Dirk Calloway: Julian Assange

Right?

The Buchstaben Museum

Nice. We really do have to make it to Berlin one of these days.

Deep Fried Turkey

For the third year in a row, we deep-fried a turkey for Thanksgiving. I know this method is getting more and more popular, and for good reason: the bird comes out of the oil juicy and thoroughly cooked every time.

I've been thinking about the process, though, and I'm not sure we can actually call the process "deep frying". After all, what happens with the bird is a lot different than what happens when you make french fries.

The surface area-to-volume-to-cooking time ratio is all messed up. Arguably, the skin is indeed deep fried, but what happens to the remainder of the bird is more akin to boiling or steaming.

I always bind up my bird with marine-grade stainless steel chain and shackles. Culinary chain. An effective, if to some rather off-putting method of securing the bird.

I don't have a proper "turkey fryer," but this 25 liter pot and paella burner work just fine. It takes a while to get the oil up to temperature. The end of the chain is secured in some sort of stick across the top of the pot.

The result. This year I tried something a little different. It was frightfully cold outside, and folks were getting antsy, so we put the bird in at 150 degrees celsius (300 F) rather than wait for it to reach 170. We then watched the temperature drop to about 110, and let the 5.6 kg bird sit in there for about 45 minutes. The lower temperature explains the coloring: maybe a little pale. The meat was great, though! And like I mentioned before, I'm not sure it's really deep frying. The oil never gets back to a temperature where it risks burning the skin. Really, the skin is shocked by the hot oil, and then the bird and the oil slowly approach equilibrium, closer to 100 degrees and well below frying temperature.

Falun velodrome visit

My bike club took a road trip up to Falun, in central Sweden to ride the new indoor velodrome built in a former factory space. As the volume of the space prevented construction of a proper 250m regulation 'drome, the group behind the project settled for a smaller 190m oval with relatively long straights and steeply banked (50 degrees) sharp corners. And by filling the space, (which was punctuated by columns) the site has no provision for any type of bleachers or public seating.

All these drawbacks made me somewhat skeptical of the project. But after participating in the weekend-long course, led by club member and local resident Alf, I have to say I am an enthusiastic supporter of the effort, and would love to see a similar development in Göteborg. Riding in ovals is far from boring when you have a fine indoor facility such as this, and it requires a good deal of concentration to avoid spills.

I did take a tumble, or rather ran over a fellow who took a tumble directly in front of me, so have experienced plywood-burns. The experience was nothing to get terribly worried about, and will absolutely not prevent future endeavors on the track.

The visit did cause me to evaluate the total costs associated with having an indoor velodrome, which can be broken down into three broad categories: 1) the space, 2) the velodrome itself and associated costs (showers, bicycle maintenance and storage), 3) maintenance of the facility.

Of course, in the long run, 3 is going to be the biggest cost. The energy required to heat this immense volume is frightening to think about. As for initial costs, 1 vastly outstrips 2, especially if one is considering a vast span (no columns to disrupt views) and seats for a public. There is great architectural potential in an arena project, but the velodrome would most likely have to double up as a handball or basketball court, or ice rink, comprimising the interests of cyclists.

By reusing an existing facility, as they have in Falun, costs for 1 have been eliminated, allowing the much easier financing of 2. As for 3, hopefully the development will be such a great success that those operating costs will be covered by the site itself in a couple years. Time will tell.

One could skip 3 by proposing an outdoor velodrome, or a velodrome in an unheated shed, or simply under a roof, but that may not be such a popular solution. And in our post-industrial society, we are not lacking in vast empty factory buildings...

I've Got a Good Feeling About This

You've probably seen this video clip by now. It's a fairly amazing feat, but as Chris Jones explains, the contestant's reasoning leads to a fairly certain answer. As an experiment, I explained the game and the situation with this puzzle in three separate classes I taught today, with between one and six students each. With a little prodding, (circling the _'__ and _) each group was able to solve the puzzle within a couple minutes. These are groups of non-native English speakers, and certainly not big English-language puzzle fans. All the groups looked at it as an impossible task, but realized it wasn't as difficult as it seemed at first. An interesting reflection on possibility and appearances.

Apple Pie in an Omelette Pan

I've long bemoaned the lack of availability of regular old pie pans here in Sweden. The ceramic one I had here originally broke, and its Pyrex replacement, muled to me by my father on one of his visits, has disappeared. What you normally find in kitchen shops here are sort of broad pans with fluted sides, what I'd call a tart pan. Flea markets, usually such a rich source of kitchen wonders, haven't proven any better.

