Trip to Killeen

You'll remember from one of my previous posts that I had to take my motorcycle in to get a recall repair. I was originally scheduled to run it over to Abilene for an appointment at 9:00 in the morning. It's about an 80 mile ride....farther than I've ever been before. However, when I went to leave, it was cold... like 25 degrees. Now, 25 degrees isn't too cold, but when the wind is blowing at about 20 MPH and then you create an additional 70MPH of wind chill and ride for an hour and 15 minutes, that gets really cold. When you don't have the proper gear it can quickly lead to hypothermia.

I chickened out. I turned around and went back home before I made it across town. I called the dealer and tried to reschedule for later in the day. I was told that they were much too busy and I'd have to reschedule for almost two weeks out. This really made me mad because I had called them the day before and was told that "it only takes 20 minutes and you don't need an appointment".

I called other Suzuki dealerships in "the area". The only one I could get in to was in Killeen, which is about 115 miles away. I waited and left at 10:30. By then it had warmed up to 40, which is still chilly, especially for a 2 hour ride. So, I donned by Patagonia long underwear, a pair of jeans, a pair of windproof pants, a fleece pull over, a patagonia R4 jacket, my Mountain Hardwear windproof shell, my balaclava, skull cap, helmet, and windproof gloves. I really felt like Ralphie's little brother from The Christmas Story, but I was toasty.

The ride down was great. I stopped in Lampasas (that's about half-way) and shed a few layers since it had warmed up a bit more. Anyhoo... I got the bike fixed and I didn't freeze on the way down there.

The ride home was a different story. I've heard other cyclists complain about the factory seats on their motorcycles, but always thought mine was nice and comfy. Until I made it back to Lampasas. An hour and 15 minutes from home I felt like I was sitting on a 2 x 4. And talk about a wedgy... yikes!

For awhile I decided to grin and bear it. That strategy soon failed. Suddenly, I began to notice that there were a lot of historical markers along this highway. I'm currently taking US History since 1877 at Howard Payne University. The history of cental Texas become increasingly interesting. I stopped at every historical marker between Lampasas and home. This allowed me to get off the bike about every 10 minutes, stretch my legs, and get my undies out of a bunch. In addition, I learned a lot about several dried up towns like Goldthwaite (the H is silent, go figure) and the Farmer's Alliance. Very interesting indeed.

Pony

Somehow Hope got the idea in her head that she would get a pony when we moved to Texas. I'm not sure exactly how that happened, but anyway, she was pretty sure she would be getting a pony.

So, for her birthday we gave her a Cinderella castle. It's really neat. The clock even chimes when you turn the hands to midnight. Anna stayed up until the wee hours of the morning putting on all of the decals. Bless her.

We also bought her the accompanying carriage, which comes with a horse. After she opened all of her cards and other stuff, she was prancing the horse around on the floor. She looked at me and said, "Daddy, look! I got a pony."

"Yes," I replied. "Don't you remember you were going to get a pony when we moved to Texas? There you go."

Bike Bummer

Wow... it's been forever since I've added anything to my blog. I guess it's because I've been crazy busy. Mom and Dad were here, and then Anna's grandma passed away, so she's been out of town with the girls to be with her family. And me? Well, I've been doing a bunch of extra stuff at work... and my taxes...

Speaking of taxes.. Have you ever done taxes when you've purchased a home, refinanced, sold a home, relocated, and bought a new home in 13 months? Well, it's kind of depressing really. Partial year taxes in one state. Figuring cost basis on the old house. Deducting points, interest, and other stuff for a plethora of mortgages. Figuring out what relocation expenses can be deducted, etc. It's a real chore. On the good side, I get to deduct points for 3 mortgages in one year. Still, it's never fun to put all of this together.

I'm also suffering from motorcycle withdrawl. There was a recall on my bike and they recommended not riding it until the issue has been repaired. So, tomorrow, I get to take it in to the dealer (80 miles away) to get it fixed. I'm really looking forward to being able to ride again. It's been two weeks now since I got the recall notice and the weather has been really beautiful down here.

