Thanksgiving on Coats Mountain

The day before Thanksgiving, my friends spotted a flock of 30 turkeys crossing the lawn on their wooded land north of Nashville. None of them ended up on the dinner table, it was nice to spend the holiday in a place where its strongest symbol runs rampant.

For the second time in my life, I didn't sit at my parents' table for Thanksgiving; the only other came when I refused to go with them to Connecticut because I wouldn't lie to Grandma and my mother's family about my father being out of work.

This year's absence also concerned work, but my deadline for Kansas-Missouri on Wednesday and two shifts at the store over the weekend. With my sister's recent departure for the Pacific Northwest, I just didn't feel up for the drive, much less watching lopsided Thankgiving Day football. After my Father's report on their guests for the weekend, staying in Nashville proved prescient.

So the Coats family, who took me in for Easter twice since I migrated south, offered for Thanksgiving as well. Since I began renting their one-bedroom apartment in Inglewood three weeks ago, I have become family by proxy.

When I rumbled up the steep driveway, I recalled the Continental Divide and its strain on 4-cylinder engines. The new tired accepted the challenge of the gravel drive which wound to the small cluster of houses that overlooked the mountain valleys leading away from Nashville.

Soon the house was full, including some people to which I had stronger ties than I knew. Tim's aunt and uncle lived in my apartment building for many years, as had their son. He had been born in this house, the mudroom out back had been built as a tiny nursery (now it stores bikes, brewing equipment and the catbox).

I couldn't shake how strange that felt; since it was a family house for 50-plus years, it shouldn't have have been. But it was. It's rare to meet people who have history in your house.

The food was splendid, and my streak for making cranberry sauce ran to six years, although the 2009 version featured a pint of blueberries as a frill. Following an afternoon of wine, it felt like it took gallons of coffee to return myself to driving condition. When I rolled back down to the rural road, the coffee worked long enough to guide me home and directly to bed, the effects of a Thanksgiving meal had become too large to surmount.

Because I'd Rather Blog About Beer Than About Me

You can read the exciting details here at the beer blog. 

Soon I will regale you again with stories of my battle with the post office, fierce deadlines and breaking news in Kansas City healthcare, and plotting my western travels in 2010. As for music - the best of 2009 will be quickly chased by the best rediscoveries of 2009 (aka shit I didn't hear before Jan. 1). 

I can finally ride the bike again without fear of death beneath the wheels of some hillbilly machine. It could still happen, but the streets are wider, no one parks in the bike lanes, and the rear entrance to the Shelby Bottoms Greenway is a scant two miles away (insert "Rear entrance to Shelby Bottoms" joke here).  

So a Thanksgiving bike ride should be just the tonic to break the funk I've been stuck in for the past week. A little foot injury has prevented my long runs, so I'm eager to return to the trails in one form or another. 

Sequential Faults (Remind Me Why I Kept Reading)

I think I've had it with mainstream comics. Some might say that's about 22 years past due, but I finally fee alienated enough to stop wasting the money. Since I moved to Nashville, I have visited the local shops almost every Wednesday, thrown down money in search of a good read, and become connected with other comic fans here in Music City. But I can't escape diminishing returns any longer, not at $3 or $4 a pop.

In short, every book I've come to enjoy in the past 2-3 years has skewed off on tangents I can no longer follow.

After killing Captain America two-plus years ago, he was replaced by his World War II partner, Bucky Barnes. Superheroes return from death all the time, but this one felt different: an heir apparent with a new attitude, myriad new plotlines and a supremely underrated supporting cast made the new Cap a can't-miss read.

Bucky's history since the war had years of storytelling potential, but Marvel pissed it away for Captain America: Reborn, which asserts Captain America didn't die, but became unstuck in time. No, they didn't drop Billy Pilgrim under the mask. They just took a noirish, street-level book and crossbred it with Lost. Maybe they'll keep two Captain Americas around after this plot-by-numbers story ends. The fresh one they shoved off the stage for the status quo worked just fine.

Then there's Batman and Robin - with longtime Robin Dick Grayson now in the Bat-suit and possible Bruce Wayne heir Damian as Robin (long story). After a first arc with uber-collaborator Frank Quitely, Grant Morrison's stellar writing gets bogged down in awful art. A great story can survive weak art, but Morrison struggles without a better foil (great art, of course, cannot hoist a weak story). Another problematic plot point to come: Bruce Wayne isn't dead but has been (ahem) .... lost in time.

After years of build-up, DC finally unleashed Blackest Night, a major plotline about the dark forces of the universe seeking vengeance on the light (aka the Green Lantern Corps, which maintains it quality despite the trainwreck of an event book it's inexorably tied to).

