Chili Cook-off and Aikido???

I had something else clever to write about, but for the life of me I can't remember what it was.

This past Sunday was the neighborhood Chili cook-off. I was determined to make a good showing, but I really didn't know which recipe would be different enough from what everyone else would bring. Susan told me about Nigella's Chocolate Chip Chili (link). I was a little iffy on it at first but after reading the recipe a few times I warmed up to it. If we had a charged camera battery there would be a picture, but it did look a lot like the picture from the link above. I did make a few modifications to the recipe, because I like to personalize all of my dishes. :D Modifications: substitute one of the kidney bean cans with a black beans, instead of 1 tsp red pepper flakes I used 1/2 tsp of habanero pepper flakes (from my old garden), I deveined the fresh red pepper in addition to deseeding (that was a mistake, I lost a lot of heat that the habs didn't backfill - dammit). Anyway I thought it had great flavor after 3 hours in the oven (I love my oven). Susan found a 5Qt crock pot for $15 (now that's love), that I poured all of the goodness into and took it to the cook-off.

There were about 10 entries of varying quality. I believe I tried them all and could honestly say that mine was the best. There were no duplicates, which I found very interesting: Cincy, NY, Texas, Scottish (it really missed the mark of all of the entries - you don't just pour a bottle of chili power over meat and call it Chili), vegetarian, etc. With 40+ people at the party there was obviously something for everyone, because each chili got at least 2 votes. I've always had a hard time voting for my own entry so I voted for the vegetarian chili - because I thought it was the bravest entry. So you can guess what happened, right? There was a 3 way tie for first: mine and 2 others (I can't remember which ones). If I had just voted for myself I would have won outright, lol. I sent Susan up to get the award: a Christmas candle; no idea what the others got.

Last night I decided to give one of the local Aikido dojos a go to see what it was like. I had observed one of the classes and was less than super impressed, but its always hard to tell until you actually get on the mat. I was not disappointed in my original appraisal. I don't know exactly what they were doing, but it wasn't any aikido that I had ever seen/done before. I'm not sure what it was to be honest - the teaching instructor (not the head sensei) said they were "big circle, but linear". Really? Because it looks like it was "run into each other and don't bother with joint control aikido". My spider senses were lit-up when I was at the front desk signing up and the discussion turned to one of the students tearing an ACL while practicing. They all agreed that they had never heard of that before - hmmmmmm, I have - none of it first hand, but it always had to do with careless or cruel instructors (two sides of the same coin, IMHO). I do know how they could help most of their problems (funny they didn't ask, though :P); how about start having people learn techniques from kihon (static) instead of everything from ki no nagare. Hmmmm? The instructor kept saying everyone was clashing, so what would be a cure for that? More of the same? Yep. AHHHHH! (Which reminds me - its a lonely existence when you are the only one kiai-ing) Looks like I'll be shelving that hobby for the foreseeable future, but with beekeeping, cycling, kayaking, and cooking; it would have been tough to fit it all in anyway.

Speaking of cooking, I've just started reading Julia Child's My life in France. I am completely devouring the book during all of my free time (and Susan's for translating the French for me - otherwise I have to find an online translator, which isn't as good). Its more of an interactive exercise because of the translation issues and looking up the regions, wines, food terms I don't know, etc. Susan and I have talked about doing a bike tour of France this spring and I am really looking forward to it.

Making Room for Turkey Ride/Race

Ok so I'm touch late on getting this one out. Its been over a week since the ride and it is beginning to fade a little bit. But here we go. I really (ok, not too really) wanted to ride the 50 miler instead of the 25, but because we were going to visit some of the wife's family later in the day - I just did the 25. This was the inaugural ride and they had a few things together, but not the start time. It started at 10:30 for crying out loud.

It did have many things together like the support goldwings and police at the major intersections (Wake Sheriffs, Durham Sheriffs, Morrisville Town and others , sorry the memory is the second thing to go). The SGA vehicles though did not actually have any supplies for fixing flats or pumping up tires, which is a bit puzzling. The police on the other hand I thought did a great job and were very supportive. In the one bit of unfortunate happenings - a vehicle decided to go around the police and not obey the lawful commands given them and struck a cyclist in the race. The driver was apprehended and cited (unfortunately he/she was not tasered into a non-thoughtless SOB). The cyclist only sustained a knee injury and was released from the ER and told to stay off of it for a bit.

