Timothy King – Page 18 – Mechanical Sympathy

Instructional Leadership: the comeback

Our new admin just arranged our first head’s retreat. As a forum for clarifying what the department heads in the school want, I’d call it a resounding success. Toward the end of the day we had a small group discussion on instructional leadership. The idea was to define it and clarify what we need to do it.

I’ve had a long and complicated relationship with leadership and leaders. Much of my time in air cadets as a teen was spent studying leadership techniques. My experiences there suggest I’m an atypical team member. At one point we were playing a massive capture the flag game in the woods at Camp Borden. My Flight Sergeant picked out myself and a few other NCOs. We were told to locate the flag and harass the enemy, that’s it. The vast majority of our flight were younger cadets in their first exercise. The Flight Sergeant kept them all with him and they moved in a large group (like locusts), capturing everyone they saw by sheer force of numbers.

I eventually found the flag after working loosely with the other rangers, but mainly on my own. I had someone relay back to the large group where the flag was and we ended up winning with this very unorthodox approach. The other team did what was normally done – everyone had similar jobs in squads. Afterwards my Flight Sergeant said, “I knew if I kept the keeners in the big group they wouldn’t enjoy it, so I set you all loose and looked after the young ones.”

That lesson in differentiating how you lead has always stuck with me, but my focus when leadership lands on me (I seldom go seeking it) goes beyond catering to helplessness. I want self determination and personal empowerment in my team, and I expect team members to acknowledge that empowerment with engagement. I don’t want them to ever feel like they are being dictated to, or are being forced to accept ideas that run contrary to their own best practices. The leadership structure should exist to empower and encourage self determination in the professionals it manages.

It’s a tough, results orientated job (like pro baseball),
and you’ve got to find ways to handle the pressure.
Leading people who do this everyday is a challenge.
Talking down to them doesn’t work.

Of course, this assumes that you’re dealing with professionals. If you’ve got teachers who aren’t willing or able to be competent professionals then I would be looking to teacher training and board hiring practices to weed them, not detuning the entire educational leadership apparatus to cater to a tiny percentage of incompetents.

In discussing leadership with other department heads at my school I was struck with just how different their idea of leadership is from my own. I not only step lightly around teachers who don’t like or need to be told what to think, but I also expect competence when it comes to internal communication. After saying this I was told by another head (in front of many others) that my department has terrible communication. She said we need to have many meetings where I drill home information, but I should also present it in a way that makes them accept it. My job isn’t just to inform, it’s to indoctrinate.

Absolutist thinking feels lazy to me, the result of trying to
look for an easy way out of a complex situation.

I couldn’t imagine criticizing another leader like this, let alone in front of a large number of colleagues. I became angry at her ignorant and callous disregard for my place in this group, so I walked away rather than firing back. That someone would have this approach to management in my building makes me uneasy (it also explains why the iconoclastic tech teachers in my department would take great pleasure in telling her exactly what she wouldn’t want to hear just to make her angry). It took me a few days to realize that those comments say much more about her approach to management than it does about the colleagues I speak for at heads.

I was having Costanza moments after this altercation.

Instead of not being able to think of something

I tend to be overly vicious in my comebacks.

Walking away is a learned response.

In my mind a micro manager is the worst kind of leader. They constantly interfere and demand consistency with inane details rather than focusing on a goal; they want conformity to process rather than results orientated flexibility. Some people need that kind of micromanagement but I’m not interested in managing them, or being one, or having much to do with that process. If you want to alienate the most capable people in your organization, this is a great way to do it.

Another head who had overheard all of this had a chat with me and went back with this idea, “leaders should also include outliers who question and prompt revision in leadership practices.” The head with whom I seem diametrically opposed thought this a ridiculous idea. Leadership is about forcing compliance. Meetings are about beating down resistance and creating that compliance. Ever hear teachers complain about meetings and wonder why they are so negative about them? I don’t, anymore.

