on tomatoes

"The first ripe, locally grown tomatoes still come as a shock. They stimulate all the senses at once, and place us firmly in summer. And they are a reminder of how far agriculture has drifted away from seasonality. When tomatoes are available in the supermarket year round, we lose that keen anticipatory yearning for the juiciness of summer. Instead, we accept a pale approximation of a tomato, a tomato completely severed from our daily reality, grown by farmers thousands of miles away."

--Alice Waters, Chez Panisse Vegetables

Hood to Coast - Part 1

It's been almost a month now, so I think I've had time to fully process the madness that was Hood to Coast. First in a series.


The Fred Meyer Hood to Coast Relay is the world's largest relay race. It's pretty simple: there's twelve people on each team, you start at Timberline lodge on Mt. Hood in Oregon, and run until you get to the ocean. Each team has two vans, with six runners to a van, and the twelve of you hand off the "baton" (actually a little blue slap bracelet) in order until you get to the end.

There are 36 legs in the race. Each runner runs three legs, which add up to about 15 to 17 miles total. All twelve runners take turns in the same order, so the first runner runs legs 1, 13, and 25, the second runner does legs 2, 14, and 26, and so on. Along the way you run down the mountains, through the forests, through the farmland, through Portland proper, and through the remaining countryside until you hit the finish line, on the beach in a little town called Seaside. You run through the dark of the night and the heat of the day. It's 197 miles all told.

This may sound crazy, and it is. But the Hood to Coast has been run each year for 25 years. This year there were over 1000 teams, which means 12,000 runners, plus drivers, etc. There are male, female, mixed gender, masters, corporate, and who knows how many other divisions. Most are recreational teams, and some of them have been running the race for as many as 22 years in a row. Something keeps them coming back. The Hood to Coast is a big deal in Oregon--everybody knows about it, and if you haven't run it yourself, you probably know someone who has.

How did I get involved in all this?

continue reading »Well, I've wanted to run the Hood to Coast for years. There was often talk of putting together a Stanford team, but that idea never would have flown when we were in college--it's too much, too close to Mammoth and the cross country season. Talk of an alumni team fizzled quickly when most of us either moved away, got jobs, or started running for a living. Plus, the logistical challenge involved in getting twelve people to a race, including van rental, hotel, figuring out the course (no small challenge), and taking care of a thousand other little things, is daunting enough to rule out all but the most serious attempts.

Enter Gleukos, a sports drink manufacturer out of Portland, who sponsored the Farm Team this past season. They are very nice people and wanted to put together a team to win the race, as part of a PR effort for their product. (Marketing plug: Gleukos is a sports drink that contains glucose rather than the usual fructose/sucrose, which is supposed to be absorbed faster by your body than other types of sports drinks. We used the stuff and it is good.) The Gleukos people contacted Gags and the Beast, and they assembled a crack group of Farm Team alumni and a few other folks.

The "Gleukos Fast Fuelers," in order of race position, separated by van:

1) Brendon Mahoney
2) Luke Meyer
3) Jason Lunn
4) Mike Wallace
5) Sean Graham
6) Patrick Boivin

7) Tommy Greenless
8) Jonathon Riley
9) Stephen Donahue
10) Tom McGlynn
11) Andrew Hill
12) James Nielsen

Now I'm not about to go writing all about what everyone has done, but there are a few serious studs on that team. You can look them up if you want. Long story short, we thought we had a very good chance at winning. I was a bit nervous about keeping up--although I'd been running a little bit, and doing a workout here and there just to pass the time, I wasn't in very good shape. So I started a four-week crash training program and looked forward to race day...

to be continued

small moments

1. A moment on a Southwest flight from Chicago to San Jose via Las Vegas (where we landed but were not allowed to de-plane, sorry Louie). A man a couple rows in front of me--older, stocky, weathered face, gray bushy beard, t-shirt, tan shorts, permanently furrowed brow--like someone who's spent too much time in the desert--had kicked off his sandals to relax during the flight. He got up to go to the bathroom in his bare feet and returned trailing a long sheet of toilet paper down the aisle, attached to his foot. We all stared in awe. He was completely unaware until a lady walking down the aisle took mercy on him.



2. A moment riding the Brown Line back to the office from the Loop. I saw an elementary school playground that had recently been demolished. The Bobcat was still mired in the mud along with the remnants of the play structures. It was drizzling. A bunch of kindergartners with their teacher were pressed up against the wooden fence, peering through slats in the board and wondering at the destruction. It reminds me of when they destroyed the great old wooden-and-chain-link playground at my elementary school and replaced it with the rubberized safe bullshit kind. Safety takes all the fun out of it.



3. A moment on the Vegas->San Jose leg of the same flight, when I suddenly realized that I was talking rudimentary particle physics with the cute Ph.D. student next to me. And they say EE isn't good for anything.

faceball

Once in a while a sport comes along that is so revolutionary, so uplifting, so downright compelling that it becomes more than a sport; it becomes a phenomenon. It is so full of passion, so brimming with human drama, so alive with excitement that it captures the hearts and minds of young and old alike. The rise, fall, and redemption of larger-than-life figures are played out on the world's grandest stage, before an adoring and insatiable audience. That sport is Faceball.

Faceball historians trace the game's origins to an interoffice game of catch in early 2006. Tossing the football back and forth proved too tranquil for the fiercely competitive participants. Yours truly decided to see how close to his body he could make a catch, "without letting the football hit me in the face." This new pursuit, while a worthwhile diversion, soon lost its thrill.

