I AM A POWER USER

There in the photograph is electronic detritus resulting from about three and a half hours that I am never, ever going to get back.

Long ago when cable internet became available I was an enthusiastic early adopter.  We had fast internet at work, I knew what it was like, dial up at home just wasn't going to be adequate.  I bought my own cable modem, had the cable installation guys come out and cable up my modem, and bingo, goodbye dial up.

All of that is to say that my cable modem was pretty old.

Recently my cable company, Comcast, (they call themselves Xfinity but who are they trying to fool?) has been sending me letters telling me that my cable modem wasn't providing me with the maximum opportunities that Comcast was ready to provide.  As for me, the service still seemed fine, I ignored the letters.

Until the last one.

Service on my modem will be discontinued as of December 2.

OK, I get the message.  That's the old modem on the right, the Xfinity letter center foreground with the power connection for the old modem sitting on the letter.

So I did the research and bought a new modem (DOCSIS 3.0 for those keeping score).  I learned from the new modem installation instructions, NOT from Comcast, that after plugging everything in I would have to call my "cable provider" to be "activated".

Who doesn't love calling the "cable provider"?

Several rounds of providing my 10 digit phone number, my street address, my name, and the last four of my social security number followed by one accidental hang up by me (user error, cheek on the off button on the wireless handset) I was activated.  To discover that I did not have internet access.  The tech I was on with at that moment gave me the number to call Xfinity tech support.

A couple more rounds of (see above) and the tech was able to deduce what I could already tell from sitting in front of my computer watching the lights on the modem and the wireless connectivity icon in the desktop tray that my modem had been successfully activated but that it was not communicating with my wireless router (that's it on the left side of the pile).

He said I would have to contact the manufacturer of the router.  When I expressed my frustration with the fact that to this point I had only followed the desires of my "cable provider" and that the results of that course of action was that they had crashed my system he offered to switch me over to the special double secret level of Xfinity tech support.

He forwarded my call.

A couple more rounds of see above.

Then a recorded message that they were too busy right now to take my call, please call back later.

This is what is referred to as a "service industry".

Recognizing that I was now totally on my own I set off on the power user's trajectory, trying to fix my wireless router without any interference from my "cable provider".

The old router was only "801b" capable, we all know what that means, right?  It was an extremely aged router, probably every bit as old as the DOCSIS 1.0 router.

I have known for a long time that this was coming some day and I had already a while ago taken the step of acquiring a refurbished "801g" router.

Yeah, yeah, I know, it is only a phantom upgrade from "b" to "g".  But it is newer hardware.

I suspected that I had to reconfigure the router and since I could not find the installation disk for the old one and since I had a newer one . . .

Well, the old router joins the trash heap.

I knew this was coming some day.

I bypassed the router, connecting the modem directly to the computer, open Firefox, find the website for the router manufacturer.

FAQs?

Pretty soon I was running the disk from the new router hoping against hope that this would lead to an internet connection.

Disk error, failure to install.  Probably because the disk was not compatible with Windows 7.

But I AM A POWER USER.  I knew that the router could be manually configured if I could somehow figure out how to reach it.  Reconnect directly to the computer and then the manufacturer FAQ says to type the IP address into a blank address slot on a browser page.   Reconnect the router, IP address?  It asked for a username and password.

Disconnect everything, reconfigure with the hard connection modem to computer, return to the manufacturer's website.  Find instructions for what to do in default situation, reconnect everything, find the blank spot again, IP address again, enter no user name and default password, and voila, welcome to configuration page.

So enable DHCP, allow cloning of IP address, a couple other tweaks, then one final agony of having to run through a power off power on cycle with all of the parts (unplug router, unplug modem, power down computer, replug modem wait for the lights to stabilize, replug router wait for the lights to stabilize, power up computer) and voila at last.

I have internet and I have wireless.

I AM A POWER USER.

Hello, it's me

Pop goes pop artist,
The headlines said.
Is shooting a put on?
Is Warhol really dead?

Oh well, now Andy, I guess we've got to go
I wish some way somehow you like this little show
I know it's late in coming but it's the only way I know
Hello it's me.

Goodnight Lou.

White light/White heat

At the end of the piece Lou stops playing but his guitar, tuned to the edge of feedback, continues to produce sound.

Only art
Can see me through
Only heart
Can see me through
My life's disappearing from view
My old life's disappearing from view

I was forever changed
I was forever changed

How's your bicycle fitness?

