I always enjoy that trip. Gives me something to look forward to at the end of the day, the fresh air and the scenic gorge, even if it means that big uphill climbing out of the Norman’s Kill Ravine. But come the time change, it will be dark by the time I get out of work most days, so I won’t be able to ride home from work. That said, I do plan to ride on in on mornings when it’s still decent out and can take my bicycle home on the bus.
Turmeric, Ginger and Less Omega 6 Fats 🧑🍳
Lately I’ve noticed how much less achy I find myself. I am thinking it’s mostly due to my better choices in eating but also because of all the turmeric, ginger I eat and how much less omega 6 fatty acids I’m consuming by eating less meat.
Watching next week’s forecast for Tucker County like a hawk 🦉
Or is it that an owl? I am studying it so carefully, but once we get beyond next week it looks pretty good but things could change, but I’m hopeful. I mean I’ve all but got my truck into drive and heading due to Tucker County. But maybe it will actually happen next weekend.
Good morning! Happy Sunday. Partly cloudy and 50 degrees in Delmar, NY. ⛅ There is a north-northwest breeze at 8 mph. 🍃. The skies will clear around 7 pm.
Working on some maps 🗺 this morning and then I’ll go for a bike ride 🚲 out to Five Rivers Environmental Education Center for a while. Might then bike out to New Scotland and then who knows where. 💨 A bit windy this morning for sure. Decided on a simple breakfast 🥣 of cream of wheat, chia seeds, shredded apple and Greek yogurt. 🍏 With lots of cinnamon and ginger of course. I was up before six this morning and it was super dark like usual and I’m not super motivated this morning. 🤷♂️ Nice sunny day ☀ but with the wind, kind of cold.
Today will be partly sunny 🌞, with a high of 57 degrees at 2pm. Five degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around October 27th. Northwest wind 8 to 13 mph. A year ago, we had partly cloudy skies in the morning with some clearing in the afternoon. The high last year was 69 degrees. The record high of 86 was set in 1897. There was a dusting of snow in 1939.❄
Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:42 pm with sun having an altitude of 38.9° from the due south horizon (-31.9° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 7.4 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 5:37 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (253°). 📸 The sunset is in the west (259°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 6:15 pm after setting for 2 minutes and 57 seconds with dusk around 6:42 pm, which is one minute and 37 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 7:16 pm. At sunset, look for partly cloudy skies 🌃 and temperatures around 53 degrees. There will be a northwest breeze at 10 mph. Today will have 11 hours and 8 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 47 seconds over yesterday.
Tonight will have isolated showers after midnight. Mostly cloudy 🌧, with a low of 44 degrees at 2am. Three degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 8th. Northwest wind around 9 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. 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 38 degrees. The record low of 25 occurred back in 1978.
Not too bad of an afternoon … 🚲 🍎🛒 🍞 🥘 👨🍳
Do I wish I was in Pennsylvania tonight, over-nighting at County Bridge Campground on my way down to West Virginia tomorrow? Sort of yes, though it would be wet and miserable tonight in Penna., but I still made the most of the afternoon into the evening.
Most of the afternoon I was dragging my butt, showered and aired up the tires on my bike to 50 PSI as they had gone below 40 PSI. Boy, oh boy do they ride rougher at 50 PSI. And I wonder why my truck rides like shit running the tires at 42-45 PSI. I run them hard too, a lot of people run them closer to 35 PSI but I’d rather reduce fuel consumption and tire wear, though that doesn’t help with the natural toe out that those big tires have. At any rate, hard tires ride hard even if they are more efficient.
Sort of raced out to Indian Ladder Farms along the bike trail, though traffic was fairly light due to the cloudy and cool weather. I heard the 4 PM chime as I was heading into Font Grove so I knew time was tight. But when I got to Indian Ladder Farms, it didn’t seem like they were packing shop up at 5 PM it was packed, with a swinging rock band and crowds at the hard-cider place. Me on the bicycle just locked up my bike on the split-log fence next to the entrance and walked. Disappointed with the selection of apples, it seems like more and more of the store has been taken over by gifts and knick-knacks, and they only have a tiny selection of what-seemed like overpriced-apples and even less of vegetables.
