I spent some time this afternoon making bread. I decided to follow a recipe for focaccia. All I needed was a packet of yeast and a potato - the other ingredients were there in my kitchen. Right now the dough is still rising - if I’ve even done everything correctly. At one point when it got hard to mix, I got my hands in the bowl, only to find that it was still very gooey. The more I tried to rub the unfinished dough off my hands and into the bowl, the worse it seemed to get. Like quicksand. But there’s just something satisfying about getting your hands covered with dough: It’s a visceral understanding of the consistency. As I added more flour to the mixture, the feel of the gradually changing dough was immediate.
I’m meeting my friend Troy for a drink in a few minutes, so if I bake it tonight, it’ll be after that. I figure on trying a small round in the oven to see how it comes out. I haven’t quite mixed in all the flour called for in the recipe, so I’m a little suspicious. The occasion of the meeting is a celebration of “25 Years of Chimay in America” at the Reef. Chimay, if you don’t know, is one of the more memorable Belgian craft beers. Beer - you might not know this from drinking Budweiser - is one of the classic monastery crafts of Europe. So much food processing knowledge was saved by monks during the dark ages, and many alcoholic beverages exist today as signature creations of very specific places for that reason.
For now, I’m going to treasure the opportunity to drink a beer made in Belgium. Should we be facing an energy crisis as some people say, then such long distance transportation of potables will become a thing of the past and we’re going to have to take up the challenge of producing those things we enjoy locally, or simply do without.
Posted in bar-scene, gourmand | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Wed, 19 Nov 2008 22:48:00 GMT
Elections are one of the times I really feel my irritation with mainstream media. They get so excited about announcing the results as early as possible (their job) that they run the risk of screwing it up (not their job). “Dewey Defeats Truman!”
So the TV networks break in with special coverage of… what exactly? They don’t have the answers yet. The polls close on the west coast at 11pm EST - if you can assume you know who won in what states the moment that happens - and, California counts for quite a lot of Electoral College votes.
The excitement is real enough, but that’s not an excuse for wasting an entire evening of newscast blabbering on about what little you know so far. It’s a pleasant surprise to wake up in the morning and know for certain who won.
My Concession Speech:
As our Time Zone approaches the 9 o’clock hour, I am feeling gravity’s pull. The people have spoken, and… I don’t know what they said. Surely the Reef will have it on the big-screen TV, along with some fine domestic micro-brewed beverages. About seven beers changed on Friday and it’s going to take me a while to taste them all at the rate I’m going.
Also, I got an important-looking piece of mail for my old roommate. One of her doctors still had her listed at my address. For all I know, it’s just a packet of junk, but to be on the safe side, I can look for her at the bar - the only place I ever see her anymore - and possibly hand it off to one of our mutual bartender friends for safekeeping. They are sure to have her phone number.
An Interesting Fact:
Today is the second time I voted for the guy that won… In the presidential election. I was just a little too young to vote in 1988, and it bugged me. In 1992, I walked into my local junior high school and voted for Bill Clinton. Sixteen years ago. Sometimes I voted for somebody I knew would not win. There was a transcendental meditation party fielding a candidate in ‘96; Nader got my vote in 2000 because I wanted a good showing for his party and I didn’t have to worry that Gore wouldn’t win DC. If I remember correctly, I voted for Kerry - I really like brie cheese, by the way.
Today I am back in alignment with the will of 51% of the people.
Tonight I dream of presidents who do not grin like an idiot; Presidents who take ideas seriously; Presidents who display genuine concern; Presidents who speak to me.
I watched the election results at the bar, and I didn’t expect there to be an answer until tomorrow. There were dozens of fanatical supporters - people waking up from a nightmare. Now the streets of DC are a party, like the day they tore the Berlin Wall down. People in this town believe tomorrow is going to be a better day. I hope they’re right.
It appears to be done.
