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June 10, 2020 Morning

Good morning! What day is it? Hump Day from the Adirondacks, of course. Two weeks to Latest Sunset 🌆. Filtered sunshine and 62 degrees at the Speculator Village Park. ⛅ There is a southeast breeze at 8 mph. 🍃. The dew point is 56 degrees.

So camp is taken down once again 🎪 and after work today I’ll most likely head home. I’m out of food and ice, well except for some dry goods like peanut butter and jelly, some mustard and eggs. 🐮 I dumped out the last cup of so of milk in the milk jug in the cat hole 💩 before breaking camp because otherwise I figured it would go rancid and it already was two days expired. I had to take down camp as my three nights in I e location, as the regulations state, had expired. Plus I don’t think today will be a very good day for solar power. ☀

To start out my day, I walked down to the boat dock at Speculator Village Park ⛲ with my binoculars to observe birds 🐦 and ducks until the first email 📧 or call 📞 of the day comes in. I know at eleven o’clock the texting program gets underway and that should keep me busy the bulk of the day besides all the other memos 📝 written, database imports ⏫ and all other necessary tasks.

Today will be scattered showers between noon and 1pm, then scattered showers and thunderstorms after 1pm. Partlu cloudy ⛅ , with a high of 78 degrees at 3pm. One degree above normal, which is similar to a typical day around June 14th. Maximum dew point of 66 at 5pm. Southeast wind 8 to 13 mph. Chance of precipitation is 50%. New rainfall amounts between a quarter and half of an inch possible. A year ago, we had cloudy skies in the morning, which became light rain by afternoon. The high last year was 81 degrees. The record high of 96 was set in 2008.

I have my bathing suit and beach towel ready 🏊 should the weather be nice enough and I get a break to swim during lunch or after work. I’m not sure how stormy today will be but I’m sure we might get some large booms from thunder ⚡. While I’ve been washing my hands and rinsing out my hair and shaving each day, I could definitely use a good shower 🚿 when I get home as it’s been a week since I’ve had a good scrubbing. Been cool enough up north that I’ve not been swimming.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:58 pm with sun having an altitude of 69.6° from the due south horizon (-0.4° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 2.2 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 7:55 pm with the sun in the west-northwest (296°). 📸 The sunset is in the borthwest (304°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 8:39 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 31 seconds with dusk around 9:13 pm, which is 34 seconds later than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 10:01 pm. At sunset, look for rain 🌧 and thunderstorms 🌩 and temperatures around 71 degrees. The dew point will be 66 degrees. There will be a south-southeast breeze at 11 mph with gusts up to 21mph. Today will have 15 hours and 21 minutes of daytime, an increase of 44 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will be scattered showers and thunderstorms before 9pm, then a chance of showers between 9pm and 3am, then showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm after 3am. Some of the storms could produce heavy rain. Mostly cloudy 🌧, with a low of 67 degrees at 1am. 12 degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 67 at 10pm. South wind around 11 mph, with gusts as high as 21 mph. Chance of precipitation is 60%. New rainfall amounts between a quarter and half of an inch possible. In 2019, we had light rain in the evening, which became cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It was somewhat humid. It got down to 58 degrees. The record low of 36 occurred back in 1980.

Tomorrow I’ll run to the laundromat 👚 and continue unpack and get things cleaned up. It’s yet another work day but I can work remotely from my truck while at the laundromat. I’ll also need to get groceries. 🍲 I’ll call 📞 the shop 🔧 about them looking into the wear pattern on the tire, have them rotated and a synthetic oil change. I know the service light isn’t on yet but I always like to do oil changes early to avoid sludge build up. ⛽

On this day in 1964, United States Senate breaks a 75-day filibuster against the Civil Rights Act of 1964, leading to the bill’s passage. 👍 That was a big change back then and fifty years later I expect even further changes in our country. I’m glad police 🚨 reform and defund the police has gotten so much attention – I think it will make a big difference in the future of our country.

Cool but sunny this weekend and at least in Speculator. Saturday, a chance of showers. Partly sunny, with a high near 67. Chance of precipitation is 30%. Maximum dew point of 49 at 8pm. Sunday, a chance of showers. Partly sunny, with a high near 68. Chance of precipitation is 50%. Maximum dew point of 52 at 8pm. Typical average high for the weekend is 77 degrees.

