reviews

Surviving Wisconsin Winters Part 5: the Magical Warmth of Snowboard Socks

Health

snowboarder and dog

stance-snowboard-socks

I don’t intend this as a review of any specific sock, though I’ve already come to rely on Stance Socks. I only want to highlight a key feature of knee height wool socks.

While it’s only an extra few inches of wool, knee-height adds significant warmth. It’s a magic-bullet layer of insulation that boosts overall warmth, while adding zero bulk to your torso.

Though each sock covers only an additional five inches of skin, it’s special skin. It’s your extremities. So, in covering 20% more of each leg, you’re shutting down 20% of lower-extremity body-heat radiation. Stated in the inverse, you are increasing heat retention. Think of the difference a turtleneck makes. Same difference, even more so.

Really, it’s like adding a Capilene 2 long-sleeved thermal top — but adding neither bulk nor fabric-on-fabric friction to your torso. Magic!

[Animation credit:  Jeremy Thompson; Snowboarder.com]
[Photo credit:  Stance Socks]

Surviving Wisconsin Winters, Part 4: Wool — It Does a Body Good

Health

wool for overcoats

This year I have a new go-to layer for winter cycling:  an old, cashmere polo shirt. The warmth is incredible, but it’s also got the buttoned polo collar and short sleeves, so it vents really well.

In my seventh Wisconsin winter, I’ve become a wool convert. Sadly, over the years I’ve stockpiled a whole closet full of Patagonia Capilene. Don’t get me wrong, Capilene is an excellent product. It breathes exceedingly well, and it offers quality insulation without bulk. But I wish I’d spent half that money on wool, instead. It’s so much warmer than any synthetic of comparable weight. (Wool does have its drawbacks.)

And the real killer app of wool is its antimicrobial properties. Don’t we wear wool sweaters months at a time without them getting stinky? We can because of wool’s microbe-fighting powers. By contrast, we wash synthetic base layers after each wearing. I wear wool much longer. Wool thermal bottoms? I wear them three to four days between washings. Longer, even. So even though I only have a few wool baselayers in my closet, I never run out of clean pieces.

Synthetics get stinky fast. The micro-textures of synthetic fibers create the perfect spawning bed for bacteria. Bacteria causes B.O. Even Patagonia garments treated with antimicrobial chemicals have to be washed after each use. Untreated garments get stinky after a few hours just sitting around the house!

Also new for me this winter:  snowboard socks. Check out my post on wool snowboard socks.

(Image credit:  Fashion Color Textile Factory)

Save Hundreds by Adding RAM to Your Old Laptop

Entrepreneurship

laptop and Asian kids

My three-year-old laptop has gotten sluggish. No biggie. That’s to be expected for its age. And business laptops have gotten so inexpensive, I could replace it for peanuts.

But why not breathe new life into it instead by expanding the RAM?

At 1/10th the cost of even a cheap, business laptop, it’s worth a shot.  Then again, it’s only a slam dunk if I can install the RAM myself. Some laptop chassis make it impossible to access the RAM. If mine is that way, then having a professional do it ($80 in parts, $60 labor, PLUS a trip to the PC repair shop) would push this project into the $150+ range. For that money, I’d have to consider a new machine. Yes, big-box stores will do the install for forty bucks. But you have to leave the laptop overnight. So that’s two trips to the store.

To do it myself, the machine needs to have either (a) an access door over the memory compartment or (b) a back cover that comes off easily.

NOTE: if your laptop has neither one, STOP RIGHT NOW. Trying to open a machine without easy access is just asking for trouble.

Luckily for me, this laptop does have an access door. Most business machines do.

Next (and maybe I should’ve done this first), I determine how much RAM can be added. To do so, I answer some basic questions:

•  Is the laptop 32-bit or 64-bit?
•  How many memory slots are open?
•  What type of RAM do we need, exactly?

