Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Success, the end

Count this as another successful completion of national blog every day for a month month.

*pauses for appreciative applause to die down*

A special thanks to all who helped out, notably Jim Mora, Allen Iverson, Goldy, Jimmy Fallon and my little family.

I did get in a bicycle ride today and it felt very much like a ride that may be the last one for this year. As noted earlier, this is the second time in the last three years that I have ridden on November 30 but any further rides will be rides crossing over into historic territory. There is a reason I don't ride in December and that reason could be felt out there again today. It was cold.

It does look like it was an OK day to be a wolf.I ride past that area of the Como zoo with great frequency but during most of the year there are far too many people in the park, discouraging me from checking the nearby wolf woods. The wolves have some serious fence, or perhaps I should say fences, around their abode.

It was pretty grey out there in addition to being cold. I did find something of interest to photograph though. Apparently there has been some sort of giant factory over run down at the Ford plant, there are what seems like two or three hundred of these at the Fairgrounds.I know the Ford plant is scheduled to close down soon but for the life of me I cannot figure out why they suddenly had to produce that many white Rangers.This isn't the original ending to the movie but it is one of the edits that I think improves the final product. NaBloPoMo, this is the end.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

160

All that angst for no good reason, as it finally turns out. The goal was to get in 160 rides at an average of 25 miles per ride, 4,000 miles for the year. Today I took my 160th ride, the average is above 25 miles per ride, bingo. It turns out it was a done deal the whole time, nothing to it, pfft.

*pause*

OK, the fact that I am now riding very near to the end of the 8th month of a 7 month season may have something to do with it. As I was riding today it occurred to me that a definite upside of a bonus 8th month of riding is that next season is only 4 months away instead of the more usually expected 5. Yup, that's the sort of stuff I think about while riding.

The sun was out today and it was a couple of degrees warmer than yesterday. The sun doesn't really provide much warmth at its current angle in the sky but riding in the sunshine just feels warmer than riding under heavy overcast. I started closer to my usual starting time which allowed me to finish before the local school patrol was out and about. So it was good, it was warm enough, it was light enough, I enjoyed it, I had a very nice ride.

Gear adaptations also help, I went with the windstopper booties over my shoes (toes were getting cold yesterday) and the full winter mittens, the heavier weight with the wool mitten liners as opposed to the ones with the fleece glove liners. Wool mittens are way warmer than fleece gloves.

I felt so good that I set off for a late season visit to the northern lakes. My only concession to November was that I took the absolute most direct route. I did this in case it was too cold and I had to beat it for home. Usually I ride a route north which takes me along the way to places I like to ride. The route is a couple of miles longer each way than the absolute most direct as a result.

A direct result of the direct route is that I found myself at a spot near Sucker Lake that I don't get to very often.That's what happens when I ride directly east on Highway 96 instead of back through the neighborhoods behind Snail Lake School. I entered the Sucker Lake portion of the park on the bike path off Highway 96 instead of along the vehicle driveway off Rice Street. Different spot, different perspective.

Does a picnic table count as a bench?

I think the vehicle driveway may have been closed as I did not see a single car in the park on a day when it was sunny enough that I expected to see at least a few cars.

Further down in the park I came across evidence that it is November. The lake is still clear but the water in the slough across the road has a skim of ice.You have to be out there late in the year to find this, Vadnais is closed to cars.Over there on the left, though, you can see that the pedestrian gate is open. I had already ridden some on the bike path up at the north end of Sucker Lake so I was feeling enough like a pedestrian that I went ahead and rode through the gate and down to the lake.

I was hoping to see the big white birds but was disappointed again. I got a couple of photos of an absolute giant raft of ducks, mostly mallards but decided after getting home that they were not particularly distinguished. They didn't make the edit.

I was nearing home when I came upon a drastic example of the brush whacking that has been going on under the power lines around here. There is a spot where all summer I rode past where a willow tree had grown out over the road and dangled the very end of a branch at just helmet top level at the edge of the road. I had fallen into the habit not of avoiding the branch but of seeking it out to give it a little head butt. I didn't even particularly realize that I was doing this until today I discovered that I won't be doing that particular maneuver again any time soon.I was about to put the camera away when I glanced to the right.I got the full standard distance and was home before the curtain fell.

And a shout out to tech support everywhere. When I had a job the actual tech support conferred upon me the honorary title of "power user" indicating that I had more of a clue then the average user about how all of this data processing machinery works. As a retired person spending time in the same building (our house) as a still actively employed non-power user I find that I have been converted to, for the purposes of this building, tech support. Today I showed her how to get her bookmarks back after they had mysteriously completely disappeared leaving her unable to access without difficulty the sites she uses to go about her still active employment. If you don't know how you don't know how but those of us (power users and above) who know how know that you right click the "bar" area at the top of the screen and toggle on or off any of the bars that are active in your browser. Somehow or other her menu bar, which includes the bookmarks, had been toggled off. Such is the life of tech support. She knows how to do this fix herself now. At least I don't have to show her how to turn the monitor on.