Posted in politics, bar-scene | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Wed, 05 Nov 2008 01:04:00 GMT
It is very cold in my apartment, for reasons that I do not understand. Only a few weeks ago, workmen came to test the radiators - it was a success. The radiators proved that they could get hot when it was not necessary for them to be hot. Today they need to be hot and they aren’t. I have exercised the “stay in bed” option, after trying out the “walk around in slippers”, and the “drink hot liquids” options. It’s like I’m living in the woods or something.
Look on the bright side, though: I like gloomy fall weather. It threatened rain all day yesterday, then finally delivered. Today I assumed from the weather maps I saw that a cold front would pass by and the sky would clear. So far it has not happened. I thought heavy wind usually drove away the clouds (notably not true in a hurricane - but is that usual?).
I don’t talk much about sports here - mainly because I don’t care - but, last night was potentially the closing game of the World Series, and my roommate Phil invited me to come out and watch part of it on the big screen TV at the Reef… So we braved the cold drizzle to have a pint and watch some baseball. Phil is rooting for the Phillies, and when we get into a conversation about it, I occasionally introduce myself to people as Ray. (Some of you won’t get that joke, but I can assume these people will - just tailoring my performance to the audience…)
Maybe I should bite the bullet and get up - take a hot shower, put on several layers of clothing (maybe a coat, too)… I suppose I should go shopping - there’s an errand I need to run for my sister - and then it’s back to the books: I’m brushing up on my Windows admin skills with a skim through the debugging book and a couple other security and programming tomes. The blog won’t write itself (lazy blog! the nerve…), and I’ve got several economics questions I’ve been meaning to explore lately, not to mention all those photographs to sift through and process.
Posted in ontology, bar-scene | 1 comment | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Tue, 28 Oct 2008 17:09:00 GMT
A couple weeks ago, I was out on 18th Street late one night, fumbling for my camera to get a picture of a cool convertible driving past, but by the time I started shooting, the camera was in the wrong mode, and I shot a short video… Remarkably, the video was pretty good - but I need to edit out the sound or something because I was upset. And you could tell. Alcohol may have been a factor… At least nobody got hurt. You gotta watch out for fussy drunks who don’t like their pictures taken… On the other hand, they’re not always so aware of what’s happening.
As a special treat, along came this guy with his blue-tinted headlamps a few seconds later. I knew they looked blue to me, but well… just see for yourself: I didn’t even have to boost the saturation. All I did was clip the black point on the master levels so the three shots would have the same overall tone. Mmmm… bread and butter Photoshoppin’.
I take a lot of these night shots along the main drag in my neighborhood. Frankly, the light sucks… but I suppose it could be worse. It’s probably more ambient light than some daytime shadows. I turn the flash off and the red hand blinks to warn me about holding steady. I do what I can…
Posted in bar-scene, photos, photography | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Mon, 11 Aug 2008 02:12:00 GMT
Yesterday I the heat wasn’t so bad, and I took a stroll through the zoo, headed uptown then crossed back over to the Cathedral.
Oh let’s see… Thursday night I had a message from Troy, suggesting that we get a beer in my neighborhood, so that was a nice distraction. I spoke to Marina about her recent Hurricane experience, and that was when Troy called me back and we were able to do more than leave messages. I was planning to stay in for the evening, get some reading done and catch up on my rest. Things didn’t work out like that, though. Troy met me on the first floor of Reef, we drank one round, then I suggested we survey the roof deck, which is usually too crowded and hot. It was neither of those things, but we still couldn’t sit - so we hovered at the roof edge examining the street life from above. I think my bartender friends were startled to see me bring a friend along - I suppose that means I haven’t been very social lately. After all, one of my favorite activities is to wander around town by myself taking photographs and writing in my journal. If I can read a book at a bar, I’m happy. Once Troy left, I found an unoccupied stool and stayed a little longer while they overserved me with and undercharged me for some Wasmund’s, a local Single Malt Whisky from Virginia.
