June 2007

Bike to Work #13 - Half of My Goal

No big deal on the bike to work again today. However, I am now half of my goal for the year! Maybe I set my goal too low?

Say, for example, I work 52 weeks in a year. Maybe high, but good for our purposes. That's 52 x 5 trips to work. That's 260 trips. 25 rides to work is about 9% of my trips. Reducing it by 10% isn't really that much. Well, I'm going to keep going as long as I can, see how it works out. It will be interesting to see what happens.

The other day, I drove my car to work after biking and a weekend. Felt strange, and I longed for the bike again.

Bike to Work #12 - Back on the Road

Nothing special today. Just hot, sweaty, but things performed as expected. Met another fellow biking to his work at the wastewater treatment plant. Always good to meet new people!

Jack Adalist

Years ago, I worked with a fellow named Jack Adalist. In our conversations, he mentioned that he had a bit role in a movie called Liquid Sky. After doing a search on the web, looks like he has been doing more than ever. Guess it's never too late to quit your job and start over again. Best of luck Jack, wherever you are (Israel?).

Fixing the Rear Derailleur Cable

While changing my tube in the flat I got last week, I noticed that the the cable guide under the bottom bracket (pedals) was broken. I picked up the part and a new cable, and replaced it (the first time). I didn't have any problems doing that, and even adjusting the derailleur settings afterward went smoothly. There was only one problem that I had that I didn't anticipate: cutting the cable short. Originally, I had hoped to solder the end so it wouldn't fray as I do not own one of the cable end covers or the tools needed to put it on. However, the solder didn't stick to the cable. I looked for some shrink tubing but, lacking that, settled for some of the edge molding that you use to hold the screens in on screen doors and windows. It had a hole in the center, and fit quite snugly. I tried to melt the end a bit, but that didn't work that well. We'll see how well it holds up. At least it looks better than just wrapping it in tape, which is what I did last time.

Homemade Ice Cream

Made homemade ice cream according to this recipe. Well, close anyway:

• Get a plastic bag, fill it with ice
• Add 6 tablespoons of rock salt. I didn't have this, so I used regular salt.
• Get a ziploc type baggie, fill it with:
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• 1/2 cup of milk. I used 2%, and added some creamer to get the fat up a bit
• 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla
• Put the little bag in the big bag, and shake for about 5 minutes. It took me about 10 minutes, and I had to add extra salt to get the mixture to freeze. Still not sure why this works, but it seemed to help. That and a lot more shaking.
• Put the big bag in a waterproof container when it starts leaking.

It didn't taste too bad...sort of like crystalized vanilla ice cream. It was a hot day, though, and it was good enough to try again in the future. At least, a good waste of an hour! It always tastes better when homemade. No matter how awful it tastes.

Your Own Doctor Who TARDIS

Here's a link to a bunch of folks in England (and the rest of the UK, I assume) who have created Doctor Who's TARDIS in their gardens, incarnated as a shed.

Nuts in the Forest

A friend of mine, Tom Jennings, ran 100 miles in the Mohican 100. He did it in 28 hours and 38 minutes. Makes my 12 mile bike to work look pretty silly. Course, it only takes me an hour or so, and I'm not exhausted.

No Jury Duty

I was selected for jury duty, but, unfortunately, it was cancelled. Too bad, as I was interested in seeing how the whole justice system works, and seeing if I would be convicting/freeing people from the wheels of justice. Oh well...better luck next time.

Nothing Better to Do?

If you have nothing better to do, you watch a guy with even less better to do than you. He's counting to a million.

Bike to work #11 - No big deal

Biked to work - no problems this time. After Monday's pains, including some jerk who was blowing his horn at me for no apparent reason and a flat tire, today's ride was a breeze. I put in a thorn resistant tube in the back tire (where I got the flat), and realized that the cable guide under the cranks was broken. Yay -- yet another thing to fix. At least it appears to be holding on for the short term.

Bike to Work #10 - Disaster Strikes

Biking home from work today with a friend of mine, I got about 1/4 of the way home when my back tire lost pressure. I took it off and tried to find a hole, but it still held the pressure in. We started again and the rest of the pressure went out. He cut ahead of me with the intention of picking me up, but I beat him back. I ended up calling my wife to pick me up, somewhere near the halfway mark after trying to make a stop at Wheels Bike Shop. Closed, unfortunately, by a few minutes.

After getting home, I found the problem rather quickly: a small shard of glass had penetrated my tire and gashed the tube. If I had seen that on the road, I could have fixed it. However, I might have punctured a new tube in the process.

The plan is to get some thicker tubes - the thorn resistant tubes like the ones I put on my wife's bike. I previously blew out 2 of them running across rose bushes (don't ask) until I switched. No problems since. Maybe put some tire liners in as well.

The plan also included taking a spare tube - just in case.

Looking for Something Creepy?

Start here.

Lots of pre-20th century engravings and drawings. Pretty cool, and pretty creepy, even in this day and age.

Revenge of the Earth

Don't take this as an environmental piece. But, it kind of is.

In the back of my mind, I wonder if the Earth is trying to kill us off. Consider the following items:

• Global warming causes water to rise. People drown.
• More hurricanes, stronger storms are coming around. More people get killed.

