Archives November 2024

Ever since I moved into my house I had wanted to rent a heavy duty carpet cleaner to potentially make the worn carpet look at least a little better. I have my own carpet cleaner but it’s light duty, doesn’t do a great job and makes a horrible sound like it has spun a bearing. I’m not sure why it took 18 months to do this but I did plunk down $30 to rent the unit from the nearby Ace Hardware.

It was easy to use and held a ton of cleaning solution. The 3.5 gallon tank lasted me long enough to do all carpeted areas in my place. The combination of it’s weight and high suction worked well at pulling dirt out of the carpet. When I dumped the waste water it was very dirty. Does the carpet look like new? Nah, not even close but it is definitely better than it was. The only thing that will make the carpet look new is replacing it although I might switch to vinyl plank flooring for those rooms when the time comes, I’m not sure. Anyway, the process was easy enough and cheap enough that I won’t be waiting another 18 months to do it again.

Saturday afternoon I opened up the new Inmotion E20 wheel I was sent for evaluation. It’s dual wheel configuration is unique and designed to lessen the learning curve for new potential riders. I unboxed it and got it on the charger but didn’t want to ride it until the following day.

When I took the wheel out the next day I chose to do so at the Greenway, a perfect place for low speed riding since the E20 top speed is only 12MPH. The two wheels initially felt like a hindrance as I am accustomed to one tire below me instead of two. My body adjusted to the different physics pretty quickly though and outside of bumping against the top speed limits of the wheel a few times I had a very enjoyable ride. At the end I ran into some One Wheelers that recognized me from YouTube. I had one of them that had never stepped foot on an EUC try the E20. Within a couple minutes he was rolling around which was exactly the intent of this wheel.

This wheel is extremely inexpensive by modern day EUC standards, currently costing $320. You can easily spend ten times that for a higher end wheel. Despite the low cost the build quality of the wheel seems good and it is feature complete. It’s intent is to introduce people to the hobby without the financial and physical impact that is typical. I think it does a very good job of accomplishing those two goals.

Later Sunday afternoon I had an idea that sounded good in my head. Go watch the Eagles/Cowboys game at Tacos N Tequila. It was the 4:25 game meaning I could grab dinner while I am there plus Sunday is 2-1 for house margaritas, a nice bonus. Well things did not wind up well.

Let’s first talk about the game. The Cowboys appear to be in near free fall and were just bad. Despite some early mistakes the Eagles slowly pulled away until the game was no longer a contest, winning 34-6. I’m not sure if the Eagles defense is that good or the Cowboys are just that bad. Regardless it was nice to watch them beat up on Dallas.

So with the two for one deal on margaritas you can have it one of two ways, two physical margaritas or one margarita with double the amount of tequila. My first four were the normal variety. I was feeling ok and had my two tacos and chips along with the drinks. For whatever reason I then opted to do the the double shot varieties. After the first one I was more drunk but still felt ok, ok enough to order one more. It was during the final double shot that I really felt the surge come on along with that siren that I had just felt a week prior at Juan’s party. It was time to stop.

I did not want to sit at the bar feeling this way so I made my way slowly back out to my car and just sat in it, for a long time. I was hoping that the feeling of nausea would subside but it did not. Eventually I popped my door open, leaned over the sill and was sick, it was awful. I went through the purge cycle four or five times, in between each I would just close my eyes and wish I was in the middle of a bad dream I could awaken from. After at least an hour I engaged full self driving in the Tesla and had a short but safe drive back home.

When I got there I still felt awful and fell asleep on my bed for probably another hour and a half at least before waking up to take a quick shower to clear any residual reminders from the experience. It was bad. I have not thrown up from drinking in a very long time. I think the last time was during Oktoberfest when my dad and step mom were visiting which might be close to 10 years ago at this point. I would be fine to not ever experience it again. I’m not really sure what drove me to drink to that degree but it presumably was not happy thoughts.

Despite a severe sleep shortage I had to wake up early for a dentist appointment which I was not happy about. I drug myself to the office. In addition to the cleaning they went in and touched up two fillings while I was there. Getting drilled on was exactly what I did not need at that point in time.

I was not feeling great all day but I did meet up with my buddy to play pickleball for a bit. Later in the session we played a guy older than me and his wife. They beat us rather easily all three games. He was extremely good. He said he played level 4.5 in the US Open which means he is probably closer to a 5.0 player. He was very aggressive and covered three quarters of the court. If our only concern was winning we could have targeted his wife a lot more but that is sort of lame IMO in recreational play. It was good experience having to work against such a high level player.

