July 7th, 2011 - Nashville Tennessee

Nashville again? Yes. You can't do all or even most of Nashville in a day and it would take months to get the full range of flavor the city has to offer. More importantly, Nashville has so many things to do for FREE. North Alabama could learn a ton from the learning and arts opportunities that are readily available in the greater Nashville area for under $10 a person or less.

The main destination of our trip was to the Tennessee State Museum and specifically the Egyptian Relics, Replicas, and Revivals in the changing gallery. Admission to both the Museum and the Egyptian exhibit are free, but the Egyptians wonders are only in town until September 4th.

The museum features many artifacts and items from the early history of Tennessee including its fair share of "jars and bowls" to an armory of Cival War era swords and firearms. I tend to take pictures of what catches my eye as opposed to what has the most historical value, so with that in mind... I thought these were kind of cool.

Here we see a depiction of the Great Bass Drum Massacre of 1815. You see these people? Yeah, they're running away from the bass drummer. As well you should, people of 1815... as well you should.

This a small plaque on a bench made by David Crockett (king of the wild frontier). Crockett's hands touched this wood. There was a sign nearby that asked people to "please" not touch the bench. What kind of a cruel thing is that to do? Why place something of cultural and historical importance within arm's length and then ask people not to touch it? The bench practically begged to be touched.

I totality touched this

See this? This is an actual mummy. This isn't from the traveling Egyptian exhibit and this isn't a replica. This is an honest-to-goodness dead person. I got to see this FOR FREE. Thank you, state of Tennessee and city of Nashville for reminding me how much you rock. This is said to be a 3,600-year-old Egyptian mummy brought to Tennessee in 1860.

Did not touch

There were several hand-crafted quilts and other pieces of art on display.

This is called "Atlas" by Jess Jones of Smithville, Tennessee and is described as "Digitally printed, artist-made paper and vintage map, with signatures, in abaca paper and found papers, with waxed linen." I rather like it. It appeals to my love of maps and old diagrams.

The following are replicas from the visiting Egyptian exhibit. (I did take a picture of some of the actual relics using my zoom, but decided not to post those because I thought that seeing them in person was the better experience. So go see them. Did I mention it's free?)

This guy was at the entrance to the "Revival" section of the Egypt exhibit. I want this in my bedroom. Esther may object. I really should have checked to see if they had miniatures in the gift shop...

I think it looks like a giant Stikfas minotaur. Who wouldn't want that?

PLAYMOBIL!

This next painting freaks me out. Warning: scary baby alert! It's wearing eye-liner and has what appears to be a shaved head, four o'clock shadow and a double chin. I think this is the Antebellum version of those Facebook apps that combine your picture with that of your romantic partner to show what your hypothetical children would look like. I have no idea what that is in its hand- it's semi-transparent hand. I'm also assuming that this is a female child in a dress and not a male child in some dress-like gown.

More up from our day in Nashville in a bit but for the time being you can check out all the pictures from the (FREE!) museum here, including two of our children in the stocks.

July 5th, 2011 - Paint

Esther and I headed into Cullman with That Girl One to get some paint to start/finish a couple of projects around the house. We were briefly distracted by a trip to Hobby Lobby.

This picture says everything I believe about US politics.

Esther found something that she felt a particular attachment to as well.

From there we moved on to Lowe's and the Aisle of Endless Colors that I love so much. I could be all angsty and negative and say that the paint aisle for me is a perfect illustration of the culture of excess we live in, but I won't. Choice is good. Esther chose "Blue Phlox" for the new house paint. 

Here we see Esther pondering the subtle differences between BLUE#26445 and BLUE#26446.

We stopped at a couple of furniture stores to see what the current thinking is in bat-shit crazy prices for sofa and loveseat combinations. Let's see... new sofa and loveseat or a bionic arm that shoots a grappling hook? New sofa and loveseat or enough gasoline to power the Death Star? Tough choices.

The second floor of a furniture store in downtown Cullman that I remember from my youth. Haven't been here in about 20+ years. Not much has changed.

A short while later we had all the trained monkeys busily toiling away with Blue Phlox covered brushes.