So here is what happened.  As of October 10 I had ridden once with temperatures in the 60s and twice with temperatures in the 50s.  Both of the times in  the 50s were in September.  September was very warm and then early October veered completely off the rails with daily highs in the 70s.

I took a day off noted in the bike log as too windy and the very next day it says overnight rain and suddenly 58.  It rained for a few days and when that finally let up we had a series of days with highs in the 40s.  I have of course ridden a few times with a temperature in the 40s (I have the gear) but always only after having worked my way down to it with about a dozen or more rides in the 60s and an equal number in the 50s.  That last ride on October 10 featured mid-70s.  Jumping suddenly from the 70s down into the 40s was just TOO daunting.

So my own answer to the bicycle fitness question is that my walking fitness is coming along quite nicely, thank you.

Today at noon it was sunny and bright and 51.  After only 16 days off I ventured out again.

I was surprised by how much green there still is out there, the river banks down in the city have dispensed with the yellow phase but it really doesn't seem to have reached the red and orange stage yet.  It is, after all, still fall, maybe another month or so until winter.

I rode over to the Falls, it was too nice a day not to.

I was lining up the photo when another guy on a LOOK 585 rolled up, did a take, and then launched into a lengthy comparison of his 585 and mine accompanied by extravagant praise for that particular bicycle model.  The color schemes were not the same but we both are palping Mavic wheels.  He was riding Ultegra, I am, of course, riding Chorus.

A pretty good time was had by all, except maybe for the guy with him who was riding one of the lower level Treks.

It turns out that despite appearances the bicycle season is not yet actually over.  But then again maybe it is, forecasts for tomorrow point back to the lower 40s.

Brrr, but probably a nice enough day for a walk.

How I spent the weekend

This one was actually taken before the weekend but this is going to be my only chance to post it and I do want to post it because this is about as handsome as the ash trees ever get. This one is Friday morning, I can tell because that green bag at the end of the driveway is related to our Friday trash pick up. I know it is morning because we left home Friday at about noon.

We got home Sunday afternoon (after driving through a SNOW STORM south of Duluth until nearly Forest Lake) to discover that most of the leaves on that tree have given up and are now lying in our yard instead of clinging to the tree.

For that day and a half or so when the ash tree is gorgeous, it is transcendentally gorgeous.

So we went to Duluth.

We have never been in Duluth for the migration.  We have been up to Hawk Ridge at least a few times but never before in the fall.  As recently as two springs ago I think we took a picture at this spot, it is the end of the pavement on the road that leads up to the observation spot at Hawk Ridge.  It is prettier this time than it was the last time we were there.

That marker verifies that in glacial times there was a glacial Lake Duluth occupying the basin now filled by Lake Superior.  However, glacial Lake Duluth at its highest volume reached a level twice as far above sea level as current Lake Superior.  In fact, portions of the current Sky Line Drive in Duluth follow the glacial lake's former beaches.

The road continues from there but within easy walking distance from that point is the main observatory station for the Hawk Ridge Nature Reserve.

It is a wild, wild scene in at least a couple of senses of that word.  We walked up next to that observatory platform and took this photo back towards the lake of the crowd at the edge of the ridge.

The guys on the observatory platform have pretty major spotting telescopes as do several of those people out there at the edge.  The guys on the platform are quasi official so they have clickers on the rail around the platform on which they are keeping count. For example, this is what they had posted on their board while we were there.

We didn't stay for a full hour BUT during the time we were there we personally observed 8 or so bald eagles and at least a couple of dozen red tailed hawks as well as smaller numbers of several lesser hawks.  Mostly they were at a distance but a Cooper's Hawk made a right at the edge of the ridge close in fly by.

It wasn't so much about being able to get a really good close up look at the eagles and hawks as it was about being there and being able to observe that they were, in fact, migrating.  I personally found it to be pretty exhilarating.

Again, using both senses of the word, it was a wild scene.

The fellow traveler loves Brighton Beach, we headed down to that just outside the eastern city limits of Duluth park and natural area.

Those of us raised in Minnesota have a very distinct image of what the North Shore of Lake Superior should be and that photo captures a lot of it.  A rocky shore with a big, big lake and big sky.

This one captures the view up the shoreline towards Two Harbors.

We drove out that way until we came to a road ends construction project.  We stopped on the way back at McQuade.  One of my best friends at the DNR is an engineer who had primary design responsibility for this safe harbor project.  I used to walk into his office to find him going over the drawings for this.  I have seen the drawings hundreds of times, this is the first time I remember actually being out there since it was completed.

