Scattered Thoughts . . .

Kenzie and Lukey spent some time with us this past weekend and, as always, we had a great time with them! For dinner, I prepared Kenzie's favorite meal which is a recipe I obtained from my grandmother almost 40 years ago. When I was in high school and college, I spent a lot of time at my grandparents' house. My sailboat was kept in their backyard because they lived on the water on the south shore of Long Island so I would go there to go sailing but I also visited frequently to help them out and just say hello. Gramps was still working at the time and every now and then I would go to work with him. My grandmother regularly needed help around the house since having serious heart problems a few years earlier so I would spend some time with Gramps on the weekends when he was home from work and I would spend time with my grandmother during the weekdays as I helped out around the house, mowed the lawn, and ran some errands for her. My cousin, William, and I would make sure one

Two of my doctors have been advising me and even pressuring me to get a colonoscopy for quite some time. I attempted this a few years ago but, after discussing my health issues with the doctor who would be doing the procedure, we decided the risk was too high so we didn't even attempt it.  Now, I have a new mast cell specialist and he had referred me to a doctor to give a colonoscopy another shot. I was scheduled for late this afternoon.   In the meantime while waiting for this appointment date to arrive, I had another visit with my mast cell specialist. We briefly discussed how to manage my medications in the week leading up to the colonoscopy and we had a tentative plan in place. To be honest, I wasn't too optimistic about my health holding up through this procedure but I agreed to give it a try. The last thing I want to do is come across as non-compliant because I do need continued treatment. That being said, I also emphatically told Sheila that if this procedure was a pro

This year has been brutal in many ways but, for now, I'm just referring to our climate. For months, we've had our house closed up with the air conditioning running because it has been unbearably hot and humid. We've had many rain days and so few days of clear skies that I could count on one hand the number of times I was able to use one of my telescopes in the past five or six months.  So, we've had our air conditioning running just about daily during this period until the day before yesterday.  Yesterday, the heat and humidity finally broke and I was able to open all the windows and doors in the house! That really felt great and I thought that perhaps we were finally due for some nice autumn weather.  Wrong. The temperature plummeted and this morning we needed to close every window in the house and use the stove to heat up the house. It was frigid! On the positive side, this first cold snap of the year always reminds me that it is time to test the furnace

I have a down day for my health today... and I know tomorrow will be the same... so, I'm here at my desk trying to find some simple things to keep my mind occupied with something other than my health.   There has been a lot of talk in a few of my astronomy groups about trying to capture a decent photo of the Milky Way and it seems that a lot of beginners have big problems with this. Fortunately, it really is not as difficult as people make it out to be.  Most of these beginners have brand new dSLR's which are more than capable of capturing the Milky Way yet they are having difficulty capturing a decent image so I figured I should write something with some basic info about how to accomplish this type of photography. Any dSLR, technically speaking, is capable of capturing a pretty good image of the night sky so the biggest obstacle is learning how to use your dSLR. Today's mirrorless cameras are just as adept at this type of photography and some mirrorless cameras

I've moved on to the second phase (and unplanned phase) of our garden window project by working on refinishing the window sashes for this window.  Our homebuilt garden window has a couple of removable window sashes that we can insert into the frame for colder weather. In the warmer months, I will leave the sashes out (as seen in the photo to the right) so the view is wide open with no obstructions. These sashes were in pretty lousy shape. It seemed silly to design and build this nice new garden window and then just install the same old worn-out sashes when the weather cools down and during the longer part of the year when we need extra insulation. I've been experiencing this throughout our renovations... you know... when you make a clean spot, everything else that didn't look so badly before you made a clean spot suddenly appears horrendous... I needed to do something about these window sashes.  I also needed to replace the window sill... something else I hadn'

This week, I've been working on building a garden window that I designed. There were a few setbacks but the window is now closed in and in a finished state, finally! We had some lousy weather... first far too hot and humid which is particularly catastrophic for my health and that did affect my health. The sun and heat actually caused what appeared to be hives (according to Sheila) but it didn't feel like hives... regardless, my skin did not look pleasant. One day this week was so humid that I couldn't breath so I went back indoors and laid in the air conditioned house for the remainder of the day. Then we had intermittent rain causing some more delays.  Near the end of the project, I needed to use my drill press. I don't use this benchtop tool often so I had to dig it out of the shed and dust it off. Well, I needed to do more than just dust it off... it was seized up completely.   Clamping down the straight edge for cutting glass. I opened the lid to the dr

As has been the norm here for the past few months, it is dark and dreary outside this morning. I'd like to get back to working on our garden window but I'm not going to pull all my tools outside when it appears as though it will rain at any moment.   On the positive side, it is far cooler out there today! The humidity seems to be at far more tolerable levels too!   I should be able to get out there to do some work in another hour or two... I'm looking forward to making more progress on this window project.