Tomorrow morning my six year old son and I will attend our first religious service together. It's a holiday for the Muslim world, apparently. We're in Rochester and honestly, I have not set foot in a mosque or touched my forehead to a prayer rug in maybe 12 years.. We're going to the Turkish Society of Rochester for the service, where pretty much everyone knows who I am and knew my father. There will be lots of looks and double takes from old friends of the family.. Some of whom remember a ti... Read Full Story

The single most impressive thing about Phoenix Arizona is the Rental Car Terminal. Intelligent design has a special place in my heart. The thing that brought me down was the emptiness. Phoenix is a lonely city- all dressed up and waiting for a party to happen, it seems, and everyone is a no-show. The glimmering mini skyscrapers seem to be populated only by the palm trees which surround them. It's a scene out of Grand Theft Auto if I ever saw one. The boring flat landscape is made interesting ... Read Full Story

New job, different bike commute. For the past five years I was lucky to have an 8 mile bike ride to work. (I used to take the long way home of course..) Now my bike commute is 26 miles each way and I fear that it may be a bit too much, especially in the mornings. This is going to be hard to do more than once a week. I need to leave the house at 6:00 am in order to get there at a reasonable hour, and the logistics of clean clothing, grooming failures and odor control really make it harder than... Read Full Story

If you told me 10 years ago that I would one day break down and buy a "Christmas" tree I would have made a face indicating that I smell cabbage.. "That's blasphemous" might have been my reply. Now looking back upon 38 years of deprival of one of the most cherished and fundamental American traditions ever known, all I can really take credit for is saving some time and some money. "We don't celebrate Christmas" is not a compelling enough reason for a six year old boy to accept. Christmas is a h... Read Full Story

I'm pleased because even though I crashed heavily two times at today's Canton Cup Cyclocross Race, your hero never quit, he avoided being lapped and even caught four people and sprinted past a fifth right at the finish line. My son Reis pulled a similar result in his kid's race for 6 and 7 year olds. He went right off into the weeds on the first slick muddy turn and was dead last.. until he got back on the bike, chased down and passed two kids and finished fourth. Mommy for her part, put up w... Read Full Story

I have two weeks of free time before I begin my new job. Today after depositing Reis on the school bus I went out and did an endurance/tempo bike ride of about 37 miles in 2 hours. On my way up Route 102 North I noticed one of those ubiquitous NBW arrows in the road, beckoning me to turn onto Purgatory Road. It's nothing like it sounds- this is a tree lined country road with no traffic and brand new ultra fine (fast) blacktop. At some point I forgot what day it was and what time it was and th... Read Full Story

For the past many months and months, Facebook has pretty much hijacked my attention span, taking it away from this blog and leaving readers twisting in the wind.. unless they themselves migrated over to the land of imitation friendships. Let's face it, accepting a friend request is the equivalent of canine crotch sniffing. We proceed to ogle all of the friends, photos and other bullshit which our new "friends" have just exposed. It's a peep show of flashers and consenting victims.Today someth... Read Full Story

I'm excited and nervous- my hand's on the buzzer and I already know the exact answer, before the question is even asked. When success is guaranteed, why is there hesitation? Maybe because nothing that is worth having is ever easy to get, except when it occasionally is.. and so we second guess whether it's really worth having.. and why aren't others also getting some? Because they can't no matter how hard they try, dumb-ass! Read Full Story

Recent posts are by a renegade blogger who has hijacked Amerikan Turk, not by me, Murat. This slideshow is from me though. I have no time to blog and Amerikan Turk is on it's last legs. Forgive me for letting it slip into such a death spiral. Well.. at least you now get to see where much of my free time is used. Enjoy: Read Full Story

Artık eskisi gibi her haftasonu birileri ile dısarı çıkmakistemiyorum.Beni yoran iliskiler, yeni tanısmalar, yeni yüzler aramıyorum. Eskidostlukların da özetini çıkarmaya basladım. Iliskilerde tasarrufagidiyorsun her seyde oldugu gibi ve gereksiz insanlari hayatindan atmakistiyorsun.Yapmacik, inanmadan konusmak istemiyorum artık. Beni anlamayanlarlaKonuşmak cümle kirliliði yaratıyor ve hak edenlere saklıyorum enerjimi.Istedigime istedigimi deme özgürlügüne sahibim, elestirme hakkınıOlustu... Read Full Story