True Colors helps clarify your social approach to leadership.
I’m a strong green/bit of blue – I’ve got no sense of gold…

There are many different types of leaders all with their own strengths and weaknesses. My thing is exploring the edges, and I look for highly capable people to share that project with. If experimentation with pedagogy or learning tools is your thing, then I’m your department head. It’s why technological change and the social upheaval it causes interest me.

My ideal department is staffed with people who need me to support them without constantly questioning them as they improve the state of the art of teaching. Put me in an administrative role where I’m supposed to enforce conformity and I’m a disaster. If that’s what we’re looking for in instructional leadership, I’m ready to step down immediately. You’re also going to find it difficult to get me into lockstep with everyone around me whether I’m a leader or a follower.

Consensus building is something that I’m terrible at but greatly admire. Those leaders who can create a sense of direction in a group without alienating anyone are magic. Whereas I get passionately angry about the asinine people I’m supposed to direct, these patient consensus builders are able to gently take them in hand and find a way through to them. I can appreciate the efficiency they bring to group work and admire them for a skill I lack.

The bureaucratic pencil pusher who holds the-way-it’s-always-been as sacred is the antithesis of everything I consider important, but those people play a vital role in creating consistency and order in an organization. As leaders I can’t really see the value in them, but I’m sure a consensus builder somewhere could help me with that.

A good bit of reflection here, I think. I’m no longer angry about the altercation we had and I’m trying to see the value of diverse voices in leadership positions. If the goal is all of us in lockstep as we produce the same narrow goals in the same way then I’m in the wrong place. I only hope that people higher up the org-chart recognize the value of diversification in instructional leadership or, as an outlier, I’m in real trouble.

Emergency Memo: Post Peak, Nov 2014

GRAND RIVER DSB – EMERGENCY MEMO – Mon, Nov 3rd, 2014

NOTE: This memo is being sent to all staff within the board. Following the upheaval and violence over the summer, and the Federal Government applying the War Measures act on a national scale in August, the combined RCMP/Police/Military presence has restored some order. Fuel is being rationed by the Federal Government and the Provincial Government are being asked to enact emergency measures to normalize the situation and reduce chances of mass starvation and freezing as winter approaches. One of the key aspects of the plan is to normalize and enable basic rights, including the right to education. What follows is GRDSB’s plan…

The sudden, sharp rise in fossil fuel prices (here for information) have forced our board to make some dramatic policy revisions in order to match the new emergency management plan recently presented by the Ministry of Education, Province of Ontario.

A typical school bus run now costs approximately $550 in fuel costs alone, and is expected to become even more expensive, making this option economically untenable. With the various unions, we have tried to maintain the collegial relationship of previous collective bargaining agreements while working to create a sustainable public education system in our province. These changes are brought on by world-wide resource issues beyond our control, and we have to modify our approach to education in order to continue maintaining a sufficient level of service. The followings steps will ensure this:

TEACHERS

1) Teachers are still required to attend the nearest school to them, preferably without the use of petrochemicals. Those schools with a sufficient number of local teachers will remain open while being retrofitted with sustainable energy devices. In many cases, if you can see a wind turbine or mini-hydro project being built near you, this will indicate a public school.

Note: This is a provincial and federally mandated program in order to ensure ‘energy islands’ in as many communities as possible. The lack of fossil fuels makes mega-infrastructure such as non-localized power generation unsustainable. All communities will now be responsible for generating their own power.

2) If you live out of the board area, it is suggested that you consider relocation, or contact your local board for employment opportunities. We will do everything we can with neighboring boards to ensure that teachers are able to make this transition. If you do neither, and you are no longer able to able to fulfill your contract, you will be declared surplus and released.

3) If there is no local school within walking distance of your home location you may:

a) Apply to the provincial online learning initiative. With this initiative any household with children under the age of 18 may receive free wireless high speed internet, meaning many students will take this opportunity to learn online. As an eteacher you would also qualify for sponsored high speed internet at home. You would then resume your duties by teaching remotely.