A 32-bit machine can only use 4 GB memory. Maximum. You only waste money with more. This laptop is a business model, so I assume it to be 64-bit. Just to be sure, I check “system properties”:

Start menu > Settings > System > About

It tells me:

HP Envy 15 Notebook PC
Installed RAM:  8GB
Processor:  Intel Core i7-4720HQ  @ 2.60GHz
OS:  Windows 10 Pro, 64-bit

If the model name doesn’t appear there, check the sticker on the bottom of your machine.

How to Find Model Name of Laptop

I then plug that info into an online tool (at Crucial.com) that tells me how many RAM slots the laptop has and exactly what type of RAM stick is compatible.

I order an 8 GB stick from Crucial for $34, including shipping.

For the actual mechanics of installing the RAM stick, I consult this excellent Laptop Magazine tutorial. (With pictures!)

Note: the Laptop Magazine writer could’ve done better with Step 4, “Remove Any Memory in the Upper Slot.” She says,

Chances are that any installed  memory will be taking the upper slot, so you’ll need to remove it and put it in the other bank so you have space for your added memory.

She meant to say the existing RAM stick is in the way; it’s covering the open slot. But we would’ve understood that part once we opened the access door and had a look around.

And, voila! We enjoy significantly improved performance. More importantly, we save hundreds of dollars on the new laptop we don’t buy.

Wrist or Hand Pain with Cycling? Try Sweptback Bars!

Health

There’s Got to be a Way

Two years ago, my doctor diagnosed carpal tunnel syndrome. Pretty depressing to hear those three words. But an EMG test ruled out carpal tunnel.

With that good news, I kept riding. But I had to change something to lessen the pain. I thought what I needed was getting the weight off my hands.

Cheapest Option, First

I first tried bar ends (below).

bar ends

This was the cheapest option. Bar ends gave me three hand positions, with one far above the handlebars; gripping the little curved “horn” at the top is like riding a chopper motorcycle, taking all my body weight off of my hands.

This was when the pain got really bad. Even with little body weight on my hands, riding with my hands at shoulder height placed the weight of my dangling arms squarely  onto my wrists. The pain got so serious, I had to take time off of work.

More — and More-natural — Hand Positions

I tried drop bars.  Drop bars offer three hand positions. And two of those put your grip in a more natural attitude: rather than palms-down–the position that really strained my wrists–the “hoods” and the drops place your hands in neutral, like when dangling at your sides or shaking hands. But, sadly, riding on the hoods or the drops presses body weight onto the hands.

My brother, who races cyclocross, suggested a way of keeping the neutral hand position while keeping body weight off: he said to get my hands not up , but back.

Picture the suave European bicycle commuter, riding completely upright, with hands back and low (below). That’s the combination for ultimate comfort.

The only drawback: it’s so un-sporty.

amsterdam_bicycle_suit

Swept Back, Low . . . and Sporty!

Then I saw this trike!

tricycleI

I fell in love with this tricycle’s “aggressive,” upside-down installation. Some cool bike designer had the vision to flip the handlebars over because it looks cool. The result:  the hands are both back and low, while creating a rakish, jaunty profile.

So I researched “swept back” bars, intending to install them upside-down. I found the sparrow style, first (below).

sparrow_road levers

Swept back, for sure, they just weren’t back far enough, only about 30-40 degrees.

The Surly “Open” bars (below) were swept back more, 53-degrees.

surly open bar

The Velo Orange “Tourist” bars were getting closer, at about 60-degrees. Plus, installed upside down, the Tourist looks awfully slick (below).

Tourist

I eventually settled on the Nitto “Albatross”, with an 85-degree sweep (below).

Nitto-bar-compare3

And, actually, the term I should be emphasizing here is not “sweep,” but rather “reach.” In this photo compare the reach of the Nitto Mustache (90 mm) vs. the Nitto Albatross (170 mm).

reach - albatross vs. mustache

The longer the reach, the farther back your hand position, and the more upright you’ll be, taking more weight off of your hands.

Here’s my cyclocross bike (below), with the Nitto Albatross installed upside-down. Pretty cool, huh! Neutral hand position. And my hands are back far enough to take 95% of the weight off.

bike for blog

I have since been undergoing serious physical therapy for the hand pain. But in the meantime I’m riding my bike with a lot more comfort. My Albatross bars are taped all the way across for three hand positions.

