Literally I was 15 minutes late in the office, but before I could get my helmet and gloves two people where in my office telling me the database was down, followed shortly by the head programmer as I glanced over the stacks of paper representing robo calls I had to set up and assign, and work orders that were pending that I had to do as the rest of supervisors were out.
I knew this was the way the week would go 🏢 being that we were short staffed and the office was busy. Then there was the email about emails being lost, voice mails being broken, and a bazillion other issues I was on the phone with technicians and other staff about. 📞 And people seemed annoyed when I was like, do you really when I pointed out the policy, and said we are willing to work with you but this is really kind of pushing the limits on things. 🙄 So much eye rolling today. I’m kind of glad I didn’t take last week off for vacation and step into this cluster of a day when I returned.
Riding back and forth to work today was smokey, 🚴 especially in the afternoon but I usually go slow on the way back home up the hill. Probably did more damage to my lungs on the commute then anything I smoked over the weekend, grass or the non-whacky stuff. That was quite the epic fire 🔥 on Saturday night for a while, though it quickly burnt on up. It’s nice coming home and seeing empty waste baskets. I’m sure the liberals are blaming my fire and my big jacked up truck for the wildfire smoke. 🌥️ That didn’t smoke much though as it was hot. They sealed the driveway at my place and the landlord left the empty buckets along the road. I grabbed one, I wanted two but the rest of the buckets had sealant left in them or other crap. Plus how many buckets can I really use right now for camping? 🪣 That said my shitter bucket is falling apart, but I want at least two or three buckets besides that at camp for storing gear, collecting cans and trash. Especially when summer cation finally happens. Maybe I should have thumbed through the buckets more, nobody has taken them yet. Maybe tomorrow if they’re still there. One of them I’m using in the kitchen for compost, 🌽 as with sweet corn I have a lot more organic trash to save my parents pile. That stuff doesn’t burn well, and it’s better to return to the soil at my parents homestead, boost fertility, then turn it into smoke.
Went to the park for a while this evening but I didn’t feel like reading, 📖 just thumbing through my phone. 👍🏻 Whatever, I should read more, and I did listen to more of the audio book I have on Anxiety on my bike commute both ways today. Got listening to Cat Steven’s records on YouTube. 🙀 Tomorrow is another Colonie Planning Board Meeting, another opportunity to champion saving the Pine Bush, that woke solar facility proposed for the Pine Bush in a recommended full protection area is back on the agenda again. 🦋 I’ll be on my best behavior, and not say what I really think about a woke solar facility in the Pine Bush, or point how American policy is trending against industrial solar, ☀️ although honestly as rural neighbor, I’d much rather have a solar farm then a bitching subrubanite about the smell of manure or smoke. 🐮 Solar farms are rural land uses, much like feedlots and hay fields and forests. Lynne is up north at camp, so I’ll have to drive myself to the hearing in my big jacked up after driving to work, 🛻 I’ll probably go hiking in the Pine Bush there after.
Blog has been raking in the cash all week. 💵 It’s crazy, the blog in the past week has brought in $56 which is more then some weeks last winter. Not a ton more blog traffic but a lot of high revenue, search engine traffic. I am sure it’s mostly people wanting to learn about places to camp in the back country. 🏕️ It’s paying for my next adventure, though I’m sure by next fall when the hosting bill goes up, it will be even more expensive. That’s good I guess. A lot of people were at Burnt-Rossman over the weekend, I wonder how many of them learned about it from my blog? I think I’ve helped to popularize camping at Rensselearville State Forest since my adventures up there, and probably Piseco-Powley too. Hopefully it encourages more state investment in such lands if people are actively using them and not trashing them. Honestly, I’m not that worried about yahoos wrecking the back country, as few travel that far from the city, and it’s mostly local teenagers with their boozers that leave the trash, and even that’s not that common after mid-June graduation weeks. 🗑️ Wasn’t sure if I was going to bealbe to get the photos off my camera from the weekend, especially those taken at Middleburgh Cliff after I discovered the flash card was damaged, it’s like 15 years old, 📸 but I was able to snap off the broken plastic and properly inserted and worked again. Maybe I need to get a few new flash cards before vacation. 🏖️
I can’t extend my weekend next weekend either as there are no supervisors in the office on Friday or Monday morning, 🖥️ so someone has to be there to monitor all the systems and assign work. Plus with all the other people I’m covering for, getting my ordinary work done in the office will be a challenge. Still considering a Friday night through Sunday trip to the Adirondacks, looking at White House for the wild blueberries, assuming they can still be found up that way. I don’t remember a lot of good swimming holes in that part of the West Scandaga River but it’s been years since I’ve really explored that area. 🏊 That said, I got so much good produce at Shauls and I kind of want to check out that swimming hole with the tube next to Max Shauls Campground that I kind of think it would be fun to head back out to Schoharie for another weekend. Another option would be to hammock camp at one of state forests locally, maybe not Cole Hill this time for a change. 🌲 But where? Rensselearville State Forest is a good choice for truck camping in the fall and I could do hammock there but maybe not. I did Dutch Settlement State Forest last summer, when I told myself I’d do round 2 at Gas Up but instead ended up hiking back to the Cliffs of Middleburgh. I’d don’t know.