I am writing this on Sunday.

Joe and Scottie — Married 1 month

The Sochurek wedding reception we went to last Sunday was nice. They had hors d’oeuvres, with a focus on Czech food. But parking was quite a drag. The reception was at Towson University. The closest parking garage and lot were both closed due to construction. I found a spot on the street right away, but Mike and Rose pulled up behind us and were at wit’s end. They had been looking for a spot for the last half hour. So I gave them my spot and took one across the street. It was a heck of a hill from the street to the building. Mike isn’t very mobile these days. After the reception, I pulled the car down to the building to give them a ride up the hill.

Tony & Donna – Married 40 years

There are times when it costs more to turn the AC (air conditioning) off than it costs to run it. This was quite a warm week — cool evenings, high 80s in the afternoons, then T-storms late in the day to cool things off again. Overnight lows were in the low 70s, making sleeping fine. The house was fine in the morning. Danita went to work and I went on a bike ride. But when we got home in the afternoon, we started thinking about how a restaurant has its air conditioning on. It wouldn’t be so warm and sticky. We could eat without turning the oven on, and it would feel so good. We finally ate at home Wednesday. The temperature got up in the 90s and I turned the AC on. But we went out Thursday because we had a great BOGO coupon that would expire soon. The highs went back down to the mid-80’s Saturday, so the AC went back off. It wasn’t as humid and the house was actually comfortable with all the fans on. But we went out to dinner anyway — this time a picnic concert in Catonsville. It was our only activity this weekend. The weather was wonderful, but the band was only so-so. The AC is back on today. It isn’t all that hot out, but it is very muggy. We just finished having quite a shower.

The one-year old stole the show

I visited Top Banana Wednesday. I saw a lot to like. It’s a small organization. Jean, the executive director, is one of two full-time employees. They have two more part-time office employees. A ReServe person does their marketing. They have a few truck drivers that work two days a week, and a raft of part time or volunteer folks who pack food in preparation for delivery, stock shelves, etc. All of this was more or less what I expected. But I was quite surprised with their computer setup. It is absolutely first-rate. It turns out that advantages can be had when the executive director’s two sons are in IT. Their problems are with a database program, but the program is so well secured that I couldn’t get inside it. Jean’s objective was to meet me. Having passed her interview with flying colors, she wants me to come back and meet her son, plus the part-timer who is the informal office IT expert. Jean wanted more of a commitment from me from the first visit, but one thing I know is that the database is not working. I don’t feel comfortable committing until I can look inside and see how much of a mess things are.

That’s it for this week. I hope this finds everybody doing well.

Note: There are no pictures this week.

I am writing this post on Sunday, June 23, 2013. My web service is so slow at sending the Emails that I schedule for “immediate” delivery that I felt I should include the year, just to make sure there’s no confusion. This has to be the only Email service that is slower than a newspaper. ;-(

This was a pretty busy week. Lots of bike riding. Lots of cleaning. Lots of parties. Lots of employment news.

I must admit, the bike riding is becoming a little tedious. The bottom line is, I think I’m ready to ride the Blue Ridge now. Of course, another couple of weeks of training won’t hurt, unless I hurt myself training. I didn’t want to be out over the July 4 holiday because there would be more people out over the 4th — more traffic, more competition for rooms, etc. I originally targeted to be done by the 4th. But Don said he wanted to come along, and he had other plans that delayed us until after the 4th. Now that the trip is delayed, he’s talking about how he’s not in shape for this and he might not have time to get into shape. What a mess. Whatever happens is going to happen. I’ll just have to wait a couple of weeks more.

We had so many party opportunities this week that we couldn’t do them all. Jan, one of the people Danita works with, had a party for the office staff at his house yesterday. Jan’s party conflicted with a neighborhood party. But this was the 4th or 5th time Jan had tried to hold this party. He started last summer. Every time he set a date, almost nobody was available to attend. Even yesterday, two of the office staff couldn’t attend. The party was so small we felt obligated. But it was a very nice time. Danita works with some nice people. Today we will be attending a wedding reception for the Sochurek’s children. The wedding already took place. We will be attending the Baltimore reception.