On to the bits bout the race. It was a very fast race for me (my average is around 14 - 14.5 mph and I was able to do it at 16.4 mph). The miles kept peeling off very quickly and I was able to take some of the downhills at over 35 mph. There was some wind during the last 8 miles or so, but it wasn't too bad. The race was pretty well marked, but still I saw a couple take some detours. It was kind of funny, but they passed me twice without me ever passing them and on a single loop that's kind of impressive. Brad had a similar experience with someone that passed him that didn't follow the route very well. I did finish in the top 10 which made me happy, but since it was recreational no one else knew they were racing me :P.

Susan and I didn't leave the house to meet up with her family until 1 or 1:30, so we didn't get to the zoo until after 3. We were greeted at the North American gate by a very toad-faced critter that I assume is a volunteer worker that has had a very hard life. Based off of my video game experience you have to be evil for a long time to look that hideous, but you can't judge a book by its cover. You have to judge it by its merits. Then the toady opened it mouth and said, "We CLOSE the gate and hour before CLOSING. Come back some other time." We tried offering it live flies and stools, but nothing could prevail on its one true joy of the day. We decided to take our $20 and just walk around the outside and checkout some of the new construction and the arboretum. I am bummed that I didn't get to see the bee exhibit that the NC Zoo just installed, but maybe in the spring will be better in any case. Do toads survive the winter?

We did get caught up to the family and did some catching up since we had not seen some of them in a good long time. It was good see them again, but I doubt I'll be able to eat fried seafood again. I just don't have the taste for it I once did.

November WCBA meeting

Finally actually entering in this entry that has been sitting here for a bit.

It was a cold and rainy night... I would normally prefer to be in PJs in front of the fire place or my xbox (both of which produce enough BTUs to heat a small building), but went to the meeting instead. We got an update on the sales from the State Fair. We sold 26K of honey (3400 pounds and 29000 honey sticks) with a total profit of 11K. In South Park terms it goes like this: Step 1: Get Bees, Step 2: ..., Step 3: Profit. (Where Step 2 = all kinds of work to get good production out of your bees) The math ends up being about $6/lb for the honey (retail), but 2/3 that for wholesale. In other words, find someone to sell your honey to instead of the State Association.

The speakers for this month were a couple that did PermaCulture (Permanent Agriculture) on their farm. It was a very interesting discussion and way of thinking, but not one that I'm willing to go into much detail about or even try it myself. I don't want to spend all of my time thinking about 5 uses for everything on my property.

Bee-haver versus Beekeeper

So if you have bees and they (the bees) have not exactly agreed to the situation; can you still be considered a beekeeper? Saturday is mowing day and the hives are in the yard, ergo the electric mower and the bees are going to meet. I have been delaying mowing for a couple of weeks now to see if it would just mow itself, alas it has not done so. Which leaves me in the position to inform the bees that the orange monster is not there to harm them. Do bees see orange? That may have been the problem - I did not speak to them in terms that they could understand. The large upside-down poppy flower that buzzes really loud is not an interloper come to steal your precious honey.

They were actually pretty well behaved about the mower, but a hundred or so bees came out of both hives to check out what was going on. I was wearing my beekeeping jacket just in case, but it didn't seem necessary. So, like always, I decide to press my luck and take a look-see inside both hives to make sure that they have enough stores to get them through an admittedly mild NC winter. Mary's hive has been working the hardest and was the furthest behind. When I looked in I was very surprised that there was a lot more bees than the last time I looked and I saw a fair amount of capped honey too. I have a lot higher hopes that her hive will make it now. Elizabeth's hive was bursting over with bees and capped honey. I'll have to keep and eye on them in early spring to make sure they don't get too crowded and want to swarm.

In checking I only made one major mistake (I don't even bother with keeping track of minor ones): trying to pop the inner cover off of Elizabeth. They had really glued down the inner cover and I had popped the back two corners and for some reason decided to push the lid forward to break the seal on the front two corners. Well that didn't work. It just shifted the entire hive and made everyone inside a little nervous. I'm there trying to put the cover back on right when about 20-30 guards come out the top at top flight speed and hit me in the netting hard enough to make a slapping noise. There was little I could do, but keep working and try to reassure them that I would only be a minute more and they could go back to doing their thing. Once I got the lids back on everyone went back into the hive a calmed down very quickly. I went over to sit with them a couple of hours later and they were fine. I was kind of worried that they might chase me off if they were still upset, but no such problems.

