 Nostalgia, DVDs, old movies, television, OTR, fandom, good news and bad, picks, pans, cute budgie stories, cute terrier stories, and anything else I can think of. Contact me at theyoungfamily (at) earthlink (dot) net . . . . . . . . . .
|
||
|
» Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Stalked
Going bike riding involves coming out the front door, taking a few steps to the garage, wheeling out the bikes, and zipping off to make circles of the neighborhood to the eventual tune of a couple of miles, stopping back in the driveway, wheeling the bikes back into the garage and going inside. At no time do I go on the lawn or under a tree or anywhere else "wildlife" could be lurking.
So will you tell me how when I get inside I end up having a honking big ant crawling on the shoulder of my shirt? I swear they stalk me. :-)  » Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Wheelin'
We went back to our bike riding tonight, having been pre-empted on Sunday by my fever and on Monday by James not getting home from work until 8:40; by the time we had supper it was already dark. There was a nice breeze rather than the warm pall of air of the past two weeks, so it wasn't as bad as its been. We did nearly two miles. I think we may be ready to take the Silver Comet in small doses; pity we have to get into the truck and drive there (but I wouldn't trust any of the roads from here to there, even if we had the stamina—really no room for riders on the side of the narrow roads and people just drive too darn fast).
Labels: bicycles » Thursday, June 05, 2008
Oh, Joy!
While we were out biking, the temperature dropped ONE WHOLE DEGREE!
It's now only 85°F. Urgh. I'm gonna order a pair of these. » Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Express Laughs
Well, one thing good about the box being out is that we watch DVDs. :-) We pulled the little television out to watch Jeopardy, then had our bike ride. According to the odometer, we did about a mile and a half, which was amazing considering it was still 86°F and quite smothery.
James put together the breakdown crate we bought for Willow and had her lie in it for a while, giving her a dog biscuit as a reward. Then we put something funny on: Futurama. I can't believe Fox cancelled this and kept The Simpsons. » Sunday, June 01, 2008
Sunday Heres and Theres
We went back to WalMart this morning so that James could get a better bicycle seat. He also bought a bicycle-repair multitool that can be fastened to the bike. I purchased a little carry pouch for mine, as well as a speedometer/odometer/clock, plus a hand pump. We also stopped at Lowes to get some safflower seeds to put in with the birdseed we bought at Kroger, and then had lunch at Longhorn. Since we had hickory barbecue marinated boneless pork ribs, layered with sliced apples, mushrooms, and onions, marinating in the crock pot, we only ate half our 8-ounce "Renegade" steaks and brought the rest home.
Then we had to go back to Lowes because we forgot to buy the breakdown pet crate. We have been considering buying one for a few years, since she rides so nicely in the car sitting between us that I think it's being stuck in the crate that makes her vomit early on trips. I reminded James that we also needed to buy Wil a travel harness so we can safely seat-belt her into the car, so we bundled her into the car and went to PetsMart. You can't try the newer travel harnesses on any longer, though; they're packaged in that idiot blister pack. So we made a best guess in choosing one, then walked through the store. There were quite a few dogs there today, and Willow did pretty well. She even went nose-to-nose with a Lhasa Apso. She had less luck when we passed by the big dogs up for adoption—Wil was frightened of them and they knew it, setting up a barking chorus. Before we went home, James went into H.H. Gregg to see if they had certain decoder boxes. We have the coupons that will upgrade our little televisions to digital and they expire at the end of July, but James is looking for the decoder boxes that also get the analog signals of the smaller stations. Gregg only had one brand of box and it wasn't one of the boxes that get analog. When we got home I fitted the harness on Willow; it's on the smallest adjustment I can do, but it fits her very comfortably. James pulled out the bicycles to work on them, only to find the multitool didn't have what he needed to get the seat off. So we had to go back to WallyWorld where he got a universal socket wrench. We also looked for converter boxes, but they again only had one brand which didn't do analog. So James installed his new seat and raised his handlebars, but had less success fixing his rear brakes. I installed the speedometer gadget to my bike myself: there's a magnetic screw that fastens to the spokes, and you position the transmitter on the fork so it is close to, but not touching the magnet. Then you fasten everything on and you try it out. Just around the neighborhood I was doing between 6 and 9 m.p.h., with an average of seven. James also lowered my handlebars, which is great; I finally feel like I am in control of the bike and don't have my elbows in the air any longer. Finally we came in to cool off, listen to a movie show on the radio, and eventually to eat a pork dinner. (While we were out I had a Spanish station on for Schuyler the music was lively and it seemed to perk her up.) I perused the movies and wondered which would be the best to see in widescreen. I finally put Twister on. Yes, widescreen and surround sound make a good companion. :-) » Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Past Times
I am 84 pages into the first volume of About Time and am enjoying it immensely. We are talking an anal-retentive volume here. :-) I have several episode guides to Doctor Who, including single-volume works and then the paperback "Handbooks" for each Doctor, plus the Discontinuity Guide, which lists all the errors, but nothing like this detail. Along with examinations of each episode, there are sidebars about how the BBC operated in the 1960s, how the show was created, who really created the Daleks (one of the early designers of the Daleks was supposed to be Ridley Scott, but he had left the BBC a few weeks earlier to learn how to direct), theories of how the TARDIS works, can you rewrite past history, etc. Wonderful stuff.