Anyway, today I had an epiphany while grilling a sandwich in my skillet. Of course! A skillet is basically a pie pan with a handle on it. So I set about trying with an apple pie in my omelette pan.

Shoe-wax lipbalm

It's getting cold and the air is dry here in Sweden, and since we were at a pharmacy last weekend we decided to pick up a tube of a new lip balm. (why is it pictured upside-down on their website?) The cashier sold us on the lanolin content, and reading the Norwegian description I picked up on the beeswax content too. (Oddly, beeswax wasn't mentioned in the Swedish description.) I told the cashier that it sounded a lot like my shoe wax, and there was a good laugh all around.

After coming home, I decided to compare the labels more closely. Indeed, both my "universal lederbalsam" and Decubal Dry Spots Balm share almost their entire ingredients list:

Beeswax (cera alba), lanolin, paraffinum liquidum (petroleum jelly), petrolatum, and castor oil (ricinus communis oil) are the basic components in both the shoe wax, selling for €80 per liter (note the price tag on mine was in Swedish kronor, making it actually significantly cheaper than the suggested retail price), and the lip balm, which at 65 kr for 30ml makes it about €230 per liter. It's hard to say what the exact proportions of the two compounds are, but they have a similar texture and odor. I suppose the Decubal has more lanolin, which can't be cheap. (Unrelated: In Sweden there's a whole ad campaign based on the premise that "cheap" sounds like "sheep" in English. Ridiculous.)

Anyway, something to ponder.

Product review: Sugru part 2

Most of the photos on this site are taken with a Sigma DP1 camera. This camera has its quirks, and despite its form-factor is certainly not your typical user-friendly point-and-shoot. It has a very large, unusual sensor and a very sharp lens which make for fine image quality at the expense of speed and ease-of-use.

One of the accessories sold for this camera is an external optical virefinder, an overpriced little plastic thing. I made my own from a flea market camera with the same field of view, a dead flash, hobby store brass, leather, and Sugru.



By this time I had learned a little bit about the material, and feel that this was a better success than my sauce pan repair. By letting the Sugru cure just a few minutes after opening the package it becomes much easier to mold. Most shapes are best created from a base sausage-type form, which can then be formed as it hardens over the next ten or fifteen minutes. Sugru also acts as an excellent putty for filling cracks and imperfections. The grip I added to the camera was smoothed and shaped with a stainless steel ruler, and looks like a commercial product. The viewfinder is more clumsy, but with the Sugru is now well-protected.

The material hardened quickly and the camera and viewfinder are now ready for use.

Pear clafoutis

I had a pile of pears that were ripe, so I figured I'd better do something with them. A classic quick treat for a coffee or desert here is a clafoutis made with whatever fruit is in season, so today: pear clafoutis.

Above: a buttered skillet, with ten smallish pear halves fanned out. Peel the pears, and use the end of the peeler to remove the core once halved.

In the blender I've got 1 1/4 C of dairy: in this case half buttermilk and half whole milk. Crack in three eggs, then add 1/3 C of sugar and 1/3 C of flour, and a bit of vanilla. Blend!

Pour the mixture over the pears, and bake 30 min at 200 deg C (400 deg F).

Cyclocross in Slottskogen

Product review: Sugru part 1

Somehow I stumbled upon Sugru a couple of months ago whilst perusing the interwebs. The stuff seemed to have potential, so I ordered a small starter pack. I was surprised upon receiving the parcel how little one gets for one's money: the kit I got contained six small packets, each containing less in volume than those little ketchup packs from Dairy Queen. They also have expiration dates, which is somewhat intimidating: better think of something to do with my remaining five, at least before April next year.

Fortunately, I had a project waiting. This is a really nice 2L saucepan I picked up at a flea market here in town. Thick, robust stainless, possibly a sandwich bottom (one fellow I showed it to suggested it may have a layer of copper in the bottom), and a cracking bakelite plastic handle:

Normally I avoid any type of plastic handle on my pots and pans, since I like to be able to pop them from stove top to oven and back again at will. Since Sugru claims to be heat resistant to 180 deg C, I figured it was worth giving it a go to repair the handle.

My first impression of the material upon opening the package was that it was really too sticky and fluid to work with. It most certainly wouldn't support itself for any type of larger piece, at least in the state is is upon opening. I also realized that the volume of the little packet, while seemingly tiny, was really too much for my project.

I tried two different methods for this repair. First, I rubbed a small volume of Sugru in some of the smaller cracks near the handle, putty-like. Then I took a much larger volume and coated the handle around the larger cracks near the hole in the handle.

