Beaches Are Always Better

... when your tires are this fat.

Here, let's zoom out for the full view.

Not a fishing trip, merely a bike ride at St. George Island's state park.  From the East End it was an easy reach for the HT to the 2m Carrabelle repeater, even with that little rubber duck antenna.  Had a short conversation with a friend in Gulf Terrace, 100% clear audio.  Though it's hard to see in the picture, the Carrabelle water tower was in unobstructed view.

Total distance, something like 15 miles including the Gap Point Trail.  The ICT is a hoss to haul around over that kind of range, and this evening I am grateful for the miracle of ibuprofen.

More E-Bike Commentary

From over at youbuh toobuh:

• Your E-Bike Is Trash (And You're Delusional) 9 minutes of harsh truth.
• Why Bike Shops Won't Fix Your E-Bike 20 minutes of economic reality.

And don't do like my friend did, who bought one off Temu, punched the throttle, and didn't make it out of her driveway without broken bones.

Seriously folks, if you're thinking of a bike just get a real bike (and a helmet) and ride the damned thing.  If you go slow, nobody cares.

Meanwhile, Down at Battery Park...

The Florida Seafood Festival is going on this weekend.  Just walked home with an order of fried mullet roe.  Saw some friends while there, including the Seafood Queen and her family, and generally scoped out things for tomorrow.  While walking back under the bridge, spotted a pod of dolphins catching their supper too:

Will be back tomorrow, after the parade (10am), to have a plate of fried mullet and scope through the vendor booths.  Overall things looked really good.

Swift Slows Down

The Swift gamma ray burst observatory satellite fell back to Earth yesterday, ending its planned two year mission after twenty two years of fruitful observations.  Article at space dot com, and more details at NASA's Swift page.  It's a pity last summer's re-boost mission didn't go as planned, but the damned thing had already lasted eleven times its originally planned lifespan.  That's a decent return.

Here, have some theme music.

New Antenna Analyzer Exorcism

Ye Olde MFJ-259B antenna analyzer – purchased used over a decade ago – had been getting a tad rattly for several years, giving inconsistent readings until sharply rapped across the faceplate a few times.  Lately though it was increasingly unwilling to straighten out and measure right, and finally seems to have given up the ghost sometime between last winter's project – wait, projectS – and last week.  Unreliable, and it only goes went up to 170 MHz.  I'd always wanted the ability to get up into the 440 MHz band anyway, so... I went shopping and found a screaming deal on a like-new Comet CAA-500-mkII at MTC's used gear page (shown in inset).

The meter arrived today, so I had to do acceptance testing immediately.  Pressed the power switch and hey presto!  Batteries already installed, lit right up.  Attached a dummy load onto the MF–thru–VHF port and yep, 1:1 SWR.  Looked for the N-to-UHF adapter... search... grumble... find... attached dummy load, and yeah, nearly 1:1 SWR there too.  Tried a few other items at hand like this little UHF antenna – OK, it's all good.

Then my suspicious mind took over.  Wait, batteries already installed?  Hm.  After brand name battery disasters of years past, better check that out.  Two small screws later:

Why would anyone put these accursed objects in an expensive piece of test equipment?

Fortunately they hadn't yet started corroding and the fix was trivial.

Safe batteries installed.  Now I can sleep nights.  Relatively speaking, of course.

Now what to do with the old MFJ-259B?  It's almost certainly reparable, but probably not by me on my limited time budget.  I'll hang onto it for the moment and try to unload it in the most honest fashion – "broken, probably reparable, bargain price" – at the next hamfest.  Whenever that might be.

Onward.  I've got antennas to double-check.

November, November

Just a rainy day, very little going on.  Well, at least there's this:

I'm not complaining.

Out for a Walk

Just a nice picture of the Moon coming up from the end of the park pier.  No more comment needed.

Fluke Multimeter From Space!

Well, almost.  They flew one on a balloon to 105,000 feet, parachuted it back, then tested it.  Results?  Good as new.  Video here.  Also worth reading from previous posts:

• In praise of Fluke's 101 and 107 meters.  (But if you do anything electrical for a living, go with the 117 or one of their task-specific models.)
• Care and feeding – no high-zoot alkaline batteries!  (and no capes!)

Sure, that was just a marketing video, but you have to admit that it was a cool marketing video.  Seriously, just save yourself the trouble and expense.  Get a Fluke.  Buy once, cry once, yeah; but they're really not that expensive.

New Video by The Chats

May be, may not be your taste.  The car is pretty cool.  <link>

Carrabelle Repeater is Back Up

Antenna replacement day was Saturday, and blogging has been light because of that and other goings-on.  Anyway, here are the unchanged frequencies:

Frequency: 145.23 MHz

Offset: -600 kHz (standard, probably the default on your radio)

PL Tone: 123 Hz

and here is a coverage map of this and other nearby repeaters:

Actual coverage will depend upon your station.  This is fairly representative for a vehicle with a decent antenna.

That is all for today.  I have bikes to work on.

I Was Planning on Fat Biking Yesterday Morning...

After watching that SpaceX launch.  But instead there was an unexpected opening at the dentist's office I'd been trying to get into, so no fat bike for the moment.  That's OK, because here are two looks at the Surly Moonlander.  Admittedly my ICT is a model-step down from this particular beast, but it's got a lot of the same welded-in fun-factor.

• In Which Berm Peak Tests It (28 minutes).  Two quotes: "You get up some speed on this thing and you start to see your life flash before your eyes." and "The bike doesn't need to make sense to make fun."
• In Which Surly Asks Berm Peak To Send The Bike Back After He's Kept It A Year (17 minutes).  Instead, he called them back and said he'd really like to keep it and how much money y'all want? and he bought it.  Once you try fat tires, it's unimaginable to live without.

