Serious soldiers surround simple sins with celebrity
tickling tits left handed and tightening tourniquets.
Jumbling a bumble drunk and dark with whiskey.
Break a wall, all to fall, I am drunk.
Rye whiskey prickly and with cedar poisons
my reaction time a fog.
Avec un bon cul. Un gros cul pour moi.
All the trees leaning fees
to be paid.
My feet are hot
my head is not
take off the shoes today.
I've seen some of my best friends reduced to stammering, drooling, incoherent sacks of flesh flailing about in vain at windmills. A good dose of booze, a social environment, and voila, the previously perfectly normal human being has become unchained. Unconstrained by rationality, by the broadest possible understanding of the social contract. I've seen a young child's Halloween ruined by a stealing spree. I've seen fights. I've seen money lost. And now, ladies and gentlemen, I've had my windshield shattered.
Of course, interestingly enough, I've had my windshield shattered once before by a drunk person. But I certainly wouldn't lump that incident in with the far more pedestrian event that happened yesterday. The first time my windshield was shattered by a drunk person the projectile's path originated from the passenger seat. On a trip to Newark DE to buy oxycontin. He was a bona fide alcoholic. A destroyer of lives. An intensely sick human being. He died.
The event that took place yesterday was more annoying than it was frightening. This weekend was the annual Little 500 bicycle race at Indiana University. The race immortalized in the rather good movie Breaking Away. It's a big deal on campus. Students here think it's the be-all end-all of college experience. Of course every college think they have some event like this. For Juniata it's Pig Roast. The students use this weekend as an excuse to be stupid. They drink heavily for the entire week leading up to "Little 5". They skip class. I had five students show up for class on Thursday...at 4 fucking o'clock in the goddamn PM. I call them my Little 5. I have thirty students in my class. This is unacceptable.
But everyone accepts it. The students here are generally very bad. Of course there are a handful of good students and I'm lucky to say I have a few this semester, but for the most part, students here are unmotivated in the extreme.
But boy do they know how to get drunk and be morons. College is not very hard. You simply have to go to class and study. The ones who know how to deal with the academic environment can probably get by with 15 hours of work a week. The less well suited to structured study, perhaps 30. You just have to do it. And most of my students this semester are taking easy classes. It's their final semester. Bowling. First Aid. History of Beer. History of Rock and Roll. No joke. But they decide to fuck off and get wasted and break stuff. Generally be reckless.
And this brings us to my latest Little 5 experience. It was about 7:45pm yesterday, Saturday April 21st. Around the peak of Little 5 debauchery. The race was over. The Cutters won. Everyone was wasted. I'm driving west on 3rd St. Locusts darken the sky. A giraffe and her offspring run free from the zoo. An old lady is mugged. Just past Henderson there is a group of young people playing baseball on the sidewalk. 1st St. is a fairly busy street. Not a great spot for baseball. The ball had escaped Lamonte's grasp and rolled into the street. Blown up with braggadocio, Lamonte steps nonchalantly into the avenue. The car in front of me swerves wildly into the left lane to avoid hitting him. Traffic in that lane stops. Lamonte does not acknowledge this scene. Rather, with his left foot on the curve, his right in the street, he picks up the ball and guns it. Apparently towards the meat that stands on the sidewalk next to my car. But, unfortunately, Lamonte's an idiot. Why throw the ball so fast when my car is so close to the target? Because Lamonte is a drunk asshole. Little 5 rules!
I was pissed. I got out of the car, shaking with anger. Swearing. Lamonte told me to chill out. There's no reason to yell at him. He'll give me the money. His meat friends said he was "legit". And that it's no big deal man, not even a day in shop. I told them that was a great fucking point. Not a pain in the ass at all. In fact, I should be thanking them for breaking my windshield because it's such a fucking delight to deal with.
I hate Little 5.
Coarse, gray cement smells dusty in the sun. It rolls out unevenly in front of us blending into the sky in the shimmer at a distance. We walk for many hours. Feet sore. Throats dry and voiceless. A rusty chain link fence eight feet high runs parallel to our path, anchored in the sandy soil silently. Rusting. Slowly. Quiet.
