October 11th

Well…running about on time today with getting up around 7 but I am still pretty worn out….my legs don’t hurt as much as I expected with riding back with a flat yesterday but we’ll see how they feel when I get on the bike here in a minute…it’s weird having to wait for it to get light to be able to go out but soon it will be the temp that controls that…after the warm of the next day or so, it’s going to be cold with highs in the 50′s and 60′s…and it’s supposed to storm later today and into the night so I need to get the lawn mowed after the first ride but I think I’ll do two rides today after only doing one yesterday….if I have the tire fixed, that is…Meijers finally had tubes in stock again so I bought two to have a spare just in case….had a weird dream last night about a Joe Walsh concert that was to be held in the old Civic auditorium in GR but had elements of this house in it….strange…but it was cool to actually have a dream again….don’t have many of those anymore….not much to do today…just the rides and the lawn but I should get the branches around my power line cut back soon…but I’m not sure I need to do that today….it will be a full day without that so I may just do that by itself later in the week….I still can plant more grass seed today and I’ll take a look at that after mowing…more later…

Another damn flat…

Well…coming back from the beach, I had another flat on the bike and had to ride about 4 miles back on the flat tire…it’s the first flat I’ve had in a couple of months but I couldn’t find out what caused it even with turning the tire inside out and going over the whole tire with my hands…didn’t see anything that was sticking in the tire but it may have fallen out with me riding the thing back flat….at least it wasn’t on the inside of the tube so the electrical tape is still working to cover the spoke ends….so, no second ride today with rain coming in about 30 minutes and I am not going to get wet along with having pain from riding with the flat…should take something for it here in a minute to get ahead of it….

October 10th

Well…running really late this morning with not getting out of bed til 7 and then having to run out to get the paper…at least my new debit card worked and now I have to fix netflix since I use that for autopay…I did sleep okay last night and feel okay this morning but won’t be getting on the bike until after the F1 race that is coming on in a few minutes…and it is raining right now with another storm back in Iowa that will get here around noon or so so getting the grass seed planted was a good idea yesterday…..not sure if I’ll get two rides in this morning but I will get at least one and I won’t feel guilty for that…didn’t have two meals yesterday but I think it was like one and a half…only had a grilled cheese for dinner and I made one with swiss and that was pretty good….but that left me with about 1K calories for the day and that is not enough…I did catch two mice yesterday on the sticky pads and I still have 5 more pads but I hope they were the only two….not much to do today…no cooking since I still have leftovers to use so I think I’ll just wing it for a while and watch the race and have more coffee and read the news….more later…

I figured something out…

Well…just got done with my work for the day and it’s after 2…got the rides in and then got on reseeding another 2 1/2 pounds of seed in the dead spot on the front of the lawn and the back…then did the weed walk and ended up sweating through everything it’s so humid out here…while I was on the bike today, I think I figured something out about how much my legs have been hurting lately…and I wonder why I didn’t think of it before…as you know, about 3 weeks ago I re-geared the bike and that makes it much harder to pedal and I haven’t gotten them used to it yet….just had a candidate for city commission ring my doorbell and talked to her for a half hour or so….and told her about the problems we are having with loud cars and speeders up here…not sure if she is one I’m going to vote for…that research is going to happen this week so I can get my ballot in by the end of the week….okay, need another glass of water and some more ice so I’ll end here….no more later…

October 9th

Well…running about on time today with getting up a little after 6…but it still took an hour to get my brain working enough to come here…and I’m still not sure it is…need coffee….I did sleep okay and with just looking at the weather, I’ll be able to get out on the bike after F1 qualifying is done at 9…and that will get me to two rides before noon today….and I need that with being lazy and only getting one ride in yesterday and the day before…okay, I know the rain had something to do with it but I probably could have squeezed a second ride in yesterday but it would have been late in the day and it is hard to go out without coffee to help get the legs moving…not too sore today so that may help…didn’t get much done yesterday but I do need to clean today and maybe start on the living room door frame but I can only do the outside of it since I want some satin finish white to do the inside and the frame needs to be sanded and patched first…my thumb seems to be healing but it still hurts like crazy when I bump it and I hope that stops soon…I need to be able to use it to repaint the wheels for the winter tires next week…I have thought about getting one more year out of the old ones but I think they are too worn to do that….and I don’t want to be trapped here when it snows so that will be the project for the next week….it is a little disheartening that I’m seeing snow plows all over out here already so I think it probably gets pretty bad out here..so I will need the new tires….not much to do today…just going to get the rides in and have leftovers so I don’t have to cook but I don’t want to get into the habit of not doing anything like I did Thursday….more later….

Dodged that bullet…

Well…after I got the first bike ride in, I was getting ready to go out for the second one and thought I’d better check the radar real quick with the pop up showers that have been going on the past few days….and just like I thought, the clear skies turned into rain so I put the bike away after I hosed it down to wait for the rain to stop…but 3 more little showers popped up heading this way so I give up…one ride today and that’s okay…I did see a really cool thing on the trail where it runs right along the lake…when I turned a corner, there was a huge sandhill crane just standing in the middle of the trail..it stood 4 to 4 1/2 feet tall and when it took off it’s wingspan was about 6 feet or so…I was a little concerned about how it was going to react to me riding up to it but it just took off and flew away…first time I’ve ever seen that….pretty cool…so now, I’m going to watch a soccer match and do a little cleaning….the US won it’s world cup qualifier last night and are first in their group right now…we may get to the world cup for the first time in 12 years…. and that would be cool….

