Not So Famous…

I’m not trying to be alarmist here.  There’s a difference between being alarmist, and warning of something that could happen if we continue on our current course.  If someone warned the crew of the Titanic that an iceberg was up ahead and could be dangerous, would they be alarmist, or merely watchful? I’m also not saying that a collapse will happen…merely that I think it’s more possible than most of us would care to consider.

Gary North, a prolific economic writer has detailed why the collapse of the dollar is not only a possibility, but is actually becoming more of a threat each day.  It’s a long article, but it’s really worth it.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north642.html

One of the things he wrote about on the 26th of July was that when banks face dramatic loss of capital, they either find new investors, or they reduce their loans. When there are not many new investors because these investors have less with which to invest, these banks have no other option but to contract loans.

When banks lose capital, they must either find new investors, or else they must reduce their loans. When they reduce their loans, they refuse to roll over existing lines of credit to American corporations. This is the major threat to the system. It is not a threat of the bankruptcy of the banks; it is the threat of the reduction of lines of credit to American corporations – corporations that are dependent on these lines of credit.

And what do we find in this morning’s New York Times?  An article entitled:

Worried Banks Sharply Reduce Business Loans

Mr. Gary North shows that it’s quite possible that the dollar may collapse. What he says is that there are failsafes built-in to the system.  Most people will not lose their money.  Those few investors that have invested over the $100,000 that is guaranteed by the FDIC will lose money over the $100,000, but said investors have likely taken steps to ensure that their deposits are guaranteed by multiple banks.  They’ve spread around their wealth, so if they’ve got $600,000 in deposits, they’ll get $600,000 if they withdraw it all.  The government will protect the nominal value of their deposits.

There is a difference between real and nominal dollars, though.  Real dollars are dollars adjusted for inflation.  When you talk about how much your average person earned in 1940 and in 2008, you must discuss it in real dollars in order to have any sort of meaningful comparison.  Because what is a dollar, after all?  What does it really represent? Ultimately, the dollar’s value fluctuates, and the only real meaning of a dollar represents what you can buy with it.  Let’s say it’s 1914, and you have a dollar. In 1914, the value of a widget is $1, so you can buy one.  Based on the rate of inflation, today, it would require $1.95 to buy the same widget. This is a small amount, I know.  But let’s say your monthly grocery bill is $600 a month.  The grocery bill for the same food in 1914 would only be $307.69.  What will it be in the future?

The buying power of the dollar is the real value of your dollar.  What is protected by the FDIC is the NOMINAL value…not the real value. So while you might get your deposits back, if the real value of the dollar, which is not guaranteed by anyone, collapses, you’ll not be able to buy much with your money.  it’ll be worthless.

The buying power of your dollar WILL go down if the Federal Reserve has to bail out banks and investors for their bad economic decisions. When necessary, the Fed will create the money it needs out of thin air, and whenever that happens, the dollar is worth less and less. The amount of money you deposit is guaranteed, but that guarantee might just devalue that amount to practically nothing.

What can we do?  Not much when it comes to our own economic decisions. You can withdraw all your money, but in the event of a systemic failure, your money will be worthless, so you’ll be holding essentially a fistful of nothing.  About all we can do is elect people who have a CLUE about economic policy. Congress continues to bail out banks and investors when they’ve made poor economic decisions.  This is a BAD thing, people. Yes, in the short run, it makes people feel better.  What it also does, however, is eliminate percieved risk. Yes, folks, it actually encourages bad behavior. What gets rewarded, gets repeated.  This is not the ultimate price we’ll pay for these bailouts, though.  In their efforts to monetize these failing banks, the Fed will eventually run out of money to do so.  When that happens, they’ll have no option but to begin creating money, and when that happens, the collapse of the dollar is at hand.

I have not explained this process well, I know. It’s a confusing set of terms and concepts, I know. But failure to understand where we’ve arrived is analogous to prolonging the problem.  We need to become educated people.  We need to understand why a choice between McCain and Obama is not a choice, really. We need to understand these things so that we can choose the best candidate.  And when we DO understand these things, we will understand that we cannot choose the lesser of two evils any longer. We must choose a good candidate.  And they are out there, people. Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party and Bob Barr of the Libertarian Party are two good candidates.  If enough of us awaken from our apathy, and vote our conscience, then the “throwing away your vote” argument will no longer have any weight. Awake from your apathy and vote for the better candidate.

Turns out that we’re NOT heading into Victoria tonight.

