silbatron

My neighbor Ace at 92: Decorated vet, living legend

Ace is a neighborhood legend -- with one arm, four purple hearts, and more than a dozen antique cars, he's hard to miss. Nearly every weekend, Ace drives one of his old cars up Connecticut Ave to pick up his favorite meal at McDonalds. On a nice day, you can catch him outside holding court near while one of the cars is lucky enough to soak up some vitamin D. I caught up with Ace this past weekend, just following his McDonalds trip and a few days before Veterans Day. Here's a brief clip of him summing up a remarkable military career and his passion for old cars. He'll be laying a wreath on the Tomb of the Unknown Solider today and driving an old military jeep in the Veteran's Day Parade. I could talk to Ace for hours. After a very full life, he has some of the best stories in the word.

Frequently asked questions about my ride from NYC to DC (Climate Ride 08)

Have you been training?
Define training?

Well, I mean, do you ride a lot or something?
I biked to Annapolis and back last weekend... This will be much more difficult, but I plan on surviving.

Will they shut down the highways or something?
Definitely not. Apparently there are other roads between New York and DC, at least one of which goes through Amish country, where we'll be spending a night.

What happens to the money if you don't finish?
Thanks for your confidence. The money will be re-routed from the beneficiary organizations to cover my medical expenses. Ok?

You'll have overcome climate change when this is over?
Fer sure.

How much money did you raise at the fundraiser you guys hosted at the Black Squirrel last week?
Almost $1,000 -- thank you to everyone who stopped by and contributed!

Is it too late to make a contribution?
No! Quick -- here's my fundraising page. I'm almost at my goal... You can help me get there.

Wait, when do you leave?
Saturday AM at the crack of dawn. If you're in NYC, stop by our kickoff event, 6-10p at BLVD (199 Bowery). Tickets.

What's this team thing?
Asher, Dave, and I are all riding under the 1Sky banner -- because we want to show our political leaders that America's ready for bold federal climate solutions. Here's our team page. And Phil is riding under the 350 banner for similar reasons.

And why are you doing this again?
It feels like exactly the right thing to do at exactly the right time, and we're going to have a blast.

What's the schedule? Where will you be and when? Here you go.

Best way to keep up with the ride while you're on the road?
- Climate Ride 08's blog and twitter feed
- This here blog and twitter feed

America: D.C. Memorial Day Parade photos

Some shots from Memorial Day parade in our nation's capitol. At this rate rate i should have Independence Day up by Halloween. Trying slideflickr here so i can overlay music, which was impressively dead easy to use -- only wish it would show the slides in full screen. Fullscreen slideshow here if you like it that way (photos much better but you'll have to create your own soundtrack).

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where did all of these catalogs come from?

... and, what's a catalog? Just when i thought purchasing a physical CD was a quaint notion, when's the last time anyone outside of Iowa ordered holiday gifts from a catalog? I returned from a few days away to find a mountain of catalogs begging to be redirected to the landfill (my building doesn't recycle them, sadly). Then I remembered a recent post somewhere about a free service called CatalogChoice.org that does all the legwork of unsubscribing for you -- from whatever catalogs you no longer want to receive. Brilliant. No idea if it works yet (ask me in 8 weeks), but it couldn't have been much easier, and it sure is a great idea long overdue.

Adams Morgan Day photos

Great day for a street fair. I think we were all worried that summer was trying to sneak out the back door without saying goodbye, but we were proven wrong. Got a little trigger happy and shot almost 200 pics during the festivities; just spent past few hours in the darkroom [that is my laptop] editing and culling them down to my Top 40. Check out the photoset here. Of all the photos I've taken this year, I think i'm most proud of these, so please just indulge me. Two of my favorites (for your appetizer):

hogs, carneys, and fried oreos

... at the Montgomery County Agricultural Fair today. Because after the last two sundays of tubing and amusement parks, it just seemed like the right thing to do. These are the sorts of events that make us Americans either especially proud or embarrassed by our country. And, more importantly, it's the type of place that makes amateur photographers think that they've turned pro. So, ahem -- check out my set from today. Warning: contains farm animals.

sunday is for rollercoasters

dazed and enthused
Originally uploaded by sbma44.

needless to say, this was more fun than i ever really planned to have on any given sunday in DC. as evidenced by the photo here.
the honorable players: Ficke knew more about the place than anyone should admit (hence the coke can coupons); Emily tamed the rideguide VR system to get us there; Tom documented; and Sommer almost lost her feet.
UPDATE: In addition to the photos, Tom has more here on why the Superman ride was great and validates everything else i said. or ever will say in the future.

The beauty of destruction

Firefox just crashed. With like 20 tabs open. And they didn't come back like they were supposed to. I'm an idiot for having them all open, but I'm also really glad that they're all gone now. On the other hand, A.V. closed this weekend and will probably soon be blown up. Nothing beautiful about that. Goodbye sweet divey Italian restaurant of yesteryear; you were too good to us.

massive, beautiful bike crash (CSI: Arlington -- call me)

Short version: Me, cycling on two-lane Mt. Vernon trail along Potomac, traveling between 10 and 15 mph in slightly overcast 80 degree weather. The Unsub, a young, stupid male between the ages of 6 and 11 approaches from the opposite direction on a red bike in my lane, riding in parallel with his apparent friend at approximately 5 to 10 mph. Instead of returning to his own lane, the subject swerves off the path toward the grass to my right -- at exactly the same time that I veered off my side of the path to avoid him. Bam!! HUGE collision -- both of us on the ground, twisted up with our respective bike frames. Despite the massive impact, we were both lucky. No major injuries reported. When i looked over at the kid, he seemed to be missing a big tooth or two, but there was no blood, so hopefully the teeth just hadn't come in yet. After some minor bike re-tuning and a dust-off, I was back on the trail and the kid was up and gone before any useful words could be exchanged. Long version: I'm in a bit of manageable pain at the moment, but the whole experience turned out to be a great rush. There was something amazingly poetic about that moment before impact. That moment when you're completely lucid about the disaster that's going to take place in the next millisecond, and yet you're just one millisecond past being able to take any other course of action that could prevent this from happening. So in this strange half-second, your only option is to surrender to the tragedy unfolding before your eyes, to accept the unraveling fate. The lack of needing to make a decision was surprisingly freeing. And while the sore left half of my body may say otherwise tomorrow, the forceful collision of metal and atoms in that crash was also strangely satisfying. Sort of like the release of energy that comes from breaking a glass bottle against a brick wall, or even from experiencing a thunder and lighting storm. The sheer unpredictability of the whole event carried some intrinsic value for me, which I can't completely explain. Both the collision and the unpredictability of the event are just so rare that they seem somehow precious. Of course, my outlook would probably be a lot different if I was writing this from a hospital bed... I guess it's just nice to be reminded of your own vitality now and again.

sleeping

is not going well for me these days... which is bad, cause i'm a damn good sleeper. between the CSI / Criminal Minds / 24 episodes that reveal exciting new forms of torture moments before bedtime and work/travel-induced anxiety, i either find myself standing up in the middle of the night trying to catch a plane or starting a meeting, or i'm anxiously killing TV terrorists and villains until i'm even more exhausted then when i first went to bed ambiden or ambien, or whatever your name is, i'm not ready for you yet, but i see you in my rearview mirror. i'm going to pull from the thorson playbook and start with some whiskey before bed me thinks. other ideas?