Archives March 2017

Last night after work I threw the wheel in the truck to ride by the school.  The grounds were unusually empty because we are in the middle of the one week spring break the school system down here observes.  I didn’t have a very long ride but I must have been talking/recording through almost the entire thing since the video turned out to be over 20 minutes long.  It covers at least a half dozen various topics.

This morning we were rudely awakened by the sounds of Sadie vomiting next to my side of the bed.  I got up and cleaned up the mess in a sleepy haze and then tried to fall back asleep for what felt like some much needed additional zzzz’s.  I think I may have finally fallen asleep about 5 minutes before the 5:55 alarm went off which was incredibly awesome.

The weather this weekend is supposed to be really nice.  I hope to take advantage of it some way other than not sweating as much doing house/yard chores.

Last night I made a Costco stop on the way home.  While I was snaking through the aisles I saw they were selling these very mature banana pepper plants.  They were huge and had a dozen or more mature peppers already hanging there.  I don’t think I ever bought a plant at Costco before but I snagged it and plopped it into the cart. When I got home Cindy actually picked a few of them and roasted them for dinner.  They were as good as they looked.

We are enjoying what is likely our last cold snap of winter.  The temperatures this morning dipped into the upper 40’s.  Sure it feels cold to me after 16 years in Florida but I still enjoy the brisk air that winter brings on occasion.  The 6 months of long, hot and humid summers make days like this special.

In WoW I sometimes set my sights on random in game goals, most of which take extensive and repetitive actions to achieve.  My latest target is earning a mount that allows me to traverse areas of water at normal speed instead of super slow swimming speed.  Having this type of mount is a real time saver in certain situations.  The rub is to get it you need to spend tons and tons of time, fishing.  I literally will need to catch a couple thousand fish to make it happen.  Fishing is incredibly boring.  The only way to make it bearable is to have the game up on one screen and YouTube or Netflix up on another.  I am about 2/3 of the way there.

When I got home last night I jumped on the Concept 2 rower in the bedroom for a 20 minute session.  I would say rowing rivals swimming as one of the best total body workouts so I would like to try to get one or two sessions in per week to help supplement my fitness routine.  The biggest roadblock has been with my right knee.  If the knee is feeling swollen or painful the compression portion of the rowing movement does not feel good at all.

After I rowed I decided to go jump on my wheel.  I first rode it around the back yard for a little while while the dogs were out there.  The dogs didn’t pursue me on the wheel as much as I thought they might.  They seemed to lose interest/energy pretty quickly.  I then took the wheel out on the road, riding down to the back entrance of the county fairgrounds where I saw they were actively preparing for the 10 day long county fair.

The Eagles have been active in free agency so far signing two wide receivers that will hopefully help the team this year.  The receivers last year were basically awful showing an inability to get open or catch the ball consistently, two requirements for the position.  I was also surprised but happy to see they brought Nick Foles back, making it possible to release the Chase Daniels and his large contract.

Although Nick has performed poorly since he left the Eagles I still am happy about him rejoining the team.  During his brief stint as the Eagles starter he showed a lot of heart as well as that magical year in 2013 when he had a nearly perfect statistical season. It’s good to have Nick back in the nest.

With the extended daylight evening hours I now once again have the opportunity to get some stuff done during the week that used to be reserved to weekend only.  The project I did last night however didn’t require daylight.  Cindy was having problems with the door knob that leads to the garage.  She asked if I could put a lever style handle on there instead which makes opening the door easier when your hands are full which is often the case coming from the garage.  I have replaced the front door handle and deadbolt before, I don’t think I ever replaced an interior door knob.  The replacement was not very technically challenging and I had it completed in roughly 15-20 minutes.  The lever mechanism worked well.  Cindy liked it.  There might be other key knobs that could use a swap out in the future.

Some days the best I can give you is stories about changing door knobs.

So Friday night Cindy and I went to the Tarpons opening game of the season.  Like I mentioned I did not buy season tickets so we had to wait in a surprisingly long line to buy tickets on site.  We managed to get seats in the same section and same row as our old season tickets, ironically.  Even though the parking lot seemed fuller than I was accustomed to the arena itself only seemed a little more full as a result.

We were wondering if things would be any better or worse this season since the team is once again in a different league, an annual occurrence.  There was one big change this year, fans are no longer allowed to keep footballs that go into the stands, something that ALWAYS was a cool perk, dating back to my days as a Florida Firecats season ticket holder.  I laughed when I heard the announcement about not keeping balls, a further testament to just how strapped for cash the team must be.

