Going to be a warm one for early October. Dry too, which is not great for my eyes or for burning shit. Got to watch out for those Chinese Uncles that everywheres these days. Apparently they don’t understand what it means to be living in Trump’s world. Thinking of heading down to Columbia and Dutchess Counties today.But first listening to some Country Joe and Fish and packing my day pack and bike, enjoying that ever sweet smell of the corn silage. No getting stoned with the dry eye.
I need to fire up Red and get him off the lawn, 🛻where he has sat since last Saturday when they re-sealed the driveway. Probably killing the grass. I should have moved him mid-week but I was busy all the different things going on and I was riding bike to work all week so no need to fire him up. 🚲 It wasn’t a bad night down at the Town Park after work, still wasn’t super dark until around 7 PM. I rode home without eye protection, though it did kind of dry out my eyes.
I was going to go out to Schoharie today and do an overnight, 🔥 but with the fire risk and burn ban making people give you stink eyes when you even mention having a campfire or smoking pot in the wilderness, and the whole common sense thing, I think it be better to instead do day trip today and maybe just ride out to Five Rivers tomorrow and hike maybe at one of the other preserves before going out to see the folks on Sunday. I soaked more kidney beans overnight for cooking this morning but I’ll wait until I get home this evening or maybe tomorrow morning.
I think instead I’ll head out to Columbia and Dutchess County. 🍁 🚶 Thinking maybe the Beebe Hill Fire tower, then head down one town to Hillsdale, park and spend the balance of the day riding the Harlem Valley Rail Trail. 🚲 I’ve been thinking of riding and exploring the Harlem Valley Rail Trail for some time now. Then maybe check out the Greenport Conservation Area before dark, then take US 9W back north. I doubt those homesteaders off US 9W with all the goats and hogs that get into a tizzy with the town about the smell that always used to have a burn barrel going won’t be having a fire today, even if they burned far far the ban in 2009. 🔥 I kind of like their homestead, too bad so much of what they’re doing with their land is illegal in New York. 🚜 Fucking whining liberals.
I am a little worried about my eyes getting excessively dry from riding but I can wear my sunglasses 😎 which should help, and some of the dry eye is caused by looking at my phone 📱 and other devices, which apparently discourage blinking. I guess if they get too dry, put in more eye drops and stop riding. 🚲 I need to grease up the chain and crank as it’s creaking again, but I can do that out on the trail. ⚙️ I always carry grease, tools, and an air pump with me at all times.
I need to get to Walmart and evaluate what my options are for dry eye treatment going forward – preservative free solution is probably the best and most soothing, and while I do a mostly full vial at work and one unopened one in office, I do see it being used up quickly and it’s rather expensive. Plus I don’t want to get addicted to artificial tears 😭 which is always a risk. There is other supplies I need at Walmart too like more eggs, cornmeal and I’m sure other things I can’t think of immediately. 🛒 Well maybe when the day comes to an end, as darkness is earlier and earlier this evening.
I say I’m recovering quickly from my eye surgery 👁️ but the dry eye issues keep popping up even though they seem to have gotten better especially as I keep my eyes wet. But it’s about finding the right balance of keeping your eyes wet, while not spending too much on solution or becoming dependent on it. Wetness helps the nerves and cornea grow back together quickly and strengthens my vision. It’s actually so sharp both in the day and night. But it still doesn’t seem great at times with the irratation. 🌃 I do think the LASIK place really undersold the dry eye risk, though in the majority of cases the nerves grow back and you do recover eventually.
Still thinking Columbus Day Weekend I’ll head north for a week, 🍂 I just want it to be a little wetter and less dusty. Between the road dust, the campfire smoke, the dry eyes caused by the marijuana and the fire risk, I really want rain. 🌧️ Right now, smoking pot with dry eyes just sounds painful. 😭 Plus I get tired of the Chinese Uncles, mostly on the internet or elsewhere being like OMG! you terrible had a small campfire 🔥 after dark when you can see embers during the burn ban, you awful person even if it’s legal if not recommended. Or even worse, running into one of them in the wilderness. 🌲🌲 And people complain that I make too much noise blasting holes in shit with my shotgun. 🔫 The culture of Chinese Uncles is not just ruining the internet, the Democratic Party, and the world more generally.
Two weeks of household trash mixed with motor oil and light fluid and wood went up into smoke. I remarked how black and pungent the smoke truly was.
At one level I get why they banned burn barrels and rednecks burning their garbage. Some things are pretty noxious to burn, full of carcenogenic chemicals. Still much burns down to little more than water vapor and carbon dioxide. I get the stench but life has pungent smells especially in rural areas where food and fiber are raised and processed, but the liberals are so obnoxious.
