Ploafmaster General

Okay package thief, I hope you enjoy your ill-gotten aerosol cans of brake cleaner and Boshield T-9 rust protector.

My mother-in-law lives in Wilmington, NC. Well, outside Wilmington in a suburb called Leland. It’s nothing but freshly expanding exurban sprawl with stroads and isolated subdivision neighborhoods spreading into formerly rural wetlands. In the roughly 15 years that she’s lived here I had mostly written off this town as not having much of an interesting coffee scene. But now as her time in the region draws to a close, I have coffee on my face.

Many years ago we stumbled upon Bespoke on Princess Street downtown. They served Counter Culture at the time (but switched to Black and White eventually) and provided the sort of coffee bar experience I enjoy. I think there were a couple of other places in town that weren’t Port City Java (regional Starbucks wannabe) but were more of a “place to get breakfast and coffee with it” than a place for fussy coffee dorks like me. I’m sure I’ve missed some things, but Bespoke was close enough to Leland that it was easy for us to pop over there when visiting my mother-in-law. So I just sort of grew comfortable with what we knew and stopped looking.

We’re almost done with a weekend in North Carolina for my mother-in-law’s birthday, and yesterday morning we went to Bespoke. Some time in the past year they changed ownership and, while they still have a full coffee bar, the concept has dramatically shifted. The interior is more of a dark cocktail bar, and the vibe on a Saturday morning is off. I still had good espresso and the pastries they have now are a markéd improvement (from a new-ish place called Pie Slayer that seems awesome), but the shift in atmosphere shocked me out of my stupor and got me looking again.

Well it seems like there’s plenty of good coffee to be had around town now, and I need only have looked. Years ago. There’s a place called Maven that roasts specialty coffee in town, but I ran out of time to check them out. And this morning I drove way out to Ogden (30 minutes from Leland) to Casa Blanca since they were open on Sunday, and they just flat-out rule. Solid espresso and cortado, and really nice pour over on my way out. I bought a bag of beans to take back up to Richmond.

I suppose the lesson for me—which I should have learned already when I was shocked out of complacency in Richmond this year!—is to always keep an eye out for what’s going on in a town’s coffee scene. I like to be a good regular customer at places I enjoy, but I still like checking out new joints when they arrive. I’m sure I’ll have to re-learn the same lesson in the future!

Always a little upsetting when I watch cycling videos from people in Germany, New Zealand, Malaysia, Japan, etc. and they’re all complaining about the same things I do with drivers and bike lanes and what-not. It can be especially bad in the US, but it’s bad everywhere.

Sitting two rooms away from my mother-in-law at her house, slowly developing an eye twitch as I hear the absolutely alarming bullshit blaring from Fox News on the television.

Parents (me included) love introducing their children to favorite media. My wife and I showed our first born Star Wars movies perhaps a bit too early. Between both of our kids we’re at various stages of introducing The Simpsons, superhero movies, Clueless, etc. I’m pretty sure we’ll start watching Gilmore Girls with the middle schooler in the near future, while my son—more tolerant of frightening stuff—has started enjoying MonsterVerse movies.

But at some point this past year our daughter introduced us to something new: Mummy Joe, by way of a li’l green undead fella named Zobny. Our entire family still loves this video, and we eagerly check out every new one that comes out. Sometimes it’s a baby reading your horoscope or a poor, confused skellyton. We even enjoy digging through the back catalog, learning about Deathface the Horsey, weewee, or the full Kid Vampire saga.

But there’s one video that, while maintaining the general goofy nature of Mummy Joe, hits a bit emotionally harder. And that’s about Blorgween:

This video has all the Mummy Joe hallmarks: silly mispronunciations/spellings, tight and cohesive storytelling, and bit of realness wrapped up in absurd humor. But it also digs deep on the feelings of fading childhood and the loss of innocence that comes along with acquiring knowledge and maturity. That sounds pretty “exitenshal” I guess, but it’s neatly presented with the right mix of humor and melancholy.

I fear I’ve started down a dark path…I just purchased my first bike component from eBay (a Shimano 600 Arabesque front derailleur).

After a year since his last video Eric Marth returns with a gorgeous and clever resto-mod of this early 70’s Raleigh.

Today is my wife’s birthday! Happy birthday Valerie!!!

