This one's got potential huh?

This decor was intended for the blind, presumably.

House number one, the funky church. This is the living room?

Jennifer and I had the super-duper experience of shopping for houses. As it turns out, we can afford dumps. I guess you could also call them crap-holes or shanties, but dump is probably as good a word as any. The first place we looked at, listed for $115K was a storefront church, complete with drumset and 15 seats as well as a resident homeless man and some serious mildew. The next house was furnished with nothing save some blankets, a few boxes of Sugar Pops and two TVs being watched by the current residents, a mother and her two 10-year-old boys. The next house had some possibility, primarily because no one was living there, though it was about 10 dumpster loads away from being refurbishable. The next two houses we went to were liveable, albeit decorated by either Herman Munster or speed-freaks alternately. At last, our shining hope in a more-or-less desirable neighborhood turned out to have a 15 degree slant to the kitchen floor. Oh well, you can't have everything you want.

As it stands, we're planning on continuing the search, finding a nicer crap-hole, fixing it up and moving into it sometime over the summer. I guess I should brush up on my carpentry skills. We'll need them if we want to live in an actual house rather than a rat-hole.

For the first time in about 3 years I rode a criterium. The circuit is run around a large oval of roads in Fairmount park here in Philly. Overall, about 30 riders showed up, then we divided into two groups, faster and slower. Everyone was supposed to have a blinking light as the ride didn't start until 6:30. Surprisingly few of the riders had headlights though, I was one of two in my group. Being rather out of shape and not having done much real cycling in a while, I took up with the slow group. Sprints were held every 5 laps and I expected some competition from the bigger guys, maybe even from one of the 3 women in my group. As it tuns out, I KICKED ASS! Oh yeah, I was like, totally faster than anyone else in the slow group. I totally laid the smack down on all of those beginniers and weekend-warrior racers. I got special satisfaction out of blasting past the spaz who bumped me as we went around the second lap. Actually, I felt a lot like Andy Kaufman wrestling women to the ground. I, however, didn't taunt anyone.

After 2 years of participating primarily in sports and activities that I suck at: downhill skiing, rock climbing, speaking Japanese, I really enjoyed not coming in at the bottom of my chosen activity. It's refreshing to know that I have some modest skill in a form of athletics. I'm really looking forward to joining up with a club here and getting my wheels back, as it were. Viva Philly! May the good times roll!!

It finally snowed enough to go skiing on. At last, at long last, I was able to go cross country skiing. With luck I'll be able to go at least once more before the snow melts into a giant slushy heap. It was unfortunate that the snow prevented Meghan and Brendan from experiencing the joy that is a Philly Cheese steak. I guess we'll have to save it for next time. B and Meghan arrived yesterday morning, we toured a brewery, chilled out, and then had ourselves some delicious home-made goodies courtesy of Jennifer. Plus, I've figured out this recipe for some damn fine soup, soup of the gods, in fact.
Anyway, just rambling a bit, but the winter olympics are nice to have on TV for a change, though it made me realize, again, that there are no snowy mountain peaks anywhere near here. Dammit.

Jennifer and I contacted a realtor the other day. We're thinking of the "next big thing". Marriage you ask? Heck no! Why, we're just waiting for the common-law statutes to kick in and then we'll be set I think. We're planning on being here for the next 5 years, give or take. Jennifer's job is really working out well, she was just asked if she wanted to be published, if so, one of her co-workers could put something her way if she wanted. Now that all my materials are in, I do the waiting game for grad school. I'm psyched about the idea of working on something more meaningful than selling clothes at an "Outdoor-chic" store like EMS. Work is going well though, I'm figuring out the perks and making friends.

Anyway, back to this house thing, Jennifer and I want to buy one. It's like the biggest toy you can get, aside from a yacht or a child. I like the idea of fixing up a place and making it work for me. I really want a workshop where I can put all my bicycles, tools, gear etc. It would also be sweet to build my own little rock climbing gym. These things are simply right out for a renter, however. Additionally, I'm getting tired of fixing stuff in this apartment. I'd rather do it for myself, and be able to reap the benefit, rather than turing it over to my landlord at the end of our stay. It's just not worth it to fix your own apartment. Lastly, Jennifer's saved up a heap of cash from Japan and work elsewhere, and I'm totally out of debt, at least until grad school kicks in. Now that I'm working part time, and the "spending moratorium" has been in place for a while, we can work on getting pre-approved for a loan and then checking out some places. The key variable is sketchy neighborhood vs. cost and standard of living. There are some damn cheap houses in Philly. Like 3 bedroom places for $20,000. Of course they're right in the "Little Beirut" neighborhood, so you get what you pay for. Or, you can get a condo close to downtown, 400 square feet for something like $250,000. Take your pick.

