Hops Harvest

Last week, the Wall Street Journal ran a story about brewers who make seasonal, limited edition beers using fresh (as opposed to dry) hops. I had great intentions of commenting on the story at the time, but let's face it: Right now "blogging" is not at the top of my to-do list.

Anyway, last Monday the fabulous Jay Brooks, of the equally fabulous Brookston Beer Blog, helped out with the hops harvest for two breweries in his neighborhood (Russian River and Moonlight). He's posted some fantastic pictures and terrific commentary to go with them. Check it out at his blog. It's the entry for August 29, 2006.

A Stranger To Me Now

The other day, I received a copy of the dust jacket for my new book, a history of American beer. It’s gorgeous! Engaging design; rich, lively colors -- far more exciting than what shows up onscreen at my website. (Only downside is my photo: I look like I just won the Messiest Hair in the Universe award.) [Note: This was in reference to the hardcover edition, which looked like this.]

But even as I admired the jacket and the talent that created it, I experienced what has become common in my life as a writer: That sense of distance and disconnect that comes with each new book. That jacket -- the physical object -- has nothing to do with my creation. Just as the book itself, when it finally arrives, will feel to me like someone I once knew, long, long ago but who I now barely remember.

What I remember about my books is this: Hours and hours and hours spent sitting at a microfilm reader, or going through decades worth of indexes. Leafing through journals and old magazines. Days spent at archives and libraries, days filled, more often than not with frustration and panic. Plastic filing cubes stuffed with photocopies of documents. Staring for still more hours and then days stretching into years at a computer monitor. Grabbing pages of text from my printer, filling them with penciled corrections and edits, desciphering those scribbles and arrows and circles as I type the changes into the computer.

That’s how my mind’s eye remembers my book. Those other pages? The ones printed with a fine font and adorned with a page number, the book’s title across the top of every other page in yet another lovely font, all bound in a tidy package between two hard covers and decorated yet again with that eye-popping dust jacket? That’s someone else’s work. Nothing to do with me. Lovely to look at; delightful to hold -- but, well, not something I would identify as mine in the Lost and Found.

And so it goes with my books: they leave my hands in one form, then reappear in another. Sure, I remember those thousands of hours spent creating the manuscript. But this finished product, the one I sometimes spot in a bookstore, is a stranger to me. A companion of days long past now vanished from my life and living its own.

I got the cynicism blues....

First off, let me say that I am not by nature conspiratorially minded. I'm not one of those people who think birth control pills are a plot by pharmceutical companies to train young women to a life of pill-popping so that as they age, they'll think nothing of taking diet pills or Prozac.

But I must confess that when I head the news about the airplane-bomb plot thwarted by British intelligence, my very first thought was: "Hmmmmm........now was there really a plot, or did Bush and Blair cook this up as a way to bolster sagging support for the war in Iraq?"

After all, the timing was sure odd, coming as it did on the heels of Joe Lieberman's defeat in the Connecticut primary, a loss that news analysts are blaming on voter unrest over the ongoing war. See? I sound exactly like a conspiracy-loving crackpot. (Although let's face it: Karl Rove likely danced a jig when he heard the news. He surely LOVES the idea of a crackpot leftwinger running for office!)

To make matters worse, I've absolutely become a complete pessimist, and that really bothers me. As a rule, I'm generally optimistic. I assume that people are good and that things will work out. But right now, between this ungodly mess the Bush administration has created and the horrific war in Israel and Lebanon, and the ongoing misery that is Africa, well, for the past few years my optimism has slowly soured into a morass of pessimism bordering on despair.

And now I'm turning into a certifiable crackpot. But this sad state only indicates, I think, the extent to which conditions on planet earth have deteriorated since September 11, 2001. I can't think of anything more clearly designed to fuel anti-American hatred and terrorism than the Bush administration policies that are supposedly aimed at ending terrorism!

So once again, I gotta ask: Where will this end? Not well, I fear.

Please buy new books. Please.