Saturday I’ll probably walk out to Five Rivers 🚶 for bird watching 🐦 and then Sunday I’ll probably hike at one of the local preserves before going out to mom and dad’s house for Father’s Day. 👪 I’ll bring my own fork and knife 🍴 along with plate, and set up the screen tent 🎪 to help further social distancing. That said it’s at least in New York that pandemic is winding down at least for round 1.

I expect it’s likely that the Capital Region will be in Phase 3 of the reopening 🏢 and I’ll most likely be working downtown next week. Do I have any evidence of that? No. I’m just waiting to see when CDTA reopens. 🚍 I’ll probably be taking the 719 back and forth to work 💼 as that bus is rarely crowded, especially the 8:26 downtown.

As previously noted, there are 2 weeks until the Latest Sunset of the Year 🌆 when the sun will be setting at 8:42 pm with dusk at 9:18 pm. On that day in 2019, we had partly cloudy and temperatures between 85 and 56 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 80 degrees. We hit a record high of 96 back in 1943.

Silence

December 4, 2018 Evening

Good evening! Four weeks from now will be the New Year. Mostly clear at the freezing point in Delmar. There is a northwest breeze at 13 mph. 🍃. Cold day tomorrow, things will only start to thaw out at tomorrow around 1 pm. 🌡️ I guess it was cold tonight but then again the bus was early and I barely caught it. 🚌

Tonight will be mostly clear 🌃, with a low of 17 degrees at 5am. Eight degrees below normal, which is similiar to a typical night around December 27th. I guess late December isn’t that far away. Maximum wind chill around 20 at 12am; Northwest wind 6 to 11 mph becoming light in the evening. In 2017, we had mist in the evening, remaining overcast into the early morning. It got down to 39 degrees. The record low of 2 occurred back in 1989. I did turn the heat up a bit when I got home.

Tonight will have a Waning Crescent Moon 🌘 with 5% illuminated. The moon will rise at 5:10 am. The New Moon is on Thursday night with mostly cloudy skies. The Cold Moon 🌝 is on Friday, December 21st. The sun will rise at 7:09 am with the first light at 6:37 am, which is one minute later than yesterday. 🌄 Tonight will have 14 hours and 48 minutes of darkness, an increase of one minute and 9 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will have increasing clouds ☁, with a high of 33 degrees at 2pm. Seven degrees below normal, which is similiar to a typical day around December 23rd. Although it seems like lately it’s been warmer around Christmas. Calm wind. A year ago, we had freezing fog in the morning, which became mist by afternoon. The high last year was 53 degrees. The record high of 65 was set in 2001. 9 inches of snow fell back in 1902.❄

Remarkably pleasant morning for walking down to the express bus. Crisp but with proper dress it’s quite delightful with all that sun. 🌄Good thing I walked down to the Park and Ride as not only was it a nice walk I was the only one who boarded the 8:26 to downtown. Earlier buses are much more popular. 🚌

Lunchtime I walked on the plaza 🏃which was nice but cold. But I like the fresh air and the blue skies for a change, it gets tiresome looking at the same things over and over again doing laps inside the Empire State Plaza. I guess if I really wanted to get my heart pumping I’d climb the million dollar staircase in the Capital. It won’t be long before doing lapse in the concourse becomes difficult, with State of the State protestors.✊

Cool this weekend with temperatures running 7 degrees below normal but otherwise sunny. 😀 Saturday, mostly sunny, with a high near 30. Sunday, mostly sunny, with a high near 32. Typical average high for the weekend is 38 degrees. Then quite possibly a warming trend for the next week with lots of sun.

It looks like most of next week should be sunny and relatively nice out in the Finger Lakes. Seasonal temperatures which means cold but snow free and they don’t have a lot of snow out there. 🌞 I am off next week to finally do my November camping trip. ⛺ Granted it’s now December but the weather looks nice. Maybe 10 degrees colder, 10 minutes earlier sunset but either side of the deer regular hunting season is about the same.

In four weeks on January 1 the sun will be setting at 4:33 pm,🌄 which is 10 minutes and 51 seconds later then tonight. In 2018 on that day, we had rain, snow, mostly cloudy skies and temperatures between 38 and 20 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 31 and 16 degrees. The record high of 57 degrees was set back in 1966.

