Jason Shares Secret of Well-Baked Sourdough.

First, I created a sourdough "starter" by mixing flour, water and yeast into a 4 qt container. I let it bubble up, out in the open San Francisco air for a few days. 

After it started to smell like what might be beer you would never drink, I put a lid on it and threw it in the fridge for a couple weeks. 

I came back to my creation and used it in a Cracked Pepper Sourdough cheddar recipe. 

Pretty fun to make, and the taste was a big hit. Next I'll dabble with a pasta dough recipe and make ravioli.  

It's all about the bread machine to get the process started.

Tailgatin' Wickenburg Style.

You've read my recent posts about Pat + Betsy coming to see La Nancita and me in Wickenburg. We had a grand time: hiked,  chatted, went to the Heard in Phoenix for Indian Market then chatted some more, ate some more, and celebrated the very best time together!

Just before the gals left again for Phoenix and the airport, I posed them on the tailgate of the 2005 Town + Country. I think the pic turned out pretty well -- but look at the gorgeoues gals I'm working with as my 'models!'

Los Cab GC Lunch Staff Rocks!!

La Nancita and I ordered up three club sandwiches today to go. Wheat bread lightly toasted. Fresh fruit on the side.  And handfuls of the best chocolate-chip cookies you've ever tasted.

Better than the cookies? The Staff at Los Caballeros Golf Club. Outstanding. Awesome. Fun. Friendly.  They practically invented the concept of customer service.

Thank-you's to:  Art, Irma, Dan (who actually works on the golf course and not in the Grill) and Brandi.

Not to mention their boss Joe who was off duty today, but very much there in spirit.  He would have been proud.

Nice job, one and all.

Photographer Mark Gaggia Talks His Craft.

Photography is a basic part of my life. Yes, I’m a professional photographer. More important:  I’m a human being – astounded and humbled by how fast our world has changed, how fortunate I’ve been to record the “frames” of these passages for my children and grandchildren.

When I was a student at Brooks Institute in Santa Barbara, working in the 35mm format, shooting Tri-X, manually focusing my Nikkor lenses, setting f-stop and shutter speed, without a light meter, taking pictures was my window on the universe.

Not so long ago the world was still a mysterious place: Darkest Africa, Peru, the Far East, Afghanistan, the Orient. Destinations most people only dreamed about. Languages we had never heard, smells and tastes and clothing we could only imagine. This was in OUR lifetimes.  So different now.

Forty years ago we hadn't seen everything already, didn’t even know what we didn’t know. We were wide-eyed, curious, naïve. Back in 1972, when friends of mine at Brooks Institute dropped out of school to become the first white people ever to be seen by, and live with, a particular tribe in New Guinea, it took months for us back home to learn about them. MONTHS!  

When my friends returned to the States they learned from the priest who took them to New Guinea that the tribal people they lived with wept for them daily. My friends had become part of the tribe's Song. It was the song of their history and it was ten thousand years old.  

I still weep when I think how beautiful this story is: to become a verse in a community's song, a part of the history of their whole existence. My God, man.

I have always seen my life as framed moments, frozen in time. I’ll go to my grave seeing life this way. That’s who I am, probably why I became a photographer.  Memories in Black + White, of places far away, the mystery of humanity, the possibilities of discovery, the chance to become part of a People’s Song.

Smilin' Senoras, Stylin' Senora

Took the gals out to hike Vulture Peak this morning.  Wind was blowing from the northwest, a very chilly 50-degrees here in Wickenburg.  Adrenaline was pumping, no one was complaining, and plans were afoot to share the hiking poles on the ascent to the Peak (of Vulture Peak).

Betsy and Pat are veteran climbers and made it to the top -- some 3,526' above the Sonoran Desert, overlooking Wickenburg to the northeast, and catching a glimpse, if you looked hard enough, of Kingman, AZ way off in the distance.

As for Sammy and me,  we climbed into the car.   Back at home we had chores to tackle,  leaving our "huespedes hermosas" -- translates to "pretty guests" en espanol -- to do the heavy climbing.

More on the adventures of Pat + Betsy in a subsequent post.

Miami Joe hangs with Ghana Joe.

Used to say "you meet the nicest people on a Honda" - 

Yesterday Adam and I took a bike ride down south about 15 miles to The James Deering Estate, now a county park and historic site.

Nearby there is a dock where folks go to fish and enjoy the seabreeze.

Here we met this man - Joseph by name.  Joseph emigrated form Ghana to the US in 1958, settling in LA for 30 years or so before he moved to Miami about 20 years ago to retire.

Now 81 he heads down to the dock to fish for mostly barracuda, but also catches snook, small sharks and rays. Joseph asked me if I fish.  I said I had tried many times but ahd not had much success.

His reply - "aw, man - just fish, just fish!"  Some good and sage advice I suppose.

Back on our bikes again today.

Lovely Ladies Liven Up Sonoran Desert.

It's a sure sign of Spring when Gorgeous Gals like these pose for a foto with the Sonoran at their backs.  Shot was taken yesterday with trusty Canon on the little patio on the eastern side of the Lazy Fox condo.