While the seasonal burn ban really only impacts brush pile burning and not small campfires for warming and cooking food, it’s been dry so one needs to be extra careful like I was a few weeks ago up at Rennselaerville State Forest and in the Green Mountains National Forest – the later now completely banning campfires outside of developed campgrounds. Hopefully soon we will get rain.
It wasn’t a fait accompli that I was going to take my week off to go to the Adirondacks starting this evening. But I sort of wanted to do this week before all the colors were gone midweek with the expected and much needed rain coming. Yet, I was so busy with work and everything else, plus I have a lot of events I would otherwise miss next week. And that rain would have impacted my mid week when I planned to be at Horseshoe Lake. And dumped me up at the St Regis Canoe Area during the busy Columbus Day Weekend where solitude might be hard to come by.
If fire danger meant no fires all week up in the wilderness that would mean many long cold nights in the wilderness next to the heater. Plus all the accumulated trash from a week camping. I’m sorry, not having a fire in the woods ain’t real camping regardless of what you say. I hate separating out all the otherwise burnable packaging and cleaning it for recycling.
Some day when I own my own land, I will continue to burn whatever paper and plastic I can, but in ways superior to a stinky smoldering burn barrel. Something that can easily consume multiple feed sacks of packaging garbage, that is the packaging of things that I can’t produce or reuse on my own land. Have lots of garbage cans so I can avoid burning in the driest of weather but also have the satisfaction of knowing every wrapper I toss ends up in the mound on the outskirts of town.
I know eventually it will rain again, and I’ll be able to spend nights again in the wilderness with fires. And in the meantime I can dramatically cut back on my trash output by once again washing out containers and separating them for the urban single stream recycling either in my parents or neighbors bin, or taking it to the transfer station. And even if I don’t get out camping this weekend or having a fire this weekend, it’s not the end of the world, other day trips end other adventures can be planned. I’ve been craving to explore the Harlem Valley Trail for some time now.
I was a bit creeped out by waiting for that bus at Delaware and Morton at quarter after 10, especially with the black kids racing and giggling down the street, having fun like kids, dodging in and out of traffic.
Cue all the racist stereotypes of gang bangers and muggers, 👦🏿👦🏿👦🏾👦🏾👦🏽👦🏿 reinforced every day by the Trumpster and I was a bit nervous. I don’t know, just kids and yokel locals and my phone and bike aren’t particularly nice but I did quickly stick it in my pocket like any good racist and was willing to flee on bike. Just a lot of kids out and about on such a warm and pleasant evening for early October. One thing that amazed me though was how awesome my vision 👀 since having my eye surgery a week ago. While there is still some minor halos around the street lights 💡, really things were so bright and clear. Maybe it’s because the city has invested in better streetlights when they went to brighter LED lights, but I felt like things were not dark or dull at all last night. Even in the darkness of the suburbs, it didn’t seem so dark. The bus was about 10 minutes late due to construction 🚧 on Delaware Avenue but it eventually arrived, and I made it home. I had some trouble with the bike rack 🚲 on the bus, it is very tight being a new unit and being that one style they use, but once it was on, it was very secure. Good because Delaware is rough in parts due to the construction.
It was a productive meeting, 🧑💼👨🏼💼💼 and I think we made some good arguments about why they should not permit solar development ☀️ there. But it left me so tired and it was late for sure. It was good after a very quiet day at work. 🖥️ After a past few weeks, things have been very quiet in the office. Rode in yesterday, but today was particularly nice. I am still so exhausted from last night though.
Headphones 🎧 are now working again, after not charging properly. I had accidentally washed them in the machine last week, and while they sort of worked good for a while – got rid of all the ear wax plugging them 👂, they weren’t charging properly. 🔌 But a good cleaning with a q-tip and some rubbing alcohol they are charging well. They are kind of essential for my mental health, especially while working in the office. 🧠 The tunes provide a good distraction, especially when I’m coding.
By the time I was home due to construction and the late meeting, 🚧 I stepped off the bus and breathed in that sweet smell of corn silage from Preska’s dairy. 🌽 🐮 It smelled absolutely amazing, really an intoxicating experience with it’s sweetness. I got home, cooked up some onions, beens and some of the remaining zucchuni I had, 🍳 headed to bed, but after a night of talking politics and the Pine Bush and carefully reviewing the proposal for a solar farm in a large part o the Albany Pine Bush, ☀️ I was pretty amped up and could not get to sleep.