The rest of my three day weekend was spent doing a lot of nothing. It was all I felt prepared to do at that point.

Last night I skipped volleyball because of the IT band I have been dealing with on my right leg. If I am not on Advil it’s very difficult for me to walk without a limp right now. Playing volleyball in that state would make no sense.

I instead utilized that time to pack up my second Veteran Patton that I recently sold. I feel fortunate to have sold it relatively quickly and feel better about my decision to buy the two wheels from Jason although the financial gain is not very significant. Getting the 100 pound box into the back of the truck this morning was fun.

I also did another pull up variation that I self named the Finger Pyramid. It is doing a pull up with decreasing fingers each time, concluding with one on each hand. The difference between using two fingers and one in difficulty is significant. I was able to do one finger on each hand but it was tough. This weekend I am planning to do a more difficult variation that has more repetitions. It’s been sort of fun doing these mini-challenges. It reminds me of my days when I was creating and running calisthenic challenges on the Bar-Barians forum 12-13 years ago.

I have a long three day weekend ahead of me as the office is closed for Veterans Day. I have several potential projects that I can do over those 72 hours. It’s a matter of how my motivation and physical state of being hold up.

Yesterday I got a picture of my Sherman S looking out over the San Francisco skyline. It was sent to me from the buyer of my wheel who lives in northern California. I thought it was a really good picture and gave me an odd feeling, seeing my wheel on the other coast.

In more wheel transaction news I now have sold the second Veteran Patton that I bought several weeks ago from Jason. It’s a relief to do so. Although I will make a little bit of money from flipping the two wheels I bought from him it is not a significant amount. It’s fine. Like I mentioned yesterday my ass is not on fire to buy a new wheel at the moment anyway.

My new paddle arrived yesterday. It was an unboxing like no other. The Selkirk Labs 007 arrived in a James Bond style hard metal case which was crazy. Included was a bunch of swag that you don’t get with normal paddles either. I can’t wait to get some real world testing in on the paddle soon. The surface feels gritty and the paddle feels good in my hand.

Last night I also put together the RGB floor lamp that I recently purchased, building off the RGB additions I did to the office last week. Putting the light together wasn’t too difficult. What will be more difficult is finding the spot where I ultimately want to utilize it. For now I have it in the back corner of the kitchen where it is partially hidden from view as it casts color onto that corner.

After work I filmed a new body weight challenge, a static hold in pull up position. It is something I used to do semi-regularly as part of my calisthenics routine but I have not done so for awhile. I wound up doing it twice, the first time I accidentally turned the camera off instead of on so it was not rolling as I held on for dear life, holding for close to a minute. I had no choice but to do it again but of course I could not hold for as long the second time, dropping off the bar after around 44 seconds.

For whatever reason whenever I post a movement on my pull up bar Dawn takes it as a challenge and tries to match/beat it. She posted a video of her holding for over a minute which was impressive even though she used an under hand chin up grip. I congratulated her on her victory but reminded her that all it does is provide fuel for me to keep upping the bar, pun intended.

So yesterday I posted an excerpt from yesterdays blog on Facebook, the last statement which was this “I will continue to focus my efforts on being a solid human being that exhibits kindness, personal responsibility, thoughtfulness, and empathy, regardless of the political party calling the shots. My life can be good all the same.” I thought it was a good message in the midst of a lot of unsettled political waters because of the election.

Well even that message of positivity wound up becoming a negative back and forth between my circle of FB friends that were on opposite sides of the fence which was definitely not the intended result. If anything it reinforced why posting anything related to politics in the present day and age is like throwing a lit pack of matches into a barrel of gasoline. Everyone involved is going to get burned.

You may or may not have noticed that I have done basically zero election talk in here leading up to the election. The only election discussion I have really had was during the last 25% of the live stream on Sunday. I just have not felt like discussing the election, partially because I was already pretty confident of the outcome. The reality that was coming just wasn’t something I wanted to talk about.

Trump’s win was decisive, flipping several states that voted for Biden four years ago, most notably my old home state of Pennsylvania. He also won the popular vote which I think might wind up being the highest amount of votes ever received by a candidate. This was fueled by a good turnout as many people felt strongly one way or the other with it being described as a historic turning point, by both sides. So why do I think this has come to be, again?

From what I read with exit polling the number one factor to voters was the state of the economy. Despite democrats trying to point out that key economic indicators have been steadily improving the bottom line is everything costs more, much, much more than four years ago. Light thinking would simplify this down to Trump was president before and things cost less, so if he is president again things will magically cost less.