I was so spoiled by Golden Harvest Orchards in Kinderhook what now was almost two weeks ago with their cheap prices and wide selection of fruits and vegetables. Excuse to ride the Albany Electric Trail and spend more time poking around that O-K town! Though I probably have to drive at least part of the way there. At any rate, I got my half-peck of apples for eleven bucks at Indian Ladder,, got in line and got out of there craziness. I had no interest in the cider doughnuts, in part because of the line but also because it’s just not my thing anymore. I’d much rather savor good apples, fresh, shredded with lots of cinnamon and ginger or fried in some olive oil with aforementioned spices and maybe a dash of stevia in the friyng pan. I want to enjoy my fruit, not have it bathed with so much sugar and saturated fats, even if occasionally a little sweetness doesn’t hurt. I think next time in a week I might just get apples that are on sale in bag at Hannaford rather then ride out to Indian Ladder, though it was a very scenic ride towards the end by the orchard, despite the gray skies, heavy traffic and piss poor leaf color this year. Good ride though, 17 miles round trip.
Stopped at Hannaford on way back to stock up on brown rice and green lentils again as I’m almost out, and that’s an essential as the work week is coming up sooner then I want to admit. After I got back home, put the oatmeal-whole wheat bread in the oven, along with spaghetti squash, sweet potatoes, a couple of chopped up apples in a separate pan. Baked for 40 minutes to an hour, the bread was done first. I kneaded the bread this morning after breakfast — another good simple wholesome bread containing just whole-wheat flower, water, yeast, oatmeal (not ground) and some sea salt, topped with a bit of sea salt and several flakes of oatmeal — allowed to rise all day.
To serve over the spaghetti squash I made red lentil soup — probably the Indians would call it curry though not following any recipe in particular. It was made by boiling the heck out of a bad red lentils until they were basically mush, frying up some onions, tossing them in, along with a bunch of frozen spinach, and frozen stir fry vegetables. Added a bunch of turmeric and smoked paprika and cooked it down, it was amazing over that spaghetti squash with that oatmeal bread dipped in, some sweet potatoes on the side, and baked apple for dessert. I won’t say it was an instant TV dinner though I did have a Youtube streaming on my phone in the kitchen, but I doubt I spent an hour cooking and I was very happy with the results and have many more good meals to eat in the coming days just ready to be pulled out of the cupboard or the refrigerator.
Maybe it’s not real food or something normal people would call dinner without tons of sugar and saturated fat, but it filled me up quickly and was yummy by my weird sense of taste that goes for earthy, flavorful and healthy over sweet and fatty. I’m happy, even if your not!
Georefrencing! 🌐
Georefrencing is the creation of control points on map and using georefrencing software like what is built into QGIS to project an old or otherwise unprojected map onto a modern map using GIS software.
Lately I’ve been doing more and more of it. I started learning it for reprojecting historical aerial photos but lately I’ve discovered how powerful the software is projecting both historical maps and maps that are in government reports and permits.
Like a Sexually Abused Child That Shoots Up a School 🇮🇱 🇵🇸
I was listening to more of the news coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict and those were the first thoughts that came to my mind. Hamas so viciously attacked Israel because it’s people, the Palestinians have been so abused at the hands of the Israelis over the years. Why have the Israelis abused the Palestinians so much, forcing them into tiny walled cities, much like the Nazis did the Jews? Mostly because they’re set on continuing the cycle of violence as they’ve learned and grown up under the worse of the worse.