Habitat for Humanty Bike Ride

On saturday I had my first group ride/race. It was a 31 mile ride from the Durham Bulls Athletic Park through north west Durham. I had been thinking about doing the 62 mile race (there was a 31, 62, and 100 miler options), but since the longest I had ridden for the past 2 months was 8 miles at a clip, I felt 62 was a bit too ambitious :P.

The weather for it wasn't too bad at all; a steady sprinkle to light rain and very little wind. It was in the 60s and no sun. I didn't need to worry about overheating at all. My biggest fear was crashing and endurance. The crashing part was close only once; going down a very steep hill at almost 37 mph, my back tire got a little loose on me and I had to slow down. The roads didn't have much standing water, but they were very slick.

Riding in a group wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. With 3 races going on and very different skill levels, people got broken up after about 5 miles or so. I started in the 11-13 mph group just because I didn't think I could hang in the 13-15 group. Well I passed all of the people in my group and most of the 13-15 group. My final average was 14.1 mph (not great by any stretch, but better than 3/4 of the 31 mile riders. I thought I would be much further back than that, but the better riders rode in the longer rides. The first group from the 62 miler came in about 5 minutes after I finished the 31; which puts them at around 28 mph in the rain (I could barely hold that down hill).

Friends from work did the race too, but are a good 1 to 2 mph faster than me, which makes a pretty big difference. They said that I finished only a minute or so behind them. I didn't even see them in the beginning of the race, because they started in the 18-20 mph group and I caught up to them at the halfway rest stop (around mile 17). Brad said that they were there about 30 seconds before me, but didn't see me also so they thought I had just wimped out on the race.

It was a lot of fun and I'll probably try to get in some riding before spring, when I expect to do my next race. I am bummed that I didn't do a 50 this year, but hopefully I'll get in a couple next year.

Biking to work

I rode into work yesterday. My bike ride for Habitat for Humanity is Saturday and I've been a little lax. Definition of "lax" - haven't really spent any time on my bike in 3-4 months. I was doing 30+ mile rides there for a while in spring and early summer. Now I'm struggling to keep up a good pace for 10 miles :(.

Raleigh is far more friendly for bikes than Richmond. Here they at least care if there is a hit and run death of a cyclist. But yesterday was very nice in that no one beeped at me or tried to run me off the road. Its the little things that I consider wins. It was the ride home that make me the mot concerned. It was raining and late. We had a 5pm demo and I didn't want to miss it. I didn't leave the office until 5:30 and still had to change and get on the road. Fortunately the ride home is much quicker than the ride in (mostly down hill). With the rain and low visibility, I thought I would have more problems with the other traffic, but it turns out no one is walking during this time - which opens up a nice friendly path - the sidewalk. Normally I would not be a proponent of bikes on sidewalks - too much can go wrong with different speed critters on the same path, but since Raleigh doesn't have bike lanes on every road - you need to do wants require to not risk your life unnecessarily.

I did make it back to the house before it was completely dark - which would have sucked on my last leg, along the community greenway. I was covered in mud though and my back pack took much of the abuse (it also had my MacBook Pro in it - which fortunately did not get wet at all). I am glad that I got the cycle-cross bike instead of a regular road bike. I was able to handle the standing water and mud without too much problems.

Thursdays is supposed to be nice so I'll have to ride then too and I'll have a hope of not dying Saturday. I still haven't ridden in a group. I'm more a solitary person when I'm exercising or playing games. Sure there are times when I'd like to be part of a group, but for the most part I'd rather just rely on myself instead of others. I don't know what to expect when there will be a ton of other cyclists out there with me.

Sugar-Free Honey

I totally forgot my most favorite question of the other night. Anyone that knows me knows that I'm not the best person for hiding my emotions. I do half of my communication through facial expressions.

