A Hot Mess Part Seventeen: Penumbra

25 January

I'm about to disappear again. Five days from now I'll be doing my best to remember how to work hot glass. We had our first class meeting of the semester two days ago; all we did was sign waivers and pick lab slots. Our Tuesday night team is together again. The regular cast of characters is back, with a handful of advancing beginners and a few returning after some time away. I had already gotten through my ritual hour of impostor syndrome panic five hours before class, when I looked at the roster. By the time I walked into the studio, I was ready for whatever.

So, here's the thing that happens when I look at the stuff I've made:

When I'm in the classroom, and, really, any time during the semester, my glass has a life of its own. I scrutinize each piece, noticing the flaws, the thickness, the little errors all over. I see every one for what it isn't. Each piece is up against the obviously perfect work of all of my other classmates.

Then the semester ends. I start to see the pieces not for what they aren't, but for what they are. This, I think, is how most of my friends are looking at my work, and why, during the semester, I can't understand how they could possibly like anything I'm doing. When I'm away from the classroom, my glass has a chance to breathe; or, more realistically, I do. Away from the classroom, my pieces are what they are, and they glow when the sun hits them.

The transition happens the minute I get home from the final critique of the semester.

The few pieces I truly like find their places in one of two cabinets, shielded from dust and from cats. I have already tossed the worst pieces into the waste bucket, where someone will take them and smash them into shards to be melted into their next works of art*. The next-to-worst ones live in a box, out of sight, most likely destined for the waste bucket sometime in the next semester. Some are worthy of selling for charity, and leave the house in exchange for donations. Other pieces have my friends' names on them, and I gladly send them away.

That leaves a handful of pieces I don't outright hate but don't like very much either. While we're supposed to be making art, we still sometimes focus on usefulness instead, much to the annoyance of our instructor.

Last semester was full of half-failed experiments. In learning how to use the wet saw for cutting angles, and in learning the wrong way to make a drop vase, I wound up with half a vase with an angled mouth. It didn't sell, and I was about to put it in the destined-for-waste box when I realized that it would be perfect to hold Jack's razor.

Maine #11, with its tree that stretched into a snake, didn't sell either. It became a hairbrush container, and I'm glad I still have it.

Another Maine fail that went under the saw for practice became a pencil holder.

And yet another Maine fail that didn't sell turned out to be perfect for holding all the wooden spoons that had been jamming a kitchen drawer for years.

The two glow-in-the-dark ghosts that look like utter shit in the daylight were living in the go-to-waste box, but I pulled them out a few days ago. They'll live on a window sill until next fall, when, I hope, better ghosts will replace them.

Our first Tuesday night session will be February 4. I'm going to work with clear glass for a while. I want to get better control of shapes and thickness so that, when I do use color again, my pieces will have more grace and height than they do now. That's the plan, anyway. Whether or not I stick to it is another matter. Color is irresistible.

(*I do this too. It's fun to go trash-picking. Two of my classmates are geniuses at using scraps. When we were just starting out, My Classmate and I picked through the refuse to get our hands on color we weren't otherwise supposed to be using. Three of my favorite pieces are made from odds and ends. Last semester I unloaded a malformed cat; one of my classmates saw it, liked it, and took it home. That bucket is a gold mine.)

Slow Coffee

This ain't grab 'n go. 

25 January 2020

The twelve of you who read this little blog know that I'm a coffee snob. Now that coffee shops are popping up like weeds all over London, I'd packed a travel mug and planned to sample as many of them as we could on our ten-morning trip. 

I figured out early on that, at least in central London, coffee is something to be taken on the run.

That's not how I like mine. 

When I'm home, I grind my beans in a burr grinder, empty the grounds into a French press, wait for the boiling water to cool down a bit, pour the water over the coffee, stir, and wait at least four minutes before decanting.

If I have time, I'll drink at least half of it at home, slowly, while I'm reading an article about scientific fraud or political machinations. If I don't have time, all of the coffee goes into two travel mugs, which I take to work with me, and sometimes I won't finish until almost 2:00 p.m.

The beans, with rare exceptions, come by subscription from Acadia Coffee Company (the best beans you'll ever buy) and Homestead Coffee Roasters (if not tied for best, a close second). 