Looking ahead, Christmas Eve 🎅 is in 3 weeks, Christmas 🎅 is in 3 weeks, New Years Day 2019 🎉 is in 4 weeks, National Bird Day 🐦 is in 6 weeks, 36th Birthday 🎉 is in 8 weeks, 5:30 PM Sunset 🌆 is in 11 weeks, Average High is 40 ☀️ is in 3 months, 8 PM Sunset 🌇 is in 5 months, Independence Day 🇺🇸 is in 7 months, Last Sunset After 8:30 PM 🌆 is in 32 weeks and Election Day 2020 🗳️ is in 100 weeks.

Why Trump hates Brutalist buildings like the FBI’s headquarters.

Why Trump hates Brutalist buildings like the FBI’s headquarters.

"It is also not surprising that Trump the architecture critic has no love for FBI HQ, one of the most reviled examples of the maligned Brutalist style. In the public imagination, capital-B Brutalism—the postwar fad named for béton brut, French for raw concrete, and defined by its heavy, cast-concrete forms—tends to be lumped in with both the shoddy, underfunded modernism of public housing projects and the space-age experiments that followed. As Julia Gatley and Stuart King write in Brutalism Resurgent, a 2016 anthology, brutalist came to be “a pejorative term used to describe monolithic buildings of raw concrete construction that impose themselves on their surroundings.” In the New York that shaped Trump’s aesthetics, that description would have suited affordable housing projects like Waterside Plaza, River Park Towers, Chatham Towers, and Tracey Towers—the antitheses of Trump’s new brand. The far right appears to be leading a broader backlash against architecture self-evidently built with 20th-century technology. Such structures, in addition to their perceived deviance from the “Western traditions” venerated by American fascists, represent the tastes and lifestyles of America’s treacherous urban elite. "

June 21, 2018 Morning

Good morning! Happy Summer, as we shift down into Direct Drive of the Week. 😎 Okay, maybe not for a few more hours but it’s a beautiful day to kick off summer. Blue skies, not a cloud and sunny and 63 degrees in Delmar, NY. There is a north breeze at 7 mph. 🍃. The dew point is 54 degrees. Really not a drop of humidity to speak off. If I had today off and I wasn’t as tired, today would be a most excellent day for hiking up a mountain.

Today will be mostly sunny 🌞 , with a high of 81 degrees at 3pm. Two degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 56 at 11am. North wind 7 to 9 mph. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies. The high last year was 78 degrees. The record high of 97 was set in 1938.

An awesome weather day for kicking off summer.🏊 Now that session is over I got to make sure I’m getting out and enjoying summer before it’s done for the year. I expect things to pick up st work once fall approaches though. Summer vacation in the Finger Lakes and may be a little bit in Western New York or Pennsylvania should be great. I love swimming at the many Gorge Parks in the Finger Lakes, watching the sunsets, and the cows chew their cud. 🐮 Do some hiking, some fishing, camping, traveling, and kayaking. ⛺ Lots to do now that summer is officially underway.

Still thinking about West Virginia this November, ⛰ although I also want to possibly set up camp in Western NY somewhere and do some hunting too this fall. I’ll have to see about getting a camping permit from the DEC if I do that.🔫 I probably will have the time enough come November to do both. This summer I should spend more time at the range too.

The sun will set at 8:36 pm with dusk around 9:11 pm, which is 12 seconds later than yesterday. 🌇 At sunset, look for clear skies and 72 degrees. The dew point will be 48 degrees. There will be a north breeze at 8 mph. You don’t get more pleasant weather to kick off summer. Today will have 15 hours and 19 minutes of daytime, an increase of 2 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will be mostly clear 🌞 , with a low of 51 degrees at 5am. With clear skies and low humidity the temperatures will drop by early morning. Eight degrees below normal. Maximum dew point of 51 at 6pm. North wind 5 to 8 mph. In 2017, we had mostly clear skies. It got down to 53 degrees. The record low of 37 occurred back in 1940.

