From sync@caliban.Corp.Sun.COM Tue Jun 23 13:58:08 1992
To: nomadness@caliban.Corp.Sun.COM
From: wordy@lorien.qualcomm.com
Subject: Notes from the Bikelab -- #18
Status: RO

--------------------------
NOTES FROM THE BIKELAB
Issue #18 -- 6/23/92
by Steven K. Roberts
near Syracuse, NY
(42 57 31 N 76 5 45 W) 
--------------------------

Copyright (c) 1992 by Steven K. Roberts.  All Rights Reserved.  
(Intact reposting and free distribution are OK with permission; 
personal forwarding is OK without.)

IN THIS ISSUE:

	Adirondack kayak adventure
	The LEVIATHAN Project
	The Great Capacitor Query

"I'm not hungry; I just want it all."
	-- Christina Boyko, in unconscious parody of my life,
	ordering a "lumberjack breakfast" in Old Forge, NY



Late.  Dark.  Loons echo otherworldly laughter from afar, their 
voices following countless acoustic paths to arrive at my ear as 
if from the depths of space, their real distance impossible to 
determine.  The moon, almost full, filters through deep woods...
little patches of it in constant flickering motion, adding 
unsteadiness to our walk.  The mirror-calm waters of Fourth 
Lake in the Fulton Chain reflect distant shorelight, starlight, 
moonlight, and the subtle glow of a solitary cloud, all perfect in 
concert like the visual equivalent of a distant impressionist 
nocturne.  Claire de Loon...

Every overused romantic cliche of idyllic Night was created for 
this moment.

Christina and I pick our way through the trees to black water, 
and quietly slip into our kayaks -- the sensation more one of 
"putting on" rather than "climbing aboard" the tiny boats.  We 
adjust to a new reality:  afloat in tight personal craft responsive 
to our very breath, legs disappearing below deck, feet on 
rudder pedals, hands gripping cold fiberglass paddles, rumps a 
few inches below waterline.  Almost silently, with only the 
swish and drip of paddles to reveal our movement, the dock 
falls away.

Surreptitiously we glide into the lake, into the darkness, into 
the exhiliration of adrenalin-intensified NIGHT.  My bow wave 
is a steady vee; paddles flash white in the moonlight, rhythmic, 
my hands cranking smoothly like pedaling feet, the 80-degree 
rotation of the feathered shaft already automatic, satisfaction 
in the silence of efficient motion.  Aimless yet swift, we 
disappear onto the dark watertop, drifting in parallel like twin 
spacecraft, silent, vigilant, coldly alive and alert in the 
impossible vastness of infinity.  Our trajectories merge slowly, 
trimmed by microinches of pedal movement.

I look over at shadowy Christina, a blonde ninja of the night 
gliding beside me in beautiful deadly silence, her subtle wake a 
phosphor line barely visible yet somehow unmistakable.  I 
murmur sweetness and she laughs softly, the sound amplified 
by solitude.  "This is huge," she quips, deliberately ambiguous.  
Our craft collide gently and we lay paddles across each others 
gunwhales to merge them... drifting as one, slowing.  Jupiter is 
brilliant.  Atop the dark cold Adirondack water at 2 AM, our 
humanity is a precious shared event of the here and now, the 
online world of computerized frenzy far from our thoughts.

The boats tip as we lean together and kiss -- lips soft and 
yielding in the depths of deep space.  Sweet.  Moonlight in eyes, 
a smile, Grand Marnier on our breath, the night perfect.  With a 
giggle we push the boats apart and sprint away, circling and 
drifting, playing commando kayaker, bumping in the night, 
dancing with moonbeams, hiding in the deep shadows of shore, 
frolicking in the water like dolphins until the night grows cold 
and cabin lights beckon...

                        * * *

The next day.  Oh my.  I could base a lifestyle on this, I observe 
to myself as sun-warmed shoulders bend once again to their 
rhythmic task, the miles passing easily, the day sparkling 
within and without.  (The last time I made that prophetic 
lifestyle comment was in the spring of 1983, while pedaling 
Robby McCormick's strange recumbent bicycle along Ohio farm 
roads and dreaming of nomadic possibilities...)

