Personal
I’m thankful for small towns not too far from home
The country, the small towns, the rural life that is only a few minutes away when hopping in my pickup truck. While I don’t explore the backroads as much as I did in my younger years, I still spend a lot of time visiting small towns and camping in the wilderness. I always like seeing the farms, the mountains, the charming downtowns and businesses. While I don’t live in the country today, I know some day I’ll will again have that opportunity.
Restored Bimbo Box at the Colcon Collectors meet in Northampton
I remember Bimbo boxes as a kid at resturants. They were kind of silly, usually I was steered away from them as they really are a waste of money even if they are kind of good for a laugh. On the internet though, they're free to view on the Youtube.
Not quite as much of a rush today 🛻
That’s one advantage to driving in today, no bus to catch and I can leave later then if I were to ride in. Hopefully today I can get the spoke dropped in the wheel at lunch time and it remounted when I get home.
Still watching the forecast for the weekend, ⛈ Friday’s thunderstorms look problematic for heading out of town on Friday. Might do the quick over night and visit the Gas Up on my own. 🚜 Then with the warming trend, take the following Friday June 21st off – – and leave the Thursday night before for the Potholers for a three-day weekend. 🏊♂️ I am thinking about checking the patches on my tube, adding some fix-a-flat to ensure no leaks, and floating down the East Canada Creek not this week but the following week. 🛶 Also been thinking about paddling Lily Lake and doing some other kayaking locally. Almost thought about bringing my kayak into work today and kayaking the Hudson River after work, but it’s still kind of a cool and gray day – – and I might need to pick up my bike wheel after work.
Other then that I’ve been going through my list 📃 and realize there is a lot of things I missed at work on Monday. Random things came up between my two jobs that proved to be a distraction and got cranking out some maps 🗺 for the blog. Maybe I wasn’t ready to fully face 😔 the day on Monday. At any rate, it’s Tuesday and I’ll get the essentials done right away when I get into the office including running the report I forgot to run on Monday. Lunch time, I need to make sure to block off to get to Steiner’s to get that spoke put in. I’m really hopeful that gets done right away or can be done in the afternoon and I can pick the wheel up by leaving work a bit early. I don’t love driving in 🚘 even with the acres of parking 🅿 but hopefully this is a one shot deal.
Full shipping channel in Baltimore reopens nearly eleven weeks after Key Bridge collapse | WYPR
The Problem With YIMBY Economics
Kind of a mixed bag of a Monday 🛍️👀
I mean I’m not angry or depressed about how the day went, more of a mixed day with mixed emotions.
I got the wheel off the bike, and deflating the tube and tire full of fix-a-flat turned out to be far less of a mess then expected when I pulled the valve stem. 🚲 I was so sure I was going to end up with a face full of fix-a-flat. Sucks that I couldn’t ride to work today, but I’m pretty sure I can drive into work tomorrow, 🚘 and swing by Steiner’s a lunch time, they slap a perfectly spoke in there in 5 minutes, charge me $30 for the privilege, and I’ll be back on the road as soon as I mount the new tire and re-fill the tube. Bike speedometer dried out and is working again. Now I just have to reset all those settings on it, and get the repaired wheel back on my bike. No idea how or where I broke the spoke – – probably it was the rough riding up at Thacher Park – – I was having too much fun, abusing the bike. But that was more then a week and 150 miles ago, so I have my doubts that’s when I broke it. 🤷
Got home to two different checks in the mail – – one apparently is a letter for an unclaimed check from my dental provider prior to the pandemic. 🦷 I don’t remember even getting that check, but it was during the pandemic, so it probably got tossed and burnt up. ✒️ I got to get that notarized from the bank. 🏦 $59.30 – – money I didn’t know was mine. The other was from a vendor, who reimbursed me for sending back his ear pods he left in the conference room. At least he was true to his word.
Missed the express bus home today, 🚍 as the shuttle was stuck in traffic on the ramp to the Empire Plaza. The Express bus was ahead of us, I guess. Ended up catching the 5:45 PM bus home. It’s fine. I was home by 6:15 PM, as the local was on time, fried up some zucchini and onions with turmeric, salt and cornmeal. And had some frozen strawberries. 🍓 I’m good.
Heading out for a walk to the park now. 🏞 Blog revenue has been pretty good last three days, so that’s something I’m quite happy about. I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been posting new outdoors trail maps, or because more people are interested in finding place to camp and spend time in the wilderness. 🌲 I really could see both of them being truth. At least now the blog brings in more revenue with the ads then what I’ m spending for hosting and my two domains – – andyarthur.org and andyarthur.com. It’s good to own your name at any rate, as some point in the future I could put in on my resume, and it keeps me nimble and thinking and coming up with new skills and content for the blog.