This evening I’m heading over to the Albany Pine Bush Commission’s World Headquarters to video tape and listen to Lynne Jackson speak about saving the Pine Bush. 🌲It’s nice once and while when a state l public authority recognizes the work of non-governmental volunteers. And if not for Lynne’s efforts after the past four decades there would have been a lot less of the ecologically unique Albany Pine Bush left.

I need to drop off my work dry cleaning this weekend to the cleaners. 👔I think I’m only going to bother with my good jacket as the old one has gotten to the point it really should be retired to the clothing donation bin to be donated to a foreign country or shredded into rags. I might steal some of the buttons though off it before I get rid of it in case I lose buttons on my other blazer. I will have to buy a second one maybe later in the autumn when we holiday sale is underway. Earlier in a week I heard a debate about new legislation to help dry cleaners upgrade their equipment — and got reading about the dangers of PERC ☢ — which I was surprised to find out is widely used in 2/3rds of dry cleaning facilities in New York still today.

Apparently, PERC is a wonderful dry cleaning substance, even if it horrible stuff to breathe or be exposed to. New York has some really tough regulations regarding PERC, as it’s pretty nasty stuff even in low levels, 😷requiring strict cleaning of the machines and various measures to keep PERC from leaking out into the ground and air. I know they spend millions to clean up old dry cleaners, trying to remove tiny amounts of PERC that build up in the surrounding soil and building materials.🗑 Probably explains why a simple jacket getting dry cleaned is now $8.

This weekend I’m going to buy new boots 👟 as the ones I’m wearing have worn through the soles and have developed cracks in them two. Strangely enough the leather is actually in good shape. I’ve tried really expensive boots over the Walmart Sweatshop Brand known as Brahman Boots but I rarely get much more life out there, as it’s the soles that tend to wear out as I do a lot of walking. Sometimes the leather fails first but that’s the exception rather then the rule. Maybe some of the more expensive brands are more sustainably sourced but it’s really hard to tell what is better or not thanks to global capitalism. I usually put the used boots in the clothing and boots recycling bin, as they are nasty to burn with all that rubber.

Looking ahead, there are 22 weeks until Thanksgiving 🦃 when the sun will be setting at 4:27 pm with dusk at 4:57 pm (Standard Time). On that day in 2017, we had rain, cloudy skies and temperatures between 46 and 34 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 45 degrees. We hit a record high of 70 back in 1931.

March 23, 2018 Evening

Happy Weekend! It’s actually fairly mild for a change this evening. Maybe there is hope for spring? Cloudy ☁ with snow showers around and 43 degrees in Delmar, NY. ❄ There is a northwest breeze at 15 mph. 🍃. Temperatures will drop below freezing at around 11 pm. ☃ Okay, maybe not quite tailgate drinking weather.

The sun will set at 7:11 pm with dusk around 7:39 pm, which is one minute and 9 seconds later than yesterday. 🌇 At sunset, look for rain showers, clouds ☁ and mercury around 37 degrees. There will be a northwest breeze at 14 mph.

Traffic heading out of the city tonight is a breeze🚃💨 so for the first time this week I should be home close to on time. 🕟After dinner I’ll figure out what I want to do about going out for a walk or the library.📚 Too cold and too early of a sunset for the park. 🌳Or maybe just a nap. 💤It’s been a long week.

Nine weeks from now will be the start of the Memorial Day Weekend.⛺ I am hoping though that there will be some weekends before then that are nice enough to head out of town. I’m sure there probably will be.🔥By mid April the snow will be mostly gone, even in the Adirondacks. While the signs of spring for next week are faint its fine, I will keep busy with budget week next week.❄ No snow is predicted for those late nights where I might drive in and🚗 that’s what I’m worried about.

Tonight will have a slight chance of snow showers before 7pm, then a slight chance of rain and snow showers between 7pm and 8pm, then a slight chance of snow showers after 8pm. Mostly cloudy ☔ , with a low of 27 degrees at 6am. Two degrees below normal. Northwest wind 7 to 10 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. In 2017, we had mostly clear skies with more clouds in the early hours of the next day. It got down to 27 degrees. The record low of 0 occurred back in 1875.