We had our bike rides tonight (very difficult tonight, since it was still about 79°F and sticky as hell), the came back to watch Most Outrageous Moments, and now I am watching a marvelous documentary on the Smithsonian Channel in glorious HD, about the different monuments in Washington, DC, which was filmed in the fall, so the color accents the architecture. Labels: bicycles, books, exercise, television » Wednesday, May 21, 2008
The Unbearable Lightness of Pants
I did errands on my lunch hour today since I am out of AAA batteries for my wireless mouse. Supposedly the batteries are supposed to last about three months. I'm lucky if the ones I've bought last three weeks. I finally got ahold of some Panasonics, which have worked better before. But methinks I need to go for rechargables. I don't like throwing out so many batteries.
I also picked up some vinegar to do the kitchen drain, but my main purchase was a pair of pants. I wanted something easy to pull on to go bike riding and light due to the summer heat. I noticed last time I was in there that they were selling the "scrubs" that employees wear in hospitals for only $8 each, and the pants had elastic waistbands and were very light. So I bought a pair. Very nice and light indeed. I'll have to buy another. » Monday, May 19, 2008
Postprandial Moves
We took the bikes out for about fifteen minutes, just around the neighborhood. It's a bit like training wheels, acclimating yourself again.
On the other hand, it's nice to remember again what it was like to fly... » Sunday, May 18, 2008
Rolling, Rolling, Rolling
After supper we took the bikes around the neighborhood a few times. James still needs to adjust his back brakes and I really must have my handlebars lowered. I don't feel in proper control. I also notice I am having trouble reaching the caliper brakes. I have small hands and this is a pretty wide grip. May have to loosen the mounts and move them up a little.
I didn't expect the years to fall away once I started rolling and miraculously end up back in 1983 and the five-miles-nightly stamina (for one, my knees are definitely cracklier than they were back then!), but yeesh...it started to rain after the third orbit, so we came in. We had a very quick thunderstorm that started the dog barking and got the north and west windowsills quite soaked. What Has Four Wheels and Wobbles?
Two bicycles ridden by people who have been "on hiatus" for several years.
I kept seeing bicycles yesterday. People on them. Bikes on the back of cars, in the beds of trucks, on racks. I woke up this morning thinking "I want to go to WalMart and buy a bike." Astute observers will probably remind me "Linda, you have a bike." Yes, I do. I bought it in 1996, after we purchased the house. (There was no room to keep it in the apartment.) I rode it about half a dozen times, mostly to get air in the tires, and then pretty much quit. There was so much traffic in the neighborhood there was no safe place to ride and there were always mosquitoes out because we were fifty feet from a creek, plus every time I wanted to ride, I had to go into the backyard, which I hated, through a gate that never worked properly, and into the shed, which was full of spiders. The bike itself is still brand-new and is reasonably clean, especially now that it was rinsed off with the hose last year, but it needs a good lube and new tires. So over the winter I asked around at bike shops for this work to be done. The average price I got was $125! I only paid $99 for the bike! I said to James, "I'm going to say something stupid. I want to go to WalMart and buy a bike. But today's the last day it's going to be nice; tomorrow it will be eighty and sunny and it will be horrible again." But we went anyway. Something's got to give here. I picked out the retro 7-speed Schwinn (a lady who was trying to pick out a starter bike for her tiny little boy said, "Oh, that's cute, like a PT Cruiser," and James grinned and said, "She has one of those, too"), and he got just a generic 21-speed guys' bike. We brought them home, did the rest of our shopping, then came home to fix them. Seats are always placed too high for me, and for some reason they angle them up so the front of the seat is like the horn on a Western saddle. James fixed that, and he also adjusted his rear brakes and lowered the "horn" on his seat, but raised the seat itself. However, he is going to have to buy a metric hex set to fix the handlebars on my bike; they angle upward and I feel like a bird flapping. Stupid. I felt really stupid on the first ride-around. I was scared. Me, who used to ride five miles a night after supper the whole summer of 1983, zipping in and out of the streets probably at about 12 mph. Made me mad. By the fourth ride around the street I was a little more comfortable, but the handlebars really have to be lowered. I don't feel balanced with them at that angle. The big thing is going to figure out when to use them. If James got home at a reasonable hour, we could go out biking after dinner. But the earliest he can get home is seven; usually by the time we get done eating it's almost eight o'clock. By that time we're both exhausted. Not to mention that I still can't tolerate the damn sun, which came out while we were out fixing the brakes and things. I came in absolutely sick to my stomach for at least an hour. |
||