True tech support and probably even most power users will recognize what our browser of choice is from the terminology used in the above discussion.

Monday, November 28, 2011

Recreation

I love my bicycle and I ride because I enjoy it.

But today . . . ewww, maybe the enjoyment thing was not so much.

The weather channels kept saying upper 30s and sunny with light winds so I was pretty optimistic. At noon it still wasn't warm enough so I delayed until much later in the afternoon than I usually like to get started.

Here's the deal with this late in November, if you delay until late enough in the day for it to be warm enough to ride comfortably you are going to run into a problem with daylight. That's the theoretical statement, the practical is if you don't start until 2pm you are going to find yourself out there at 4pm with the sun rapidly disappearing.

I am at core a summer time rider, therefore my bicycle has no reflectors and no lights. Reflectors are required by Minnesota Statute but if I am never going to ride in low light conditions reflectors are only extra weight. Today I endured the inevitable consequence of my reflectorless self when I had to cut the ride short from the standard distance because it seemed no longer prudent to be out there without reflectors, the light was going away.

It was always too cold. I have the gear, I was not uncomfortable or endangered or anything like that. But it was too cold for pleasant recreational riding.

I have made several comments about the really interesting light that we only get in the fall. Today I have discovered that we are moving out of the rich interesting light of fall into the thin, anemic light of winter. I took a picture of the sky.You might think that was at the end of the ride but actually that's very early, probably about 2:25, just a couple of minutes before I paused at the Cattle Barn.Every bicycle ride accomplishes something. Today I got a few more miles and I expected that I was going to have a latest ride of the year in the last several years accomplishment to report. Instead once I actually checked the log I discovered that as recently as two years ago (in 2009) I had a ride on November 30. No rides in December since 2004 though. I do suspect that I have reclaimed the mantle of latest ride of the year by a bicyclist living in my neighborhood, however. I suppose that's something even if today was clearly too cold for recreational bicycling.

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Crazy barley

I concur that the translation offered by the French guide when she first visited Fort Folle Avoine was "barley". My google translate page translates avoine from French to English as oats and translates wild oats from English to French as folle avoine. I think oats is a reasonable conclusion to reach.

However

It is my personal belief that "barley" makes a better story. I think it might be quite reasonable to adopt a corollary to the family rule and decide that there is no need to ruin a good story for the sake of google translation.Just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Nice bench, no?

Saturday, November 26, 2011

*sigh* Leftovers

Thanksgiving is a family holiday. In our family this means that each year the big meal is hosted by a different family member. Which is good.

But which means that more often than not we arrive home on Thanksgiving evening to discover that our house does not have those wonderful lingering aromas that only cooking the traditional feast produces.

It is a melancholy moment but a moment that adults have spent their life times teaching themselves to deal with. All adults know how to face this moment.

Well, maybe not all.

Here's what we do.Some people might call it extreme, we call it leftovers.You go ahead and do it your way, we are going to go ahead and continue to do it our way.

In pretty important football news, yesterday in Nantes FC Nantes stuffed AS Monaco 3-0. There is a log jam at the top of the Ligue 2 table but FC Nantes remains in the mix, currently outside the promotion zone but still easily within range. It is plenty OK for a Nantes fan to retain some optimism.

Meanwhile the downside of 0-3 is the continuation of a tale of woe in the Principality. The travails for Monaco this season are perhaps even more severe than the ongoing ignominy of Nantes in Ligue 2. Monaco last year was in Ligue 1 with a long history of success. Monaco has seven Ligue 1 championship banners and has won le Coupe de France five times. The relegation to Ligue 2 had to hurt in view of the fact that, like FC Nantes, Monaco was an absolute fixture in the top league.

In its first year in Ligue 2, Nantes at least contended, giving Nantes fans the illusion that the team was soon to return to the top rank. The team did in fact succeed in winning immediate promotion back to the top rank. The immediate second relegation is another matter and continues to be the itch that the team seems unable to scratch.

For Monaco, this first season outside Ligue 1 looks dire, dire indeed. With this most recent result, AS Monaco is absolute dead last in Ligue 2, 11 points from 15 games. In France only the top two leagues are fully professional. The third league usually has a professional team or two but also has teams that charitably would be referred to as semi-professional. The beautiful people in Monte Carlo fact the very real possibility of relegation of their team from the ranks of professional football and as early as next year could be seeing only amateur football.

Friday, November 25, 2011

Family holiday

My little family in a little rocking chair.We still have that little rocking chair. STC used it to access the window ledge in the TV room.

I know it is a long holiday weekend but I have always wondered if it is still a holiday on Saturday or if the holiday part of the weekend is over. I mean, it's just Saturday, right?

Thursday, November 24, 2011

Turkey bowl

There was an excellent turn out for the turkey bowl this year.And why wouldn't there be with temperatures heading for the 50s again today?