Technical Considerations

NOTE:  Choosing handlebars is somewhat complex.  The diameter of the tubing must fit your existing brake clamps and/or shifter clamps.

Diameter measurements are critical at two different places on the bars (three, if you want to go with bar-end shifters):

1) clamp diameter (where the stem clamps the bars)

2)  tube diameter (where you want to install the brake levers).

Replacing drop bars? Unless it’s a vintage bike, the stem clamp diameter is either 25.4 mm, 26.0 mm (Italian std.), or the more recent “oversized” 31.8 mm.  (See Sheldon Brown:  http://sheldonbrown.com/harris/handlebars/index.html.) Given all these variables, you may or may not be able to keep your existing stem. But the stem is fairly inexpensive. You may want a new stem, anyway, for improved height or shorter reach.  The point is to get you more upright and get the weight off your hands.

But test out your new swept back bars with your existing stem. Have the second, very different stem, picked out to compare the two.  If it’s a “pop top” stem, it’s an easy switcheroo.

Tube diameter is the more expensive consideration. Going to a swept back bar may require you to replace your existing brake levers and shifters. In my case, I had to replace all of the above. The expensive bar-end shifters ($120), set me back nearly $400 for the complete customization.  By the way, bar end shifters require an interior tube diameter of 20 mm.

Most swept-back bars come in 23.8 mm, which does not accept MTB brake levers. (MTB brake levers require 22.2 mm tubing; some mechanics claim you can simply “shim it”; don’t listen to them if you want your brake levers to remain positioned properly.) I really wanted two-finger style MTB brake levers, which would’ve been easier on my hands.  But you can’t have everything.  The next best thing for me was Shimano’s BL-R550 road break lever set (see my bike, above).

SECOND CAVEAT: some of these measurements might be off.  Please confirm them with your LBS before ordering any parts.  You can also check here:  http://sheldonbrown.com/gloss_ha-i.html

Good luck!

Beer Review #31: Central Waters Illumination Double IPA

Food and Drink

CW Illumination- beerpulse.com

Just FYI, I’ve dispensed with the beer-roundups format. From now on my beer posts will each review a single beer. I’m calling this one Beer Review #31 since my ten existing beer roundups contain three beers each.

Illumination, Central Waters Brewing Co.
Rating:  4.05/5
12 oz. bottle, 9% ABV, 108 IBU (estim.)

Man, that’s good. I gave this beer a 3.95 when it first came out two years ago. I wonder if the formula’s changed. Probably not, or Central Waters would’ve made a big deal of it, the way Sixpoint Brewing did with 2017 Hi-Res. Or Classic Coke. But “new formula!” is usually crisis PR disguised as marketing. That’s certainly not needed with this excellent brew from CW.

Too bad the aroma underwhelms. What am I smelling? Can’t say. The shy aromas hold themselves back. A bland appearance, too, a cloudy, dull amber, like a cellar-aged beer.

My wife says it tastes cellar-aged, too. It does! There’s an oxidized, buttery umami that . . . I don’t know how to finish that sentence. Something about pork. I love pork.

In the mouth it’s brilliantly complex, yet balanced. The clean, citrus hop bite presents first, with maybe a tinge of pine astringency. Then a ripe-fruit sweetness — sweet tangerine and papaya — swirls with the umami to create a proper meal of flavors:  a summer fruit salad and a pork tenderloin in butterscotch reduction. Hyperbole? Sure. But the complexity does impress. Balance comes from the sweet fruit, as opposed to sweet malt. It reminds one of Dirtwolf (Victory Brewing). But better, with more body, more drying ethanol heat, and that character of butter-like, meat-like oxidation.

Uh, oh, hold on: the aftertaste is a bit yucky. The hops in the back end are all white-grapefruit pith, blotting out the fruity sweetness. I’m sure many a hophead would appreciate it. It’s very West Coast, I guess. But hear that? That’s the sound of me sticking my tongue out.

So I was mostly right two years ago with my 3.95 rating. Good on me.