The Sugru was much harder to form and smooth than I had been expecting. It really is a fairly fluid consistency straight out of the packet. The final result is therefore kind of choppy, and not at all as professional-looking as I had hoped. But the cracks are indeed filled, and the handle has taken machine washings without any trouble so far. The Sugru-as-putty experiment was perhaps more successful, and I may attempt to re-do the handle entirely with this method in the future.

It's not a pizza until it comes out of the oven!

We made pumpkin pizza last night, with a nice pumpkin-base sauce and smoked wild boar. My daughter wanted to add cucumbers, so I let her put one on a corner, and showed her one of my favorite Seinfeld clips:

Zombie Bicycle Thief

$6 for a tube and $10 for labor?

Smith Tower Penthouse

Apparently Buckminster Fuller's former baby-sittee lives atop the Smith Tower in Seattle.

The interesting work of John Ioannidis

Interesting article from the Atlantic on the work of meta-researcher John Ioannidis. It's of course not so surprising that medical research should fare so poorly in his studies. It would be interesting to see how other fields fared, though it is hard to see how other fields would be exempt from the influences affecting medicine and physiology. What's disturbing though is the trust we as a society put in medical research, not only emotionally but also economically.

(Graph courtesy of AAAS.) This is a frightening graph in many ways. We are on the cusp of a full-fledged energy crisis, yet the amount invested in energy research is a pittance compared to the money we're throwing away at medicine. As Ioannidis points out, the more money we throw at the field, the more phony results are likely to turn up. Still, it would make me a lot more comfortable to know that the field is given resources proportionate to its importance.

The other interesting element this article presents is whether the general trust the public has in science should be allowed to tarnish due to public exposure to Ioannidis's work. Doctors are held in special esteem by the general public, and for large swaths of the practice to be exposed as little more than fraud doesn't do much for the public acceptance of science (not to mention how it might poison the health-care debate in the US). Truly important issues of climate change, energy policy, stem-cell research, high-energy particle physics experiments, and science education can all be questioned by a science-questioning public (just look at the comments section of this NYT opinion column on climate change), but the public needs to maintain an open and tolerant mind, subject to change. I have no doubt that there is lots of lousy climate science out there, but the bulk and breadth of the total research combines to constitute fairly robust knowledge.

But the original article is of particular interest when one considers that the pharmaceuticals we're being fed unnecessarily end up right in the ecosystem. If we can trust her research, of course.

Magical Numbers

Daniel Gilbert wrote an excellent column for the Grey Lady today outlining the issue of irrationally favored numbers. Coincidentally, I taught classes today focusing on numbers and measuring units, sort of a pet interest of mine. Though I didn't bring up my dozenal society fantasies, or Swedenborg's octal counting system, I did mention the lesson of ring sizes in Sweden, which frequently utilize fractions of millimeters rather than the decimal counterparts to more easily help customers find appropriate their appropriate ring size and limit the range of sizes a jeweler must stock.

Tension cot

I was flipping through a Manufactum catalog yesterday and this cot, designed by Ole Gjerlov Knudsen in 1962 caught my eye. The use of natural material turnbuckles, as seen on a traditional bow saw, to form the tensioned tie beam in the structure is a clever use of traditional materials and technology. He designed a chair too, apparently.

Though the end results are quite different, a similar structural strategy is used in the LuxuryLite ultralight cot. This uses tensioned aluminum and carbon fiber poles instead of the traditional turnbuckle mechanism. The principle, using a tensioned tie beam, is the same.

It would be interesting to see further use of this principle in collapsing furniture. I've long been interested in the use of ratchet tie downs in other applications, and this would seem to be a natural use for them. Modern steel turnbuckles could also be used in this application.

Bridgestone MB-6 Project, Part 2

I visited the powder-coater with the bare frame this week, and was a bit taken aback by their new pricing. Really, the price is reasonable considering the work it takes, and to tell the truth I haven't been very satisfied with the work done for 200 kr. 800 kr, the current asking price, includes bead blasting and clear coating, luxuries previous junk bike projects have gone without. This is a vanity paint job more than anything, since it's not covering up any frame modifications. But the original paint was in such bad shape, I think I'll go ahead and do it. I'm going to blast the frame myself though, and save a bit on the total cost. They even had a pink, RAL 3015, which seems a popular color for bikes.

It seems a shame to spring for a new paint job without doing any frame modifications. The most obvious route, since it's going to be a singlespeed anyway, would be to put on some track ends. That way I'd avoid the trouble of gimmicky chain tensioners and whatnot. Still, I have a feeling this bike will live to experience another build, and I may want that derailleur hanger in the not-so-distant future. Also, the dropouts feature a couple fender/rack mounts, which will probably come in handy, and which are generally lacking from track ends if you don't drill and tap some of your own.

