Scattered Thoughts . . .

I 've been out on my new bike more than a few times over the past couple of weeks since the bike arrived.  Some of these times, I mounted my Sony X3000 action camera on the handlebars.  This is a pretty nice little action camera.   Actually, I captured some underwater video of Kenzie and Lukey in the pool in Dayton earlier this summer that I haven't done anything with yet.  I need to revisit all those photos and video from that trip and share some of that here.   Anyway, back to my recent bike rides this autumn and having cameras with me during the rides... I didn't keep this little action camera running continuously but I did get some decent footage ten to twenty minutes at a time.  My plan was to eventually cut the long videos into four or five second clips of interest and then put together a video of those short clips.  I really didn't spent a whole lot of time on this but I managed to get a video put together this morning. ...

I was feeling relatively well this morning and the weather was very nice so I wandered out on my bike this morning for some exercise and photography.  I quickly took my morning dose of medications, had an English muffin and some iced tea then packed up a backpack with emergency medications and a little bit of photography gear.  Then I grabbed my helmet and backpack and headed out the door to my bike.   A small issue arose with my bike on this ride.  The gears were a little wonky today.  I need to adjust my rear derailleur because, on its own without any input from me, my bike kept changing gears on me when in the range of around gears three to five.  In the big scheme of things this really is a small issue.  It is just a matter of finding the time and energy to fine tune that rear derailleur again.  Actually, I need to spend some time refreshing my memory on how to make this adjustment first which adds some time to the whole task. Unlike my ...

I went on a longer bike ride this morning and it's only the evening but I am already feeling the consequences!   The ride this morning had a lot more hills to climb and, clearly, I was not yet ready for that.  After a week of rain, however, it was nice to get back out on the new bike.  I'm really liking this bicycle after all the upgrades I have added since it arrived. This time, I loaded up my photography backpack with three different cameras for this ride.  Unfortunately, I ran into some problems. The first problem is that the primary location where I wanted to photograph is now mostly obscured by trees that have grown significantly over the past few years.  This wasn't the end of the world but it was disappointing. The next problem is there were people everywhere and I was hoping to capture landscape photos devoid of people.  Oh yeah...  the traffic on this Sunday morning was insane too!  They were all Vermont license plates so I can't ev...

I went on a couple of short bike rides the other day.  The weather was nice and I was feeling fairly well so I figured I better get out on the bike before it is too cold and the bike is stored away until April or May.   I'm still trying to figure out the best way to carry a little bit of photography gear while riding.   The problem is that I want to have easy access to this gear and, preferably, easy access to this gear without having to completely get off my bike.  I'll stop and stand, of course, while straddling the bike but I'd prefer to not have to get completely off the bike, take off a backpack, and dig into the backpack on the ground...  shoot a few photos...  then put everything away again, put the backpack on, and then get on the bike again.  Just typing that wears me out! I've tried a few different options over the past week but I'm not completely satisfied with anything I've tried so far.  Everything seems to be less than ide...

S heila took some much-needed time off yesterday afternoon so we headed up to Burlington for a change of scenery.  I was feeling rather lousy and my health was a bit unstable but everything turned out "okay" due to taking a bunch of extra medications throughout the afternoon.   Unfortunately, although it was dry, the weather was drab, overcast and very gray.  Also noteworthy is that Burlington looked like a run-down, filthy, abandoned ghost town.  There was graffiti everywhere and every building was covered in grime, dirt and chipped paint.  Burlington was on the verge of looking very much like a dying coal town. Traffic was almost non-existent.  Then, while we were walking around, we noticed that we saw very few other human beings.  Stores were empty.  Restaurants were empty.  A little bit afterward, I realized this was likely due to a lack of international tourism.   What was really bothersome is that all the storefronts were...

P arts of downtown Waterbury are under water again.  There are photos of this all over Facebook but I don't want to share other people's photos on my blog so you'll need to find the photos on Facebook.  In addition to extensive property damage to homes that were damaged just last July, there are significant road closures mostly due to the roads being washed out.  Some of the road closures are to keep people out of the areas that are still under water. Below is a map of northern Vermont showing the road closures.  As you can see, there is a big concentration of road closures in Waterbury.   At the moment, the status of our barbeque scheduled for Saturday is unknown.  Liza and Whitney are both trapped with no way to get out of there immediate area.  This may change by later today or tomorrow but, for now, they cannot go anywhere. We had some water in the house at a known roof leak.  Actually, it is a leak around the furnace flue.  Every fe...

The day after our cruise on Lake Champlain, we did some typical tourist sightseeing around Waterbury with Lukey and Kenzie.  It was a quiet weekday morning so we beat the tourist crowd.   We started at Cold Hollow Cider Mill... Tasting the apple cider...   I found it to be a little bitter on this day but the taste does vary from season to season. After tasting the apple cider, we roamed around the store looking for things to purchase.  (We found plenty and went home with plenty.) Making the cider donuts... The kids and Gee had planned on getting some apple cider slushies but the slushie machine was being cleaned so they had no slushies available.  We did, however, get a dozen freshly made apple cider donuts instead of the slushies...  oh...  and quite a few other products that would have been purchased regardless of whether we got slushies or not. This is a view from out behind the cider mill looking toward the Worcester Range (and our house)...