During Noreen and David’s visit, we got out and about quite a bit to enjoy our beautiful Central Texas Spring weather.
I spied this interesting conjoined twin Texas Bluebonnet at the Wildflower Center. The stem was wide and flat.
Wildflowers.
Category: Funky
Earth Day 2024.
Some National Parks are created to preserve a rare species. Others are created to preserve a uniquely beautiful location. I’m sure there are other reasons that motivate a place being enshrined and protected as a US National Park.
Sequoia National Park was founded in 1890, to “protect giant sequoia trees, the largest living trees by volume on Earth,” according to the National Park Service website. In the early days of Sequoia NP, fire suppression was a major focus. It was fascinating to learn that in doing so for upwards of a century, we were actually threatening their existence. It turns out that the seed cones of the giant Sequoia trees require the high-temperature heat from wildfires to release their seeds. And natural thinning by wildfire is also needed to provide adequate sunlight for the new trees.
In the end, modern researchers have provided better guidance to preserve these gentle giants, who are obviously resilient to fire. It was hard to find one of these up to 2000-year-old trees that hadn’t been scarred from fires at some point.
This is an important lesson to think about on this 54th Earth Day. We should act with preservation and conservation in mind, but learn and adapt to the best methods. Sometimes we are wrong.
2024 Eclipse.
Happy New Year! I know. I’ve been MIA. Sorry about that. But, I’m still here!
Noreen and David joined us in Austin for the last week or so. They flew down to see the total solar eclipse. Our house and much of Central Texas were in the zone of totality. We wanted to maximize our amount of time in totality. So, Monte picked Lampasas, Texas as our destination, about an hour drive northwest of our house. The forecast was not great for Austin or Lampasas, but we took our chances, and it turned out great.
Lampasas experienced over 4 1/2 minutes of totality, and it was awesome. The clouds cooperated and, like in 2017, the predicted Armageddon didn’t happen. We didn’t hit traffic or crowds.
One thing that was particularly cool, and that I really don’t recall it being as striking during the last eclipse as it was this year, was how upon reaching totality, it was like the lights just turned off. I don’t remember it being that sudden or that dark in 2017.
I guess I’ll have to travel somewhere if I’m going to see another. There’s one in August 2026 in Spain, maybe I’ll make that one!
It’s come to this.
I wonder how Captain Kirk dealt with software updates on the Starship Enterprise. We experienced our first automatic “over-the-air” software update in the Subaru last week. It was not something we could opt out of. It was going to auto install if we deferred it more than twice. So it did. It said it completed successfully.
HOWEVER, after a couple days, the computer touch screen went into an endless reboot cycle every time we drove the car. And that’s a tad disconcerting in this day of smart cars.
So we took it into the dealer who said we didn’t have the most current level of software. So, they installed it.
I guess we’ll see if this one will work. New 1st World problems…
One step forward…
As Monte likes to say, every time we go to the boat to cross something off the todo list, we add 2 more things to the list.
On Monday we went to the marina to install 3 new halyards and new jib sheets on Nirvana. When we lowered the jib to change the halyard, I found a 2’ long tear along the edge of the sunbrella cover. So we rolled it up and brought it home.
No more over-sheeting the jib against the spreaders, please. It’s not the America’s Cup…
Yesterday I laid it out and mended it; should be good for a while. I ripped off the sunbrella cover, sandwiched the tear between 2 layers of new adhesive-backed 6 oz dacron, sewed it down several times, and then sewed the sunbrella back down.
One step forward…
Not ideal.
Since the beginning of the year, I’m having an issue with my right knee. It has gotten steadily worse. I have an orthopedic specialist. I met with him again a few days ago, to get his interpretation of an MRI and a prognosis/diagnosis.
This is the actual dumbed-down drawing he made to illustrate for me what an ideal, ‘healthy’ knee should look like on the left, compared to the current situation in my knee on the right. I was initially taken aback by the jagged, bumpy, withering bits on the right vs the bit on the left. Not ideal. And, apparently, it’s not going to get any better. I have an angry knee.
So, I’m going to have to get used to a popping, crackling, unstable, inflamed, and swollen knee for the long haul. A compression brace can help with stability. Injections may alleviate symptoms a bit, but only a replacement would get me back to ideal, and I’m definitely not ready to do that.