When we arrived at the safe anchorage before being guided into the harbor, the captain decided that the 25-knot gusting wind was too much, and that it would be a better decision to stay in the safe anchorage.  We get refunded on our tours, and get to relax on the ship.

I wanted to go on the pub tour, to be sure, but a relaxing evening is much, much better than being rushed everywhere and then back on the ship.

Dinner tonight was quite tasty:

• “Something in French” - This was a pot pie made with puff pastry.  The name, pronounceable only by me, is apparently easily forgotten.  It was quite tasty, however, and had the word “reina” in it, which either means king or queen, we think.  Nummy.
• Philadelphia Pepper Pot - a.k.a. “Sneaky Stomach Lining Soup”.  I was not told that this dish contained tripe until I uttered this phrase: “Ok, THAT has a weird texture. (chew, chew).  And a flavor that does not redeem it.  What is this?”  Yuck.  The broth was good, but the tripe just was not. I’m sorry for all of you who like it.  Spongy, and possessing an unpleasant flavor is not good eats.
• Caesar Salad - Yeah, the same as before with more dressing.  I think they over-dressed this salad, but it was better than the alternatives sounded.
• Prime Rib - Normally, I don’t like prime rib, but I figured I’d give it another shot, and I’m glad I did, because I learned the secret of proper prime rib consumption: Horseradish.  Seriously, there’s nasty fat you have to cut away, and the meat, while tender, does not have any sort of browning on most of it, etc.  But when horseradish is applied, it transforms the meat into something well worth eating.  Try it if you’ve not.
• Sugar-Free Butterscotch Pudding - Not your Jell-O pudding mix, this butterscotch was flavored perfectly, not too sweet, and had a true baked pudding texture.  Makes me want to make it from scratch like my grandmother used to.

Tonight, we’re going to watch American Gangster in one of the theaters, and I’m going to have some beers to replace what I did not get to have in Victoria.  :)

Back in town tomorrow night.  WOOT!

We spent a day at sea in the Tracy Arm Fjords which were gorgeous, to be sure.  I like days at sea.  Something about the untamed waves, the wind…I don’t know.  It makes me want to live on a ship.

The day at sea was relaxing.  Dinner was King Crab Legs, but it’s been a couple days since then, and I don’t remember what the appetizer and soup were.  :)  The crab, however, was overcooked, I think.  Crab often has a more “fishy” flavor than lobster, but this was much more pronounced than I prefer.  I have heard it said that fish and shellfish smell and taste more fishy the more they are cooked.  Add that to the stringy consistency, and I will hazard the guess that the crab was overcooked.

I didn’t have the crab, however. Kim ordered it, so I went with the Chicken Kiev.  Chicken Kiev is a breaded, pan-fried, bone-in chicken breast in a garlic cream sauce, stuffed with butter and some other herbs.  Quite tasty, and given the condition of the crab, the preferred dish, to my thinking.

Yesterday was Ketchikan, which is the first town settled in Alaska during the Gold Rush.  We had about 4 hours or so in this town, and we did a little bit of shopping.  I got a pocket ulu knife, which is an Alaskan knife that’s a little broader and shorter than standard pocket knives.  It was cheap, but if it lasts a year, I’ll definitely have gotten my money’s worth.

I also got a couple strings of Christmas lights made from…wait for it…SHOTGUN SHELLS!  Kim hates them, but they made me so happy, I wept.  :)

Last night’s dinner was exquisite:

