Next weekend now looks better lol? I’m packed though and ready to go with an ambitious agenda. More sun would be nice but I take what I can get as winter’s coming and I have Monday off with Tuesday being a state holiday for the mostly uncompetitive elections I voted in last week mostly pissed about the drone issue not that I even own a drone.

Good morning! Mostly cloudy and 42 degrees in Delmar, NY. ☁ There is a south breeze at 6 mph. 🍃. The skies will clear around 6 pm.

I had forgotten how unpleasant the side effects were from the COVID jab 💉 as my arm 💪🏻 was a sore throughout yesterday though the bike ride in the cold both ways probably didn’t help. 🚲 And then I was sleepy 😴 all afternoon yesterday, maybe because it was a five 5⃣ day work week after

So I’m off for a four day trip out to Madison County. 🐮 Not quite West Virginia but it’s a good adventure I have planned closer to home. 🌥 Not going to be a real sunny weekend but mild, not looking super wet. Lots of gravel biking maybe some single track trail riding come Tuesday. Plus exploring Chittenango and Canastota on the Erie Canalway. 🚲 Plus Cazenovia, a fun town and I want to check out the Aldi there. 🛒

Tried to keep the packing list 📃 simple and to the essentials for this four day, three nights trip. I’m close enough to stores 🏬 to buy supplies if I forget something or if things go terribly wrong I can head home. 🏡 But a lot of the camping 🏕 gear I keep in the truck year round. Trying though to keep this trip under $100 for all consumables like gasoline, and any items above and beyond ordinary food. Banana or oatmeal that I would eat regardless don’t count but paper towels do. Though most of the consumables I have from vacation already bought.

Quick breakfast 🥚 of eggs I boiled last night, some whole wheat bread I baked on Thursday 🍞, apple 🍏 and I’ll bring an a banana for the road. A five hour energy ⚡ for my caffeine jolt and a quick shower 🚿 and hopefully I won’t be pissing all day. No ginger or tumeriac until I’m to camp, lol. 😂 That five hour energy ☕ packs in as much caffeine as 2 ½ cups of coffee which I probably would otherwise drink and be pissing my way to Madison County. Plus I drank a lot of water 💦 yesterday to overcome the symptoms of the COVID jab.

Stopping at Tractor Supply in Guilderland to top off my propane tank 🏮 after 8 am when they open to be safe though it’s not super low after such a mild vacation but the nights are long and cool especially with the time change. 🕒 Set my manual clocks ahead at home, will do the truck before I leave. Also will need more gasoline and a few groceries – bananas 🍌, apples 🍏, carrots 🥕 and whatever fruit and vegetables look good and are cheap as I’m good on grains and proteins. Maybe honey, 🍯 cottage cheese and Greek yogurt. Canned pumpkin? 🎃 And fuel ⛽ for the truck.

Today will be mostly cloudy 🌥, with a high of 55 degrees at 2pm. One degree above normal, which is similar to a typical day around November 2nd. South wind around 6 mph. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies. The high last year was 71 degrees. The record high of 76 was set in 1994. There was a dusting of snow in 2006.❄

Going to be a rather gray day today but the plan is to spend the balance of the day riding the Chenango Canal Trail 🚲 down to Hamilton from Bouckville. But not too late as the sun sets early and I want to have time to find firewood. 🔥 Gain an extra hour tonight and I get up so early these days, but I’m going to be a bit more relaxed about getting up but still probably in darkness to maximize the limited daylight. 🌅 Plus I like sipping coffee ☕ watching the sun rise.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:40 pm with sun having an altitude of 32.1° from the due south horizon (-38.8° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 9.6 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 5:06 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (243°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-southwest (250°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 5:46 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 6 seconds with dusk around 6:14 pm, which is one minute and 15 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 6:49 pm. At sunset, look for partly cloudy skies 🌃 and temperatures around 53 degrees. There will be a south-southeast breeze at 5 mph. Tomorrow will have 10 hours and 12 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 28 seconds over today.

Yesterday was my last bike 🚲 ride home after work with the time change 🕒 but I still think I want to try to ride to work as much as possible until too cold and snowy ☃ and take the bus 🚍 home in the evening. It was a nice ride home, the wind not as strong as I had feared. But by no means am I going to ride through the South End after dark and onto an unlit bike path in the gorge. But the buses all have racks to take my bike home. 🚶 And I’m going to start doing evening and probably morning walks again.

Tonight will be mostly cloudy 🌥, with a low of 41 degrees at 5am. Six degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 17th. Calm wind. In 2022, we had cloudy skies in the evening, which became partly cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 61 degrees. The record low of 17 occurred back in 1951.

Got looking at Ebooks and all the online services my library offers. 📚 I’m still in the mindset of the library being just physical books but they have hundreds of ebooks, magazines, and especially those free training classes on advanced computer classes for GIS 🗺 and other skills like programming with Udemeny. While I probably wouldn’t pay for the online classes, they’re remarkably good and free through the library. 🖥 And they can be accessed from my smartphone 📱.

Looking ahead, next Saturday is Veterans Day 🪖 when the sun will be setting at 4:38 pm with dusk at 5:07 pm (Standard Time). Big change with the time change. Friday also is a state holiday with Veterans day observed then. On that day in 2022, we had rain and temperatures between 69 and 48 degrees. This year it could snow or be wet ☔ or maybe not it depends on the timing of the front come Thursday into Friday. Typically, the high temperature is 51 degrees. We hit a record high of 70 back in 2002.