Smoke Signals

The other day a pal and I were at the grocery and we ended up in a discussion with two other cyclists about hand signals. Neither of the other two knew what they were. I ran through them and mentioned that the use of the left hand has to do with how easy it is for other vehicles, particularly motorists, to see the signals.  As it happens for some time now I have used the point with the left hand for going left, point with the right hand for going right. About a block after the conversation, Ian pointed out that I had just said that motorists are unlikely to see my right hand and shouldn't I use the bent left arm instead? Um, er, ah, I argued. The fact is I hate the bent left arm signal, no real idea why but it's aesthetically unpleasing to me. However, having realized that I was wrong and condemned out of my own mouth, I have gone back to the bent left arm.

As the economy  continues to morph into some kind of hellish neo-liberal dystoptia, I have become increasingly convinced that the proper response is to marry a rich widow, defraud her of a portion, but not all not even the majority, of her wealth and use to buy a food truck. I would then change my name, I am leaning toward Ish Kabbile and a bbq.  In the service of this future easy street, I decided to make a smoked beef brisket. According to all and sundry smoking blogs and webpages it is the sine qua non of bbq. Indeed, according to all and sundry making bbqed beef brisket is slightly, but only slightly, less complicated that than the logistics of the Berlin Airlift. Not true. I went to the store bought a half pre-trimed brisket and seasoned it:

The next day I set up the grill for smoking:

I used two thirds of a chimney of lump charcoal in a little metal container, an aluminum pie tin filled with water and, in total, 1/2 bag of soaked apple wood chips added every half hour or so.  And cooked it for about 5 hrs turning it over about half way. It looked like this  when I flipped it:

And then, because everybody said to, I took it off the grill wrapped it twice in aluminum and stuffed it in oven at 220 until it was done, about 2 hrs more. After 1/2 hr of resting, it looked like this:

When I sliced it, it looked like this:

It was very, very, good and a lot less work then it sounds.