On another note (for you techies), I've been working on playing around with Linux lately. When Dad was here, I was trying to help him get set up to run wireless on his linux laptop. I decided that I should give it a whirl again since it'd been years since I've really played around with it. But which Linux distribution should I use? I decided to try a bunch of different ones and compare them. I started out with Kubuntu, but didn't like it because there was a bug in the distribution that prevented you from doing several administrative tasks. I found this to be really annoying. I tried OpenSuse and I actually liked it fairly well. I think if I was going to run something for business, OpenSuse would be a front-runner for me. Doing the web install took like 9 hours because of all of the downloading. I didn't like that. All of the other distros I tried came on single CD iso images of 650 MB or less. I tried Mepis as well. I really liked Mepis. It just worked. The distribution includes everything you need to play MP3s and DVDs. I really liked that, but it uses KDE, and I'm not a big fan of KDE. Too busy. And ugly. Too much like Windows. It's supposed to be unix. Don't make it look like Windows. Finally, I tried ubuntu. Kubuntu is actually a spin-off of ubuntu, so I wasn't expecting a lot out of ubuntu, but I actually ended up liking it more than any other. The Gnome interface is simple and elegant. Everything worked, and the install was a breeze. However, it doesn't come with support for MP3s and DVDs. Still, I think I'm going to stick with ubuntu and just add the other things I need. Dad, if you're still looking for a good linux distro, I'd recommend that you use ubuntu.

OK, but here's my gripe with Linux. I keep hearing from everyone about how much easier it is to setup and maintain than windows. If you want to install an application, you open your package manager and download what you need. But, often the software you want isn't in the package manager, so you have to go get it from some other source, or download the code and compile it yourself. Most people don't have a clue about how to do this. Shoot... I'm a developer and I don't usually like to compile someone else's code. With a windows system, you simply go to the manufacturer's website, download the installer, and run it. I fail to see how apt-get and package managers are easier.

The security update/patching mechanisms are cryptic and difficult to use. Plus, half the time, they prompt you to update almost every package on your machine, which takes hours. And people say this is better than WindowsUpdate?

In addition, wireless support is a joke. It's difficult to configure, and only supports WEP. Everyone knows that WEP is easy to crack... that's why we all run WPA/AES or WPA/TKIP these days.


It's frustrating, because I want to run a unix O/S, but I just don't think Linux is ready for prime time. I guess I'm just going to have to get an iMac so I can run OS X. Ok, I'll stop spewing out technical gibberish now.

Good Night.

Maybe it was a fluke

Scrabble scores for game #2:

Anna - 255
Joe - 241
Mom - 139

The Scrabble Queen Arrives

OK, so Anna and I thought that we were the only Scrabble champions in our family. However, Mom just showed us both up. She whipped us soundly. The final score was 298 (Mom), 268 (Joe.. - at least I beat Anna!!!!), and 264 (Anna). The reason she won was her 7 letter word that traversed two Triple Word Scores for a total of 167 points for a single word. Anna and I fought back bravely laying words like PINITES (Joe - 90 points) and SPEEDOS (Anna - 78 points.)

Ah well. Now I'm showing my Mom how to write a blog entry gloating about our Scrabble prowess.

Would I Buy A Mac?

Would I buy a Mac?

Absolutely! Surprised?

Apple has really made a lot of strides over the last few years.

1) Their new Operating System (well, it's a few years old now) is based on FreeBSD, which is a unix-like operating system. This means that it is incredibly stable and secure. The problem with the unix-like operating systems (Linux, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, etc) is that their user-interfaces leave a lot to be desired. They aren't something that most computer novices would be very comfortable with. Apple has taken their really, really good UI and put it on top of a unix system. This is great because it's easy to use, very robust, secure, and stable. Also, everything is now built pretty much on open standards like TCP/IP instead of old proprietary protocols like appletalk.