It’s been 80 years since World War II was underway and all the atrocities it involved. But the actions of the Nazis against the Jews and other minorities haven’t stopped hurting, all these years later. A fear and hatred, and oppression that was put upon the Nazis from the world powers after World War I with numerous penalties put on the German nation for starting the first World War.
A cycle of violence unbroken. 🕊
Murder, terror, and war crimes can not and should not go unpunished. You can’t not arrest a school shooter, because he was sexually abused by his parents. Hamas is a threat not just to Israel but to world as a whole. It’s leaders need to be put behind bars, punished for the lives taken and harmed. But the oppression of the Palestinians by the Israelis can’t be ignored. Leaders who commit war crimes, engage in terror need to be punished.
Nobody of good conscience can have sympathy for the Hamas leadership’s actions against Israel, but at the same time, one can understand why many people tolerate or even sympathize with their efforts to liberate the Palestine people. The cycle of abuse needs to end, powerful counties shouldn’t abuse minorities, and minorities shouldn’t retaliate using murder and terror.
I’m not one to get involved in protests or even share my thoughts on social media, lest the wave of negative comments. But I have my views, as unpopular as they may be in some quarters. Maybe my views come out of my disdain for the mainstream media and political thought, but I can’t stand to see minorities oppressed and the constant drum-beat of conformity demanding support for America’s preferred winners in conflict.
Not the nicest day ever but it’s not raining. I say that a lot these days, lol. 😂 ☁
I was up at 5:30 this morning to make breakfast and get going, and then it was dark, sat down at my computer and finally figured out how to calculate mile points along roads and trails. Doesn’t seem like a major accomplishment but the code turned out to be something I’ve been racking my brain over the past year or so, though when I finally got it to work, it was fairly simple to implement in reality.
Good afternoon! Mostly cloudy and 55 degrees in Delmar, NY. ☁ Calm wind. The dew point is 45 degrees. The skies will clear tomorrow around 4 am. Not a real beautiful day, did see a brief break of blue sky but it’s dull and overcast again now. Not heading down to Pennsylvania or West Virginia today but those days will come, or so I tell myself.
I was up early and it was dark. 🌇 The pancakes I made up with ground oatmeal and some quinoa were good 🥞 I added a banana to the mix for sweetness 🍌 and topped with lots of frozen blueberries 💙 and sugar-free maple syrup. I might end up eventually switching back over to real maple syrup but the low calorie nature of the prior is good, and it’s much cheaper. Maybe come next spring, when it’s fresh. And maybe only as a treat. It’s good to use up the quinoa — it’s better now that I’ve started to wash it better and it cook it longer to get rid of the bitterness but it’s not my favorite breakfast food just in a mushy bowl. But it’s surprisingly good mixed into the oatmeal pancakes.
Also continuing on the oatmeal theme 🍵 (I bought more oatmeal this week), I decided to make oatmeal bread up this morning with whole wheat flour, water, yeast and a bit of salt. Also included shredded carrots 🥕 in the mix to boost fiber levels and give it more texture along with the oatmeal. I keep trying to make healthy meals, while keeping things interesting through variety. The apple bread the other week I wasn’t pleased with due to the lack of salt and fat in it, but the garlic bread I made was delicious. I topped the oatmeal bread with oatmeal and a bit more sea salt for good measure. I plan to bake tonight with spaghetti squash and sweet potatoes at the same time in a very full oven, and then reheat more pea soup — though I’ve thought about making up soup with the red lentils, salt, turmeric and other spices. That might be good, especially after my bike ride. 🚴♀️
Been reading and studying map making 🗺 in the effort to get better at GIS and make better more useful maps for the blog, make more ad revenue and expand my skill set. One of the big things I’m trying to master is label placement in QGIS. Automatic label placement often sucks, but I’m not very good at manually working with labels in QGIS. In modern versions of QGIS manual label placement isn’t hard but I find it rather confusing as I’ve never used the manual label placement options much and they aren’t always super obvious how to use them. Like how do only show desired labels using manual label positioning, rather then suppressing them? You can change one of the override settings to do that but it’s non-obvious. Plus I’ve been learning all about pinning labels, a concept I didn’t know much about until I spent some time reading and experimenting. Labels are important for quality maps but I have to admit I was very ignorant on how they all worked in QGIS.