Please click HERE to contact the board elearning conversion initiative for remote students and staff.

b) Apply through our board for a provincial grant to open a learning centre. If you own or have access to a building that would provide a suitable environment for a micro-school, and there are enough local students you can consolidate your area students into this structure and initiate your own k-10 program. Since all schools are now k-10 schools, you would be in a very similar teaching environment to your colleagues. LCs will be developed where-ever a 10-1 student-teacher ratio can form.

Please click HERE to contact the board provincial liaison for learning centre creation.

4) Curriculum has been revised and the law altered to reflect our new circumstances. The old standardized tests have been removed and in their place the New Ontario Diploma now exists. This diploma follows previous standards, but offers students earlier departure (students may now graduate between 15-16 years of age) while ensuring that fundamental skills are still evident. The NOD review is highlighted on the updated Ministry curriculum page. It is a two week series of literacy, numeracy, citizenship and general knowledge assessments designed to ensure that a graduating student has sufficient skills to survive in the new, post-peak-oil economy.

Please click HERE to see the NOD initiative and the new requirements for graduation.

STUDENTS

Ontario curriculum will now be revised and the law changed to reflect our new reality. Students are legally required to be in a virtual or physical personal learning plan until the age of 16. During their 15th or 16th year, students may take the Literacy & Numeracy Review. A mark of 70% or higher in both of these reviews will grant them a NOD (New Ontario Diploma). NOD now takes the place of the OSSD.

Students who fail the NOD at the end of their 16th year are assessed and presented with a Sub-NOD rating. SNOD60 would indicate a student at 60% NOD requirements. SNOD30 would indicate a student at 30% of NOD requirements.

Young adults who have finished school at 16 may choose to return, but like ANOD students, they will be required to support their learning financially.

Following passage of the NOD, students may choose to:

1) WORK: the reduction in mechanization has put a premium on physical labour, and graduates will have no trouble making a living wage in the new economy. Jobs in agricultural and infrastructure labour are not only available but in great demand. One of the key reasons for reducing the graduation age was to fulfill this need. We can no longer afford to hold willing workers in public institutions until they are 18.

2) APPRENTICESHIP: the skilled trades have made agreements with the Ministry of Education and post secondary institutions in order to encourage and maintain high skill positions. Students may choose, after completing their NODs in their 15th or 16th years to begin an apprenticeship in any one of dozens of trades. These apprenticeships often involve moving away from home. The Ministry will continue to track and support these students until they reach journeyman status (usually in their 5th year of apprenticeship). Regular reviews will ensure students are in productive, safe, learning and working environments.

3) ANODs: students interested in pursuing academic streams may choose to complete their Advanced New Ontario Diplomas. These courses are designed to be completed by a capable student within one year. As a result, funding is only available for the 12 months following successful NOD graduation. Students taking longer will have to fund their own studies, including the costs of energy and school access.

Graduates with ANODs will be able to apply to one of the four remaining universities in the province. Entry into these institutions is very competitive. Only students who complete ANODs on time (or early) with exceptional grades should apply. Courses in post-secondary now tend to be much more applied in nature. Universities are intent on turning out doctors, engineers and teachers rather than unused undergraduate degrees. Students who do not know their major, will find access to university very limited. Students who do not have a working plan for their academic studies will also find post secondary access challenging.

The new streams are designed around an expected distribution of 60% NOD to the workplace, 30% apprenticeship and 10% ANOD graduates. The manual nature of post-oil food production and distribution alone requires this kind demographic.

SUMMARY

The Federal and Provincial mandates recognize that the era of cheap energy is over, and our society needs to adapt in order to maintain and improve our technical skills and preserve the rights found in the Constitution. Public structures such as law and education can ensure that human rights are not being violated and children still have an opportunity to become educated, effective members of our brave new world.

Children and the poor are at risk of being tyrannized as their value as manual labour has increased and the petro-chemical basis of pre-peak social justice is broken. Without a presence in every community, the weakest members of society are at risk of abuse. With this in mind, it is vital that our public education system reassert itself with the support of regionalized arms of the provincial and federal governments.