I talked about the floor cleaning last week. Most of everything came out grand, but the bathroom floors near the toilets came out less than perfect. So far, the tile and grout have been steam cleaned twice. They have been cleaned with super-duper cleaning solution. They have been cleaned with vinegar and baking soda. They have been cleaned with bleach. They are certainly cleaner now than they were when I started. And they are still short of perfection. At this point, if you have any tips for cleaning tile grout, please keep your tips to yourself. I decided my two choices were to pull the toilets up and re-grout, or declare the job done and get the grout sealed. I’m declaring the job done.

CASA called me back to take care of a problem. In an Email exchange, they agreed I had already solved this problem once, but they asked me to fix in one more time. I did that Wednesday morning. Since the job expires at the end of June, that pretty much closes the chapter on CASA and leaves me unemployed. Then GOC got interested in getting some help. I thought I might become un-unemployed. After the meeting last Friday and a follow-up Email Monday, there has been no response from them, leaving me un-un-unemployed. But Friday, I got a call from an organization called “Top Bananna”. This organization is in the DC area and delivers groceries to elderly that can’t get out. They have problems with their database. I’m driving down Friday to see if I think I can help. I’ll probably leave their office un-un-un-unemployed. It’s an hour drive,  but I will be able to do most of the work from home. Their executive director told me they receive $3,000 in groceries a week. I figure this limits them to no more than 100 clients. She also said she would probably see me & let me in when I walked up to their front door, so I figure they don’t exactly have an office full of staff. The $15 / hour stipend they pay to ReServe is probably a strain on their budget. This should be an interesting experience, if nothing else.

That’s the news for this week. I hope this finds everybody doing well.

Note: There are no pictures this week.

Whew! The craziness started Wednesday. We had carpet cleaners coming in. We’ve never had wall-to-wall carpet before. It turns out that no matter how much you vacuum, and even if you don’t have munchkins running around, after a while the carpet just gets dirty.  While we had them in, we also had them clean the bathroom tile floors professionally. Two young men showed up at the appointed time and did a wonderful job cleaning the carpet. Unfortunately, the tile floor didn’t turn out quite as well as the carpet, which is why a supervisor is visiting tomorrow morning (Monday). They have been very friendly about the tile floors so far. I think things will end up turning out fine. When the cleaners were done, it the weather outside was beautiful. So I got a nice little ride in and as well as getting the carpet cleaned.

The forecast Thursday morning said the morning would  be dry, followed by rain in the afternoon. I took a bike ride in the morning. We had a shower. Then we had a heavy shower. When that turned into a small T-storm, I headed for shelter. An abandoned factory had a large porch with a roof. This was a huge, rambling factory. The original main building was built with lots of cement and steel, so the structure was sound. But the roof had holes, there was broken glass on the floor, and graffiti on the walls everywhere. I felt like I was in a scene of a grade-B mystery story — you know, lightening, thunder, lots of rain, and surroundings that were in general just plain old spooky.

Friday was supposed to be clear in the morning and rainy in the afternoon, with a severe storm in the evening. The only problem with the forecast was, if you actually looked outside, it was already raining. It didn’t make any difference, because I had a meeting with GOC (my old employer). My old boss quit. They had nobody in the IT department. But they have to do some IT work. They called me up and asked if I was interested in contract work. After I said yes, I found out that they had connected a lot of dots. They were offering me a $10/hour position through ReServe. I object to that. I got the opportunity because of my previous job there and my knowledge of what they need. I turned down the ReServe offer, but attended the meeting anyway. We’ll see if they are willing to hire me. But the State of Maryland is not a charity organization, and trying to get me to do the work through ReServe was sneaky, and I’m not doing that. I suspect nothing will come of this. Anyway, when I got home, the weather was beautiful and I had quite a nice little ride in the afternoon. Plus I got to watch a short but intense T-storm in the evening.

Friday evening was a neighborhood “Chill & Grill”. Danita made an excellent desert, which completely disappeared. (A lot of residents don’t eat desert, so it’s unusual for a desert to disappear.)