Perfect, perfect.  The word keeps dropping into conversation as 
it does on summer afternoons in the Rockies.  Slipping along 
wooded shores, at one with the water, the wind light and 
pleasant.  Gliding through narrow inlets and creeks, prowling 
coves,  whispering through crops of milfoil and arrowhead, 
nudging aside the yellow buds of waterlilies, pointing out deer 
on shore, startling the occasional quacking couple with its busy 
flotilla of downy yellow-brown ducklings.  The muscles of my 
arms and back growing into a new role, their soreness 
strangely pleasant; learning the rhythms of power and the 
behavior of the tiny craft, smiling when a maneuver drops me 
perfectly alongside my friend to share a beer -- or lands me 
with a whispering bump on precisely the intended spot.  

The highlight of this day (actually, a meta-highlight, given that 
the day itself is one) is the bog on Third Lake.  "Marsh," I 
thoughtlessly label it, unmoved, muscling back toward open 
water after a quick pass through a tree-lined cove.  "No, no, 
wait," Christina calls, "I want to check this out."  Reluctantly, I 
steer hard to the right and come about for a quick pass... and 
find myself suddenly in another world.

Covering many acres, this is a perfect specimen of a quaking 
bog -- a floating ecosystem of cranberries, lichens, sphagnum 
moss, cattails, orchids, redwing blackbirds, and carnivorous 
pitcher and sundew plants.  Awestruck, we creep softly into a 
long crack barely wide enough for the kayaks, pulling up next 
to a beaver house of stacked driftwood.  We climb gingerly out 
of the boats -- I onto a small island, Christina onto the larger 
mass... and it's fluid!  She bounces up and down, and over a 
hundred square feet of surface rocks with her; I try the same 
trick and my island sinks slightly, covering my ankles... then it 
calves, drifting a foot or so away from the mainland.  I pull 
back with the paddle, feeling oddly like a penguin on an ice 
floe.  My friend is ecstatic:  as a biology major who escaped 
school at every opportunity to explore one of these rare bogs 
near her alma mater, she alternates between gasping with 
delight at the botanical wonders around us and educating me in 
the remarkable details of their interaction.

So how many years has this been growing?  Did it begin with a 
windblown scrap of sphagnum or a bird-dropped DNA 
ambassador from afar?  I glance with dread across the lake to 
well-manicured lawns and moored powerboats, and suffer a 
wave of sadness... this wondrous micro-world may one day be 
developed into oblivion as have so many of its diverse 
brethren.  But for now it is a timeless wonder, a living 
laboratory, a showcase of natural magic.  

We return to the water, somehow changed.  An idea, already 
germinated, is beginning to take root.


The LEVIATHAN Project
-------------------------

It started years ago, resurfacing now and again in differing 
forms like the old long-distance bicycling fantasy that began in 
my childhood and culminated with this 9-year nomadic 
adventure.  I remember it still:  trapped in my Air Force dorm 
room, collecting a file cabinet full of travel literature from 
around the world; daydreaming over maps in the midst of the 
floundering Cybertronics epoch in Louisville; going for an 
afternoon bike ride in Ohio and feeling the pull... to keep 
going... to never turn back.

It's like that now, but with water.

Remember my adventure last summer -- BEHEMOTH's 
"shakedown" cruise from Illinois up through Wisconsin with 
my friend Susan?  I didn't speak of this at the time because it 
seemed as heresy:  taking the maiden voyage aboard the 
culmination of a 3-year development effort, still months away 
from completion, yet having fantasies of the next machine.  
What would my readers say, after waiting patiently for me to 
get the hell out of the lab and start putting some of this 
technology to use?   I kept silent, suppressing my aquatic urges 
in print... but my journal reveals how it really felt:

                        * * *

The trip took on a dreamlike quality as we pedaled slowly 
north along the Wisconsin shore -- through Sheboygan and 
Manitowoc, then across the root of Door County to Green Bay 
and up into Michigan's Upper Peninsula.  As we traveled, I felt 
a change overtake me:  Lake Michigan was reminding me of 
something... something that gripped me with increasing 
tenacity as we made our way north with the water to our 
right... endlessly sparkling, tempting, teasing.  Sometimes we 
would go play in it or lie beside it, camp on its shores, inhale its 
vapors.  We ate fresh perch from it, frolicked about its surface 
on a friend's Jet-Ski, and listened to it at night.  We gazed 
across it at sunset and felt its cold roar in a storm.  Always the 
water...