The game itself was closer than any game we saw last year (Tarpons won), but I think it was more because the Tarpons aren’t as good this year, not because the team they were playing was very good.  The team from Alabama had generic uniforms with absolutely no logo or branding anywhere.  They also had noone on the roster that knew how to kick a football.  Each kickoff after a score was a hilarious spinning top that would go a few feet in the air.

We loaded up on shitty stadium food that included beer, pizza, nachos and ice cream.  The combination left me feeling gross afterward.  So I found this years Tarpons much like any other season, mildly entertaining at times but a little sad as well.  I’m not sure if I will be attending any more games this year or not at this point.

On Saturday I kept myself busy in the morning with to do’s.  One particularly frustrating task was replacing the screen in the pool chlorinator. There is a small plastic screen at the bottom that is used to keep the 3 inch chlorine tablets slightly elevated above the outlet that connects back to the water line.  The old screen broke a long time ago and since then I noticed it takes forever for the chlorinator tablets to dissolve.  I theorized that because there is no screen anymore the tablet itself was blocking the hole, not allowing the tablets to dissolve.

So the problem was I had to remove the three tablets that were already in the tube.  This proved to be VERY difficult.  I spent around 20 minutes with two long screw drivers shoved into the tube trying to carefully lift the tablets out one by one.  It almost felt like I was playing a game of Operation, one slight move and the tablet would go tumbling back to the bottom.  I refused to give up and eventually fished all three out and was able to install the new screen.  After all that effort I certainly hope it fixes the issue. I was buzzing around the property pretty much all day attending to things both inside and out as Cindy was gone the majority of the day.

At one point during the day I had the wheel in the truck  with the intent of going on a ride.  For the first time ever I did not follow through on that intent.  I just did not feel like riding as my mood was very poor.  You can get a good sense of my state  of mind from this fail video I posted.

I also worked shaving my head into the mix, something I last did around Thanksgiving.  It was long overdue.  I was running out of ideas for head shaving videos so I totally flipped the script, doing it outside with the chickens.  It was logistically difficult but it was nice to not have to worry about cleaning up. The chickens seemed confused.

Saturday night we watched Sully on DVD.  I was very surprised by some aspects of the movie.  I never knew that Sully was actually criticized at first for the decisions leading up to him putting the plane into the Hudson River and was being investigated for negligence.  The movie had me putting myself in that plane and imagining the absolute terror that everyone was feeling when they knew they were going down.  To have every single person survive is truly incredible. It was a good B+ true life story.

Despite daylight savings kicking in, obliterating an hour of sleep, I got up without an alarm a little after 6 and headed to the track to run.  The full moon was bright in the sky as I started running.  Things did not start out well.  My right IT band was hurting, a lot.  After two limp filled laps running counter clockwise I was actually considering bagging it, something I despise doing.  Once I mentally commit to accomplishing something, quitting is just not an option.

Instead of bagging it I decided to reverse direction after completing lap two.  Running clockwise makes the corners less painful on my right leg.  I was still limping more than a mile into the run but eventually the pain subsided and I was able to finish up the roughly 5K run.  I was glad I endured but hope this won’t translate into another round of chronic IT band problems.

When I got home I headed immediately out to the chickens to do their daily maintenance.  While I was out there I attended to a few minor repairs/upgrades to the chicken accessories.  I redid their ladder that is used to get on the perch, tightening up the rungs, many of which were spinning freely which is dangerous.  I also built a small stand for their large 5 gallon water container that is kept behind the coop, keeping it off the ground enough to minimize the amount of dirt and debris that gets into it.  The chickens seemed thankful for my efforts.  I enjoy being out there with the birds, it’s relaxing and simple.

I went out on a long solo ride on my wheel.  I decided to go somewhere totally different and parked about a half mile from the beach.  I had a great time exploring the coastal area and I think it reflects in the video.  I told Cindy I could even see a scenario where we park off the beach and then ride the wheels there to chill for awhile.  It could be fun.

I spent a good portion of the rest of the day multi-tasking, playing WoW and watching Man in the High Castle episodes.  My current goal in WoW revolves completing a long, boring grind involving fishing.  Yes, you can fish in WoW.  So anyway on one screen I had WoW up while the other had my Amazon Prime Video playing.   It made the mind numbing task of leveling fishing much less arduous for sure.

In the last decade of my life there have been a lot of lessons learned and knowledge gained.  Those lessons never stop being taught.  Life rarely goes in the direction intended, no matter how tightly you grasp onto the wheel.

So the Tacoma was at the dealer all day having the replacement wire harness installed as well as having some things checked with the transmission.  I made one call a little before 4PM just to make sure the truck was ready to go and had Ann return the call within 25 minutes, a far better response than I ever have received from the old service advisor. She said the truck was indeed finished and ready to be picked up, the first time I have been able to pick up the truck the same day it was dropped off.