Side note:  this beer is a perfect candidate for the cellar. A year in cool darkness should knock the aftertaste down a notch or two.

[Image credit:  beerpulse.com]

Daredevil Brings Great New Villain(s)

Media

From Gene Hackman’s Lex Luthor to Phillip Blake’s The Governor (The Walking Dead), great casting and charismatic actors have frightened, enraged, and intrigued us with super villains from the comics universe. If you’re hankering for a new Big Bad, definitely turn on the Netflix series Daredevil. Vincent D’Onofrio strikes all the right notes of charming-sociopath evil in his surprisingly vulnerable Wilson Fisk (aka, Kingpin, in the original Frank Miller comic).

Daredevil Wilson Fisk

As many have noted, there’s an obvious historical reference in Wilson Fisk’s uber-developer “activities.” It’s a nod to mid-century NYC villain Robert Moses. Moses is the infamous urban planning autocrat and destroyer of blue-collar neighborhoods from the 1950’s and ’60’s.

But that’s overlooking the more salient two-headed juggernaut-of-gentrification: Mayor Giuliani/Bloomberg. Wilson Fisk “cleans up crime” by sending Chinese immigrant suicide bombers to Russian mobster hideouts; Giuliani/Bloomberg blows up minority neighborhoods with the now roundly repudiated policing tactic of stop-and-frisk.

Wilson Fisk wants to make the city safer and more beautiful. The question of course is, safer for whom? Beautiful in the eyes of whom? Giuliani and Bloomberg say the same thing during their tenures as mayor. Gentrification may bring safety and (a very particular kind of) beauty. But at what cost? By its nature gentrification shreds the existing social fabric — demolishing the historic character of the street and displacing existing residents. Consider the following.

  • In central Harlem the white population grew 405% between 2000 and 2010.
  • Average house prices in Harlem increased 86%.
  • 37% of the city was re-zoned.
  • Eight of the city’s tallest buildings have been built since 2001.

My brother lived on Manhattan’s Lower East Side (aka, LES) from 1993 to 2007. During the ’90’s, when I would visit him we’d walk through the blacktop city park around the corner, and I would worry about the kids on the seesaws and doing Double Dutch on the sidewalk; scattered on the asphalt were spent syringes and used condoms from people in the park the night before.

Since the time of Giuliani/Bloomberg, the grit and grime of the LES has been completely erased. Crime has been rendered moot. But that park is gone, too. So are the children. Now the LES is high-rise condos and the well-to-do. The Salvation Army Residence is now the Bowery Boutique Hotel. CBGB, the iconic, hellhole live music venue, is now a John Varvatos shop.

Sounds great. But what about history? What of people and character displaced? No more Indian curry walk-up windows. No more mudflap, by-the-slice pizza counters. The writers and academics? The Asian produce vendors and union film-production workers (like my brother)? They’re all gone.

And it hasn’t stopped with Manhattan. As new skyscrapers push lower-income and middle class Manhattanites out, the displaced are pushing into the outer boroughs. A telling New York Post headline reads, “New Hipsters Fight Old Hipsters in Bushwick.” Another headline puts it less ironically: “Gentrification as ‘Benign Ethnic Cleansing.'”

Here’s an amazing image from an article in Gothamist :

gentrification Google Street view - Daredevil blog post

Image credit: Justin Blinder, via Gothamist

 

New York Magazine says of Bloomberg’s development efforts:

[Bloomberg] bullied and cajoled developers, steered Liberty Bonds their way, and pushed through rezoning as they wanted. Today, each new Skyland Summit gets superseded by another. The race to the clouds is reminiscent of 1930, when the Chrysler Building and 40 Wall Street tried to bound past each other for the title of world’s tallest — only to have their rivalry mooted a year later by the Empire State building.

Sound like someone we know? (Less the immigrant suicide bombers, of course.)

VINCENT D'ONOFRIO as WILSON FISK in the Netflix Original Series “Marvel’s Daredevil” Photo: Barry Wetcher © 2014 Netflix, Inc. All rights reserved.