I looked critically at my atlas.  The convoluted line reflecting 
years of travel gravitates to water whenever possible -- is it 
because that's where it's flattest?  Prettiest?  Most placid and 
relaxing?  Most culturally diverse?  Often, along coasts (or even 
rivers), the traffic in RVs and vacationers is far worse than 
only a few miles inland... yet always I return, braving the 
motorized madness for the pleasure of being near open water.  
And somewhere in the back of my mind is the recurring dream 
of taking it further, of crossing that shoreline at last and 
returning to the sea.  Think of it:   no broken glass, no hills, no 
drunk rednecks screaming at me to Get the F*** Off the Road, 
no relentless 50-mile stretches of teeth-clattering shattered 
asphalt...

There along the Wisconsin shore, an idea began to take form -- 
one that is rapidly developing into what may become the next 
machine... LEVIATHAN, successor to BEHEMOTH, coalescing 
from the vapors of fantasy.  (This may seem surprising, since 
BEHEMOTH is just lifting off the launch pad, but the whole 
process of achieving true nomadness is evolutionary and major 
projects like this take years of planning and development 
effort.  Might as well start now.)

Pedaling along at a steady 9 mph, I'd watch the water and 
imagine the machine:  a sleek vessel of 20 feet or so, equipped 
with a recumbent drivetrain in addition to paddles and a pair 
of deployable outriggers for stability when under sail.  All 
horizontal surfaces would be covered with solar panels for 
propulsion and electronic systems, of course, with breaks here 
and there for antennas and hatches.  It would be efficient and 
sleek, completely waterproof, with a sealed Mac screen in front 
of the cockpit and a fully embedded control system to manage 
security, power, data collection, navigation, and 
communications.

But water alone isn't enough, I realized.  My database of over 
5,000 contacts contains few who live right on the water, and I 
would quickly grow frustrated with the logistical problems of 
finding trailers, or worse, having to leave my valuable machine 
behind while finding my way to someone's house for the night.  
A folding bicycle stashed below deck?  Hey... why not turn 
LEVIATHAN into a bicycle trailer for use on land?  I could 
reach some river town or seaport, haul the machine out of the 
water, strap on a folding carriage with 20" bicycle wheels, 
unfold a custom recumbent bicycle, link them with a hitch, and 
pedal off... hauling it all behind me as I do now, but no longer 
fully dependent upon the whole decaying and overloaded 
network of roads.  Hmmm....

The idea continued to develop, so rapidly it was startling.  The 
excitement was reminiscent of the frenzy that launched the 
Winnebiko project back in 1983 -- an obsessive fantasy that 
grew within hours to a design specification.  I struggled to keep 
my mind on BEHEMOTH, still months away from completion 
and only a few hundred miles into its maiden voyage... but the 
water, the water... the allure was relentless.  Out in the lake, 
little coves beckoned.  Far away, the thin line of Door County 
nestled on the hazy horizon; I fingered my push-to-talk and 
raised the 2-meter repeater at Sturgeon Bay and realized that I 
could just aim myself east from Oconto and pedal there.  My 
thoughts soared beyond... through the Great Lakes, up the St. 
Lawrence, around the Atlantic Provinces, down the intracoastal 
waterway, around Key West, through the Gulf, up the 
Mississippi... enough water to keep me amused for years, with 
land-based interludes to keep it interesting -- then a pedaling 
portage over to the Pacific Northwest and another whole world 
of aquatic wonders to explore... and then the canal network of 
Europe, Japan's west coast, Australia...

It was dizzying.  Should LEVIATHAN go into trailer mode, or 
become a wheeled vehicle itself whenever venturing onto 
shore, taking advantage of the same drivetrain and familiar 
operating position?  Should I incorporate the design constraints 
of Kinetic Sculpture and make it work on sand and mud as 
well?  I grappled with engineering issues -- stress distribution, 
waterproofing, streamlining, computer architecture, 
communications resources -- recalling in a rush that Spring 
night in Ohio long ago when the Idea first struck, sitting by a 
campfire at a friend's party, gazing into the flames while 
assembling my first Winnebiko from the stuff of firelight and 
imagination. 