The fence posts offer tempting shade where some insects congregate in the weeds and sand. But the long, cool, shifting bands of shade are too small for humans. No other shade in sight. Perfectly endless concrete we walk.
One foot in front of the other. Plodding. Sorely. Blisters burn buried below. Lips sliced through by dryness and sun, a mosaic of scabs. Slicing pain radiates into my dry mouth. Itself cracking, caking dust. Wheezing.
The concrete crumbles slowly, giving way to sand and dirt and concrete mixed together. It crunches and shifts underneath our feet. The fence rolls up and runs away rusty. Squeaking and scared.
No concrete now, just sandy and soil and chaparral rocks. Mesquite. Up and around the corner. Cliff dwellings wall off black holes in the rock. Bushes grow to trees and shake their limbs at us. How were we to know? We had to come this way, no other way to...proceed. Promise to go.
Large forest now with real soil moist. Cool breeze blows hair and mist on dry lips. Water falling in the distance. Plunge pools and mist. Clear cold water falling. Diving. In.
Here are some pictures from the end of my spring break. I thought I had more. But I don't.
Downtown Sylva North Cackalack. Click for bigger.
This here story ain't about no warm water fishes. Hell no. It's about Panthertown, where Brook Trout, the mighty char, rule the roost (and bears shit fifteen feet from your head while you sleep).
So Daniel and I hiked down into Panthertown and stayed in the shelter at the base of Big Green. Pretty nice accommodations. Open on all sides, just a metal roof over a wood floor, but nice compared to a tent. Except when it's pouring rain all night long and you notice the large, oval indentations in the leaves under the eaves that look about bear size. And Daniel left two days ago. It's just you and any bear that needs shelter from the storm. What was that? Was that a bear? It's hard to hear with the rain on the roof.
But when light returns to Panthertown it's one of my favorite places on this whole earth.
Complete with new bridges! These are a huge improvement over the old ones, although I'd very much prefer to not have any at all. That sure would slow down the traffic through the valley.
So Daniel and I didn't have much luck the next day. We each caught a tiny little Brookie out of Panthertown Creek above Granny Burrell Falls, but then he hiked out and the fishing started to pick up that evening. I caught a couple nicer fish, 5-7" out of the Talking Tomorrow Hole, one of my favorites in the valley. It's little, but there is a bit of a rock wall on each side and it sounds like a dinner party is happening somewhere nearby.
Daniel at the bottom of Granny Burrell. Click for bigger.
Daniel looking in the spooky pine woods on the way to the sandbar pool with the cliffs on Blackrock in the background. Click for all the glory.
Daniel with his women's energy bar.
I also caught a couple nice fish out of the apparently very deep hole right at the bottom of Granny Burrell falls. There is a big log in that hole and I'd throw my orange stimulator right next to it and the fish would come up almost vertically from the deep dark depths to devour it.
Click for bigger.
The next day I hiked up over Little Green Mountain and down to my very favorite hole in Panthertown. I pulled two very nice Brookies from it and about a dozen more decent sized ones.
This is at the bottom of Granny Burrell. Click for bigger.
A healthy spec from the pool below Granny Burrell.
A wee bit of snow clinging for its life on the back side of Big Green Mountain.
On the top of Little Green.
A long brookie from my favorite pool.
Uh oh.
Two big buddies from my favorite hole. Click both for bigger.
The shelter.
It rained hard all Thursday night and the river was way up and kind of muddy. So I decided to head out on Friday, a day early. I drove up to Deep Creek to try my hand with big streamers in the muddy water to no avail. But there was a guy there spin fishing with a big frog lure who hooked nice 18" Brown trout.
A waterfall less than a mile up the Deep Creek Trail.
I took a shower at Sean's and met up with him and Mark at the Tea House where much debaucherization ensued. Part three soon.
A new and heretofore completely unexpected account of Gravity Head 2007.
