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adventures / cycling / Monday / photo / swimming — Comments Off
1
Jul 24

Now my jaw hurts, or my ear, could be my face, also my lungs

It’s possible that, while I have felt largely fine — tired, stuffy, but fine — that I’ve been a bit farther beneath the weather than I realized. It’s possible that I’m falling apart as I write this. So, you know, standard issue cold. I’ll be fine tomorrow, or Thursday, or two Tuesdays from now. I’m only 10 days into feeling mostly OK and kinda unwell, after all. These things take time.

I don’t want to overstate it. It hasn’t been bad. The biggest thing is that I’ve done less the last few days than I should have. That’s pretty much it. Even still …

Sunday afternoon I got in a 1,650 yard swim, my longest since last September.

I even swam it at a reasonable pace, a mile in 40 minutes. I’ve just looked at two different charts on the world wide web, which is authoritative in every way, and they have each convinced me that this time is somewhere between novice and intermediate. I need to swim more.

Just as soon as my shoulders are rested.

That swim was probably fast because I had somewhere to be. Swim scared, swim with an appointment coming up fast, I say. It was a do-the-laps-run-through-the-shower sort of exercise. I had to get to the airport. I had to drive through this.

And then it was hurry up and wait. And wait. And wait. There’s a sign in the cell phone lot that says the maximum time allowed is 30 minutes, but I encourage the airport to take that up with the airline and mother nature. (They also have two vending machines full of drinks in the cell phone lot, which seems at odds with the parking limits.)

I stayed there for three hours. But the views, man!

My lovely bride wasn’t that far away. A few fences and rules about running around on the airport tarmac were all that kept us apart. And also the weather.

Ahe landed early, 5:45. She got off the plane at 9 p.m. And so I spent three-plus hours in the cell phone lot. This gave me plenty of time to go through the contents of my car — six pairs of sunglasses, four masks, two full-sized umbrellas, a giant fist full of napkins, four grocery store bags, a lint roller … and so on. Allowing me to bring a little more order that paired nicely with Saturday’s chore of vacuuming the trunk, which was a big effort, and probably a clue, in retrospect, of how the ol’ body is feeling. Anyway, Approaching 9:30 I finally got her in the car. And if the worst thing that happens when a loved one is flying almost a quarter of the way across the country and through bad weather is that you miss dinner, you take it.

Just think of how much I could have swam if I knew I had all of that extra time …

Today, we visited a local farm and picked up some vegetables. You get a custom box of fresh, locally grown produce every week. On the side, they’re selling corn for a dollar an ear.

If you ride around here enough a few ears of corn will just fall into your window. Save your dollars.

Our friend Stacey came over for a bike ride. It was a nice easy ride. We pedaled by the bike shop, where the local runners were getting ready to run. We went through town and back into the country side.

And then we found ourselves on a road with one small hill. Rather than grind it out, I wanted to get over the thing. Stacey interpreted this as an attack, it was not an attack, but so suddenly we were in an uphill sprint.

She is fast. It hurt. Breathing was a little bit harder after that. I spent the next several miles trying to recover from it. I think I am still trying to recover from it. See above.

We haven’t check in on the kitties in a few weeks. The cats know. And they are letting me know. You’ve all been missing out on the site’s most popular weekly feature, and for that I apologize.

Phoebe has moved to her summer afternoon napping tree. It’s a popular spot for the midday sun.

Recently, she re-discovered a basket she doesn’t get to enjoy all that often. It usually holds another basket, but now it’s a Phoebe spot.

Poseidon, meanwhile, is happily hanging out on the fridge. In between cabinet meetings, as you can see. He often spends dinner time — the cat’s me time, I’ve decided — in that cabinet behind him there. He’s ridiculous.

And there is, of course, always time for the tunnel. This may be his favorite spot, not counting someone’s lap, or being featured online.

So the cats, as you can see, are doing just fine. And they hope you’re off to a great start to your week, as well.

cycling / errands / Friday / photo — Comments Off
28
Jun 24

The quiet parts are always the best parts

As a friend of ours says, I have been underneath the weather. Sinuses. Allergies. Head cold. Some combination therein. All three. Who knows. I think I might have been running a slight fever at times yesterday. I didn’t feel quite as bad today.