There's a nice essay by James Grippando M.J. Rose's blog. I second the emotion: If you buy books, PLEASE buy new if you can. Writers make zero dollars from used books. That's zero dollars as in: Zip. Nada. $0.00. Not-one-thin-dime. If writers don't make money, then the publishers don't make money. And if publishers don't make money, they won't publish any books. And readers won't have new books to read.

If you love to read; if you care about books, words, and the marvelous way in which books feed our imaginations, then please, buy new if you can. If you can't, that's okay! Check out books from your library. Libraries are funded in part based on numbers of patrons. The more patrons, the bigger the budget. And libraries are the bedrock (along with good manners) of civilization.

So please, if you can possibly do so, buy books new. If you can't, then please, patronize your local library. We'll all be better for it. Thanks for stopping by. Thanks for reading!

I'm dead! Give me money!

I'm a long-time reader of obituaries. (No, I have no idea why I'm so fascinated by them. I'm sure the psychiatrists in the audience would be glad to offer some explanations). Anyway, I've read obits for years and years -- decades, in fact.

Back in the old days (which are increasingly seeming like the GOOD old days), the families of the deceased might suggest memorial contributions to a favorite non-profit. Great idea, because after all, does anyone really need all those flowers?

But in the past two years, I've noticed a truly disturbing trend in the American Way of Death: the family suggests that memorial contributions be made to -- the family.

Now, okay, if the deceased is the sole breadwinner and leaves behind a spouse and seven kids, I can certainly understand that the survivors might need some financial assistance. Or if a child is suddenly orphaned by the death of both parents But that's rarely the case in the "give us money" obits. Sometimes the deceased is a child. Sometimes it's an elderly person. Sometimes it's an unmarried, unparenting adult.

But the survivors want MONEY.

What the HELL is the deal with this? It's bad enough that soon-to-be-marrieds now routinely ask wedding guests for dough (the lastest wrinkle in that nasty fad is posting a house plan at a website and asking people to pay for a window, door, or floor covering. But survivors of the recently deceased asking for money? Ewwwwwwwwww! I truly don't understand this.

So if anyone can explain it to me, well, I'd be thrilled to bits. Just don't expect me to endorse this new "custom."

Oh, groan..........

Cross Chicago off the list of Places Where I Want To Live. Seems a city councilman is urging the city council there to pass an ordinance banning restaurants from the use of oils containing trans-fats (or trans fats.....) In April, this council voted to ban foie gras in the city's restaurants!

Good god. Am I still living in the United States????? For god's sake. Have we lost all sense of personal responsibility? Have we decided to become a Big Brother society? Yeah, yeah. Okay, that's a simplistic view. But for fuck's sake (yes, this is MY blog and I can use whatever words I want because last time I checked I still live in a nation that places a premium on free speech), let's get a GRIP. We do NOT need city councils deciding what businesses can and cannot do. Or, for that matter, what kind of food private citizens should or should not eat. Or restaurateurs should serve.

My own town -- Ames, Iowa -- is just as bad. Several years ago, the city council voted to ban smoking in restaurants. Never even TRIED to negotiate with owners to install proper ventilation. This turned out to be a true slippery slope: not long after that, the same council voted to ban upholstered furniture on front porches. Yes, I live in Little Nazi-ville.

If the Chicago city council (or this jackass city councilman in particular) wants to do something about good health, then they should ask Oprah to sponsor a marathon. Have Oprah sponsor a "town meeting" on healthy eating. Spend some dough on having good-food types talk at public schools. Whatever.

But for fuck's sake, let go of the "let's monitor every goddamn aspect of people's lives, including what sorts of cooking oil restaurants use." Because otherwise it's the same thing as saying "HEY! I know what's best for all of you, and by god, I'm going to pass laws deciding what you can and can't eat.

Because frankly, I think you're too fucking stupid to make your own decisions. And besides that, I hate democracy and love tyranny." And I'm here to tell you that that kind of thinking scares the fucking shit out of me. If I wanted to live in tyranny, I'dve long since emigrated to Iraq.