Elm Ave Park and Ride

The Mid-West

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This book I am reading makes a good point about the Midwest – the land is cheap, people are friendly and laid back, zoning and codes regulations tend to be much less with less enforcement. Conservative cultural norms are more laid back, preferring that government stay off people’s land and out of private businesses.

Building and living in an off-grid ‘tiny’ house or cabin is much easier when you don’t have to deal with nearly as aggressive of code inspectors. Buying a handgun or other firearm for hunting and personal protection is just as easy – fill out the federal paperwork, have them do a quick background check, and pay the cashier, and walk out with your new gun. Outhouses and composting toilets are easier to get approved, if there is any review at all. As long as there isn’t a high fire risk, you’re free to burn your trash and debris, typically with no permit. Off-road shops, ATVs, snowmobiles, and alike abound, often with a good trail system to ride not too far from home. Good-sized white tails, geese, ducks for hunting and other wildlife abound in the rural landscape.

The flip side, as the book notes, is the Midwest is mostly flat or with rolling hills. There aren’t the big mountains to hike, the state forests and national forests are much smaller part of the landscape – and often far away. The distances are spread out, they mean a lot of driving to get to work, shopping, or healthcare. Much of the Midwest is gritty and industrial, with lots of big farms and industry in cities and surrounding areas. Farmers for the most part don’t care what you do on your land, but recognize they have a business to do and that includes spreading manure and applying pesticides their fields, sometimes late at night with big loud tractors. Cows can be noisy, even if they are fun to watch graze. Hunters hunt, they have loud guns. People love shooting. I get it, I grew up in the country. I like doing many of those things too.

I am not one for conservative politics per se. If anything, I have become less political in recent years, focused on my own life concerns, making and saving money. I actually kind of like the idea of living in a culture that is less politically liberal, one more focused on natural resources and using them efficiently. Is there a thread in conservative politics that is entirely irresponsible and not based in reality? Sure, but it’s hard for a farmer, a hunter, and outdoors-man not to love and respect the resources that produce for them.

First Prize Slaughterhouse in 1952

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Lately there has been talk of demolishing and redeveloping the First Prize Slaughterhouse in Guilderland. A look at that building in 1952 when it was still bringing hogs in from local farms and Midwest and turning them into delicious hot dogs.

Some History for September 13th

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  1. 1759 – During the Seven Years’ War, the British defeated the French at the Battle of Quebec, a pivotal moment in the war for control of North America.
  2. 1948 – Margaret Chase Smith of Maine became the first woman to be elected to the United States Senate in a special election.
  3. 1993 – The Oslo Accords, a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), were signed on the White House lawn in Washington, D.C.
  4. 2008 – Hurricane Ike made landfall in Texas, causing widespread devastation and leading to significant loss of life and property damage.
  5. 2015 – NASA announced the discovery of flowing water on the surface of Mars, raising hopes for the possibility of life on the Red Planet.
  6. 2019 – Saudi Arabian oil facilities, including the Abqaiq oil processing facility and the Khurais oil field, were attacked by drones and cruise missiles, temporarily disrupting global oil supplies.

A Rainy Hump Day ☔

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It looks like it’s going to be a wet one for at least a few more hours and then some clearing. I’m not moving fast, I stayed up too late after doing some cleaning in the kitchen putting away clothes and fine tuning the indexing on my bike after really greasing up the gears, leading to some good smooth shifting again.

Good morning! What day is it? A wet one, of course. Rain and 64 degrees at the Elm Ave Park and Ride. ☔ Calm wind. The dew point is 64 degrees. The skies will clear around 8 pm.

I’m really not in the groove this morning, moving slowly but surely though the eggs and spinach 🍳 are helping a bit. I didn’t catch the earlier express bus 🚍 downtown, so I can do some extra steps in the Plaza but maybe not as many as I should before work but I’ll get off my butt and certainly do the stairs up to the 18th floor.

Totally ignored the doctors advice ☕ and had the extra cup of coffee this morning. 🧑‍⚕️And hot peppers with the eggs so I’ll probably have to piss extra but whatever I’ll be in the office and I’m not taking my bike to work. 🚳I thought about putting the bike on the bus but I figured between the rain and riding on the front of the bus down the expressway in the rain my grease job would be for naught by the afternoon commute. Traffic will be heavy at rush hour and I won’t be able to get exercise while riding the bus 🚍 home but I can walk 🚶 after getting home. Forgot to get the salmon out of the freezer before work 🐠 so I’ll have to plan something else. Maybe finish off the sweet corn 🌽 and I guess I can defrost some chicken in the microwave if I’m really looking for something warm for dinner. Or maybe just heat up some of soup or rice-lentils I have in the fridge. 🤷‍♂️

Today will have showers, with thunderstorms also possible after 2pm. 🌦 High of 73 degrees at 3pm. Three degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around September 19th. Maximum dew point of 65 at 12pm. 🏖️ Calm wind. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New rainfall amounts between a quarter and half of an inch possible. A year ago, we had light rain. It was humid. The high last year was 79 degrees. The record high of 92 was set in 1948.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:52 pm with sun having an altitude of 51.3° from the due south horizon (-19.6° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 4.8 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 6:34 pm with the sun in the west (270°). 📸 The sunset is in the west (276°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 7:11 pm after setting for 2 minutes and 55 seconds with dusk around 7:37 pm, which is one minute and 46 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 8:13 pm. At sunset, look for partly cloudy skies 🌃 and temperatures around 67 degrees. The dew point will be 62 degrees. There will be a calm wind. Today will have 12 hours and 39 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 50 seconds over yesterday.

