Delmar, NY

They’re taking about frost in the North Country this morning 🍂

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You can taste the fresh silage on the air and you know it won’t be long before the leaves will be full of color in the North Country. Up at five o’clock cooking down split pea soup to have with homemade bread.

Good morning! Happy Thursday. A cold start, you might need the choke on your motor. Mostly clear, the sun is rising and 47 degrees in Delmar, NY. 🌅 Calm wind.

Up a little after five to cook 🍳 and get started on my day. Needed to run to the rest room and then I needed to have coffee ☕ and get that pea soup cooking down. A half pound of spinach, onions, stir fry vegetables, a crust of whole wheat flour and water plus two eggs, a bit of milk and corn starch topped with a bit of Parmesan was breakfast. Dinner last night was pizza 🍕 but not that American crap way. A simple whole wheat flour and water crust, several paste and other tomatoes that were starting to mold a bit run through the food processor with a garlic clove and a bunch of spices with flour to harden, topped with chopped onions and spinach and a bit of Parmesan. 🥦 I do eat a lot of spinach, I like fiber. Fills your stomach up fully without many calories.

Lately I’ve been a been a little nostalgic 🎶 and listening to a lot of country music from the early 2000s like back in college. Not that I’d ever want to go back to those days with all those trials and tribulations of youth and far less money but life was good before inflation kind of ruined everything. I think it’s September 11th and just the autumn weather that takes me back to the first year back at Hudson Valley Community College, my first experience with much urban life, and being on my own, having a car, being able to go up to the woods whenever I wanted to. 🎄

Out walking around 6:45 AM this morning. 🚶‍♀️ Definitely a beautiful morning for the walk, should be a great ride down through the gorge to work. 🚲 I tasted some of that pea soup, it’s delicious, I’ll bring some for work and probably have some more for dinner. Might end up freezing the rest so I can have it later in the weekend, obviously with some fresh bread. 🍵 Might be a good way to end Saturday after riding trail most of the day up at Thacher Park. 🚵‍♀️ I am starting to run low on bananas, 🍌 I might stop and get just them at Hannaford during the evening commute home. Other then that my pantry is pretty solid.

Today will be sunny 🌞, with a high of 70 degrees at 3pm. Two degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around September 26th. Maximum dew point of 50 at 6pm. Calm wind becoming north around 6 mph in the morning. A year ago, we had cloudy skies in the morning with more sun in the afternoon. The high last year was 76 degrees. The record high of 95 was set in 1895.

I called the General yesterday 🚚 and guess what I’m on call back list regarding when they can do the passenger airbag inflator recall work. I figured with all the notices and social media ads I’ve gotten about replacing the airbag inflator, they’d have a ton in stock at this point and I could just drop the truck off in a week or two and have it back the next day. Nope, they took down my information but couldn’t promise me an appointment at this time.

Called back the doctor, 📞 and after a bit of phone tag 👩‍⚕️ they want to do some more testing about my pissing problem.  Didn’t catch it right away, as my phone is set up to automatically go to voice mail. 📨 Heck of it is since I’ve not been eating so many zucchini and overnight oatmeal, I’ve not had such a pissing problem.🚽  I kind of don’t want to spend more money getting tests, as I think it’s mostly in my head at this point, to blame on my diet, but they said some of the initial rounds of test were inclusive. 📋They can’t schedule me until another two weeks, so at that point I’ll re-evaluate if I find myself needing to piss too much. I really think the key is stay away from coffee and overnight oatmeal before road trips, especially my October trip if I’m thinking West Virginia.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:49 pm with sun having an altitude of 48.2° from the due south horizon (-22.7° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 5.4 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 6:20 pm with the sun in the west (266°). 📸 The sunset is in the west (272°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 6:57 pm after setting for 2 minutes and 54 seconds with dusk around 7:23 pm, which is one minute and 47 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 At dusk you’ll see the First Quarter 🌓 Moon in the south-southwest (198°) at an altitude of 18° from the horizon, 233,527 miles away. 🚀 The best time to look at the stars is after 7:58 pm. At sunset, look for clear skies 🌄 and temperatures around 66 degrees. The dew point will be 50 degrees. There will be a north breeze at 6 mph. Today will have 12 hours and 16 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 52 seconds over yesterday.