The street looks like it rained a bit over night. That coulda, woulda, shoulda been snow.

Wasn't.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Bicycling weather returns

And I saw quite a few people out doing it, including one of my neighbors. I may still get another ride in, I suppose, but today I was content to walk.

It was OOTNDITHO the day before Thanksgiving. The high temperature was above 50, the sun was out the sky was blue. Spectacular.I am just a tiny bit worried that I don't even have the last bicycle ride of the year by a retired guy living on my block. However, as I think I said earlier, I am satisfied with the season I have had even if I don't get another mile.

On the other hand, looking at the long range forecast there emerges just a slight possibility that I may this year, for the first time since 2004, get some December miles.

Here is the flower yard in late fall and after it has been visited by the same bushwacking guys who visited my yard last week.Those guys have done some serious whacking on that oak tree. They are very, very serious about removing any vegetation with the potential to interfere with the electricity.

Most of us think this is the right thing to do given our dependence on electricity. However, given how much we depend on the cable, not only for cable TV, but also for the inter tubes and for lots of people, for phone service (including 911), I find it just a trifle troubling that Comcast isn't out here engaged in a similar vegetation removal for the lower set of lines, the cable.

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Some Girls

These two didn't stay around long and they wouldn't pose. But they did sit in the tree for a few minutes, rare and unusual visitors to our corner of the suburbs.I was doing some surfing this morning, looking at Jimmy Fallon as Justin Bieber, that sort of really important cultural reference maintenance, when I came across the news of a re-issue of Some Girls by the Rolling Stones.

Guest appearance by Ludacris.

Anyway, I was especially amused by the blog bit about the Rolling Stones re-issue stating that Some Girls had one of the most celebrated and controversial covers of all time.

The State of Minnesota paid a veteran's bonus in about 1973 to all who had served in the armed forces during the Vietnam war. The bonus was paid on a sliding scale based on number of months having served during a specified window of eligibility with a special additional $300 for those who could by use of their official military records demonstrate actual service not just in the military but in the Republic of Vietnam. I qualified for the maximum amount of the bonus, $600. This was completely found money, a true bonus. I decided to spend at least part of it on something a bit frivolous.

I already owned many or most of the Rolling Stones albums. A special note here to young people who might accidentally tune in: that's what we back in the pre-modern era used to call compilations of new materials made available for sale by the popular groups of the day, the compilations were on a substance known as "vinyl" which required a "stereo" with a "turntable" to allow listening to the "album".

Back to the story, at the moment in time when I received the bonus, I was spending a huge amount of time listening to the 1972 release "Exile on Main Street". I decided that my frivolous purchase would be to complete my collection of Rolling Stones albums. As soon as I cashed the bonus check I went to the neighborhood "record store" (record was another term used pretty much interchangeably with album) and completed the collection. I maintained the complete set for several years thereafter. For people who actually know, I think about through "Steel Wheels" (I should check actually, I think I may have "Voodoo Lounge" and maybe even "Bridges to Babylon" but absolutely certainly not "A Bigger Bang") before finally deciding that if Mick and Keef didn't care about the music anymore there surely was no reason for me to keep buying it.

So along the way I purchased "Some Girls" within days, perhaps hours, of its official release.

Therefore I own one of the aforementioned celebrated and controversial covers.I went on eBay and see that at least one entrepreneur has placed his "near mint" copy up for auction with a starting price of $500.

I doubt $500 but this is the most fun I have had owning a "collectible" since the bottom dropped out of the market for the Jose Canseco rookie card that I also own.

Monday, November 21, 2011

Last of the stories yet untold

This is the Hôtel de Beauvais at 82 rue François Miron. Rue François Miron was for several hundred years part of a grand entry into Paris leading directly to the palace of the Louvre. Again much of this story is taken from Walks Through Lost Paris by Leonard Pitts.

The hôtel was built betweeen 1655 and 1660 on a commission from Pierre Beauvais and his wife, Catherine. Madame de Beauvais was first chambermaid to Louis XIV's mother, Anne of Austria. The two women had a most intimate connection. As chief chambermaid Beauvais administered the queen mother's colonics. She also deflowered the queen's 16 year old son, the boy who had become king at the age of 4. The queen mother was overjoyed. Her husband, Louis XIII, apparently suffered from sexual dysfunction, it took the couple 22 years to conceive, and Anne had been apprehensive for her son.

At that time it was the fashion at court to imitate the king and so the sexual favors of Catherine de Beauvais became much in demand.

On August 26, 1660, Louis XIV and his wife Marie Theresé made a triumphal entry into Paris passing along Rue François Miron. Louis rode a chestnut mare covered in a brocade of silver and precious stones (it is useful to remember that at that time Louis was quite possibly the richest man in the world), Marie Theresé rode in a carriage covered in gold and silver and pulled by six pearl grey horses.

