Book Report: Alternate Routes
What if the myth of Dædalus, the Minotaur, and the Labyrinth was real and furthermore explained Los Angeles' tornadoes? This is a fantasy novel by Tim Powers, who specializes in novels of the form "W...
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Book Report: The Big Rig
It's about about USA long-haul truck drivers working darned hard for darned little pay. This book gets into the historical and sociological (Is that a word?) reasons for the "little pay" part. Some ...
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Book Report: Coyotes
Donald Trump is scared of undocumented Mexican workers. Then again, he's a coward who's scared of plenty of things. How much should you worry? In Ted Conover's book Coyotes, he (Conover, not Trump) t...
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Book Report: Carsick
In which cult film director John Waters hitchhikes across America. He spends a lot of time waiting. When he does get picked up, it's often because he's recognized. A non-celeb like you or me wouldn't...
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Jotting Notes on Bill Jonesi GC Summit 2011 Presentation: Rallye School
It's a talk by Bill Jonesi about Road Rallys, especially about the local varieties favored by The Rallye Club. This was a good talk. Going into it, I thought "road rally" just meant time+distance r...
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Book Report: Independent Cycle Touring
My bicycle's a coatrack; why did I read a book about planning and riding multi-day bicycle trips? Well, I wouldn't have heard of Independent Cycle Touring except that I know the author; but I'm glad...
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Green Tortoise tour photos
Yesterday, I got back from a Green Tortoise (backpacker/hosteler bus) tour of some northern-USA parks, including the Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, and Zion canyon. I haven't done a write-up yet, but the...
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Book Report: The Crossroads of Time
In this parallel-worlds scifi adventure, our hero meets some people who are largely, but not 100% like him; he figures they will all get along OK, and they do. He goes to strange places similar to o...
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Milestone: 13 Million Hits
Wow, it's the site's 13000000th hit. (Sort of. Actually, it probably passed 13000000 a while back. I skipped counting a bunch of hits (most of them?) during October-November. Anyhow.) 124.185.38.69...
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Book Report: The Forms of Water
It's a novel by Andrea Barrett, but it's not about scientists or even lab assistants. Who knew that Barrett wrote about anyone other than scientists and lab assistants? This novel is about people. ...
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Book Report: Uncommon Carriers
I'd read most of these John McPhee essays already, and it was nice to read them again. This collection includes the essay about riding in the hazmat truck. That essay is darned good. Look, not all...
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Book Report: Sand Cafe
I have now eaten ramen noodles that were prepared on one of those espresso machine milk-steamer attachment thingies. I am told that the espresso machine cost a few thousand dollars. However, the no...
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Book Report: Dishwasher
Dave Hill wrote in to say that he'd been reading some of my old web pages. (He didn't say so, but he probably started browsing because he was hoping to see some kind of writeup about the the No More...
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Book Report: Rain or Shine
You want to read this book. It's short, it's easy. It has rodeo announcing, stirring human drama, show business, the changing face of the American West, junk food wrappers. The writer, Cyra McFad...
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Link: ExistentialTraveller
In June of 2005, Tom Manshreck drove from Brooklyn to Alaska. And he wrote about it. Tags: travelog | Canada | baseball |Labels: road trip, travel...
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Site Update: Jan 05 Road Trip Report
Just nine months after the fact, I uploaded a write-up of the road trip that Tom Lester and I took back in January. You could argue that in 2004-2005 span, I thus completed another unemployed travel...
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Book Report: Road Fever
What does it take to drive from Tierra del Fuego to Prudhoe Bay in less than a month? Will, determination, and paperwork. A big stack of paperwork. Folders and folders of paperwork. Visits to con...
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location location location
As we waited to get into the puppet show, Tom and I made small talk. I told him that I'd finished reading Linda Greenlaw's Lobster Chronicles, about her adventures getting re-settled at Isle au Ha...
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get on the bus
My bus was not full; that broke my plan. My first week at the new job coincided with the company ski trip. I knew a few people at the new job, but not many. Now, on the bus ride back to the bay a...
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