Tonight will have a First Quarter Moon with 45% illuminated. The moon will set at 1:58 am. The Blue Moon 🌝 is next Friday. The sun will rise at 6:51 am with the first light at 6:23 am, which is one minute and 46 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌄 Tonight will have 11 hours and 38 minutes of darkness, a decrease of 2 minutes and 54 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will have a slight chance of rain and snow showers after 3pm. Mostly cloudy ☔ , with a high of 38 degrees at 2pm. Nine degrees below normal. Northwest wind around 10 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. A year ago, we had sunny skies. The high last year was 43 degrees. The record high of 69 was set in 1976. 5.5 inches of snow fell back in 1956.❄

Looking ahead to Sunday, mostly cloudy, with a high near 41. Northeast wind around 8 mph. Typical average high for the weekend is 48 degrees.

Apparently the Cumberland Farms that I saw didn’t have power the other night is now abandoned. The reason they didn’t have power is they are totally shut down.⛽ That kind of sucks, they used to have good gas prices and where one of biggest gas stations around. I’m shocked that such a gleaming big gas station is now abandoned. I guess that’s the ugly underbody of capitalism at work. Make some money then throw it all away when it stops making money.

As a frugal person, I’m always upset when I see waste in society. I’m always running around and turning off lights. 🚮I especially hate wasting finite resources like fossil fuel and non organic trash. But ultimately I realize it’s not my place in the world to stop injustice.

In four weeks on April 20 the sun will be setting at 7:43 pm,🌄 which is 31 minutes and 56 seconds later then today. In 2017 on that day, we had rain, cloudy skies and temperatures between 62 and 46 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 61 and 39 degrees. The record high of 93 degrees was set back in 1941.

Looking ahead, Good Friday ✝ is in 1 weeks, Arbor Day 🌳 is in 5 weeks, 8 PM Sunset 🌇 is in 6 weeks, Memorial Day Weekend Starts 🏕 is in 9 weeks, Average High is 80 🏖 is in 13 weeks and Buy Nothing Day 🛍 is in 8 months.

🇺🇸🦅Only 62 days remain until the start of Memorial Day Weekend!🦅🇺🇸

The End of 2017

The End of 2017 is upon us. In a few more hours we will flip the year forward to 2018 and the calendars onwards of January. It’s been a frigid end to a year that in many ways has been disdainful for millions of Americans but at the same time, was one of a prosperous, growing economy while ominous clouds grow in the background.

Like the heavy smoker who insists that cough they have is nothing, at some point our excessive consumption of fossil fuels and energy more general is going to catch up with us. We can continue to ignore poverty, and hope it won’t come back to bite us. We can’t ignore fundamental economic laws,, turn our backs on the world, try to stimulate an already red hot economy. One year, of the mostly dreadful Trump administration is done. Maybe the President has put some balance in our government, reined in the worse excesses of the previous administration, but it’s hard to say much positive about a year where our President has acted far from presidential and deminished our nation’s stature.

Tonight is definately a bright moon lit evening, as the mercury drops well below zero and the occassional wind whips around. With the fresh snow, things are quite beautiful. If it hadn’t been so cold and snowy, I would have loved to ring the New Year in the wilderness, but with tonight’s weather that was not to be. I keep telling myself one of these years I’ll spend a New Years Eve under the stars, but so far this time of year has been much too cold and snowy. There will be a day, some day in the future, when I will have a cabin up in the woods, and I can be sitting next to the woodstove, enjoying a cold New Years Eve like tonight.

While not every adventure went perfectly, I definately got out and saw a lot of nice places. Much of the summer into the autumn was quite wet, and while precipation has slackened as autumn turned to winter, we still have a couple of inches of snow from Christmas Day that continues to linger in the cold. Maybe before we get too far into 2018, the weather will moderate to the point where I can have an adventure in the Adirondacks or even just local state forest. Maybe not the for next few days, but eventually I am sure this cold pattern will break.

At work and in life, I’ve been thinking so much about 2018 lately that it seems like it is already here. Plans are written for next year, and I’ve always started to think about April and summer vacation trips. Not to mention November 2018 trip to Western NY, or maybe even West Virigina? There are many more places to see in 2018, and I would like to see some new places, as in many ways I’m bored with the ordinary. Piseco-Powley Road and Moose Plains are great, but I’ve been going there forever. In many ways I’m bored with camping, I need new ways to spend my time and get new enjoyment out of the wilderness. Maybe I got to start trying to get some of my colleagues to go along, or join an outdoor club, or do something to shake things up. 