This woman walks up to the NCBA booth and asks: "Do you have any sugar-free honey?" I'm afraid that I gave her my "are you making fun of me" look. I tell her that no table sugar was added, but that honey is 70% fructose and glucose. There is not much getting around that. She then tells me that she found some sugar-free honey at some store for her mother. At this point I have mostly recovered (but I think it was too late) and said that I'm afraid that we don't have any of that.

I later looked up "sugar-free honey" on da google and found what I expected: imitation honey. This stuff should be condemned by all peoples. The other was this crazy plan by the Indian government to have bees in the middle of Stevia fields and then be fed the leaves instead of sugar-water after the nectar flow. I wish them luck - but I have my doubts. Honey naturally has a low glycemic index, far below sucrose, so why all the fuss.

So in terms of my own learning pains, I put a front boardman feeder on Mary's hive and started quite a storm yesterday at noon. This caused a lot of robbing and fighting . I later read from the local associations newsletter that you should avoid front feeders in the fall for this very reason - doh. The funniest part is this morning when I checked on them - they maybe drank 1/2 cup of it. I'm guessing that all of the fall nectar is far more tempting and the just decided that the 2:1 syrup is just a little too rich.

State Fair

I was an honest salesman tonight. Well at least a salesman and I didn't lie on purpose. I workeed the North Carolina Beekeepers Association booth selling honey and answering questions (they got answers for free and I think they paid too much).

My favorite questions for this evening:
Q: How are your bees doing?
A: Fine and yours?
Q: I don't have any bees?
A: Want some?

Q: Do you have comb in honey? (Got asked this at least 20 times)
A: No, sorry. A bee colony can make 8 lbs of honey or 1 lb of wax. Its just too expensive to use wax in that way.

Q: What's the best honey you have for sale?
A: All of it. (But if were me and it will be at the end of the night. I'd get the darkest you can find. It has more flavor, nutrients, and won't crystallize as fast as the lighter honey)

Q: Why don't you have any honey from Wake county?
A: Too much rain this year to get a good nectar flow. Hopefully next year will be a little drier, but not too dry.

Q: Why are the honeys different colors? Is it flavored differently?
A: The dominant flowers that the bees drew honey off of cause the coloring. There will also be a subtle difference in flavor. The darker amber it is the more they were pulling nectar from tulip poplars. The lighter is from clover, holly, cotton, and locust.

Q: Which honey will be the best for my allergies, cough, joint pain, scars (for real), etc.?
A: Which county are you from? Well here. This is from the hive closest to you. (I felt bad about this answer, but I know honey makes me happier, so the placebo effect may help them.)

Q: Aren't you afraid of getting stung?
A: Nope. I'm afraid of spiders, but I have a healthy respect for my bees.

My four hours went by very quickly. I was sharing the booth with one of the senior members of the Wake County Beekeepers Association. I let him handle all of the tougher questions about hive management, health of the local hives and local beekeepers. I handled small talk and customer engagement - which frankly surprised the hell out of me that I could be that extroverted. I was able to in the couple of short lulls to ask about some hive management questions that I had too. He was able to calm me down about some feeding questions (i need to do a 2:1 sugar to water ratio for the fall) and pest management.

At the end I was actually sorry to have to leave, but the building was closing . I did pick up some great dark (nearly black) honey from New Hanover county for Susan's cough . I may have to see if they have another evening that they need someone :D

Exploration Day

Yesterday was the first day for the bees at the new location. It was cloudy and sprinkling, but there were a lot of scouts out and about. At first they would just come out slowly and then do a spiral up into the air to above the tree line and take off to where ever they were going. But by afternoon they were all over the place. I was hoping none of the neighbors noticed the increase in curious bee activity and such a cool day. They should be spreading out more soon and then it won't be a big deal at all. Bloo did like watching them from my office window, which is right above them. They would fly up and land on the sill and do whatever and Bloo would just stare at them. I told him that I didn't think that he would enjoy eating one.

We also made it over to the State Fair. I think Susan is planning on entering one of her knitted items next year - I hope so. I spoke with one of the Wake County Beekeepers members and found that there was still an open slot at our exhibit on Tuesday night, so I'll be working that.

Finally moved down

With all of the fuss of moving it was quite an orchestra to get my hives down here to Raleigh. I needed to get them inspected in VA and then get an application to locate them in NC. Both State Apiarists were very helpful and understanding about the whole thing. NC's told me the only thing he would have interest in was if my hives had Foulbrood. Which I knew they didn't because they didn't stink to high heaven.

