The Death of BLZZRD

BLZZRD was our '93 Taurus SHO that we ordered custom made from Ford. After almost 20 years in our care, we sold it to a friend of a friend last summer. It had reached the point where it would not conveniently pass state inspections and parts were starting to get difficult to acquire. The '93 SHO was a fairly limited production run about 21K were made. That was, surprisingly, the highest production in any single year for the SHO.

Earlier this year, we starting receiving notices from the Pasadena Police Department that BLZZRD had been impounded and might be auctioned. About two weeks ago, we received a certified letter from PPD that BLZZRD was to be auctioned on April 28. So, this past Friday I went to the auction preview to look at BLZZRD and see if we should bid on it and attempt to sell it again. The short answer was: No. It was apparent as soon as I walked into the impound lot that BLZZRD was not going anywhere under its own power again. It had been in an accident and the total bill to repair it would likely 10 times its Blue Book value.

I took a look around the car and it was a sad sight to see. The owner that wrecked it (it doesn't look like it was BLZZRD's driver's fault, but it's tough to say for certain) had done some mods to the car that it pained me to see. He'd spray painted the white wheels black and he'd also filled in the SHO on the back bumper with black paint.

It was tough to say goodbye to that car. It deserved a better end.

Lunching out: El Rey ??

El Rey ?? (not certain of the full name) : A Mexican joint that took over the building of El Rinconcito. I'd planned on going to El Rinconcito, but since El Rey was in their place I did not have the opportunity. El Rey looked a little sketchy, housed in an old, run-down former Dairy Queen. The sign on the front of the building said "Open Soon", but the electric light in the window said "Open".

I pulled into the parking lot, opened the door and walked in. The lack of air conditioning was immediately apparent. I was greeted by one of the workers and my drink order was taken. They were so new that they did not have any iced tea, so I made do with a Coke.

I saw a menu on the far wall and order from that when asked. Ordered the enchiladas for which I had a choice of chicken or fajita. I went with the fajita. A subsequent set of diners received an actual menu, so they do exist.

My meal consisted of 4 enchiladas, rice, beans, salad and sour cream. The rice, beans, and salad were ok, nothing outstanding. The enchiladas were pretty good, I think they used a fair portion of chili powder for the seasoning, as there was a bit of red residue on the plate at the end.

The meal totaled to about $9 with the drink. I wouldn't hesitate to give them another chance, if I'm in the area again. But, I don't travel there very often.

Weekend update

Friday

Dropped by the Pasadena impound lot to check on BLZZRD and see if we should come back for the auction on Saturday. Unfortunately, the answer was no. BLZZRD had been totaled in a wreck.
Lunch at El Rey, about a block north of the impound lot.
Aikido

Saturday

Aikido
Stop by Texas Art Supply for more matting supplies
Dinner with K and K at Durango's

Sunday

Grocery shopping
Work on a batch of Cafeteria lady rolls that failed
Work on more matting and framing
Nap
Work on stuff to grill for dinner
Made a peach pie
Work on another batch of Cafeteria lady rolls that failed
Superhero movies on TV

Aikido Saturday Afternoon - 4/28/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Troy, Liz, and Charles

Ukemi:

Took a couple of falls, still protecting the pulled back muscle

The Walk:

Twice as usual.

Releases:

Worked with Charles on his set.

Techniques:

Worked with Charles on Shomen-ate.

At the end of class, Tim had me work on the defensive and offensive jo techniques.

Offensive: throw to my left, throw to my right, wrist lock (we skipped this one), high throw to my right, shihonage, gedan-ate, shoulder blade throw, over the top ankle throw.

Defensive: Gyaku-gamae-ate, Shomen-ate, Low-otoshi, Row the boat, Hi-otoshi

Aftermath:

None of note.

Aikido Friday Night - 4/27/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Trey, Phillip, Troy, and Reese

Ukemi:

Took a couple of warm-up falls, still protecting the pulled back muscle.

The Walk:

Not tonight

Releases:

Watched over Troy and Reese.

Techniques:

Watched over Troy and Reese and Trey and Phillip.

Aftermath:

None of note.

Aikido Thursday Night - 4/26/2012

Aikido players: Phillip, Troy, Brad, and Sal (Wow! Big crowd for a Thursday)

Ukemi:

Very light, trying to protect a back muscle that hurts from volleyball

The Walk:

Not tonight

Releases:

Not tonight

Techniques:

Sal and Brad worked on Waki-gatame, ude-gaeshi, and hiki taoshi. The arm bars were a little frustrating tonight.

Phillip and Troy worked through 11-16 with very little input from me.