I was thinking 💭 today would be the day to go to Walmart 🛒 and get all the things on my list 📃 that Hannaford didn’t have at a good price, but I might wait until tomorrow as I want to go for an evening walk and then I can get fresh spinach, berries or anything else I might want. I think it will be warm enough tomorrow to wear shorts to work but I want to try on 34×32 pants 👖 for l size before I order a few more pair online. I’m going to one of these days put most of my XXL clothes into the attic, as they really don’t fit well anymore and they really look like when I wear them I’m starving and just got out of a concentration camp. Plus between the too large and good fitting clothes, I really have too many to put in my dresser.

Tonight will be partly cloudy 🌃 , with a low of 53 degrees at 5am. Typical for tonight. Maximum dew point of 62 at 6pm. Calm wind. 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 32 occurred back in 1963.

Weekend still looks cool and sunny, though some models show more clouds then sun on Saturday. 😎 Saturday, partly sunny, with a high near 72. Maximum dew point of 53 at 4pm. Sunday, mostly sunny, with a high near 76. Maximum dew point of 56 at 12pm. Typical average high for the weekend is 75 degrees.

Looking ahead but not necessarily forward, there are 2 weeks until More Night then Day 🌌 when the sun will be setting at 6:46 pm with dusk at 7:12 pm. I guess it means more time by the campfire in the evening. 🔥 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.

Indian Ladder Farms

Those forty inch jeans 👖 don’t really fit anymore and are so baggy

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I really need to get some new jeans that are better fitting though I only got this pair a few months ago, not realizing what was despite the warnings I was given. Especially because the Salvation Army shirt I got is so nicely fitting. Still I’m hesitant to invest in a new clothes of any expense as I know what I’m up against in a culture that prioritizes low quality calories, excessive sugar and fat. I’m good but the social pressures are so bad, and it can be lonely eating things that are actually half decent for you.

Good morning! Happy Tuesday. Rain and 66 degrees at the Elm Ave Park and Ride. ☔ There is a north-northeast breeze at 5 mph. 🍃. The dew point is 66 degrees. The skies will clear tomorrow around 2 pm.

Too rainy 🌧️ for the morning walk and I wasn’t moving fast enough to catch the earlier bus 🚍 downtown. The rain let up and I walked down to the later express 🚏but in part I delayed as I didn’t really want to do laps in the Plaza in part because that would add another time up and down the eighteen flights at work and I didn’t want to do that. Lousy excuse but I’m still not doing elevators at work.🛗 It’s stupid, I’m not afraid of the state elevators and I’m sure the state police 🚨 would come and rescue me when the elevator breaks down but I like the exercise of climbing 🧗‍♂️ all those stairs. The worse thing that could happen is I get trapped in the elevator with the head of the Assembly Republicans and after a few awkward seconds maybe talk about deer 🦌 hunting or something in the wilderness.

Morning was eggs 🍳 with a bunch of onions, spinach, and peppers. Lots of fiber and protein there. Had a few cups of coffee ☕ though I really should cut back on the fluids as I’ve been having to piss a lot due to 6000pall the water I’ve been consuming from the watermelon 🍉, zucchini 🍆, egg plant and the fruit 🍏 I’ve been eating. Last night was breaded egg plant with panto breadcrumbs using egg as a glue, with a sauce made from tomatoes, jalapeños, onions and Italian spices and a bit of dried Parmesan on top. Broccoli 🥦 on the side. It was good in the broiler all crispy.

Today will have showers, with thunderstorms also possible after 3pm. 🌦 High of 71 degrees at 3pm. 11 degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around September 24th. Maximum dew point of 69 at 2pm. 🏖️ Northeast wind around 6 mph. Chance of precipitation is 80%. New rainfall amounts between a quarter and half of an inch possible. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies in the morning with a few breaks of sun the afternoon. The high last year was 87 degrees. The record high of 96 was set in 1959.