Yesterday, I went for an evening walk 🚶‍♀️ and went through my dresser and pulled out most the XXL clothes and put them away in the crawl space, and started to go through the hand-me-downs I got from the late John W. Some are XXL unfortunately, I only meant to get XL but I’ll try them on. 👕 Going to wash them though before putting them with the other clothes, as some of them have a bit of an old man smell to them. The pizza I had was good 🍕, very filling, didn’t really need a desert. Lights were out before 8:15 PM though I did listen to a podcast or two on my phone before getting fully asleep but that’s fine, I’m usually up by 5 AM most mornings to start cooking and getting a jump start on my morning.

Totally getting sold on going down to Canaan Heights West Virginia sometime after Columbus Day Weekend 🍂 to mountain bike, hike, camp and see the sights. I mean I’m not 100% on this and it could change, but it would be fun. Probably start the week up Wellsboro PA-area to ride some of the Pine Creek Gorge Trail. Not sure how much farther south I’d go in West Viriginia, maybe Dolly Sods, but I would rather focus on Canaan Heights, Blackwater Falls State Park and the Canaan Wildlife Refuge as I haven’t spent nearly enough time up that way.

Tonight will be mostly clear 🌃, with a low of 46 degrees at 6am. Four degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 1st. Light northwest wind. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 51 degrees. The record low of 31 occurred back in 1962.

I’ve been starting to look more deeply into the future of the blog. 📝 I can bitch about the cost of running it but it won’t make it go away. I kind of would miss not doing it, so it’s probably worth the money to me. I do want to re-work the data structure, make things more efficient and maybe remove more of the custom code and try to make it use as much of built-in WordPress code as possible. 👨‍💻 I could bring my laptop home and work on this over the weekend, especially if it’s going to be rainy. The big difficulty might be the transition — taking down the old data structure and replacing it with the new one, and getting all the URL rewrites perfected before going live. I don’t know any way to do this completely without taking at least part of the blog offline to do the change over. 🤷‍♂️ I might also look at implementing Google AdSense, so I can get some advertising revenue, to cover the costs of doing the blog. I don’t love that idea — there is too much advertising pollution already, but I get tired of ever inflating costs, even if it really is a smaller part of the budget that that I’m making more money at work. 💸

A chance of showers throughout the weekend with more sun on Sunday. 🌦 Saturday, a chance of showers, mainly after 2pm. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 66. East wind 3 to 6 mph. Chance of precipitation is 30%. New precipitation amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch possible. Maximum dew point of 52 at 10am. Sunday, a chance of showers. Partly sunny, with a high near 68. Chance of precipitation is 30%. Maximum dew point of 56 at 1pm. Typical average high for the weekend is 72 degrees.

I won’t say it’s a banner weekend this weekend, 🌦 but maybe not a wash out. Still will be good enough to do the Nature Bus to Thacher Park. Saves some money and it’s a fun day, plus I went out camping last weekend. 🏕 Maybe next weekend I’ll get out again, though the very long-range forecast doesn’t look all that great in all honestly. Columbus Day Weekend, which is two weeks from Saturday might be better. ⛵ 🍂 Only time will tell, though it seems like autumn will be late this year.

South Along Lake George

There is so much to do and explore in Canaan Heights

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I am thinking once again about going back to the beautiful country known as Canaan Heights around Blackwater Falls State Park in West Virginia. This year, though I might do it a bit different — and focus my trip on just Canaan Heights and not spend my time tooling around the other parts of state to explore as there is much I haven’t explored there, and could easily access with my mountain bike, no driving or expensive fuel consumption needed.

I could set up camp along Canaan Loop Road and stay there for the balance of the week. Ride then hike back to Lindy Point Overlook, Blackwater State Park, Table Rock and the many trails through the dense Mountain Laurel. It’s just such beautiful country there, and while I’ve camped up that way a few times, I’ve really not spent a lot of time there. Plus it doesn’t involve winding through all those steep and narrow mountain passes with Big Red, chugging fuel at the same time. And if I wanted to, I could stay there the whole week after coming down on a Monday or Tuesday (doing the Pine Creek Rail Trail the weekend before in Pennsylvania), and then heading all the way home on Sunday. That said, eight hours of driving might be a bit much for me. Maybe I should plan an overnight somewhere along the way.