By normalizing schools and supporting local sheriffs, we hope to rebuild a safe and fair society. Drastic times call for drastic measures. Please consider being part of the solution, it’s time to let go of the past.

Stay warm as the weather is getting cold and ensure that your lodgings are able to withstand a non-chemically heated winter.

Best of luck,

Your Superintendent.

GRDSB

ps: as further information becomes available, and the board network comes back up under its own power, I will continue to email the latest.

Scripted Lives

I’ve been mulling this over on the motorcycle side of things, but the idea runs throughout modern digital life, so I’m going to open it up further here.

Being a computer technology teacher I have a passing acquaintance with software. I’d even say I’m pretty handy with it, but I don’t really like where it’s going since it has become an integrated part of modern life.

Since we started carrying networked computers around with us we have become scripted creatures. Our devices wake us up, tell us what we’re

Turing tests have computers imitating people in order to demonstrate intelligence. Ironically, it’s pretty much the opposite nowadays. Instead of bringing machines up to human intelligence, we’re watching human intelligence lower itself to a simpler standard.

doing, and how to get where we’re going. They remove doubts and make memory redundant. We no longer guess at unknown information, or watch media by accident. We live in a walled garden of playlists and information at our fingertips, surprises seldom happen. Technology gives us access to information and media, as well as allowing us to communicate, but it changes how we do it; the medium is indeed the message.
When we connect to The Network we are operating within a script, quite literally, all the time. Software scripts dictate what we see, how we see it, and how we express ourselves. Complex human relationships are being reduced to scripted simplicity dictated by technological limitations rather than the full range of human ability. This restriction has begun to redefine what people are capable of doing.

I struggle to find non-scripted moments when software isn’t dictating my responses. You’d think this only happens when you make a choice to connect on a device, but it happens constantly in the world of action. I can’t stop my car in heavy snow as quickly because a computer steps in to keep the wheels spinning, even when I’m making a conscious choice to lock them. Scripts are written for the largest possible population. We’re all being held to the outcomes of average thinking.

As Kenneth Clark states in Civilisation:
35:36: The obvious: “…our increasing reliance on machines. They have really ceased to be tools and have begun to give us directions…”

… and that was his angle on things in 1969. Things have come a long way since. Our brave new world of technology is levelling everyone off. Individual ability doesn’t matter when we are all just variables in an equation.

Students experience education, entertainment and interpersonal relationships through a digital lens whose singular intent is that of continued engagement. When your world is housed within a simplistic digital process designed to constantly get your attention you have a lot of trouble dealing with your irrelevance in the real world.

When prompted into unscripted situations where I am asking them to critically analyze a piece of media, students long for a Google search to tell them what to think. When given a opportunity to express themselves many students will leap into the same template to organize other people’s material they copy off the internet. When given a stochastic engineering problem with no clear, linear resolution they freeze up and long to return to scripted experience.

Technology is such an enabler, but it’s also limited by its capabilities. If friendship is now understood through the lens of social media then it isn’t what it once was, it’s less with more people. More isn’t necessarily better even though we’re told that it is more efficient. If communication with a student is primarily through screens then teaching isn’t what it once was, it’s more information with less learning. Both friendship and teaching pre-date digital communication and have deep, nuanced social histories, but we are happy to simplify them into oblivion for convenience and the illusion of efficiency.

If you ever find yourself struggling against invisible limitations, fighting to express yourself but finding it increasingly difficult, you’re up against this reductive technology. That freedom of choice you feel when you put aside the digital and reclaim your full range of sense and capability is intoxicating. It supercharges your mind and allows you to retain your humanity. That I see so few people having those moments is a real cause for concern.

My son and I searching the tidal pools at Pacific Rim National Park on the edge of the world. Carefully selected technology (a motorbike – so no digital distractions and out in the world) got us there, and then we put it all down and got lost in the world with no scripts telling us how to interact with it. When was the last time you were unplugged?