2) iPod. What else do I need to say? iPods rock. They are the very best music player on the market. But did you know that you can play video on them? Carry around your digital photo collection? Backup important files from your PC. With the new iLife (see below) I can add pictures to my Mac and have them automatically sent to my friend's iPods. How sweet is that? Add new pics of the kids to the Mac and they magically appear on grandma's mac and her iPod too.

3) iLife is a suite of applications for editing home videos, recording a podcast, creating webpages, sending email, etc. There are lots of options here for the PC as well. However, the Apple apps are really simple to use and are all integrated with one another. Not too mention the iPod integration.

4) The hardware. Apple recently announced a new iMac that uses an Intel processor. This is cool because it's much faster than the old machines, plus the new Macs are essentially running on the same type of hardware that you buy from Dell or HP or whoever. But the iMac is all inclusive. No wires required except for your power cable. Wireless ethernet, bluetooth, speakers, and monitor all built in. The monitor, by the way, is a 17" or 20" High Definition display. It blows most other PC displays out of the water.

Everything I've mentioned above is included in the price of the unit... $1299 for the 17 inch model or $1699 for the 20 inch model. OK, it doesn't include the iPod, but the integration is built in. It's really a good value for what you get.

Of course, then there is Aperture and Final Cut Pro. Aperture is probably the best photo editing software available today. It allows you to edit the raw image as seen by the ccd on yor camera. So, you can adjust lighting, exposure, etc AFTER you physically take the picture. It's spendy at $499, but if you are going to spend $1300 on a nice Nikon D70 (hint hint John and Jenn) why not spend another $500 and be able to really use the thing to it's potential. Final Cut Pro and Shake are Apple's professional video editing suite. If they were good enough to make "King Kong" they are probably good enough to edit your home movies.

Do I think you should throw away your PCs and jump ship for Apple? No. PCs are great. I love them. You can do just about anything you want to with them. However, if I were looking at a new PC today, I'd most likely buy a new iMac.

Grilling Experiments

When we got married, my pastor and his wife gave us a Char Broil grill as a wedding present. It was a thoughtful gift and one that we certainly used a lot! I only wish at the time that I had known more about grilling, because I really didn't have much of a clue about what I was doing. Well, the faithful little Char Broil survived being tossed across my deck in May 2002 during a fearful hail and wind storm. It made it through 3 moves, but alas, in 2004 it finally gave up the ghost. In the end, the burner element rusted out, the grates where shot, and it wobbled really bad.

I lived without a grill for almost two years (terrible, I know). I promised myself that rather than buy another cheap one (which I was certainly grateful to have) I'd save up my money and buy a nice one that would be more durable and produce better results. So, when I moved to Texas, I decided that the time was right and I purchased a Weber Genesis Silver C (With Side Burner). I started using it with OK results, but nothing too fantastic.

Then, my parents bought me a copy of Weber's Real Grilling for Christmas. This is a fantastic book with over 200 recipes and a ton of information about grilling techniques. A new flame started to burn in my grill and I've been turning out some really good food. I'm very pleased.

Here lately I've been trying more and more challenging recipes including various types of Rubs, Marinades, etc. Of course, not everything turns out perfectly. I remember running across one of Mom's old cookbooks as a kid and looking at her notes in the margins:

"Ron likes."

"Ron hates."

"I like, Ron doesn't."

I'm finding myself making similar annotations in my cookbook. Tonight, I tried to make Honey Lime Chicken Salad (With Tomatoes and Avocado). The marinade was awesome and the chicken turned out great. However, when I combined the rest of the ingredients the avocado mushed up (think guacamole) and the finished product didn't really look that great. The flavor of the chicken was great, but I didn't like it all together. My margin notes read, "Marinade is great, Salad is gross."

Kids and Driving

My friend Trevor recently made a post to his blog about his oldest kid being able to drive in 12 years. In order to fully appreciate this post, you should really take a minute and go and read his post. If you don't, you really won't understand what I'm talking about.