Saturday we had perfect weather and I took my 65-mile training ride around Liberty Reservoir. I did it in 7:05 — not bad for an old man considering all the hills on this route. It was nice  because I used to have to detour around some road construction. But the construction is just about done and I was able to take the regular route and stop for a snowball on the way home. When got home, Danita offered to make a picnic dinner and we went up to Catonsville for an outdoor concert.

Today (Sunday) was the very last BSO concert. This was a free bonus concert. They had a special edition of the movie “West Side Story” which had the music removed from the sound track. The symphony played the music while we watched the movie. It was kind of like symphony karaoke. I was amazed at how well the symphony stayed in perfect synch with the movie. Or maybe they were bow-synching (like singers sometimes lip-synch when performing on an outdoor TV show).

Just in case you haven’t heard, my brother Rick moved. He is released from the nursing home and got an apartment. He is now living independently.

He doesn’t have Internet service yet, but hopes to get it soon.

That’s a lot of news for one week. I hope this finds everybody doing well.

Suzanne and Margo

Margo works for Danita at UMBC. Margo and Suzanne have been together for over 15 years. This year, MD liberalized their marriage laws. Margo and Suzanne got married today (Saturday). it was a very nice wedding. The ceremony was outdoors in brilliant sunshine. It was followed by a very nice reception at a building on the grounds. One advantage of getting married after being together for so long is that the principals can be themselves and have fun. Because I am married to Danita, I got to sit at the “power table” with Ray Hoff (who used to be the director of the research group), and Jan (who is currently the director of the smaller of the two groups Danita runs).

Painted Shoes – Birds that Mate for Life

If it had rained, the ceremony would have been in the barn. Then I would have been able to use my line about how gentlemen used to wear a tie when going to church and overalls when going to the barn. But it was sunny, the ceremony was outdoors, and I can’t use that line. The wedding had a lot of personal and hand made touches. The ladies painted their shoes. Suzanne’s theme was birds that mate for life. Margo’s theme was flowers, combined with the tree of life.

Our week was bookend-ed with rain. In between, we had great weather (as we did today), and I rode my bike. To do something a little different, I drove down to Northern Virginia. Most of Northern Virginia is what I call “Suburban Desert”. There’s not much reason to go there. But when I did the MS Cure ride two years ago, I discovered there is a section west of Dulles Airport that is beautiful country — farms, fields, and gently rolling hills; with the Blue Ridge Mountains occasionally defining the horizon. The ride was a victim of it’s own success. There were too many  bikers on two few roads. They don’t do that ride any more. I don’t have the routes I rode two years ago. But I found a promising route on the Internet. Wednesday, I decided to go down and try out the ride. Google said it takes an hour to drive there. Allowing 90 minutes with traffic and 7 hours for the ride, I should beat Danita home.

The ride was less than totally successful. The “best” route driving down took the Dulles Airport toll road. I drove through the toll booth and noticed they were charging my E-Z Pass $1.75. I judged that was a fair fare. Virginia got the drop on me, though. A few miles before I was to exit, I went through a second tool booth — $5.10. By the time I saw the sign, there was no option but to pay the toll. That was an outrages rip-off. Going home, I drove around the other side of Dulles Airport and paid no tolls. The second half of the bike ride was all Suburban Desert. It was simply miles I had to do to get back to the car. Not knowing the roads in the area, I decided to follow the plan and not try to find a shortcut. Finally, the drive back was a much slower than the drive down. It took 3 hours to do my 1-hour drive. I should have known.

But the first part of the ride was perfect. Perfect weather. Perfect country. Perfect roads. I started out going past a new wealthy area. These houses were so large, the 4-bay garages didn’t look at all out of place. I never got close to one of the houses, but it certainly looked like they were built with real stone. It also looked like the lots were about 10 acres. These people are not pretenders to wealth. Then I went through an upper class neighborhood. The “better” houses still had 4-bay garages, but the stone was fake, and houses were separated by 50 or 100 feet. It seemed to be an open-minded neighborhood. They allowed people in even if they could only afford a 3-bay garage. Sidewalks were everywhere and flowers were plentiful. After that, it was 35 miles of gorgeous country.