I like medium and dark roasts from single-origin beans, especially from Indonesia (Sumatra and East Timor) and Mexico. My latest favorite, thanks to Acadia, is Tanzanian peaberry in a medium roast (you can get Grover's Mill's version right now).

I take my coffee black, preferably from a French press. A good pour-over will do, as will a brew from a stovetop espresso pot (which is more like an Americano than a true espresso). Drip coffee isn't strong enough. Real espresso is too strong. 

Long story short, I know what I like, and in London I hoped to find it. 

I didn't. All but one place we visited offered only drip coffee or varieties of espresso, leaving me to ask for Americano almost every time. What I was served was so hot that, more than once, I burned my tongue. The travel mug I had with me is so good at retaining heat (see the 2:00 p.m. reference above) that I really couldn't get a sense of how good the coffee was until sometimes two hours later, at which point I'd be standing outside of a museum or a book shop, trying to finish, or sneaking sips from the mug in my tote bag while we were having lunch. After ten days in London, I only had a vague sense of which places were worth returning to. Part of this is because I didn't want to waste any of Jack's time, and because we always had plans. Many of the shops had so little space that no seats were available even when we did have time to spend.

We were wandering about Shoreditch in East London when we found the high-end tea shop, the London Tea Exchange. While Jack perused thire massive collection, I honed in on the travel mugs and tea pots.

There were double-walled glass contraptions with removable steel filters inside. Clearly meant for tea, the FlowTea looked as if it would do for cold brew as well. The shop keeper told me these things aren't available in the U.S. (they are, from Amazon), and I didn't bother to fact-check him. 

 my imported FlowTea, in use for hot coffee

I also bought a teapot-cup-saucer set, not because I needed one, but because the colors and pattern are so completely me that I knew I'd regret it forever if I didn't buy it.

I paid stupid money to ship the teapot and mug home because there was no room left in my suitcase. This, I figured, would ensure that I use them both until I somehow break them both.

And use them I do, making my slow coffee even slower. The FlowTea makes a worthy cold brew; I fill the canister and let it sit out all day, mixing it every so often if I'm around. It does a good job with hot coffee too, although it doesn't retain heat for more than an hour or so, and the strainer system can be messy if one doesn't let it finish draining before taking it out.

The tea pot is ridiculous, and that's why I love it. Now, on rainy weekends, the French press coffee goes into the tea pot, which I carry to the table. I drink slowly from the cup and run my fingers over the raised patterns. The pot keeps the rest of the coffee warm long enough for me to take my time.

If I had any command of glass, you know I'd try to make this. 

Today was another rainy Saturday. At Plain Jim's suggestion, I herded a handful of Slugs and their significant others to meet at Grover's Mill Coffee in the depths of Princeton Junction or West Windsor or East Windsor or something; it all looks the same. Don't let the strip-mall location fool you: these folks roast their own beans and serve French Press in a volume worth sharing. They did it right. They waited four minutes before pressing. They served it in ceramic mugs. It wasn't too hot to drink. I sipped slowly, finishing over the course of the hour we were there. 

This, of course, is suburban New Jersey on a Saturday, not central London on a Tuesday. Still, I hold out hope that the next time I travel across the pond, I'll be able to savor some slow coffee.

Gonzo's Day Out

Gonzo at Six Mile Run State Park

20 January 2020

You know those mornings when you wake up from 9 hours of sleep and still feel like shit? Saturday was like that.

I'd already canceled the towpath ride I would have led if anyone had bothered to register. There was snow in the forecast, snow that would change to rain, leaving central New Jersey a slushy mess. The temperature at 9:00 was in the mid-20s. That nobody had signed on to ride in such weather was a relief, if not a slight surprise. The Slugs I run with tend to obey Rules #5 and #9 with a certain amount of religious adherence.

I drugged myself with coffee and dragged myself downstairs to where I'd set Gonzo on the fluid trainer the night before.

Poor Gonzo. Booted from commuter duty in 2014, stripped and repainted a stealth sparkle, the LeMond Zurich of unknown vintage was set to return to his original job as a winter beater bike. He went out a few times, but for the most part he stayed inside, on fluid trainer duty.