This morning I drove up to VA to hang out with Jake and to pick up my hives since we are mostly moved in at this point. While watching some football and Jake working on his main hobby - turned pens; he asked if the inspector had told me about his inspection. I had only heard that I passed, but nothing else beyond that. He said that the inspector told his grandfather (whose farm where my hives were located) that if I had put them in a different corner of the field they would have done a lot better - AHH CRAP! And now they are down here and I don't know if they are in a less optimal location again.

So here is how you relocate two hives (one hive body a piece) in a Toyota Matrix: have a brilliant wife (check), listen to brilliant wife (check), follow advice of brilliant wife (check). I had a sheet of fiberglass screen that I was going to cut up a bit and put over the hive entrances. Susan said: "Why don't you use the rest of it as a barrier between the back seats and the trunk?" Well, duh! ("Why didn't I think of that - that's awesome".) But in my defense I did come up with the name: "Danger Cage". Which Jake and I fashioned as the penultimate defense for my drive back.

50000 bees, 3 hours, 160 miles from the farm to the new house.
defenses:

1. Air conditioning running at full - probably 40 degrees in the car (slows down bees a ton)
2. Night - bees can't fly at night so I only need to be concerned with crawling bees (cuts off a full dimension of travel)
3. Hives with entrance screened - they would need to be pretty crafty to get past fiberglass and duck tape
4. Tarp - bought 6x8 tarp and a roll of duck tape at Home Depot on the way up, made me giggle for some reason.
5. Danger Cage - floor to ceiling screening and duck tape
   
6. Wore my bee suit jacket on the drive - kept me warm and was ready to pull my hood on if worst came to worst.

I was surprised when I picked up Elizabeth's hive - it must be around 70 - 80 pounds. I think that hive will make it through the winter just fine with that much honey. Mary's on the other hand was probably 45 - 50 pounds. I've always worried about that hive and it seems like will need some special care to survive. I got some new stands and pollen substitute that I'll give them both here in the next day or so. I think I'll also put one of the top feeders on Mary's and probably a front feeder on Liz's.

Two hive bodies and 2 frames down

Ok now I'm actually making some progress. Over the weekend I got the two hive bodies built. I upload pictures soon. For giggles I build out two of the frames with wax foundation. I'm living the beekeeper's dream - of sorts. No plastic for my girls :P. It was really a lot of fun. I hadn't done any wood working in forever and did a pretty good job of not hitting myself with the hammer or gluing body parts together :D.

On Saturday, the wifey and I went with Jake and Katherine to lunch and over to his grandfather's farm to look at possible location for my bee yard. I think it will work great. The land is leased out to a farmer so there should be flowers for a much longer than normal - which will be great since I will be getting them late. The only problem is that the place I picked out - I checked out on Google Maps and I am pointing in the wrong direction. I'll take the map with me next time and just shift the placement.

I spoke with one potential mentor and he may work, its still up in the air if the bees will be near where he has other hives. He won't have Nucs until early next month. I need to check with Bob at this week's beekeepers meeting. I may also need to look into getting involved with the East Richmond beekeepers too.

The garden is going like mad since all of the rain - but I think all parties involved will be happy with more sun. One more weekend and I think the garden will be right where I want it for the spring - all the paths and mulch layed down, first plantings done (second if you are a radish), and vines (grape, blackberry, and kiwi) tamed a bit.

Making some progress

My hives are ordered and still "pending" at Dadant (https://www.dadant.com/catalog/index.php). I have no clue when they will actually ship. Combine that with the fact that I haven't contacted any of the mentors and it's looking kind of iffy for this year.

I went to the Thursday night Richmond Beekeeper's meeting. They had the president of the Ashland Beekeeper's Assoc. as the speaker. It lasted the whole 2 hours and bored the crap out of me. He just covered a small subsection of the things we learned in the beginner's classes. The worst things was that he was a 5th generation beekeeper and he didn't really provide any new insight at all. The only interesting thing was when he talked about his grandfathers bee yard in a stand of Black Locusts. He was talking about how his grandfather had to get ladders to stack the supers up high enough to keep up with the honey production. If only he could have brought some pictures of that.