Click the picture of Dr. Roger Baylor to read it.
I thought I'd make a run at fishing in southern Indiana. Try my luck at some smallmouth bass fishing. Zack, the fly fishing guy at JL Waters, told me Clear Creek has some good smallmouth fishing and I read a good DNR report that confirms this. So I went to check it out twice this week and I think I'll head back tomorrow. I got skunked the first day but yesterday I picked up two Long Eared Sunfish and a fat shiner. Hopefully I'll get some smallmouth tomorrow. I'm fishing the section near Ketchum Road a couple hundred yards upstream from Cedar Bluffs. It's a nice creek. Smells like the Brandywine. Reminds me of my youth.
Click for bigger.
Sometimes you just find a lot of good stuff on the internet all at the same time.
There's a lot of crap on Youtube, but these movies are great. They're mostly bluegrass and "old timey jazz" performances and jams, but there's also a fantastic rendition of Folsom Prison Blues by some young looking folks.
This is a great article about free will and philosophy's relationships to the sciences. I seem to remember that it was this kind of stuff that got me interested in philosophy. My sophomore year in college I think. I was pretty intrigued by a passage in The Brothers Karamazov where one of the characters claims that all our actions are just the wiggling of nerves in our brain. I wish I new philosophy of mind and metaphysics better. And The Brothers Karamazov.
I got the link at Leiter Reports.
Tell me Mr. Buck Jones, where is it that you go? You and your flap, flap, flappin' little leather wings, dipping and diving and swerving and flying around my head at noon. Don't you know little buddy, don't you know that bats aren't supposed to fly around during the middle of the day? You probably have rabies. I'm glad you don't bite me.
I hit up Gravity Head on Friday night with Ryan, Yaniv, and Chris then left directly from New Albany on Saturday morning. Unfortunately, yet again, I decided to take 441 straight through the Smokies because I wanted to go to the fly shop in Cherokee. I knew it was a mistake but I always forget about how bad the stupid fucking traffic is in the Gatlinburg area. Sean and I hiked into the site at the bottom of Forney Creek, slightly less than 3 miles from the end of the Road to Nowhere. Luckily I had packed steaks and a growler of Bell's Hopslam to ease to my frazzled nerves. Sean had a good bit of single malt and we got pretty tight that night. We cooked the steaks on sticks over the fire.
The wild pigs were real bad in camp. The ground was all torn up throughout and the little bastards even had the nerve to come rooting around while we slept. The rooted up the area where we cooked and where I was laying next to the fire.
Sean I explored the area on Sunday, walked down to where Forney Creek empties into Fontana. Pretty weird landscape. Ran into a group of backpackers that were on the wrong side of the river and too chicken shit to cross it. Who knows how they got there.
I did a good bit of fishing that day but only ended up with a 6-7" rainbow under the bridge at the junction of Bear Creek trail and Forney Creek trail. But I did catch it on a Hares Ear nymph I tied myself. Which was pretty cool.
After a couple pulls on Sean's signature backcountry whiskey vessel (a metal fuel bottle), he set off down the trail and I hit the creek again but came up fishless. There was a pretty serious hatch on, maybe Blue Winged Olives, but the fish just weren't feeding on the surface.
The next day I hiked up Forney Creek about 4 miles to the confluence of Jonas and Forney Creek. It's a neat hike which goes past some old logging camps and early white settlements. I spent the mid-day with a bat I named Stunt Pilot Buck Jones. I seriously think it had rabies. I also spent about 2 hours fishing up Jonas Creek which was extremely brushy. It was tough making my way upstream. But the little fish were hungry and I missed a lot of strikes. I think mainly because they were so little they couldn't get the hook in their mouth. But also probably because I'm slow.
Daniel showed up sometime in the afternoon and we fished a bit I think but not too long. He had stopped to see Sean on his way up and Sean told him about the steaks so lo and behold he packed some in too. That was cool. So we cooked steaks (on a grill this time) and shot the shit about his new life as a PhD student at Clemson studying fisheries biology. He told me some cool stuff about Shad and fish ladders.