I really wish I could have afforded better shoes when I spent so many years running back in college.
Cosmic reminder.
A month ago, the Universe reached out to remind me that “things are just things.” I was rear-ended in our brand new Subaru Outback (sniffle). The other guy was very remorseful; and uninsured.
Anywho… repairs are now complete, and the Subie is fixed and back home.
Our Subaru “badge of ownership” also arrived. I’m ready to enjoy many miles and roadtrips.
Quit moving my cheese!
Many years ago I was gifted a small book called “Who Moved My Cheese,” by Dr Spencer Johnson. It’s a quick read, and I recommend it. It delivers the message that change happens, and when it does, it’s not the end of the world, just keep looking for new cheese.
I’ve recently received impersonal emails regarding changes for two different apps that have become a mainstay for me – my podcaster app, Stitcher, and the My Photo Stream integration which made it easy to wirelessly sync photos between the Photos app on my Macbook and my iPhone. I use both of these capabilities daily.
The free Stitcher app is going away at the end of August, to become a monetized asset for its owner SiriusXM. I think I’ve found a replacement piece of free cheese for Stitcher. My Photo Stream is going away at the end of July. I’m still working on finding a new kind of cheese for that, as I’m not fond of using iCloud.
Regarding Stitcher, I found a nice article by PCMag on the top podcast player apps in 2023 and gave it a quick read. I picked one of them to try and installed it today, the Pocket Casts app. It was easy to export the set of podcasts I currently subscribe to on Stitcher in OPML format, and import it to Pocket Casts. My initial impression is thumbs up. It’s free, and it has most of the features I have become accustomed to. If you’re on Android, read the PCMag article to find a candidate for you there.
If your cheese has moved, give the book a quick read. 🙂
Brother, can you spare a spare?
I’m enjoying our Chevrolet Bolt EV. It’s an unassuming electric vehicle that is roomier than it looks, holds everything we need, well appointed in features, and fun to drive.
The other day, while on a trip to the post office, I encountered a couple who had a flat tire in the parking lot. They had the car already up on a jack but were standing around on their phones. I asked if they needed help, and they said yes. They asked if they could borrow my lug wrench as the one they had was too large for the lug bolts on their wheel.
I said sure, and upon opening up the spare tire well in the back of the Bolt, I was surprised to find that there was no jack. No spare. No lug wrench. This car didn’t come with a spare?!
Anyway, I drove home, grabbed a lug wrench, and brought it back to them. They finished the job and went on their way.
After getting home I hit up Google and learned that Chevrolet Bolts, VW ID.4, Teslas, Ford’s Mach-E, and most other EVs don’t come with spares, not even as an option. I did not know this. So now Monte and I are doing some research on what we want to do about it.
We can buy a spare – either a temporary donut spare – or a full sized spare. But a fully inflated one doesn’t fit in the wheel well in the back of the car, so it would have to sit in the cargo space in the back. What is cleverly disguised as the wheel well for a spare tire is actually the place that they install high-end stereo systems if someone ordered the car with one. It is neither round nor big enough for even a donut spare. We could probably fit an under-inflated spare down there, but would need to be able to inflate it to 50 PSI when needed.
We can buy a jack – but one needs to be very careful about where to place a jack under an EV, given that that is where the batteries are.
We can buy a small, portable air compressor, which we probably will do at a minimum.
I have learned that spray-type fix-a-flats are not desirable to use, as they will foul the Tire Pressure Monitor gadgets that are inside each of the tires.
So why is this becoming the new norm? I have to assume it’s a combination of cost savings, weight savings for maximum efficiency/range, space saving, eco-friendly (for those who say it keeps rubber tires out of the landfill). But I suspect it is also related to the target demographic of EV owners, many of whom have probably never changed a tire in their lives.
If I think back to the many times I had a flat tire and changed it, it was due to running over a nail, or something else that led to a slow leak, for which I guess an air compressor would be a temporary fix. I’ve never had a total blowout. So, maybe an air compressor is all we need for now. Perhaps a spare in the boot for longer trips. Our Chevy Bolt EV has self-sealing Michelin Energy Saver All Season tires, which is even more re-assuring.