This was such a complicated idea it spawned a number of others, including these thoughts of gamification.
The wise Skillen of the internet also shared this article on distraction prevention by a new media professor, which led to thoughts on distraction.

Everyone Deserves Respect

Bullies are cruel, but demanding respect
from everyone is the worst kind of bullying

According to our newly created mission statement we’re supposed to be producing students who are respectful. I was advocating for responsible but respect got the nod.

Respectful students serve order. Their docility allows a system to exist beyond reproach. If students are respectful they obey authority without questioning it. Respectful students are easy to manage. Any adult in the building doesn’t have to be respectable, they are automatically entitled to it. It’s a good way to ensure that students do what they’re told while the system can do what it likes.

Misuse of respect doesn’t end in organizations, it has also crept out into society as a whole. We’re all supposed to give it to everyone all the time, but you earn respect don’t you? I’ve been told, and it’s printed on the wall of the school to be seen every time I walk in the door, that everyone deserves respect. I find this not only untrue but pathologically wrong headed.

The temptation is to go straight to serial killers and death camp commandants in proving that not everyone deserves respect, but respect isn’t easy to earn even for the mediocre. Anyone who respects mediocrity is probably simple minded, or so desperate to not offend anyone that they appear simple minded. The motivation behind respecting everyone is to not offend anyone, but in the process of putting everyone up on a pedestal, individual effort and excellence is rendered meaningless.

There is a confusion of language around the word respect. People use it to mean being civil or polite, but that isn’t what being respectful means. Being respectful arises from you holding something in high regard. Using respect as a demand instead of a recognition of excellence is manipulative, usually done by an organization that doesn’t want to be held accountable.

Respecting a person comes from you holding their thoughts and actions in high esteem. It doesn’t come from valuing everything they do because they do it Blind fandom or faith is dangerous. Any organization that enshrines respect as a demand should do some soul searching. I can respect a system that strives for respectability. I can’t respect a system that demands it… it’s disrespectful!

The idea that everyone’s opinion matters is at the root of the
vapid everyone deserves respect belief.

People toss around statements like ‘respect your elders’, perhaps this is where schools get the idea to enshrine it in their mission statements. Respecting someone because they are old strikes me as quite irrational. The eighty year old draft dodger who ran away is hardly as respectable as the twenty year old who did his duty. One of the first realizations I had as an adult was that age is a poor indicator of respectability. We demand it in children to make them manageable, but that kind of ageism is little different than racism. We should value people based upon their thoughts and deeds, not on their social status.

Everyone deserves to be treated civilly. Everyone deserves compassion, but everyone does not deserve respect. We like to enshrine it in school language in order to subjugate children into an unquestioning relationship with authority, but that isn’t particularly flattering. Teachers do not deserve respect. They deserve to be treated civilly, and compassionately, but they don’t deserve respect, no one does. I would hope that they earn it with their students, but many don’t, and then issues of classroom management arise. We might try to stamp out the individual assessment of respect, but it’s always there between people regardless of their age or job.

Respect plays an important role in how human beings interact with each other. We should all strive to be respectable and earn the admiration of our fellows, but making respect an expectation belittles us all and encourages, at best, mediocrity. When everyone is automatically assigned respect individual effort becomes pointless.

We should be aiming for more than misdirection and ease of control as educators. We should be encouraging individual excellence in our students, not hammering them all down with false demands of universal respect.

Touring Southern Vancouver Island

I just found out I get to spend a glorious weekend at the end of May in Victoria BC. I’ve been out that way before, and after the worst winter in years in Ontario I’ve already started thinking about how I’m going to spend a day in something other than a frigid deep-freeze.

Cycle BC rentals and tours offers bikes out of Victoria for a variety of uses. I immediately began fantasizing about a glorious day tour through southern Vancouver Island on two wheels. With choices of a Suzuki V-Strom 650, Kawasaki KLR-650 (which I’m already on the verge of buying) and other smaller bikes, the Vancouver Island bike choices are ideal!