On their route, the royal procession stopped in front of the Hôtel de Beauvais to salute the Queen Mother standing on a richly decorated balcony, the same balcony in this picture.Among those standing with the Queen Mother on the balcony was Louis's aunt, Henrietta Maria, widow of England's King Charles I, who had been beheaded only months earlier by Oliver Cromwell during the English revolution.

By the end of her life Madame de Beauvais had been reduced to a pauper and lived destitute at the hôtel as a simple renter.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Nice day for a walk

I watched most of the really important football today. Actually I watched all of it except for the time when it had put me to sleep and I was napping.

For actually important football which interests me, FC Nantes has entered the competition for le Coupe de France with a 1-3 road victory over something called US Bouscataise. This was a game in the 7th round of the tournament, the round in which the Ligue 2 teams enter. I think there is at least one more round before some of the Ligue 1 teams appear.

After watching the local important football on the telly I went ahead and spent an hour outside. The temperature was in the 20s, the sun was bright and the sky was blue, a nice day for a winter walk.

Walking fitness was good.

Long range forecasts indicate that bicycling still has a chance to make a couple more appearances but even an eternal optimist such as myself has to admit that there needs to be a major improvement in pavement conditions from what I observed out there today before I myself will be venturing out on skinny high pressure tires.

One website says 50s for Thanksgiving Day.

Meanwhile in domestic news our major shared weekend activity was the hockey. We love the hockey. Those of you living within easy driving distance who are not attending the games are missing out on a cheap ($1 admission for many games) but highly entertaining form of hockey. Shame on you if you call yourself a hockey fan and haven't seen this team play.

Earlier in the season our new sophomore scoring sensation notched a pure hat trick against a conference foe. A pure hat trick is one of the rarest of scoring feats, three straight goals scored all by the same player. This game was early in the season but even so it was a bit surprising that not a single hat was thrown onto the ice in the traditional fan display of appreciation for three goals in a single game. It was such an odd omission that in her post game YouTube interview even the player herself said she was a little disappointed about the lack of hats.

We have been season ticket holders for a while but we haven't seen lots and lots of hat tricks. We have never actually thrown hats onto the ice but I was taken by the disappointment of the player that no hats were thrown. I agreed with her that it was disappointing.

So in Friday night's game she scored FOUR goals. On the third goal a bunch of hats got thrown onto the ice. Again we were not participants.

We arrived early for Saturday's game and had a chance to chat with several other of the regular attendees. There are two distinct groups of every game attendees, one of which is the parents of the players. The second group is people who love hockey. It is a decently sized group but small enough that we all know who all of the rest of us are. We see each other at every game.

We chatted with the couple the male half of whom was, from my perspective across the ice, the first person to actually throw his hat onto the ice in appreciation of the third goal. The female half said she had decided to bring a hat to the game from now on even though she wasn't wearing one. She had it in a bag and just wanted to have something to throw onto the ice if another hat trick occurred.

TOPW attends hockey games with me and I discussed this and considered that in the future perhaps we should follow that lead. She said she had several caps that she doesn't really wear anymore, as do I, and we should be prepared.

The new scoring sensation got a goal in the first period and when she got another with 1:41 remaining in the second we decided we had to act. We could not afford to be unprepared any longer. We went to the merchandise counter in the corner of the arena, checked over the available stuff and purchased two of the cheapest hats available.Right after that but before play resumed I was standing watching the Zamboni when the hat chucking couple passed by. I reached into my pocket and showed them my hat.

They laughed and thumbed up.

Just 1:48 into the third she struck again, HAT TRICK! Out of the pockets and onto the ice went our very, very recent purchases.

The on ice officials gather up the hats and deliver them to the penalty box where the off ice officials turn the refuse over to arena personnel. TOPWLH had learned from the other couple that you can just approach the people in the tunnel and they will give you your hats back. She did so and they did so.

One of the other regular attendees who sits behind us noted that we hadn't even owned the hats long enough to remove the tags. So there they are, our Amanda Kessel Hat Trick hats.

We are not worthy.

Saturday, November 19, 2011

And so it begins

"Weatherguide Facts" in the morning newspaper reports that today is the average date for the start of permanent snow cover in the Twin Cities."Weatherguide Facts" does not define what it means by "permanent".

Friday, November 18, 2011

Bonus miles

The snow isn't forecast to arrive until tonight or perhaps even tomorrow. The sun was out, temperatures were back to the November norm for this year above average, the winds were pretty much calmed. I checked the radar and the magenta stuff was all still off to the north and west so I went ahead and rode my bicycle.

The sun lasted until, oh, about the end of the driveway. The forbiddingly grey northwestern quadrant of the sky kept sagging in my direction and the blue of the southwest kept retreating. Even more than the last time, this ride felt like the last one.

I wanted to visit one group of old friends at least once more before they are moved outside of the distance that I can comfortably travel without my car. Here is a LOOK at one of the cows.Here's a pretty good look at what the sky had to offer.41 at the Cattle Barn at 1:09pm. Middle of the day. 41. November.

