Maybe I just get up too early, the hour when the good folks of Madison County are milking the cows but shifting that extra hour of daylight in the morning doesn’t help that much. There is only a limited amount of daylight in November.
Good morning! Monday’s come back around again. Partly clear and 33 degrees at the Stoney Pond State Forest. Sunrise is quite pretty now that it’s finally happening. 
Calm wind.
Up early decided I wanted eggs 
again this morning. No cinnamon on my eggs this morning, lol. 
Did fry up two onions 
which made for an excellent start though sort of melted my olive oil bottle warming it by the heater. Mushrooms 
, garlic and spinach, lots of turmeric and smoked paprika. Then I decided I was still hungry so I fried up some French style green beans with another egg and nutritional yeast. 
Should be good on the energy 
side of things today.
Today will become mostly cloudy 
, with a high of 48 degrees at 2pm. Five degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around November 18th. Light south wind increasing to 11 to 16 mph in the morning. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies in the morning, remaining cloudy in the afternoon. It was humid. The high last year was 72 degrees. The record high of 73 was set in 2015. 3.2 inches of snow fell back in 1933.
Today I plan to head to Cazenovia around nine 
and park and ride my bike from there. 
Some around the village, Lorenzo State Historic Site and Cazenovia Lake Park.
I know nothing about the historic site, worth checking out. Then some of the Chittenango – Cazenovia trailway down to Chittenango Falls State Park 
and hike down to the falls and maybe some of the park trails in the back.
Solar noon 
is at 11:47 am with sun having an altitude of 31.2° from the due south horizon (-39.3° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 9.9 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 
starts at 4:10 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (242°). 
The sunset is in the west-southwest (249°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 4:51 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 7 seconds with dusk around 5:19 pm, which is one minute and 12 seconds earlier than yesterday. 
The best time to look at the stars is after 5:54 pm. At sunset, look for mostly cloudy skies 
and temperatures around 47 degrees. Breezy, 16 mph breeze 
from the south. Tomorrow will have 10 hours and 6 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 26 seconds over today.
Yesterday was a great day. 
A whole lot more sun then I expected. I thought maybe sunshine breaking through clouds late but not the deep blue skies most of the day. 
Started out around 11 am parked across from the Chittenango Village Hall, rode along the Chittenango River Trail, the partially completed Chittenango Feeder Trail to current terminus, Chittenango Canal Musuem, then along the Old Erie Canal to Green Lakes State Park, part of the way around Green Lake, then to Canastota and Wampsville. Then back around to Canastota and poked around the village then back to Chittenango on Main Street. 36 miles or so ridden, see my track I posted earlier. 
Drove back through the Fenner Wind Farm 
and made it back to camp 
nearly a half hour before dark. 
Had a quick dinner of bean soup 
and bread 
that I reheated then fried some apples, banana and strawberry 
in some olive oil with stevia. Pretty good. A bit cool with the wind for a while 
but it died down as the night progressed.
Tonight will have showers, mainly before 2am. 
Low of 43 degrees at 7pm. Nine degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 11th. Windy, with a southwest wind 18 to 28 mph, with gusts as high as 43 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It was somewhat humid. It got down to 46 degrees. The record low of 18 occurred back in 1962.
Replenished the firewood stock 
up at camp so I’m ready for tonight. I’m not going to string up a tarp but I’ll have dinner fairly early and a fire and retire to the bed of my truck once the rain picks up which looks to be around seven 
o’clock if the forecast is accurate. I have books 
to read inside my truck cap and I have cell service here 
so I can stream video, listen to podcasts or lectures from my truck. Hoping tomorrow will be dry enough to do some riding or hiking, not sure but maybe one of those preserves on Otsego Lake north of Cooperstown. 
I could also ride around Hamilton and poke around the village a boy if it’s not raining.
Veterans Day Weekend 
goes back and forth on how nice it will be. Depends on the timing for that front on Thursday still could change. Still much cooler than this past weekend. Veterans Day Observed, Friday, mostly cloudy and 40. Saturday, partly cloudy, with a high near 37. Sunday, mostly sunny and 38. Typical average high for the weekend is 51 degrees. Not sure if I’m heading out of town next weekend but if I do probably Rennselearville State Forest though I’ve considered Vermont too.
Looking ahead as but not forward, next Monday is the first Average Night Below Freezing 
when the sun will be setting at 4:43 pm with dusk at 5:12 pm. Earlier for sure back in the Albany. On that day in 2022, we had partly cloudy and temperatures between 49 and 36 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 50 degrees. This morning in Madison County was a bit below freezing but the elevation is higher here. We hit a record high of 69 back in 1964.
I’ve decided this winter I really want to and should commit to bringing my programming and data science skills to the next level 
with those free courses on Udemy offered by my library and other free sources of programming knowledge like Free Code Camp. I was really into Free Code Camp until the class got really hard and was on topics I thought I’d never actually use for my blog and similar purposes. 
But now in the next few months when I transition over to Data Services professionally, I want to have not only the skills needed to succeed at work but also personally. Computer programming and data science skills are a transferrable to a wide variety of careers. 
so I could listen to music 
as loud as I wanted to, there are a few campers down the way and they seemed to have gone inside pretty early because of the cold. I know that I usually prefer to camp at a roadside site that is more spread out but there aren’t many options nearby.
Of course, because I’ve been traveling my phone 
with my vest. The colors were really good down by the lake and up here by camp. 
of the backroads of Otsego and Madison County, the mud and manure, the run down farm houses and the earthy smell of livestock. 
The junk cars and rusty tractors, the goats 
staked down in front yard, the deer 
hung from the tree, the pig pen 
in the corner of the yard.
I’m making good money at my job now 
but I’m really trying to save every penny I can, so I can eventually own land out in the country, live in small town. But not New York State – I don’t want to have to beg some judge for a pistol 
permit and I want to be able to have burn barrels 
and have fires to burn debris and brush whenever I want and not spend all my money on property taxes. In other words rural living minus the New York State part. Kind of like Pennsyltucky minus the high taxes although there is a lot to like about the state especially in the Pennsylvania Wild Region although many other parts of the state have wooded hills above the fertile valleys. 
Moon with 1% illuminated. At 7 PM, the moon was in the west-southwest (253°) at an altitude of 1° from the horizon, some 226,468 miles away from where you are looking up from the earth. 
Lots of stars 
tonight. I got out star viewing app earlier. At the state speed limit of 55 mph, you’ll make it there by April 7th. Buckle up for safety! 
The Blue 
Moon is on Halloween 
Saturday, October 31. The darkest hour is at 12:47 am, followed by dawn at 6:50 am, and sun starting to rise at 7:18 am in the east-southeast (102°) and last for 2 minutes and 58 seconds. Sunrise is one minute and 12 seconds later than yesterday. 
is in 6 weeks, Repeal of Prohibition Day 
is in 7 weeks, Boxing Day 
is in 10 weeks, Static Electric Shock Day 
is in 12 weeks, National Cheese Lovers Day 
is in 14 weeks, Save the Pine Bush Turns 43 
is in 16 weeks, Presidents Day 
is in 4 months, 5:30 PM Sunset 
is in 18 weeks, and Snow Moon 
is in 19 weeks.