The next morning we headed down the creek a couple hundred yards to a big, deep pool I found the day before and fished around it for a couple hours with no exciting results except that I lost 4 rechargeable batteries out of my camera in the creek. They went deep down under some rocks and I couldn't retrieve them. Nothing like pollutin' to make you feel good about yourself.
We decided the fishing in the Smokies sucked and that we'd head down to Panthertown where I knew the fishing would be better. The hike out was on the longish side for a fishing hike, ~7 miles, and the first bit was pretty uphill and the last bit was pretty down hill. The worst part was that Daniel had to hike the whole thing the day before going the other way. But we did run across Silas the Horse Wrangler.
We were seated on the trail after the long uphill having a drink and a snack and we hear something loud coming around the corner. I yell "HEY BEAR! HEY BEAR!" Thinking it might be a bear running down the trail at us. It turns out if was a dude on a horse with a pack horse in tow. He laughed at me. He says, "You thought I was a bear? That shit don't work man. The Park Service tell you that's what you're supposed to do. But it don't work."
He had long gray hair and long gray handlebar mustache. The rest of his face was very freshly shorn however. He wore denim overalls and no shirt. His small but obvious gut hung out. He was quite good on the horse though. There were trees across the trail ahead. He noted that the trail crews were lazy and that he knew because his brother worked 'em. He rode his horses down into the hollow and up the steep side around the trees and back onto the trail. He might have been Eustace Conway for all I know. I'm just going to call him Silas the Horse Wrangler.
Daniel and his serious vehicle.
Act II sometime soon.
I haven't slept well in a week. I've been too busy. I've been too excited. For Spring Break! Show me your titties baby! Panama City Beach! WOOOOOOOO! Just kidding. I'm going to North Cackalack. I'm going to the Smokies. To Forney Creek. For a week. With Daniel Hanks. And Dr. Séan O'Connell. I'll be in the woods for one whole week and it will be incredible. The forecast is good, highs near 70. That probably means good insect hatches. Blue Winged Olives, Quill Gordons, Blue Quills even. Many a trout will be deceived. And that's not all. I kick the whole thing off tonight with a visit to the opening day of Gravity Head 2007: Gravity Madness, March isn't just about basketball anymore!, at, of course, Rich O's in New Albany. Where I will sample many high gravity beers and after hours of tedious deliberation with myself, will select a favorite of which I will purchase a growler. I will then pack that growler into the woods on Saturday night and Dr. Séan O'Connell and I will drink it down and cook steaks on sticks over a fire.
See you in a week. I will return with pictures a plenty and hopefully zero Rattlesnake bites.
Stout: the beer that means something. That's my motto at any rate. And it's a damn fine motto if you ask me. We all search for meaning in this life and when it's found you should make it clear to the world, OLLY OLLY OXEN FREE. Shout it out from the top of your lungs: I LOVE BURNT BARLEY BABY.
Searching for good craft beer in the Midwest is kind of like playing a giant game of Capture the Flag. Sure, there's good craft beer to be found, but you're not exactly walking on roads paved with golden malt, verdant hops and crystal clear spring water. The roads are paved with corn. Literally. One hundred bushels crushed for every linear mile. It's a kind of earth-friendly filler. We power our cars with it. We make our roads with it. Hell, I wash my hair with it every other day, gives it that wholesome Midwestern shine.
But look long enough and hard enough and you can find the flag. Soar through the cornfield with eyes peeled wide. Hark! A settlement! Perhaps their victualers brew a strong and dark drink, roasted and toasted to keep our bodies strong. OLLY OLLY OXEN FREE I scream from the top of my lungs. I've found some stouts and I drank them down and here I will of them write about.
Dr. Stan Hieronymus thought it was a good idea to have a beer blogging carnival and I couldn't agree more. So this is my little piece of participation. Click the pictures for grand versions.