• Crab, Scallop, and Whitefish salad with a duet of caviar - I’ve never had so much fish or loved it quite so much.   The salad, which was a formed mold of said fish and shellfish, was exquisite.  Not too much of any flavor dominated, and I was quite pleased with the flavor harmony. The caviar was definitely…interesting.  I’ve never had the opportunity to try caviar, so I leapt at the chance.  We had a small orange style and a larger orange style.  (Check out the descriptive wording on that sentence, folks.)  The smaller orange variety was salty and fishy, as would be expected.  It was tasty with breadsticks, and I finished it all.  The larger of the orange variety was rather unpleasant to my palate. They burst when you masticated them rather like…salty, fishy grapes. Exactly…my thoughts as well.
• The soup was a chilled Pineapple, Banana, rum-flavored concoction - It was more of a smoothie, to my taste, and quite good, at that.  These chilled soups are quite interesting, and never feel like soup to me. Still, I rather enjoyed it.
• Caesar Salad - In this dressing, I could actually taste the anchovy that all Caesar salads are supposed to contain.  I think often chefs do all they can to minimize this taste, which would account for its popularity.  I enjoyed the flavor, though, preferring it to the “tangy ranch” variety we are more often served.
• Lobster and King Prawns - What more can be said?  The lobster was cooked rather well, especially compared to what we had on our cruise to Mexico a couple years back.  The prawns were cooked equally well, and all of it was quite good. The waiter was late with the butter last night, but I don’t really feel that the lobster required it.  It really stood on its own.  Very buttery and rich.
• Beef Wellington - I know this is the first time I’ve ordered two entrees, and I tried to keep that sort of thing to a minimum, given the fact that I’ve not exactly lacked for food this trip. However, Beef Wellington prepared properly is a thing to behold.  It makes me feel better to say I split this with Scott and Kim.  Beef Wellington is beef tenderloin cooked in a puff pastry shell with a black truffle “filling”. The black truffle filling was earthy and helped to balance the pastry shell with the heartiness of the beef, which was quite tender and juicy.  It was served with some sort of polenta-like mould made from Italian Parsley that I found rather good. Everyone else disagreed, including Laura who almost didn’t even try it.  (She’ll think twice about trusting my recommendations from here on out, I think.)  At any rate, I enjoyed the Beef Wellington, and am glad I chose last night to do the 2-entree thing.

Tonight is Victoria, British Columbia, and the menfolk of the family will be doing a Pub Tour. (In truth, though this is the last day of our journey, I’ve been looking forward to this tour for quite some time.) We arrive in Victoria at about 7pm, and there will be a line to get off the ship, I think. We’ll be doing an early dinner, and then heading off.  The ladies will be doing a tour of Bushart Gardens which is apparently supposed to be beautiful.  Kim will be bringing her camera.  I will be looking for Canadian dark beers.  While we import only lagers and “Ice” beers from Canadia (intentionally misspelled), there have GOT to be some decent beers in these pubs.  I look forward to trying them all.

Home tomorrow, though.  In all honesty, I am looking forward to it.  I miss our house, our shower, and having Internet whenever I want it.  Oh, and my XBOX is supposed to come back today!  Oh, and Lord of the Rings Online is waiting for me.  So much to look forward to.

Notes to friends:

Gabe - The Crown Royal on the ship is $22.95…for 1 Liter.  BevMo said it’s $31.99, so that is a good enough deal to pick you up a bottle.  :)  Looking forward to hanging with you again, mang.

Shawn - I have sporadic Internet on the ship, and it costs $0.50/minute.  I posted all those posts you missed in the span of about 10 minutes.  :)  Windows Live Writer allows me to backdate posts, though, so it looked like I’d been posting them the entire trip.  Yes, the food is quite good on a cruise.  In fact, in my estimation, it’s almost the main reason TO go on a cruise.  :)

See you all upon our return!  Hackmaster next weekend!  woot!

Yesterday, I was able to go on an excursion with Kim to the scenes named in the title.  It was a good tour, made better by a great tourguide with excellent stories.  If you’re ever on an Alaskan Cruise, and you’ve got a stop in Skagway, this tour is excellent.  If you get Andy, you’re in for an excellent tour.

To begin with, we took a little town tour through Skagway.  It’s a dinky little Gold Rush town wherein they found no gold.  Mostly, it was a place where gold miners in the Klondike valley could get their gold traded, etc.  Andy told us a story of where a man decided to rob the only bank in Skagway.  He came in with a pistol and a stick of dynamite and demanded all the money in the bank.  Something happened and he panicked.  He apparently set off the dynamite and blew himself (and the bank) up.  In tearing up the floorboards, the townspeople discovered something had accumulated underneath.  Apparently, people fiddled in their pockets with the gold they were bringing back, and this resulted in some of the gold dust flaking down underneath the floorboards. The more floorboards they pulled up, the more gold dust they found.  They found enough gold dust under the floorboards to pay for the repairs to the bank.  Indeed, they found more than that.  They found enough gold dust to actually make MONEY off the bank robbery.

At the summit, we stopped and took some pictures of the majestic landscape.  It reminded us of a slightly more rugged version of Scotland.  Gorgeous, really.

We got to the suspension bridge and took a great many pictures.  It was windy and cold.  :)

Finally, we went back down the mountain, and went to the salmon bake.  An excellent meal! Salmon with a caramel sauce.  Very tasty.  The smokiness of the salmon with the sweetness of the caramel sauce was definitely an experience.

Finally, we returned to the ship, where we had our actual dinner.

