two years -- a record.  I'd like to replace him with a stainless steel version, but it's hard for me to spend the money when this one still works.  I'm waiting for my next inattentive spell.

Day One of 365 Days of Red Hat (May Change to 3 Days, Depends...)

Why?  Because I'm moved to produce:

the image of its own self-sublimation. 

think about it.  I'm so smart. 

I/me visited the Moscow Museum of Modern Art. 

- M

The Beauty of Everyday Objects.

We all have certain functional items in our homes, like a perfect vegetable peeler, which we would keenly miss if lost.  Replacing them isn't easy.  Money isn't the issue since many of these items aren't expensive.  The problem is finding the exact replacement.  Due to some infernal law of the universe:  The more perfect the item, the less chance you have of ever finding one just like it again.  Even if you saw an aisle full of those things last week.  You are highly unlikely to ever, ever, ever find that exact vegetable peeler again.

Finding new items to replace our loved ones is like getting back into the dating game after 20 years of marriage.  You have to go through the whole process of getting to know someone, again.  Compromises have to be made, quirks learned before you can be comfortable with the new peeler.  It's a time of adjustment.  Try not to make comparisons, this just leads to "what ifs" and doubts.

Why do I love some of my inanimate objects?  They make my life easier.  They free up my time.  They work the first time, and they work with enviable ease and logic.  Sometimes, they are even beautiful in a utilitarian way.

I'm going to share some of my favorite functional items around the house: Here is a cloth bag I love.  I bought it at a Russian grocery store called Perekrostok.  It's both pretty and functional.  It's the perfect size for a run to the store.  I can hang it off my shoulder, and it stays!

The Council on Foreign Relations Embraces School Choice

WSJ has an interesting essay on yet another group who espouses school choice and competition: School Reform's Establishment Turn. Eventually, school choice will be adopted by everyone and no one will remember why, or admit, they were against it. 

What's Old is New Again, But with a New Blurb on the Dust Cover

Another interesting article calling on progressive people to send their children to local public schools (ht to Joanne Jacobs).  Yes, they claim it's out of principle.  But, dang, they sure can save a lot of money.  They can put that extra money towards a good State school.

Sending My Kids to Public School: Why being a part of the system is how to fix it By Rhiana Maidenberg

Yeah! for these recent essays making the case for upper-middle class/progressive kinds of parents to enroll their children in local schools and to become part of the solution.  It's a better argument than going after people for not putting their children into the local schools.  Put your own children into local schools before criticizing other people for not doing so.  Anyway, arguments against choice and vouchers lack moral umph when made from people whose own children attend stellar public schools or private academies.

But fair warning:  For those who think their decision to opt in is revolutionary, fixing the system from the inside has been an on-going and thankless process pursued by parents for decades, and no more likely to be effective without real choice for all parents.

Funny world when progressives and Charles Murray all agree on something:

Changing life in the SuperZIPs requires that members of the new upper class rethink their priorities. Here are some propositions that might guide them: Life sequestered from anybody not like yourself tends to be self-limiting. Places to live in which the people around you have no problems that need cooperative solutions tend to be sterile. America outside the enclaves of the new upper class is still a wonderful place, filled with smart, interesting, entertaining people. If you're not part of that America, you've stripped yourself of much of what makes being American special.

Such priorities can be expressed in any number of familiar decisions: the neighborhood where you buy your next home, the next school that you choose for your children, what you tell them about the value and virtues of physical labor and military service, whether you become an active member of a religious congregation (and what kind you choose) and whether you become involved in the life of your community at a more meaningful level than charity events.

 

Lake Baikal Adventure

I ran a half marathon in Siberia this past weekend.  A friend happened to mention she was running in the Lake Baikal Marathon/Half, and was I interested in it also?  Ahhhh, yes.  Who wouldn't be? This gave me a solid three weeks to prepare for the half marathon after a two and a half year break from running.  Luckily, I had a crack theory on how to train for long distance races.

A friend of mine (who also took part) theorizes that the best running program is one where you avoid injuries from over-training.  So, the more you run, the greater your chances of injury.  The less you run, the less chance of injury.  Taking this theory to its logical conclusion, he avoided any risk of injury by doing no training.   I took a less radical approach and did a little bit of training.  I managed to run a total of four times before the big day.  Though I do follow his theory of no training in just about every other endurance sport.

The Lake Baikal Marathon/Half Run was some of the most fun I've ever had.  It takes place in the small village of Listyanka outside Irkutsk.  Listyanka is a lovely Siberian village with charming homes and incredible views of the lake and surrounding mountains.  The air is squeaky clean, the sky a palette of blues from light to dark, and the snow brilliant white.  The biggest danger for a runner is actually snow blindness, then killer Nerpa seals.

There are lots of activities in the area -- dog sledding, snow mobiling, skiing, hiking, touring other villages around the lake.  Everywhere I went the food was excellent.  The cuisine is Russian with Siberian influence.  Most of the meals in local restaurants include the fish from Lake Baikal called omul.  These guys are related to trout and quite delicious.  

Everything I ate was good, except for one meal -- the pre-race spaghetti dinner.  Yes, we had spaghetti noodles, but the sauces were very odd and salty.  It's like the chef based recipes on images of spaghetti sauce without a list of ingredients.  Better we had had a pre-race pelmeni dinner.

Now for the race:  Imagine running in 7 degrees fahrenheit ( - 236 degrees celsius for our international readers), on the world's deepest lake, on ice, across snowdrifts, leaping over chasms of roiling lake water, dodging hovercrafts filled with crazy picture snapping relatives, rabid seals, and the strangest sensation of frost bite and heat exhaustion at the same time. 

And no toilets on the course!  It's a lonely yet very public thing to take a potty break on frozen flat tundra with nothing to hide behind except the curvature of the earth.  Only people in Florida didn't have a view to the show. I did feel much better afterwards, though - and shame, yes, but I think I made the right choice.

The race itself was very well organized.  The people running the show were personable and competent.  The runners were a hardy, insane breed from all over.  We had groups from China, Japan, Germany, and Australia.  A couple of guys from Spain.  A sprinkling of Anglo-American types, an Austrian, someone from South Africa, some other places, and plenty of locals, who swept the medals for the men's full marathon.

Starting line.  It's hard to tell whether it's a run or a scuba event.

"Please, please, no running to the left of the red flags. You may be disqualified. No questions."   The pre-race information meeting was dominated by warnings to not run to the left of the red flags. Killer seals?  Anti-Putin protests?  Mystery...

 
  Nerpa dog

 
  Nerpa cat

Actual baby killer Nerpa seal.  Luckily I got my shoe back.