Of course the truth is much more complicated than that. The supply chain being choked off by covid started the snowball of price increases but then when that choke hold relaxed businesses decided to keep the status quo in prices, it was good for their bottom line. To me, thinking that a change of who is sitting in the White House is going to persuade businesses to lower prices is just foolish. Greed is good, after all.

Trump also won votes with his harsh status on immigration and the woke movement. Do I think illegal immigration should be allowed to flourish? Nope. Do I think some of the the things that have come out of the woke movement border on ridiculous? Yep. But in the end I think the high cost of living that we all have experienced the last four years was the biggest negative working against the democrats. Well that and that I think Biden and/or Kamala were far from the best candidate the party could have offered.

I have already received some text messages from friends on both sides of the coin, some feeling the world is coming to an end while others are joyous that the world can begin again. To me the outcome is much less impactful/important than it was in both 2016 and 2020. More and more my focus has turned inward towards things I can directly control/impact. Burning all sorts of energy in a tribe mentality war between opposing political factions is something that no longer serves me. Perhaps prosperity does truly await as a result of this election result but I’m certainly not counting on or expecting it.

Last night I made a concentrated effort on not watching election coverage. Around 8PM I hopped in my Tacoma and just went for an elongated drive masked as a stop at the gas station. When I got home I watched an episode of Penguin on HBO. It was only after that, probably 11PM or later that I flipped to the ongoing results broadcasts. Even though the race had not been called at that point it seemed pretty clear to me the way things were heading as I turned it off and fell asleep. I will continue to focus my efforts on being a solid human being that exhibits kindness, personal responsibility, thoughtfulness, and empathy, regardless of the political party calling the shots. My life can be good all the same.

Last night I made an unplanned run to Costco. I needed frozen shrimp, something that for some reason Publix does not appear to sell, at least the one closest to me. As is usual I loaded up Elsa into the Tacoma for the ride. She loves sleeping on the two dog beds I have in the back of the cab. It was after 7:30 by the time I got there so it meant the store was less stuffed with human beings than normal, something I appreciate. As is always the case I spotted other things I could use while there and threw them in the cart.

I was hoping to be able to sell the Veteran Patton I bought from Jason just by mentioning it in a couple of my videos. I was able to sell his V10F in that manner. However I am still in possession of the wheel so I posted it in the online for sale forum with a handful of pictures and stats on the wheel. I don’t have a ton of flexibility on the pricing unless I want to lose money on the transaction. Hopefully I can get a legit buyer soon. I don’t really need a spare wheel sitting around the house.

After the completed sale of my Sherman S I could easily pull the trigger on buying a Sherman L but I instead have those funds sitting in my savings account. For whatever reason I am not feeling much urgency to add another wheel to my fleet of wheels that are already under utilized. My brain hasn’t been in a super happy place lately, maybe that’s partially why I am not excited about the idea of buying one. There are some satellite issues that sort have dampened my enthusiasm somewhat.

I received confirmation that I will have not one but two new mobility devices to review shortly. The first one is an Inmotion E20. It is a unique dual tire EUC designed for beginners. It’s configuration makes balancing left and right significantly easier and it’s low price makes it a good way to potentially get somebody interested in the hobby.

The second device is a set of Moonwalkers. These are devices you strap to your shoes like roller skates. They are like having a permanent moving sidewalk under you. As you walk the wheels engage to move you at the speed of a run. I am very curious how these will feel. Unlike the E20, I don’t get to keep these skates when I am done, they have to be sent back.

There is a new tropical storm forecast to swing into the gulf within the next couple days. It’s pathing looks far enough away from us to be primarily just a rain maker but you never know. The only good thing about it being this late in the year the storm is unlikely to become a monster.

I hustled home Friday because I was invited to go to my buddy Juan’s birthday party. The birthday party was just his family members. I was the only non-family member in attendance which meant something to me. It did not take long until I had the first drink of the night which was handed to me be one of Juan’s brothers, an espresso martini. Juan had told me how good they were, I had never had one. The drink was good indeed and went down easily. I had another one or two of them as the night went on.

Juan is hispanic and I was immediately struck by just how loving and sweet they were to one another. The entire night was nothing but fun, laughter, and drinking, lots of drinking. In addition to the martinis Juan kept a steady flow of red wine coming my way. If that wasn’t enough I also had a Modelo and a couple seltzer drinks as well. I was obviously drunk.

