Well, the Obstacles and the Uncertainties (of not knowing the future) continue!!!
On Monday, 29th, we woke-up to NO WATER...
- well - that doesn't sound too bad, (because most people have "City Water") and one would just telephone the city-water-supply people and all would be good, again.
Nope, sorry we can't do that - we have two wells - Ms. May calls 'the hubby' and the hubby (who, of course, still has a broken toe) goes into 'debug-mode'
yeah - the pump-motor had a dead-short (electrical problem, UGH). Well, thankfully, one of my buddies runs a pump-shop, I take it all apart, take it to him, and one of the capacitors is 'toast' - - $40 - not bad,
but WHY was the capacitor bad (in this 10 year old pump) - the capacitor had 'bit the dust' because the pressure-tank wouldn't hold air, so I try to pump-it-up and - well that wasn't going to work with the bicycle-pump (at least in this century); so I go to Harbor Freight and buy a portable pressure tank, fill-it-up with my (Ingersol-Rand) air-compressor (3 times) and then put that all in the pressure tank (which has a rubber 'bladder' in it) and then I get, "NOTHING" (well - it's a WELL-PUMP - it has to be PRIMED before it sucks water out of the ground... - SO _ I snake-together about 7 hoses (about 250 feet worth) and use the "OTHER PUMP" to give me SOME SOME SOME SOME pressure in the line and to prime the pump -
BUT - I still notice a 'slow-leak' in the pressure-tank - UGH UGH - so I have a new pressure-tank on order for delivery tomorrow or Wednesday... ($360 plus tax, delivery, installation (the is something I can NOT do with a broken-toe (even without the broken-toe I'd need help!....
SO, in the 'interim' I finally got a new tire for the minivan (yes - it had showed-up 'lame' on Sunday morning (left-rear-tire-flat (HUGE bolt through it! - I tried to patch this thing - put THREE plugs in it and it STILL LEAKED! - UGH ) - and I'll take the mini-van in for service tomorrow morning
AND - today Mr. Mike finished the newly re-furbished 'privacy-fence' (< link to picture!) on the east side of the house. - it looks VERY NICE! - and we have a LOT of left-over (OLD) panels that I'll have to do something with.
AND - now we have 3 new 'fireboxes' for Ms. May's kiln, I'm hoping to cast-up another one tomorrow (Tuesday) after I get the minivan serviced.
AND - well - that's enough for now!
On Sunday, 28 April, 2013 we faced - like a lot of the things we face in life:
the Obstacles and the Uncertainties of (a tricycle-trip) like the same sorts of things in life!
notice the little tiny 'squigglies' in the purple line that comes from the upper-left (NW)
and goes to the lower-right (SE)... - these 'squigglies' are JUST SOME of the 'Obstacles'
someone put in our cycle-path!
We had planned, we had plotted, we has sussed-out on Google Earth, we had measured mileages, we had HOPED, we had done our research, we had prepared, and - well - as in many other of life areas, we FAILED, MISERABLY, at the 'execution' of this task...
We had WANTED to tricycle through the 'NEW' A1A bypass through the Seabranch State Park... (a 20 minute trip, normally)
Mr. Bill had actually ridden this (approximately) 2 mile, new, concrete cycle-path on Thursday, 25th April, and it was WUNNERFUL!...
However, when we went out this morning - and left the house at 06:20 a.m. (after having gone to bed EARLY the night before) we found a LOT of THIS:
what this IS - is a "MAJOR OBSTACLE" to tricycle fun & enjoyment... - Notice, also, the 'bears' riding behing Ms. May, and behind HER and the BEARS you see yet another obstacle, one we have just passed?!
and if you think that this is, "O.K., we can walk or cycle or push or pull around that", then that's fine... BUT - there were more than 10 of these things (and the imagination that went into creating them), one of them was an old metal gate erected across the cycle-path...
AND - there's a 'background' story to this 'A1A bypass through Seabranch State Park. The Background is this... - About 3 or 4 years ago I was 'volunteered' for membership (as a cyclist) to the 'BPAC (Bicycle and Pedestrian Access Committee (which is an 'advisory group' (with meetings 'about' once a month))) for the "Municipal Planning Organization" of Martin County. Well this 'bypass through the state park' was one of the first projects I worked on when I first got on the "BPAC". It had been delayed from starting for almost a year, with the 'political excuse' (this is my terminology) that there were some gopher tortise(s) (a protected species) in the way of the cycle-path and that someone had to be hired to not only STUDY the tortoises, but then to MOVE them, and of course more delay in making sure that the tortoises didn't come back. SO after the gopher-tortoise delay - the whole thing rather than taking a year or so has been nearly three years in the making and they are probably, now, at least a month from completion, but the actual construction is only about 3-4 months and they are almost finished.
But, hey, let's give these guys & gals credit:
1.) there are some VERY VERY SMART people in the county government that know where to go to get this and that money for this and that project (or sub-project).
2.) the bulk of the money has come from OUTSIDE our county.
3.) all I've had to do is sit-back and offer my support, and it hasn't cost me, personally, anything but my time devoted to the BPAC.
I feel that is the bottom-line here, that the SMART PEOPLE in County Government have heard our voice and are both listening and attempting to support us...