Oh yeah, homeowners out there, gimme all your inside advice. I want to come to this hunt armed to the teeth, if you know what I mean. Jesse Ventura in Predator style. Knowledge will be my machine gun! Viva Cuba! Viva mortgage de quatro percento!!

Good news all around.
Jennifer and I passed an enjoyable weekend in DC. Emi was out visiting and Brendan made his usual appearance, hung over as he tends to be whenever we're in town. Friday night was the best as he passed out on the couch, muttering things like, "But...who's gonna put him into the car-seat?" Ahh, good times.

Next, I got some good news from home, Asa is actually going to be able to skip the impending surgery, he's healed up quite nicely. The freaky part was, apparently, pulling out the various tubes that had been embedded in his body to aid his recovery. There was a PICC line from his upper arm into one of his coronary arteries and also a drain for the pus in his side. The doctors yanked those out and the boy is on his way to recovering from a week and a half out of school.

As for me, Jennifer managed to get me a bottle of Sake from the liquor store downtown, and let me tell you what... I am in flavor country! I've been missing my rice-wine something fierce. Not only that, but I made a flippin' awesome fish chowder. Probably the best soup I've ever made, and one of the best soups I've ever eaten. Now, if only I can duplicate it.

I've been busting my head for the past few days writing this damn personal statement for my grad-school application. For those of you who may be out of the loop, the plan is that I'm hoping to planning school next fall. I gotta get me some real skills. Maybe by the time i'm thirty I'll be able to get a "real" job. Not that I mind selling technical apparel at Eastern Mountain Sports, it's just that I'll go crazy if I stay there too long.

To think that this is the 5th draft is heartbreaking.
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“Couldn’t believe it, good 200-bushel-an-acre land under a dang Home Depot parking lot,” my uncle lamented over dinner at the farm. He was relating the story of his trip from Sioux City, Iowa to the Chicago suburbs where my cousin lives. My uncle and I have often differed on matters of politics and public policy, but on this topic we were on the same page. I see the natural landscape frivolously turned into lawns and subdivisions without a sidewalk in sight, he complains of the fertile farmland lost forever. We both agree that urban sprawl is out of hand.

While I have strong sympathies with New Urbanist design ideas, I have some reservations about high-density, transit-oriented developments. There must be some sort of sea-change for New Urbanism to catch on. Though the cost of our sprawling landscape is high, for many, those costs are less tangible than the benefits of the status quo. Without a clear comparison, we are likely to trade the nebulous problem: “less farmland” for the visible benefit: “abundant parking.” Finding ways to compare such disparate variables is an essential part of communicating the need to change our environmentally questionable development style to the public.

I am applying for the Master of City Planning degree at the University of Pennsylvania where I hope to contribute in two main ways. First, I hope to do research on the topic of incentives: specifically, the ways in which planners and policy makers can influence people into making transportation and housing decisions that appropriately weigh the benefits and negative externalities of their actions. I am particularly interested in Professor Keene’s studies on “walkable communities” and farmland preservation. Second, I realize that in order to implement change in a community, one needs the specific skills and know-how to take a project from paper to reality. While my undergraduate education gave me a conceptual understanding of urban landscapes, I realize that I need technical abilities to succeed. I am looking forward to improving my skills with GIS in order to use this powerful tool to communicate my ideas to others. Additionally, I believe that the opportunity to work directly with a client organization in one of the studio sessions will give me an experience unique among the graduate programs I’ve investigated.

After Penn, I intend to take my skills and experience to the workplace. As a firm believer in the necessity of regional planning, my aim is to work for a private firm or regional organization that will allow me to focus on the preservation of natural resources through sound planning. The need for mobility, independence and space are deeply ingrained in the American mind. I respect these needs, but understand that the long-term viability of our cities and country depends on us making better use of our resources. In our country, where space is not infinite, mobility depends on having a car and independence requires gas money, finding an alternative to urban sprawl is not just a good idea, it is imperative.