Plus I was reading about the DEC burn ban, 🔥 which is really just the typical seasonal burn ban for large bonfires and bursh piles, though I guess they’re starting it a week early due to the dryness. Campfires and cooking fires are still allowed, though it’s obvious they’re trying to discourage it due to the fire risk. I guess I don’t need to save all those burnables for fire starting, I’ll have to do the green thing, 🌎 and start separating out the milk jugs and junk mail for recycling rather then fire starting. ♻️ Indeed, was up in Rensselearville State Forest two weeks ago, and even Vermont the week before that, I was very concerned and careful with fire, making sure to drown it out before bed, and keeping it well under the three-foot limit. But that’s not the reason I decided to put off my Adirondack Trip until next weekend. 🏕️ Most of it is my concern about my dry eyes, I can’t imagine spending all day riding in the dry air with so much irriation. 👀 I know things will get better over time, but the weather is certainly not helping.
Probably next week regardless I’ll head up north. 🏕️ Hoping the Wednesday rain showers ☔ are a little more substantial in the North Country, and if I do have a fire 🔥 up north I’ll keep it small. Probably things will be past peek by then, but I would go up to Speculator area for the Columbus holiday weekend ⛵ and on Columbus Day head up to Horseshoe Lake 🧲 and I figure by Monday evening most of the campsites would be free and quiet. I’m hoping that in two week things wouldn’t be wet mid-week unless next week when they’re talking rain right in the middle of my trip. Then come Thursday, head up to Floodwood Road or maybe one of the other areas just off the St. Regis Canoe Area for the final three days, to ride the Adirondack Rail Trail 🚲 and paddle and portage the St. Regis Canoe Area ponds. Do need to fix the tires on my portage cart. Both are flat.
This weekend I’m not sure. Still thinking about Schoharie, or maybe I’ll just do a nice day hike or bike. 🚲 Maybe just Five Rivers. Need to decide what I want to do. 💭 Should be a beautiful weeekend but probably a bit too cold to swim, and certainly not a lot of water around in a lot of the creeks. And it’s not like I’m ready to leave tonight.
West Virigina is a coal mining state, but historiclaly and today. From here, you can see GOB piles -- garbage overburden piles -- from old coal mines on North Mountain, just north of the North Potamac gap.
The hum and growl of the trucks hauling garbage to dumping grounds on the hillside in Rennselear and the state workers grinding their way into the Empire State Plaza to work for state agency accroymn in an office abbreviated with 3 to 5 letters, boring a shit but glad as hell they aren’t working for the feds. And I’m riding my mountain bike to the suburban office next to old city garbage dump and sewage treatment plant after watching the den Hoed Dairy video of them hauling poo and water out to the fields on their 1970 Detroit Diesel, almost tasting the tangy smell of the manure and partially burnt off-road diesel on my tongue.
Been working on updating and organizing the datasets on my computer for map 🗺️ making. I got some new data from the DEC and I’ve been having speed and memory issues with loading the data, so I’ve been trying to figure out the right balance between storing things in Parquet and PostGIS databases for map making. I am also dissatisfied with the latest batch of maps I’ve been making, and trying to learn more about the latest labeling features in QGIS. It’s really confusing all the different options that program has. Then there was just a lot of random projects yesterday at Data Services 🖥️, and then I was in meetings all afternoon on Capitol Hill. 🎄 Important stuff like planning the Christmas Party and Pie Baking Contest. 🥧 I can’t believe we’re already thinking about the holiday. Hell, I’m already planning my November trips. Leaves will be gone before you know it, as I smell that sharp smell of Preska’s silage being packed for the ladies for the year.
Last night I was watching that video 📺 about catalytic converters and the advanced engine monitoring tools that keeps engines running in a range where the catalyst is important in urban areas where air pollution is a major issue. I could have done a lot of things last night, but after doing a quick shop and cooking dinner 🛒 I was pretty darn tired out and just wanted to lay back in bed until dark. I think wearing the eye anti-rub shields was inferring with my sleep so I skipped them as I figured I was close enough to a week out from my LASIK surgery. Yesterday, I was noticing how truly clear my vision was riding to the downtown meeting on the beautiful sunny ☀️ day. Still a bit of irriation at times but even that has gone away as is the red eye 👁️ which seems to be fading. I think I am now at that point where I don’t have to wear goggles for showering 🚿 so I can get my face clean and probably if it wasn’t October I could even hit up swimming hole. 🏊 Some people take longer to recover then others, though I admit I still need to regularly add artificial tears 😭 to my eyes to keep them from being irritated at times – and it’s best to use them before I start feeling the irriation again. Supposed to do that for 5 more weeks, we’ll see how that goes, they’re kind of expensive and pain. Contact solution or even the preservative red-eye solution might be okay, even if neither is as soothing as those little over packaged plastic bottles of expensive preserative-free artificial tears. I’ll see what Wally World has and for what price.