Another work day today, then one tomorrow, then it’s off to camp in the Adirondacks. 🏕 I’m not sure how nice Friday will be and Saturday looks chilly up north, but I might end up bringing both the heater and bug screen, along with tarps. 📚 I’m sure Lynne is going to ask if I want to go to the Guilderland Meeting regarding the Senior Home Development in the Pine Bush 🌲 but I’ll see if I can get out of that because I don’t feel that great, and I’m tired of attending meetings regarding the Pine Bush, yelling and screaming and being mocked in the press. 📰  I really have other priorities, and I’d like to get books from the library and get packed for camping. I doubt I’ll leave before early on Thursday morning, but if I get ready, it’s less to do tomorrow. Pine Bush stuff is kind of important, but I don’t want to be on the forefront, and so many of these hearings and being shoved down by the town board is kind of boring. Plus I have salmon 🐟 to cook up tonight with spinach, and I’m looking forward to that on this rainy night.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 1:01 pm with sun having an altitude of 61.5° from the due south horizon (-9.3° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 3.3 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 7:20 pm with the sun in the west-northwest (284°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-northwest (290°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 7:59 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 4 seconds with dusk around 8:28 pm, which is one minute and 27 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 9:07 pm. At sunset, look for rain 🌧 and thunderstorms 🌩 and temperatures around 70 degrees. The dew point will be 67 degrees. There will be a calm wind. Today will have 13 hours and 58 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 32 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will have a chance of showers and thunderstorms before 1am, then a slight chance of showers between 1am and 2am. Mostly cloudy 🌧, with a low of 65 degrees at 4am. Four degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 68 at 6pm. East wind around 5 mph becoming south after midnight. Chance of precipitation is 40%. New rainfall amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch, except higher amounts possible in thunderstorms. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies. It got down to 58 degrees. The record low of 41 occurred back in 1972.

In 1969, the Woodstock Music Festival Opens on Max Yasgur’s dairy farm in Bethel, 🎧 🎸🎷 much to the distaste of his neighbors and fellow community members. 🐮 I’m sure he just thought of it as a way to make some money on a wet, muddy field that wasn’t growing much hay or silage that year due to the weather. He used to run the largest dairy farm in Sullivan County. Of course, they cut his milk contract in subsequent years, and was forced out of the dairy business. His son would go on to be the Sullivan County Clerk some years later. And the farm became a tourist destination in recent years. 🗑 The hippies trashed the land more then Yasgur could have ever expected, to say nothing of what they did to the neighbors. And he just wanted a little money from the hippies, and expected after the weekend, the muddy field could be tilled up and put back in production.

On this day in 1970, President Richard Nixon completes the break from the gold standard by ending convertibility of the United States dollar into gold by foreign investors. 💰 Much was made out of it, but truth be told the US hadn’t been pegging it’s currency to gold since the 1930s and by the 1960s the value of the US currency had grown with the size of the economy and inflation, it was getting harder and harder to come up with enough gold to settle the currency, especially as investors sought more gold as a hedge of growing inflation as the sixties slid into the 1970s. 📈 Truth be told, regardless had the gold standard ended or not, the gas crisis would have still occurred, and it would have done a lot of damage to economy, though a lot of that was baked in after the sixties, and all the post-war expansion including the baby boom and the construction of the Interstate system which produced a enormous boom that was petering out by the seventies as major legs of the system were finalized. 🛣

Cool but sunny this weekend. 😎 Saturday, mostly sunny, with a high near 75. Maximum dew point of 58 at 2pm. Sunday, sunny, with a high near 84. Maximum dew point of 64 at 4pm. Typical average high for the weekend is 82 degrees. Actually, Sunday will be fairly warm and muggy. But Friday the high is only 66 degrees with rain showers. I am going to bring my heater up north I guess this weekend, along with the screen tent as the bugs may be bad. 🎪 I wasn’t sure if I was going to bring my kayak up north, but Sunday could be a very nice day for kayaking on the Mohawk River around Moss Island, 🛶 especially if I do a bike ride first. Although do I want to spend more time at the Potholers at Piseco-Powley? 🏊‍♀️ Decisions! 🤔

Looking ahead, there are 11 weeks until Halloween 🎃 when the sun will be setting at 5:51 pm with dusk at 6:19 pm. On that day in 2022, we had partly cloudy, rain showers and temperatures between 64 and 37 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 56 degrees. We hit a record high of 75 back in 2019.

When Big Bay turns north to Piseco Lake it becomes too shallow to navigate

Went for a hike at Norman’s Kill Ravine at 7:30 pm. Not a good idea, made it back to my bike at 9 pm.

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To be fair, the online reviews said it would be an 1 ½ hour hike to do the full loop. However, I thought I could always turn back and there would be short cut trails. But there aren’t as many trails as shown on OpenStreetMap and turning back wasn’t super easy option as the trail is one way and blazed in one direction only, the terrain is quite rugged and overgrown with lots of mountain bike paths cut through whose direction is not obvious.

Plus I really need to think about getting a much brighter headlight on my bike for riding through those dark suburban subdivisions or in the woods. Tail light is okay but not great but the headlight which I’ve had since my college days is a really shitty halogen flashlight bulb which replacing the batteries only made marginally brighter.

I’ll post photos tomorrow they’re on my other camera.