This past autumn I’ve become increasingly interested in the hobby of electronics and microcontrollers, and what one can build at home to make life better, creating carefully colored lighting for rest and relaxation, and hopefully early next year, a large LED-based display sign that can display pictures and messages. Electronics are a fascinating field, there are many inexpensive compnentss you can get from China to make all kinds of things. Having a better fundamental understanding of electricity will benefit me in the long run — it will help me reduce my energy bills for now — and eventually help me when I decide to transition to an off-grid life-style.

This past year, I’ve been following more Facebook groups on homesteading, farming, and the off-grid life. One thing I’ve come to a greater impression and knowledge of on these topics is how much learning, skill, practice and capital is needed to transform natural resources efficently into useful products. Most natural resources, like the sun are dispersed, raw, and unprocessed, it’s left up to us the human, to use science and carefully gained knowledge to turn nature into something useful. And just like an electronics project, without careful studying and planning, your bound for failure. You have to start small and simple, and even then realize you may run into complications, and what appears as a simple project at first can become quite capital intensive. Successful hunters spend months planning their hunt, they scope out wildlife with trail cameras and other natural signs. They invest in the right gear. The same is true with renewable energy, with off-grid living, with agriculture. Living in a fossil fuel society, where we can turn our lights on instantly by burning old dinasour bones, we’ve forgotten what really makes up the basis of society.

2017 was the year I really came to realize that old age isn’t guaranteed and that retirement isn’t all fun and games. Both of my parents in 2017 saw increasing health scares, both are having increased trouble with their hearts and eye sight. It seemed like months, even if it just was weeks, visting Mom in ICU after heart surgery this autumn. Disability creeps in, and there is no guarantee that the years after 65 or 70 will be years of wonderful leisure as put forward by many in the media. Maybe the rich who didn’t work hard enjoy a life of leisure well into their 80s or 90s, but that certainly isn’t guaranteed. I will miss Mom and Dad when that year comes, which hopefully won’t be 2018 but instead will have many years left to come of decent health. I tell you, I think I will take early retirement, as soon as that’s an option for me in the late 50s or early 60s, because those later years of leisure are certianly not guaranteed.

The West Virigina trip was definately the highlight of the year, although it definately was not as special as the trip two years ago, in part because the leaves weren’t nearly as a good, the weather was inferior, and I didn’t visit Shenandoah National Park or Spruce Mountain. I had that rattle in my truck that worried me throughout the trip (which turned out to be a $100 repair after the trip, that wasn’t a big deal). The Moose River Plains trip in late September with the mercury pushing 90 degrees was pretty nice, although the hot weather still couldn’t make the days any longer.

Summer vacation certainly was wet. Besides the rain and the big flood the first day camping, it was a fine trip despite the cool weather, clouds, and rain. The trip I took out to Erie, Penna to view the esclipe in bask in the sun one last time before summer was done was pretty great though. All the major holidays were either very wet or just quite wet. But I survived in the wilderness and drank some good beer and had some nice fires. I look forward to the days when I live somewhere I can have a fire every day I want.

All and all, I have to say 2017 came and went quicker then I ever anticipated. I got a lot done that I wanted to get done, but there is still more to learn, more to experience, more to develop to become. Lately I”ve gotten away from walking and hiking as much, and maybe eating less healthy foods, so that’s something I do need to change in New Year. But over all, I think it was a pretty good year.

As the wind howls around, on this very cold last evening of 2017, I have some peanut butter cookies in the oven baking away, to enjoy with a cold glass of milk. Probably soon I will retire to bed, and when I open my eyes tomorrow, it will be twenty-eighteen.

December 26, 2017 8 AM Update

Good morning! Happy Frigid Tuesday. Four weeks to National Pie Day. No, not that Pie ‘R Square Day, another one in January. Mostly sunny and 15 degrees in Delmar, NY. There is a west-southwest breeze at 14 mph. The current wind chill is zero. The wind is fairly well blocked in Delmar but I’m sure in the city with the tall buildings and exposed farm fields, it has to be that cold.