As I pedaled away, trying to ignore the headache and nausea that had been with me off an on since returning from England, I watched the snow come down outside and wondered which bike I'd take for Jim's Six Mile Run Sunday.

Kermit would be good in the wind, but I didn't want road salt to get onto the steel frame. Ditto Beaker and Rowlf. Especially Rowlf, who has a Colnago-club shaped cutout on the underside of the bottom bracket shell for some reason. Miss Piggy? But we won't be climbing hills.

If I only had a beater for salty roads.

Hello? Remember me? Gonzo? The one you're trying to destroy on the trainer right now? The last time I went outside was February 24, 2018!

So I took off the sludgy trainer wheel and locked in Gonzo's stiff road wheel, so neglected that the tire had gone completely flat.

Locking a rear wheel into that frame is a pain in the ass. I never get it right the first time. One stomp on the pedals or one bump and the wheel comes unseated. I never remember to tighten the lever enough. This dropout takes tight plus one.

It took three tries to get it in for good. We were on Amwell Road. I held the frame while Ricky pulled the wheel back into the horizontal dropout.

All four of us -- me, Jim, Ricky, and Ralph -- were on our winter beater bikes. Jim had done some tinkering with the Krakow Monster, and now he's mostly happy with how it feels. I, on the other hand, remembered why it was that Gonzo had stayed indoors for two years: the brakes never really worked all that well; the shifting, because I switch between two wheels, isn't precise; and the bike takes a lot of effort to get moving. Made of spare parts, Gonzo was never meant to be a precision machine. Gonzo was meant to ride in road salt and rain splut.  A sparkly new paint job and hand-me-down racing wheels make Gonzo more fun to ride, but still.

The more heavily-traveled roads had enough salt on them to turn our tires white. There was a little snow on the sides of the shadier roads. Jim had made the right decision to modify his route to keep us away from the shadiest spots. In doing so, he cut out the series of three annoying hills that, on a hilly ride wouldn't amount to much, but on an otherwise flat ride really get on my nerves.

His detour took us south on Hollow from Camp Meeting to 518. An emu lives on the farm at the corner. I think the bird knew we wanted pictures. It came toward us, curious, then, cheeky bugger, it kept hiding its face behind the fence slats.

We got back to Six Mile Run around 1:00 p.m. All the snow was gone.

The sun landed on Gonzo's frame, snazzing the sparkles.

When I got home I didn't change rear wheels. I'm leaving Gonzo road-ready for now.

Downshift and Spin

Rocktown Road above Lambertville 

12 January 2020

Halfway up Rocktown Road on our way out of Lambertville, I realized I hadn't taken any pictures. This posed an existential question: If I don't take any pictures, would there be a blog post?

So I stopped on the ridge.

Ricky, Pete, Bob, and Sophie were so far ahead of me that thirty more seconds wouldn't make a difference.

I'd listed the ride on Saturday evening. Up until then, there had been rain in the forecast for Sunday morning. Now we'd be dry and facing 40-mph wind gusts instead. I didn't care. I hadn't ridden since December 28. The forecast temperature was for the mid-60s.

Ricky started with me from my house. We spent a little too long drinking Kenyan coffee I'd made with the stovetop espresso pot. Not as strong as real espresso, it comes out like a dense Americano: opaque.

We needed the caffeine kick because we were into the wind the whole way up to the Pig. Pedaling seems so easy when you don't have tights on for the first time in months. Still, I stayed in the small ring, my usual mashing giving way to quick spinning.

We arrived a few minutes late. Pete had already found us, in his customary manner, as he pedaled past the Pig until he saw us approaching south of Pennington. Sophie and Bob were in the parking lot.

Sophie had forgotten her helmet. She was ready to call it quits, but Pete, who lives about a mile away, had a spare at home. We followed him to his house, got Sophie sorted, and went on our way.

I decided to add some miles at the top of the Sourland Mountain by going east on Mountain Church to Rileyville, then back west on Mountain. When we got to Linvale, I had a massive brain fart, and instead of continuing straight, I turned left, sending us back down the mountain in exactly the wrong direction.