Tuesday Dinner:

• Prosciutto with Cantaloupe - This simple appetizer was quite good.  It’s been a long time since I had prosciutto.
• Spinach, Pine Nut, and Tomato Vinaigrette salad - Nice, tangy salad.
• Veal Scallopine with Marsala Sauce - There were other things I could have tried on the menu, but really, how could I pass up properly cooked veal with a marsala sauce??  lol.  This was MOST excellent.
• Tiramisu and a Marsala Gelato - Gelato is like an Italian Ice cream, but smoother, and often made with wine or other alcohol. Quite good.  And the tiramisu, of course, was excellent.  Not as in-your-face as some of what we get.

Finally, I have to report that I lost my new Alaskan Brewery hat the MOMENT I stepped onto the gangway.  A wind blew it right off my head and into the ocean.  That was quite sad.  I’m going to be looking online for another one soon, I think.  :(

Yesterday was Juneau, and was quite the experience. Kim went on a photography tour, and her brothers and I went on a tour called “A Taste of Alaska”, and it was quite fun.

To begin with, we went on a little bit of a driving tour through downtown Juneau.  Our guide showed us the Alaskan Governor’s Mansion, a couple of the Alaskan State Government buildings, and a couple local points of interest with stories behind them.

Then, we were off to the Alaskan Brewing Company.  Now, their Amber Ale is quite common in California, and it’s good. But I’d not had many of their other beers.  This was my chance. I tried every beer they had on tap, including one that they will never bottle, and is only available in the brewery.

The first I had was the Alaskan Summer Ale.  I remember that this beer was more malty than I expected from the color.  It was a lighter ale, and packed a huge malt character.  Nice and sweet, it’s an excellent beer for after lawn work or any other hot job.

Next up, the Alaskan Amber.  Fairly standard Amber, if a little hoppy. It’s a great deal of aromatic and flavor hops, and not so much bittering, though. You can find this beer pretty much anywhere in California, and it’s well worth getting if you’ve never had it.

The next beer I had was the Alaskan Pale Ale.  Again, a standard Pale.  Also full of even more aromatic and bittering hops.  A good pale.

I went from there to the Alaskan IPA, which was quite tasty. If you’re expecting an IPA, that’s what you’ll get with the Alaskan.  It was quite a bitter beer, and rivals many of the best.

After this, we took a turn with the Oatmeal Stout.  A shining example of the style, to be sure.  Roasty, chocolate-y notes characterize this wonderful dark.  I highly recommend it.

This next beer was an absolutely WONDERFUL beer, and I’m sorry you all will never have the chance to try it.  Alaskan has these beers they call their Rough Drafts.  Now, the name suggests that they’re working on these beers for bottling, but sadly, this does not appear to be the case. These are beers that the brewers mess with, and are only available in their brewery.  Still, this beer is one of the most amazing I’ve ever tasted.  This was the Alaskan Coffee Brown Ale.

I’d never considered mixing coffee with a BROWN ale, to be honest. I’d consider a stout or porter, since the coffee notes mix quite harmoniously with the roasted and chocolate malts used in these brews. But this beer was incredibly full of coffee aroma and flavor.  The truly awesome thing about this brew, though, was that I could easily distinguish between the coffee and brown ale aspects.  Neither overpowered the other, creating a harmony rarely seen in specialty ales of this nature.  I told them that if they wouldn’t bottle it, I’d just have to try and copy it. :) (I might even write them to see if I can get a hold of their recipe.)  They used a pound of coffee extract per barrel of wort, added both during the boil and after fermentation.  I know their Starting Gravity was 1.060, and that it yielded around a 6.2% abv, I think.  So with that, I need to come up with a brown ale recipe that I like, and see how I can add some coffee.

The problem with adding things after fermentation is that even though most of the fermentable sugars have been consumed by the yeast, there is still some there, and adding bacteria at this point would definitely mess things up.  So I’m going to have to sanitize the coffee extract before I add it.  I’m really looking forward to this coffee brown…

The final beer I had the pleasure of trying was the Smoked Porter.  I know they’ve won awards for this beer, but I don’t know that I’ve ever tried it.  If I have, I don’t think it ever tasted like THIS.  This was one smoky beer.  They smoke their own malt, using woods found in and around Juneau, and the result is a beer surpassed only by the Rauchbiers of Germany.  Roasty, smoky notes are the exceedingly abundant flavor compounds in this beer.  Definitely not a beer to have with other beers, though.  The Smoked Porter has a unique flavor profile, and it will definitely skew your perception of other beers.  Probably a great beer to have with BBQ, to be honest.

