James Pearl Thinks Blogging is Dead

The September Blog Project - #21

I played around with the ramp this morning and gave is a v1 try. I put it pretty close to the whale and overshot it by a bunch, which made the landing dangerously close to tail of the whale. After that I moved it back but was somewhat chicken shit to send it. I will need to have a safety in between the launch and the whale, because I really don't want to case this and go ass over tea kettle. I'm thinking my ramp needs to be a tad steeper because I think this is setup to be more of a vertical thing that horizontal. Sometimes I am really pretty good at this but in this case I admit I don't know what I'm doing.

This is before I placed the jump.

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I also got a haircut today. Carson will be happy.

Julia and I went out to P'Burg tonight to watch the girls volleyball team play. She has a friend on the team and of course Kirt's daughter is on the team, so we hung out and watched the game. This is also where I went to high school but I had never seen this new campus, and holy shit it is something else. Absolutely gorgeous place.

Driving through that area is really weird for me now. It's literally a lifetime ago when I lived out there and so much has changed, even if so much is the same. Lots of memories, across the spectrum. I guess this is what they really call nostalgia. Sort of memories of a previous life but also a little sad? I have no idea why I would be sad. Maybe because I'm old. No idea.

Anyway, they girls won, which was cool.

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The September Blog Project - #22

I started this Friday like I've started every Friday this month, doing some TM with Kirt. More details can be found here. Again, you know you never thought I would make the first 4. Now we'll see if I can bang out all 5. So far this month, I have done a total of 8 TM days (2 RV, 6 CR). Target is 10-12. We'll see.

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Then i went home to "work." I spent 3 hours rounding out the week then I went outside to mow the lawn. Today should be titled: Get Outside Before the Shitty Weekend.

Around 5:00 D and I met up with Glenn to get in a last ride before the monsoon comes. I know a lot of people fret about this. Obviously, I try to make the most of my outside time, especially right now with such amazing weather. I would prefer it not rain this weekend but it is what it is. Anyway, we rode 9 miles and got in as the sun was starting to call it a day, or I guess a set of days because we may not see the sun again until Monday or Tuesday. So it was a good way to wrap the week and start the weekend.

Finally, I shaved. Carson will be smitten.

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Norm said:
I went outside to mow the lawn.
Click to expand...
Was this is one shot? As I recall from earlier posts this is a task that is spread out over multiple sessions or days (could have been due to time constraints). Real question is how are the hornets? My neighbor's are still alive and kicking in the tree, over 10 cans in (half from me, half them), plus some "peppermint oil" that is supposed to make them leave. Hornets 11, humans 0.
 
rottin' said:
Was this is one shot? As I recall from earlier posts this is a task that is spread out over multiple sessions or days (could have been due to time constraints). Real question is how are the hornets? My neighbor's are still alive and kicking in the tree, over 10 cans in (half from me, half them), plus some "peppermint oil" that is supposed to make them leave. Hornets 11, humans 0.
Click to expand...

The lawn was in one shot. I have been doing a single mow more often these days. Sometimes I'll split it into back & front/sides but more often than not I try to do a single session if I can. Back in the dinosaur era, when it didn't rain as much, doing a little at a time was fine. I think I tried the piecemeal approach this year and when I was done I just had to start over because the grass is growing so fast. Sort of like painting the Golden Gate Bridge.

I have also learned the difference in these stingy things:
  • yellow jackets - assholes that live in the ground
  • hornets - assholes that build those mud huts in trees and on your house
  • wasps - those gangly alien-like MFers
  • bees - the ones when you run into them they kiss you and it tastes like honey. Or something like that.
So I had 3 spots where there were yellow jackets:
  1. Back of the house, left side of the back door
  2. Front left near the driveway
  3. Front right close to the steps
#1 was an easy spray and done. In theory. They have since moved to the other side of the door, behind the aluminum siding still. Low priority so I am not worried too much though I should be. Bee?

#2 was the first I found, and sprayed a can in, and gone. When I went to plant the mums there was a single yellow jacket in that area harassing me. I assume this was not an original resident, but maybe a cousin who was visiting that day only to realize the family was eradicated? I have not seen anything there since.

#3 was like the mansion in the rotting 6x6s that face the street. I am in a list groove today so I will keep on that:
  1. First nest was a hole in the ground, which ate maybe 2 cans
  2. Then they moved to the wood - 1 can
  3. Then they moved to a spot below #2 - 1 can
  4. Then they moved to a spot a few feet to the right of #3 - 1 can
  5. Then they moved back to the ground - 1 can
Ok so I let it sit for a bit and in a few days, they were gone. Seemingly. When I went to dig in the 4x4 there were maybe 5 that were hiding under one of the 4x4s, so it seemed that they were starting nest iteration #6. They did not bother me that day, I was able to set the 4x4s, plant the mums, and nobody attacked me. I cannot explain why they would be so passive.