I continue to be in awe of those who work in county government and their commitment to the cycling community and their ability to continue to keep on supporting us and doing it over the LONG HAUL. These people have both the tenacity and the knowledge to get these sorts of projects done and my hat is certainly off to them. I must admit, though, after 3 weeks in Austria that the Europeans really REALLY know how to support cycling, but we here in America are catching-up!
I could NOT SEE any of these 'obstacles' (Some might call these "Tank Traps" if they'd been in the military) from either end of the cycle-path, where I'd driven in the car not 12 hours before we attempted to ride this. - UGH UGH UGH - so - a 10-20 minute cycle-trek turned into 45 minutes of pulling, pushing and shoving the tricycles through all these 'obstacles'...
But - we managed to complete our ride (22 miles overall) and we managed to have a terrific breakfast (well, brunch, actually, I guess) at the "Old Dixie Cafe" (north branch), after finding another breakfasting place closed on Sundays...,
and Ms. May gave me a 'Medal' (spelling alternative: Madel) for my 'overcoming serious obstacles' - what this means, of course is that I hefted her tricycle around a considerable number of these 'obstacles'...
For the late-March / early-mid April trip to Austria, this link has more 'images', but not much text: http://vikingasia.blogspot.com
some pictures:
This is a detail of the floor in a palace in Salzburg
took a LONG TIME to climb-up this hill, but the food at the top was pretty good!
A view of the town of Salzburg ("salt" burg); looking to the south-east
Some snowboard freak - amazing the people the let-in to the snow-areas!
a picture of Ms. May and our friend
Lily in Vienna
this
is a 'track-log' from a snowboarding outing at Mutters (south of
the city-center)
Color-Matching
- the waitress really understands this concept...
the
Vienna (Austrians call it 'Wien') rental bicycle
More text and analysis and news & views will be presented herein, now that we are 'home-again' (however, - the airlines seem to take great glee in losing my snowboard bag, because it wasn't here, when we got here, and they lost it going over to Innsbruck, on the 29th of March, also... - BUT _ I TRUST THEM (why I don't know) - that they will deliver it in a day or two... (update - it WAS DELIVERED less than 24 hours after we got home!)
Something to ponder:
Both Ms. May and I have been (at time(s) in the past) part of the 'Hang-Gliding' scene. We're both licensed, and we've driven (retrievals) for several different people / competitors at several US-National and World-level competitions.
However, we'd never been to Austria. What - prey-tell - is the connection you ask?
Well here's the deal - during our roughly 17 day visit we must have seen two dozen para-gliders and a few sail-planes.
We realized that one of the world's record holders of great renown is from Austria. We now fully understand WHY he's a world record holder. It's because of the geology - geography - topography of this nation, who's bulk is in river-valleys that yield, basically - literally hundreds of square-miles of landing-zones (farm-fields) for virtually ANY sort of un-powered flight (paragliding, hang-gliding, sailplanes).
He holds world records in all three.
He's held these records (at least some of them) for over a decade, and with the landing-zones next to some 5,000 foot to 11,000 foot peaks (where the "LIFT" happens) there's just no other place that I know of, on THIS earth, that has this sort of geography / geology / topography, and it's that that yields the 'MOST perfect' place to be a para-glider / hang-glider / sailplane pilot... so - if you were to aspire to hold world-record(s) in any of these disciplines - then you should move to Austria!
Second thing to ponder:
Now that I've snowboarded in Innsbruck, Austria (and (being from Florida) I'm no whiz in the snowboard scene) I recognize that this is a WONDERFUL place to come to play-in-the-snow. We only know one 'winter' sport and it's snowboarding, and we certainly enjoy it when we can. Austria (specifically Innsbruck) makes it VERY VERY EASY. I spent time at three of the well over 100 different snow-resorts. I used Mutterer, Axamer-Lizum, and Nordketten. I also was told that "Stubai Glacier" is a wonderful place to ski-snowboard, but I never got there... - Maybe next time...
(Please note that there seems to be some disagreement about the "Nordkette / Nordketten" name... (sometimes the spelling is without the 'n' on the end, sometimes not - sometimes the 'n' signifies the tram, the cable-car, the ski-area, sometimes - well - you get the picture, huh? OH _ and for the mountain biking folks, Nordketten has an awesome downhill for you!
Two of the three ski-areas were an easy commute from the Innsbruck (central) train-station, with FREE bus-rides to the snow-areas. Nordketten is north of the town and though you can bus-up part way, MOST people will ride a tram and cable-car to that snow area.
All three were reasonably priced, and when we rented boots and other gear at Mutters and Axamer Izum, the rentals were quite reasonable, price-wise and the gear was quite good / current-year gear.
All three of these resorts used the "RFID / "Skidata" " system for lift-tickets, which makes life much easier for the customer / skiier, as well as providing data to the ski-resort area that was impossible to have with previous system(s). I'm now pursuing a book and some experiments within the RFID world.
The "_WordPress_Pages_" look-alike(s) :
click on one of these: About_Bill Contact_Bill Gallery Document_Storage Miscellaneous
More on this section, also, when I find some time (I seem to have lost some time, have you found it?) - I have attempted to become a 'WordPress' expert, but I have (like my intro into many other areas) I have FAILED. - I FAIL to 'see the point' of WordPress - it seems to have TERRIFIC LINKS into / out-of the database, BUT IF YOU DO NOT NEED A Database, WHY use WordPress? - anyway - maybe I'll write more when I understand more and/or when I find a reason to use a database?