I had an early lunch, mid-day cuddles with kitties, read a bit. it was relaxing.

This afternoon the tree people came by to chip up the brush from last weekend’s storms. They were fast, efficient. It’s a time-is-money business, one supposes. And it was just the first step in a process that will later break my heart. I’m dreading all of it.

Later I visited a store, a mom-and-pop shop. I’ve been in four times in the last year. The first three times I met the wife, who is very kind and struggles with the technology. Today I walked in and … no one was there. I walked to the back office. No one. I walked back up to the checkout counter to make sure no one was in a heap. No one.

The door was unlocked. No signs of struggle, other than the open sign sitting on the floor. I stood there for a minute or two, long enough to pull out my phone to see the time, and wonder how long I should stand there before beginning to call people.

I saw a camera just above the cash register, and if it is real, there are probably others, so there’s that.

And then the restroom door sloooowly cracked open and a man walked out.

“It’s always a risk, picking a time to go to the bathroom.”

He needs a BRB sign, and a door lock. I have, after all, been told by Republicans that the country has gone to hell. Over and over.

Anyway, he seemed like a nice fellow. We conducted our brief business and I left for my next stop. I hit up a Walmart. I don’t go to Walmart that often, or any great big store, really — nice, medium-sized grocery store is my biggest shopping experience these days. So this isn’t snobby. Probably it is my routine. Simon Pegg should set his zombie sequel at Walmart. Any Walmart. Maybe the most charming and disconcerting thing about the store is that customers are exactly the same, everywhere in the country. They are out and about, living the lives Springsteen sings about.

“Born to stand in the crosswalk, as a family, staring up into the sky as if looking for an eclipse for 45 seconds” is a great song. Everyone thinks of the classic, “Dancing at the end caps.” And, of course, “Sad eyes can’t see that I’m in the way of everyone” is an underrated deep cut.

And then I visited the medium-sized grocery store. Aisle one for granola … they’ve apparently stopped carrying one variety I prefer. Aisle two for raisins. The produce section for strawberries. In, out and on to the car wash. Ahhh, the finer points of life.

When I got home I set out for a bike ride. It’s been two weeks — our recent trip, the weather, the aftermath, being underneath the weather — and I have lately realized that if I don’t go, I can’t ride.

And maybe, I rationalized, this will help my nose and cough.

I set out around 6 p.m., by which time everyone has gotten to where they need to be and all of these country roads are free of traffic and it is quiet. There’s just the breeze, a perpetual headwind, the humming of the wheels, and the creaking parts of my rusty old bike. I love that feeling, those minimal sounds. Well, maybe not the creaking my bike makes.

Even the cows were quietly appreciating the silence.

This was the big traffic jam, and not the biggest tractor I saw.

Not too long after that, I had a flat. Rear tire, and there was no inflating the dead tube to limp home. So there I stood, swapping out Contis, pumping, and failing at pumping, until I was finally able to get a little air in the new tube. I need to add a mini-pump to the things I need to buy. Mine is almost 12 years old, I guess, and it’s served it’s purpose. Hand pumps fit in the pocket. They are small; they are light. Most won’t fully inflate a new tube. What you get is enough air to ride carefully home. And a good bicep workout. This one has become a frustration. It seems now I have to hold it just so to get any air into the tube at all. Just another thing on the list of old and worn out things I need to replace. It’s a list that’s now far too long.

The scene of the re-inflation … sort of.

So now I’m shopping for a pump. If anyone has any recommendations, or wants to buy one for me, the key features are they must fit in a jersey pocket, and it shouldn’t make me want to quit riding bikes when I have to use the thing.

Anyway, have a great weekend! Riding and swimming and cleaning around here. Back to normal next week.

cycling / history / markers / New Jersey / photo / We Learn Wednesdays / Wednesday — Comments Off
12
Jun 24

Got a wrench? I’m going to need a wrench.

We were just heading out to the hardware store for an early evening errand — I needed a wrench larger than any wrench I own. I own many wrenches, a lifetime of accumulation will do that for you, but I do not own anything that will open 10-and-a-half inches wide. And, today, we had a reason to need one. So I resigned myself to spending a fortune for a tool I needed to use exactly twice, to take off a piece and, moments later, reinstall it. Then of course, I wouldn’t need to use the wrench again for a good quarter of a century or so.