Dinner was interesting, and I was able to try a couple different things:

• Duck Pate - I know that you’re supposed to have a crazy inverted “v” there, and an accent or something, but you know what I’m talking about, and I don’t feel like trying to find those stupid characters.  The Duck Liver Pate was…interesting.  Definitely rich…definitely smoky.  An excellent spread on breads or crackers…until I get to the slight aftertaste.  Maybe I’m not a true gourmand, but I don’t care.  That little aftertaste killed it for me. One of the reasons I don’t like liver.  (But absent in good haggis…) :)
• Corn and Sweet Potato Chowder with Vermouth - The soup is very LIGHTLY flavored with vermouth.  I couldn’t even taste it, and neither could Mark, the liquor connoisseur. Still, very tasty.
• Salad with Raspberry Vinaigrette - I was disappointed with both the salad and the dressing on this one.  Could be the other things I ate, but the greens and dressing conspired to form a very bitter taste.  I gave most of it to Mark who didn’t like his chilled cucumber soup.
• Lobster Pasta with a Cognac Sauce - A very tasty, rich pasta dish with a tomato/cognac sauce.  Also had a half- lobster tail, which was quite good.  Loved this dish.
• Grand Marnier Souffle - An EXCELLENT dessert.  Had a French Vanilla sauce.  The entire dessert was nicely understated.  None of the dominant flavors was overly dominant, allowing the chef to show off mastery of the souffle itself.  Light Orange, Egg, and Vanilla flavors combine to make this the second best dessert of the cruise thus far.  (The Drambuie parfait was tops for me.)

Today, we’re going on a suspension bridge tour of some sort in Skagway, Alaska.  It involved a salmon bake, which I’m looking forward to, though it means we might miss dinner tonight.  This is too bad, since tonight is Italian night.  We might eat dinner on the ship anyway.  :)

See you l8er!

Yesterday was our first sea day, and it was nice and relaxing.  The cruise liner we’re on offers a continental breakfast in your room if you so choose, so Kim and I started with that.  (I just had a coffee and yogurt, but Kim got a danish and some tea.)  There was more there, but I wanted more of a protein-based breakfast. (Read: meat.)  So we ate our pre-breakfast, and headed for the buffet.  As buffets go, it was fine.  Nothing to write home about.  (A blog, however, is another story.)

We then went to see what the Blackharts were doing, and the 4 of us (Kim’s brothers were still in their rooms) headed down to the game room to play some Phase 10, planning to at least observe a Guitar Hero tournament that was happening around 11:15, I think.

When we got to the Guitar Hero tourney, it was revealed that they weren’t as organized as the term “tournament” might otherwise suggest.  In fact, they couldn’t even get 2 guitars hooked up to the Wiis they were using, so it was more of a competition where the highest score wins.  (The tournament using Face Off or Pro Face Off would have been much different.)  Scott and Mark wanted to know if I wanted in on Expert, and I agreed, knowing I wouldn’t beat anyone.  I definitely need to practice more on guitar.

Mark failed Hit Me With Your Best Shot by Pat Benatar, while I chose Tenacious D’s The Metal to fail on.  Both of us failed quite well, considering how we thought we’d do.  Scott actually competed on Knights of Cydonia with two other guys and came in third.  It was pretty fun.  The boys stayed to see if Mark placed in the Medium event, and to play GH just for the heck of it.  The rest of us returned to the game room to finish playing Phase 10.

After Phase 10, the boys showed up, and we switched to Skip Bo, which was fun until Mark decided there was a distinct possibility that he might actually vomit, and left the table to go outside for some fresh air.  Incidentally, he won Skip Bo, thanks in part to my skillful playing. (read: the cards came up right for him to win.  If it were up to my skillful playing, he’d probably still be trying to go out.)

To explain why Mark didn’t feel so hot, you need to understand that we were on the open sea.  Now that we’ve made it to the Inside Passage, things are much smoother, but it is pretty incredible how even a LARGE ship like this one can be tossed around by the seas.  Gives a new respect for those who came to America by ship.  These ships are designed with stabilizing mechanisms, and they’re much larger than the ships people used to travel on. Yesterday was a rough day in terms of the ocean.  The Captain’s Log described it as moderate, but I think had we been on a smaller boat, it would have been described as “HOLY CRAP, WE’RE GONNA DIE!”  :)

Lunch was fun as we tried various things we’d never tried before.  When the food is freely available at no marginal cost, it tends to make one quite brave. After lunch Kim and I retired to our room for a nap and some more relaxation.