Ok, are you back now? Good. Here goes:

Dude,

You think that's bad???? My kids are already driving. And to beat all, I had to re-arrange the garage so that we can all park in there:

I Have Arrived!

Have you ever had one of those moments where you think to yourself, "Man, as a parent.. I have ARRIVED!" ???? hmmm? I think we all have one of those moments now and again. You know, you're just going along and you see or do something that just strikes you. You stop and think "Wow. Now I understand why Mom or Dad said or did that".

Well, I had one of those moments last night at Wal Mart. My kids like ketchup. (Does anyone have kids that don't?) We go through a lot of the stuff. It goes on chicken nuggets, french fries, they'll even dip carrots in it. I always try to buy the big bottles because it's cheaper. There I was last night pushing my "buggy" down the aisle. Pause. Did you know that a shopping cart is called a "buggy" in Texas? Anyway, so I was pushing my buggy down the aisle and I spied this little gem sitting on the shelf:



I had to have it. I thought, wow, now that's a man-sized bottle of ketchup. The hunter-gatherer in me proclaimed that I had gotten a great prize for my family. HO! HO! HO!

And then it all came rushing back to me. This must be what Mom and Dad felt like when they bought 1 gallon jars of pickles, 50 pound bags of rice, and 10 pound tubes of Braunschweiger. (That stuff should be outlawed.) Anyway, yeah, I know now that it was really the hunter-gatherer pride in my parents that sent me to school with smoked liver sausage sandwiches for all those years.

I have arrived. Long live the hunter-gatherer instinct!

Is that a mouse or just Chili Rellenos?

It was my wife's birthday a few weeks ago so we went out to eat to celebrate. This was extra special since her parents also happened to be in town.

Now, the restaurant we went to is a great Tex-Mex place. Really good food. The food is generally really hot and spicy, and really flavorful. I've only been there a few times, but I usually leave feeling like I ate something extremely good, but also wondering whether or not my tongue would set off the smoke alarms when I walk in the house. I keep hearing about how good chili rellenos are, but I hadn't actually gotten up the nerve to try them since they are basically Anaheim Peppers stuffed with cheese. I decided to bite the bullet and give it a try.

Man... they were good. Really good. But when I got closer to the top of the peppers I realized that they hadn't removed the seeds, and the seeds contain the oil that gives the peppers their "heat". I decided I couldn't quite handle all that in one sitting without regretting it a few hours later, so, I finished everything else on my plate and asked for a "to go" box.

I chatted with everyone at the table for a few minutes and then we all prepared to leave. I picked up one of my chili rellenos by the pepper tail and lifted it over into the "to-go" box. A look of terror flashed across my mother-in-law's face.

"HUUUUUUHHHHHH"

"What is that? Is that a MOUSE?" She whispered loudly enough to turn heads at a neighboring table.

I about busted out laughing. In the dim light of the restaurant, from 8 or 9 feet away, the Anaheim pepper I was holding did look remarkably like a mouse. We all had a great laugh and went home.

Here's a picture of my leftover chili rellenos:

Fires

For those of you who have been watching the news, you've probably heard about the fires in Texas that killed three people yesterday. That was about 30 miles from my house. It's been bone dry down here. There hasn't really been any measurable rain since Late September / First week of October. Everything is very dry and extremely flammable.

It was kind of interesting yesterday. The skies were very clear in the morning. My father-in-law and I decided to tackle a home-improvement project together. We added a power roof vent to my house. So, there we were up on the roof, cutting holes, playing with power tools and electricity, and liberally apply roof cement. It was a warm afternoon... about 85 degrees. It doesn't get much better.

