Busy

I hit the ground running when I got home last night.  I didn’t even change out of my work clothes before I headed outside, daylight was at a premium. I had Ali pull the various cold protection off the plants in the morning but I told her I would put it all away.  So I gathered up the empty pots, weight plates, comforters, blankets and pond underlayment. I folded, stacked and organized it all and put it away.

It looked like for the most part the stuff that got covered survived the bitter cold although I did see some additional damage on a few things.  I really hope that this early burst of arctic weather we have had the last month or so is the last of it for the winter.  I don’t think I will be that lucky.

Later I was doing some more testing with the timing system.  After work I picked up some electronic components at Radio Shack. Oh by the way, if you are looking for a fantastic deal on an Iphone 4, go to Radio Shack by tomorrow.  You can get one for as low as $125.

The stuff I got was for two different timing situations.  First thing I attempted was to fashion a remote trigger for my timing box.  I have a proposal to time an adult track meet in April.  In order to get accurate times a remote trigger for the timing box would be ideal.  In theory you hit a button that is connected via a long wire to the timing box at the start of the race.  The button will capture the current time as the start time, pretty simple.

I wired a momentary contact switch to a 1/4″ male phono plug which is all I should need based on some research I did.  I inserted the plug and hit the button and got no response.  I tried several times with no success.  Just to make sure my switch wasn’t the problem I desoldered it and then touched the two wires together to simulate a switch and still got no response.  Back to the drawing board on that one.

The other stuff I got was to allow me to utilize my old DC power supply I bought years ago for my RC plane hobby to function as a power supply for the timing box.  The timing box has an internal battery that is supposed to power it for 4 or 5 hours.  However batteries can fail.

If you try to run the box off the included AC charger the box will beep loudly and incessantly in protest.  The only way to do it is to use DC power.

I am timing our most prestigious race of the year, the Naples Daily News Half Marathon, in a couple weeks.  I wanted to make sure I was protected against an unexpected battery failure.

I also was playing around with the latest version of the software I use to time races.  It has some new features.  One I found particularly cool was the ability to send a text message to any cell phone when a runner crosses the finish line.   So if you wanted to let your wife/friend/relative know how you did, they would get a text as soon as you crossed.

I have had a surprisingly quick recovery from my 10 mile jaunt on Sunday.  As of yesterday I felt pretty much back to normal.  In fact I plan to run at the gym today, a good thing.

Hey the Stern show is now available on the official Sirirus XM Iphone app.  I guess I don’t need to use Pocket Tunes to hijack it anymore.