All of that gave me a slow start Friday morning, but I picked myself up, dusted myself off and went for a trek anyway. I had a vague notion of going as far as the zoo, which is just down in the park a few blocks away. I drank an iced coffee and enjoyed the sights. Walking through the zoo is not easy - even a sparse crowd presents navigation problems: Nobody is in much of a hurry, but they do dart this way and that at the last minute, closing the gaps I planned to pass through. Kids have a tendency to scream about which animals they do or do not want to see, often because the adults are leading them in an inauspicious direction. There was a crowd around the elephant pen, but I found peace and quiet in an exhibit on pollinators with a roofed in area of benches. There was a mock backyard filled with garden plants and birdhouses. I was going to sit still and see how close the birds would come, but immediately a big group of little kids from a summer camp showed up. I stayed long enough to cool off, then I set out again. At the entrance to the zoo, a small boy was up on a lion statue, and his father was coaxing him to jump. I dawdled for a minute to check their progress - It looked like they might be there for a long time. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I detected the slightest memory of me at that age, too scared to come down.
On Connecticut Avenue, I went north toward Cleveland Park. I scribbled notes in my notebook as I went. The bridge over abandoned Klingle Road was nearly finished - they’ve been rebuilding it for years, and most of the work was down by the creek bed. A string of school buses waiting for their charges to tour the zoo was parked on both edges of the bridge, and the bus drivers were gathered on the stout new railings along the curb. I looked over the barely protected side of the bridge at the workmen below and daydreamed of a hike I took once up the little valley along Klingle after a snowstorm years ago… The road was closed but still drivable, except for the occasional outer curve edge falling away into th creek. A rivulet of runoff had formed within the packed snow, and the only people I encountered had their dogs off the leash. The road has further decayed since then, and I haven’t figured out what they plan to do with it.
Further along the avenue, I examined the main drag of Cleveland Park. Many of the shops have changed in just the last ten or so years. CVS had historical photos of the neighborhood hanging in the front windows - just as they do at the Dupont Circle store. One of the pictures was an enlargement of the developer’s brochure for several newly built neighborhoods - we don’t call them by those names anymore. A young woman in knock-off art nouveau rendering beckons me to buy a house in ‘the heights’. One of my favorite coffeeshops by the subway escalator is boarded up, and the Yenching Palace restaurant similarly abandoned - it’s marble facade partially dismantled, no longer suggesting 20’s Shanghai.
There were supposedly bad mudslides in the park, so instead of navigating that, I turned up Porter, where I considered catching an H bus back to Mt Pleasant. I admired the refinished craftsman bungalows glowering over the street. The air may have been cool, but the sunlight compelled me to find the shady side of every street. I encountered stands of bamboo along 34th, trying my best to find the same vantage of a photo in the CVS showing a bridge at the crossing of Reno and Newark, but the lay of the land didn’t register. Part of Reno road followed the course that eventually became 34th, so I must have passed through the spot - Maybe I wasn’t trying hard enough to see it. The bamboo was certainly planted to provide a measure of privacy, but it always feels like it escaped from the zoo, where in its invasive spirit, it grows in abundance as food for pandas.
I climbed the last bit of hill to the Cathedral, getting tired enough to look out for a bus home. Sensing a gap in the schedule, and not trusting my little clock that needs a new battery, I took the last hundred meters to the greenhouse, only to find it deserted for the season. It was only a year ago that I bought a rosemary plant there, and they seemed ready for anything. I wonder what was different this year… or if last year was an anomaly and I just lucked out.
Posted in DC-roaming, bar-scene | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Sat, 26 Jul 2008 18:31:00 GMT
Last night I was supposed to stay home and refrain from spending money. I was going to sit on my money for a while, and make sure I got all my bills paid on time first. Well that went out the window, and not for nothing - it was one of the most enjoyable evenings I’ve had in a while.
I figured the crowds would keep my visit short, but then it wasn’t particularly crowded out at the bars. The heat and humidity weren’t too terrible. I wandered into Asylum to have a whiskey. One bar stool was available - I could see someone had just signed for their bill. My friend Carina was bartending, and she came over to clear the spot for me when she saw me waiting to pounce. She took away the empty glasses, wiped off the bar with a rag, then something new and unexpected happened:
She produced a squeeze bottle of ketchup from behind the bar and proceeded to draw me a heart outline in ketchup on the bar!