It had been windy all day (about 35-40 MPH gusts) and when the sky started to haze over at about 4 PM at first I thought it might actually be a storm rolling in. In a sense, it was. The haze was a mix of dust and smoke from the firestorm up in Cross Plains. That fire must have been magnificently frightful up close. At 30 miles away you could smell the smoke and all the kicked-up dust. It clouded the sun. Supposedly, the flames reached 30 - 40 feet high and the fire moved at about 45 MPH over the dry brush and grass. The power of nature is simply amazing.

Push Pops

The in laws are here to spend Christmas with us. They like to come and spend a few weeks with the grandkids over Christmas. It's nice for my wife too. Since I get along so well with them, we all really have a nice time.

The other night, we went to WalMart to do our pre-company power shopping. We finished and got in line. Suddenly, Anna realized that she forgot to put something on the list. She took Hope and went to go get it while I kept our place in line with Tori.

It wasn't too long until it was almost our turn. While I loaded the stuff (a TON of it!) onto the conveyer, Tori busied herself by re-arranging the candy on the shelf. Suddenly, I looked back and she was walking away from me.

"Hey Tori, come here."

She kept walking.

"Tori... hey.... Stay with Dad."

No response.

"Tori. Stop!"

She stopped, but didn't turn around.

"Hey, you... come 'ere!"

She stood still.

"Do you want a spank?"

"No"

"Turn around."

Slowly, gingerly, she turned around. In her fat little fingers was a Push Pop. I looked down. Push Pop wrapper on the floor.

I looked at Tori. Red stuff on her coat. Red stuff on her hands. I think she thought her gig was going to be up shortly because, man, she was going to town on that Push Pop. I've never seen her tongue move so fast. She was going to savor every little bit that she could before I inevitably took it away.

But really, there wasn't really a lot I could do. After all, I couldn't exactly put it back on the shelf. She had been really good in the store, so I thought... hey, why not just let her keep the dumb thing. It's only 39 cents. I looked at Tori and I asked, "Do you want a Push Pop honey?"

"Peeeeeaas" (Please)

Anna returned with the item that she forgot. Tori looked at her and said, "Heee mama .. (Here Mama)... see wan some? (Do you want some?)...

When we got home, we had to give her a bath.... Push Pop in her hair... Her clothes, hands, running down her neck, running into her diaper... I'm still not sure how she managed that one....

Rain

I came to the realization the other day that I've been in Texas for two months and it's only rained once.... the first week we were here. It's normally pretty dry down here, but going 8 weeks without anything is atypical. I've kind of gotten out of the habit of checking the forecast before riding my motorcycle to work because, hey, it never rains down here.

As I prepared for work yesterday, I realized that I was running about 20 minutes early. Great! My bike was pretty dirty and needed to be cleaned. I've been cleaning it by hand with a bucket of water, which takes like an hour. I decided to stop by one of the local car washes on the way to work and clean off my bike. So, I got there, deposited my $1.00 in quarters, and used their pressure hose to clean off all the dust and gunk from inside the wheel wells and all that. Looked real good and only took about 10 minutes. Hi ho, off to work I go.

I got to work, did my thing for about 4 hours and decided to head home for some lunch. I walked up to the front door and realized that it was raining, but only lightly. I decided I was too hungry to go without lunch, and rain really isn't a big deal for a tough little guy from Minnesota (see previous post). By the time I got home, my jeans were soaked and pasted against the front of my legs. I changed my pants, ate lunch, and then took Anna's car back to work. I left my now muddy, water spotted, not so clean motorcycle in the garage.

Todo list for weekend:

Clean motorcycle.

Chilly

Man... I haven't blogged in almost a week! Well...It's time for a good story.

Some of you probably don't know yet, but I finally got rid of the old Geo Metro. I wanted to replace it with something a little sportier, more reliable, and well, I really didn't have a lot to spend. So, somehow I convinced myself (and the wife) to let me buy a motorcycle. Cheap, reliable, good on gas, and able to do the quarter mile faster than a Corvette. Not that I really needed to do the quarter mile that fast, or I ever would, but hey, it sounds nice when you write about it in your blog. OK... So, here it is, my liquid cooled, shaft driven, fuel injected 2006 Suzuki Boulevard C50. It even has this thing on the gas tank that tells time.