I need a plan for the weekend and the next week. 🏕️ Going to be a nice, colorful autumn weekend 🍁 so I should spend it up in the wilderness but I haven’t decided if next week I should go to the Adirondacks ⛰️ or wait for the next week. At one level I feel like I should rest up my eyes a bit more, 👀 all that time in wilderness with the dry conditions could only aggreviate the red eye issues. But on the other hand, I do feel great, and the first half of week looks excellent but Tuesday probably into Thursday looks more unstable and the Columbus Day Weekend looks cool. 🍂 If I wait another weekend, then the leaves are likely going to be well past peak in the Adirondacks, though it might be a lot quieter up north except for the occasional ringing out of gun fire by the deer hunters. 🦌 If I don’t go north this weekend, I do plan to head out to Schoharie at least for one overnight, so I can visit Shauls one more time before their closed for the year. Might be good colors along the Catskill Scenic Trail and nice riding there over the weekend. But who knows how cold and miserable the following week is going to be. Need to decide soon.
Truth is I have nothing packed or prepared for the weekend, 💼 but reality is that doesn’t really matter. I have an obnoxious Save the Pine Bush Meeting at 6 PM tonight, but I’m kind of hoping we’ll keep it brief and I can catch the 18 bus home at 6:50 PM or so I have time to pack. I really don’t need to go to the laundromat before whatever trip I do. I think I can make it through a week with whatever clothes I have if I decide to go to Adirondacks and get supplies before work on Friday, I really don’t need that much for the Adirondacks. Still the thing with going to ADKs is once you are up there, options for food and supplies is very limited – yes you can get a $3 can of greenbeans on Charlie John’s in Spectulator or A&P in Tupper Lake but those are your options. Fresh stuff, yeah right, maybe $1.50 a pound half spoiled bananas 🍌 if you’re lucky. Need underwear? Probably have to wait. Truth is in many ways I prefer traveling in other parts of the state, as I can always get lots of shit to buy, 🛒 at Wally World and Aldi’s. Terrible but it’s the truth, outside of the park it seems like the shopping options are unlimited on vation. Maybe I’m just addicted to that cheap plastic shit at Walmart that quickly get used up and tossed into the fire. 🔥
Would need to load the kayak up if I’m going north, but the truth is I don’t need that much for a week of camping 🏕️ and much of my gear is already in my truck. Really would be my last big adventure with Big Red though I’m thinking Stoney Pond and/or Charles Baker come November. I can’t believe we are already into 🐮 manuring season, and whole regions of state have seen their corn silage chopped. 🌽 The responsible thing would be to be in town next weekend – John Wolcott Underpass ribbon cutting is Wednesday and I’d miss a semi-important work meeting on Tuesday. 🍕 It’s a pizza lunch meeting, not Cardona’s, lol. 😁 I’m just worried the mid-week when I’m at Horseshoe Lake and Lows Lake will be a wash out, 🛶 crap for riding and paddling, only really good for laying around and drinking beer 🍻 and smoking weed. 🍁 The thing is if I wait another week, I know the leaves would be crap in Adirondacks. Maybe okay in Southern Tier or elsewhere, but I want to check out the St. Regis Canoe Area 🛶 and the Adirondack Rail Trail. Been years – really the pandemic year – since I was last up that far north.
I’d love to get to West VIrigina this autumn, but this ain’t the year with my creaky old truck. 🛻 Next autumn though for sure. I haven’t done the mid and northern Adirondacks in a long time – as I was noting. it will be great when I have small, new truck. I need continue researching trucks – probably get a Toyota with the off-road package and a cap, and I’m not going to jack it up I tell myself on 35 inch tires, though kind of want to. I should save money so someday I can own my own land, and actually be able to have livestock and burn shit. 🔥 Retirement that far away, and there a good chance that next truck will last until retirement. September was anoher good month for the blog, brought in $188 in ad revenue. August was a $244 buck month. All for making some maps and interesting things at least in my mind, talking about diesel and cow shit and burnt plastic and smoking marijuana in the National Forest. Or something like that, as none of that would be legal, don’t you know about the urban emissions laws 🏭 to keep our air clean and the planet green. 🌎 Well, those tankers of cow manure and water does help keep the fields green and growing.