We were at the end of our driveway and had to yield because our neighbors were returning home. So I walked over to see Joe the Elder as he got out of his truck. He’s got a great big smile, an across-the-street “How ya doing!?” and a positively enthusiastic handshake. Lovely people. He gave me two wrenches to try, and so we did not have to go to the store.

Both worked! And we needed both. And it took the both of us to complete the job. But we did! And, this part is important, it seems we got it right the first time. Nothing was broken, no utterances were uttered, and our cost, after the replacement part, were two stiff backs and a bit of sweat. Standard DIY invoicing.

The replacement part is a device that holds filters. Looks like a cup holder. We can hold four drinks in the thing. The previous one was broken, somehow, which is a mystery because the thing lives in a case that requires a metric wrench, a mallet and then some deliberate intentions to even get to it. We replaced it with a similar piece, but supposedly more sturdy, which is good, because if we have to go through the whole process again — after all of that to open it, we had to remove a threaded piece that was not installed in such a way as to grant easy access, then mallet hammer and pry one piece from the other and so on — I think we just might start over.

I took the wrenches back over and as ever, I am wondering what I can offer these nice people as a gesture of thanks. It’s one of those small-to-you, big-to-me things. This wrench was sitting in their garage, and that one was in his truck, and he wasn’t using them, but it saved me a small fortune, and a trip to one or more stores and the frustration that could go along with it. And they say, don’t ever go buy something, just come over here and get it. They really are quite sweet. We’re very lucky with the neighbors we picked.

When I woke up this morning I wondered if I should go for a swim, or a ride, today. I did both yesterday. And that was easy enough. Doing both two days in a row seems like a tiny challenge. And then I got up, and wondered if I would do either. I felt weary. But that’s no reason to stop, it’s just an excuse to slow down.

This afternoon my lovely bride was heading out for a ride and I invited myself to tag along, get dropped, and see her back at home. I predicted she would leave me behind in one of two places, both of which can best be described as “early in the ride.” And she did, in both places.

Somehow, I caught up to her again, which was great because that allowed me to ride in front of her in the one little tricky part of this route, a three-tenths of a mile stretch with a fork and an awkward merge. I sprinted through there with the only bit of energy I had and she stayed right behind me and that made the next turn easy.

This look right here?

This is the look The Yankee gives you before she rides you right off her wheel.

While I’d done the little lead out and made it off the relatively busier road onto some empty county roads, I could not keep up from here.

I lost sight of her a third of the way into the ride, and slowly diminished for the next hour or so. But this was too be expected. I don’t have a lot of miles in my legs right now, but somehow it feels like I do. Anyway, pleasant ride, even if I got in two seconds later than I’d anticipated from half-an-hour away. My riding buddy had no such problem. She pronounced it a strong ride, and, having spent the whole of the thing watching her disappear into the distance, I’d say she was being gracefully humble.

It’s time once more for We Learn Wednesdays, where we discover the county’s historical markers via bike rides. This is the 38th installment, and the 69th and 70th markers in the We Learn Wednesdays series. These are grouped together because they’re directly related anyway as we continue our exploration of Fort Mott.

In the last few weeks we checked out the old gun batteries and had a quick look at the observation towers that helped them in their work of defending the river and Philadelphia, beyond. Most recently, we took a quick glimpse at the parados and the moat that served as the fort’s rearguard. We also saw the signs for the generator, plotting and switchboard rooms. (The signs are good, the rooms were empty.) Last week, we saw another empty room, the battery commander’s station.

The park has a map to orient you to the fort’s layout.

The river is on the left side of this drawing. You can see the pier jutting out into the water. Next to that you’ll see the long row of gun placements. You can see the moat, in blue, behind them.

Today, though, we’re starting off between the moat and the gun batteries, up near the top on the map, at Peace Magazine.