They swore it wouldn't devolve into another zombie story. Yet almost everything tied into it features the same plot - hero confronted by dead allies/loved ones/villains, they run, they try to reason with the zombies ... er, Black Lanterns, then come up with a last-ditch method to defeat them. The Green Lantern books had been among my favorite for the past few years - and Sinestro Corps War revealed how to handle a compact crossover. This one has spiralled out of control, what surprises that still remain have been dampened

So for weekly comics, count me out. Aside from the always-stellar Astro City, which combines 1960s comic innocence with modern flair, and the occasional work from Alan Moore, Morrison (not if it features Phillip Tan art, though) and Neil Gaiman, I'm ready to give up the comics ghost.

What scares me is how close this parallels my departure from the hobby in the 1990s. Collectible covers and variant issues ruled the roost, idiotic plotlines overtook my favorite books, Spiderman had been a clone for the past 20 years and Green Lantern became a mass-murdering despot.

Change a few names, and oh so little has actually changed.

Money Matters, But Not If You're Rich

You might have caught the middle-finger victory dance unleashed by Titans owner Bud Adams following an interception on Sunday. It's quite amusing and excessive, but what else would you expect from a quirky Texas billionaire without his six-shooters in easy reach? If the Rich Texan from the Simpsons had a real-world parallel, Adams wouldn't be far off. I even imagined him shouting "Yee haw" as the Titans turned the interception into seven points.

Now, reaction to the NFL's fine of $250,000 for the bird-waving has struck fans as extreme. I instead leaned back on my father's common refrain - "That's akin to fining me a dollar." Granted, he usually uses it whenever the newsrags gush about an athlete or actor giving a donation to their alma mater, but it applies with Adams as well. From the cheap seats, it seems like a large fine.

I stopped using the bird years ago - best not to give bad drives with gun racks an excuse - but an obscene gesture on a roadway might cost me a few hundred dollars (I'm purely guessing here, but Metro cops pull over people for far less). That hurts me far more than the bigger fine impacts the team owner with a 10-figure bank account.

It isn't as if that penalty is going to kill the Adams fortune. He writes the check and goes on with his life, and we can only hope the slap on the wrist doesn't embolden him - next week the Titans play Houston, and I don't want to know how Adams would react to the team now playing in the town he spurned. I wouldn't be surprised if he flashed them.

We forget that athletes and the wealthy don't subscribe to the same rules as us commoners. Personally, I long for the day when we can say, "Remember if you see any celebrities, consider them dangerous" (thanks to Kent Brockman for that).

Because I Won't Comment on the Cleveland Actas .... er, Indians

The return of an aging superstar to the second-tier American League club might usually elicit nothing but yawns, but this one earns a pass.

Thanks to Upper Deck, Ken Griffey Jr. has been the face of baseball for more than 20 years. Other players have evolved into all-time greats, but even as he approaches 40, I can't help but think of the bright-eyed teen on the first card in Upper Deck's inaugural set. Pulling that treasure from one of the first foil packs I bought was easily the highlight of my baseball card-collecting days. His father had a solid major league career, but placing a prospect who had yet to play an inning of major-league ball in such a position was a risk. Griffey Jr., of course, delivered on that risk.

Reds' fans possess less nostalgia for Griffey, who fare much worse during his second decade in the game. He never reemerged as the intimidating slugger, often injuring himself in attempts to make plays. The euphoria that those fans expressed at Griffey's signing (some people thought he would lead to World Series triumph) ended with a shrug, since the Reds had not challenged for a playoff spot for most of the decade. Unfortunately, Griffey injured his hamstring, and it plagued him ever since.

His return to Seattle felt right; Griffey had his best days there, and where better to close out his career than where he essentially saved baseball (only with a playoff appearance in the mid-1990s did Seattle baseball finally earn a following).

While his decline is stunningly apparent - the Kid only hit .214 last year, with 14 homers - his importance to baseball is not. Griffey Jr. was supposed to be the guy to break the homerun marks of Roger Maris and Hank Aaron, not the wave of muscle-bound sluggers who would overshadow Griffey during the steroid era. Few ever suspected him, and his mercurial rise in the 1990s and steady decline do not point to the juice.

Plus, his physique and hat size look about the same.

He might only unleash that fluid swing to an occasional highlight these days, somehow, I feel better for baseball knowing he will still get a few at-bats in 2010. When he goes, so does that last childhood link to a sport of haves and have-nots and mercenary ballplayers.

Catching Up Vol. 5: Random Ramblings

Rather than trot out a bunch of filler, here are a few scraps of fall that I couldn't throw away.