Since then I have not seen a single yellow jacket flying around. Yesterday I went to the mansion area and kicked the 6x6s and nothing came out. So they may have all moved to behind the house. On that note, I should probably buy another can.

So what's the score of this war? No idea, I'll let you decide.
 
The September Blog Project - #23

Not sure if you noticed, but it was a tad wet today. I started the day easy, drinking coffee on the porch, watching the rain, with the dog.

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Then I ran down to the local market and got some fruit plus more mums. Then I planted them. I did not get stung. There's a 3rd new one on the porch, which you'll have to take my word for.

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I went to buy some dog food because Bear ran out after breakfast. No picture.

Went to CR with Bear and did some raking. Post here. By the end it started dumping on us.

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Got home and D had made some banana bread, of which I ate some.

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Then I made a mystery box to send to Joy.

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Did a Zwift ride before dinner - no pics.
Ate dinner - no pics.
Currently watching Dungeons & Dragons. So far it's kinda entertaining enough - no pics.
 
Norm said:
The September Blog Project - #23

Not sure if you noticed, but it was a tad wet today. I started the day easy, drinking coffee on the porch, watching the rain, with the dog.

View attachment 223628

Then I ran down to the local market and got some fruit plus more mums. Then I planted them. I did not get stung. There's a 3rd new one on the porch, which you'll have to take my word for.

View attachment 223629

I went to buy some dog food because Bear ran out after breakfast. No picture.

Went to CR with Bear and did some raking. Post here. By the end it started dumping on us.

View attachment 223630

Got home and D had made some banana bread, of which I ate some.

View attachment 223631

Then I made a mystery box to send to Joy.

View attachment 223632

Did a Zwift ride before dinner - no pics.
Ate dinner - no pics.
Currently watching Dungeons & Dragons. So far it's kinda entertaining enough - no pics.
Click to expand...
Liked extra for banana bread with xtra Choc chips
 
The September Blog Project - #24

It was moist...

Woke up, had coffee.
Ate more banana bread, had coffee.
Walked the dog, had coffee.
Did a Zwift ride, had coffee.

Sensing a trend here? At this point it was now too late in the day to have more coffee so the narrative takes a different direction.

We have water coming into the basement. It's not from below, but from the side/above. I think this may be a gutter problem manifesting itself this way. We literally live on top of a hill.

D made split pea soup and roasted beets. This is the only image I have today. We ate this while we started True Detective season 3.

We bought tickets to go to Florida for Thanksgiving.

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A Note on the Zwifting

I was going to put this on the indoor thread but I'll limit it here to the 3-4 people that actually care about training indoors & read this blog. Now is a good time to start the climbing stuff again. The climbing portal is a good way to get yourself back into a structured routine, and those routes aren't odious like the Alpe. To step back, the climbing keeps you honest, and as far as making yourself stronger goes, it's a great way to work on sustained power output. I know it's not for everyone, but for those of you who can do it, now's the time to start kicking the tires.

Eventually you may want to get to the Alpe and start using that as a workout in erg mode. I gave it a shot today but just didn't have it in me. So I did an hour and called it. I was tooling just over 200, not terribly interested in pushing myself hard. I'll probably baseline my Alpe workout at 210 to start, then try to ramp up to 250+ by the winter. It'll come around fast enough.

Hopefully this weekend is an outlier and I won't be on this thing too much on the weekends until the winter really kicks into gear. But when I have to ride it, I'll try to structure it as specifically as I can.
 
Norm said:
The September Blog Project - #24

It was moist...

Woke up, had coffee.
Ate more banana bread, had coffee.
Walked the dog, had coffee.
Did a Zwift ride, had coffee.

Sensing a trend here? At this point it was now too late in the day to have more coffee so the narrative takes a different direction.

We have water coming into the basement. It's not from below, but from the side/above. I think this may be a gutter problem manifesting itself this way. We literally live on top of a hill.

D made split pea soup and roasted beets. This is the only image I have today. We ate this while we started True Detective season 3.

We bought tickets to go to Florida for Thanksgiving.

View attachment 223699

A Note on the Zwifting

I was going to put this on the indoor thread but I'll limit it here to the 3-4 people that actually care about training indoors & read this blog. Now is a good time to start the climbing stuff again. The climbing portal is a good way to get yourself back into a structured routine, and those routes aren't odious like the Alpe. To step back, the climbing keeps you honest, and as far as making yourself stronger goes, it's a great way to work on sustained power output. I know it's not for everyone, but for those of you who can do it, now's the time to start kicking the tires.