There’s no way to photograph the whole sign without the railing, which is, no doubt, period authentic. If you’ll allow me, then, the generous use of the blockquote …

A Special emphasis was placed on keeping the interiors of the defensive magazines under the various batteries dry. According to an excerpt from, “Reports on 5-inch Guns, Fort Dupont and Fort Mott, December, 1900, Operations” which references Battery Gregg …

“…ceilings of the magazines consist of flat arches of 6-inch hollow tile and the vertical walls are covered with 2-inch hollow tile furring and both ceilings and side walls are plastered with a thin layer of Portland mortar 1 – 3. Two hundred thirty-two linear feet of 3-inch vitrified tile were laid underground from emplacement number 6 to a manhole at the entrance of the west emplacement for carrying cables for electric light and power. Outside walls of the battery were roughly plastered and then waterproofed with paraffin paint #3 and coal tar. A 2-inch porous tile drain was placed around the foundations of each emplacement and covered with a layer of broken stone.”

Despite many efforts, condensation of moisture in the emplacements and magazines continued to be a problem that was never adequately solved. On June 11, 1903, the Chief of Engineers authorized an allotment for the construction of a new storage magazine to be detached from the main installation and located behind the parados. Money was also provided for the creation of a tunnel through the parados, and for extending the railroad tracks through the tunnel to the new magazine. The brick building, called the Peace Magazine, was finished in 1904. The structure was slightly more than eighteen feet by fifty-two feet on the inside, with a copper ventilating roof.

I’d like to think that Peace was named after someone who worked on the fort, or in honor of a soldier who served and died elsewhere, like so many of the parts of Fort Mott, but I don’t see any mention of it anywhere.

Here’s another angle of the magazine.

And one more quick view today from Fort Mott. This marker actually addresses what’s across the way.

At this section of the Delaware estuary, the waterway narrows from a broad bay into a river. Considered a strategic location early in the nineteenth century, military officials selected this area for a coastal defense fortification. Fort Delaware was built on Pea Patch Island during the first half of the nineteenth century. However, the advent of steam-powered naval vessels necessitated a more elaborate defensive scheme to adequately protect the upstream ports. Fort DuPont on the Delaware shore and Fort Mott on the New Jersey side were designed and built during the last half of the nineteenth century to reinforce Fort Delaware. The three fort system remained in force until after World War I.

Fort Delaware is visible on Pea Patch Island. Finished in 1859, it also served as a prison for Confederate soldiers during the Civil War. Many of the prisoners who died there are buried at Finn’s Point National Cemetery, located adjacent to the north side of Fort Mott.

(The state really should get around to updating some of these markers.)

The three photographs show Fort Delaware on Pea Patch Island, the view of Pea Patch Island from Fort Mott, and the last is an aerial view of the three forts that protected this section of the river. (All three were closed down when a more powerful and modern installation opened down river.)

And if you’re looking off into the distance, you can see a bit of Pea Patch island, and the fort that stands there.

You have to take a ferry to get over there. And maybe one day I’ll visit. There’s a lot of history over there, as well. When it was built in 1859, that hazy looking fort over there was a state-of-the-art example of American fixed fortifications. It also served as a POW camp during the Civil War. Almost 13,000 Confederate prisoners could be held there at once.

Back on this side of the river, Fort Mott became a state park in 1951, but it was a self-contained military installation in its day. At it’s busiest, Fort Mott had over 30 buildings, including two barracks that each housed 115 soldiers, commissioned and non-commissioned officer housing, a hospital, post exchange, library, a YMCA, a school for the soldier’s children and more. Most of those buildings were constructed between 1897 and 1905. It closed in 1922, when another, more modern, installation opened downstream.

We have just one or two more markers to visit at Fort Mott, and we’ll do that in our next installment. Until then, if you’ve missed any of those historical marker posts, you can see them all right here.

cycling / music / photo / Re-Listening / swimming / Tuesday / video — Comments Off
11
Jun 24

A mechanic, two hours of exercise, and music that still holds up

Took my lovely bride’s car to the shop yesterday and got it back the same afternoon. Regular maintenance sort of stuff. But things are better, she said.

The guy has a shop in the middle of a neighborhood. It’s a two-bay shop, with a slab that’s not big enough for the cars he has on the property. His office is all the way in the back, it’s a … careworn sort of place. That isn’t ordinarily the right word for this sort of thing, but it fits. No one is especially happy when they have to see their mechanic. You take a little angst and stress and — depending on your pocketbook or what’s going on — maybe a little anxiety to your mechanic. People bring in the things that make something careworn.

