Bill Schell's "BeachWeb" for October 2011   made-with-Nvu-t.png 
AND - trike-rides continue (about 3-5 days a week)  - I have a "Trice Q" model from I.C.E. Trikes (located in the UK (they don't make / market my model anymore, but they make and market something considerably better, I've upgraded (and then upgraded some more) mine, so it is only a ghost of it's former self!)

I am now closing in on 14,000 miles (no, no decimal point mistake there) - after just barely 3 years (end of next week) since I got my trike.

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Here's a track-log (red-line on the right-side) and an 'elevation (and speed) profile' (along the bottom of the image)...

IF you have trouble - here's a link to a larger-version (same as clicking on above version) and an EVEN LARGER version...

IF you want the ...kmz file and you know how to use it in Google Earth - here it is...  ( link to ...kmz file )

for picture of me on the trike scroll down in THIS web-page for a picture taken of me on the "Tour of Sebring" the first weekend in September, this year... Other pictures available upon request... - IF you are thinking about a trike for any realm, let me know I have lots of learned things you might be interested in.   One of my college friends (who now lives in Denver (environs)) just bought TWO Trikes, one for himself, one for his wife.

IF you have not seen (experienced may be a better term) the movie, (Wikipedia-link ===>) "The Adjustment Bureau" then you just MIGHT want to see this incredibly thought-provoking Matt Damon movie...   There is / are no guns, no car-chases, no blood, no explosions, only the awesome power of the human brain at work here...

The story-line (The Adjustment Team (a short-story)) comes from (Wikipedia-link =>) Philip K. Dick (of story-lines for Blade-Runner (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?), for Minority Report, for the Terminator series,  for Total Recall, Next, Screamers and for other such sci-fi movie block-busters.  

Philip K. Dick died almost 3 decades ago, but his story-lines, books and short-stories live on...

Just in case you have NOT HEARD the GREAT NEWS...
          Our friend Mr. Panda Bear now has his OWN WEB SITE < click-here!
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OR - if you are "into" QR Codes (Quick Response (bar) Codes) - then you can scan / copy / point-your-browser to) the above QR Code for Mr. Panda Bear's Web Site!

HOW MANY Panda Bears do YOU KNOW who have a QR Code for their web-site?
Wow!!! ---- (twice WOW - two meals with this!)
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for a REALLY GREAT seafood sauce:
 a 'smidgin' of this, a smidgin of that, and PRETTY POWERFUL STUFF!!!...

Flower-Pictures, for your enjoyment!

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Another opportunity to show you 'just some' of our flowers (that prosper)...  

A number of questions come-up that we can not answer (at all).  People ask, "HOW do you make these things look SO GOOD?"

Our answer is, "DO NOT DO ANYTHING" except give them a LOT of  (subdued (like let the sun filter through 'Shade Cloth"))  LIGHT, a LOT of WATER, and NO other support - they will do their thing...

ON THE OTHER HAND _ we live in Stuart, Florida - it is HOT here, it RAINS a LOT and - well you get the picture...

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Now this Rose gets 'full-sun' about 4-6 hours a day or more NOT THROUGH SHADE CLOTH,
and other than that we don't do ANYTHING to it (except feed-it every once in a while)


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YES - it were GOOD and I can still "DO IT" _ boardsailing in 20-30 mph that is!  (it was gusting OVER 40 knots at one of the camera-sites that I normally 'maintain')  AND YES - after a few days of this sort of wind I had to clean ALLLLLL the camera-housing-glass on ALL the cameras...  (this was the weather over the weekend of October 7-8-9)

I hit 30 plus mph (according to my trusty (almost 8 years old) GPS unit (Garmin GPSMap 76 CSx)  (over a six-second-average) twice on the 5.0 sail, (and only managed a milder 28 mph on the 4.5 sail when I changed to it.    Ms. May called about mid-day (about mid-way through my near-collapse) and said, "If you're on the 4.5 what am I supposed to sail?"  - so - well - UGH - we don't have BIG enough sails for light wind(s) and SMALL enough sails for HEAVY wind - so I guess we'll have to invest in SOMETHING!

AND - YES - on the 'EPIC' boardsailing (wind) day - it was also our 16th Wedding Anniversary! - and it feels good to be married to Ms. Huggly for that long...

And on Friday night we'd gone-out to 'Anthony's Coal Fired Pizza' - and that was REALLY TASTY - and yeah - even in Florida you can find coal - but they import theirs from Pennsylvania - where the first "Anthony's" was located...