The idea is that small craft can be in considerable danger on the big lake if caught too far from harbor when a storm comes up.  Superior is a very unforgiving lake.  What we have here is a couple of stone breakwaters at a spot far from the next nearest possible refuge.

My friend Memos would be the very first to say that this is all temporary, that when the big lake brings one of the megastorms that the big lake is very VERY capable of bringing that all of this will go away.  He only designed the project that they asked him to design.  What they asked him to design is something that will last a long time.  This will last a long time.

But when the big lake comes to take back what belongs to the big lake that puny little sanctuary will be no more.

It rained right about then so we headed back into town.

It was a small squall and by the time we got parked and headed over towards the arena it had turned into a darn nice patch of Saturday afternoon.

Here is the FT leaning on a lamp post on a corner of street underneath the Aerial Lift Bridge and a pretty interesting sky.

I think the local Army Corps office here is a suboffice of the Detroit  district.  I thought others in the Detroit district might find the local office interesting, I also thought it is a pretty nice old brick building still serving a useful purpose.

 Pretty nice Saturday afternoon on the Duluth waterfront.

They don't have Big Red here but they do have light bearing structures on the end of both of the structures delineating the shipping channel and one of them does have a red roof.

We were patient and managed to get the FT posed in relative isolation with this big anchor of the whale back steamer Thomas Wilson.

The Wilson sank after a freak collision with another ship less than a mile out from the ship canal on a calm morning in 1902.  Heavily laden with iron ore, the Wilson sank within minutes after the collision, carrying nine members of her crew to their deaths.

In 1973 scuba divers recovered the anchor and a 60 foot length of anchor chain from 75 feet below the surface of the lake.  The anchor is now on display on the waterfront providing a nice photo prop for the FT.

But here's what we were there for, the hockey.  This picture was taken during warm ups.

Friday night, Gophers 4, UMD nil.

Saturday night, Gophers 6, UMD 3.

55 victories in a row.

Pretty good weekend, we had lots of fun.

In other sports news, FC Nantes has an American playing for them and he contributed mightily to the latest victory by the surprise success story of this years Ligue 1.

AC Ajaccio 0-1 FC Nantes

Nantes stands fourth in the table after 10 of the 38 games of the season schedule.

Vaughn Monroe in concert 1965

Well, excuse me for coming back to this.

I was cruising YouTube and I came upon Vaughn Monroe in concert in 1965. This thing is for sure just a cowboy song, especially as it was done by Monroe in 1949.  But in 1965 he is doing it wearing a dinner jacket with a full orchestra all in matching complete formal dress.  In front of the stage people can be seen dancing (fox trot?).

The way he does it in 1964 isn't exactly country, but Monroe's powerful and distinctive voice and phrasing make me want to post it again.

Ghost Riders in the Sky.

Monroe may not have sung it precisely in this way but the words reproduced below the clip are as taken from the sheet music as written by Stan Jones.

An old cowpoke went riding out one dark and windy day
Upon a ridge he rested as he went along his way
When all at once a mighty herd of red-eyed cows he saw
A'plowin' through the ragged skies and up a cloudy draw

Yi-pi-yi-ay, Yi-pi-yi-o
Ghost riders in the sky

Their brands were still on fire and their hooves were made of steel
Their horns wuz black and shiny and their hot breaths he could feel
A bolt of fear went through him as they thundered through the sky
For he saw the riders comin' hard and he heard their mournful cry

Yi-pi-yi-ay, Yi-pi-yi-o
Ghost riders in the sky

Their faces gaunt, their eyes were blurred, and shirts all soaked with sweat
They're ridin' hard to catch that herd but they ain't caught them yet
They've got to ride forever in that range up in the sky
On horses snortin' fire, as they ride on, hear their cry

Yi-pi-yi-ay, Yi-pi-yi-o
Ghost riders in the sky

As the riders loped on by him, he heard one call his name
"If you want to save your soul from hell a' ridin' on our range"
"Then cowboy change your ways today or with us you will ride"
"A-tryin' to catch the Devil's herd across these endless skies."

Yi-pi-yi-ay, Yi-pi-yi-o
Ghost riders in the sky.

And yet another one

The wind picked up a little today compared to yesterday but it doesn't seem really worth complaining about.  Temperatures AGAIN about 15 degrees above average for the date, I rode my bicycle.

Here's a little glimpse of what kind of day it was, shameless sunbathing on October 10.

A southeasterly wind had enticed me down into the big city.  That's Lookout Park on Summit at the peak of Ramsey Hill.