Walt moves over for Headless Ted
Fact: Walt Disney was cremated, and does not frozen awaiting revival in the distant future. Fact: I wish Ted Williams' family cremated him so his embarrassing saga could have ended. I can't remember the last time a final resting place drew so much attention then revulsion, but the sad saga of post-mortem Ted Williams got uglier this year.

The short version: Skipping a funeral, Williams' unscrupulous son, the late John-Henry, flew the baseball legend's body to an Arizona cryogenics facility, where the son would later be interred as well. Seven years later, allegations about abuse of the Red Sox great's head knocked him back into the headlines. I won't repeat those horrific tales of corpse abuse here, because I prefer to hold onto the last public memory of Williams - being mobbed by players on the 1999 All-Star team, where rejected all bureaucratic attempts to get them to clear the field. That spontaneous remembrance of baseball's rich history beats a head in a metal box any day.

Skipping American Government 101
The House bill is a gesture, and will looking nothing like the completed version. How many times did the Republican-led Congress from earlier this decade pass bills overturning the restrictions on drilling in the Arctic? How much new drilling has begun? Unless the Senate acts in kind, the House accomplishes nothing. This is Civics 101, yet people go ignorant.

Pieces from the House bill will survive; the public option probably won't. The problem of a Democratic majority is it relies on moderate and conservative Democrats, many of whom won't go along with any step toward a single-payer system. Every votes counts there, unlike the shepherding common in the House.

Beating down the once-beloved Browns
For 10 years, football-loving people largely looked away from the Browns, chalking them up as blandly mediocre to downright awful. But as bad as it looked in 2008, the Browns have transcended all previous ceilings for awful football. The secretive, arrogant Eric Mangini enters, and suddenly the team transforms into an epic trainwreck, with Mangini and owner Randy Lerner each vying to play Casey Jones. It's so painful to watch the team of my youth, which too often had great seasons winnow down to heartbreak, collapse into this wretched mess.

But like everyone else, I cannot avert my eyes. Watching his puffy coach act like he's the smartest guy in the room when he clearly knows little about the game has proven more entertaining the football his lackluster team produces.

Catching Up Vol. 4: Welcome to Inglewood

Moving in is hard to do, but live among the boxes is just good enough.

For roughly a week, the commute has changed, and I have been getting settled in my new neighborhood. The quiet has been borderline deafening - the television goes nowhere near as loud now that it no longer competes with busy 51st Avenue South and I-40. Opening the door to eight lanes of highway every morning did nothing to improve my tinnitus. I can hear the wildlife again, and don't need a calculate to figure out the number of passing cars.

It was necessary to close that chapter of my Nashville years. I endured too many cold winters and blistering summers to stay another. After giving notice, finding an apartment on Craig's List and leaving Columbus in three short weeks, I finally uprooted from Nashville's West Side, trading it for a side-by-side duplex on the east side enclave of Inglewood.

While the commercial corridor of Gallatin Pike needs a loving hand (the closest restaurants and only ones within a mile are Sonic and Church's Chicken), there are pockets of commercial development, including a little swath of restaurants buried in the neighborhood and only a short bike ride away.

The change of scenery will help, but moving had a much more practical backdrop: I need to be on a lease to make tough decisions. I spent four years in an ugly roommate situation, and it only took a year back on a lease for me to leave Columbus, which remains in play if I depart Nashville.

But fear not, dear friends; for now, my only concern is getting this apartment looking right for a little Sunday afternoon housewarming.

I bought little of consequence for the Delaware Avenue place, and jury-rigged spaces for my surging record collection, my beer-making gear and other new hobbies. Rather than buy more storage, I found that Trapiche Broquel's wooden boxes perfectly fit 12-inch LPs. I still have to add a bathroom shelf for all those little wares that need a home, but home has mostly been established, despite me only spending a few hours a week there. Between jobs and gym hours, I barely do anything there besides read, sleep or fend off a cat made surlier by another move and long, lonely days.

The changes are immediate at the old place, of which I have cleared the final hurdle - the landlord returned my deposit, and I returned it to the bank.

I stopped by the mailbox to check for any lingerers and while finding no mail, I noticed an odd contraption on the front porch: the ancient furnace which spat out blazing heat in a 10-foot radius and had no further influence on the apartment's temperature.

On the coldest nights, I slept on the couch. Whoever lands there next might still face stunningly cold winter mornings - built in 1910, the place has no insulation -but they'll go without that metal hulk and its teasing heat. My new heater might not radiate any greater warmth, but at worst, it's only for a single winter.