So much for my ability to navigate on roads I've been traveling since 2000.

We went west on 518, straight into the wind now, without trees to block it. We ducked north on Harbourton-Mount Airy, then south on Rock Road West, putting us back on 518  above Lambertville.

One good brain fart deserves another: I wanted to turn right on York Road to get us farther north into Lambertville. York Road is, of course, off of 179, not 518.

Pete was enjoying every minute of my brain-fartery.

We went to Rojo's, because of course we did. One of these days I should try Lambertville Trading Company again. There's rarely any room inside LTC, but, then again, there weren't any inside tables at Rojo's today either.

Even after the break I was lagging as we made our way up Rocktown Road.

We had a good tailwind, so we went straight to Route 31. We didn't have Jim to sing us across. Somehow we all made it through alive anyway.

Years ago, like, maybe ten now, there was an alpaca farm not too far in from Route 31. The animals would all turn to watch us.  Even though that pasture has been empty, I always look. Today I saw something.

In the distance, in a field that was so far away that I wasn't sure if the property fronted on Route 31 or on Mountain, was a small herd of alpacas.

40x zoom for the win.

We swung through Pete's neighborhood again on the way back so that Sophie could hand off the helmet. Pete, Bob, and I lingered in the Pig parking lot, enjoying the unseasonably* warm air. Ricky and I let the wind, which had died down only a little, push us home.



(*I don't even know what that means anymore. Wild temperature swings are the norm now. Welcome to the slow apocalypse.)

Miscellaneous London

British Museum, London

7 January 2020

We're flying home tomorrow. Here some some photos that didn't fit into the other blog posts.

Cloud 9 Cycles, Bloomsbury: This ball of inner tubes is the only positive thing I have to say about this store. There were two employees, both young men, and they completely ignored me. Never assume that a middle-aged woman in a winter coat doesn't have two decades of road cycling under there. That I was looking up at wheelsets was a good indication that I did, indeed, know something.

The lighting was bad in the Building Centre, where there's an exhibit on London's infrastructure and city planning. We had fun trying to identify landmarks on this three-dimensional model of central London.

Viewed from the east, where the Thames drains to the sea:

London as seen from the north:

From the west:

And from the south:

A puffer fish in the King's Collection at the British Museum:

Frankish (I think) glass from the King's Collection:

Ancient Egyptian (I think) glass from the King's Collection:

Seven Dials, Covent Garden, at night:

St Pancras Rail Station:

St Pancras as seen from the pub across the street:

I was going for quintessential tourist London here: St Pancras, a pub, and the iconic, red London buses:

Construction cranes, decorated with lights, as seen from Oxford Street at twilight:

A sun made of lights at the exit of the British Museum's Troy exhibit:

A residential building on Torrington Street, Bloomsbury, where, presumably, one can live in a round room as if it were in a turret:

And that's a wrap. Bye, London. See ya when I see ya.

Cats and Graffiti in Shoreditch (With Bonus Cat)

Balthazar, resident of Lady Dinah's Cat Emporium

7 January 2020

No trip to London is complete without a visit to a cat cafe. We returned to Lady Dinah's Cat Emporium to play with the latest adoptees, most of whom were self-entertaining and couldn't have cared less if we pet them or not. Such is the essence of cat.

Dorian, who is annoyed by the kittens:

Mountolive (Olive), one of the kittens:

Victor, found as a kitten, always a kitten, due to a hormonal defect:

Pip, a kitten:

Cassandra, the Alpha Cat:

Rodney:

Tinkerbell (L) and Lizzie (R):

Lizzie on the wheel:

Tinkerbell:

Balthazar (Baz), a kitten who is still getting used to people:

Baz playing with my camera strap:

Baz with his teaser toy:

Baz peering down from his safe perch:

Oberon (Obie):

Teddy:

 The cat cafe is in East London, in Shoreditch. Here, graffiti is an art form:

Bloomsbury, where we're staying, had been cat-free until we found this very orange mush lounging outside of the Brunswick Centre. He let us talk to him and pet him, letting out happy peeps and chirps. Clearly he was well cared-for. He was this trip's bonus cat: