Well…I knew this was coming…have felt pretty worn out the past couple of days and was just waiting to hit the wall and it happened today…went out hard at full sprint on both rides today and then fell off the cliff this afternoon….have been exhausted all day and it feels different than just tiredness…. and I know part of it is trying to keep the calories down, too, and I might be doing better at that than I should…but the big thing is that I need a day off the bike and everything else to just veg out and restore my body….but when will that happen? Not any time soon unless we have a day full of rain…and that isn’t going to happen out here…although I did get wet on the bike both times today but looked at the radar and one little cloud was over here while the rest of the state was being flooded…..it was cool on the second ride when a thick fog rolled in at the beach and took visibility down to about 30 feet…I couldn’t see to the end of the boardwalk or the beach from just across the road….I need a new phone so I can take pictures again….
Finally, a push for voting rights…
Well…after the repubs spent the first 6 months after the election trying to prevent dem voters from voting by almost 300 voter suppression laws, it looks like Joe is finally getting the idea that this is the most important thing to get done…part of the new emphasis I think came from the 50 dem Texas legislators who fled the state to DC to prevent the worst laws of all of them from being passed there…and who have been threatened with arrest from Texas’ governor for their actions. This afternoon, Joe is giving what is being called the most important speech of his administration and will be calling out the repubs as the un American pricks they are….and here’s the thing, they really are trying to steal the country since they have no ideas that anyone except for their rabid base likes…taxing the rich to pay for infrastructure and elder care is supported by 80% of Americans and yet that was the first thing the repubs wanted out of the infrastructure bill….and making it harder to vote is only supported by their fox news watching cult followers…where more than 65% of Americans want voting easier. So, as with the rest of us on the left, we need to keep up the pressure on every legislator to pass this voter protection legislation…or we will lose our democracy forever….geez…
I was wrong…
Well…after all my bitching and complaining that it never rains out here, I was wrong…it did rain overnight since there are puddles on the roads and I even got wet out at the beach when it started raining like crazy out there…but it quit after about 5 minutes and I rode back here with it just spitting…but, it looks like there is more rain coming in soon and we may even get a small thunderstorm so I showered up and am going to wait til the afternoon to go back out…rain I can take…but not lightning…
July 13th
Well…I wonder if it’s ever going to rain out here? It has been forecast for quite a few days in the past few weeks and it never comes…I was really planning on a day off the bike today but it looks like I’ll be out there in an hour or so….darn….slept okay last night but still feel pretty slow right now and that seems to be the new normal these days…I did get out of here for a little while last night and I needed that…just jumped in the car and took a cruise out to the beach and stopped at the joint down the hill for a beer…need to get out of the rut I’ve been in and start doing things…but my brain has not been too amenable to doing that lately….I did have my 3rd day of quiet up here yesterday and that is pretty relaxing but I know it’s not going to last…there seems to be a cycle to it but I am still going to keep up quashing the idiots when they pop up….I just noticed that the swelling is down in my elbow and it doesn’t hurt nearly as much as it did even with abusing it yesterday by mowing and feeding the lawn…it has been months since it was pain free and I welcome any improvement….not much to do today…I was planning on just taking it easy and getting some cleaning done but that looks like it’s not going to happen without the rain….rain was my only excuse to not ride today so I may have to re-think rest days….have done almost a month of 30 miles a day and I’m worn out…more later….oh, I did see one cool thing on the way back from the beach last night….a huge mass of at least a hundred bike riders on a guided tour with all kind of riders and bikes in it…need to find out what that is about….