Dinner was formal last night, and everyone, everywhere was dressed up on the ship.  Formal, on the ship, means that men shall wear a dinner jacket of some sort, and a tie. I forgot to mention what I had the first night for dinner.

Saturday Dinner:

• Seafood Spam - No, it wasn’t REALLY spam, but it was a BUNCH of seafoods crammed together into a loaf.  It wasn’t bad, but apparently not too memorable, since when I was trying to remember what I had, Kim and I had a rough time of it.  lol
• Cream of Porcini Soup - Tasty, but not hot enough, and Kim thought it was a little earthy for her tastes.
• Mixed greens with a citrus vinaigrette - This was a salad.  Not the most spectacular I’ve had, but not bad at all.
• Seashell Pasta with Chicken. - There was a fancy name for this, but I can’t recall it at the moment. It was tasty.  The sauce was almost raw-tomato-tasting, but it was really good.
• Some sort of dessert. - I don’t remember what it was.  It was chocolate and somewhat dry.  I was kind of surprised that it was flourless, but since I’m not a big dessert guy, it wasn’t memorable.

Sunday (last night) Dinner:

• Crab Quiche - Quite good, except for the bits of shell I got.  Not many bits, to be honest. We were all kind of surprised at the size.  Quiche is normally small.  Either small pie pieces or little mini quiches.  I do enjoy some crab.
• Lobster Bisque - The highlight of the evening, really. I’d never had a bisque, though had seen them made on the Food Network.  I can see what the big deal is.  A strained soup with the best of lobster in it.  Richness, salty, and hearty is what I got.  A couple pieces of lobster in it.  Well worth the time we had to wait to get it.  lol
• Silver Salmon - While at sea, and while my wife doesn’t have to cook it, why not have fish?  This salmon was very good.  Not overcooked, no fishy taste.  Served with a cucumber salad to the side, and mashed potatoes, which were also good. This was a perfect complement to the Lobster Bisque, earlier, I think.
• Parfait flavored with Drambuie - Mark and I have a bit of a running joke about how Gabe and I love Drambuie, and how Mark believes it to be the nastiest tasting liqueur ever invented. This parfait was sort of a….uh…..well, it was not served in a glass with granola in it…I can tell you that.  It almost had the texture of really smooth ice cream, or frozen yogurt.  Very buttery and rich.  The Drambuie came at you as the very last flavor. It was mild, and gave a slight bite to the finish of this most excellent dessert.  It was a wedge of mmmmmm.

Today is our Juneau day.  Kim and her parents are going on some sort of walking tour, where they actually go on the glacier.  I expect some awesome pictures.  Meanwhile, the boys and I will be going on the Taste of Juneau tour.  Pub tours are my favorite.  :)  I’ll let you know how it all turns out.

Oh, and yes….the lounge singer was back again.  This time, we did call our steward, and were informed that there was nothing that could be done.  He was to sing until 12am.  (Which was more like 11pm, since we had to set our clocks back an hour coming into Alaska.)  So while I write this, it’s actually almost 9am for my West Coast readers. I like gaining an hour. I don’t like booming male vocals while I’m trying to sleep.  lol

And for the most part, it’s been nice. Dinner was tasty, as you expect on a cruise. Staff is generally helpful.  It seems to me that they’re trying to sell you things a lot more on this cruise than they did on the cruise Kim and I went on to Mexico.  But they’re just trying to make money.

Last night, however, there was a lounge singer almost directly below our room singing until about midnight or so. His voice wasn’t bad or anything.  Very lounge-singer-like.  It’s just that it was loud.  It was actually vibrating the bed and floor of our room.  We were kind of amazed, because from what we could see, the singer was one deck down and a little aft of our room. We couldn’t imagine that he was much louder in the lounge area.  So I went down there.

He was.

We were considering who we might call, since there was no way we were going to be able to get some sleep when he actually stopped.

We’ll find somewhere to complain today.  Honestly, when there are rooms directly above that area, he doesn’t really NEED to be that loud.

Oh yeah, and when I went down there, there was no one watching/listening to him except a crew member.  Nice, eh?

Anyway, today is a sea day, which is my favorite kind of day.  We get to walk around the ship, etc.  There are classes or seminars you can attend, and we might stop by some of the free ones, but nothing really sounded interesting.  I thought it was kind of cool that they had some Photoshop classes for people who don’t know how to use it.  Pretty basic classes, but if someone bought a digital camera for this cruise and had no idea how to use it, it’d be perfect.