I'd like to add that Phlox is one of the few flowers that I can, most days, identify on sight.

A few other random pictures from the day can be viewed here.

July 4th, 2011 - Continued

I think Esther has this whole corn on the grill thing down to a science. I can't think of a better way to cook corn on the cob. There's no need for additional buttering, you just peel open the foil and munch away. I messed around with some curry and Rooster Sauce, but you can't get much better than butter (or butter-like substance of your choice) and a few simple seasonings.

The guinea pigs are thankful for the roughage to nosh on.

We also blew a few things up in the name of independence- less this year than the last because our big scary wolf-dog has developed a real freak-out response to the louder rockets. Esther wrapped his mid-section in an ace bandage (not as crazy as it seems) and we put all three of the beasts inside the house while we did our level best to set the pasture on fire... for FREEDOM!

All the pictures from the 4th can be viewed here. 

July 4th, 2011 - Speaking of Travel Bugs...

We like our Travel Bugs and Geocoins to travel the world and collect pictures and visit the places that we've never been to as our proxy selves. Sometimes, however, things happen and a Travel Bug goes missing in action. Maybe they get left inside a backpack that is lost in the bottom of a ravine. Perhaps they are thrown out the window by a mischievous little brother. There are even some folks that have taken it upon themselves to find trackables and keep them with the intent of never returning them.
 

Sometimes life just throws you a curve ball (Ha! Sports reference!) and the Travel Bug you picked up last week in a cache is somewhere in the rubble of your wrecked car or lost along with all your belongings in a house fire.
 

The point is, Travel Bugs are subject to Murphy's Law times ten. How many other things in your life do you purchase just to leave in a plastic box in the woods in the hopes that another like-minded soul will find it, pick it up and move it to another box in the woods within a reasonable amount of time, over and over again? The very raison d'etre of a trackable is to become lost and never seen again.
 

But reincarnation is an option...
 

When you purchase a Travel Bug “dog tag” you get two physical metal tags. The second tad has the word “COPY” written on it but is otherwise identical to it's twin brother. This tag is like the green 1-up mushroom in Super Mario. If your Bug finds itself sucked into a black hole you can bring it back to life with the COPY tag.

Here are three Bugs that I've recently given a second chance at life:

 

Original release: “Castle Mischief Racing Spoon 'Prince'”

We had this great idea to release five measuring spoons as Travel Bugs- one for each of us- and see which ones would rack up the most miles and travel the farthest. Two of these were stolen out of the first cache they were placed in and never seen again. This taught me something: I don't like the idea of representations of my kids, even plastic spoons, being stolen and collected by some jerk. It kind of bothered me. The saying is “never release something as a Travel Bug that you can't bear to lose forever”. Well, I didn't like the idea of losing little avatars of my wife and kids.
 

Re-release: “Jeep Shmeep – Blue Toyota 4-Runner”

Several years ago there was a promotional release of special trackables in coordination with Jeep. These ran for a few years with a different color of Jeep each year. The promotion is long gone but I can't help but notice the popularity of Jeep vehicles among other cachers. Well, I've never owned a Jeep but I did have a red 4-Runner. This re-released Travel Bug is a blue Matchbox version of that same Toyota.

Original release: "The Keys to Castle Mischief"

Every castle needs a big rusty ring of keys to unlock all the doors, right? That was the idea here. At some point in its history the dog tag and the ring of keys were separated and that pretty much means the death of a Travel Bug.

Re-release: "Bell-Head the Panda Ninja"

If our fictional ring of keys for our fictional castle were to come up missing they needed a fictional bandit to abscond with them. This was a Taco Bell kid's meal toy that is kind of a knock-off of several other lines of PVC figures available on the market. I thought it was cute and I've been hanging on to it for a while, knowing that I would be attaching a dog tag and sending it out into the world.

Original release: "Roll the Bones - A Rush Tribute"

I'm a reasonably large Rush fan (i.e. I don't own a Rush shower curtain but I do have several CDs and concert ticket stubs). This was a set of three dice (one for each of the members of Rush) and an actual dog tag in the shape of a bone with the lyrics from the song by the same name had a goal of traveling to a town in Canada that is seen by many as the birthplace of Rush. It never crossed the US/Canadian border.