Eventually you may want to get to the Alpe and start using that as a workout in erg mode. I gave it a shot today but just didn't have it in me. So I did an hour and called it. I was tooling just over 200, not terribly interested in pushing myself hard. I'll probably baseline my Alpe workout at 210 to start, then try to ramp up to 250+ by the winter. It'll come around fast enough.

Hopefully this weekend is an outlier and I won't be on this thing too much on the weekends until the winter really kicks into gear. But when I have to ride it, I'll try to structure it as specifically as I can.
Click to expand...
Funny you mention the climbing and zwift.

Also having been on all Zwift all weekend where normally I am outside this will be the first full “off season” I have a smart trainer.

Due to my tendencies to stay on the flat courses with my dumb trainer the last 8 years or so of zwift today I was thinking this year with the climb portal I really need to change my training routine and mix in some
Of the hill routes.
 
iman29 said:
Funny you mention the climbing and zwift.

Also having been on all Zwift all weekend where normally I am outside this will be the first full “off season” I have a smart trainer.

Due to my tendencies to stay on the flat courses with my dumb trainer the last 8 years or so of zwift today I was thinking this year with the climb portal I really need to change my training routine and mix in some
Of the hill routes.
Click to expand...

I need to look into this as well. I usually do some TrainerRoad over the winter, mostly because I'm familiar with it and it's easy to set up a plan of some sort. I tried Zwift for the first time on Saturday, riding the "Mountain Route" in Watopia and it was a nice change from trying to make one line follow another line.

I have no idea what "Alpe" is so guess I'd better start googling.
 
Norm said:
I was going to put this on the indoor thread but I'll limit it here to the 3-4 people that actually care about training indoors & read this blog.
Click to expand...

I’m going to switch to Zwift this offseason. I’d like to change things up and follow my own “plan”.
 
jShort said:
I’m going to switch to Zwift this offseason. I’d like to change things up and follow my own “plan”.
Click to expand...

I'm curious why. IIRC, you are 1 of the people that had trouble getting into Zwift. I like it but I also understand it doesn't work for everyone.

I'd be more than happy to throw some suggestions your way if you want to talk off-blog about it.
 
The September Blog Project - #25

OH BOY, IT'S MONDAY AGAIN!.

Yes, all caps. What is there to say on the 4th Monday of this month, of this blog? The September Blog Project enters its final week with the last Monday of the run. In what can only be considered an absolute gift, the month started on a Friday so it will end up having 5 Fridays and only 4 of the other weekdays. I'll take, "Shit that don't matter" for $200, Alex.

Oh yeah, it was raining again this morning. I sat on the porch by myself drinking a newly opened (red) box of coffee from Onyx, something from Kenya. As often is the case, it was glorious. Bear was too lazy to get up to join me today, so I sat with the rain and the diminishing bird population and enjoyed the morning. I am no longer in shorts & a t-shirt. I now have to wear a light jacket and shoes because it's cold, and sometimes wet.

Work.

Then I went to CR and raked some more stuff on orange, what I shall call the Orange Therapy Project. I now have 2 low-level projects going plus whatever Kirt cooks up for us on the Fridays. More details on today's work here.

Finally I did a Zwift ride for an hour, very easy. I'm going to try to stick to the "hard is hard, easy is easy" approach this winter. With the amount of yard & trail work I'm doing, it's easy to get enough activity through the day currently. Yesterday I quit on the Alpe so I figured I needed an easy day. Today was that.

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The September Blog Project - #26

I have long maintained that Tuesday is the worst workday of the week. Today did not live up to that adage. In fact, today was just fine.

Coffee.
Work.
Then I went to Round Valley. More into here.

Ok. So. I am obviously on a roll now, with today being the 11th day I have done TM this month. I suppose I could have called this The September Giving Back Blog Project but in all honesty, I didn't expect to be out there so much. I told Kirt I would try to give my September Fridays and that was all. The rest sort of rolled from that. October will not be this prolific.

I admit I'm a bit tired right now. Hand cutting all that shit today was a chore. If I had it over I probably would have burned it with fire. I will also say this eBike is the only way I could do this week after week. It really does make the experience 1000x better. I can work myself to the point I want to be done and don't really need to leave that much in the tank to get back. Today was the first day I took trail all the way there & back. The last 2 times I went back on the camp road.

Anyway, as Lynyrd Skynyrd once said, Tuesday's Gone.

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