Anyway, Kim and I mostly relaxed in our room once we were on board and had eaten lunch.  We didn’t get tons of great sleep in the conference room, and needed some relaxation.  :)

So this morning, I’m drinking coffee and watching Tom and Jerry while I was for my turn in the shower.  We’re going to go do something for breakfast, and walk around the ship.  My favorite.

The beginning of our Alaskan cruise vacation started out an awful lot like that movie.

The flight to Seattle went quite smoothly, actually, as my mother-in-law pointed out.  The rest of the trip has not gone well.

When we got to the hotel, however, they informed us that we should have checked in LAST night. Because, you know, we often sleep in a city the night before we get there. Turns out our travel agent booked us the day before we were actually going to arrive in Seattle.

What’s more, the desk guy called every hotel in the stinkin’ city of Seattle, and EVERYTHING is booked tonight.  That’s right…everything.

So, after he calls everywhere, he comes up with the Idea That Saved The World: They can throw some roller beds into a conference room with two bathrooms (no showers), and we can stay there for the evening.

So, we’re in a conference room, and we’re getting ready to go to sleep.  The hotel guy says there are always people who check out early, and that by the time we’re ready to shower, he’s pretty sure that they’ll have a shower available. (Though it won’t have been cleaned…we honestly don’t care.  We’re glad we’re not on the street.

I’d like to take some time here to say that Nick from the Best Western Airport Executel in Seattle is the best, most helpful, life-saving employee I’ve ever had the pleasure of dealing with.  This guy called every hotel in the area trying to find us a room, and when he could not, rather than turning us away, he put us up in one of his conference rooms.  He’s found us extra pillows (without being asked), and cups for the bathroom.  He also found us one more bed than he thought he’d be able to lay hands on, and has generally been the most helpful person on the planet.  If you’re ever in Seattle, and are looking for somewhere to stay, I can certainly recommend the Olympic Room at the Best Western Executel.  And Nick should be made the President of Best Western, man.  Thank you so much for helping us out, man.  We really appreciate it.  We’ll be writing a nice thank you letter to this place letting them know how valuable of an employee you are.

Tomorrow, mystery showers, and embarking onto the ship.  Should be exciting.

Oh, and Mark was taking a flight from LA to Seattle, and he missed his flight.  He’s staying in the airport tonight, while they get him on the first flight to Seattle tomorrow morning.  This has been an interesting trip for us all.

P.S. The Captain’s plate in the Best Western restaurant?  Phenominal.  Crab Strips, Salmon, Halibut, Shrimp, and french fries?  Freakin’ yum.

The D.C. City Council is preparing to vote on legislation that essentially makes the right to keep and bear arms completely ineffective.  I didn’t talk about it when the Supreme Court overturned the D.C. handgun ban, partially because I knew everyone else already was, but partially because I wasn’t as happy as some might expect me to be.

For one thing, the vote was 5-4 in favor of overturning the D.C. handgun ban.  We were ONE VOTE away from “abolishing the 2nd Amendment”, as the Supreme Court opinion said. That is pretty darn sad, in my opinion, and I couldn’t bring myself to write what I felt.

Also, the opinion, as is usual with rulings of this sort, left a lot of wiggle room for the government to be able to effectively ban guns without actually banning guns.  They stated that “reasonable” restrictions were perfectly acceptable. Now, all that remains is defining what, exactly, is reasonable.

The new legislation proposed by the D.C. City Council is attempting to define what is reasonable:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25685126

A handgun can only be kept in the home unloaded and disassembled or stored with a gun lock.  read: worthless. The linked article mentions just how worthless in this quote from Chris W. Cox of the National Rifle Association.

The NRA’s [Chris] Cox also derided the trigger-lock requirement. “Unless a criminal is calling you before they break into your house, you’re going to be left in [the] same position you were prior to the (Supreme Court) case,” he said.

Exactly.  The point of having guns is not so that you can spend a couple crucial minutes attempting to take the stupid gun lock off, or trying to put it together while a criminal opens fire on you. The point of having guns is to be able to defend yourself against these criminals.  That means shooting first.

Now, I have a problem with gun restrictions at all, since I know that the right to keep and bear arms wasn’t granted to us for hunting.  it was to defend ourselves…against any threats to our liberty. . . . including the government.  Of course, the government doesn’t want that little bit of information to become popular.  Much easier if they just disarm us all.  Then they can pass any kind of legislation they want, take away any of our freedoms, and generally make our lives hell, and they don’t have to worry about us rising up.