Naturally, making such a purchase requires a lot of research. I spent countless hours (just ask Anna and watch her roll her eyes) reading up on what I should buy, going to showrooms, etc. Usually Hope came along with me and would always sit on each bike and tell me if she liked it or not. As it were, Yamaha makes a little 50cc dirt bike for little kids. She thought it was really cool to sit on it, but her legs couldn't reach the controls because she's still too short. In response to her fairly repetitive requests to buy one for her, I ingeniously replied, "Honey, look, your legs are just too short for this motorcycle. See... You can't reach the controls." This seemed to suffice just fine and she left me alone about it.

There's nothing quite like pulling up to a stop light in a Geo Metro and realizing you're in the wrong lane. Nervously, you glance into the other lane, trying to calculate which cars will take off faster than others. Where will my coveted space be? Who will allow me to slide over? Will I miss my turn/exit/whatever? Careful planning and execution are the key with a small clunker with only 2 good cylinders. But now, oh glorious!, I have a motorcycle. It's really fun to ride. Every morning I don my jacket, pull down my helmet, and let the crisp autumn air rush briskly past my face as I ride to work. When I pull up to a stoplight in the wrong lane, I still look in the other lane just to make sure no one has pulled up with a Diablo, or a Boxster, or a Z3. With these few notable exceptions, I know that I can beat just about anything off the line if I need to. Oh! The thrill of the ride! The freedom!

And then it got cold.

Hey, I'm a big tough guy (well OK, a little tough guy) from Minnesota. I can handle mother nature's fury just fine. No little whamsy, pansy 20 degree weather is going to keep me off my ride, right? I think the Lord has his ways of humbling people. The brisk autumn air has started to get a little too brisk. 20 to 30 degrees isn't too bad when you're standing still. Try adding a 70 MPH windchill factor. I added liners to my gloves and went on. One thing kept bothering me though... My chin would get mighty cold. That air rushed across the bottom of my helmet and swept right across my chin and neck. It was time for a solution.

So, one day, Hope and I headed down to the local motorcycle dealer in search of something to cover my chin and neck. I settled on an insulated baclava. It was thin over the head, but there was windproof fabric and insulation over the neck and chin. Perfect! Problem solved. I paid for my purchase and turned around. There sat Hope on a 50cc Yamaha dirt bike. I was taken aback at how much she had grown in the last three months. Both feet were firmly planted on the controls. She looked up at me with anticipation written all across her face.

"Look Dad, I can reach both feet things, right?".

"That's right honey, you're really getting to be a big girl, aren't you?"

Hope turned sideways on the motorcycle, glanced at me, and then turned to the sales woman. "We'll take it!" she shouted.

Well, then we had to have the discussion about just because she could fit on the motorcycle didn't necessarily mean that we would get one, etc. It was rather amusing...Ok, back to the story.

As the temperature has continued to drop, I've sort of developed a reputation at work. People see me ride up and say, "Wow, you rode today? You're more of a man than I am." I'm getting to know more and more people down here and they all think I'm either half crazy or way tougher than themselves. It's really worked out to my advantage. In a strange sort of way, I'm earning their respect. It sounds funny, I know, but it's the truth.

So, this week, it got really cold, at least by Texas standards. It was 11 degrees one morning as I prepared for work. I was determined to ride to work. It's a guy thing. So, I thought for a few minutes, donned by Patagonia long underwear, a heavy sweater, Patagonia R4 insulated jacket, my baclava, glove liners, Outdoor Research SlipStream windproof gloves, put on my Mountain Hardwear backcountry jacket, pulled on my helmet and started the bike. I was all bundled up and warm as all get out. Cruising through the neighborhood I was pretty toasty. I hopped on the highway. My fingers were a little chiller than normal, but not bad.