The KLR would be nice, but the V-Strom is a whole other bike by a whole other manufacturer, and I’ve always been Suzuki smitten. The GSX-R 750 has been on my wish list since I was a teen. The Hayabusa has a special kind of charm (especially after sitting on it). The chance to ride a Suzi through the Pacific Northwest would be a dream come true.

After having a look over the options, I think the Port Renfrew-Cowichan Motorcycle Route is what I’m looking for. 272 kilometres of wild, North Western Pacific seaside, a winding route through the mountains and then back down the other side into Victoria again.

After such a long, cold winter, the thought of riding around Southern Vancouver Island in late spring is a glimmer of hope in the darkness.

http://www.cyclebc.ca/routes
http://www.cyclebc.ca/motorcycles

It’s booked! A BMW F800ST this Friday, pictures to follow! – May 27

Decentralizing 20th Century School IT Infrastructure

From the Prezi brainstorming digital sandbox: http://prezi.com/h7ms3hw7jx7-/mini-lab/

30:1 student to computer ratios? It’s too expensive to have a 1:1 student to computer ratio?

This is a load of nonsense. While the business world has moved on to individualized computing devices and cloud based software solutions, school boards still doggedly hang on to 20th Century thinking about centralized IT with massive, complex software images, difficult to manage intranetworks and remote maintenance of shared machines.

I’ve been on the ground, at class-level watching this fail again and again. Equipment is vandalized and left inoperable for weeks at a time because no one local bears any responsibility for it. Technicians are stretched thin between many schools, often not returning for weeks on end. The already dismal student access to technology becomes even worse.

Labs that contain over-priced, years old hardware are kept under contracted repair long after they have given up every ounce of their residual value and are little more than landfill (and a heavy weight on network efficiency). Those same labs contain the same, tedious software on the same, tedious hardware; a monotony of labs that offer nothing of the variety and opportunity available in the world beyond school.

The networks are overburdened with file sharing intranets that grind to a halt when many users begin to copy large files to network servers, or overfill limited on-site storage, causing the whole thing to simply stop. So much focus is placed on intranet software and file sharing that access to the internet itself is through a tiny bit of bandwidth, making access to the largest collection of human knowledge ever assembled jerky, slow or utterly useless.

A modern business office uses task specific equipment to enable users continuous access to their data and their colleagues. Phones are used when appropriate, but phones are never appropriate in school. Tablets and ultralight laptops serve the mobile employee, allowing them to input information and communicate as though they are in the office when thousands of miles away.

Technology in education studiously ignores the needs of the student who must travel from home to school and class to class, carrying bags of massive, out of date textbooks. Student to student communication is discouraged in most learning situations in favour of discipline and order. If students do communicate in school (and I assure you, they do), they have to do it in underhanded, devious ways that violate whatever the latest technology-banishing rules dictate.

Information Technology in school is anything but. Perhaps Lack of Information Technology would be a better title.

The mini-lab idea returns technical literacy to teachers from the star chamber of board based IT. It places local people in charge of local equipment and drastically reduces the costs of educational technology while dramatically boosting the student to digital tool ratio. Instead of the monotony of labs of out of date, inefficient, over-priced desktops, staff and students would gain access to an eclectic mix of digital tools and begin to develop meaningful digital fluency in both hardware familiarity and data management. It’s a first, small step in a diaspora away from centralized board IT and toward differentiated technology access that truly serves our teacher’s and student’s needs in the evolving datasphere.

Biker Nerd Style

While everyone else is going for the Harley Davidson leather thing, I’m looking for a bit more nerd in my biker look. I’m going with for an Imperial trooper vibe.I like the idea of white kit that gets used looking on the road. Having a white jacket and helmet will also be cooler in hot sun.

Star Wars Bike Culture!

The black and white theme can follow through to the bike too. White helmet with black trim, white jacket with black trim. White bike with black trim…

Monochrome but high visibility True North textile jacket. It’s armored
(very Trooperish), and vented so it’ll be comfortable in the heat or lined
in the cool. Wish it came in white.
That’s the helmet I want, not the one I got, though the one I got was a full face white helmet with black trim too. A modular helmet would be fantastic – the fighter pilot style is a bonus.

