Cleaning the kitchen tonight

Once, I had a crush on a guy who sat next to me in our "Philosophy of Contemporary Issues" class. We'd talk about the hypothetical deterrent effect of the death penalty and he'd drink this huge can of RedBull and I'd struggle quietly to not vomit from the smell. Now it is a vital chemical for most of my major life events, like moving and big writing projects. Go figure.

Other supplies purchased today (minus the cat):


Not pictured, the remainder of my bottle of Bulleit, which I must either drink now or forever hold my peace with breaking it in the moving process. This has happened before.

My brother and I discuss whiskey

He: "I like Old Thompson's. Cheap stuff. Goes well with root beer."
I: "Bulleit is really nice for drinking alone."
He: "Aw!" (sympathy face)
I: "No, like without anything mixed in. Not like by myself alone."

faster, faster

Thoreau went to the woods in 1845, and stayed until 1847. He then spent the next seven years polishing his manuscript. Today, he would have been expected to tweet the whole time: "Pulled bean field weeds, thought of great line about hearing/stepping to different drummer, need Indian meal 4 bread, pond looks nice today." - Bill Leuders

I think there's a place for the rapidfire communication we're evolving into. One of the big drivers of innovation is the exchange of ideas, the introduction of novel thoughts and problems into your sphere of understanding. This could mean reading books, but it could also mean reading your friend's Facebook status, or an offhand comment in an e-mail. Or a meandering Gchat that turns into an idea for a short film. Isn't that how it happens in most movies? Someone is conversing about something completely unrelated to their problems, and then, AHA, problem solved, they run off excitedly to their chalkboard full of numbers. I can never find anything I'm missing until the moment after I've asked someone else if they've seen it.

But I agree that any trend toward valuing the immediate at the expense of slow, thoughtful ideachewing and factverifying (when you are in a field that requires factverifying) is not just sad, but frightening. I shudder at how many asinine political slogans are being ReTweeted as absolute truth, with a "word, sister" tacked on at the end. Republican or Democrat, I don't care. And the Thoreaus of the world (writers or inventors or chemists) all need time to be alone with the creative energy they've gained from communication, to turn fodder into fuel.

Even poem-a-day-writers will be spending the next four months on revisions.

Here is a good day off:

Not pictured: sunshine, bicycle, cats, fresh coffee, Baraboo River, birdsong, crabapple blossoms, a couple decent rough drafts, a good, good friend I will soon be seeing.

Today I discovered that homemade beer bread is the poor/lazy man's way to make a yeast-like bread with less than 5 minutes of stirring fewer than 6 ingredients, plus 45 minutes of baking. And it tastes amazing.

I used some leftover Knot Stock from this one time when I got really excited about Furthermore Beer, but while I could taste the beer, I couldn't really detect that "lovingly microbrewed with real cracked pepper" flavor. There may be future experiments next time I have beer around the house to see if it matters what you use.