The couple of times we’ve been there, I’ve seen a few fishing poles in the front room. They’re just sitting there, on a pile of stuff that looks like it hasn’t been moved in a long time. Two rooms back, there’s the guy. A bit on the tall side, thick all the way around. Always wears a bandana. He strikes you as a time-is-money guy. He’s economical with his words, because if he’s talking with you he isn’t making money elsewhere.

I’m not even sure what the guy did to her car given the small amount of money he charged. I asked him to look into something about my car, too. And maybe he will. If he does, maybe he’ll charge me a low, low price, too.

It’ll cost more.

Monday was a beautiful, mild, sunny day. Today was perpetually overcast, but Monday was just lovely. The sort of day where you could unassumingly spend too much time indoors. The sort of day where you wouldn’t even notice it. I spent too much of it inside.

I did go for a little 30-mile bike ride, my first in eight days. I felt like I needed a few days after my last one, and then other things come along and fill your days and before you know it, you wonder if you’ll remember how to balance the thing. It’s embarrassing.

They closed a road while I wasn’t riding. The first sign I saw said the bridge was out. It’s an overpass over the freeway, and I figured it couldn’t be really out, because that would have inconvenienced the motorists below and surely I would have learned about this. So I ignored the signs and the barrels, rode right around them and up to the bridge. And only when I was on the thing did I worry, but the bridge is an engineering marvel and, halfway over, I rationalized that if it could hold itself up then whatever was going on wouldn’t be challenged too much by one guy and a bike.

Only nothing was going on with the bridge. The issue was a little further down the road. This was the issue.

Once I got around that I had, of course, another little stretch of road that was closed from the other direction for the same reason. Almost a mile guaranteed with no traffic. It was lovely! I should just go back and ride that over and over and over again, for as long as it lasts.

Meanwhile, last night was the night the local volunteer fire department … practices driving their trucks around? They actually closed down one road, and a volunteer who takes his traffic directing duties very seriously waved me onto this road.

I’ve never been on this road before! A new road! This particular area is laid out in a wide country grid, so I knew exactly where it would go. It was almost like being lost, but not nearly as fun. Being lost when your legs feel good is just about the most fun thing you can do on a bike. The other day The Yankee was telling me about a ride she had without me where she got turned around for a while and I said, “Really!?” a little excited, and a little jealous. So when I’m not haunting that closed road I need to find more new roads. (I have one in mind just now.)

I saw some beautiful cattle enjoying their evening graze.

Soon after, a fire truck passed me. And I met that rig two more times. I’m not at all certain what they were practicing. (And I know for certain it was VFD practice because they’d deployed signs in some of the areas that were impacted.) Maybe they have new drivers.

Early this afternoon I went for a swim. I put my camera on the bottom of the pool to document the experience.

The experience was laps. I swam, slowly, 1,250 yards. All part of the build up. The build up to swimming more, later. As usual, it took a while for my arms to feel like doing laps. The first 50 yards or so felt great. The next 600 and change felt sluggish. Somewhere between 700 and 735 yards, though, I felt like a champion swimmer. Long build ups, short peaks. Typical.

Actually it felt like a nice swim from about 700 yards through to the end, though I was ready to be done at the end.

Ever since I was a little boy, I said in my best Robert Redford voice, I’ve always gotten hungry around the water. Playing in it, splashing around in a lake, wading in a pool or swimming medium distances, they would all create the same deep hunger. It’s a familiar feeling that a lot of little boys and girls get. Only it never left me. I came to think of it as a physical and a mental need. I can just look at the water and get hungry, was a joke I told my friends. And so I had a second lunch today.

Which was great because, in the later afternoon, and into the early evening, I went out for a casual little 25-mile bike ride. I saw this tractor, which, if you look carefully, is dripping something on the road.

And I set three PRs this evening, all on (little) hills. I am not at all sure how that came to be, but I’ll take it.

Let us return, once more, to the Re-Listening project. As you may know, I’ve been listening to all of my old CDs in the order of their acquisition. I’m also writing a bit about them here, just to pad the site, share some good music and maybe stir up a memory or two.