I’d originally thought I’d go cheap on the kit, but this is where you get yourself sorted out so that you’re comfortable and protected, at least as much as you can be on a bike. To that end, I’m looking at all the details.

I’m all about the stream lined biking boot. They protect the ankle, offer good ventilation and water proofing, and aren’t as crazy expensive as I thought they’d be.

I read another new rider in Cycle Canada who tried to go with construction boots but was frustrated by how clunky they made his footwork with gear changes. I’m looking for boots that protect while giving me a good feel for the bike.

Getting kitted out for a bike is a cautious process. It’s important to get what fits well and suits the kind of riding you’ll be doing. A bit of consistency in the colour choices and style make for a bit more of a personal statement. I might not line up with the Harley crowd, but I’ll look Imperial cool.

Zen And The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

I just finished this book. It’s the first book I’ve finished digitally, I’m more of a paper and ink reader, but I thought I’d give this a go on my phablet.

The narrative is based on a man and his son doing a cross country trip on a motorcycle in the 1970s. The story focuses on that quiet mind you experience as you make miles on two wheels. While some people’s mind wander while riding, the narrator of this hefty tome starts with an examination of the basic mechanics of motorcycle maintenance but quickly wanders into a philosophical deconstruction of Greek philosophy and its effects on Western thinking.

If you’ve got a background in philosophy it’s fairly easy to follow, if you don’t you’re probably going to be wondering what the hell is going on. Persig likes to wander into complicated philosophical arguments with little warning.

The book is full of some real gems in terms of how we approach basic mechanics as well as life in general, but it can get pretty full of itself as well.

“Is it hard?’
Not if you have the right attitude. It’s having the right attitude that’s hard.”
― Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values

To further complicate things the author is battling with his alter-ego as he recovers from electroshock therapy. No, this isn’t an easy read, though it’s worth it if you can get through it. I suspect this is a book many people have purchased but few have finished. It sure looks smart on your bookshelf though.

Last year I read Shopclass as Soulcraft, which I’d recommend as a much more accessible read if you’re interested in getting philosophical through the lens of motorbiking.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is a classic, and it has attained a kind of cult status in philosophy and motorcycle literature. I’d recommend reading Crawford before you take a run at Persig. Reading a review of Western philosophy wouldn’t hurt either.

Digital Collars

Originally published on Dusty World in April, 2014:

Wise Europeans have begun enacting legislation to protect people from the relentless onslaught of digital noise. Coincidentally, I’ve recently had a number people lamenting the digital ties that bind them. An article on how students can’t hold a conversation any more and a moody French art film on digital alienation followed:

LOST MEMORIES (French, English Subtitles) from Francois Ferracci on Vimeo.

This past weekend I had an elearning student send an email Friday afternoon and then shrilly demand, Monday morning, a response. I haven’t heard back from them yet, but I did point out they were getting a detailed response to their email the next school day. Ironically, that student has never logged in on a weekend and has frequently been weeks late handing in work, but perhaps we aren’t all held to the same standards of immediate access. That people can yank on that digital leash and demand our attention regardless of their own competence is an irritation.

Another teacher mentioned how his smartphone is spoiling his hunting. He used to get himself up into his hide and then settle down for some meditative and quiet hours communing with nature. The last couple of times, deep in the woods, he’s been so busy keeping up with texts and social media that he forgot to commune with anything.

The same teacher also mentioned that he has called students out for answering texts while in the middle of a working machine shop. They often tell him that it’s their parents texting them. He takes the phone and texts the parents saying that the student is busy and should be paying attention to what is happening (it is a machine shop). It seems parental expectations have piggybacked on invasive digital practices.