Cold morning for sure. I am off from work today for the holiday, but it’s back to the daily grind tomorrow. A lot of my colleagues have off next week, but I always volunteer to cover for people and 8work during the end of December, because it’s often too snowy and cold for road trips, and my family is local. Come Independence Day Weekend, it’s a different story, although in 2018, Independence Day is a Wednesday, so I won’t be able to make it into a long weekend, especially as I expect a rather busy summer at work, with lots of late nights. At least it’s usually well air conditioned at work. Got a lot of stuff to do to prep for 2018 when I get back into the office, and I’m sure my Christmas Cactus and other office plants will be thirsty and looking for some water.

Today will have isolated snow showers after 4pm. Mostly sunny but cold, with a high of 25 degrees at 2pm. Eight degrees below normal. West wind 14 to 18 mph, with gusts as high as 31 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. A year ago, we had mostly cloudy skies. The high last year was 41 degrees. The record high of 59 was set in 1895. 13.9 inches of snow fell back in 1969. The blizzard of 1969, which fell on top of the two odd feet of snow already on the ground!

That snow yesterday was more of a nuisance then anything else, although I stayed home on Christmas, just because I didn’t want to deal with digging out my truck or the blowing snow. Sometimes when it’s really cold out, it’s just nicer to stare out the window and work on various projects.

The sun will set at 4:28 pm with dusk around 5:00 pm, which is 41 seconds later than yesterday. At sunset, look for partly sunny conditions and 23 degrees. The wind chill around sunset will be 9. Breezy, 17 mph breeze from the west with gusts up to 29mph. Today will have 9 hours and 4 minutes of daytime, a increase of 23 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will be partly cloudy, with a low of 6 degrees at 6am. 11 degrees below normal. Maximum wind chill around -3 at 6am; West wind 6 to 14 mph. In 2016, we had cloudy skies. It got down to 35 degrees. The record low of -18 occurred back in 1914.

I have to admit, I really didn’t do that much yesterday but change one of the pins on the LED dimmer and continue to work on some new modes. I’ve noticed some flicker at certain light levels, making me think there is a bug in the code or something messing with the PWM output. I don’t know, this is a new issue to crop up. But I guess it’s fine.

I have found some double-wide LED track that I think I am going to order, and then put the Arduino in an Arduino case. I don’t think I will mount the Arduino shield I built into anything, just because it’s not that fragile, I don’t want to accidentially block the IR reciever, and I want to “feature” my home-made shield. Plus stuffing those MOSFETs into a box would be difficult the way I have mounted them. When it’s done, I want something that looks quite professional and well built. I also want to get some 20 guage wire, as the 16 gauge wire I have automotive wiring purposes is kind of thick, and the 26 and 30-gauge Kyner wire I bought for wiring gates and other control circuitry is dangerously thin for the source and drains that control the LEDs.

The LED strip, all 5 meters when fully lit at maximum brightness has a theoritical demand of 6 amp 12 VDC or 72 watts, although at the brightness I drive them at, it rarely exceeds 1-2 amp. Yesterday, while testing it I found at 40% brightness at 2700k I was only pulling about 180 mA or about 3 watts. My volt meter kind of has some it’s internal circuitry fried from stupid shit I did years ago, so I can’t measure about 200 mA. I have a 10 amp cheap power supply I got from eBay, although I have my doubts that it could deliver that amount without shutting down. It already shows a bit of a voltage drop (granted, a reasonable 11.8 volts) when the LEDs are at full brightess, but it may be because I’m using the 26 gauge Kyner wire right now on the gates and drains. The 5050 chips are supposed to put out 16-20 lumens per watt (which on paper is really quite efficent), but I can tell you that the 300 LEDs in strip I have certainly have not been driven to a brightness equal to 4,800 lumen or as bright as three incadescent 100 watt bulbs. While I expect to capture more light when the LEDs are all pointed in one direction mounted in the double LED tracks, I doubt that they really are all bright. It will be nice to have the LEDs mounted, rather then just taped to the wall using masking tape.

My next Arduino project is going to be an LED message board like you see in commerical buildings in the alike, using addressable LED strips mounted on board. In some ways that will be a cheaper and simplier project, in part because I already have the hardware I need for the project like the soldering iron and the Arduino. It’s also simplier to build, as you don’t have the MOSFET transitors and many resistors to wire up. I do need to get a 10 amp 5 VDC power supply to drive that, although maybe I will see if I can steal one from an old desktop computer rather then order one online. Addressable LEDs look like a lot of fun, although they are less efficent then non-addressable ones. 