UPLAND BREWING COMPANY (Bloomington IN)
Chocolate Stout
The head fades quickly and a sharp, shiny, metallic scent wafts up to slice at my nose. Dry, grainy, chocolate malt asserts itself and I feel cheated. Plastic chocolate pinches my mouth and lingers unwelcome.
BARLEY ISLAND BREWING COMPANY (Noblesville, IN)
Black Majic Java Stout
"I won a silver medal at the GABF this year in the 'coffee flavored' category, naaa naa na."
"You're an idiot. You don't know how to spell magic."
"It's a clever play on words. And it's trademarked."
"You are made of too much coffee. At first you appear to be rather viscous. But you're not. It's all lies. You've always been a lier. It all started at the hotel in Key West. You weren't going to the store to buy limes. You were doing unspeakable things for a fix in the alley behind the Lazy Gecko. More or less in plain view. People staring in disbelief. WHY DIDN'T I END IT THEN? You're not a bad beer, you just need to beef up a little bit. Fill out in the hips. In the butt. A little bit of body and a dash of residual sugar would go a long way in combating your acrid java ways."
"I don't even know who you are."
BELL'S BREWERY (Comstock, MI)
Kalamazoo Stout
Dear Kalamazoo Stout,
You smell like the wedding cake of King Edward the VIII. Delicate yet sumptuous. Creamy yet nimble. I wade through your waters in ecstasy. I dream of taking you away on a romantic trip to Pennsylvania Dutch Country where we can lay nestled in each other's arms until daybreak.
With love,
Matthew Daniel Dunn, Esq.
FOUNDERS BREWING COMPANY (Grand Rapids, MI)
Black Rye
This is definitely not your father's stout. Mainly because I'm not sure it's a stout at all. But I bet you father would enjoy the way the spicy spicy spicy nose slaps you around like a stripper's tits. That sweet stripper smell. Mysterious yet comforting. Picante! Again, unfortunately, much like our friend Black Majic (sic), Black Rye needs to put on an extra pound or two. She kicks so much game that she needs a little bit of junk in the trunk to give her a solid foundation. To kick all that game.
NEW HOLLAND BREWING COMPANY (New Holland, MI)
The Poet Oatmeal Stout
Not very stout
Sweetish nose about
to shellac my tongue.
It smells like candy to me- too smooth
Ryan thinks Carafa malts are the culprit.
TWO BROTHERS BREWING COMPANY (Warrenville, IL)
Northwind Imperial Stout
Fruity. Diacetyl I dare to conjecture? Do you contain anise? Licorice? You are strange.
Ryan, Brian, Yaniv, the Stinks... without you, none of this would have been possible.
I drove to the center of our country today. At 99 miles an hour. Chewing tobacco is primarily a driving hobby for me. Keeps me awake. Keeps me sane as I throttle through frozen corn fields and truck stops. Dodging woodchucks and the cop's drop and Midwestern transvestite hookers who walk balding in high heels along access roads fighting 30mph wind gusts and the gas station attendants who tell me: "She...he...it, whatever. It walked in here, used the bathroom, and walked back out. Got no damn idea what the hell the story is. We called 911." These are good Christian people who also chew tobacco and hunt deer and wear camouflage jackets.
On the long straight trip from the Kansas City International Airport (with daily flights to Paris) we met the Fireworks Magnate, an honest to goodness Tycoon-Robber Barron who completely looked the part except for the jeans and sweatshirt. Told us we were buying the wrong stuff, the kid's stuff. We were wary of the pitch but soon came to realize he spoke the truth. Owned 52 stores in 10 states. Worth $43 million. That is if we could believe the huge hag of a Midwestern slut who checked us out and gave us $10 in fireworks for free as she copped Ian's knob and jerked on Ryan's chain. I stayed out of it. You can get worts through that kind of contact.
We arrived at the house and played with the kids for a couple hours. Taught them how to gamble some and then Brooke took our money in a cutthroat game of Uno. She has a strong poker face. Bailey refused to play with us. She's kind of snooty. But she did show us her Cinderella (?) magnet things which was cool because Cinderella looks pretty hot in her skivvies.