One of the reasons I enjoy me motorbike so much is that I can’t be doing anything else while I’m on it, though apparently others have found a way. The operation of the bike occupies my mind and body completely, it’s very therapeutic living completely in the moment like that. That the information technology around us constantly pulls us out of the present is a problem we need to resolve. Maybe the French aren’t out to lunch in trying to protect people from this expectation of being permanently leashed to our information stream.

From the frustration of sitting behind a car at a green light because the driver is distracted (thought they aren’t supposed to be), to helicopter parents being constantly in touch with students, perhaps it’s time for educators to start charting a more socially responsible approach to digital intrusion.

Note: In case you think it ends there, here is another sad ode to social media, it’s becoming a meme!

How to Pick a Project Bike

I’m still wallowing in the sense of satisfaction from taking an old, field-found Concours and putting it back on the road again. With a road-ready bike in the garage I’m looking for another project bike. I’m not short on choices, a quick look online revealed a wide variety of ‘project’ bikes; apparently a lot of people start them and don’t finish them. You can pick up failed projects that run the gamut from boxes of bits to a machine that just needs a bit of TLC. I’d think you have to feel like a real burk if you bought a bike, dismantled it and then walked away from the mess you made, but people do it. I’m left wondering if some people start projects just to waste time rather than aiming for a finished product.

Knowing which bike to pick is a big part of selecting a workable project. The Concours was owned by an older fellow who knew what he was doing and fully intended to ride the bike again. It wasn’t stored properly or used, but the attention paid to it was knowledgeable, making it a good choice for a project. I was able to hear it running and even rode it home, so I knew what I was getting into.

The Connie is also a popular bike with a huge online community. The ZG1000 Concours I have was in production from 1994 up until 2006 and ’86 to ’93 in a previous, similar generation. A lengthy production run means lots of parts out there. I had no trouble finding both new and used parts for it and getting advice was as easy as logging into the Concours Owners Group or referring to the easily found shop manual.

As a starting project the Concours was a good choice. For my second project I’m looking for a bit more of a challenge. Just north of me a 1989 Suzuki DR600 Djebel came up for sale, menacingly suggested as a project bike.

The DR600 evolved into the DR650 in 1990. DR650s are still in production today, but the DR600 was quite a different machine. After doing some digging on the interwebs I discovered that finding parts for it might be a real problem (one Suzuki dealer said there was no such bike). There is no shop manual available from any of the usual publishers and the only thing I could find that was close was a photocopied PDF of a 1985 model from a guy in Australia. The bike was available in continental Europe and Canada, but not the UK or the US, so I’m looking at a long out of production bike that was never sold in the largest market in the world. This didn’t stop me from going up to look at it though.

The DR600 is a huge trailee machine. The young owner had the ownership, but it was still in the previous owner’s name in spite of the bike being in his possession for a couple of years; the project had obviously gone stale. The amount of rust on fasteners suggested that the bike had been left in the weather for at least some of the time. It won’t run, rust in the tank and fuel system was the diagnosis. Aftermarket tanks are pretty easy to find for off road bikes (and look very Mondo Enduro), but there are none specifically for the DR600. A DR650 tank might fit… might.

A non-running machine means you’re missing a chance to get a sense of the internal workings. You’re probably walking into a complete engine rebuild if the bike has had rust force fed through it during two years of failed diagnostics. An unplugged speedo cable and loose, corroded wires also raise questions around the accuracy of the mileage as well as the potential for annoying electrical issues.

I’m looking for a challenge, but the Djebel (an Arabic mountain!) is one I’m too cautious to climb. If I’m a decade in and have wrenched a lot of bikes, I might have taken a swing at it, but not when the asking price is similar to a ten years newer, running KLR650. I still had to fight my mechanical sympathy which was tugging at me to take the bike home and make it whole again.

So, I’m still looking for another project bike. An ’81 Honda CB400 came up nearby for half the price of the Suzuki. Also not running, but a much more popular machine that isn’t a problem for parts availability or service manuals. Stored inside, it looks like a good candidate for my first rebuild. It also looks like a good choice for a more complicated customization. A CB400 Scrambler would be a sensible evolutionary step in bike builds for me.