During the second seltzer drink I felt it, the “if you don’t stop you are going to throw up” feeling. To be honest I am surprised it took that long to arrive with how much I had to drink already. I immediately stopped and switched to drinking water. I hung out with Juan until after the rest of his family had already left. He wanted me to just stay over but I told him I couldn’t because of Elsa.

I wound up leaving his house after 11:30 and did not get home until 12:30 or so. To be safe I utilized full self driving on the Tesla. It did an outstanding job, taking me the entire way without me having to intervene at all. It’s a good thing because I was exhausted. When I got home I brushed my teeth and collapsed into bed. I had not drank like that in a long time.

Despite not getting to bed until very late I kept my alarm set to get up and play pickleball with Sue in the morning. I was very tired when I awoke but not hungover like I would have expected. The first couple games I played like I was hungover but things improved as the morning went on. Saturday evening I went out to dinner with a friend and had three margaritas. Normally I won’t drink back to back but I I broke that rule.

My big task on Sunday was to work on repairing the fence. Since I have lived there I have made several lesser attempts to repair loose fence boards by adding additional fasteners. The problem is the board that was being fastened to was rotting. It seems that areas of the fence that receive over spray from the sprinklers are in the worst shape.

I decided to address that problem by purchasing sections of 1 1/2 x 2 1/2 pressure treated lumber and use them to face the rotting board. I would cut each section to length, use a hammer to drive them into place and then sink a couple 3 inch screws on each side at an angle that attached to the 4×4 post. I then drove an additional 3 inch wood screw through the back of the fence board and into the new piece of lumber, locking it in place.

Attaching the top support was easy, doing the lower section sucked. It required me to wedge myself between the fence and the hedge while bending over awkwardly to drive in the screws. It aggravated my back and knees. In total I did 85 boards over the seven sections of fencing. The end result is those boards are now secured for the foreseeable future. The bad news is I really need to this for the entire remaining fence line, ugh.

I watched the Eagles almost blow a game to the Jaguars. Once again Siranni was aggressive when he didn’t have to be and almost cost the team the game as a result, leaving 8 or 9 points off the board that they could have had. Only a very late interception by the Eagles in their own end zone saved them from what would have been an absolutely crushing defeat.

Last night I did a live stream. I wanted to utilize my cool new RGB accent lights. I had to change the angle of the camera so they are more visible. It was also the first time I streamed since rearranging my office. Even though it had only been two weeks since my last stream a bunch of things had happened during that time period that kept me talking. During the last hour or so of the nearly three and a half hours the topic turned to politics which I typically avoid discussing publicly, however with the election being a couple days away it was hard to avoid I guess. I did my best to be the voice of reason during the discussion. Once again my bedtime extended past midnight, a habit that I would be best served to get away from.

Last night was Halloween and it was basically a non-event at my place. I didn’t even buy a bag of candy just in case a lost trick or treater made it to my door. I did have an emergency plan of offering them Pop Tarts if necessary. I instead spent my evening testing out the new Pidzoom TPMS kit that I received this week. It is designed to alert you if your tire pressure drops, a good thing to know when you only have one of them.

It seems like a high quality product but I realized that there is a caveat, you have to have a wheel that will support it. The sensor replaces the valve cap and is significantly bigger than one. I tried it on three of my wheels and I could only get it install cleanly on one of them, my Master. On the Patton the sensor attached but if you spun the wheel it would hit the battery casing. On the V13 I couldn’t even get it installed as there was not enough clearance between the valve stem and motor housing. Supposedly if I deflate the tube and adjust the angle of the valve stem I might be able to get it to work on that wheel.

Evidently on the web site there is a FAQ that points out that the sensors are not compatible with all wheels along with a list of wheels it IS compatible with. I was not aware of this. So I hope to continue the testing/video this weekend with this new knowledge secured. It seems like cool hardware, if I can actually use it.

The rest of my Thursday evening was on the normal side. What won’t be normal is the birthday party tonight I am attending for my good buddy Juan. He and I have been friends for long time. He recently got injured while hiking which is going to keep him from playing pickleball for quite awhile which he is depressed about. I am hoping the party helps elevate his spirits. Speaking of spirits, I am pretty sure I will be consuming a decent amount of them tonight.

As long as my knees still function I hope to play pickleball tomorrow morning. I also need to do a more in depth repair of the fence where the loose fence boards are. The renailing I did a couple weeks ago has already failed. The rest of the weekend will take care of itself.

It was this time a year ago where one of several ridiculous scenarios played out that was the beginning of one of several ends with my ex. Thinking about the degree of insanity that I allowed to fester makes me angry to this day.