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10
Jan 23

Gustard is for (mustard) lovers

Today seemed to last forever. I looked up, it was 11 a.m. I looked again, it was 1 p.m. The next time I glanced at the time it was 2 p.m. For the next 46 consecutive hours it was 2 p.m. Not sure how that happens. None of the rhythms or chores of the day were different than a normal day. Nothing to make it stretch or compress. It was just two. Two. Twoooooooooooooo.

Also, I had four hours of sleep last night. And change. Four hours and change. Really, though, when the hours of sleep starts with four, the extra minutes seem a trifling detail. There was a time, mind you, when I got by on much less. But I started making a conscientious effort to sleep more and now I can’t sleep less.

So it was that I came in this evening, sat down with a cat and dozed off. Only to be woken up when my lovely bride came through the front door. And I dozed off again. Only to be woken up when she came upstairs. And then I was awake, until it was time for dinner.

We had cheeseburgers this evening, which let me use, and use up, my first bottle of Gustard.

This was a Christmas gift a few years ago. My god-sisters-in-law (go with it) got it for me because we all like the band Guster, I’m impossible to shop for and some people like a challenge. It turns out Guster partnered with this company in Vermont and they makes a good mustard.

I don’t even like mustard. Or, I didn’t.

This year’s Christmas gift included more Gustard. Because we flew back from Christmas some of our presents were shipped after us. The box, including my new Gustard, arrived today. So, tonight, I could finish this bottle. Life has its grand moments of small serendipities of timing.

Or maybe it wasn’t timing. Maybe I just stayed in the period between 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. for six weeks and the box had plenty of time to USPS its way here.

One of those is likely.

Probably the timely shipment of a parcel.

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6
Jan 23

My Bob Barker line was my third-funniest joke of the day

At the end of the day, as I was walking out of the office, I ran into the guy who locks the doors. He’s a fine fellow and we always have a good laugh. He was doing his last task of the day, slamming that bolt home, as I was leaving the building.

Did you just lock me in?

“Yep, you’re stuck.”

I will take that personally, then, for two days.

He laughed, and I instructed him to have a good weekend. Just, you know, in case that was somehow helpful, as if the man hadn’t yet thought of that possibility.

But the best part, aside from sending him home with a chuckle, was that I got to use the sincere expression, Have a good weekend, pal.

I once had a friend who used that pal to great effect. Sometimes I use it, and it makes me smile, thinking of him. You never heard the comma, because you were so busy being touched by the sincerity that came with that “pal.” He is a park ranger these days. I bet he’s great at that.

Anyway, there was a lot of bright sunlight to enjoy today. I am cold, but happy.

This was the second time this week I’d seen the actual sunlight and blue skies. It did not disappoint. I will accept the cold — this being January and all — but I will need some sun in exchange. That’s not asking too much. Otherwise it is just the usual, relentless, gray.

As if I needed to see it again, and from another perspective, to verify it, here’s the mid-afternoon view up through the giant skylight in the commons.

It’s gray 165 days a year here, and we have this giant window set up. This time of year I’m always amazed people don’t just sit there and stare up in wonder when the skies are blue.

Part of that is because there’s no one here right now. No students, anyway. Some of the professional types were in the office, getting ready. Classes start on Monday. This, then, is the last deep breath in. The normal rhythms will return. And, sometime in mid- or late-April, spring will finally show up. May it get here soon.

Got back on the bike this evening, and had a nice 27.7 mile ride. Should have gone longer, but there are dinner considerations to consider.

I considered I normally like dinner.

But, after the semi-impressive bonk on Wednesday, sitting up after 80 minutes and feeling as if I could ride all night was an encouraging sign.

Also, I was underwater at one point. Look to the left of that graphic. Biggest ray I’ve ever seen.

So I made a spreadsheet to chart my bike riding progress this year. I wanted to create a graphic that would illustrate how I did against specific daily averages over the year. One line will represent improving last year’s totals by 21 percent. The other will be a line that, if I can keep up with it, would mean a 42 percent increase over my record-setting 2022.