When I got the truck I was happy to see the work had indeed been completed but also the car wash that I was promised was actually performed, the first time that has ever happened since I took my Tacoma there. I am hoping I now can enter a prolonged stretch of no unexpected dealer visits except for free maintenance.

Tonight Cindy and I are going to the opening game of the Tarpons.  For the first time ever I opted to not buy season tickets.  Instead we are just going to buy tickets at the door tonight and see how good/bad things are this year.  There are only four home games and one is on a Sunday afternoon with another being on a Monday night which sucks.  The first couple years of the teams existence the games were always on Saturday nights which was so much better.  I also plan to get some cheaper seats instead of the $25 a pop variety we normally had.  That money basically buys you a cup holder and closer seating, neither of which really matters all that much to your enjoyment of the game.  If we have fun we may go to another game or two, if we don’t we won’t.

I hope to get some quality EUC riding in over the weekend as well as attending to the normal cast of to do’s.

So the Tacoma is once again back at the dealership.  The defective wiring harness that took over a month to get has arrived and is due to be replaced to correct the SRS warning light problem.  While it is there I am having them check the fluid level in the transmission. There has been widespread reports of the 2016 Tacomas coming from the factory with low trans fluid levels, especially if the truck has the towing package with the auxiliary trans cooler.  The reason I suspect mine is low is some odd surging I have had while shifting first thing in the morning.  It almost feels like the truck hits neutral for a split second in between third and fourth gear.

I did follow through and request a new service advisor after having back to back nearly identical frustrating experiences with the guy I had.  I asked for a woman that has been there for a long time and that I had dealt with successfully in the past when we had the 2007 Camry Hybrid.

My experience with Ann this morning was great.  She was friendly, conversational, and clear in setting expectations.  She got bonus points when she saw me waiting outside waiting for a loaner vehicle to be brought around.  She asked why I was still there as I had been sitting around 10 minutes.  I told her they said it had to be brought around.  She immediately gave some of the lot guys shit, saying it should have been ready to go. 60 seconds later the car was there and I was on my way.  I am really hoping for a positive dealer experience this time around.

Last night after work I decided to get 20 minutes in on the rower, something I had not done for quite awhile.  The biggest reason for the rowing hiatus was the same thing that stopped my running, the right knee/IT band pain.  I figured since I have now been dipping my toes back into running it is time to row again as well.  It felt good to get a few thousand meters in.

My ass is dragging today due to another night of poor sleep from several different external reasons, the last of which being Sadie deciding to unceremoniously throw up at about 4:30AM.  I will battle the drowsiness with coffee as best I can.  Hopefully tonight I can get the roughly seven hours of sleep I seem to need to perform at a normal level.

So the past few days there has been a growing brush fire in our area.  On Monday night one of the roads I use to get home was closed just past where I get on.  Last night the fire had spread and that road was no longer open to traffic.  The end result was me getting diverted into a quagmire of vehicles, many of which would normally be using the interstate to get home.  My normal 40 minute commute took almost double that this time.

The skies by my office have a doomsday sort of appearance to them from the thick smoke in the clouds.  There is nowhere you can go right now that does not have the persistent smell of smoke, indoors or out.

Tomorrow my Tacoma goes in to have the wiring harness installed that I have been waiting a month for.  I called and requested a new service advisor, hoping to avoid the incredibly frustrating experiences I have had with the other guy who thinks communication with a customer is optional instead of a requirement.

Cindy and I got out to see Logan Saturday night.  Instead of going to Coconut Point we went to Paragon which is sort of a lower level Silverspot with preassigned “luxury” seating.  The seats in Paragon are actually power recliners which on paper sound good.  The reality is they don’t actually recline far enough for me to ever be comfortable.  I was constantly shifting position the entire movie.

So I did zero research going into the movie.  It was a Wolverine movie so I knew I would enjoy it, I always do.  Well within the first couple minutes when I saw extreme gore and the F bomb being thrown around nonstop I realized that they decided to go the Deadpool route with Logan, another R rated super hero flick.  I am the farthest thing from a prude you could find but it was a little over the top even for me.  I never thought I would hear Patrick Stewart say “fck” in a Xmen movie, until Saturday.

I also didn’t realize the movie was intended to be the last in the Wolverine series even though I did recall Hugh Jackman saying awhile ago that he would not be able to keep playing the role for much longer because of the physical demands.  So anyway I liked the movie although even at the end I was still fuzzy about exactly what caused Logan to be ailing as he was.  I also was annoyed that even though this was a Marvel flick, I sat through nearly 10 minutes of post movie credits and didn’t get the mini-preview payoff of whats to come that has become the norm, just a black screen.  I am going to miss the Wolverine character for sure. I’d give the movie a solid A-.