A few things…
Well…darn, just finished up all the work I had to do today and it’s almost 2pm….one little thing that has been under the radar after it was announced last week is the fact that Joe Biden’s administration is going to go after monopolies and consolidation in business and is going to be much less inclined to approve mergers that lead to it. I really hope he addresses the consolidation in the media, too, since I think there are about 4 companies that control all of the radio in this country….I guess even fox news is getting tired of trump lying about his election loss and they even ran a streamer basically saying there was not voter fraud in the 2020 election while the idiot boy was giving a speech to the q anon convention over the weekend….or I wonder if it is the 2 billion dollar plus lawsuits that are still pending from the voting machine companies they have been slandering since before the election…..the sanctions hearing that is going on here in Michigan about the unfounded lawsuits that trump lawyers brought about the election trying to overturn the results and appear to be entirely based on the fevered dreams of repub voters is not going well for them….at the very least the judge thinks the lawyers should have checked to see if they were true before filing the suits but the opposing lawyers think they shouldn’t have to…and it has devolved into a shouting match that is not a thing any smart lawyer would avoid…but trump’s lawyers have never been too smart….that’s it for now…
July 12th
Well…is it another morning? And what day is it? The days just run together now and I can’t tell one from another….I guess that’s what happens when you’re retired….and the boredom….way too much of that….oh, well…I did sleep okay but sure don’t feel like it right now….it seems that I feel worn out all the time but that’s probably just from getting old….okay, that’s enough of that….didn’t get much done yesterday but the bike rides but I do need to mow and feed the lawn today so I wonder if that will be enough so I only do one ride today….we’ll see….I could be getting an off day tomorrow with the rain that is forecast but that was supposed to happen yesterday and it didn’t rain at all so I’ll believe it when I see it….we could sure use the rain out here since we are almost 10 inches under from normal and that means drought…and that extends across the center of the state…..I do need to get out and get some exterior paint so I can get on the door frames and get them painted but that may wait til next week since I do want to get out to the beach for a swim or two this week….I live 5 minutes away from the lake and have only been swimming once? And my biker tan is getting pretty ugly so I need to even that out….not much to do today….don’t have to cook with doing all that yesterday but I do have to plan meals for the rest of the week….and I really should mow but I’m not motivated to do anything right now….I think I’m going to do a post on that later today…feel like I don’t know how to just live without something to move toward and that is concerning me some….more later…
Another toy for rich people…
Well….with the launch of Richard Branson’s sub orbital space ship today and the breathless coverage of it, I don’t get it….yeah, it is something of a technical accomplishment but damn, sub orbital trips were being done 60 years ago so I guess I don’t see that this is any kind of progress….and the news constantly emphasized that this ship can take 6 passengers into space and that is just so wonderful that ordinary people can now go kinda into space…but what kind of ordinary people? At more than 250,000 bucks a seat, what kind of ordinary person can afford that? I don’t mean to be a crab about this but if we tell the truth, this ship is not going to do any scientific research…it is not stretching the limits of technology…and it’s only use is to be another toy for rich people to uselessly spend money on that will go straight into another billionaire’s pocket….not much of an accomplishment in my eyes….
July 11th
Well…running about on time for a Sunday…got up a little before 7 and headed straight out to get the paper and the cool temps woke me up pretty well with the top down on the car….but, I need more coffee….had an okay day yesterday and didn’t have to make a noise call so the counter starts at one again….got two good rides in and took my tablet on the second one to take some pictures of the trail and posted them to fb….working on the second week of no flats on the bike and I think I’ll change out the rear tire soon but the bike is working so well I don’t want to screw it up…even the 5-6 shift is working and every time I take the rear wheel off changes that….so I may just wear the rest of the tread off before I change it….it looks like the rain that was forecast today is not coming so I won’t get a rest day until later in the week…we really need rain out here but it never comes and I wonder if that will hold into the winter when this place gets all the lake effect snow? I wonder if I’m doing potatoes wrong since they keep falling apart when I boil them for potato salad…I don’t remember ever having this problem before and I guess I’ll have to go out to the internet to check what the problem is….not much to do today….Sunday is the one day that I try to not do any work and just relax and not feel guilty…and there are races and soccer that I want to see so that will give me something to do later today….more later…
Why would they do this?
Well….when I read about all of the vaccine/virus denial and lies coming out of right wing news, the question comes to my mind is why would they do this? What’s in it for them to make sure that their listeners get the virus? Is it just stoking the outrage machine they need to keep their viewers coming back for more? I have never seen a safe, effective vaccine vilified as the covid one is and you would think there would be a clear reason for this coordinated attack…I know part of it is to attack Joe Biden…but the line of the attack they are using is so incoherent that the only thing you can draw from it is “vaccine bad” and saving lives by figuring out how to get more vaccine into more arms is like Nazism….this is how far the repub party has fallen in my lifetime…it is now run by cranks and crackpots who have no problem causing people to die by their lies…and what for? What could possibly be a net gain for them to kill off their own people? I still don’t get it….morons…
July 10th
Well…I felt pretty exhausted yesterday and that showed last night…fell asleep on the couch and didn’t get to bed until after 2 and didn’t get out of bed until almost 8 this morning….and I still feel pretty worn out today and I am really hoping for a rest day tomorrow since it’s supposed to rain all day…at least that was the forecast yesterday and I haven’t looked at the weather yet today…I do know it only 55 out here right now and that means a long sleeved t-shirt when I get out here in a few minutes….didn’t even get to coffee until after the machine turned off and that happens about twice a year….had an okay day yesterday and cooked lots of food so it will be leftovers for the next few days but I do want to make another batch of potato salad and cut up some carrots and celery for healthy snacks to have with ranch dressing that I load up with horseradish…very yummy…if I get the rain day tomorrow, I’m going to change out the rear tire and put the new one on and lube up the chain….will probably do the chain later today after I get the rides in so it can dry by tomorrow…not much to do today…just going to do the rides and a little cleaning but I’m not feeling I have enough energy to do much more…I do have another one to do today about the malaise I have been feeling lately but I need to flesh that out on the first ride….more later…