It’s ambitious, but it’ll be interesting to see how it plays out. Right now, at least, I am well ahead of the blue and green trend lines, as you can see by that purple line. I’m wondering if/when the more ambitious goal will slip away from me.

Oh look, this mountain has its own weather system.

I’ve probably shared a version of that before, but it amuses me, which is the point.

Don’t worry, though, I won’t share that chart again for quite some time.

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2
Jan 23

The non-holiday, holiday Monday

OK, OK. Let’s get this place back to normal. We have to settle down, I know. There was all of that travel, and then the extra weirdness of New Year’s, compounded by the weirdness of that being on a Sunday, meaning the hangover for the amateurs were observed today — by both the amateurs and their employers. And then I published something here on Saturday, very strange indeed. And I had today off. (And tomorrow!) But we stayed in, with good reason.

For the life of me, I don’t know why anyone over the age of 24 goes out for New Year’s Eve, no matter the night of the week. And it makes zero sense during a pandemic. (Yes, that’s still on.) Unless you figure you’ve done all the ritual and obligatory family events you need to do for the next several months, so you went out to get contaminated, and contaminate others, willy nilly.

Which is thoughtful of you, really.

Funnily enough, the etymology of willy nilly goes back to about 1600. To the Internet! (Where you already are!) Willy-nilly:

c. 1600, contraction of will I, nill I, or will he, nill he, or will ye, nill ye, literally “with or without the will of the person concerned.”

And just one or two generations later, there was the Great Plague of London.

City records indicate that some 68,596 people died during the epidemic, though the actual number of deaths is suspected to have exceeded 100,000 out of a total population estimated at 460,000.

Precisely why we stayed in. And, also, because we are over 24.

The cats had a party, though. Check out their glasses. You’d be profoundly disappointed in me if you knew how long we’ve waited for that moment to appear, just for these photos, and for nothing else.

And that’s as good a transition as any to move us smoothly into the most popular feature on the website. (I look at the analytics (and thanks for your visit) so I know these things.) Phoebe is having a ball.

Poseidon has been very cuddly and lovey today.

It’s when he’s charming that he’s most dangerous, because it is all a ploy. But, my, how he can charm the unsuspecting.

As ever, it is creepy when they do the same thing at the same time.

Just darned unsettling.

The thing you’ve been skimming or just scroll past, the last six weeks or so: On New Year’s Eve I set a personal best for mileage on the year. As ever, I did it at the last minute.

I had a difficult time trying to decide how much to do that night. If I’d stopped at that point, four miles into that ride, I would have set a best by only a mile. It was obvious I didn’t have another metric century in me, but it seemed like there should be some meaning or importance to this number no one else will ever know. Shouldn’t there be? What should it be? I failed utterly in that regard, but settled in to simply enjoy a midnight ride, which is the real meaning and importance.

I fell in with a fast group and stayed with them for six miles or so. I sprinted out of that group at the finish line for no reason. I beat them all to a vague finish line no one agreed to in a race they didn’t know they were having with me. Victory, he said grimly, was mine.

And after 18 miles that evening, that was that.

But the best part of the night, The Yankee decided to ride a few miles with me. We rang in the new year pedaling away in the bike room, holding hands and being cute and all. Here are our Zwift avatars, together.

It was her second bike ride of the day. She went to the pool today, and is back to doing her many other workouts, as well. So, if you’re wondering, she’s recovering nicely from her September crash and subsequent surgery.

Which means I have to find some way to get in more miles this year than she does. This will take a concerted effort on my part. (Not to worry, I already have a spreadsheet and two new goals to help me with this.)

I have about 75 pages to go in Rick Atkinson’s The British Are Coming. It’s one part Tolstoy, one part Burns, and all of it a story in a style befitting the journalist taking a turn as a historian. Last night I got to that point where I began to hate that the book is ending.

It’s a feeling all the more pointed because this is the first book in a trilogy, and because it is good, and so is everything else of Atkinson’s that I have read. Problem is, he hasn’t published the other two installments yet. These things, no doubt, take time. This one, for instance, has 564 pages of text, 135 pages of endnotes, a 42-page bibliography and 24 full-page maps.