Photo: Barry Wetcher
© 2014 Netflix

Surviving Wisconsin Winters, Part 3: Windproof Boxer Briefs

Health

frozen crotch

I’ve previously blogged about frozen groin syndrome when winter cycling. In that post I recommended stuffing a pair of glove liners down there to keep frostbite from one’s nether parts. My new solution is infinitely more elegant. Smartwool makes a pair of merino boxer briefs with a well-placed windproof panel. I present to you the Smartwool PhD NTS Wind Boxer Briefs:

boxer briefs windproof Smartwool

I wish I’d had them on when riding home from a Super Bowl party the other night. Temps were in the low single digits. The ride took an hour. I thought I had layered up perfectly. What a joy it was to ride hard and generate lots of heat, my torso warm and my Levi’s 501 Cords venting the perspiration.

I didn’t have an extra pair of glove liners with me, so my groin got cold. Painfully cold. Then, after a half-hour, the area went mercifully numb.

The trouble was getting home and having the blood return to my frozen crotch. If you’ve ever spent a lot of time in serious temps, skiing, ice fishing, hiking, you know all too well what happens when you get home. The blood returning to your numb finger tips and toes means hours of stinging, searing, aching pain.

Yeah. That.

I’ve had these windproof boxer briefs for a month, now. This product absolutely works. I’ve ridden my bike three different days in subzero weather. What a difference. They’re expensive, at $50. But that’s the cost of living the outdoor life in Wisconsin. Either that, or stuffing your drawers.

Need Some New Sunglasses? Try Tifosi Optics

Health

I need to replace a pair of wrap-shades I’ve recently lost. Over the years, I’ve found myself buying Tifosi Optics again and again as a function of budget and comfort.

Tifosi manufactures mid-grade sports eyewear that hits the sweetspot of middling price and more than adequate performance. The build quality is solid; the pair I’ve just lost would’ve held up years longer. Congrats to the person who has found them and not turned them in at Lost-and-Found!

Unfortunately, Tifosi no longer makes that model, called the “Pave.” I try on over thirty (no joke!) different models, at three(!) different bike stores, to no avail. The newer designs don’t fit my face well, at all. Not even their new “Asian Fit” line for smaller, rounder faces feels good.

I ultimately throw up my hands and buy the pair the bike store manager is wearing, simply because they look cool on him. Tifosi calls these the “Dolomite 2.0”

Tifosi Dolomite 2.0 2015

I choose the Dolomites with the photochromic lenses. In the end they feel great on my face. The new, adjustable nose pads are a real improvement and keep them from sliding down my mosly bridge-less, Asian nose. The only problem: the photochromic lenses only darken about halfway. According to the Tifosi site, they should get much darker. I nearly return them.

Thank goodness my wife suggests the lenses might need a “break-in” period. She means repeated exposure to sun then shade, sun then shade. Sure enough, the photochromic properties improve over the course of a week. They’ve now become my favorite pair of glasses in recent memory.

ONE CAVEAT

Avoid, at all costs, the Tifosi single-lens design, like this one:

Tifosi single-lens style 2It’s a design fiasco. Durability of Tifosi frames comes from its flexible nylon material. The nylon admirably bends without breaking. HOWEVER, the lens is made of very un-flexible polycarbonate. So, even just a small amount of flex to the bridge (above the nose pads) will crack the lens. A cracked single-lens will forever fall out of the frame.

Dark Chocolate: The Super-est Superfood

Food and Drink, Health
20150225_230536

My most recent haul.

Can you tell I like chocolate?

I seek the cocoa, not the sugar. Even my childhood was more Hershey’s Special Dark than Nestle Crunch. Call me a lifelong cacao snob.

These days I prefer bars with 85% cocoa content. Less than 65% seems forgettable; higher than 85%, astringent. No chocolate Easter bunnies (35%)! But neither do I enjoy the black-hole, uber-darks (90+ percent), which to me have hints of Listerine.

Foodie magazines issue their standard caveat to those trying out serious dark chocolate for the first time: Anything over 70% is not for the faint of heart, they say.

Or is it?