Then, she introduced me to the people sitting nearby and ran off to pour more drinks. (50 cent Lite Beers for much of Saturday afternoon - progressively more expensive as the night wears on.) People looked at me, then looked at the ketchup heart, then back at me. “What’d you do to get a ketchup heart?”
Um… “Nothing that I know of.”
(I lied: It’s just nothing specific, and was just as surprised as they were…)
One guy to the right of me must have had a few drinks already, because he repeatedly tried to request his own ketchup heart, but Carina skillfully ignored this aspect of his order. He got more lite beers. He had trouble figuring out why he couldn’t have a ketchup heart too, but it was too much strain to produce a coherent argument as to why he should. He went back to wondering what made me so special as to deserve one.
The guy to the left of me - Andrew - had his copy of Cormac McCarthy’s “Blood Meridian” out. When somebody asked him how he could concentrate enough to read in a crowded bar, I had to step in with moral support: “I’m amazed I didn’t bring a book of my own… I find I can concentrate on reading with any distractions until I’ve had a couple drinks - then it’s too much work to filter out the noise”. We got to talking about “No Country For Old Men”, (see what I wrote earlier here…), the faithfulness of movies to books, and the metaphysical discussions he’d had with his friends about one particular scene in the movie - do _we_ see the villain, or do we see what the sheriff imagines? And, he’s never seen the man. I wonder now if this is important? Cinematic storytelling often shows you something incorrect as an indicator. How should that dread be presented?
At some point barhopping April showed up to call out my name from across the bar, run over and give me a peck on the cheek. She didn’t stay long.
The juke-box was playing some of the standard Asylum fare. We had a laugh over the Supreme Court’s ruling on the DC gun ban when we heard the M.I.A. song with the Clash sample and the prominent shotgun sound effects.
The fog of alcohol always confuses things. I stayed long enough to shoot a few games of pool with Andrew. I demonstrated an incredible ability to come from behind - that can upset opponents who think you are thereby toying with them, but Andrew was a pretty relaxed guy - it didn’t seem to bother him.
Meanwhile, upstairs, Carina let somebody write something on her back in pen - it was something to encourage customers to be polite while ordering. It was largely visible because of the “tank top that wouldn’t stay down”. I know I have some T-shirts that I wish were longer, but for girls, short shirts are the fashion. A definite sexism rules the roost wherever people feel free to express themselves… You can develop a tolerance for it, whether you’re the object of drunken desire, or just a bystander. Some people might say I’m in the wrong place, but I have the feeling more people like me should be there. A half dressed blond girl serving beer can really bring out the worst in some of these people… But, that half-dressed blond girl is a friend of mine, and I don’t feel guilty for paying attention. When time permits, we’ve even had some thoughtful conversations. That, my friends, is a good way to get through life. And maybe that’s how come I got a ketchup heart, and you didn’t.
Posted in bar-scene, film-and-TV, books | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Sun, 29 Jun 2008 21:44:00 GMT
When I heard there was a disgruntled bartender giving away free drinks, I came right down…
I love the sound of this, but it’s not entirely accurate.
It was a really nice day yesterday (today, too), and when I left work, I went on a walkabout. I worked my way into DC on Georgia Avenue by walking and riding buses. I read my book as I went, and I observed the architecture very carefully. I’m reading “The Design of Future Things”, and I’m receptive to how the urban environment is arranged. I’m having a lot of interesting cinematic images in my head, more ideas at once than I could possibly write down.
When I reached Park Road, I got off and walked over to Wonderland Ballroom. I read at the bar and had a whiskey-and-coke. One of the control analogies in the Norman book is Horse+Rider. It illustrates the concept of loose reigns vs. tight reigns, and he goes on to meditate about how that might be designed into hi-tech devices. Since he’s done a lot of work on cars and airplane cockpits, a lot of his examples tend to devolve into driving. I have one more moment where I think “Oh no! We’re not going to have to drive in the future are we?”. My hopes for the future are to let the machines figure out how to accomplish a lot of the things we want to do. He does allow for this possibility: At one point he suspects that cars will drive us everywhere, and that there will be special parks where people can drive the cars for leisure - just like horseback riding is more relegated now.