As I neared home I spotted this at about that distance from my front tire.I was at speed so I had to circle back and do a little searching to confirm the fleeting look I had the first time by. The memory is very fresh and raw in my mind of the flat tire fiasco day from earlier this month. I just wanted to be sure I had seen what I thought I had seen. Then I wanted to shudder and think ever so briefly about how close I had just come to doing it all over again.

I did what any responsible bicyclist would do, I bent over and picked up the nail and disposed of it properly.

4,110 miles for the year as of today, 102.75% of the annual goal. Anyone exceeding the goal by more than 2.5% is entitled to bonus miles.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Probably I should have ridden but I didn't

I have a glass of water out on the front step hoping that it will freeze in time for me to get a photo to illustrate today's blog. I don't know about official measurements but the thermometers at my house never reached 32F today. I invoked the water would freeze in my water bottle rule, did not ride, and am now hoping for that plastic glass out on the step to bail me out for blogging material.

I can ride when it is cold, here is part of the report originally published on November 17, 2007. That was a Saturday and I still had a job.

"With 8-12 mph winds from the NNE I headed off towards the northeast, towards Lake Vadnais. Once again I discovered that the park is still open but today for the first time ever I was the only person there. Two or three cars drove through during the time I was off the bike at the picnic area but I was the only human being actually out in the cold. I have been to Vadnais many, many times. Today is the first time I was there alone.

I was the only person there and here is what everyone else missed:

There were some big white birds swimming in the middle of the lake so I tried to get a picture of them.I was having a little difficulty making a positive identification. I thought I knew what they were but I just was not sure. I hoped that they would swim a little closer so I could get a better picture and eventually they did. Even then I wasn't sure, if they were what I thought they were they are a species only very rarely seen by me in the wild. I just wasn't positive but I came home and Googled the species that I suspected and there just is not any doubt.

Swans. Swans don't come to town very often.Eventually I gave up hope of anyone else coming along to share the experience and started on home. It was a little warmer with the wind behind but the sun made only occasional brief appearances and it never got very warm. The Rice Street A&W has a sign saying closed for the season and a thermometer across the street saying 39."

That's all I am going to have for today unless and until that water on the front step comes through.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Brrrr

I got in a nice walk but I was a little bit chilly every step of the way. If it is too cold walking at about 3 mph then the chill at 14-16 would be excessive. Bicycling did not occur.

But I do have a couple of untold stories, here is one.

This is the Hôtel de Sens, built between 1498 and 1519, and one of the last two remaining medieval buildings in Paris.The rest of the story is liberally paraphrased from the most excellent Walks Through Lost Paris by Leonard Pitt. I found the book to be an immensely informative resource for preparation and to also be a quite useful guide book while actually taking the walks.

The Hôtel was built for the Archbishop of Sens for his frequent visits to Paris when Paris was only a diocese subordinate to the archdiocese of Sens. In 1605, after a long exile from Paris, Marguerite de Valois (Queen Margot), the daughter of Henri II, gained permission to live in the hôtel. The hôtel is located on Rue du Figuier which derives its name from a great fig tree that stood before the entrance to the hôtel. Even though she did not live there for long, Margot found that the tree encumbered the comings and goings of her carriages so she had it cut down.

The Queen had a weakness for young lovers and in May of 1606, at which point Margot was age 52, the hôtel was the scene of a most dramatic incident. One morning as Margot entered the gate accompanied by her 20 year old lover, Julian Date, her former lover, the 18 year old Count de Vermond, stepped forward and shot his rival in the head. Vermond fled but was apprehended in Rue Saint-Denis. Two days later, Margot, dressed in mourning clothes, sat in a window of the hôtel and watched Vermond mount a scaffold constructed at the building entrance, presumably where the fig tree used to be, and the very spot where the crime took place. Vermond was given an opportunity to make an "honorable amend" to the Queen but refused. In a rage, Margot cried from her window, "Kill him, kill him!" And the blade fell. In grief, Margot moved from the hôtel to a big new house on the Left Bank.

Just to the right of the turret on the left side of the building and above the two windows a cannon ball is lodged in the stone, a leftover from the insurrection of 1830.

By the way I spent some time today learning how to and then configuring my keyboard so I can type all of those French letter accents with my regular English QWERTY keyboard. Take that you old dog new tricks naysayers.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Last ride?

Maybe.

Today I went over 300 miles for the month of November. That is an excellent first 15 days of any month but a particularly excellent first 15 days for November. There are several indications, however, that any more rides this month and this year may be hard to come by. Thursday and Friday seem slightly possible but most other of the next several days seem doubtful.

The morning newspaper reports that the average high temperature for the day has now reached 40. The high temperature forecasts for the near future are, for the most part, below average. It doesn't take much below 40 before my absolute hard and fast end of the season rule is invoked: I will not ride if the water will freeze in my water bottles while I am on the bicycle.