Well... 4 miles into my 6 mile commute I thought I was going to suffer from hypothermia. My fingers ached terribly, my jeans felt like fishnet stockings (not that I really know what fishnet stockings feel like. It's a literary analogy. I learned about this sort of thing in college.), my legs were numb from the knee down, and I pretty much felt like an idiot. When I arrived at work, I was the only motorcycle in the lot. You should have seen the look on the security guard's face as I came through the door.

"Cold enough for you?"

"Nah," I replied, "not too bad." I was at work for a good twenty minutes before my fingers felt normal.

I've since learned that they make electric gloves for motorcyclists. They plug into your bike and keep your fingers warm. Who knew? I'm also on the lookout for a good pair of riding pants that aren't quite as thin and drafty as denim.

Do I regret buying my motorcycle? Well, at times it's incredibly inconvenient (and chilly!), but it could be worse. I could be that other guy at the stoplight sitting in the minivan.

Cold on the way!

...THE COLDEST AIR OF THE SEASON IS ON THE WAY...

A BITTER ARCTIC COLD FRONT IS EXPECTED TO REACH WEST CENTRAL TEXAS LATE TUESDAY AFTERNOON OR DURING THE EVENING. HIGHS ON WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY COULD REMAIN IN THE 20S AND 30S OVER MUCH OF THE AREA WITH NIGHT TIME LOWS IN THE TEENS AND 20S.

IT IS POSSIBLE THAT TEMPERATURES MAINLY ALONG AND NORTH OF A MERTZON TO SAN ANGELO TO BROWNWOOD LINE MAY NOT GO ABOVE FREEZING FROM TUESDAY NIGHT THROUGH FRIDAY MORNING. WIND CHILL READINGS COULD RANGE IN THE TEENS AND 20S. THE BELOW NORMAL TEMPERATURES WILL LINGER THROUGH AT LEAST FRIDAY.

TAKE THE TIME TO PREPARE FOR AN EXTENDED PERIOD OF FREEZING TEMPERATURES WITH THESE SAFETY RULES.

KEEP YOURSELF UPDATED ON THE LATEST WEATHER FORECASTS.

ENSURE YOUR HEATING DEVICES ARE CLEAN AND IN GOOD WORKING ORDER.

KEEP ALL COMBUSTIBLE MATERIALS AWAY FROM HEATERS.

IN CASE YOU LOSE POWER AT HOME OR BECOME STRANDED ON THE ROAD...BE SURE TO HAVE SOME EXTRA NON-PERISHABLE FOOD AROUND IN BOTH PLACES...A CAN OPENER...EXTRA BLANKETS...BOTTLE WATER...FLASH LIGHT...AND BATTERY POWERED RADIO.

ENSURE ALL EXPOSED PIPES ARE PROPERLY INSULATED.

YOU ARE URGED TO HAVE A CARBON MONOXIDE DETECTOR TO KEEP YOU AND YOUR FAMILY SAFE THIS WINTER.

TAKE IT EASY OUTSIDE BECAUSE YOUR HEART HAS TO WORK EXTRA HARD DURING THE COLD WEATHER. IT IS A GOOD IDEA TO WEAR LAYERS OF CLOTHING IF YOU HAVE TO BE OUTSIDE.

MAKE SURE YOUR PETS AND LIVESTOCK HAVE PLENTY OF FOOD AND HAVE A WARM PLACE.

Hehe... I love this.... It's going to be 20 low / 51 high on Wednesday and there is a "Severe Weather Warning"

OneNote

Trevor,

In response to your post about using dilbert for taking notes.... You should really check out Microsoft OneNote. Http://www.microsoft.com/onenote Best Note-taking and organizing tool I've found to date. Also integrates with Outlook so you can tie your notes to a specific meeting, contact, task, or whatever. Very nifty and way more high-tech then writing on the back of a Dilbert Calendar.

By the way, it's included in MSDN if you have a subscription.