Turns out, high-content cocoa is among the heart-healthiest foods there are. We all know red wine offers ∞highly beneficial antioxidants. Dark chocolate? Even more so. Flavonoids, phytonutrients, polyphenols — it’s got them all. The health benefits? We’re talking cholesterol-busting properties and antioxidant action, not to mention anti-inflammatory effect. The ∆ORAC value (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) of cocoa blows the doors off of superfoods we usually think of as the cancer fighters and heart helpers:

Cocoa, µnatural, unsweetened  55,653
Ginger root, raw                               14,840
Apples                                                     6,681
Garlic                                                       5,708
Red wine                                                4,523
USDA Database for the Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity (ORAC)

Granted, that ϶chart-topping ORAC score refers to 100% cocoa solids. So, then multiply that times 0.85, and you still get an 85% chocolate bar with a score of 47,305 — more than three times the value of ginger root.

In case you were wondering, Hershey’s Special Dark contains 45% cocoa. Nestlé Crunch, 30%.

FOOTNOTES

∞ The healthful benefits of dietary antioxidants have not been proven definitively, even though both food science and the medical establishment accept the concept.

∆ ORAC scoring is only one measure of antioxidant properties in foods. Other competing measures (FRAP, SOD, etc.) deviate somewhat from ORAC values. In 2012, ORAC briefly fell out of favor. But the most recent research has reestablished it as the go-to for antioxidant measurement of foods. For more, have a look at this recent piece of research.

µ Here’s info on “natural,” or un-Dutched, chocolate. The Dutching process typically lowers ORAC scores of cocoa, though not by very much.

϶ A number of foods actually score significantly higher than cocoa. But those are mostly spices and herbs — foods one wouldn’t eat enough of to realize significant antioxidant benefits.  [Sorry, that link has gone bad. Here’s another resource with a table of ORAC scores, where cocoa scores even more highly than I had seen before.]

Want to Save $140? Fix Your Chipped Knife

Food and Drink, Health
knife holder with arrow

My chipped knife on the magnetic knife holder.

Why Knives Chip and What to Do About It

I recently found this knife of ours had become chipped pretty badly. I didn’t care all that much. Not only was it a castoff from a friend who’d downsized her kitchen. It was just a $40 item from Chicago Cutlery. Had the chipping appeared on our $140 Wusthof chef’s knife, I would have cared a lot.

This knife? Nah. When I found it chipped, I sneered briefly planned obsolescence. My Filipino parents would say of this scenario sayang, as in, What a waste.

knife chipping closeup - snip tool

I cook without my reading glasses, so didn’t notice the chipping ’til it got pretty bad.

Turns out, I should have been sayang-ing at myself. The chipping wasn’t caused by cheap, flawed steel or poor quality control. It was me.

After hand-washing my knives, I stand them on edge to air dry. I learned somewhere that air-drying is best for keeping knives sterile after washing.

Turns out, air-drying is perfect — if you want droplets of water to collect on the cutting edge, weakening the steel as they slowly evaporate. Then, when sharpened, the weak spots flake rather than grind. Hence, the chips.

Now for the happy ending.

By chance in an airport lounge, I learned of my errant ways from The Today Show. A quick Google search then led me to this YouTube tutorial. Have a look-see at how to easily repair a chipped knife.

Murray Carter of Carter Cutlery going to town on his knife

Murray Carter of Carter Cutlery going to town on his knife

For regular-maintenance sharpening, I’d been using a rolling-wheel sharpener (below). Bad. Not only is the grain to coarse. Its design makes it impossible to keep a consistent grinding angle. This contributes to the chipping–this blunt instrument (as it were) wreaking havoc on the weakened steel. We do have a rarely used whetstone. I’d never used it because the user manual insists on a technique that’s slow to the point of absurdity. (“Pull the knife toward you five times, for two seconds each time. Then reverse directions, away five times. Repeat this alternating cycle fifty to one hundred times.”)

knife sharpener rolling

Little roll-ie sharpener

Wrong! The whetstone used Murray-Carter style (GIF-image, above) is actually a real pleasure. And fast, too.

knife whetstone

Whetstone, extrordinaire