And today we reach back to 2005, to listen to a CD that was released in 1995, Son Volt’s debut, “Trace.” Uncle Tupelo’s Jay Farrar left the band and that lead to the creation of Son Volt and Wilco (Uncle Tupelo sans Farrar). Wilco’s debut was released first, by a few months, but Son Volt’s debut, in September of 1995, was a bigger hit. Either way, listeners one. (Both bands were, and are, terrific. Two alt-rock, alt-country bands are better than one.)

“Trace” was a reasonable commercial hit, peaking at number 166 on the Billboard 200 chart and soaring to number 7 on the Billboard Heatseekers Albums chart. Perhaps even more importantly, it was a critical success.

“Windfall” was the first single, and the first track. This was the first Son Volt sound most of us heard.

Something about Farrar’s voice that conveys a desperate, lonely, honky tonk feel that you didn’t get a lot of at that time. It was the nineties! And this, for me, was a library pickup to help fill an important gap in the collection.

Here’s the thing, though. These guys could absolutely rock.

The first time I saw them live was at Midtown Music Festival, in Atlanta, in 1998. It was a three-day, seven-stage show. There were more than 100 bands there, absurdly good acts, and you could see the whole weekend’s worth of music — if you were willing to sweat and stand for the whole thing — for just $30 bucks. Son Volt played early Friday. Just after that we saw the Indigo Girls and in between songs Amy Ray said they’d been over to see Son Volt, too. “God bless those guys,” she said.

I saw them once more, the next year. On Valentine’s Day, in fact. I took a girl to a first date to see them. I’d met her in a record store — and somehow it seemed that we knew each other, or the same people, or people thought we knew one another — and music was important to her. Soon after, we worked together. I got tickets to the show and she decided to call it a date, which was unexpected, at least by me. We had a nice time, and I am came to find out later that I passed many tests that night. We dated for four months after that.

She’s manages a big construction company and is married to a realtor. They live close to the beaches where she grew up, close to her family. It looks pretty perfect for her. I wonder what sort of music she’s listening to these days.

If Son Volt is somehow on the list, she’ll have to travel to see them this summer. They are playing a few festivals. Still rocking.

adventures / cycling / Monday / photo / television / video — Comments Off
3
Jun 24

What a fine start to June

We had a party for the god nephews and niece in-law (just go with it) yesterday evening. The boys are at the age of physicality and not understanding the ability to hurt one another. How they don’t devolve in any waking moment to the most charismatic wrestling move now on television is a mystery. But they wail on each other, as kids do, in just about every other way. It’s fun for them both, of course, until it is not. They are both insanely careful around their sister, which is cute. I am still bigger than them, so I can use the news anchor voice or go stand over one when he is being a little too much. Sometimes it’s the little brother that has to be called to heel.

In other words, they’re boys.

So we recreated famous football catches and toured the basement. They were very interested in our basement, which is not nearly as cool as their grandfather’s basement, and I told them so, but they could not be dissuaded. We had pizza and macaroni and cheese for dinner. We played basketball as a last-ditch stalling effort before they finally left.

The youngest, by the way, has a girlfriend and they have kissed at school and he says they both liked it, and he is in the NBA. He is also graduating kindergarten in a few days.

Oddly enough, I wasn’t completely sapped of energy when they left last night. Must have been that real-strawberry popsicle.

The cats hid upstairs during all of this. They are not used to little people, is the best we can figure. Lately they are both quite friendly when an adult comes by for whatever reason. But these half-sized types are no good for them. They don’t really have a reason for this fear, they just know it on a run-upstairs-and-hide level, and they aren’t wrong.

When they weren’t dodging loud, smelly, pokey, little people, they’ve had a great week. Phoebe is anticipating the sun’s movement.

And she keeps a close watch on the front yard.

Poseidon, meanwhile, has the backyard under close and near constant supervision.

When he’s not taking some Poe-time under a blanket somewhere.

Goofball.

So the cats are doing just great, thanks for asking, and so are we!

I only got in 70 miles on the bike this weekend, mostly because Saturday, which I had imagined as a longer ride, was the day my body said “Hey, feet, aren’t you tired?” And my feet said, “Sure am. And what about you, back? A little stiff aren’t you?” And my back said, “Now that you mention it, yeah. And I just bet those hands are numb, too.” And my hands said “Pkkwbo fiwo iwbefnwne.” So I called it at 32 miles.