What the hell is wrong with these people?

Well…with schools starting up and the responsible ones mandating masks for kids and teachers, of course the right wing assholes spurred on by tucker carlson and the kochs, are standing outside schools screaming at children to take off their masks and that masks are just like “raping” children and are filing bogus child abuse charges against these schools and in some cases even parents. What the hell is wrong with these people? In what universe is it okay to attack a 6 year old for following the rules? It was found the other day that the koch right wing networks of think tanks and websites have been sending out instructions to their followers how to attack school boards that mandate masks and other mitigation measures to keep children safe…shouldn’t this be a crime? It should be if is isn’t…these are assaults and these brainwashed assholes need to be held accountable…and especially tucker who daily exhorts his watchers to violence against anyone who would take away their “freedoms”…but, as all of the right these days, the hypocrisy runs high in ole tucker, he and every one at fox “news” has to be vaccinated or they can’t get in the building…seems like a “mandate” to me…I wonder why tucker isn’t walking a picket line outside his studio  to protest? We all know the answer to that…they love manipulating the rubes that watch their crappy shows and get their jollies from them being assholes to other Americans who are doing the right things in the pandemic…and that is what’s wrong with these people…geez…

October 8th

Well…4:14…and that sucked…but I was able to get back to sleep until after 6 so that was okay…and I feel a little better today…not anywhere near as worn out as I have been so I’ll take it…and my legs are not nearly as painful as they have been with only doing about 6 miles in the rain yesterday…and it looks like I won’t get out til this afternoon with the rain that is coming in about a half hour from now…I do need to make a run to menards this morning for more grass seed and I’ll do that as soon as I get done with this….I wonder why there is no antibiotic cream on the shelves anymore? Have looked for it for months now and I may have to get it on amazon if I can’t find any locally…I’m almost out after using a lot of it on my thumb and need it when I damage my hands….and the stuff with painkiller in it really helps when I do major damage like with my thumb….I did basically take the day off yesterday but I won’t do that again today unless it rains all day…should get on unpacking the stuff downstairs and getting rid of the old clothes I don’t use anymore…and I got the parts for the bike the other day and should get at putting the black one back together with the knobby tires I plan  on using for winter riding….I should get a battery for the computer on the specialized bike that I’m going to put on the trainer to ride inside over the winter….but, I don’t feel like doing any of that right now….need more coffee and to read some news to start my day….more later….

A day off and other stuff…

Well…for only the second or third time since I’ve been out here, I’ve taken the day off the bike today…other than the 6 miles I did in the rain this morning…it has been raining off and on all day today and I have been waiting for an hour dry slot but with these pop up showers, they don’t register on the radar and every time I look outside the pavement is wet as if a shower just came through…and after getting wet this morning, I don’t want that to happen again so I’m done for the day…I did get some cleaning done and gave myself a haircut and just realized that I’ve been doing that since January of 2020 so I guess I got my money’s worth out of the 25 bucks I paid for the Wahl clipper set I bought….and I’m getting pretty good at it and it only takes a few minutes so I have to remember that I can keep it looking neat and don’t have to let it get shaggy…It just dawned on me that I have had the same set of earbuds for almost 18 months now…I knew the Betron set looked pretty heavy duty when I got them but I’ve never gotten more than a few months out of the skull candy ones I used for a couple of years and really expected that out of these…and they were only 16 bucks on amazon so that’s a bargain, too…oh, and they sound good, too….I am going to have two meals today even with not riding and see if that helps how worn out I’ve been feeling lately…still only had a chicken thigh, baked potato, and some corn for lunch…with a glass of milk, that’s about 600 calories and I need to use up the burger that I have left for dinner so that will be another 600 or so and I hope to see some improvement in how I feel tomorrow…no more later…

Dump AT&T and direct tv…

Well…the world news service Reuters is out with a new report that shows that AT&T and it’s subsidiary direct tv created and is still supporting the right wing hoax news channel OANN….you know the one, the channel that is all hoaxes and conspiracy theories and anti vaxxers that daily undermines our democracy with constant stories about “election fraud” that doesn’t exist. They also use the channel as an in house propaganda network that heaps praise on AT&T constantly and helps them get the government to do what they want…like when they bought direct tv and needed government approval of the merger….now, AT&T has been at his kind of crap since before time essentially when they were part of the old Bell network and they are the primary funders of the Texas repubs that just ended women’s rights to control their own bodies there….and they are still funding the idiot trump and the thugs that tried to overthrow the government and who are still at it…so, if you have AT&T as your cell provider or direct tv as your tv provider, switch since every dollar you give them helps undermine this country and helps repubs make women second class citizens….there are better companies out there to give your money to…geez…