The flaming house across the street.

It's been an eventful week or so. I guess that I'll start off with last Sunday. Sunday morning was pretty average, Jennifer and I ran some errands to pick up the remaining supplies for the closet I'm refinishing. We also drove around some areas where we were looking at housing. The housing market here is schizophrenic. I've never been anywhere with such a driven redevelopment sector. Houses are being re-habbed everywhere you look. At the same time, this is a rather recent development and therefore the boundaries are often very distinct between the zones of refurbishment and the blighted zones. For example, in the area we're considering, Brewerytown, any house south of Girard street, a major thouroughfare, is cute, clean, rennovated and $150k and up. North of that street, depending on how far you go, you can find housing in gutted areas for $20k. Schizophrenic.

Coming back home, we spent an afternoon dinking around the house. Then, while sitting in the living room, I noticed some flames licking the inside of windows in the house across the street. Within minutes the fire had begun billowing around and out the second and third story windows. Those two floors were gutted by the time the fire department arrived 5 minutes later. Talk about excitement, the whole neighborhood was out on the street. I quickly got my camera and was about to run outside when Jennifer stopped what was about to be a really insensitive move on my part.

We had also been invited to the upstairs neighbor's apartment in the evening for a housewarming party. It was a nice time, though we were the only people in the room who couldn't speak any German. Karl is a supreme Deutchophile and is a regular participant in the Stamptish meetings of German speakers in Philly. I don't know what Stamptish means, but what the hell, Karl had good weisswurst.

Things were pretty chill until yesterday evening when I got a call from my parents. They were in the Des Moines children's hospital with my youngest brother Asa. For the past month and a half he's been having a lot of trouble with stomach pain. Over the past few weeks he's been in to the gastrointerologist a few times, gotten to chug liters of radioactive liquids and had a probe put where the sun don't shine. The diagnosis is Crohn's disease, and autoimmune disorder affecting the intestine. Imagine arthritis of the bowels. The call last night was because he's been admitted to the hospital due to intense inflammation in his abdomen. Apparently the abscess or abscesses caused by the disease became infected and he had some pretty severe and painful swelling that had to be treated in the hospital. They're pumping him full of fluids, antibiotics and the like and also draining the fluids from the region.

While I'll not say I'm devastated by the news of Asa's illness, I am concerned for him. Crohn's is not fatal, but could potentially degrade his quality of life to a severe degree. For example, he'll have to keep treating his disease throughout his life and it's likely that at some point he'll have to have surgery to remove affected portions of his intestine. Shit man. He's already had to miss a number of days of school and missed finals on Tuesday. That sort of stuff takes a while to recover from. Anyway, my thoughts are with him. Ganbatte Asa.

Ok, I'm gonna post sometime soon, swear to god, but I just made the big jump from 100 percent free time to something like 59 percent free time. It's a shocker I tell you, a shocker!!!

Ok, It's been a while since posting, but hey, I'm a busy man. No, honestly, I've been busy. I suppose that I owe an apology to something in the neighborhood of half of the people who read this for stiffing them last weekend on my excursion to the midwest. Here's the deal: My parent's neighbor Chad recently bought a truck on ebay. The truck, conveniently enough, was located about an hour's drive from here, near Valley Forge. The plan was that Jennifer and I could drive the vehicle back to Ames in time to get to the wedding of a highschool friend who lives in Minneapolis. We picked up the truck just fine, headed out towards the midwest last Wednesday, and we were fortunate enough that no one was shot on our block, so we were able to get out of Philly on time. A guy was shot by the police on the next block over, thank God we're not on the 51 block of Cedar!