AND _ Ms. May found something on the internet about "RAGBRAI" ( a bicycle ride across the great state of Iowa ) and about Parkinson's Disease - things near and dear to my heart.  Seems that someone's done a study to indicate that if you 'force' a Parkinson's patient to pedal at a cadence of 90 rpm (that's revolutions per minute of the bicycle's pedals), for an hour, once a day for 8 weeks that the Parkinson's patient's symptoms 'improve'.   On the other hand I think I might die (and I don't already have Parkinson's Disease) at a cadence of 90 rpm - so - well - we'll have to do more research here, huh?
IT ain't NEARLY as easy as it looks - and/or as MANY would have you believe......

I've been trying (and trying (and trying SOME MORE)) and I've put in the better part of a couple of 16 hour day trying to get the (bob)cat-cam working, and I am NOT FINISHED, YET!!!! (maybe some day next year, huh?)

Now this is designed to 'catch' the Bobcat 'family' (five of them) walking back-and-forth via their 'corridor' which we have identified in our yard...     BUT - even though I have a 'non-antique' (If you believe the D-Link website) internet / web-camera (it's even wireless so I don't have to run 200 feet of ethernet cable). There are some 'gotchas' and some are pretty BIG!:

1.) had to get the wireless part working - I'd had it ethernetted in my office, but then I had to get it working wirelessly so I could put it near the 'bobcat-family-corridor'.

2.) it still needs power (110 volt AC - though I suppose if I really wanted to I could run it off some solar-array, with 5 volts DC at about 100 milliamps...

3.) it needs to be in an area where the grass (well actually the WEEDS) are so low that they don't blow around
in the breeze

4.) needs to be in an area where there are no morning or afternoon 'shadows' to 'confuse' the 'motion-detection' software

5.) needs to be focused (and I'm not sure my infamously bad, 60 year old eyes are any good at this focusing thing), but if I don't 'pre-focus' the camera - then the picture(s) will be pretty useless, huh?

6.) needs to be 'nailed (actually screwed) down' so that the wind and such things don't blow the camera around, and then it would point to some OTHER place than that place which we expect the bobcats to walk...

7.) need to FIND (which took almost 20 minutes on the D-Link web-site) and then CONFIGURE (which took over an hour) and then FINALLY FOUND the "RTFM" - on some other "not-where-it-should-have-been" place on the D-Link web-site..

8.) every time a rain-drop falls off the roof (underneath which is the camera) therein lies yet another 'false positive' - the motion-detection software figures that rain-drop is something 'of interest' - so it gives me an 'interrupt', then records for 'n' seconds - UGH UGH - so it thought the raindrops were "INTERESTING" instead of the O'Possum that just walked by - it missed him (or was it a her?) - wandering around in the rain?

9.) need to  - well - you get the picture - and it ain't a PRETTY PICTURE (no Bobcats yet)
     - but - well - like I said at the top of this
     - IT ain't as easy as it looks and/or as (MANY) would like you to believe?

Bottom-line on this 'project' was that I FINALLY got the thing working - but the Bobcat Family seems to have decided they don't love us any more - so - well - no Bobcat Family portraits yet.

I won't EVEN BORE YOU  with the 'test-videos' of Mr. Bill walking back-and-forth in front of the camera to make sure it works?

HOW-So-Ever - if you want to see the camera, itself, - you can scroll-down (just a bit) in this web-page to the picture of "May's Wall" - and the camera is the little-white-box (with a black-round-thing) - to the left of the washing-sink- sitting on the table behind Ms. May's 'wall'...
More things to study and consider:
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MIT (yes - the HUGELY Famous and exotic university up in the Cold Frozen North) - has - put some (not ALL) but SOME of their lectures up on 'iTunes University' and they are EXCELLENT...

So - check them out if you have not.  If you're OLD like ME - they are a way to keep you mind-YOUNG! - and if you're YOUNG you can, perhaps - find some excellent information to help you excel at whatever you're doing...

AND _ I have been studying 'Spectrum Analyzers' (<<== Wikipedia Link) - now if you're NOT A GEEK or a GEEKette- then you'll probably want to IGNORE THIS SECTION.  A Spectrum Analyzer is an electronic troubleshooting tool, somewhat similar to an Oscillocope (in appearance ONLY), but definitely gives one different information...   I've been attempting to learn about these because of a problem with 'intereference' on an RF-enabled weather-station I've been working on.
This thing (the RF-enabled weather-station) is supposed to operate in what is known as the "ISM (frequency) band" (<<== Wikipedia Link), but it does NOT, and so I'm trying to find out what / why / how / etc. etc. etc.