The Missouri State Wrestling Championship was a nemesis far too young and sinewy for us to challenge, particularly in a blizzard, so we ended up driving around for a while in the snow. We'd head to the the Flat Branch Brewpub and gorged ourselves. Purchased four growlers of brewed-fresh beer and sat awkwardly as Mike Pell heckled our waiter: "That group there, they're gonna to skip out on the check. That's what they do. That's how they make their living. They travel around the middle parts of our fair nation buying growlers and obscene dinners then they dash out the door like so much fart in the wind and you're stuck holding the bag for a cool $200."
"Sir, you're going to have to keep your voice down or I'm going to cut you off."
"Cut me off! CUT ME OFF! I'm a doctor you son of a bitch, this is prescription!"
"Regardless sir, you'll have to take your seat now or I'll call the manager."
"Mike, dude, sit down, you're creating a scence."
"You wanna scene, I'll give you a scene!"
He flipped over the table like it was a child's toy. It knocked his wife clean out of her chair and onto the ground where his hot bowl of tortilla soup proceeded to scald her eyes and she screamed.
He picked up a chair and threw it through the side window and slipped out through the hole like so much fart in the wind.
During the commotion we took the opportunity to skip out on our check. As per the norm. Like so much fart in the wind.
Chris drives fast on the snow covered back roads. They're hilly and curvy and the speed limit's 45mph. He takes it all at a cool 60. He's got a Suburu, all wheel drive. No worries. Ryan drinks most of his growler on the ride home and my knees rub sore on the dashboard.
We gamble until four in the morning. Small stakes. I was down $20 until we started playing blackjack. Cedar the sad one-eyed-dog was good luck for me. I mounted a counterinsurgency. The growlers were gone so we started on the Boulevard Pale Ales and the Schlafly. I had a glass or two of the Evan Williams Single Barrel Bourbon and Ryan took a pull off the bottle.
The kids woke us up the next morning well before noon. Ryan said "Don't let me drink bourbon anymore and don't let me play blackjack drunk." So we made Belgian Waffles and a blueberry compote, eggs, bacon, and fried potatoes. We were, unfortunately, out of beer, so I had to take some bourbon as my digestive. It's a rough life.
We lit off fireworks and played more poker and then made a run to town for provisions. Went to Walmart and Ian took picutres of Fancy-Manhattan Ryan pushing the cart around. Ryan was ashamed. We bought a couple cases of beer and ping pong paddles, balls, and a net. All we had was the table. But if you're only going to have one thing for ping pong, the table should probably be it. We managed to get another meal at Flat Branch because none of the same people were working. We skipped out on that check too.
Snowy back roads and scary driving. We're back at the house. Ryan loses $5 to Ian in ping pong. Mike Pell and Dianna arrive and we play beer pong which I pretty much dominate. We play more poker. We play Oscar which I insist on calling Joachin Phoenix, or just Joachin for short. We light more fireworks. This is when we realize the Fireworks Magnate was right. We should have bought bigger fireworks. I eat some ice cream with the left over blueberry compote on it.
We are drunk. Again.
The next day we take it easy. I enjoy an egg sandwich on a blueberry bagel which is way better than it sounds. We gamble. Chris drinks several beers before 2pm. We decide we need some activity, dammit. Need to flex our muscles. We sneak into the athletic facility and Ian and I lift weights for an hour. That's fucking dedication yo. I haven't missed a workout in a month. Chris kills everyone in racquetball. I really suck at racquetball. We go home and make a massive pasta and sausage dinner and an inordinate amount of salad which no one touches. It was going to be good too: spring greens, cucumbers, red onions, avocado, and crushed pecans. But after you stuff your fat face with pasta and sausage, the salad isn't terribly appetizing.
We gamble until 2am as we finish the last case of beer.
The Mid-Missouri Distinguished Juniata College Alumni Biannual Meeting of Philosophy and Leisure was a success.
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