Yesterday, I did not get out for my evening walk, but soon once I finish tihs blog post and take a shower I will walk down to the library. I haven’t been doing as much walking lately, because the cold seems to bother me more, and I’ve gotten lazy. Also not having working headphones with my phone, means I’ve not had music while walking. I am hoping that my wireless headphones will arrive today, which will hopefully be less prone to failure without a jack, and not get tangled up while I am walking and skiing.

I am thinking about going to skiing along the Rail Trail out along Font Grove and to Voorheesville, but I am a bit on the fence because I’m concerned that in the cold driving to just to Slingerlands may not be enough to top off the battery and get truck fully warmed up before shutting it off. I also have to be careful driving on town roads where there may be a lot of cops, because while I cleaned off my truck the best I could the cap at 8’6″ is a bitch to get the snow off. Maybe as the day progresses with the wind some of the remaining snow up top with blow off before I head out. If not, I’m sure State Route 443 later on, possibly after dark, will do the job.

Still don’t have an ice scraper, but I don’t care. I have the windshield wipers off and the snow brushed off the windshield so hopefully the sun and the defroster will do the rest of the job. It’s a cold day but there is a lot of sun. I could go hiking or traveling somewhere, but I really am avoiding using enough gas to need a fill up, because I am trying to avoiding spending money this week. While I get paid today, I have a rent check and the payment for the next six months of cell service due this week. I also just don’t have a lot of money in my checking account, in part because I just paid for my October trip with just ordinary cash rather then take some money out of savings. I guess if I absolutely had to, I could withdraw some money to pay the bills, but I am hoping by conserving I will be okay for the next few weeks.

Money is always so tight for me, and while it’s been a long time since I’ve gotten dinged for insufficent funds, it seems like many weeks I struggle to make ends meet. Each paycheck, a lot of money goes into my various retirement accounts, investment accounts, and savings account. I actually have lost track on how much money it all is, but it helping to grow my assets.  When all the withdrawls are done, there just isn’t a lot left to spend for things like groceries, supplies, and gasoline. There is absolutely zero money left any month for luxuries like that $10 toy I see at Walmart or eating lunch out, much less fancy Internet service beyond my smartphone.

While retirement is two or three decades away, in retirement I want to be able to afford land, an off-grid cabin, nice toys like a four wheeler, guns, a nice truck, etc. A secure retirement these days doesn’t come easy, with so much of the traditional guarantees of social security and a pension fading away. I don’t need or want a fancy house, just land to live on, farm, and hunt and trap but that stuff is capital intensive up front — even living minimally on a miniscule energy budget at first — even if it’s cheaper over the long run. I look at what truck drivers Bill and Rosa are doing with their cabin in Oklahoma, starting off pretty rough at first, but building up a lot of assets now that they are free of utility bills and services that suburban homeowners have to pay each month to have access to. Their new F-350 pickup truck and big farm tractor are pretty sweet.

It seems increasingly unlikely that I will be able to head out of town for camping with the cold weather next week, so that’s one less expense. Camping over Martin Luther King Jr weekend might be nice, if it’s not to cold. I don’t mind heading up north to camp if it’s relatively snow free and the day time temperatures reach the mid-20s with limited wind, but not if the wind is howling around and it’s much colder. Too much snow would make it a bitch too dig out a parking spot, especially up north where the snow is often much deeper. Saves money, which is good with things so tight. Maybe it makes me a bad liberal, but I’m looking forward to that extra $50 or so a month that it looks like I will be getting after the Trump tax cut. Hopefully some of that can go into savings, but evidently some will have to go to address my struggling finances lately.

Looking ahead, there are 4 weeks until National Pie Day when the sun will be setting at 4:58 pm with dusk at 5:28 pm. I am still partial for pumpkin pie, although honestly I don’t eat that many sweets any more. On that day in 2017, we had rain, freezing rain, snow, sleet, mist, mostly cloudy skies and temperatures between 39 and 32 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 31 degrees. We hit a record high of 64 back in 1906.