That said, it’s a long trip with my old truck. Maybe I should consider a shorter trip and plan to come back in a future year when I have a new truck. But the country down that way is so wild and beautiful.

Country Roads

Gravel Road

Maybe some Radical Acceptance is the key to climbing the Hump Day 🐪

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Kind of a pretty sunrise this morning and it should be a nice bike ride to work. I’ll close out that background I’m reviewing, call back the doctor, call the General about the airbag, move forward. It’s kind of the midpoint of everything but I’m moving forward.

Good morning! What day is it? A Day I’m Embracing, of course. Mostly clear and 52 degrees in Delmar for the morning walk. 🌅 Calm wind. The dew point is 45 degrees.

Yes, I’m actually out walking 🚶 this morning. The past few days I’ve been bad, though I either rode my bike to work 🚲 or walked the Plaza before work on Monday. Tuesday’s ride to work wasn’t bad though I think 🤔 I should lubricate the chain 🔗 again before heading to work. Mornings are dark and there is such a short window before the smoldering cars along the road at the High School 🚸 start. It’s just toxic and noxious to walk past all those idling cars along the road.

More fresh bread 🍞 was baked this morning. Experimenting with yeast, sugar and water to get more rise and perfect 👌 my bread. Apple oatmeal pancakes 🥞 for breakfast this morning. Last night was salmon with sweet potatoes 🍠 and onions with lemon 🍋 which was tasty with mango for dessert. I’m not complaining about buying a big bag of frozen mango at the store on Monday. Eating well, but not too many calories, though I have to be careful about all those carbs in fresh-homemade bread, though no added sugar and it’s whole wheat. Getting a better rise this time. Now I got to make more walnut butter up. Okay, I’ve totally fallen off the healthy-eating rocker.

Today will be sunny 🌞, with a high of 70 degrees at 3pm. Three degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around September 26th. Maximum dew point of 50 at 10am. Light and variable wind becoming northwest 5 to 9 mph in the morning. A year ago, we had light rain in the morning, which became mostly sunny by afternoon. It was somewhat humid. The high last year was 75 degrees. The record high of 90 was set in 1946.

To wear jeans 👖 or not? That’s the question, though I only have three pair that fit me properly. That said, I can probably wear the same pair of jeans twice. Maybe though today is cooler day, so better to wear jeans today and then shorts tomorrow, with jeans again on Friday. I don’t care about the weekend, I can always wear baggy jeans or re-wear somewhat dirty ones, especially if I go camping or just take the Nature Bus 🚵‍♀️ to ride trails up at Thacher Park.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:50 pm with sun having an altitude of 48.5° from the due south horizon (-22.3° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 5.3 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 6:21 pm with the sun in the west (266°). 📸 The sunset is in the west (272°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 6:59 pm after setting for 2 minutes and 54 seconds with dusk around 7:25 pm, which is one minute and 47 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 At dusk you’ll see the First Quarter 🌓 Moon in the south-southwest (212°) at an altitude of 16° from the horizon, 236,305 miles away. 🚀 The best time to look at the stars is after 8:00 pm. At sunset, look for clear skies 🌄 and temperatures around 65 degrees. The dew point will be 49 degrees. There will be a northwest breeze at 8 mph. Tomorrow will have 12 hours and 16 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 52 seconds over today.

Riding Blackie to work today, 🚲 it might be a cool start to the morning but should be a beautiful commute both and to and from work. I just need to dress warmly and be careful on way back with all the cars in shadows. 👻 I have to admit I can’t wait for the leaves to be off the trees 🌲 for better visibility on some of the intersections during the commute. But then it will likely be dark out 🌆 and I’ll have to take the bus home in the evening, ❄️ not to mention that the rail trail will get covered with snow and ice, to say nothing of it being cold to ride.