This afternoon will be cloudy ☁, with a high of 58 degrees at 2pm. Four degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around October 24th. Maximum dew point of 46 at 4pm. Light north wind. A year ago, we had cloudy skies in the morning with more sun in the afternoon. The high last year was 67 degrees. The record high of 81 was set in 1920.
The war on mice continues. 🐁 I literally caught three more last night. I think one was that big fat sucker I tossed outside yesterday in my boxers and t shirt full of shaving cream like a girl 🧒 yesterday. He got back inside and caught again. I haven’t set up the bucket trap this year but I did do both the spring traps and the sticky traps the later which I find works well with a big glob of peanut 🥜 butter which I won’t eat anymore but I’m find using it up catch mice. Lol, I haven’t heard anymore today in the walls but I envision there are hundreds 💯 in my kitchen at night when I’m not looking. 🙀 I guess I need a barn cat for my apartment. I’m not into pets that I can’t eat 🐐🐖🐄 but I could see the utility of having a cat.
I am still thinking about going for a bike ride out to Indian Ladder Farms. 🍏 👈 🚲 I’m just not motivated with the weather today, and I’ve been playing a lot around with maps and code this morning. I am so proud that I finally figured out how to Create Mile Points from a LINESTRING or MULTILINESTRING in R. While the final code I wrote was pretty trivial, it took me a long time to figure out my way around the details, and overcome some of my coding mistakes in earlier versions. It is quite a handy little piece of code, I should not. I plan to use it for a lot of projects in the future.
Tonight will have a New 🌚 Moon with 0% illuminated. At 12 PM, the moon was in the south-southeast (169°) at an altitude of 39° from the horizon, some 247,147 miles away from where you are looking up from the earth. 🚀 At the state speed limit of 55 mph, you’ll make it there by April 19th. Buckle up for safety! 💺 The moon will set in the west-southwest (258°) at 6:12 pm. The Hunter 🏹 Moon is on Sunday, October 29. The darkest hour is at 12:42 am, followed by dawn at 6:39 am, and sun starting to rise at 7:08 am in the east (100°) and last for 2 minutes and 57 seconds. Sunrise is one minute and 10 seconds later than yesterday. 🌄 The golden hour ends at 7:46 am with sun in the east-southeast (107°). Tonight will have 12 hours and 50 minutes of darkness, an increase of 2 minutes and 48 seconds over last night.
Tonight will be mostly cloudy ☁️, with a low of 43 degrees at 6am. Two degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 11th. North wind 3 to 6 mph. In 2022, we had clear skies in the evening, which became partly cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 38 degrees. The record low of 27 occurred back in 1978.
In four weeks on November 11 the sun will be setting in the west-southwest (247°) at 4:38 pm (Standard Time),🌄 which is one hour, 38 minutes and 20 seconds earlier then today. I won’t be able to ride the bike home from work at that point. In 2022 on that day, we had rain and temperatures between 69 and 48 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 51 and 33 degrees. The record high of 70 degrees was set back in 2002. Those days will be here before you know it.
Looking ahead, Daylight Savings Time Ends 🛥️ in 3 weeks, Veterans Day 🇺🇸 is in 4 weeks, Average High is 50 🍂 is a month away, Regular Deer Season in Southern Zone 🦌 is in 5 weeks, Small Business Saturday 🛍️ is in 6 weeks, Average High is 40 🌨 is in 8 weeks, Earliest Sunset of the Year ⌛️ is in 8 weeks, Tea Party Day 🐍 is in 9 weeks, Festivus 🍖 is in 10 weeks, Bacon Day 🥓 is in 11 weeks.