And after all it is the middle of November, next week is Thanksgiving, I remember lots and lots of Thanksgivings which included substantial snow sometime during the Thanksgiving four day weekend.

Here is the final act of the brush wacking episode behind our house. Actual heavy equipment showed up to remove the two giant brush piles.Surprisingly, that is a one man crew operating the truck and even more surprisingly, he did a really thorough and complete clean up of the smallish sticks and wood fragments that inevitably accumulate when you have that much brush in your front yard. TOPWLH even went to the front door to give him a shout out and a thumbs up.

I rode today. I headed out into a wind that was too strong to begin with and that kept getting stronger as I rode. There was some additional information about the hit and run on the West River Road in today's newspaper. The very strong wind was again from the west, a west wind indicates a ride towards Minneapolis, I set out to visit the crime scene again to see if I could improve my understanding of what happened over there.

Even though I eventually rode some distance on the River Road I learned nothing new except that heading south into Minneapolis was much, much easier than trying to continue on directly into the strengthening wind.

So south it was. I ducked off the River Road as it approaches Lake Street and ended up traversing south Minneapolis on 46th Avenue. I found 46th Avenue to be quite pleasant for riding with the possible complaint that the pavement is not in the best condition. I found a still nearly fully leafed out orange maple tree along the way.The nice thing about riding 46th Avenue is that eventually you come to the intersection of 46th and 46th. Some, including current and former Minneapolis residents, may know that 46th and 46th is approximately where you stumble into Minnehaha Park.

The Falls seem to running nearly dry.That is a little surprising to me. I have been out to the northern lakes and noticed that lake levels seem up if anything. It has been dry but it isn't that long since the last time I was at the Falls at which time the flow was considerably greater.

My guess is that the dam has been closed back where the creek flows out of that big lake where all the rich people live so that water levels can be maintained at a high enough level to avoid shoreline damage on that big lake.

And you know what? That's plenty OK with me. It isn't the fault of rich people that low water levels can damage the lake. And the lake does need to be protected.

Anyway, that's my guess.

Back on the Saint Paul side for the ride home I was thinking about a recent discussion I had with Wireless et alia about which house along that stretch I nominate as the Lucas Davenport big new house. I spotted one today which fulfills several of the requirements. The house number there is 564.However, I checked the archives and refer all discussion on the matter to a post from 2007 which identifies house number 404 as what I thought was the most likely candidate at a time when I was closer in time to having done the reading of the Sanford novels in which the big new house is a more prominent part of the narrative. I nominate 404.

Here's another shot through the leaves of a street with lots of oaks.That's Priscilla Street in Saint Anthony Park. Priscilla Street is one block from Standish Street. There should be a John Alden around there somewhere.

Monday, November 14, 2011

Sheldon Street

If it's a bicycle blog, and it is, any day when I can ride my bicycle is a good day. If it is mid-November, and it is, any day with 50 degree temperatures and clear bright blue sky is a good day.

So today was a good day.

I was riding towards the route that I take into a west wind (which it was, and quite strong at that) when I passed through Sheldon Street. I have noted Sheldon Street other years, it is the street on which all of the boulevard trees are oaks. The oak tree stretch is two blocks long, one block west of Hamline and extending one block north and one block south from Arlington. It was way pretty on Sheldon Street today. First up is the look from the north end, facing south into the sun.I love the light through the leaves. That seemed very pretty but when I got to the south end I was torn by indecision. Here is the view looking north with the sun at my back.They are both very pretty.

I rode over into Minneapolis. Here is the intersection of Franklin Avenue and West River Parkway. A 61 year old bicyclist was the victim of a hit and run pick up truck driver at this intersection on Saturday.I was just standing there holding my bicycle, wondering exactly how and exactly where when first one and then another bicyclist each sharing my gender and age grouping stopped and among the three of us we hashed out all the details that any of us knew.

There is a marked bike lane. This spot is quite close to the University which means that there is a fairly high number of bicyclists about, awareness should be good. Something went wrong.

The pick up driver turned himself in later. At some point we will get to hear at least his version of how and why.

I posted a photo last week of the brush pile thinking it was pretty impressive. Little did I know that those brush wacking guys were just getting started. I think they are done now but they had a brush wacking good time behind my house.The foreman of the crew likes to collect what he considers to be oddly shaped pieces of the trees that he chain saws. He showed me a piece that he collected from the trimming behind my house. I was able to inform him that what he was collecting were "school marms".

I have taken a look at the log and have discovered that this year's total mileage has surpassed 2008. Here I was thinking that this must be the least miles ever and instead I am already out of last place. Further, even a single additional ride will move me past 2006 and passing 2007 is not out of the question. Of course, I did have a job all of those years.

Sunday, November 13, 2011

Measurement error insurance

It is just a little after 5pm here and it is pitch dark.

