Notes from James

Visit to Axe Murder Hollow

Went on a bike ride today, and met a fellow and his wife who were looking for Axe Murder Hollow. I've never found it myself, but here is my best guess where it's supposed to be, by using the limitless power of the internet!

Map

For my money, the spooky abandoned house at the corner of Pinetree and Thomas Road is much more thrilling.

Eros and Anteros

For anyone wondering what the statue the couple on page 106 of the July/August 2007 issue of Budget Travel ("Surprise Engagement") were looking at, it's the statue of Eros and Anteros by Alessandro Algardi.

Bike To Work #14 - Back To Work

Met a fellow named Tom who bikes 8 1/2 miles to work. Seems like everybody has a road bike and is faster than me - I have a Swedish Crescent Lodur mountain bike, with knobby tires and lots of drag. However, I don't let it stop me, so don't let it stop you!

Greets to Rachel, who bikes a mile and a half to work! If I had that distance, I'd consider the wintertime too. I wonder how that's going to turn up.

My odometer, which I set in kilometers (part of the Swedish thing) should hit 1000 fairly soon. Looking forward to that one.

Bicycle Commuting - Reboot

Planning to do the bicycle commute tomorrow (Erie PA, for the search engines). This will be ride #14, but I realize that I haven't ridden the long commute in over two weeks! It's a bit daunting again, trying to remember how long the trip is. It's really not that bad, but a bit scary to think about after such a long time off. I did do quite a bit of biking while on vacation (Cape Cod has wonderful bike trails), so I don't feel out of shape. Not sure, but I'm getting butterflies in my stomach again.

If anybody else out there is bike commuting in Erie, PA, I'd love to hear from you! Or just even riding for fun.

Back From the Outdoors

Back from camping vacation to Vermont, New Hampshire, and Cape Cod. Did quite a bit of biking along the Cape Cod Rail Trail from Eastham, Massachusetts. It was very nice to base out of one location and just do lots of biking back and forth.

Back to reality...soon!

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.

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 #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.

My Backyard - Live Webcam

I realized that I never posted it, but here is my backyard webcam's picture. Normally not too interesting, but you might see some kids running around occasionally. Updated once every minute. Live! (Well, mostly) from Erie PA.

Bike to Work #4

I'm going to have to add a biking category. Biked to work again, this time along the Bayfront. The weather was beautiful, but I got a bit twisted up at Frontier Park and had to cut across the lawn a bit. It was a great, fast ride, and home was pretty good as well. Lawrence Park to State Street in about 20 minutes -- pretty good for me. I thought I'd be home a lot faster, but the uphill along Sterrettania is pretty brutal on me, especially after a mile long ride.

Support HR 1498

Support HR 1498, the transportation fringe benefit to bicycle commuters! Read the full text and details here. Tax breaks for cyclists!

`(F) BICYCLE COMMUTING ALLOWANCE- The term `bicycle commuting allowance' means an amount provided to an employee for transportation on a bicycle if such transportation is in connection with travel between the employee's residence and place of employment.'.

Too late for this year, though:

(d) Effective Date- The amendments made by this section shall apply to taxable years beginning after December 31, 2007.

Bike to Work #3

Third trip to work today. With every trip, the riding gets easier. I biked back on the Bayfront highway, which passes through downtown Erie PA. Nice, easy trail, no worries about traffic, and a beautiful view. My goal now is biking to work at least once a week. Maybe twice if I can get a friend to join me.

I did bike with a friend in. He has a road bike, and I had a difficult time keeping pace. However, I cut my time to work by 10 minutes! Hopefully I can keep that pace in the future.

Things To Remember While Biking

A friend of mine and I biked to work last week (ride #2, 12 miles each way for me). He got a flat along the way to work, but luckily enough, he had slime filled tires that sealed the hole. Here's a few obvious things that would have come in handy:

• Money. I had to load him a buck or so to fill up his tire with air since his pump wasn't working.
• Pump. Better than money to fill a flat. My friend's pump didn't seem to work at all, though. The other big problem is that after starting back home after filling up with gas station air, the slime broke out of the hole and the tire lost some pressure. It did stop the leak again, though.
• Patch kit. Unfortunately, this wouldn't have helped much in this case, as the slime self sealant really is slimy. I'm not sure if a tire patch would have helped as the patch glue would have to have something to stick to.
• Tool kit. Well, maybe this wouldn't have helped, but it would have been good if we had a patch kit.