                        * * *

Nearly a year has passed since then -- taking me back to the 
lab at Sun to finish what I could before moving to the road full-
time in the mothership.  I write now from Jean Polly's house 
near Syracuse, where I've spent a couple of weeks writing, 
catching up on biz, borrowing her Adirondack cabin for the 
kayaking adventure, and working on the LEVIATHAN project.  
It received a major boost when Christina turned me on to sea 
kayaking last week, and we're off next week to explore the 
coast of Maine.  The technomads alias has been hopping with 
outpourings from a couple dozen fertile brains, helping me 
home in on a real design spec for this new machine.  (It is a 
fascinating process, working on a creative project via the 
network.  Karl Fox of Morningstar Technologies commented:  
"It's fun, but it feels really weird, working with a bunch of 
obviously bright, experienced, but very different people, most 
of whom I've never met, 'inventing' some weird device I may 
never even see...")

The idea has now evolved to the point where the basic 
geometry is a large sea kayak or baidarka, with deployable 
outriggers for solar and sail power, convertible into a trailer 
that can be pulled behind a folding bicycle.  There is still 
extensive discussion of whether the leg power from an on-
board recument drivetrain is worth the additional wind 
loading, weight, and instability... and we are juggling countless 
other trade-offs in outrigger design, electrical propulsion, hull 
geometry, modularity, conversion to road mode, and so on.  
The electronic systems will be those that are "mission-critical," 
comprising a much lighter and more agile subset of those 
aboard BEHEMOTH yet still providing data communication, ham 
radio, computing power, security, entertainment, and more.

I'll keep you posted as this develops... if LEVIATHAN makes it 
past the fantasy stage, it will be a remarkable system indeed.  
And if the past is any guide, it will probably not look anything 
like what I just told you.  ;-) 


The Great Capacitor Query
---------------------------

You may recall that in bikelab report #17 I posted a question:  
characterizing myself as a AC-coupled system with a big input 
capacitor, I wondered aloud how people without that capacitor 
manage to stay stimulated without living a life of constant 
change.  I expected, and received, some very interesting 
responses.

----------

Franklin Davis of Thinking Machines in Boston writes:

I think it's a matter of signal-to-noise ratio.  What you, with 
your extraordinary level of inputs, see as "the same inputs" is 
in fact a rich, complex, ever-varying life.  My one-year-old 
daughter is different every day.  My conversations (with "the 
same old" people) progress to new areas and deeper levels, in 
cycles and waves that are not monotonic in any regard.  My 
work presents challenges that span years of personal growth, 
as I try to learn how to "manage" which means being a teacher, 
coach, friend, leader, follower, and I have no idea what else. 

It's like the idea of a city person being bored by the woods, 
because "there's nothing to do." "What??" I ask; "Look at the 
bugs around your feet; the majesty of the forest's fabric, as you 
can see new growth competing with old in a decades-long joust.  
Did you hear that whipoorwill--listen, again!"  And if you come 
back tomorrow or next year it will all be different, even though 
it's "the same."

Sure, I long for the road--that's one reason I love reading your 
missives.  I don't have enough time to travel anymore given 
the choices I've made, but then if I were traveling I'd have 
given up the richness I'm building at home.  It's all about this 
kind of balance, though--I chose to work 80% this year so I 
could spend one whole day a week with my baby.  Now I don't 
feel I have enough time at work; but I never have enough time 
with Juliet, so it's the right balance.

Do you remember the movie "My Dinner with Andre"?  Same 
issues.  Andre is roaming the world collecting <pang>s and wild 
experiences.  Wally likes to have his electric blanket to keep 
him warm so he sleeps well, and the newspaper on the 
doorstep in the morning to read with his coffee.  I saw this on 
my way out of college and thought Wally was incredibly 
boring.  A year later I saw it again and realized that Andre was 
pretty desperate in some ways, and Wally really had some 
inner peace, despite being a nerd.  As you know, there's no 
"right" answer. 

----------

Raul Deluth Miller-Rockwell at the University of Maryland 
writes:

I dunno if I qualify as "without that capacitor". I don't know if 
anyone does. But, you should already know that you can pump 
charge back the other direction...

Really, all you have to do is be alert to see things you've not 
seen before. Even if you've seen the scene a thousand times 
already. It takes a little effort, if you're tired, or whatever, but 
only to get started.