Ramsey Hill gets capitalized if you are bicyclist in this town.  In keeping with the shameless theme I am going to go ahead and mention that I have ridden up Ramsey Hill several times, I used to do it every year for the Saint Paul Bike Classic.  It's about a tough a climb as we have in this mostly flat land, no mountains anywhere within hundreds of miles city.

I included the sunbather photo for dramatic effect but here is the panorama I was actually there to try to capture.  From the top of the bluff on the east bank with the west bank bluff in view and the counterpoint of the High Bridge.

Color is coming on in the river valley, I am not even going to mention that sky.

Well, actually, yes I am.

Here's one of our big stone buildings rearing up against about as blue as it is going to get around here.

Again, trees mostly still mostly green but the change she is a coming.

Lastly then, here is the state's front yard.

Anyone want to say that parking lot isn't as unsightly as I feared it might be?

Not me.

That parking lot is disgraceful.  That's the state's front lawn.

Further, I didn't include a view but they are tearing up some more mall back over my right shoulder as I took the photo for, I presume, more parking.

The lawn next to the Humphrey Memorial and down over to the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial and the rose gardens in front of the Veterans Service Memorial Building is now under assault.

Wouldn't want those really important legislators to be ever so slightly inconvenienced now, would we?

Another September day

I already remember last month as perhaps the warmest September of my tenure.  After a four day appearance by, I don't know, what was that, March?, September has returned.  And not late September either, the right after Labor Day first few days of fall September.

76 today (although only 68 at the Cattle Barn at 1:05pm), sunny and pleasant, and the winds diminished to a very tolerable level.

OOTNDITHOD.

The newspaper and most other weather predictions said southwest wind.  I thought I would ride over to the Minneapolis lakes.  If I have been there this year I don't now remember but . . .

Anyway, that's a route that I rode a lot last fall when it appears that a southwest wind is common.

I rode down the University transitway.  The transitway runs directly into that southwest direction and is downhill, it seems like a good return route in those conditions.  Uphill, but with a tailwind.

It seemed pretty easy, maybe a bit too easy.

I got over to the Franklin Avenue bridge and was now heading mostly west.  The wind was admittedly mostly south but it felt WAY more west than east.  I decided that I was as far west as I wanted to be and broke off the Lake of the Isles quest.  The wind was southeast, mostly south, but most definitely not west.

Instead I headed pretty much straight off towards the south and ended up here again.

It is a pretty nice deal to have that place as fallback destination.  Today there were a couple of guys underneath the falls.

Spectacular yet again, no?

On the way home I rode through the construction zone on Raymond.  I have previously commented on the detour signs but I haven't mentioned this one.

As a bicyclist I am, of course, always hoping for just exactly that, a chance to share the road.

I also like the background industrial location.  I ride there a lot and note by way of comparison that a business like that never, ever, provides an aroma even vaguely as delicious as a newly brined up batch of dill pickles.

But the road leads past here.  This is the tennis courts at Langford Park.

Those trees eventually go to an extremely attractive bright orange.  It remains to be seen whether or not when that happens it will be with a sky like today's to create contrast.  And even if that happens whether I will be there to record it.  Doesn't matter, it looked pretty good today.

I rode too many miles, I feel pretty wasted.  It was fabulous.

Sunny warm punitive wind

That about covers it I suppose.

I found the morning light really attractive today when I was out in front to pick up the morning newspapers.

The sun is up over there on the other side of the field, still not quite up in the driveway.

In fact, the sun is up for only about the top five or so feet of the neighbor's spruce tree.

BikeSnobNYC recently declared that non-drive side is the new drive side for bicycle photography.

Fortunately for the likes of me he changed his mind before completing even the blog post where he made this declaration.

So, for now, drive side is drive side.

Lake Como, mid afternoon.

It was sunny (very pretty), about 10 degrees above average for this date (pleasantly warm) with a wind gusting to nearly 30mph from the south (punitive).

It was 70 at the cattle barn at 1:50pm.

Seasonal adjustments

The bicycle log for the past four days actually shows a small amount of variation from day to day but it really wouldn't have to.  Rain and cold would have worked just fine for any of those days.

Today the sun finally came back but unfortunately September did not return with it.

Still, it was warm enough (nearly average temperatures), nice enough and rather refreshingly not windy.

A good day for a ride.

It is mostly the yellows that have changed to this point but by now nearly every one that is going to go yellow has at least started.  That tree is about two blocks from here.  That sky was everywhere.

Another sign of fall is the posting of the wild and natural areas out near the lakes for the annual culling of the vermin, aka the archery deer hunt.