*sigh*

When DST ends the darkness just comes slamming down. On these days in mid-November it is more important than ever to try to get outside during the middle of the day even on a day as grey as today with no actual sun visible. At least it was light.

Today I dealt with the issue of possible measurement error. I want to ride 4,000 miles in a year but doing so depends at least somewhat on reliance upon fairly rudimentary bicycle odometers. All of the bicycle odometers that I am familiar with accept input about the circumference of a bicycle wheel, count the number of revolutions of the wheel and produce a display showing results of the conversion of revolutions into miles.

I happen to have a fair amount of confidence in my brand of bicycle odometer. Because of life experience I know to expect that certain distances on the street grid should be quite close to one mile, I know this because I often know that I am riding along a public land survey section line. Particularly in the north south direction the distance from section corner to section corner is most often going to be one mile. I ride that segment of road and notice that my bicycle odometer has advanced one mile. This gives me confidence in the odometer.

Even so, measurement error is certain, the only question is how big is the error? Well, I think based on observation that it may well be one percent or less. Therefore if I intend to be certain of having ridden 4,000 miles it is best to ride at least one percent over 4,000, or 4,040.

4,006 needs to be augmented just ever so slightly. Today I did so.

But the real interesting bit was the ongoing University Avenue light rail project. The Raymond Avenue intersection is now emphatically open to traffic. In fact, I have heard from a reliable source that soon University will be open to four lanes of traffic from Hampden to the city limits.

Well, Hampden happens to be my actual crossing of choice for University and with curiosity thus aroused I, on my return trip, turned east and meandered down to Hampden.I may still be crossing at Raymond as at least there the stop and go lights are back to full functionality. A four way stop in a little more iffy on a street like University and that makes Hampden still questionable. But at least there is a question, the intersection is open.

The sun never really emerged, it stayed cool and when I got home I had work to do. The second crop of leaves had reached a point which made TOPWLH uncomfortable.She had raked the leaves into those piles before I got home. My task was to operate the machinery to vacuum those leaves off the lawn and into disposal bags.

A pretty good time was had by all.

Saturday, November 12, 2011

Gene pool

It was a spectacularly nice day in Minnesota. I spent most of it with TOPWLH and her gene pool for a celebration of her father's 91st birthday. Wireless is, of course, also a member of that gene pool so she was present as well. I leave it to members of the pool to chronicle that event.

91 is pretty extraordinary.

So to the archives for me.

Here's some stuff from our third day in Paris. We were walking around looking at old buildings when we just sort of walked into this. It was one of those days with just too much stuff to try to publish it all. This was a found moment with a powerful impact, an impact that I felt at the time would have been lost if just sprinkled in with all of the old stone buildings. I resolved at that time to publish this separately at some point to give it the attention that just standing in front of it I felt was deserved.

This is the Allée de Justus, the alley of the just ones. It is only one block long and as you can tell by examining the street signs on the side of the building this short street was only recently renamed. For over 600 years the street was known as Rue Grenier sur l'Eau. It was renamed in 2001 to honor those "just ones" who tried to save Jews during the Nazi occupation.At the end of the block is Mémorial de la Shoah, the largest research, information and awareness raising center in Europe on the history of the genocide of the Jews during the Second World War. The side of that building includes the Le Mur des Justes, the wall of the just ones. According to the sign, the names carved on the wall belong to the men and women to whom the title of righteous has been bestowed in recognition of their actions to save Jews in France during the Second World War at the risk of their own lives.On the corner at the end of the block across from the Shoah Memorial is a school. The sign on the front of the school identifies (a person who speaks and reads French might be able to help me a bit here) that more than 500 Jewish children from this arrondissement were deported to Auschwitz.I recognize that this one is pretty somber. The feeling standing there was every bit that.

Later in the month I have a couple of fairly light hearted moments that have not previously seen light on this blog and I will get to them too.

Friday, November 11, 2011

4,006

Last year I got my last ride on November 11. So if today should end up to be the last ride that I get this year I guess I am going to be OK with that.

I had a chat with the brushwacking guys again today. I was just getting back from my ride and one of the crew expressed quite a bit of interest in my bicycle. I told him I ride 4,000 miles per year and at least for another year I wasn't exaggerating.

The only thing left is the 160 rides, I like to do that. I start the season intending to do 160 rides averaging 25 miles per ride. So far this year I have 154 rides averaging 26 miles per ride. The original goal of 160 still is at least a slight possibility. But even if I don't get there, considering the 15 days in France and the week in October lying down with the sniffles, 154 is a number I can be OK with.

It doesn't look like it is quite over yet.

Riding in the fall . . . really interesting shadows and spectacular light. There are lots of opportunities for good photos.I have featured this scene probably several times previously. It is an irrevocable sign of things to come when they put up wooden barriers to hold the frozen water in so that children can play hockey outdoors.That's the boards newly up at Langford Park.

