Spring = wind.

I feel gritty, Oh so gritty... Spring winds are doing their thing. It was too windy for me to ride home from work, so I was forced to clean the house to expend energy after I got home. Sad.

We have our travel plans for the east coast for this summer -- should be a great trip. A few days in DC, and more time in Delaware.

Slacker blogger

Kids were home for spring break, tax season came and went, as did several weeks with no blog posting. My bad.

The Memorial Death March went well this year. Stu and I beat our time last year by a couple of minutes and, despite the wind, the course seemed a little shorter this year. One veteran of the original Death March walked 9 miles; he is 93 and spry and a role model for us all.

Spring is here. Rides into town each morning are warmer and the number of wildlife sightings are way up. We had a small herd of 9 deer in our front yard last week. A couple of weeks ago I followed a skunk down Black Quartz Road (gasp!), and Monday I had a close encounter with a bobcat on my bike ride in. It looked like Nom, only more spotted and with a quite large head.

By the numbers: The photovoltaic system has generated over 3500 kW hours. The days are getting longer, and our best days are generating over 24.5 kilowatt hours. And since January 1, I have biked or walked nearly 1500 miles. (Did I mention that gas is close to $4.00/gallon!)

Shingles suck

My health care provider confirmed on Saturday that I have shingles. Nothing good about this.

But tonight I decided:

1. I am getting on my bike tomorrow even if I just go to the end of the driveway.
2. It's gonna hurt regardless of what I do, so I might as well ignore that part and do what I want.
   

To look forward to, though, Jake arrives home Friday and we have had Quincy for nearly a week now. Jay will also be down Saturday. We will have a full house of people to enjoy!

Cat Jail, and bird comments

When cats go bad...

Had an interesting encounter with wildlife yesterday. About 8 am, we passed a deer carcass by the roadside. Some crows were standing around it, and a red-shouldered hawk was on top of it, chowing down. Passed by again an hour later, and a turkey vulture was on top. I am considering going out for a run (it is Sunday morning) to see what else might be there.

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Weekend in Delaware

Enjoying time in Delaware with Dad and Kent.

American Airlines had problems getting us here and I arrived at the peak of rush hour traffic. Maybe I will go back to the very early morning flight. Fewer screaming kids, grumpy passengers, flight delays, and other things that make travel fun.

Yesterday was busy: we ran errands in the morning then spent some time in Newark. Caught up with my niece Sarah at the cupcake shop where she works, visited Newark's huge bike shop, got caught in student traffic when classes were changing, stopped in at Iron Hill Brewery (they make a pretty good porter, but I was not a fan of the India black ale), climbed to the top of the Newark Reservoir (will try to take the walk-around some other time)...

Also workshopped a paper with Jacob, made dinner (mushroom quiche), and saw family friends.

Today is again gray and rainy, but the change from New Mexico sunny is welcome. Today we will visit Lawn and George in Dover. Hoping for some time on a walking path today. Jacob is going cross-country skiing on Mount Hood, and I am hoping he will send some pictures that I will post.

Sun Power!

This post accidentally ended up on the book club blog...

The photovoltaic system hit 2,000 kWh today. New Mexico sun has been pretty reliable this fall and winter.

Not sure what is going on the rest of the week, though. High Wednesday is supposed to be 31, low is 11. Yikes! Cold biking this week.

Good day in the Dona Ana Mountains. Good dinner afterward with friends.

This can't be good

Wednesday, temperatures were in the single digits here. Weather stressed the power grid so much that El Paso Electric requested that major power consumers call off work. Happily, NMSU complied and the hospitals did not.

Our pipe between the wellhead and the house did not survive the first of many rolling blackouts we had that day. A local plumber came up within a couple of hours and said no fix for us until Friday.

The rat bastard plumbers came up yesterday and told us they forgot a tool they needed and the pipes were still frozen but they would be back NEXT Wednesday. Although I suspect we could have gotten them to repair the pipes if we had sweetened their fee, we declined and started calling other plumbers.

But the plumber who came through was Stu! Two trips to town and a couple of hours later, we had water running through the pipes. The sound was sweet! But this also feeds my theory that the rat bastard plumbers just wanted to see how desperate (and willing to pay) we were. If Stu could fix the plumbing in about 90 minutes, surely they could have done the same, in less time, but probably with less care.

Four of the four people we have talked with in Talavera had frozen pipes. Last night I went out to check that the light in the wellhouse was still on (we put it there as a heat source so the well would not again freeze). All the neighbors I could see also had little glowing well houses...

Below is the new plumbing. A thing of beauty. Notice how well insulated it is!

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