Anyhow, I’m sure my dad would have something to say about this, were he still around. 🙂
According to Consumer Reports, over a third of all new cars (gas or electric or hybrid) have no spare. It’s a thing. Needless to say, I was pleased to see a spare, jack, and lug wrench when I finally looked in the back of the Subaru.
If you are shopping for an EV and a spare tire is a deal breaker for you, check out this article I found that outlines a dozen or so EVs that come with a spare in the base package or as an option.
And make sure your roadside assistance plan and/or auto insurance covers towing your EV, properly (which generally means putting it on a flatbed tow truck).
Cheers!
Expanding horizons.
Recently, a friend shared that her daughter and colleagues were starting a used and vintage online book shop. Wanting to support them, I signed up. After taking a look, I was intrigued. The company is called Vignette Books (@vignettebookshop on instagram, http://www.vignettebooks.com). Their approach is that customers self-select an “Edit;” which is essentially a category of books. They have a quiz for customers to find out which Edit most matches their interests. I took the quiz and found the “Natural” Edit was a good fit for me.
So, you select an Edit, and then order a set of 1 to 3 books that Vignette Books picks from you from a curated set of used and vintage books in their inventory.
My order came a week or two ago and I was pleasantly pleased with the selections. One was a book about whales, their evolution, and history. I read that one first. I think I could now have a chance in any Jeopardy category about whales 🙂
The second was a biography about Rachel Carson, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I knew Carson wrote Silent Spring, but I didn’t realize that her background was marine biology and that she had written 3 award winning books on the ocean, sea birds, and other sea life prior to writing Silent Spring. So, now I’ve begun reading them. See how that expanding horizons thing works?
The next book of my three from Vignette Books is in the on-deck circle, and it is a story of a trek through the Arizona desert to find a stone carving of a maze similar to one found in Wales. I’m looking forward to that one, too.
If you, too, are intrigued, check out Vignette Books!
One more show for the road.
The Texas Performing Arts 2022/2023 season is coming to a close. I worked as a volunteer usher for my eighth event yesterday, a production of the Broadway in Austin musical Hairspray – very colorful, talented singers, and great tunes. In a month or two I’ll decide whether to sign up for the next season. I very much enjoyed the shows I was able to work.
Happy Birthday, Paul!
How is it that we know so many old people?! :). Today we celebrated Paul’s big birthday with him and his crew. It’s getting hot out there!!!
Celebrate.
This week we drove down to Houston to celebrate the birthday and anniversary of friends of ours, Asha and Shekhar.
I’ve known Asha for over 35 years, which seems strange just typing that. We were roommates way back when. We ended up moving to the same state, though different cities. She’s always reached out to remain connected over the years, and for that, I am thankful. I’ve enjoyed her family as it grew over the years, attending her wedding, and getting to know her husband and her strong, successful daughters as they’ve grown up.
Happy Birthday Asha, and Happy Anniversary Asha and Shekhar!
New trick.
When I was a kid, the zipper on my favorite pair of jeans broke. Back then, my solution was to cut and sew buttonholes in the inside of the top zipper placket, and sew buttons on the inside of the bottom zipper placket, ala button-up Levi’s 501 style. It worked, and my favorite jeans lived a while longer.
This week, I mended a pair of waterproof rain paints. The zipper had essentially corroded onto the zipper teeth and was permanently stuck in the down position. I considered the button-up solution again, but that wouldn’t be great for waterproof pants. So, I decided to go for it… replace the zipper. I’ve never done it before. So I stared at it for a very, very long time. There are like 10 different sets of stitching on a zipper placket. I had to figure out which ones to rip out to get the zipper out, which ones to leave in place, and figure out the right order of steps to sew the new one in. So, after mentally reverse-engineering the entire zipper placket assembly, I decided I could do it.
In the end, the amount of time I spent staring at it took much longer than the amount of time it took me to rip the necessary seams, remove the old zipper, and sew in the new one. I used a little waterproofing goo on the inside to waterproof the new exposed seams. And voila!
It’s not exactly Saville Row work, but I learned a new thing. #proudofmyself
Sheila365 