Here’s a question that my friend Ryan brought up, and it is definitely deserving of consideration.  If the government derives its power from the people, how is it that they can deny us the right to have guns that they can have?  If we can’t have assault rifles, why can the police show up with them?  If they can have handguns that carry more than 10 or 12 rounds in a removable magazine, why can’t Californians? This principle is somewhat addressed in the 9th Amendment, where it states that explicit rights listed in or protected explicitly by the Constitution do not represent a complete listing:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. - 9th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America

Ultimately, any gun restrictions are unconstitutional.  If the government wants to get rid of that pesky, limiting, 2nd Amendment, let them do that, but while it exists, our right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.  There is, however, a legal gray area with regards to the 10th Amendment:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. - 10th Amendment

The 2nd Amendment doesn’t appear to limit the states from infringing upon our right to keep and bear arms, so the 10th Amendment COULD delegate that right to the states. The wording of the 2nd Amendment doesn’t seem to allow for ANYONE to infringe upon our right to keep and bear arms, however, so one could argue that since our right should not be infringed…BY ANYONE, the States are not permitted to do so.

At any rate, I’m not happy about the D.C. Council essentially flipping the bird to the Supreme Court’s recent ruling. But, as the Campaign for Liberty blog post stated, it was definitely predictable.

This weekend, a couple of friends and I gathered for the bottling of my most recent creation, an Oatmeal Chocolate Stout. I’m pretty excited about a couple things with this beer. To begin with, this was the first beer I created with my new brewing kettle made out of a Pyramid Ales keg. In another case, this beer used some interesting ingredients, with which I have never brewed. I used Oats, Wheat, Cocoa Powder, etc. It is supremely interesting to me for this reason alone. However…bottling did not go nearly as smooth as brewing did.

As I said in the title, I did not really prepare. I’ve bottled several times, and I was just used to everything going smoothly. I figured this bottling session would be about as easy as past sessions. I didn’t count on a couple things:

1. Bottlecaps - In the past, I’ve not needed to worry about bottlecaps.  My initial purchase of brewing equipment included something around 100-200 bottlecaps.  In addition, when I purchased my initial equipment, I knew I didn’t have enough bottles to brew a full batch of beer, so I purchased some flip-top bottles. (Grolsch style.)  I liked them so much, that I’ve attempted to accumulate as many of these as I can.  Well, all of this conspired to make my bottlecaps last quite a long time.Last session, however, I said, “You know, I am getting low on bottlecaps.  I should buy some more…”, and promply forgot I ever said that.  The end result is that I didn’t order what I needed to order.  So I had something like 19 bottlecaps.Luckily, Gabe’s dad has gotten into brewing, and had plenty of caps for me to borrow.
2. Priming Sugar - I said the same thing about priming sugar last time as I did about bottlecaps. I did the same thing about it too: I forgot.  As a result, I didn’t have really any priming sugar.Priming sugar basically reactivates the yeast that is still in suspension in the beer, and causes it to start producing alcohol and carbon dioxide again.  Remember, when the beer has come out of the fermenter, it’s got alcohol, but no carbonation, as all the carbonation (and there’s been a LOT of it) has risen out of the airlock, and out of the fermenter.  The final step of beer creation is to “prime” the beer and then quickly bottle it.  This allows the little yeast left to consume the sugar and produce CO2 and alcohol.  Because the beer is sealed, though, the CO2 stays in suspension, and is released only when opening and pouring it.  This is called bottle-conditioning, or “natural fermentation”.  (You may hear brewers use both terms.)Normally, corn sugar is used for priming, and there are a couple reasons for that.  Firstly, corn sugar is predictable. There are virtually no unfermentable solids in corn sugar, so measuring 4 ounces for 2 cups of water is a simple way to get predictable carbonation.  Secondly, it’s pretty cheap to produce.

   Corn sugar isn’t as readily available to me, however, so I had to improvise.  Luckily, John Palmer’s book “How to Brew” covers using other sugars like maple syrup, brown sugar, etc.  We decided to use brown sugar, performed the calculations, and it should impart a really nice flavor the the finished brew.

It was a good day, but I would rather have been more prepared.  :)  However, the addition of brown sugar has tempted me to try other types of priming sugars depending upon the type of beer I’m making.  I’m thinking about using maple sugar for the next batch of Crazy Hamish I do.

It’s also made me wonder whether I might not want to start using other sugars during the brewing process.  For example, a MapleScotch Ale might be a tasty brew.  I will keep you all posted, both to the status of the Oatmeal Stout, and to the weird creations I end up coming up with!