Diet and Exercise Routine Are Paying Off

My diet and exercise routine are starting to pay off. We started working on the Christmas Decorations this evening. I had to get up into the attic and get all of the boxes down. This project is always a lot of work, so this year, I'm glad that I'm on my way to being physically fit. Every time I would bring a tote in from the attic, the kids would cheer and clap. Hope kept saying, "Wow, you're strong Daddy!" I couldn't agree more. Here's a picture of me doing an overhead press with one of our gargantuan Christmas Totes. Man... that thing must have weighed 20 pounds! If you put your face 1 inch away from the monitor, you can actually see the fat falling off of my thinning love handles...

Poetry

My mother is currently stranded in the middle of a blizzard in the midwest. Well...not really stranded... she's in a hotel waiting out the storm. All the businesses around her are closed and the interstate is shut down. But alas, the Internet is still alive and well on the great plains. As a result, we've been receiving regular updates. She's almost finished her book, and has nearly run out of yarn for her knitting project. I think she's getting bored. I decided to write some poetry to cheer her up:

Attempt #1:

I rode my motorcycle to work today.
I'm wearing a short-sleeved shirt.
Last night, I watered the lawn.
Keep the tundra...I'm fine.

Maybe this would be better expressed in Haiku:


Haiku Attempt #1:

Rode the bike today
The weather here is so nice
You can have the cold.


Haiku Attempt #2:

The wind in my face
as I cruise along the road
is better than snow


Haiku Attempt #3:

Mom sees the cold road
I see warm sun and green grass
She runs out of yarn.


ah well... better not quit my day job...

There's more of me to love

Lately there has been more of me to love. I'm coming to terms with the fact that I am overweight. My wife is a really good cook and I happen to also have a penchant for ice cream and a desk job that encourages me to be sedentary. The result is that after 6 and a half years of marriage, I've gained almost 30 pounds.

This situation creates a bit of a paradox for me. When I started backpacking a few years ago, I carried almost 50 pounds of junk with me. I've been working very hard to reduce my pack weight (See previous posts about making my own gear.) On my last trip, my pack weighed less than 20 lbs including food and water. The problem is that I've worked really hard to reduce my pack weight while my body has continued to grow horizontally.

Well... I've decided to fight back. I'm on a plan to win my body back over this Holiday Season. I thought about purchasing a BowFlex, a TotalGym, or some other "miracle" fitness machine guaranteed to make me look like Chuck Norris, or Heaven forbid, Christie Brinkley. I thought about joining the local gym. In the end, I decided that the local gym was inconvenient, and the machines were over-priced and beyond what I need at this stage of the game. Simple (Free or Low Cost) exercises would have to do it.

Since the bulk of my weight has landed in my core (Gut, Love Handles, etc) and I've had some lower back issues in the last few years, I've decided to focus my workouts on core exercises, at least initially. A simple Google search has paid off big dividends. I'm now running through some hard-core exercises for 30 minutes 3 times a week. These things are brutal.

In addition, I've put myself on a common sense, healthy step-down reduced calorie diet. 1700 calories for the first two weeks, 1600 calories for the next two, on down to 1300 calories for the final two weeks. This is provided that I can function at the lower calorie levels. So far, 1700 is going pretty good. After a week, I'm starting to see the first signs of results.

DEATH TO ICE CREAM! LONG LIVE BANANAS!

More Homemade gear

Here's another picture of some home made gear:



This is a Ray-Way tarp and net-tent. This really was the project that started it all for me. I had a great time putting it together. Admittedly, there was frustration along the way, but I think it turned out very well. My last trip on the Superior Hiking Trail was the inaugural journey for my tarp. This picture was taken at the Indian Creek multi-group campsite. After walking 12 miles and arriving at our camp, it began to rain. I got a lot of satisfaction out of sitting under my tarp and watching the rain come down around me knowing that my shelter was something that I had crafted with my own two hands (OK, and a sewing machine too).