So I have a list of things to do today. 📃 I need to call the doctor back about my blood work, though it’s hardly a priority as I’ve stopped having the pissing problem 🚽 once I cut back on drinking so much coffee in the morning ☕ and are more careful about how much water is in my oatmeal and eating too much zucchini 🍆 and tomatoes 🍅. I think that friend of mine who got my so worked up about my weight loss is a jerk. Also, no overnight oatmeal 🥣 before or fresh peaches 🍑 during road trips anymore. Might be easy until you find yourself pissing every five minutes. Also going to call the General about when I can have the air bag inflator recall replaced on Big Red, lest I get into an accident with somebody in the passenger seat. 🎈 The Taka Airbag Recall is kind of serious, but I rarely have a passenger, so I didn’t really care.

Tonight will have patchy fog between 4am and 5am. Otherwise, mostly clear 🌃, with a low of 44 degrees at 6am. Seven degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 7th. Northwest wind 3 to 7 mph. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 57 degrees. The record low of 29 occurred back in 1973.

Went down to the library last night 📚 returned a bunch of books and looked and browsed books, but didn’t end up taking out anything. Sure gets dark out early, 👣 but I got my steps in. Tonight, I am thinking after a dinner of tomato and spinach wraps on homemade whole-wheat flatbread, 🌯 I will go for a walk 🚶‍♀️ around dusk for my steps 👣 and maybe start going through clothes, putting away most of my summer clothes and things that are too big to fit and getting out some of the clothes John Wolcott’s wife gifted to me, along with some other things that fit well like I got from dad. 👕 I’m tired of looking like a concentration camp survivor, or having to dig through so many big clothes that don’t fit anymore.

Still chewing over the blog, ✍ I mean I like doing it, but it’s a lot of money but then again it’s three years and blogging gives me a lot of pleasure.  I guess it’s not that big of a hike from three years ago, but it feels like. Used to be a lot less cost. 🤑 I really could improve some of the code, get rid of some of the outdated crap and just make things a ton more efficient. There is a lot of things on the blog that are obsolete or old and outdated, and should be removed, as sometimes they randomly pop up on search engines. 🔍 And what I said years ago isn’t necessarily who I am today.

Somewhat of an improvement for the weekend. 🌥 Saturday, mostly cloudy, with a high near 67. Maximum dew point of 55 at 4pm. Sunday, a chance of showers before 2pm. Partly sunny, with a high near 71. Chance of precipitation is 30%. Maximum dew point of 59 at 11am. Typical average high for the weekend is 72 degrees.

It’s been going back and forth on the weekend, but I am thinking it will be stay-in-town weekend for heading out mountain biking at Thacher Park. 🚵‍♀️ Maybe I’ll ride down from the park after trail riding, though I think I will skip the trip down to Warner’s Lake as that was a good trip back up there. Sunday I’ll probably go out to the folks house for Sunday dinner, 🍽 and who knows I could go somewhere else to ride trail. I know they’ve built a good network of mountain bike trails on Wolf Hill, that might be fun to do. Ultimately depends on how wet the weekend turns out to be.

As previously noted, next Wednesday is More Night then Day 🌌 when the sun will be setting at 6:46 pm with dusk at 7:12 pm. On that day in 2022, we had partly cloudy, rain showers and temperatures between 68 and 50 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 70 degrees. We hit a record high of 89 back in 2017.

Old Mill

Should I pull the plug on the blog? 🔌

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I’m back to thinking about that again. I decided not to auto renew my blog but I still have to October 23rd to make up my mind and pay the $530 fee for the next three years. Indeed the cost is the big sticking point but also a recent email from the hosting company suggesting an up sell to an even more expensive contract due to the size of my blog – 36 gigabytes as they’re enforcing a 40 gig quota come November 1st as unlimited storage with their plus plan comes to an end. Somehow that rubs me the wrong way with the higher costs all around.

I’ve been considering my alternatives. One is to pull the plug on the blog come November. Another is to change web hosts. Or I could improve the efficiency of my data management system and or purge the oldest photos and maps which rarely get served and don’t add much value. The PDFs for maps take up a lot of space but get few downloads compared to the JPEG versions. Lossless compression could be increased, duplicated maps and scaled data deleted. I’ve also thought about embracing advertising, especially on the maps and archives pages which are mostly search engine traffic. Indeed if I were to embrace advertising it would be a revenue neutral proposition.