Another nice feature for a future build would be down-tube shifter mounts. These would add flexibility to any geared arrangement with derailleurs, and would allow the use of cheap and plentiful friction shifters either on the frame or on the bars. But again, the current build plan is to go singlespeed, and exposed and unused shifter bosses are even worse than exposed and unused canti-bosses, in my mind. So I think we'll forgo any additions or removals from this frame.

Is this frame really worth the trouble I'm putting into it? Of course I think so, for a number of reasons. Since I salvaged the frame, and am building the bike largely with the detritus of parts bins, my total cost won't be anywhere near that of a new bike, especially of the quality of this one. I believe any sort of adaptive reuse is a better solution for an old bike than the landfill, but there are particular bikes which represent especially good candidates for these types of projects. Road bikes from the 70s, 80s, and early 90s are widely appreciated. Quality, especially mid-market and up, was particularly good, industry standards still in use today were solidifying, and the geometry favored by builders was appropriate for a number of applications beyond that of road-racing.

Perhaps less appreciated today are the mountain bikes of the early 90s. There was a golden window, when mountain bikes were at the height of their popularity, that a number of factors came into play:

1 Geometry was more racing-oriented than that of most mountain bikes that came before, which means these bikes ride well over a variety of terrain. Also, they were not yet "suspension-specific", meaning the gap from bottom of the headtube to the tire falls is reasonable-appearing with normalish tires and fenders.

2 Standards in use today became firmly established: gone were the oddball U-brakes behind the bottom bracket and E-stays. Also, modern headset sizes (threaded 1", threadless 1 1/8") were common. Watch out for oddball headsets though! A good shop can help with things like facing a JIS-standard fork for industry standard races, but stems for threaded 1 1/8" forks or threadless 1" forks or anything 1 1/4" are hard to come by!

3 Taiwanese construction was established and relatively good by modern standards. Preferable exchange rates meant Western countries could buy relatively high-quality frames at low cost. Tube sets of complete double-butted chromoly and nice investment cast fittings were the norm even on mid-level bikes like this one. The aluminum bikes that stormed the market a few years after these are fine bikes, but they can't be as freely modified or repaired as bikes with steel frames.

4 Suspension forks hadn't yet entered the mainstream at the mid-level pricepoint, which automatically made these bikes a better all-around value than those that followed. Not having a suspension fork reduces the overall complexity of modifying these bikes for other use, as you don't have to spend time searching for finding out-of-production replacement parts. Fortunately, there are plenty of rigid replacement 1 1/8" forks available for those stuck with an obsolete fork.

The Bridgestone frame I am working on with this project benefits from all of the above. 26.2mm seatposts don't grow on trees, but otherwise almost everything on this frame is relevant today. The 1" threaded fork means I can pick from a variety of interesting stems, and cantilever brake bosses open up the world of modern and vintage cantis and V-brakes.

All that being said, it's not a lightweight:

Frame: 2342g
Fork: 882g
(with original paint)

The Levytator

This seems like a very practical solution for many adaptive reuse building projects when the building owner requires or desires increased accessibility for end users without compromising the architectural or cultural values of the original structure. The logistics of disembarking may prove challenging for some, especially since it differs so greatly from the experience of escalators of which we are so accustomed, and one can worry about crowding in the potentially dangerous staging area. The principle reminds me somewhat of funicular railways.

Corned Beef in a few weeks

The local store is having a special on högrev (chuck steak) from Ireland, so I picked up a kilo figuring I'd have a hankering for reubens in a few weeks.

Below you can see my preparation for beef corning.

I've got a lidded glass container I can keep the beef in while it seasons for three weeks. In the picture you can see that I've covered the beef with water to estimate the amount I'll need to keep it submerged. I measured the water (about 3 cups) as I decanted it into a small pot. As I heated the water, I determined that I needed about 1/4 C of course salt (I'm going roughly by Joy's recommendation here, though I've learned to cut the salt in half), which I stirred in just before the water reached a boil, and then poured it into the glass container. I've also seasoned the brine with a bay leaf, white peppercorns, allspice, mustard seed, cloves, and a couple tablespoons of sugar. It's cooling in the fridge right now, but this evening I'll free the beef of it's plastic wrap and submerge it in the brine. I use the stainless steel chain pictured in the bottom right (acquired at a marine supply shop) to keep the beef under the water level of the brine while it sits in the fridge from 2-4 weeks.