There are some TREMENDOUS RESOURCES out there on the "Internet" - most notably Tektronix (manufactures some of the best electronic test equipment not just on this planet (earth) but in the entire universe.  I mean these people's stuff is unbelieveably GOOD, (yes it's also astronomically expensive, too), but - whatever.
AND AND AND here's another 'thingie':

we've had a concrete-pad with a roof over it to the east of the garage for about 2 years now... - One of the major problems with this design (based on the level of the yard and how it slopes) is that a lot (and I do mean A LOT) of 'yard-sand' gets tracked and blown into / onto the concrete pad...  SO _ withouth 'grouting' I made a small wall on May's end (where she sprays glazes on some of her pottery), and on my end (where I keep my recumbent tricycle...


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May's wall:  (with Bobcat Camera on table just above the wall...


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Bill's wall:



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The Six-Cylinder - 700 miles in 13 hours, 'broken-ankle-express' road-trip...

I flew-out to Santa Fe, New Mexico (in mid-September), to help my sister drive her 'Fancy Car' (Porsche 911 Carrera S) from Santa Fe to Austin; since she had a broken-ankle in a 'boot' (which she is now free of) - anyway - with her ankle her ability to drive more than - say 30-45 minutes is pretty limited...  This was a LONG TRIP - 700 miles in 'about' 13 hours - well - anyway...

just a FEW pictures...

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Our 'Navigation Helper' - there were a LOT of twists-turns-and road-changes. In this part of the USA most roads lead east-west or north-south; we wanted to go South East - so - well - we needed a LOT of help navigating.  With two iPhones (Map appliction) plus the in-car GPS, plus the two of us and Ms. Panda-bear we navigated this trip beyond belief....

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One of the MANY MANY road-cuts where Mr. Bill could study the geology of the New Mexican "High Plains"...

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Mr. Bill doing the driving - 12 hours is a lot in any car - especially six weeks after we did 9,300 miles from Stuart to Vancouver and back!...
"Tour  of Sebring"  (Labour Day Weekend (for the Non-Americans in the viewer-audience, this means the first weekend in September)) cycling event:

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a sunrise picture on one of our morning rides (Monday, I think, but not sure)...

Day 3 ride:   37.1 miles in a bit less than 3 hours - some dirt (washboard) some EXCELLENT scenery, etc. etc. etc
Day 2 ride:   63.5 miles in 4 hours, 52 minutes = appx 13.3 mph (and - yes one (BUT ONLY ONE) flat - and it was a "Slow Leak"... - I rode it about the last 6-7 miles into the first rest-stop then put a new tube in while there - while being verbally abused by both my wife (Ms. May) and my riding partner (Mr. Tom) ...
 - then Mr. Tom and I proceeded to finish the 62-mile ride which was probably a lot more than my body really needed to do after having been sick for 3-4 weeks... but - well - sometimes we learn, sometimes, we don't sometimes we get rained-out (but NO RAIN today) though we'll see about tomorrow (Monday - Labour Day).
Day 1 ride:  33 miles - in  a bit more than 3 1/2 hours - with about an hour and a half changing my 6 flat tires


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Two track-logs-here - Saturday's 31 miles is in red;  Sunday's 63 miles is in green... - Ms. May (on Sunday) went to Avon Park and returned to the hotel in Sebring - so her route would have been the same as mine (green) except she turned around at Avon Park (which is annotated on the above image)...

SOMETIMES (more and more frequently, as of late) my Huggly-Bunch does a better, more succinct job than I, - her link here...

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Here at the 'Kenilworth Lodge' (an exceedingly funky hotel (very (VERY)) old - like probably older than Mr. Bill - (which is pretty old) - anyway - very ancient, but also very interesting and along with the cycling event not too expensive, either...

- ANYWAY - we met this (above picture) fellow in the parking lot.. - and - took this picture.  Note his front paws are 'kind of strange' - we have asked several people, but nothing definitive, yet, about this condition or problem  (we think (via Wikipedia) that he is called a 'Polydactyl cat' but we can not guarantee that this is true... - if you're interested, look up that term on the web and read more about him and his condition?)  - they didn't seem to bother him at all - he was very friendly!

Archived BeachWeb monthly (and other) site(s):   Click here for a list of the archived months
updated:   08:28 a.m. (USA-EDT) on Friday, 28 October, 2011;  by: Mr._Bill on the Apple Macintosh 'Mac G5' - revID:  1k