Most disappointing. It was slow, and I was well behind my lovely bride, and nothing felt especially good. And that’s why I shouldn’t ride a hard, fast, short ride the day before my longer ride, according to the hypothesis I came up with Saturday evening.

And since I was going slow, I decided to shot this hay storage. There are cow pastures on either side of the road, and that’s the leftover hay from the winter, and that should tell you how mild things were.

A version of that photo will probably wind up as one of the banners on the blog eventually.

Yesterday, I did a little recovery ride, designed to not tax myself too much. And my legs felt great on the out part of my out-and-back route. On the and-back portion I realized, Oh, there was a barely perceptible, but nonetheless helpful tailwind working in my fair a moment ago. That, of course, meant I had an insurmountable headwind on the way back in.

Anyway, today, I’m taking off, and I’ll get back to it tomorrow. In the meantime, since we’re here, let’s check on the month’s progress. May was a light month, in terms of mileage, but it’s still a productive (for me) year so far.

The green line is a projection, where I’d be if I rode an average of 10 miles per day. The ride line is where I was this time last year. The blue line charts my 2024 progress. So it’s been a productive, so far, and should be another record-breaking year.

No one is happier than my spreadsheets.

Yes, I have multiple pages of cycling spreadsheets. Never start doing this. Down this path lies madness, and mystery, and sometimes satisfaction, but usually a squinty-eyed, “How are these the data points I’m fixated on?” sort of feeling of “Huh?”

Our next door neighbor is a 1-year-old. And his parents, of course. But mostly the kid. His parents put a swing out under a tree, it is one of those four rope numbers, and it leads down to a plastic swing that looks like the manufacturer just messed up on the high seat molds and decided they could make something work out of it anyway. The boy is starting to come around to the idea of the swing, a little bit. It takes time, but it is a good swing and his parents are determined and, eventually, this will be a wonderful experience and future swings under that tree will be in the blur of memories he carries forward his whole life.

It’s an amazing tree. Huge, wide crown. Thick lush grass underneath. There’s going to be so much fun and imagination that comes to life as he continues to grow.

And he doesn’t even know yet that helicopters live in it.

Things continue to look beautiful in our backyard beds.

No jets or choppers are emerging from our greenery, though.

We are going to have some grapes again this year, though. If we can keep the pests away. (We’ll fail at that miserably.)

But it is fun to try!

I had a student ask me in the spring if I was excited that Jon Stewart was returning to The Daily Show. I’d mentioned some research we did on the program way, way back when and soon after that announcement came down and he remembered that. And afterward he asked me once or twice what I thought about the new episode.

Since it was a new media class, it seemed viable, even if these students have never even seen the product, let alone the Jon Stewart version. Somewhere along the way there was a good injection point and I said, what people forget is that, at its core, this show is a satirical critique of the media, rather than a commentary on society as a whole. And as I watched tonight’s episode I thought, This is the episode that proves my point.

His guest was Ken Buck, most recently the resigning Congressman from Colorado. And he … was not ready for this.

At the end of the interview, my lovely bride said, “He’s not happy right now, is he?” The question allowed me to return to my central thesis about the show. No, he’s not. He was expecting still another softball interview, but the difference is that Stewart came prepared, and was ready with real-time rejoinders, and names and facts. He doesn’t let things slide, which is what political operators are fundamentally trained for now.

Yes, Stewart has a staff. Yes they do four half-hour shows a week, and yes, he is only, himself, doing the one show a week and, sadly, for this limited run, but what he brings to this highly specific interview is different than every other interview you’ll see on TV, which is largely about cheaply, effectively (with conflict, if possible) filling time and getting to the next commercial break. There’s no substance in that formula. No opportunity for push back, even if you were so inclined. And many aren’t inclined. That’s one of the big problems of contemporary media, an issue Stewart has been pointing out for decades now, and perhaps never more clearly than in the A-block of this episode.

Buck wasn’t always pleased with how that went, even though it wasn’t, at all, adversarial. It could have been even less to his liking. Watch the interview, you see that Stewart bailed him out, or let a moment pass, three or four times. (Frustratingly, Stewart let one go that I wish he’d stuck with.)

It was a brilliant piece of television.