But, come on, Atkinson, this was published in April of 2020. Make with the goods!

Isn’t that last passage something? (Read this book.)

I think he’ll finish this book just before Washington crosses the Delaware on his Christmas attack. It had been a grim year, 1776, and that December, the privation of the winter quarters and the desperation late in that December would be a good place to put in a cliffhanger and set up the next book in the trilogy.

Nary a word has been published online about when the next book will be out. How am I supposed to find out what happens next?

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30
Dec 22

A new thing to sit on, and then sitting in the saddle

Our new sofa arrived today. We purchased it on July 1st.

The ottoman was ready almost right away. Apparently the sofa, which is common enough to have floor models, is built on a case-by-inspired-case basis. It was supposed to come while we were traveling all over the wide world for the holidays, but they were kind enough to hold on to it until we returned. They called yesterday and said our furniture would be delivered between 9:30 and 12:30 today. They showed up at about 9 a.m., in and out with a careful professionalism.

I’m typing this from the sofa. It is firm. Has that new-furniture are-the-chemicals-in-this-deadly-in-California smell.

Humorously, the crew chief has to take a photograph of the sofa for proof of delivery. If the signature and initials on the form aren’t enough, who is to say he didn’t take that sofa and shoot a photograph in my neighbor’s house? Or his neighbor’s house? So I’m surprised he didn’t ask us to sit on the sofa, but AI is doing amazing things these days, and so maybe that’s not proof enough either.

Hang on.

…

I just stood up to go fetch something from elsewhere in the house. This sofa is both firm and actually easy to get out of. The old one, which had 20-some great years of use, involved a rolling, pushing motion, and you always came out low, owing to where your hips wound up. With this sofa you just … stand up?

My knees approve.

Climbed on the bike this afternoon. Climbed off in the early evening. I spent so much time on the bike that I started playing around with the camera angles on Zwift. This is usually the sign that I’m ready to be off the trainer, and on the road. But, it rained all day, and it was 54 degrees at best, and once the bike is on the trainer, it tends to stay there until the weather is tolerable. And it rained all day.

Anyway, I clicked off 60 miles. I was intently concentrating on distance, because of this silly mileage goal, rather than times. But I still did my 3rd fastest time on the circuit, and my second fastest time on two loops of the circuit.

I hope my avatar has something left in the legs for tomorrow. Tomorrow we break the personal record.

Tomorrow, it won’t be weird to ride my bike into the new year.

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28
Dec 22

The last travel day of the holiday season

Today we said goodbye to our Christmas on the Gold Coast coast. It’s always lovely to be there and to spend a little quiet time at the cottage.

It’s always difficult to leave.

But we had a plane to catch. A direct flight. A short flight. And yet it still, somehow, dominated the day. Weird.

So here are a few extra photos to pad this out. Some of the winter berries we saw at the New York Botanical Garden on Monday.

(Did you see all of those posts, by the way? Part one is here. Here is part two. See part three here. The fourth and final installment is here.)

We saw this painting along the way in our trip. The placard said it is titled “Hurricane” and was a gift from the artist, Theodosia Tamborlane.

When the guy on your Delta flight says goodbye at the end of your trip.

And when you realize you’re only one trip to baggage claim and an hour’s drive from wrapping up two great weeks of travel.

I unpack as soon as I get home. I essentially lived out of a suitcase for the better part of six years, and I see no reason to leave them sitting around. Tonight that meant unloading the car, eating a quick sandwich, and then carrying everything upstairs to be unpacked. Four minutes later my suitcase was empty and my backpack was lighter. The suitcase, if not every stitch of clothing, gets put away almost immediately.

This afternoon my mother-in-law said we shouldn’t feel pressured to be there on Christmas day. We rotate alternate years to keep it fair between our families but, I said, “There’s never any pressure. We are blessed to have the time and ability to be able to see everyone.”

The only demanding part, then, is the travel. I added it up. Assuming our two planes had a very basic flight path, we’ve covered approximately 2,547 miles in the last 13-or-so days. Only half of that was in the air.

So, yeah, I guess I can see how Santa does it.