I’ve lived in Richmond since 1999, but only in the past 7-ish years have we started to see some decent bagel shops opening around town. I’m a Jersey-born bagel lover who’s had my fair share of tasty dough rings around the tristate area. I’m not an expert, but those are my bona fides. Here’s my current Richmond, VA bagel rankings, highest to lowest (not for fidelity, but rather just how good they are for texture, plain flavor, etc.):

1. Julio’s - I’m lucky enough to live super close to this place, and their coffee bar is excellent, but the bagels themselves edge out Chewy’s just a bit. This is probably down to preference in flavor. But it’s an excellent sourdough base making for a bagel that’s delicious even when it’s a plain one without any schmear. I think they could stand to stretch them a little more so there’s a discernable hole, and I hope they someday add poppy seed, but these are reliably delicious bagels with solid flavor, served warm.
2. Chewy’s - Like I said, I think it’s just preference that this is in the #2 slot, but it’s no criticism. These are fantastic bagels where the passage of time and cold fermentation is evident, and the shop is actually quite a bit faster at delivering your order than Julio’s. Nothing like the speed of a NYC or NJ bagel shop, of course, but pretty good. They have a much bigger selection of bagels and schmear options as well, so if that is important to you (which I’m sure it could be) this may be your spot for the best bagel/toppings combination.
3. Nate’s - The folks who run Nate’s are great people and, full disclosure, I’ve known them for some time. But their bagels aren’t what they used to be. When they first opened they had a skilled bagel roller and they were cold fermenting their dough for at least 24 hours. But it became clear that, as demand and their popularity surged, production and throughput increased in priority at the expense of flavor and texture. Where Nate’s still performs is with their sandwiches: properly loaded like a Northeastern breakfast sandwich ought to be, with bonus points for offering pork roll, egg, and cheese (perfect with a poppy seed bagel). The softer texture of their bagels actually serves sandwiches well, yielding more easily to the bite so as not to squish all the filling out the sides.
4. Baltik’s - Man, I dunno. I’ve had these from a package that I bought at Union Market in Church Hill, more than once. They were pretty tasty! But then I’ve also visited the shop in the Southside to get some “fresh”. That’s in quotes because my salt bagels were kinda tough. They didn’t look overcooked, but something was off. Despite plenty of visible salt the bagels had little flavor. I’ve heard folks rave about this place, but I don’t see it. They’re fine.
5. Sunday Bagel - The only reason these are so low on the list is because I think they only qualify as bagels because of the shape. I feel like they misunderstood the assignment here; this is what happens when you make some decent bread and shape it into rings rather than recognize that texture is an important part of what makes bagels distinctive baked goods. It’s my understanding that they’re in the process of opening a brick and mortar shop, so I’ll have to revisit once they’ve stabilized.
6. Cupertino’s - These are okay. I think they’re kind of a baseline for what I’d by in a grocery store in New Jersey. Points to them for offering the first passable bagels in the Richmond area that weren’t Einstein’s or Panera.

“Would you…like…an atom bomb?”

I don’t know how long this show will stay this good, but when the entire supporting cast is great (in addition to Seehorn of course) I’ll keep enjoying the ride.

Yes, yes, I’m sorry. I’ve allowed my 9YO to become a fan of The Smiths. He’ll be more insufferable than his old man in no time, I’m sure.

You know I watch too much niche bike YouTube when my son says something like, “this guy makes Dangerous Dave look like Probably Riding” 🤪

I spent the first 28 miles of my ride thinking my bottom bracket was clicking; the rhythmic sound matched the frequency of my pedaling and stopped when I coasted. It was only after I climbed back on from my final stop that I realized my keys were clicking my my vest pocket 🙃

The Smokey Mug currently has a pastry they call a “brookie”—your sort of typical brownie batter with cookie dough baked on top, or vice versa—but with a critical twist: this one has a layer of Rice Krispy treat on top of all that. It’s, uh, well, I guess I have plenty of sugar for my ride :-P

I think a lot of Jansen’s strandbeest videos recycle old imagery while incorporating his latest work, but I always love watching them; he may be one of my favorite contemporary artists. Here’s the latest, and it’s scored by “Adagio” from Spartacus Suite No. 2 by Khachaturian. It’s magnificent as ever, though the video cuts off oddly at the end.

When the time comes, which paper’s Trump obituary will headline with “WE GOT HIM THIS TIME”?