For people who live in Erie PA: I live in Millcreek, and bike to Lawrence Park. It's really not that bad: an hour from end to end, and quite scenic at points. Please consider the alternatives to driving. Think green! And save green!

Biking to Work in Erie PA

Today marks the first day I biked to work. Yay! Normally it takes me a half an hour to drive the 12 miles to work, but I biked it in slightly under an hour. I'm feeling a bit tired (surprise!), and I'm sure I can't do this everyday. However, if I can keep doing this occasionally, I'll be doing a small part to help the planet, and a big part to help my health.

The biggest surprise I had is how many people stopped on by to talk to me, and were inspired by my ride. It actually took less time to bike the distance than riding the bus would take, and it takes me from point A to point B pretty quickly. If a few more people ride their bikes, I'm sure that even more would be inspired.

Note that I'm definitely not in tip top health, but keeping a steady pace works wonders. There were a few hills that I wonder if I was putting more CO2 out than the cars next to me.

Maybe I should add a "Green" category to this blog.

Michigan Alligator

According to my aunt, a Michigan Alligator is a retreaded tire that you can find after it falls apart off of a tractor trailer rig and lies on the shoulder of the expressway. I have never heard of this myself, but I am putting this up here to see if anyone else has ever even heard of such a thing.

Relative Sizes

If you think the Earth is big, and the Sun is big, check out this video.

Speedmaster 7000 Manual

Thanks to Matt Hurley, who got them from SIGMA Sport support, there are now copies of the Speedmaster 7000 manual available! Choose your flavor: wireless or wired.

Thorn Resistant Tube Update

So far, so good. I ran over the rose bushes a few times, and no holes yet. Of course, there were no holes in the front tire either, which had the old, thin tube.

My Bike

Found a picture of my bike...at least an old picture of an "adequate representation" of it. A 1996 (?) Crescent Lodur, built in Sweden. I found this picture a long time ago, haven't found any similar pictures lately (and I have been looking).

Mine is slightly different. I put on a different water bottle cage, added a quick release lever for the seat, and changed the back tire. Amazingly enough, I'm still running with the original front tire from when I bought it (though not the original tube). Still haven't upgraded either of the tubes to the thorn resistant type. I'll probably do this if (when) I get my next flat.

I bought a padded seat from Nashbar. It's one of those gel type seats. The original one (pictured above, a Vectra, I think) was getting hard and my butt was getting sore.

Looks like the pedals are somewhat different as well, at least as far as the color goes.

Well, somewhat offtopic, Thingamablog (the program I use to do this web site) is being a pain. I was hoping that the picture would stay in the appropriate section. Unfortunately, it seems to flow down into the following article. Interesting, but not what I wanted. Instead, I need to add a bit more writing. Blah blah blah. There. I hope that's enough.

Map of Erie County

Looking for a nice map of Erie County (Pennsylvania)? Here's one in PDF format. Other maps of Pennsylvania can be found at the Department of Transportation website. Posted date is June 2006.

First Trial With Thorn Resistant Tubes

Ran the first trial with thorn resistant tubes. Due to heavy rains, most of the trails were muddy, and I totally avoided the thorny section of the trail that has been causing me most of my problems. I didn't seem to notice any difference due to weight of the back tube. My daughter is getting heavier, and the mud bogging down the bike cause most of my difficulties. I was pretty exhausted by the time I hit the thorn section of the trail, and avoided it completely, choosing to bike on asphalt and road instead.

Note to self, really crank down the seat post.

Adventures in Flats

I'm adding a new category, Outdoors, to this website. I'm going to try to document various things that I find when dealing with the great outdoors. Mostly mountain biking, as that's one of my favorite outdoor activities.

Today, I put a thorn resistant tube in my wife's back tire. I like biking on her bike with my daughter (her bike has a baby seat), and I've been having flats quite frequently, even on my own bike (usually, the slow leaking type). The last time I biked, the front tire went flat, and rather quickly. After taking out the back tube and replacing it with a thorn resistant tube (since that is where most of my flats have been occurring lately), I put the back tube on the front wheel. Before I put it in, though, I ran my finger on the inside surface, and found two rose thorns that were embedded in the tire.

I was considering putting Armadillo tires on my bike or using Slime, but since I spend most of my time lately on her bike, I'm going to just keep an eye out on the tires, seeing if they're going flat or not after this change. If the thorn resistant tube works, I'll use those instead (a lot cheaper). I've heard both good and bad things about Slime, and will wait to try that out. I'd like to avoid any potential messes.

Details as they follow.