Anyway, we drove our asses off and then ended up back home in Ames all exhausted and such and were considering the proposition of blasting off for the twin cities the next day, and I have to say, we quailed at the thought of driving up to Saint Paul so soon after returning to the comfort of our families. Anyway, it would have involved some serious car shuffling and making my parents go up to get a car was not really what I had hoped to do. Basically a logistics jam. We were all settled to send our apologies to Katherine, Ben and Marye as well, but then Jennifer got a personal email from Katherine saying how pleased she would be if we showed up. So, due to the autimotive restraints, we couldn't spend any real time in the twin cities, but we borrowed Jennifer's mom's car, drove up Friday night and drove back Friday night. It kind of sucked. The wedding reception was nice, I got to see a couple of highschool friends who had gotten larger over the years and we chatted about life. As we exited the freeway to Ames that night, Jennifer plowed into a skunk with the car. It was a long evening.

Whoa, where to start dudes?
Well, for starters, it's like, 2006. Second, I like have a part-time job at an EMS store in Philly. Thirdly, well, New Years was sweet, hung out with Meghan, Brendan and a gang of former Peace Corps volunteers at Meghan's place in DC. The weird thing about newyears is that I met this guy there from Iowa, and I KNEW WHO HE WAS. Those of you who are from smaller or more obscure places know that people always ask you, "Youre from There? Hey, I know someone from There, His name is ____. Do you know him?" To which you always have to respond, "No, no I don't." Even though you're from an out of the way place, it's not like the world is THAT small. Except when it is. This guy walked into the party and introduced himself and instantly I remembered going on a bike ride with him and the make and features of the bike he was riding, all from 8 years ago. Freaked him out, that did. Hah. My bike-remembering skills are second only to my dad's.

Oh yeah, now I'm employed part time at EMS (Eastern Mountain Sports) a chain of stores out East here. The pay is decent, part time will keep me just busy enough to be happy, but not too busy as I look for other "career" work and get ready for grad school, in theory. However, we all know that Communism worked in theory, but ask an Albanian what they think of Communism today.

Lastly, my GRE's are finally over. Thank God for that. Even though I'd rather pluck my head bald than take the test again, a small part of me wants to take the test over to see if I can get a better score. Dammit, I know I can! Fortunately, I won't be doing that again, primarily due to the fact that there's no way in hell that I'm going to pay $115 AGAIN to take a stupid test.

Christmas was different this year. Jennifer and I spent the weekend just hanging out together, kickin' it Christmas-in-Philly. The weather here was balmy, a whopping 55 on Saturday, so Jennifer and I went for a bike ride. Yay, bikes on Christmas Eve! After the bike ride was the inaugural Egg Nog Taste Off.

As some of you may know, the best commercially produced Egg Nog is made by Anderson Erickson creameries and is available primarily in Iowan supermarkets. I don't know what sort of chemical additives, natural flavors or un-nameable substances are mixed together with the standard egg, cream and nutmeg, but I know this: AE Egg Nog is the real thing. Not to be tendentious, but nothing comes close to the truth, the apotheosis of Egg Nog that is available for each and every one of us, should we choose to shop at Hy-Vee, Fairway or Kum and Go markets. For those of you who remember, "Ya Come, Ya Go, Ya Come Ya Come Ya GO!"
At the risk of becoming mawkish, I'll quit this expiation on AE Egg Nog and get down to the meat and potatoes of the matter: I needed an egg nog fix, and I needed one bad! I enlisted the help of my temerous and plucky life-partner Jennifer to procure the needed surrogate-noggs and to assist in the taste-test. Up for examination were four of the finest that the East Coast could bring to bear; Land of Lakes "Traditional Ultra Pasteurized Egg Nog", Lucerne "Holiday Egg Nog", Shop Rite "Gourmet Egg Nog", and Southern Comfort "Traditional Egg Nog".
In the picture you'll notice a number of nutmegs sitting in front of each quart, the rankings are from one to five, five being solely reserved for the AE. A summary:

Land of Lakes can be summed up by an alternate meaning of it's own acronym, LOL. Please, we would hope to find at least a creamy mouthfeel or a spicy taste, but LOL is a gloppy yellow. Two of five.

Southern Comfort was indeed a comfort. Sadly non-alcoholic, but with a creamy texture and cinnamon overtones. A personal favorite though not the grail. Four and a half out of 5.

Gourmet Egg Nog was Jennifer's personal favorite. With good creamy-ness, it clings to the tongue and slithers on down the alimentary like it should. Without the certain something (possibly the addictive compounds) of AE, a good second. Four and a half out of five.