Here is part of what I published last year on this date. The photo is of the Minnesota Vietnam Veterans Memorial in the State Capitol approach. The inscription is a quotation from the poem, "The Young Dead Soldiers Do Not Speak", by Archibald MacLeish. The inscription reads, "We were young. We have died. Remember us."Here is the complete poem:

The young dead soldiers do not speak.
Nevertheless, they are heard in the still houses:
who has not heard them?
They have a silence that speaks for them at night
and when the clock counts.
They say: We were young. We have died.
Remember us.
They say: We have done what we could
but until it is finished it is not done.
They say: We have given our lives but until it is finished
no one can know what our lives gave.
They say: Our deaths are not ours: they are yours,
they will mean what you make them.
They say: Whether our lives and our deaths were for
peace and a new hope or for nothing we cannot say,
it is you who must say this.
We leave you our deaths. Give them their meaning.
We were young, they say. We have died; remember us.

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Too cold

TOPWLH made the first report but I joined her at the front window and was soon able to provide the necessary second opinion. There were a few, and only a very few fluffy white things floating on the wind through our front yard this morning. It was one of the solid forms of water but this particular version of that solid was so insubstantial and so few in number that we were unable to spot any of them actually making contact with the ground. Still, as a first, it counts as a first, our first encounter with that stuff.

So it was pretty cold and pretty windy too. Bicycling was deemed unwise. That did not mean that we had no activity however. A crew under contract to the electric company showed up to take a look at the brush in our back yard and the yards of our neighbors. I had a couple of chats with the foreman and I must say that guy knew his tree species. He asked permission to whack a bunch of stuff from our yard. I have read enough power line easements in my life to know that he was just doing public relations by asking permission. There was no use in denying permission because they would just go ahead and assert their rights under the easement and whack it anyway.

I did give permission to pile the stuff in my front yard pending pick up.They have no easement rights out there.

But as I say I had had a couple of pleasant chats with the foreman. Further we had a small pile of sticks in the backyard left over from the leaf raking, stuff too big to go in the leaf pile and too big to be broken up and put in the yard refuse that our trash hauler picks up. It was awaiting a session with my Swede saw but when I saw the pile growing in the front yard I approached the foreman intending to ask him if I could put my stuff in his pile. I didn't even get a chance to make the request as he volunteered that he had seen my pile of sticks and that I could add it to his pile if I wished.

So that worked out pretty well.

It might be worth noticing that we have already had our leaf pick up and we are now working on what looks like it is going to be a pretty substantial second crop of leaves.

I did a few errands including a stop at the mall. Unlike the display from my neighbor's yard I didn't find anything at all amiss with this display at the mall. It is after all the mall.So today was too cold, I guess that means that even the playoffs are now over. Probably if I can just maybe get in another ride or two talking about those rides will be just talking about practice.

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

It's snowing . . . in Wisconsin

But not here.

Here it is cold but sunny and pretty. Here the wind is howling. Here the wind is blowing much, much too hard for bicycling.

Too late, I have already finished my ride. But, I must admit, it was hard, particularly at the end. It was hard.

Just to make sure here, there can't possibly be anyone who thought that because I moved a bicycle into the basement that I was through riding for the season, can there?

I didn't think so.

Here is a a corner of my garage, which I didn't realize until I took the picture is clearly the Bianchi corner.And none of those bicycles is the bicycle I rode today. Today I left behind this year's sojourn on steel and returned to crabon fibre, taking my newest bicycle out for another ride. Today's milestone is that I have now ridden NewLOOK more miles this year than I rode it last year in its inaugural season. Pretty puny milestone but I do like to be able to announce something.

I know I won't get many more chances to ride the 8 lakes tour so I set out today to check that off my November list. I also hoped to see the swans on Vadnais.

I arrived at the entrance to the Sucker Lake portion of the Snail Lake Regional Park to discover that cars are no longer being admitted. The pavement looks closed.I checked the paper notice posted on that ironic Welcome sign but the closing is NOT because of the vermin culling. The archery deer hunt's next iteration is scheduled for November 14-16, next week.

As I was contemplating this a comfort bike lady rode up to the gate from the other side, looked chagrined, and turned to ride away. I cyclo-crossed around the gate and followed her back into the park. I passed her and thought to offer a greeting. I opened my mouth to say hello and a giant bug ricocheted off both lips narrowly missing the opening.

I am not sure what today's lesson is but I fear that it might be that being friendly is not always the right thing to do. On the other hand, the giant bug bounced off.

I rode through the Sucker Lake portion of the park and over and down towards Lake Vadnais. The gates at Lake Vadnais were open. As noted once previously, different jurisdictions, different rules.

It was cold and windy but it was extremely pretty. Here is a NewLOOK at Lake Vadnais.The swans were not to be found today, a disappointment, but it was such a pretty day that I believe I am going to pronounce the whole thing to have been a success.

It's snowing in Wisconsin.