Re-release: "Darth Vader's Tricked-Out Ride"

This started out as a Happy Meal toy of a Star Wars TIE fighter. Not the "classic" TIE fighter but the one like a certain Lord of the Sith tries to shoot Luke out of the sky with in Episode 3. It's like the standard TIE with a ground effects package and a bitchin' rad spoiler and "Type R" sticker on it. You know that when Vader saw it for the first time he was like all "oh, that one is mine. Don't make me force choke you for it."

Feel free to click the links to the trackable pages and add these to your watchlist if you're a cacher or simply check back in with them if you're not.

Happy caching, and have a safe and happy 4th of July!

June 15, 2011 - Geocoin Review: "Cache at Night"

Howdy-do!

I'd like to tell you a little about a new Geocoin that I recently acquired. What's a Geocoin, you say? Well if you've clicked the links that I provided in the word "Geocoin" or if you are a geocacher you already know. For those of you non-clicking non-caching people that are still reading, here's the short version of it:


There are these things collectively called "Trackables" that some people put inside geocaches for other people to find and move to a new cache. When you find a Trackable item you log the find using a unique tracking code that is written on the Trackable itself. A record of your activity is stored in your profile on geocaching.com. You can embellish your log with additional details or your experience during the hunt and pictures, just like you can with the online log for the geocache itself.


Now, Trackables are divided into two main categories: Travel Bugs and Geocoins. Travel Bugs resemble a military dog-tag and generally look the same. Sometimes folks will attach things to the chain that runs through the Travel Bug dog-tag and sometimes they will attach the dog-tag itself to an item and release that, but the shape and size of the thing is usually the same as is the icon that is pictured on your profile- a bug-shaped barcode looking design that is also present on the tag itself.

Geocoins are everything Travel Bugs are but come in a near-infinite range of sizes, shapes and icons. Most are designed by other geocachers. There have been fully functional sextants, multi-piece puzzles and stained-glass pieces of art. 


The coin that I'd like to show you today is more of a more traditional design in that it is very "coin-looking" but also has some other rather cool features. 


This is the front side of the "Cache at Night" Geocoin available from cacheatnight.com. As you can tell by the name of the coin and the website, the focus here is on Geocaching in the dark of night. The artwork on the "heads" side features a very Scooby-Doo-esque spooky tree complete with owl silhouette and a cresent moon hovering in the night sky above. At the base of the tree is the classic ammo can container, a favorite choice of geocachers world-wide. On the trunk of the tree is a white dot that represents a "fire tack" that is often used to guide cachers who seek special night-only geocaches with their reflective surface. The words "Grab A Light and Cache at Night" flank the two sides of the tree.

On the "tails" side of the coin is a flashlight surrounded by some cartoony eyes, again like you'd see on Scooby-Doo or around Halloween. The spot-light from the flashlight is focused on the coin's unique tracking number (which I have edited out in this picture.) At top is the required "Trackable at Geocaching.com" that you can expect to see on every Geocoin.

Now here's the cool part. The two images below were taken after shining the light on my cellphone on them for a few seconds. I used about a 3 second shutter and the aperture open to 3.4 but I have not cranked the color up in Photoshop or anything like that. I'd say these represent well what they really look like in the dark. The shine off the "tails" side is particularly bright due to the amount of phosphorescent material. 

Of all the details on the coin, the eyes on the back look really great when they glow.


The coin has a really nice heft to it. It's about the size and weight of two silver dollars stacked on top of each other, maybe slightly heavier. You can see the webpage for my coin and the icon for it by going here.

June 13, 2011 - Dungeons and Dragons Nerds

Here we have a room full of nerds playing Dungeons and Dragons. Specifically, 2nd Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. 

See that Player's Handbook there on the table? Lots of memories were made with that book. Can you spot the Dungeon Master in the group? That would be my boy, standing up in front of his friends, using his imagination and his brain. Those kids- those are the socially inept home-schooled kids I keep hearing about that are stuck at home all day and never get out and never have any friends.

