I read this article about Ten Myths in America the other day and I thought it was pretty good and very interesting. So I thought I'd post it here and share it with my six readers.

Here are some notable bits:

If women truly did earn 20% less for doing exactly the same job as a man, any non-sexist CEO could thrash his competition by hiring only women, thus saving 20% on employee salaries relative to his competitors. Women entrepreneurs could hire women and out-compete any male-dominated business, but we don't see this happening. Individual cases of discrimination may exist, but it cannot possibly be a universal norm in a profit-driven economy.

if Whites are the reason that Blacks still earn less than Whites in 2008, is it not fair to point out that Whites created a system where immigrants from poor countries like India, China, and VietNam can come to America and do so well that they surpass their White hosts, economically? Fair is fair. If Black poverty is due to Whites, then Asian success is also due to Whites. If this is not acceptable, than the only other explanation is that each group's outcome is primarily due to their own actions, rather than the invisible hand of the white majority.

There's lots more logical discourse on other topics of interest, so check it out.

Yet another article about using the stuff that comes out of our asses to power our daily lives.

We could be generating huge amounts of power from sewage. The process is pretty simple — just ferment sewage to produce a fuel called biogas. Biogas is almost entirely methane, and so is natural gas, so the two are essential interchangeable. The potential to produce biogas is almost entirely overlooked by most countries — except Sweden.

In Sweden, 25% of all energy use is derived from biomass. In Linköping, Sweden’s fifth biggest city, all the buses and garbage trucks run on biogas. The also have a biogas powered train line and some private taxis run on biogas.

I've said before that we should be doing something like this, but no one ever listens to me.

Jerks.

Encouraged by the improving flavors of the Milk Jug wine and the improvised cherry wine, this weekend I finally got around to putting together the large batch of Zinfandel that I had bought a number of weeks ago. I pretty much followed the directions on the cans of concentrate and then added 4 extra cups of sugar when the sugar % measurements came out a little lower than I wanted (ha ha, as if I actually know what I want).

Here are the ingredients I dumped into the fermenter:

• 2 cans of Zinfandel Grape Concentrate (Alexander's brand)
• ~11.5 cans of cold water
• 12 cups of sugar (recipe called for 8)
• 3 tsp yeast nutrient powder
• 2 tsp acid blend powder
• 1 pkg Premium Cuvée yeast

I decided to forgo adding any tannin or doing anything else too far out for this first big batch. I want to get something good and drinkable to start and then I'll start experimenting and producing stuff that sucks.

Initial measurements 8/16/08:

• Must: ~5 gallons
• Brix: 23.0
• % Sugar: 12

I think I have decided to go with my wonderful mother-in-law's idea and call the winery Mute Dog Winery. I suppose I need to get going on designing a logo and some labels for it now.

I saw this billboard truck outside after lunch today and I couldn't not take a photo.

As most of you know we live pretty much right next to the St. Francis Seminary though there's a bit of forest between our house and the seminary grounds proper. Well on the other side of the seminary grounds there is more forest that we had neglected to explore until last night. Now we're regretting waiting so long.

The sign reads: "Seminary Woods Wildlife preserve endorsed by Milwaukee Audubon Society protected by state and federal laws" which is good. Hopefully that means it's unlikely to get turned into condos.

We wandered through the woods on a whim, at first our path led us mostly along the fencing at the back of St. Thomas More High School and the elementary school next to it. After walking a while we started to move further into the woods themselves and came across a creek of sort. Initially it was coming out of a sewer pipe; one of our neighbors who works for MMSD once told us that there are a number of streams and creeks in the area that have been moved underground or routed through sewer ways. As we continued to wander the path grew wider and more maintained, we went across a bridge over the small creek and then we came upon a clearing which held a cemetery.

Apparently the Seminary has a small graveyard out in the woods where it buries it's nuns and priests. Most of the graves were dated in the 19th century. Many of them were very simple markers, though, as you can see, there were a few very ornate stones as well as a big metal crucifix.

Unfortunately we didn't get to linger long in the graveyard, the mosquitoes were running rampant in there, while they had been pretty much non-existent in the forest. We left on a different path than we had entered so as to continue to explore the lovely woods. Just inside the woods from the cemetery clearing was a little grotto with a sitting area and a spot to have a fire, at first I thought it was some sort of Catholic shrine or something but it was just a big fireplace.

The woods were so huge and beautiful and peaceful, it was hard to believe that we were surrounded by city and only a 10 minute drive from downtown Milwaukee. We continued our stroll through the woods and eventually came out onto the Seminary grounds between the convent building and the main building. There were a few fruit trees growing here, some apples and some plums hanging from the branches; not yet ripe. We headed home having thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and with plans to return very soon.

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The week before last Anne's coworker, Chad, gave her a huge bag of cherries from the tree in his backyard. We figured we had two options, either make about 5000 cherry scones or mash it up and try to make wine out of them. Last weekend we mashed up the cherries and deposited them into a makeshift fermentation vessel. Initially the cherry juice by itself was about 5% sugar so I added some extra. Then I dumped in some yeast and stuck a fermentation lock on the top.

Initial measurements (7/26/08):

• Must: 2 litres
• Brix: 23.5
• % Sugar: 12.0

Upon checking it this morning it looks like the primary fermentation has completed. I now need to improvise some way of pressing the wine to separate it from the cherry fruit, seeds, and skins. Cheese cloth will probably work...

Now that it seems I'm doing this in earnest, I need a name of my winery, got any suggestions?

Update: On saturday, Anne and I pressed the wine through a colander lined with cheese cloth. It was a rather messy business and I have to thank Anne for doing most of the really dirty work. We poured the pressed wine into a new container and stuck a ferm lock on top though it's pretty much done fermenting based on the measurements I took:

Press measurements (8/02/08):

• Wine: 1+ litres
• Brix: 1.0
• % Sugar: 0.0

Yesterday was the one year anniversary of Anne and I getting our house. Since then we've been very very busy and we're nowhere close to done. But all in all it's been a good experience and I'm happy with our choice.

Here's the current to-do list:

• put up cement board and tile kitchen backsplash
• replace kitchen light fixture
• finish installing foot board on kitchen cabinets
• replace switches and add light switch in kitchen
• get or make LED under-cabinet lighting
• paint kitchen
• paint woodwork in our bedroom
• replace light in entryway
• install ceiling fan in living room (pray there is electrical in the ceiling cap)
• get or build new vanity for bathroom
• install new sink in bathroom
• install new in-wall faucet in bathroom
• replace light fixture in bathroom
• finish making light fixture for dining room and install it
• paint back and bedroom hallways
• replace lights in back and bedroom hallways

Whew! That's a lot of crap! Though that should pretty much take care of the first floor renovations and we can take a nap afterwards and start saving up lots and lots for creating the second floor space.

I've recently started using google reader to keep up on a lot of blogs I enjoy. I like being notified of new updates to to the sites I read. I also like being able to 'share' posts I like and have them display on the left sidebar of this site. However I have noticed that when I read articles in reader I am less likely to read comment threads or leave comments of my own. I generally love reading comments and leaving them on blogs, but I feel like I do much less of it since I started using an RSS reader. Anyone have a similar experience?

Well as you all may or may not know, the author of this blog has finally reached 3 decades old! You are a great husband, friend, and guy. I hope and pray God gives you many many more decades to spend with me...your nagging wife:)

This weekend we finally finished the patio. I am glad to have that done and I don't ever want to make another patio myself again. However, considering the money we saved doing this ourselves, I may have to...

We went from this...

...to this.

Once we got the foundation in it wasn't so bad...

...and went rather quickly.

And, we're done!

The fireplace.

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