Good morning folks on this beautiful Saturday. Started out cloudy, but now clearing. It sure is nice to the see the rays of sun, when it’s been so cloudy for so long. The breeze — around 10 miles per hour makes the 35 degrees seem a bit cooler then the mercury suggests, but still nicer then recent. Looking for a high around 40 degrees today.
Kind of slept in this morning, and made some breakfast on the stove. Not too fancy, but some eggs and salsa, with some cheese dip I (accidentally) bought for camping a while back. It was okay, but I do need to get to the store and buy some groceries. I’ll stop at the store and get a few things on Monday, and hopefully by Tuesday evening I’ll have my truck back and it will start reliably in cold weather and on short trips. I have great hope that the shop with all their tools can figure out the electrical problem, probably in five minutes (and bill me for an hour). Probably a loose wire or the battery actually. I probably could have figured it out myself, but it would have taken hours of figuring out how to test from the Interwebs and probably replacing unneeded components. But I don’t care that much, it needs to not strand me in the wilderness.
I’m off hiking to Five Rivers Environmental Education Center in a few minutes after I get done with my shower. Going to take some pictures and go for a nice walk. Feeling better this weekend, despite my nagging cough, and want to spend more time in the woods. Yesterday was nice at the Town Park but the Environmental Education Center offers more different views. I would have liked to go to the Adirondacks this weekend, but so be it. Made some good progress on various improvements to the blog, and map making.
Got my last pay stub of the year, and it was pretty good year. Better then expected, made up somewhat for a fairly flat stock market. Worked a lot of hours, but made some good money. Too bad with inflation, that money went out the door about as quick as it came in. A lot of it went to savings though, especially my retirement account. This year, I’m not making a large up-front payment on retirement from savings, so the bimonthly withdrawls will be larger, but it will provide more stability for investments, should the market decline. I’ll miss watching my savings account grow as quickly as it did in the past though. Eventually though, I hope to have land out in the country, a basic off-grid cabin, in free state. At least by the time I retire. In the mean-time, I may end up buying a small house in the city or near suburbs, where I can take the bus to work every day. I hate driving in the city.
2015 was a pretty darn good year, all things considered. Spraining my ankle sucked. It hurt like a mother and I couldn’t get around well for over a month. But once I got the boot off, I started to recover. My ankle still occasionally hurts a bit, but it’s more on and off. Probably should loose some weight, but I sure like drinking those cold ones in the woods. Camped right up to the end of year, and except for the stupid truck, would have spent New Years Eve in the wilderness. Still, I might get out camping next weekend or certainly Martin Luther King Day Jr. weekend, assuming it’s not that frigid (as defined by days that have highs close to or above freezing and no rain or damp fog). West Virgina was amazing, although I wish I had spend more time in the Shenandoah Valley, exploring some of the beautiful farm land and the Shenandoah River. Once you get into Shenandoah National Park, there are few access roads to the valley below. Maybe November 2016, I’ll take the Blue Ridge Parkway farther south, where it will be warmer and I can explore more. The Remington 597 .22 I have is a lot of fun to shoot, but I sure wish I could own a high-capacity magazine in New York, as it would make it even more to shoot.
Have a great day. It’s a beautiful one. Get outside and enjoy it.