Aftermath:

Aching back from volleyball

Sand Volleyball, 1-1, 0-2

Finally, a decent night. And, I tweaked a back muscle during the first match.

We won the first game 17-15, lost the second 11-15 or so. We were playing well and serving pretty well in a challenging wind.

The second match, we were up 8-2 and ended up losing the first game. The second game, we were manhandled from the start.

Still a nice night of vball.

At the movies: Thor

Thor: 3

This is a movie my wife wants to re-watch just for Chris Hemsworth's abs. They're not just a 6-pack in her eyes, but maybe a 24-pack.

I was expecting more of an earth-based film, but it was mainly a Norse mythos film. Decent performances by Natalie Portman and Anthony Hopkins.

At the movies: Captain America

Captain America: 3

A great all-star cast and a good tie-in to the Iron Man movies, but not terribly impressive otherwise.

Volleyball 0-3, 1-2

Another disastrous night of volleyball. Too many mistakes, not enough good play. We won the last game of the second match by the skin of our teeth, 17-16.

Lunching out:: El Rey Pollo

El Rey Pollo: A random Mexican joint chosen from Urbanspoon. Seems geared toward chicken since they claim they're the King of Chicken. I'd disagree, they're maybe the knave of chicken.

The chicken was actually half-decent. A pain to work with, but decently flavored. I ordered the 1/2 chicken. It came with 10 corn tortillas, rice and charro beans. The corn tortillas were a real pain: stuck together and when pried apart, got torn in half. The red and green salsas and the chips were disappointments, as well. The rice and charro beans were ok. The glass of ice tea was of a nice size and came with a lime wedge.

The servers were attentive, although they took a while to get me the check. Overall, a disappointment. I don't think I'll be going back.

Weekend update

Friday:

Lunch at El Rey Pollo
Crawfish Boil at GHG
Aikido

Saturday:

Blueberry muffins - mucked up the recipe again
Looked at the cars the Friendswood FIG Festival
Nap
Aikido
Pizza from Stefano's


Sunday:

Artfire work
Started work on Cafeteria Lady Rolls, Foccaccia, and German Chocolate Cake
Mowed the lawn
Nap
Dinner of Spaghetti and Foccaccia

Aikido Saturday Afternoon - 4/21/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Troy, Brad, Marvin, Gayle, Roderick, Liz, and Charles

Ukemi:

Light warm-up. Watched over Liz and Charles

The Walk:

Twice as usual.

Releases:

Worked with Charles on his set.

Techniques:

Worked with Charles on Shomen-ate.

At the end of class, Tim had me work on the defensive bokken techniques: down-the-arm takeaway, oshi-taoshi, shihonage, iriminage, Hiji Kujiki (crotch to sternum gutting)

Aftermath:

None of note.

Aikido Friday Night - 4/20/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Troy, Sal, Marvin, Gayle, Reese, Liz, and Charles

Ukemi:

Light warm-up. Watched over Liz and Charles

The Walk:

Twice as usual.

Releases:

Worked with Reese on his set.

Techniques:

Worked with Reese on Shomen-ate.

Aftermath:

None of note.

Aikido Thursday Night - 4/19/2012

Aikido players: Troy, Sal

Ukemi:

Two falls each left and right

The Walk:

Not tonight

Releases:

Not tonight

Techniques:

Sal worked on Gedan-ate and Ushiro-ate. Struggled on both.

Troy worked on Kote-hineri and Tenkai Kote-hineri. He struggled with the footwork on Kote-hineri and struggled with the arm bar on Tenkai Kote-hineri. The armbar is a weird one.

Aftermath:

None of note.

Sand Volleyball, 0-2, 0-2

Another night on the sand, another set of losses. We played a regular match first, and then we played a position match. The top two teams played each other and the bottom two teams played each other. We ended up playing the same team twice.

We played well and were competitive in all games, I think. I know one game was 15-11 or so. I'm getting a little better at timing, but I'm still taking off too close to the net. When I make my final step, I slide a little bit further to the net and that has me under the ball instead of behind it. I hope to work on correcting that next week.

My blocks are at least occupying some space at the net, so I'm ok with them at the moment.

Volleyball, 0-3

Another night of struggling. I managed to win 7 straight points on my server int he second game, but will still managed to lose the game. We were up 9-2 in the third game and lost 13-15.

Ugh.

Weekend update

Friday:

Lunch at Abe's
Aikido

Saturday:

Hauled stuff to the Spring Sparkle
Went over to K's to help repair the fence
Aikido
Dinner at Durango's with K and K
Started work on another batch of Tartine bread


Sunday:

Artfire work
LoneStarCon3 work
More work on Tartine bread and started work on Norwich Sourdough
Relaxed to tried and ease my muscle ache from all of the exercise this past week
Finished work on the loaves of bread

Aikido Saturday Afternoon - 4/14/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Troy, Brad, Marvin, Gayle, Roderick, Reese, Liz and Charles

Ukemi:

Supervised Gayle with Troy's help

The Walk:

Twice, as usual.