Sunday morning I got up early to run, once again increasing my distance by two laps which worked out to just over 5K distance.  It felt quite challenging to complete.  I am on week three of the running reboot, hopefully things get a little smoother soon.  My right knee today is feeling a little tweaked.

Cindy and I met up with a mutual friend of ours from the running club and his daughter to do some EV riding at the Greenway.  Mike has a HUGE off road electric skateboard that sounds like a tank as it rolls along.  He let me get on it briefly in the parking lot but I felt VERY unstable on it.  He thought my Msuper was extremely cool and couldn’t believe the speed and range it offers.

Mike’s daughter was very cute and quickly adapted to riding one of our Minipros that we brought along, Cindy rode the other one for most of the ride.  Cindy and Mike’s daughter immediately hit it off and had a lot of fun during the ride acting silly.  Once we got back to the parking lot Cindy pulled out her electric unicycle and did fantastic, not even needing a hand support.  She went straight to free wheeling.

We were at the Greenway for a long time, a full two and a half hours.  The weather was pretty much perfect and we took full advantage of it.  We all agreed we had to get together again in the future and Mike will be looking deeper into the world of electric unicycles soon.

Mid-afternoon I headed back out to pick up Sadie, get some groceries, and go for another ride.  I brought my MCM4 this time and did the big square outside the water park as well as riding inside the water park as well.  When I do rides by myself I normally have a lot more to say.  See for yourself.

At the store I picked up stuff for Cindy to make galumpkis, something my ex-mother in law used to make years ago.  We had a bunch of healthy cabbage in the garden so it was a good way to get some use of it.  Of course we didn’t use the ground beef and ground pork pure galumpkis utilize.  Cindy substituted veggie crumbles and it still turned out quite tasty.

Last night we watched the latest Netflix rental, Ben Hur.  Cindy was excited to see this, me, not so much.  I knew absolutely nothing of the Ben Hur story and had no idea it had ties to Christianity.  I was very tired and fell asleep during large chunks of the movie but what I did see was not very impressive.  Perhaps knowing the back story would have helped some but as is, the best I can rate it is C+.

I’m not sure if I ever have written a blog post on a late Saturday afternoon but I guess there is a first time for everything.  So the water guys showed up within 5 minutes of their expected arrival time of 10:30.  I sort of thought they would need to start earlier as it seemed like a LOT of work needed to take place for this to happen.  However they were coming all the way from Cape Coral so they had a 60 minute plus commute.

So two guys showed up, the main installer was named Tim with another guy that never told me his name.  Tim seemed sort of quiet and reserved but evidently he is THE guy when it comes to installs.  I took him out to the concrete pad where the old stuff was and where the new stuff would go.  Tim seemed a bit concerned about space at first and clearance with the roof I recently installed.  I told him the owner when he gave the estimate fully measured everything and said although it would be tight it all should fit.  Tim said he will figure it out, he always does.

So the water to the house was cut off a few minutes later and remained that way till early evening.  We made sure to do all of our water intensive activities before they showed up.  During the day I used the toilet sans flush to pee and also visited a tree or two outside to help split things up.

One problem identified early on was the top outlet in my 110 circuit by the equipment did not work.  It actually has never worked.  I have simply gotten around it from the use of splitters.  Tim said it would be best if both plugs were live for logistics.  I removed the cover and looked at the receptacle.  The tab that connects the two outlets internally was evidently broken.  I hopped in the truck and grabbed a new receptacle at the nearby hardware store.  I also made a mental note that I wanted to replace all of the outdoor outlet covers in that area with better ones.  The low grade, builder installed covers were all falling apart. I am not sure if I ever replaced a receptacle before but it wasn’t all that challenging.  Of course the most important part of the process is making sure you kill the power to the correct circuit ahead of time which I managed to do.

So other than replacing that outlet I had minimal interaction with the installers.  We did have to talk about what to do about the drain for the system.  Originally the owner talked about burying the drain and having it come out the same spot the existing one does by the corner of the fence.  Tim said that may not be the best plan since RO makes a TON of waste water, three gallons to every one gallon clean H2O.  He said that corner would get very water logged more than likely.

So after thinking about other options we came up with a better plan.  Years ago I buried two drainage pipes by that side of the house to combat a terrible erosion problem we used to have.  They exit down by the landscaped area by that side of the pool.  It seemed like a great spot for it.  The drainage pipe has holes all along it so it would help spread out the moisture.  I figured I could throw down some fresh sod to act like a natural sponge to further assist absorption.

