55 degrees with partly sunny skies with another ten degrees to go before we max out today. Making good time downtown on the express bus but it’s chilly with the air conditioning blasting. TGIF. I’m just glad that summer is coming even if this weekend will be yet another rainy weekend.

The sun will set at 8:08 pm with dusk around 8:40 pm, which is one minute and 4 seconds later than yesterday. At sunset, look for partly cloudy conditions and 59 degrees. There will be a southeast breeze at 5 mph. Today will have 14 hours and 33 minutes of daytime, an increase of 2 minutes and 9 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will be mostly cloudy, with a low of 47 degrees at 6am. One degree above normal. South wind 5 to 7 mph. In 2016, it got down to 52 degrees with rain and fog and patches of fog and mist and cloudy skies. The record low of 30 occurred back in 2005.

As previously noted, there are 2 weeks until Memorial Day Weekend when the sun will be setting at 8:22 pm with dusk at 8:55 pm. On that day in 2016, we had partly cloudy skies and temperatures between 88 and 58 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 72 degrees. We hit a record high of 94 back in 2010.

It was pretty nice evening down at the park then back home, watching the moon rise during my evening walk. With the halo of the clouds, if almost looked like a flower. Saw a bat flying around scooping up bugs. White Nose has wiped out a lot of cave dwelling bats but it seems like in Delmar you still see them around, probably surviving under the eves of houses. Bats are good, they eat a lot of bugs. 

Sat our back until around ten, watching the PBS Newshour on the tailgate of my truck. Got a bit chilly after a while but then again it’s still only mid May. A lot of road noise though as it seems everybody is out and about in the nice weather. 

Continued to look at vests and I found a place that has free shipping and a good price but I’m concerned it will be delivered while I’m downstate. I’ll have to think about what I will do, I might have it shipped to a friend’s apartment. Or I might hold off now. I always like to think about purchases before I buy them. My old one is really falling apart, that’s why I decided to skip it this morning. 

Two quick weeks from now I will be finishing packing my truck and heading to work then out to Vermont. I don’t have a Vermont fishing license but there is plenty of other things to do during my three day weekend. It’s not a big trip so if the weather goes bad, I can always head home. I don’t mind a thunderstorm but I don’t want a weekend of heavy rain while camping. 

Been starting to research heavier rear wheel to put on my bike. I’ve always liked riding from place to place and my bike is nice but I got to have something that doesn’t keep breaking spokes, leaving me broken down along the road. I am thinking of possibly riding through some of the Pine Creek Rail Trail Gorge on my summer vacation. With nearly 80 miles of bike trail, there is a lot to see. Nearly half of the trail is in Wilderness, all of it is quite rural, flat and in the deep Pine Creek Gorge.

That said, like years past I will spend the bulk of my summer in the Finger Lakes National Forest and spend my days swimming and I hiking in the cold gorges of the Finger Lakes. It’s just a fun and relaxing way to spend a summer. I have the Empire Passport again this summer, so I have unlimited park visitation, and then I can camp along old Chicken Coop Road, have a nice fire, cook some burgers on charcoal while I listen to the soft mooing of the cows across the way in the pasture.

I am feeling a bit achy this morning. Not sure why. I’ve felt like I’ve had a upset stomach for most of the week but I’m thinking it may be all the hot sauce. I really need to use it in moderation, maybe in a bottle that pours slower. And maybe get to bed earlier, so I get sufficient sleep. Often when I’m tired, I get achy and don’t feel great. With the nice evenings though, I’ve been sitting out back until 11 PM, which is much too late, especially with the sun coming up early and waking me before 6 AM.

Speaking of speed, they’ve put once of those temporary your speed signs on my road, and it’s amazing how fast people are blowing past it. People are often going 40-45 miles per hour in 30, around a fairly tight curve past pedestrians. In the era of cruise control and electronic throttles and eight speed transmissions this seems very non sensible. You reach the speed limit limit and hit a button on your steering wheel. How difficult can it be?