The true moment of revelation came when Colby Smith, known to the ages as "the Father of Faceball," decided to assign a basic, three-tiered scoring system to the game. Other ancillary rules were soon developed, and modern Faceball was born.

The game reached its zenith in 2006 with the first quadrennial World Cup of Faceball, when the game reached new heights of popularity throughout the United States and the developing world. The inaugural Cup was won by the aforementioned Smith, who breezed through pool play and the elimination bracket, and handily dispatched this author in the championship game.

Henceforth, the ancient and venerable Rules of Faceball:

I. Basic Rules

1. Faceball is played with a regulation NFL-size football. If only a Nerf ball is present, see Section V.1.
2. The two participants are separated by roughly thirty feet, or other suitable agreed-on distance
3. Participants take turns throwing the football at one another, with the challenger going first. The thrower receives points based on accuracy
4. The recipient must catch the ball as close as possible to his or her body, without moving or flinching
   
5. The recipient must not move the ball after the catch is made, in order to "frame" the ball and allow determination of the score for that throw
6. Basic scoring is as follows:
• The game is played to exactly 21 points. No more, no less.
  
• 5 points for a face shot. Face shots are determined by the following test: "Was that going to hit me in the face?" If the answer is Yes, then it's a face shot. If the throw was just going to graze your cheek, it's 0 points, but a re-throw
  
• 3 points for the torso (below the face and above the belt). Shoulders and arms do not count
• 1 point for the legs, from the belt to the knee, including the kneecap
• 2-point penalty if the recipient drops a reasonably catchable ball. The penalty is added on to the score for the throw, and can be declined by the thrower if circumstances dictate
  
• 0 points for all other throws

II. Scoring Nuances

1. The game is played to exactly 21 points. If a throw causes a player to go over 21 points, then 5 points are subtracted from that player's score, and play continues
2. Typically matches consist of the best two out of three games, although shorter and longer matches are common
   

III. Overtime

1. Like in baseball, the player who throws second (the "home team") gets a chance to throw even if his opponent reaches 21. If the second player ties the game at 21, the game goes to overtime
2. In overtime, the first player to score a face shot wins. Just as before, the player who throws second has the chance to match and force the game to continue
   

IV. Suggested Guidelines and Fair Play

1. Playing outdoors is courteous both to your officemates and to fragile office equipment
   
2. In the spirit of good sportsmanship, participants traditionally shake hands after a match
3. Trash-talking is highly encouraged before, during, and after the contest, and at all other times
   

V. Real Man's Faceball

1. If you play with a Nerf ball, the only acceptable way to play faceball is to let the ball hit you IN THE FACE. No moving. No catching. Just let the ball hit you, and take it LIKE A MAN.
2. This is Real Man's Faceball and it makes you feel alive!

the green fields of the mind

At last!


It's everything they say it is, and more.

continue reading »It's sad to say that I'm writing this almost two weeks after my first Cubs game, but I'm still sleeping off Hood to Coast, and I haven't even begun writing about that yet. But Wrigley is first in the queue, because Wrigley is a church, the church of Baseball, and holy places should be treated with respect.

It doesn't matter what team you root for growing up; there are three ballparks you must visit before you die. They are Fenway Park, Yankee Stadium, and Wrigley Field. There are others which until recently were on the short list of venerable ballparks--like the old Tiger Stadium, which is still standing but scheduled for demolition this fall, and Old Comiskey, which is long gone--but none others can match the history and tradition of the Big Three. Now I have two to go.

My first night in Chicago, a month before baseball season, I took the El up to Addison and circumnavigated Wrigley on foot. It was the only landmark I had in the whole city, and was my reference point for navigation while I was scouting places. (That Craigslist ad offering a room for rent in a house with two early-20's female flight attendants who share a room, and live a half block from Wrigley? Yeah, it was probably fake.)

So I felt I could do nothing more appropriate than pay tribute, despite the absence of actual baseball, and I vowed I would go see a game as soon as humanly possible. However, an unavoidable combination of circumstances along with a series of poorly-timed Cubs road trips prevented that. So I was very excited when I had a night when the team was in town and I could get off work at a reasonable hour, and I started feeling like a little boy again. Between the jet planes, capture the flag, and baseball, that's happening quite a bit these days.

Everything they say is great about Wrigley--the Friendly Confines, the sight of the grass for the first time, the ivy, the manual scoreboard, the Old Style in paper cups, the girls in Cubs jerseys, the seventh inning stretch, the rooftops--well, it's all true. There's nothing like it.

Forthwith: pictures.

Every game is sold out, but since the Cubbies are so bad (what else is new?), tickets are easy to come by. These cost us 20 bucks, were acquired with zero hassle, and were pretty decent seats in the lower deck. (I paid something like $14 to sit in the tippy-top row at US Cellular, but it was a highly anticipated series against my Oakland A's, featuring the return of Frank Thomas to the South Side.)


The view from our seats.


The manually operated scoreboard, the bleachers, and some of the Chicago skyline. The A's lost, by the way.


During the seventh inning stretch, the crowd unites in a traditional spiritual entitled, "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." The extended fingers represent one strike of the three necessary to retire a batter. The home team was shamed, 6-3, at the hands of the Phillies.


My friend Ryan is a Cubs fan and was distraught. I repped Oakland so I didn't care. Note that I wore the one article of clothing I have with any sort of bear on it.


In conclusion, Cubs games are awesome. In case you want more of a fix, here's some excellent writing about baseball:

John Updike's account of Ted Williams' last game. From the New Yorker.

A. Bartlett Giamatti's classic essay The Green Fields of the Mind. Evan, it's the second result on Google!