Antioch Baptist Church

I rode by Antioch Baptist Church. I didn’t take notes from the historical placard, and I couldn’t find the history on the Internet. But from memory, the church was founded “way back” in a log cabin (which is still standing). Then they built a stone building, but it was so poorly built it fell down from its own weight. (Maybe the placard didn’t use these exact words.) The building you see here is their third. The church was closed due to lack of members, but it opened up again in the early 1990s, and is active today. I don’t understand what it is that makes the past this important to some people.

Another placard noted the importance of the general area. Some Yankee soldiers, who had been soundly whooped by Johnny Reb, snuck out through this area to avoid capture. Also several Confederate generals bravely marched through the area, including J. E. B. Stuart, who started his “controversial” ride to Gettysburg here. I think this last point is funny, because most people would say that Stuart’s ride to Gettysburg was “disastrous”. The cavalry’s main job was to scout for the enemy. But J. E. B. got sidetracked and went up an adjacent valley while Lee was marching up the Shenandoah Valley. Lee knew he couldn’t win the war in a military sense. His objective was to win a major battle in the North’s territory and convince a dispirited enemy to give up. If J. E. B. had done his job, Lee might have been able to control the ground of that engagement. He might have had the high ground, instead of giving that advantage to the Union, and the US might be a very different country today. Only a Virginia historian could call that “controversial”.

Where do you think all these stones came from? I’ll bet they weren’t imported from Italy.

There were miles and miles of stone fences. It seemed to me that in places they built stone fences not because they needed the fence as much as they needed some place to put the stones. The fences were in excellent condition. I couldn’t even conceive of how much work it was to clear these stones, move them to where a fence was needed, and build the fence. There were incredible examples of extraordinary stone work. Unfortunately, I was having so much fun riding, looking, and thinking that I didn’t take pictures until near the end of the first half of the ride. The next picture shows an example of building a stone fence right into a tree. It is far from the best example of fancy stone work. Besides trees, I also saw incredible stone work around ditches, gulleys, and such.

Is a tree in the way of that stone fence? Just build the fence into the tree.

Long stretches of the ride had undisturbed woods on both sides of the road. The Cicadas were at their peak. (This brood doesn’t live in our area. We’ll be getting our Cicadas in 2021. Or so they say.) I didn’t see very many of the insects. (They hadn’t started dying off yet — they were staying in the woods and doing whatever it is they do during their short season.) But I certainly heard them. At times they were so loud that I couldn’t hear whether a car was coming up from behind. After the ride, when I was driving around behind Dulles Airport, it was a different sensation. I was going faster and the wooded areas near where I was driving weren’t as large. I would hear no insect sounds, then the Cicadas would quickly get loud, then quickly get soft, fading out to nothing.

One of the few things we just don’t have in Columbia is good Greek food. Considering how many Greeks live in Baltimore and how easy it is to get great Greek food up there, I’m at a loss to explain how one can go to a “good” Greek restaurant in Columbia and find that all Gyros are made with beef (there being no lamb anywhere on the menu). Thursday, Danita and I decided to go up to Baltimore and eat at Ikaros. We didn’t know this was the first evening of the annual Greek festival. Fortunately for us, the end-of-the-week rain had started, turnout for the first night of the festival was light, and we were able to find a parking spot. We had a very nice meal with good Greek food.

We have only one more party this week. Our neighborhood is having its strawberry social tomorrow. Last year, they forgot the ice cream. That certainly put a bit of a damper on the evening for Danita and me. We have it on good authority that the ice cream was missed by many. The forecast for tomorrow includes a 90% probability of ice cream.

That’s it for this week. I hope this finds everybody doing well.

Note: There are no pictures this week.