Not sure where I'm going with this one, but there is a balance on the earth with the number of people and the Earth. If there are too many, the scale overcorrects itself.

Maybe if it tips back too far the other way, an ice age occurs?

Well, food for thought anyway.

Bike to Work #9

One of the best things I like about the bike ride in the morning are the rabbits. They are usually running away from me, but they always give me a smile.

Stopped and picked up Taco Bell on the way home (about 20 minutes from destination). Put them in my backpack. The ride was still pretty grueling afterward, and I didn't come anywhere near the 52:30 time I did yesterday (two days in a row...woohoo!!). However, dinner was still warm when I arrived. I was warm too.

Almost 2/5 toward my goal of 25 rides before summer is out. Pretty confident I can beat that. Wondering what the real number is going to be.

Knobby tires make more work, though.

The Wizard's Castle

I found a Window's port of The Wizard's Castle, a program originally written in BASIC known as castle.bas that I remember fondly playing in my youth. I have yet to poke with it long enough to remember all the funny things that happen (i.e. the Blue Flame which dissolves books that are stuck to your hands), but am glad to find that this fun game won't die for a little while longer.

Thanks to Derelict for porting this game. I dropped him an e-mail, and he responded within a few minutes! How's that for service?

Bike to Work #8

Uneventful bike to work...just nice and relaxing. Of course, I crashed out later this evening. May even bike again tomorrow...two days in a row?!

Bike to Work #7

Much better than #6. Time to home: under an hour. Nice and sweaty! Still think the goal of 25 rides this year is doable.

Thingamablog Future

Every so often, I like to ping Bob Tantlinger, creator of Thingamablog, about the future of this wonderful tool. Here's his latest response:

Hi James,

There's been lots of progress, but it's still not quite there yet. As things stand right now, a lot of the big stuff (persistence layer, template engine, etc) is pretty much ready. But there's still a fair bit of busy work and loose ends to tie up. I know I'm really terrible at time frames, but If everything keeps rolling along as it has been, I'm hopeful that the first alpha should appear around September at the latest.

Sorry about things being so silent lately. As soon as I get some free time, I'll post a progress report along with some demos of some of the new stuff.

-Bob

Found Some Old Comments for the Blog

A Fat Rant

What she says is true, and I don't think it applies to just being fat. Those of you who are fans of GTD (Getting Things Done) and productivity should watch this too...

Accept you for who you are!

Bike to Work #6 - Pain

Biked to work on Thursday, June 7th. There was tremendous heat, but wasn't too bad really. However, on the way home, there was a steady breeze in my face, and taking so much time off from the last ride didn't help much. By the time I got home, I was really burned out, and passed out on the couch shortly after dinner. I think I got good exercise, though.

Stopped on the way home at Dobbins Landing and checked out the Niña, a replica of the Christopher Columbus ship. Tiny - amazing that people would sail across the ocean on such a small and sluggish looking vessel.

Anyway, the plan is to ride in again on Monday or Tuesday next week, and try to get a few more rides in. I was hoping to ride twice a week in, but I don't know if I can do that. I'd like to try to do at least 25 rides in to work by the end of the year. Whether or not this goal is attainable remains to be seen.

VOIP Debate

Currently deciding if I want to switch from Verizon to a VOIP service...I really don't use the phone all that much, but am somewhat leery of being my own phone company, as it were. I was thinking about trying out SunRocket...still not sure if I will. I'd like to, but I also like having the stability of a land line, especially after last weekend's blackout. I did notice that the cell phones were working at that time, though.

Taylor Air Compressor

The Victoria Mine in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan used a natural air compressor - no moving parts! - to power its equipment. This is a follow up to the waterfall powered air compressor I mentioned in the previous post. Here is a page devoted to the Ragged Chute Air Plant, a similarly powered air compressor.

Bike to Work #5

Easy bike to work today. The weather said it was going to be thunderstorms but, as is typical Erie, nothing happened. Legs are a bit tired, but no big deal! Twice this week. Hope to do the same next week. Met yet another biker, who did from Frontier Park to Lawrence Park. He had a lot better equipment than I do, but a shorter commute. Equipment isn't everything, obviously.

Compressed Air - The Past of Alternative Energy

Back in the early 20th century in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, there were some mines located near Quinnesec Falls that used compressed air generated by a central, waterfall powered power plant. I found some other sources that reported that there was a 2 PSI loss with transmission of the compressed air over three miles. Evidentally, it was not economical back then. However, another plant near Hazelton PA reported near zero loss of pressure over 10,860 feet! Search for Compressed Air Information by William Lawrence Saunders.

Photograph of the Hydraulic Power Company's plant at Quinnesec Falls on the Menominee River in Iron Mountain, Michigan. A pipeline supplying compressed air to the Chapin, Ludington, and Emmet mines runs from the stone compressor building.

Photograph taken near Hydraulic Falls, shows a typical log drive camp. Note the cook tent and large kettles steaming over open fires. To the right is the air pipe which served the Chapin and Ludington mines with compressed air to work machinery.

The future is today. What goes around comes around. Compressed air cars, anyone?