I also think that sign is interesting for a couple of other reasons, one is that it makes it fairly clear that the pavement running through the woods out there are sidewalks.

But actually I am of the belief anyway that pedestrians always have the right of way over bicycles on the same general rationale as the speed boat sail boat right of way rules.  The one under power should yield.

The other thing about that sign is that it strikes me as an inelegant way to say no spirits.

The big new tree starting looking like this recently.

That isn't the most encouraging look for a brand new tree.

Fortunately we have access to the internet and you can google white pine needles turning yellow in the fall.

The ground underneath the tree is littered with what used to be on the tree.

TOPWLH is still a little bit uncertain about the whole thing so I promised her a photo of reassurance.  This is a largish mature white pine about a block and half from here.

White pines have three years worth of needle growth on the branches during the growing season.  In early fall the three year old needles turn yellow and drop.

We were both a little uncertain when the new tree started looking a little yellow around the gills.  All is OK now.

It's a really handsome tree.

Completely off topic

Raining here today so I just want to weigh in on the really important social question of the day.

As reported by Vanity Fair, Mia Farrow has responded ambiguously to a question about the paternity of her only biological son, Ronan Farrow.  Farrow was married to Woody Allen when Ronan was born.  She had previously been married to Frank Sinatra.

Possibly, she says.

Frank as a young man.

Ronan, age 25, with his mom.

I have posted a black and white of Frank but he is, of course, famous for his blue eyes.

Here is Woody as a young man.

Further, Frank's daughter Nancy is quoted by the magazine as saying Ronan "is a big part of us, and we are blessed to have him in our lives."

Ronan himself has responded to the stir by tweeting "Listen, we're all *possibly* Frank Sinatra's son."

Good on ya, young fella.

Totally Sinatra's kid.  I wonder if he can sing.

Position description

I was just looking over the log remembering what an extremely cold spring it was.  And also thinking that September was about the warmest that I can remember.

I guess that's how you get to average.

All the major forecasters around here say that the current run of late summer is about to end, possibly with thunderboomers.

I long for a severe storm, nothing that would blow any trees down, mind you.  I was thinking more along the lines of something severe enough to knock out the electricity for an hour or two.  I am sooooooo ready for a loss of electrical power.

It was sunny and nice all morning but pretty much as soon as I got out there the clouds started rolling in from the west, the first soldiers of the coming invasion.  Wind came along with them, as often happens.

Strong wind.

Unpleasantly strong wind.

But the clouds eventually passed through and I was able to finish up my ride on what sure looked and felt like yet another wonderful day.

That's Lake Como from an angle I have never tried before but which I deliberately sought out today trying to catch some yellow (and still lots of green) in the trees and the blast of blues again available in the sky and in the lake water.  That's from down at the southeast end, near the complicated many way stop of Como Avenue and Como Boulevard and Maryland and Victoria and Wheelock Parkway and it seems like maybe another Como or two, the comma end when you look at the lake as a punctuation mark.

I used to say when I was still attending the plant that there are a finite number of days this nice in any one person's life.  Today I was lucky enough (AGAIN) to be able to spend a big chunk of this mostly pretty wonderful day outdoors in it.

I love my job.

Paradigm shift

We had a whole series of meetings down at the plant one time where various outside facilitators enthused to us about paradigm shift.

I wonder how things are going to at the plant.

For me, a long overdue change in the weather pattern produced winds from the northwest which meant that I did NOT ride over to Minnehaha Falls today.  Instead I headed out to the northern lakes eight or ten or so lake tour.

The color is coming on slowly but every glance in any direction reveals certain evidence that the color is coming.  This is a look at Sucker Lake.

It was a very nice day as may be apparent from the photo.  Temperatures remain well above the average highs for this date (which as of today is a mere 65).

I got a bench into that photo and many shades of blue and green and some hints of yellow.

I am reasonably certain that the tree giving up there in the foreground is a cottonwood.  We, of course, have one of those in our yard which means that we are starting to see fallen leaves on the driveway.

A view of the Lake Vadnais.

New bike rack, new picnic table, lots of other newish amenities, only thing missing is the mature trees that used to be there.

We received the final documents (and the check) related to our June storm damage.  To recount, we had this much damage to our roof from the big wind storm.

We ended up springing for a complete new roof based on the belief that we were definitely on the downward spiral with that set of shingles anyway, we soon enough were going to NEED a new roof anyway.

Our insurance company, based on that, well, relatively smallish patch of lost shingles ended up reimbursing us for nearly two-thirds of the total cost of the roof.

We are calling it good.