I lost my bike computer! I don’t know why they call them computers. They are really a combo digital watch and speedometer, and only cost $20 or so. When I was a kid, the coolest thing one could do to pimp a bike was to use a clothes pin and a playing card to add a motor sound by arranging the playing card to click against the wheel spokes. The second coolest thing one could do was to add a speedometer. That is, provided one could get the money. The speedometer was a hook that attached to the axle of the front wheel.  The hook sat against a spoke and rotated as the wheel turned. A shaft rotated inside a hollow flexible tube and was connected to the speedometer on the handle bar. These days, of course, everything is digitized. One mounts a magnet to a spoke on the front wheel. A magnetic pickup is mounted to the front fork. As the wheel spins, the magnet creates voltage pulses in the pickup, which are sent up a wire to the specially designed watch. It has tons of features. The battery lasts for 2 years or more. And in real dollars it’s probably cheaper than what I mostly couldn’t afford as a kid. Unfortunately, the readout unit is designed to be removable. Over time, mine got loose and removed itself somewhere along a Howard County roadside. In my case, the battery lasted the life of the speedometer. I could have visited bike shops looking for a new unit that was as cool as my old one. Or I could visit my good friend Amazon and get it delivered right to my door. The new unit delivered to my door is very nice, but it has one defect. They ship the unit with the battery removed. To show what the display will look like when it’s in use, they put a sticky transparent plastic cover over the display. When I got mine, it clearly said 21 MPH. The defect is, when I put the unit on my bike, it mostly said 12 MPH. I’m going to have to see if I can’t get those two digits swapped so it displays correctly. ;-)

It was a hot week, but good weather for riding. Friday I drove up to Jerusalem Mill and rode some of the old streets around Baltimore and Harford Counties. It was a lot of fun. You will be happy to know that the double-chocolate malted milkshakes at Jamie’s are as good as they ever were. (My route went right by there, just at the half-way point. What could I do? I’m sure it was just a coincidence. But having had the encounter,  I had to check it out.) I found things that changed as well as things that hadn’t. They added music to the patio at Jamie’s. The patio tables are still the same, and looking pretty grungy. Both were to the detriment of the establishment. But I had to forgive Jamie’s faults. How many places serve really great milkshakes these days?

Besides riding my bike, I also installed the new Wi-Fi unit in our clubhouse. I found that by moving it, I could get a great signal throughout the upstairs of the clubhouse. Somebody told me there’s even a good signal in the bathroom stalls. (That was a surprise to me. I never considered this to be important, but apparently at least one gentleman was delighted.)

I had two doctor appointments this week. I learned that I have good blood flow through my carotid arteries. I also had a psychometric evaluation, which takes a whole day. I failed almost every test. (The tests are designed to get harder until everybody fails. This maps out a person’s capabilities.) There was one test on which I had a 100% perfect score. Unfortunately, it means I am eminently qualified for the most boring and demeaning jobs. NEWS FLASH — early results are already in. I am better at some things than I am at others.

Our neighbors across the street are Gary and Sarah. Sarah has a job with the US Government. She doesn’t talk about her job much. An interviewer knocked at my door and asked questions about her. Do the police come to quiet boisterous parties? Does she spend a lot of time traveling to foreign countries? Is she trustworthy? Is there any reason to doubt her loyalty to the US? It seems that these folks always find a way to slide in the shocking question. I think they do it just to see if we’re paying attention. Years ago, it was “Is this person associated with the Boy Scouts?” (That’s back when the Boy Scouts were considered some kind of a subversive organization. It turns out the government might have been right. According to some, the Boy Scouts are subverting family values even as I write this!) The interviewer asked me if Sarah was associated with any organization that would threaten the privacy of US citizens. I was so shocked by the question, I blurted out, “You mean besides the US Government???” I hope Sarah gets to keep her job.

I received a new burden this week, and it’s laying heavy on my soul. We normally have trash pickup on Monday and recycle pickup on Thursday. Last Monday was a holiday, so pickups were delayed to Tuesday / Friday. Thursday morning, I saw our neighbor Gary (the husband) outside, and went across the street to tell him about my interview. While we were chatting, our next door neighbor Libby put the recycles out. She wasn’t the only one. Almost all of the houses put their recycles out a day too early. I warned Libby that pickup wouldn’t be until Friday. She said her benchmark was Gary, and Gary’s recycles were out. Gary advised her not to believe a word I said. Of course, the pickup was Friday. This weekend, Libby told me that *I* am now her benchmark for trash pickup. I never wanted all this responsibility! However, I was very happy I was right, because after all that, I couldn’t possibly put our recycles out Thursday “just in case”. I could have ended up with two-week-old wine bottles stinking up the garage.

That’s it for this week. I hope this finds everybody doing well.