Say 'hi' to (L - R):  Melissa, Pat, Sammy and Betsy.

After the photo op, we headed to lunch pool-side at Rancho de los Caballeros.  Tuff duty being the only guy in the group, but I pulled it off with elan.

Welcome to Wellick Field, Wickenburg, AZ. Elev. 2235'

Bench Marks - U.S. Geological Survey - Prescott, AZ

This "Bench Mark" is embedded in the sidewalk behind Yavapi County (AZ) couthouse in Prescott. Took pic, then Googled to learn more re: Bench Marks. Info courtesy of WVBike.org
All across the continental US as well as in Alaska and Hawaii there is a network of survey monuments which are bronze disks about 8 to 10 cm. in diameter set in rock or permanent structures. The exact number can only be guessed at, but some estimates suggest that one million or more are in place in all manner of locations from city sidewalks and bridges to remote ridges and mountain tops. These have been set by surveyors since 1879 and are the basis for horizontal and vertical control for all the mapping done in the US. The survey monuments used for horizontal control are called triangulation stations, triangulation marks, control stations, or simply stations. A benchmark is a monument that is part of a leveling network and is a point of precisely measured elevation.

Yavapi County/Prescott, AZ Time-Line.

It was back in the mid-16th Century that European explorers first set foot in what is now north-central Arizona. You can read the fabled, fascinating history of this area -- Prescott, AZ and Yavapai County --  inscribed by hand in a sidewalk-art tour de force on the central square in Prescott.

War, birth, death, the Great Depression, college and hospital start-ups, busines failures, famous people -- it's all there, etched in cement, colorfully illustrated in some caes, impressive as it is interesting.

The time-line stops in the year 2000 for some reason -- maybe the city/county fathers (and mothers) ran through their budget?  Vital events have surely transpired in the past 12 years  -- and they ought to be worthy of commemorating for posterity.

Steam-Powered Tractor, ca. 1906.

One of my neighbors here in Wickenburg, AZ has a fully-restored 1906 steam tractor gracing his front yard.  As I stopped to take this shot I wished the homeowner would have appeared to explain the history of this turn-of-the-century (20th that is) workhorse.

Thoughts Make You Wealthy - 2/19/12

Love every quality in your life, finances, profession, mate, relationships, and most importantly yourself. The more you love, the more you enlist the Powers of the Universe to bless, prosper, and heal you. You influence your own world in very positive ways. Love, love, and love. Take at least five minutes a day to journal about everything you love. You are now tuning into the Wonders of the Universe. You have just said goodbye to opinions, judgmental comments, and wishes to change people and the world. You have just said yes to the Universe and a healthy, prosperous life. And it all started with your decision to love.

C '61 Classmate Bill Mohan Fetes Ann Marie Engstrom.

The photo tells it all.

My Choate School classmate Bill Mohan sure did enjoy lunch last week in Washington, DC with a very special friend of the Class of 1961.  Ann Marie Engstrom, Director of Alumni Relations at Choate Rosemary Hall, and go-to person last year for the very successful C '61 50th Reunion, was in the District on official School business and called Bill to keep alive the special reunion momentum we'd developed.  


Bill (a member of our organizing committee) would be quick to tell you how much C '61 came to count on and respect count on Ann Marie. We sure did appreciate her talents, enthusiasm and deft touch. And the great thing about Ann Marie (one of many terrific attributes) is how much she loved working with our guys and their guests, and how genuine the friendship has become with our entire class .


We're lucky to have classmates like Bill, and alumni association friends like Ann Marie.  Wish we all could have been on that fancy banquette in Georgetown!

Revenge of the Maine Mooses.

My old Choatie buddy Ken Phillips sent me this the other day. Ken claims the foto was taken in Maine, and the story goes something like this.

Four hunters bagged their moose limit up in the Alagash. As the dead-eyes toasted their good fortune, a brilliant idea came over these extreme sharpshooters.

Why not a comic change of place that put the hunted in the driver's seat and the hunter on the rooftop, where the quarry should have been. This seemed way funnier to the hunting guys than to the Maine State Troopers, who took a dim view of our boys as they went through the tool booth on I-95, hi-fiving hooves and raising all sorts of hell.

My freind Ken didn't tell me the end of the story, though I would guess some alcohol could have been involved.

Wickenburg Gold Rush Days Parade Grand Marshall.

If you hang out at the Wickenburg Chamber of Commerce long enough, you're sure to meet one of our town's gorgeous, living legends.  I had the good fortune to just that this week when Parade Grand Marshall  Ms. Jeanne Tirpak and I chatted it up about the Great State of Arizona ... our Centennial Celebration .... and fancy cowgirl outfits worth with classic elan. Grand Marshall Jeanne  was very cool with stopping passers-by and asking them to snap a foto for the Velo Blog.

64th Annual Gold Rush Days take Wickenburg by storm the weekend of February 17-19. Ms. Jeanne will be doing her thing Saturday AM, 2/18/12.