Notice the obvious age differences in these kids. Remind you of anything? Possibly the age differences of your workplace or adult social group...? Check out how the girls are playing with the boys (and one girl left early). 

These are Dungeons and Dragons nerds and I couldn't be more proud to know each and every one of them and call two of them my sons and one of them my daughter.

June 11, 2011 - Shoal Creek Canoe Run (or, A Tugboat am I)

Esther is pretty good at coming up with last minute plans. She's really good at making plans months ahead too, but that's just not how things worked out this weekend. So this Saturday the thing that she set us out to do was canoe down the Shoal Creek in Tennessee. We've been canoeing before. Most recently, Esther and I paddled around at the Chattanooga Nature Center during a visit last October. As a family, we've paddled 9 miles on Bear Creek in Alabama. This was to be a 10 mile trip for the five of us- two in a canoe and the other three in tubes. All indications were that the current would be rapid enough to keep us all moving downstream at a nice pace.

The day started out as most of the rafting/canoeing trips I've been on start- packed into a 1970-somthing era Ford or Chevy van with total strangers. I don't know where these vans come from. Most vehicles this old have simply ceased to function and it's not as if they are collector's items. They come from a time before the "mini" van and the air-bag. The air-conditioners never work, the side doors have to be slammed shut and most of the head-liner reverted to its constituent elements during the first George Bush's term in office. They are beasts of burden with FOUR bench seats in the back and if you're lucky the windows will open so that a little air not smelling of good 'ol boy can get into the cabin.

We were dropped off about 10 miles upstream of Iron City, Tennessee. Oh, I almost forgot! Zephyr, our loyal Mop-Headed Jack-Weasel, came along for the ride.

I had no idea what to expect as far as how Zephyr would deal with the whole "being on a boat" thing. Our two big dogs love riding on a pontoon, but Zephyr has pretty successfully distinguished herself from the other two dogs. I don't think they really acknowledge that she's an actual dog. I think, in their minds, that she's more like a cat that has suffered a head injury. I'm happy to report that Zeph did really well on the open seas. 

We made a handful of stops along the ride in the first four or five miles. Early on we stopped so the kids could do a little cliff diving. Or something similar to cliff diving.

Here the kids practice their best "Gar Defense Posture". The trick is to keep everything you value out of the water and hope that the gar doesn't jump up and bite you on the butt.

Check out the grass up in the tree above the kids here. This is an indication of the height of the last really good flood to come through here.

Notice the rope? I'd say that about 9 of the 10 miles we tugged the kids down the creek. According to my GPS, we were going about 1.5 mph in most places and about 3 mph in the rapids. The word "rapids" is used loosely in this case. These rapids would not cause you to, for example, spill your drink if it was balanced on your head.

Esther, one half of the tugboat engine crew, took a break and enjoyed a little float time while Jake endured my incessant orders to "paddle left!" and "paddle!" as well as "keep paddling!" and the ever popular "don't stop paddling!" These orders were usually followed by the qualifier "or I'm going to send you to public school!"

Here is little Zephyr hiding in the shade of Esther's seat. (tee-hee)

Even I had the opportunity to float behind the canoe. Chan pushed her skinny arms to the point of near-exercise in an effort to pull my carcass down the creek. Here we see her on the verge of collapse while mom continues to strain against the inertia of my massive bulk. 

...also I was standing in my tube and dragging my feet across the bottom of the creek. I was pretending to "ski" across the rocks. But don't tell them that.

Here's a picture of a flower that even Esther did not know the name of. They were growing in stands in the shallows of the creek. I learned that copperhead snakes apparently really like these flowers because on my way over to take this picture I flushed a large one out. It scared me and I said a bad word. The same bad word I always say when I see a snake.

Here's Chan looking like she's just about heard enough of whatever is coming out of Jake's mouth. I have no idea what was going on back there.

This is Esther trying to flirt with the captain of the tugboat. As if.

After a long day on the creek we wrapped things up at happiest place on the planet.

Esther even let me get a small coffee.

More pictures of our day can be seen here.