I hopped in the car this evening to take my kid to gymnastics team practice only to see the tire pressure indicator on the dashboard. I ran around the car quickly to make sure nothing looked obviously bad or worse relative to the rest of the tires, and jumped back in because of the time. After dropping off the tween at the gym I drove around to 4 Wawas (they have free-to-use air pumps) but struck out at each because of either broken pumps or long lines of cars. I headed home in frustration, hoping I could sort this out with the barely-powerful-enough battery pump I had at the house.

It took well over 5 minutes to get my front driver’s side tire from 24 to 30 PSI (all 4 of my tires have a recommended cold inflation pressure of 30 PSI), then the battery indicated it was low. Not great, Bob! So I charged it while I ate dinner, hoping I had enough time to inflate/charge/repeat on the other 3 before returning to the gym for pickup. But then!

I have a rather specialized floor pump for my bikes: the Topeak “JoeBlow Sport 2Stage”. This pump can operate like most floor pumps at high pressure or, with a flick of a lever, use twin air chambers to deliver nearly triple the volume of air per stroke up to around 30 PSI. This is super useful for low-pressure gravel and mountain bike tires set up to tubeless, like my main bike. But 30 PSI? High volume? Car?

I took the battery pump outside again along with the floor pump and set up the battery dude on the front passenger tire. It also needed to go from 24 to 30 PSI, so I let it run while I hooked up the floor pump to the rear driver’s side tire. The dial read around 22-24. Well, reader, I got that tire up to 30 PSI in about 2 minutes while the battery pump was still whirring. So I took it off and finished up (along with the rear passenger tire) with the floor pump!

Would I want to use a hand pump all the time? Nope! But it sure is nice to know that a modern, high-volume bicycle pump is plenty capable of making up a 20% pressure deficit in my car tires.

The weather is so cold and blustery that I almost didn’t ride my bike today. But I figured if I didn’t ride in this weather I’d never ride outside much this winter, so I went for it and got my 30 miles anyway.

Waxin' a fresh chain. Thinking about doing a little rear derailleur cleaning/greasing before putting it on the Space Horse, though.

I think, cynically, that Kaine probably feels safe from a primary vote having just won reelection last year.

Gross.

Crossed 8000 miles for the year on my bike today while enjoying the mid-autumn splendor of fluorescent ginkgo trees around the city.

I’ve been a massive fan of The Iconfactory for years, both admiring and purchasing a number of their products. When they announced a project intended to aggregate the ever splintering social web and RSS feeds, I was immediately interested. So I was backer 214 of Project Tapestry, and pleased that it exceeded its goal. I’d backed prior projects so I was confident they’d deliver.

And they did…but I kinda didn’t gel with it for most of the past year. I should be an ideal user: I still use RSS (much love to NetNewsWire), and I still (as an elder millennial) believe in the value of text-based social networks, with accounts I like to follow on Bluesky and Mastodon.

I’m not sure what made it work; maybe the implementation of cross-talk filtering (I’m just as guilty of cross-posting—and it will happen when this publishes to my website!), maybe it was the realization I was spending too much time bouncing around between multiple apps. But for the past week I’ve been using Tapestry in place of Ivory (an app I still love), the native Bluesky app, and NetNewsWire. I’m not going to pretend this leads to less time on social media, but I do feel slightly less addled, and it’s nice to see everything in one place.

If your e-commerce system’s “order shipped” messaging doesn’t include the tracking number without me first using some bullshit app? You should feel bad about yourself.

Took a break from riding today to give some love to my All City Space Horse. Since I snapped a crank arm in October it made sense to finally convert this to a 2X setup. I now have the same gearing as my Crust Bombora: 42/26 up front and 11-speed, 11-42 in the rear. I kept the Deore derailleur in the rear (this particular one is supposed to work with a reduced range in 2X) and managed to find a clamp-on 105 front derailleur pretty cheap last year.

The main component I splurged on is probably obvious to the bike dorks: White Industries cranks and their updated VBC chainrings. I’m sure folks have snapped cranks of all sorts, but I have a little more faith in these than the cheaper dudes I broke.

Rear shifts with the Ene Ciclo 11-speed friction shifter and I have a microSHIFT in friction mode for the front. I’ve run the cabling and adjusted the derailleurs, so all that remains is waxing fresh chain and zip-tying the cables in place. Then it’s ready to hit the streets again!

Look, I know “prebiotic” sodas are mostly junk science, but here’s the deal: some of them taste pretty dang good and only have a few grams of sugar per can. So let’s not throw the baby out with the fizzy water, m’kay?