Releases:

Worked with Gayle

Techniques:

Helped Troy work with Marvin on Oshi taoshi and ude gaeshi. Occasionally jumped in with Tim working with most folks on Shomen ate.

Worked on the kneeling portion of Koryu Dai San with Troy as uke.

Aftermath:

Still sore from a week of volleyball and aikido.

Aikido Friday Night - 4/13/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Trey, Troy, and Sal

Ukemi:

Light warm-up.

The Walk:

Twice as usual.

Releases:

Worked with Sal on his set.

Techniques:

Worked with Sal on 1-10 and oversaw him working with Troy.

Worked on Garumas with Trey as uke and tori.

Ran through kneeling kote-gaeshi with Trey.

Aftermath:

None of note.

Aikido Thursday Night - 4/12/2012

Aikido players: Sal

Ukemi:

Not tonight

The Walk:

Not tonight

Releases:

Sal made it through his set fairly cleanly

Techniques:

We worked through 1-6 nicely, with the exception of Gedanate

Aftermath:

None of note.

Sand Volleyball, 0-2, 0-2

Another night on the sand. We played much better than last time, even though we still lost convincingly. The first match, the games were 15-8 or so. The second match, the games were 15-5.

My positioning was much better, I was much more balanced on my feet and I managed a spike or two and at least one block. I still made a bunch of errors as I do in the indoor league. I was, for a while, the target of a bunch of serves, so I need to improve my returns.

And I am quite sore this morning. This is going to be good for my leg muscles.

Tartine Country Bread - a recipe in search of help

The source for the recipe is this site: http://breadmakingblog.breadexperience.com/2011/02/tartine-country-bread.html

I've tried this recipe two times and it's come out the same both times. If I try it again I'm going to increase the flour or reduce the water. I'm going to post the recipe and methods and then add the paictures from along the way.

1. Grab 1 TBSP sourdough starter and add 200 grams warm water and 100 grams bread flour and 1oo grams whole wheat flour. Mix and let it percolate overnight.

2. Take half of the leaven and add it to 700 grams of water. Add 900 grams of bread flour and 100 grams of whole wheat flour. Mix.

3. Let the mixture rest for 30-45 minutes.

4. Add 20 grams salt. Add 50 grams water. Mix.

5. Put dough in a large bowl and let frement for 3 - 4 hours, turning every 15 minutes. The original recipe called for turning every 30 minutes. I doubled it this time to see if it would make the dough less wobbly. It was not sufficient to make the dough easy to handle. I'll go back to every 30 minutes the next time I try this.

5a. A turn consists of looking at the dough in the bowl, lifting the dough at the far end up, stretching it, and then folding over the bit of the dough nearest you. Rotate the bowl 90 degrees and do it again, and again, and again.

6. Dump the dough out on to an unfloured surface, sprinkle the top of the dough with flour. Divide the dough in half.

7. Flip each half over so the floured side is down.

8. Fold each half so that the floured side encompasses all of the outer surface of the dough.

9. Shape into a round shape. Cover with a kitchen towel. Let rest for 30 minutes.

10. Do letter folds on each of the halves to build tension in the loaves. Seal the loaves at a seam. Place in a bannetton to rise for 3 to 4 hours.

11. Heat the oven with a baking stone in it to 500.

12. Turn the dough out onto the baking stone. Turn the oven down to 450 and bake for approximately 40 minutes.

13. That concludes what I did for these loaves. Now come the pictures...

The dough after mixing

The dough in its fermentation bowl

The dough as it's being folded for the last time.

The dough as it's being folded for the last time.

The dough as it's being folded for the last time.

The dough as it's being folded for the last time.

Shaping after 4 hour fermentation

In the bannetton after 4 hours

In the bannetton after 4 hours

Trying to get it out onto the baking stone

Trying to get it out onto the baking stone

Trying to get it out onto the baking stone

Trying to get it out onto the baking stone

Trying to get it out onto the baking stone

Trying to get it out onto the baking stone

After baking

After baking

After baking

At least it tasted good.

Weekend update

Friday:

Lunch at II Brothers Pasta
Aikido
Started working on Tartine Country bread

Saturday:

Artfire work
More work on the Tartine bread
Mowed a bit of the yard
Aikido
More work on the Tartine bread, once again it came out too thin


Sunday:

Artfire work
Trip into town for Astros baseball game to celebrate a bunch of April birthdays.
Watched the Cars DVD

Aikido Saturday Afternoon - 4/7/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Trey, Troy, Brad, Dan, and Reese

Ukemi:

Got a partial set of rolls in. Supervised Reese for a bit.