So right around 6 o’clock Tim was wrapping stuff up.  The equipment was visually impressive.  The main holding tank is massive, holding 300 gallons of fresh water.  The majority of the rest of the equipment safely resides in a custom cabinet designed to protect it from the elements to help longevity.

As promised the owner showed up right around 6:30 to sterilize and flush the lines in the house.  This process started with us opening up EVERY single line in the house simultaneously, including the two outside hose bibs.  I was surprised the flow remained decent even with all of those faucets going.

Bleach was poured in the system to assist in the sterilization process.  After letting the cold water run for quite awhile we switched over to hot water to help get as much of the old water out of the hot water tank as well.

A sort of gross part of the process was cleaning the toilet water tanks.  Both tanks had a coating of brown slime in them.  Our hands were actually good tools for dislodging the scum.  The owner did the guest room toilet and I did the master bathroom bowl.  The combo of getting that scuzz out and using super clean water should make water staining in the toilet a thing of the past.

So after all the bleach was out of the lines Rich did some testing of the water inside.  He said it tested out very clean, on par with bottled water.    He then took me outside to go over the system so I would have the basic knowledge to understand how the system worked and how to read certain key numbers.   The water comes from the well and into a sediment filter that takes out bigger contaminants and sand.  From there it goes into a membrane filter which does the heavy lifting as far as cleaning the water.  From that point the water is dumped into the huge holding tank.

There is more work done to the water before it actually enters the house.  From the tank it goes through a a large carbon post filter that along with removing any smell makes the water more alkaline which is better for drinking water.  The final step is the water goes through a big UV light sanitizer that kills anything that would have happened to make it through the first three sources of filtration.  From there the super clean water is delivered to every point in the house.  It is pretty damn impressive.

After the tutorial I paid Rich and thanked him for the good work.  Even though the system was more than $4000 I already feel like I am getting my moneys worth.  The water from the tap is crystal clear and honestly tastes better than most bottled water I have tried.  Showers are a very different experience.  With the old system the water had a sort of slimy feel.  You always felt like you had a residue on you. (because you did)  An RO shower leaves you feeling squeaky clean.  I also noticed after the bed of the Tacoma was rinsed out today there were no white water spots that used to accompany every single car wash with the old system.

So on Friday we were originally supposed to be driving to St Pete to a doctor appointment for Cindy but it was cancelled last minute.  I used the day to get a head start on my weekend chores.  Later in the afternoon we also used the time for Cindy to get more EUC training in, this time at North Collier Park.  They have a boardwalk there as well so we thought it might be a good spot.   The weather was not great with gusty winds in advance of an incoming cold front.

Cindy warmed up a little using the boardwalk rails as a support but after  a little while she was free wheeling once again down the running/biking path.  She had a couple times that she dumped the wheel over but they were “good bails” with minimal damage to her or the wheel.  I am very impressed with just how quickly Cindy has gotten good at doing controlled and smooth mounts and dismounts.  She is much better at it than I was at this point in the learning curve. I can tell she really is starting to enjoy riding her EUC because when we got back to the car instead of just throwing her wheel in the trunk she did a bunch more riding in the parking lot.

Last night Ali showed up to do an inverse dog sitting pick up.  Instead of dropping off Sadie for the weekend she was picking her up to stay the weekend as her construction project is a weekday only thing.  During the afternoon Cindy and I did a Home Depot run so I could pick up three heavy duty outdoor outlet covers. Installing them proved to be rather difficult since all the equipment was in front of them now.  Two of the three were awkwardly installed while I laid on the lid of the RO equipment, no joke.

Late in the day I went to run one of the sprinkler zones and realized they weren’t working.  Of course my immediate reaction was to wonder if the water guys inadvertently messed something up however I resisted the knee jerk reaction to send the owner an email.  I dug into the problem some more and realized that somehow the shared ground wire connection for the solenoids half came apart.  Maybe somebody bumped it hard but I redid the connection today in a more robust way, hopefully avoiding the issue in the future.

Even with the normal chores out of the way there was a lot of labor today.  I did another dirt/sod load at HD to primarily cover the now wet drain field area as well as shoring up a couple other spots.  I think the ample waste water should get soaked up pretty well by the sod.

I also attended to my weekly bill paying session.  The addition of the RO system put a nice dent in my account balance which I hope to even out through less spending than what has become the norm.  My monthly credit card balance, which I pay in full has been rather crazy for most of the last 12 months.

I hope to keep more work a low priority for my Sunday. We are heading out to go see Logan shortly, hope it’s epic.