In a funny note of generational beekeeping - it may turn out (if I ever get my hives and bees) that I will be at least a 3rd generation beekeeper. When I brought up getting some hives to my mom she mentioned that she had some hives with her father when she was in 4H. I chuckled and told her that everything old is new again. This may be wishful thinking, but with some urban pushes in Europe maybe Urban beekeeping will catch on a little more here in the states. The biggest problem is ignorance about bees. And the complete bull about "killer bees" just makes it worse. Then there is a special level of clown like this maroon . The University of Florida should be ashamed of themselves for hiring this "Entomologist". Feral Colony does not equal Africanized Honey Bee.

Off of that soap box and on to the next. I'm sitting down at the RBA meeting and this older gentlemen sits down next to me - so we chat before the meeting got started. We chatted about where we worked and what we did. I'm going to guess (and I'm always terrible at guessing this, but) that he was 65+. At least old enough to know better than to bring up politics in a first conversation; but he decided to take it one step further and make homophobic comments to boot. Maybe I come off as someone you can make obnoxious comments to and be assured that I will agree with them; I hope not. In any case I don't think I will need to worry about ever having to talk with that douchebag again. He has been talking about keeping since 2000 and as his parting words to me at the end of the meeting, "Maybe I'll start next year". Don't let the hive entrance reducer hit you in the @ss on the way out, douche.

Didn't get much done with the garden this weekend, other than some watering. I just have 2 more small beds to prep then just care and maintenance until the second planting comes up.

Garden Check

Really started in on the garden this past weekend and finished up the planting last night of the first round of seeds. Planted: 3 tomatoes (2 roma, 1 beefsteak), 70 onions (no clue why I went overboard with them), kale, beets, sweet peas, and swiss chard. It got kind of cold last night, but I doubt anyone got hurt because of it. The salad greens mix and radishes are already up and going to be ready in 2-3 weeks. I have cleaned up my herb garden and getting it ready. The rosemary in it is still the saddest one I have ever seen, but it does has some stiff competition from the mint and balm. Still have one bed to finish up and just add the rest of the compost - but it has a while before it is out of the shade.

Herbs:
Tomatoes: Creme Brulee
Not really garden related because unfortunately I can't grow my own vanilla beans :(

Getting started

Ok. I've had four 3+ hour classes of beekeeping and one 3 hour field trip. I have a list of possible mentors in my area and a local beekeepers association meeting coming up this week. So I'm only missing a few things from this next hobby: Bees and someplace to store their little butts.

The sweet wifelette would like me to be practical and wait until I have a mentor and a place to put the hives, but practicality is for the weak. You have no motivation unless there is something urgent to push you a long. And really how long has she known me? Practical is not my middle name.

I only need a couple of things to get started: 2 hive bodies, 2 deeps, 4 supers (with frames), 2 wire bottom boards, 2 stands, foundation (for 80 frames), hive tool, smoker, eyelets and punch, wire, press, and a little protective gear (I don't mind getting stung but if I can avoid it I will). This may look like a lot, just because it is. I will still need to find a mentor that is just as persnickety as I am (that may be tougher). The problem is I have already formed a lot of beekeeping opinions without owning a single bee. For example: I don't want to use a lot (or any if possible) chemicals on my hives - so that eliminates an Italian queen and means I need a Russian or preferably hygienic Michigan or Minnesota queen. I also don't want to get a bee package from northern Georgia or elsewhere; because I would rather get a Nuc from a local beekeeper. (I formed this last opinion after talking with the state apiarist - so there is at least some education behind that opinion). I will also need a mentor that has some space in one of his beeyards for two more hives, because the wifelette is not crazy about having 80 to 140K bees around her with her bee sting allergies.

I guess I'll see how many of these opinions I can keep in the long run after I get a little experience. Susan just wants to know how long it will be until I tire of them and switch to some other hobby. I have tried to explain that they are not like hockey, aikido, WoW, or any of the others I have done over the past decade. They are living and not wholly dependent on me, but pretty close. It would be like deciding that I don't want to care for Bloo anymore. Any of the others I walk away from and the vacuum I left was filled before my butt passed through the door. If I walk away from this then I have stranded thousands of living creatures to fend for themselves against preditors and diseases.