The Walk:

Twice, as usual.

Releases:

Supervised Dan and Brad.

Techniques:

I worked on Oshi-taoshi with Dan and Brad at separate times. Had to state firmly that th working hand gets removed from the elbow once tori has gone over-the-mountain. Shortly after stating that, Dan stumbled while doing the technique which, if he'd not removed his hand from my elbow would have destroyed my elbow.

Troy, Trey and I did some work at the end of class. I worked on the releases techniques of Yon Kata with both of them as ukes. It really is a fun set of techniques when it's working at speed. Trey did some work on Owaza Ju Pon. It took him a bit to get used to working with Troy again and get his timing down, but he really got flowing by the end of the afternoon.

Aftermath:

Very, very sore. Going to need some ibu.

Aikido Friday Night - 4/6/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Troy, Dan, Liz and Charles

Ukemi:

Light warm-up. Oversaw Liz and Charles.

The Walk:

Twice as usual.

Releases:

Supervised Dan and Troy.

Techniques:

Supervised Dan and Troy working on Oshi-taoshi and Kote-hineri, respectively.

Aftermath:

None of note.

Aikido Thursday Night - 4/5/2012

Aikido players: Troy, Sal

Ukemi:

A partial set.

The Walk:

Not tonight

Releases:

Troy and Sal worked together

Techniques:

Sal managed to work on Waki-gatamae and Hiki taoshi.

Troy worked on Kote-hineri and Tenkai kote-hineri.

We got some time for them to work together as I'd guess that Troy would be the preferred uke for Sal's next demo.

Aftermath:

None of note.

Sand Volleyball, rained out

We had massive storms come through on volleyball day. The court was too wet and the weather too chancy to play outside.

Volleyball, 1-2

Another week, another win. But just one. Maybe we'll have better luck next week. Oops, no games next week, so it's the week after.

Lunching at C & D Burger Shoppe

I've passed by this place a couple of times while out and about for other Friday lunches. It has a sketchy appearance, but usually has a good crowd. And, since it's a former Dairy Queen turned into a local joint, a gem could be inside.

I ordered the double burger with mustard, no mayo, no cheese, onion rings, and a tea. I think the total was about $8, so on the low end of my usual Friday lunch spots.

It's a typical neighborhood burger joint. A wide variety of customers: grandmas, utility workers. The food is typical neighborhood burger joint, but it feels like a better choice than the usual fast food chains. The burger was decent and while the onion rings weren't Tookie's, they weren't a usual fast food joint's either.

This is a place that I won't hesitate to go back to, if the mood strikes me.

Weekend update

Friday:

Lunch at C & D Burger Shoppe
Aikido

Saturday:

Artfire work
Made Outback Honey wheat bread
Blueberry muffins - and they turned out quite strange. Maybe too much oil?
Nap
Aikido
Finished working on our taxes
Started working on Tartine Country bread

Sunday:

Artfire work
Set up tweets for the month
Attempted to repair my backup disk - it failed, so I went off and bought a new disk
Started working on setting up a RAID 1 set for my Time Machine backup
Started working on mom's taxes
Came up with mats and frames needed for next batch of framing
Grilled dinner - chicken with bacon and cheddar cheese
Once Upon a Time
The Tartine country Bread failed - the dough was too wet to hold it's shape and just oozed while baking.

Aikido Saturday Afternoon - 3/31/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Troy, Brad, Gayle, Roderick, and Reese

Ukemi:

Did a full set of left and right sided falls. Right foot aches on the left-sided rolls, but that will improve.

The Walk:

Twice, as usual.

Releases:

I ran through all 8 with Roderick. It went pretty well.

Techniques:

I worked on Shomen-ate and Aigamae-ate with Roderick. That went pretty well, too.

Troy and I did some work at the end of class. He worked on 11-16 of Ju Nana Hon Kata and I worked on the releases techniques of Yon Kata. It was nice to get some time to work on that stuff again.

Aftermath:

None of note.

Aikido Friday Night - 3/30/2012

Aikido players: Tim, Trey, Troy, Sal, Steve, Liz and Charles

Ukemi:

Light warm-up. Oversaw Liz and Charles.

The Walk:

Twice as usual.

Releases:

I did some work with Steve on the releases. We worked on 1-3.

Techniques:

Did some punch the dummy drill with Steve, Liz, and Charles.

Aftermath:

None of note.