A little more ominous is the remark about your horse sometimes having a mind of its own, and someday maybe your car too - deciding it should pull over because you need to eat. And, maybe in the service of a RF billboard or something. We would love to delegate some of the decisions, but delegate them to the marketing flaks who claim to have our best interest in mind? Sorry, no thanks. And then, next I was daydreaming about the nature of animal intelligence as opposed to machines. The dolphin-riders and horse-whisperers. When animals are ready to take a place in our society, what will that be like? We might consider them ‘less than human’, but do you really need to be all human to contribute to the mix, or derive benefits, tangible or intangible? What new levels of working together for mutual benefit are possible?
With all this going on in my mind, I realize that I’m not making any social connections with the people around me. Once I took an online quiz where you answer a series of questions, and it suggests the book you ‘most resemble’. I had some trouble with the binary choices, but I did the best I could, and the result was “Invisible Man”.
An older guy had sat down on the end of the bar, close to where I was. He ordered a beer and a couple of their famed chili cheese hot dogs. He noticed the announcement for “Guitar Hero” that was scheduled for later in the evening. He asked the cute young hipster bartending what that referred to. She left it at “It’s a video game”. But I took it as a conversational opening, and described the Simon-says procedure and the ersatz guitar controller to him. I didn’t belabor the point, but I hinted and the slavery-to-machines angle that’s been bothering me, and mentioned the full band version that some people play. If you ask me, it’s a little like the difference between watching TV alone and watching TV in a group. Many people have argued the merits of group viewing with me. I say it’s neither here nor there: I’ve watched TV with a group, but my commentary on what we were viewing seldom seemed welcome. It’s essentially going to a crowded theater alone. I paid my bill and moved along.
This wasn’t even close to being finished. Who is going to re-read it now?
Posted in urban-studies, DC-roaming, bar-scene, books | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:32:00 GMT
No silly, it’s Rock Band the Video Game.
One of the bars in my neighborhood has installed the video game and lets people play on Tuesday nights. It used to be karaoke. People got tired of karaoke, the staff more than anyone, I’m guessing. Two things worry me about this game.
First, it’s similar to the nostalgic exercise of playing old ‘hit’ songs to evoke a golden past. Just as with karaoke, you align yourself with the pleasant memory and live vicariously through the cultural product of the recorded song. Not all of this is a bad thing. But, I’m beginning to sense the pathos of it: People taking excessive association with a life they never lived, instead of doing something new, creative, and possibly just as fun. By this method we abdicate. The future is less rich. I don’t worry too much though - I imagine future teenage rebellions to invigorate culture in our wake. This is another wave of the stultifying effects of reproduction on our relationship to the works of art.
Second, and more disturbing is the bad feeling I get from all of the members of this video game family: “Dance, Dance Revolution” and “Guitar Hero” have been popular in Japan first. The games had to be ‘localized’ for American shores by stocking them with the pop songs from our charts. Every one of these games operates on the same basic principle: Simon Says. When I was a kid, we had the electronic Simon game with the four big buttons that lit up in a sequence that you had to repeat… In my mind, all the fancy guitar and drum controllers and the silly rock avatars playing on their virtual stage on the monitor do not change the basic principle at work here: You do what the machine tells you. Your score quantifies how well you obey. Is this the future? People sure look like they’re having fun doing it. “The first Matrix was designed to be a perfect world - Where everyone would be happy…”
And, the funny thing about the songs themselves: They’re not all necessarily popular hits - they’re specifically considered ‘hard rock’. This makes sense with the Black Sabbath or Soundgarden. But then you get to the grey areas - Weezer makes some sense, but R.E.M.? I could go on. We all have our personal favorites. I suspect there is some interest in crushing this out of us, though. Marketing is certainly much easier if we all like the same stuff for the same reasons.