Lucerne Holiday nog, well let me see. A fatuous beverage, no mouthfeel, slimy and resinous tasting. Had I not known better, I would have assumed that I'd drunk slightly sweetened latex. Not recommended, in fact, consider yourself warned. It garnered 1 nutmeg because it wasn't poison and actually tasted alright when put into pancake batter.

A contender not now in the picture below was the Garelick Farms Egg Nog. It was gross. Refer to the Lucerne description for a general idea.

Testing went well, but the final hurdle was, of course, the extremely disturbing hallucinations caused by over-ingestion of fats, proteins and nutmeg. I'll not write more but will include an actual photo of what was visible to me in my stupor; the effulgent aura of our Christmas tree bursting in incandescent sparks before my very eyes. An event truly horrifying until the euphoria set in.

Incidentally, studying for the GRE is going as well as my inchohate mind is capable.

The contenders. May they rest in peace.

The horror of egg nog poisoning.

So, as has been previously suspected, I am an Idiot. Yesterday morning I drove the 30 miles to the GRE testing site in the northern suburbs of Philadelphia. The Testing site was in the King of Prussia area (I'm not kidding, there are some weird-ass names in PA)and it took me about 45 minutes to get there. After an uneventful drive, I showed up with all my required materials, some scratch paper, three writing utensils, my driver's license and even Jelly Belly beans with electrolytes, in case I was having a melt down.

I pulled out my ID, walked to the sign-in desk and smiled confidently. Then the woman behind the desk told me that I wasn't actually registered. Though I had gone through the automated process of signing up, I didn't actually receive a confirmation number indicating that the process was successful. Therefore, there would be no way for me to take the test.

Dammit, I had been studying for the past 48 hours, almost nonstop. I took a short break to go to the bathroom once, but that was all. Now my new GRE date is the 29th of December. The up-shot is that I have more time to study, the downside is that I have to study more. Like I said, I'm an idiot.

So, earlier this fall, when I had nothing to do, I set myself with the goal of taking the GREs. I checked out the library books, I took the performance enhancing drugs, everything but actually study for the test. So, when time rolled around to register for the damn things, I demurred. Idiot. Now that I'm thinking of going to Penn next fall to get a masters in City Planning, I've got to scramble to get everything in order. I guess that's not a change from my normal reality. I'm a goddam procrastinator, and there's little to be done about it. I gotta get some recommendation letters, I gotta take the GREs and I gotta get my act together by Feb 1st. While that's still a while from now, it takes a number of weeks for the GREs to come back and therefore, I've signed up for them next wednesday. I guess i'll be studying this weekend.

YIKES.

Urban youth are a surprisingly sheltered bunch. Why, just yesterday I had an experience that made me quite aware of the perilous degree to which many of today's inner city children have been kept from the wider world.

As it happened, I had gone for my first run in Philadelphia, a week after our arrival. Initially I ran westward toward the Cobbs Creek Parkway system that I had seen on the map. It proved to be a nice run, similar to the run along minnehaha creek in Minneapolis. As I headed back up Baltimore avenue I realized that it was 3:15, a time that schoolchildren everywhere long for. My route back home happened to be directly along the main thouroughfare for the Junior High students as they walked home or waited for the bus.

As I passed by, it occurred to me, "By golly, these youth have probably never seen a skinny white man running past their school in tights!" Indeed, I can only presume they never had, for their cries led me to believe that they were shocked to their very cores! So shocked in fact, were some of the youth that they in fact were taken with fits of what I assume was laughter, but seemed to me more like screaming or jeering! A number of the young boys, tried their best to pelt me with chunks of snow and ice, while others took it upon themselves to run along beside me. Being not as fleet of foot as I, they were soon outstripped however. At this point I came across a brace of young girls, one of which screamed again at me, while her companion took the courage to utter a greeting to me as I rushed past. While the greeting itself was unfamiliar to me, I can only assume it to be a local saying in this region, the meaning was nonetheless clear and pleasant to me. If I remember correctly, the utterance was, "I can see yer Gibbleys!"

At any rate, the brush with the native youth invigorated me to a degree that I was soon panting for breath as I sped home to the relative quiet of our abode. All in all, it was a good day and a good run, I shal have to duplicate it by and by.

Until next we meet, dear reader.