Plus there's other people, and the net [of course] which can eat 
up hours, days, months, and years making it seem like no time 
at all. 

But, speaking of habits, how sure are you that you're not 
travelling _because_ of habit?  It seems to me that if I 
travelled that much I'd be wanting the comfort of shifting 
scenery. :-) 

----------

Phil Marcelis writes:

I have only a very small capacitor -- I maintain the AC-
coupling by moving the furniture around every 2 or 3 months.  
(I'm getting better, though... or worse, depending on how you 
look at it.  I used to have to actually pack everything up into 
boxes and move everything to someplace greater than 5 miles 
away, every 4 or 5 months.)

----------

and Courtney Duncan of NASA's Jet Propulsion Labs writes:

Your coupling to life through a capacitor made me realize (and 
several recent personal journal entries could confirm this) that 
I'm coupled with an inductor.  The more change, the worse.  
Then I realized (abusing the metaphor worse and worse) that 
you and I, in series, could be a bandpass filter, or in parallel, 
bandstop, and began wondering what the frequency would be.  
I then realized that this was all wrong, your own words 
indicate inductance in your life too, it's just small and 
overwhelmed by the capacitance.  You operate at a fairly high 
frequency, and a moderate Q.  I operate at a much lower 
frequency and higher Q.

And, Ya gotta do what ya gotta do...

I dislike travel, but long for it at the same time.  Everytime I go 
someplace, I realize I will never be able to know that place in 
any great depth.  I've lived in the same rent house for five 
years, and I was sitting out in the backyard the other day and 
had the simultaneous feelings of newness and unfamiliarity 
with the place I'd been so long and a sort of despair that I 
would never really fit in, be a part of it at an earthy level.  
Gave up that opportunity when I moved the first time... 

There are ways to keep changing without changing geography.  
Shoot, after all this time, I've just done two mountain biking 
rides -- a brand new thing in a very old place.  I've looked at 
those mountain trails for five years thinking I'd eventually get 
out on them somehow, and now I am.  I wouldn't admit it right 
now (right now, I think I've just started a lifetime of weekend 
exploration of nearby mountains) but sometime in the next 6 to 
60 months, the glitter will wear off and I'll go do something 
else new.  

At some level of consciousness, we each decide what is really 
important, then our opportunities and courage are the only 
limitations for doing it.  And, we pay the price for our course.  I 
think our courage levels, you and I, are about the same, I think 
your level of comittment and decision about your goal is 
greater than mine, at least more easily stated.  The limitations 
are about the same, the choice of course is radically different.  
The price is about the same but is exacted in a different way. 

I'm rambling here when all I really wanted to say was this: 

Just because my geography is the same, and my family 
structure is the same does not mean that I'm being stimulated 
by the same inputs year after year.  What you speak of would 
and does kill off the fire of life in people.  Take a broader view 
and you will find that your habits, habits of change and 
newness, are comfortable to you, things that you don't want to 
break anymore than I want to upset mine.  The cost of change 
from the routine, yours or mine, is high.  

                        * * *

In short, what I've just been told in four different ways by four 
very different people is that physical movement should not be 
construed as the only kind of nomadness, that perfectly rich 
and satisfying lives can be had in the same place.  

This is good to know, since I probably won't be traveling 
forever....

                        * * *

Media update:  As I predicted at the end of bikelab-17, I
got the news of the Donahue air date shortly after irrevocably
shipping the piece.  In the "live markets," the 1-hour show
about BEHEMOTH will air on July 23; it will be followed during
the next 2-3 days elsewhere.

I'm ending a two-week layover near Syracuse today and 
heading for Peterborough, the coast of Maine, Boston, Hartford, 
Piermont, Frederick (MD), and points west, possibly via Austin, 
with Colorado and Utah in late July and Washington State in 
August.  Cheers from the road!

   Steve




---------

Steven K. Roberts, N4RVE           wordy@lorien.qualcomm.com 
NOMADIC RESEARCH LABS

According to the OmniTRACS satellite terminal, I am at:

X-Position: 42 57 31 N 76 5 45 W 
X-Nearest-City: 7 miles SSE of Syracuse, NY
X-Nearest-Town: 7 miles WSW of Manlius, NY