Well, I’ve never played. My friends have tried to push me into it. It probably is fun, I won’t doubt that. Most nights when I’ve seen it, I get a real serious craving to go home and play my real guitar. I’ve even said it out loud. My reclusive habits are not the issue. It would be fun to jam with some people on other real instruments. I’m just not sure I know many people who do play. The game has levels you can set individually for the four players. It simplifies the task by presenting more or less decimated ‘fake-book’ sequences you have to match. The microphone checks your pitch and ‘gate times’ to score. There are bonuses for improv in clearly marked sections.
Posted in music, ontology, bar-scene, computer-interface | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Wed, 18 Jun 2008 15:53:00 GMT
I was amused to see this YouTube clip of Mr. Pink’s thoughts on tipping from Reservoir Dogs. Via kottke.org.
It can be difficult to have this discussion with people, because emotions tend to run high. I’m not really complaining about the state of affairs. People tip bartenders and waiters in this country. But it is always interesting to me how discussions are suppressed - I’m a devil’s advocate kind of guy, and I believe everything ought to be open to discussion. If I wanted to change the entire model of how people in the service industry are paid, do you think that I could do it? I suspect not.
From an economic standpoint, it’s a fascinating issue. Employers are willing to abdicate some measure of performance evaluation to the customers. This trade-off should be worth real money to the employer. They still fire you if you drop a lot of trays full of expensive food, but they don’t have to analyze your customer service skills.
In the clip, Pink says “If if’s such a lousy job, they can quit.” I won’t say it that way, but it’s not so far off. What are the possibilities?
There are jobs in restaurants because people insist on going out to eat. The market provides competition in service, quality, and price. Every business is caught between the market for their product/service and the market for their raw materials (usually including labor, but not capital so much since it’s a fixed cost). Drastic changes in the supply of inputs or the demands of customers have an effect on the quality, service, and price. In some situations, new entrants will rush in, and in other situations, they’ll be dropping like flies. Workers, businesspeople, and customers will adjust - customers by adapting with subsitute goods, and workers and businesspeople by entering other markets. You don’t spend all your life in one market, a typical day is a blend of several.
But this process doesn’t flow so smoothly. People run restaurants because they identify themselves with that business. People work as waiters or bartenders or chefs for the same reason - and often because they actually enjoy it (even if I do get to hear endless complaints from my friends in that line of work). In other words, there is some friction or latency in adapting to changing markets. If you lay off an auto worker, they spend some time unsure of what to do next. And maybe they retrain for something else - which can take years. Most people are not ready to jump into the next career at a moment’s notice - or gradually one by one as the balance shifts.
Now specifically: To Tip or Not To Tip, what’s the difference?
If I go out to eat, and purchase a $100 meal, then tip $15, it is actually a $115 meal from my point of view. Meanwhile, the waitress is making less than minimum wage, as the government considers tip money to be real income - even though I might choose not to tip. There is no law that says I must tip the waitress, but there is a law regarding minimum wage. For some reason, a concerted effort to not tip the waitress can cause the restaurant break the spirit of the minimum wage laws. I never could figure out why the job doesn’t just pay more. And, reward good workers with pay raises. Isn’t that how it works everywhere else? Wage disparity is supposed to be an index of how valuable the worker is. (Not how hard they are working! - we didn’t say anything about that.) In a perverse situation, hard work might not be worth more to the employer. And, the effort might be misguided anyway - not exactly what the job called for.
I generally get upset over anything that distorts price. If it’s going to be the same money, then we need to have the same basis for valuing workers. I personally witness many instances where tip money makes the worker beholden to the customer in ways that do not exactly benefit the business. If you tip well, the bartender sometimes pours you free drinks. Apparently, this is so common that there is an allowance for it, and the bartenders are encouraged to report it - it builds an intangible good will with customers (but it’s sort of hard to measure - do they really spend any more money? Maybe the consistent ability of a bar to draw customers makes it a happening place… Nobody goes there anymore - it’s too crowded.)
Posted in bar-scene, employment, economics | no comments | no trackbacksPosted by Evan Bittner
Wed, 11 Jun 2008 21:29:00 GMT