Well, I feel like somebody's punched me in the right jaw after the dentist visit, and in a week or so I go back to get punched on the left side.  Eh, probably worth it in the long run.  Though I wish the pain was from falling off a bike, not something so mundane as a dental deep cleaning.

ps: 

• In which Berm Peak goes rock crawling (10 minutes).  Possibly the weirdest gearing ever seen on a functioning mountain bike.

And Today Brought Quite a Lot

Best pic of the bunch, from the Avenue E wharf:

Gratuitous Pelican has other things on his mind.

ps: Those are pilings to keep boats off the dock on a high tide.  Though they do sort of look like off-kilter obelisks.  

The SpaceX Bandwagon-5 launch went off right on time at 7:04 EDT this morning.  From this far north the launch initially looked like a red dot climbing up from the horizon, then quickly transitioned into a recognizable exhaust plume within seconds, and finally into the "space jellyfish" dispersed plume you see here.

This was maybe 30 seconds before the other picture.

Definitely worth getting up a tad early.

And It's a Scrub

SpaceX Bandwagon-5 launch delayed due to poor weather conditions at the booster recovery site.  Launch re-scheduled for at soonest tomorrow.

Pack it up, see what tomorrow brings.

On The Beach #2

Again, from an isolated, undisclosed location.  Today with full load-out.  Tried for a redfish, no luck.  I was a little late on the tide.  Anyway, it was a great bike ride.

Fear the fat.  It'll roll right over you.  Your back gonna look like a waffle.

Took one route out, one route back: first on a patchy washed-out road down the center of the island, then returned via beach.  The beach way is slightly easier but a boring ride, while the center road is extremely varied: gravel, sandy double-track, wet sandy double-track, soft sand drifts over whatever was still there, wash-out!, more gravel, then damp bayfront hardpack.  Way more fun.

Interestingly enough, another rider was right at the trailhead and on a vintage Surly Cross-Check no less.  This is the direct ancestor of my Straggler, though his was set up as a flat-bar singlespeed.  He made a good effort of it, making it maybe 3/4 of the way there before the sand drifts got the better of him.  It's good to know that I could probably pull this ride off on the Straggler – however the ICT is far better suited for the job.  The 4.8" tires handled the fluffy stuff without drama, though I'm sure that something down to 3.8" would work nearly as well.

Finally, here's a profile shot of a blue heron keeping watch on me.  You know, just in case.

In Case You Missed It

... last Tuesday, SpaceX has another near-dawn launch scheduled for next Monday.  As sent by a friend:

Confirmed by a quick grok query:

Yes — there is a SpaceX launch scheduled for next Monday (October 19, 2026):
Bandwagon-5, a dedicated mid-inclination rideshare mission on a Falcon 9.

• Targeted time: Launch window opens at 6:30 a.m. EDT (10:30 UTC) from SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida.
• The booster is expected to land on the droneship A Shortfall of Gravitas (ASOG).

After that, the next ones currently listed include Starlink Group 15-15 (Tuesday, October 20 from Vandenberg) and Starlink Group 15-16 (around October 24 from Vandenberg). Schedules can change, so checking sites like Next Spaceflight, Spaceflight Now, or SpaceX’s launches page closer to the date is recommended.

See you down along the waterfront.  Or maybe not, I'll be looking upward and east.  The weather forecast is clear and cool, about 60ºF.

October Sky

One of the perks of living in Florida is an occasional sky light show.  Here are two pics of yesterday morning's SpaceX launch, sent by friends.

Frustratingly, I was up at the time but didn't happen to look out my kitchen window.  Eh, maybe next time.  Also, if the name of this post rings a bell, it's from the 1998 book and its 1999 film adaptation, both of which I heartily recommend.

A Case of the Post-Storm Blahs

You know how everyone takes a soft week after a close call with a hurricane?  That's this week.

Yesterday I was getting the fat bike ready for a redfishing expedition – rod holder: check, pannier bag: check, tackle box: check, etc. – when it occurred to me to check the tide table.  Dead low at 9:30 this  morning, that is to say, exactly dead wrong for fishing.  And while the weather is downright pleasant these day, highs in the mid-80's are still a tad warm for exploring sandy woods trails.  Eh, kick those things back to next week, ride the gravel bike around town today.  Maybe get with that VHF antenna this afternoon.  Because this bike needs a VHF antenna.

In other bike-related thoughts, 

• a 2024 interview with Dirt Rag co-founder Maurice Tierney.  49 minutes.
• annoying-but-funny dude switches to flat pedals for a month.  My take?  Flats have their place for me (eg: on the fat bike) and for the right rider are the right choice anywhere, but having ridden clip-ins for over three decades now, for serious biking I'm not switching.  Also, the claimed 20% extra power in those maximum-effort bursts (see the video) makes them worth it.
• Riding the gravel bike out to the EOC a couple of times this week reminded me of why I both love and hate road biking.  Love: speed, clean speed.  Hate: the guy who has to pass on a double-line curve – and nearly head-ons another truck 100' in front of me.

That is all for the moment.  Maybe I'll get back onto slow-scan TV, now that the summer thunderstorms have somewhat abated.  Then at least I'll have some interesting graphics to intersperse into these walls of text.

ps, somewhat later in the day:

Good to finally see.

All Clear – I Think

Haven't yet had a chance to look around outside yet – just getting daylight here – but things seem more or less OK this far east of landfall.  In many ways a replay of 2020's Hurricane Zeta (#6, #7), but worse for those near the X.  These October storms that come up from near the Yucatan Peninsula are unpredictable and dangerous.

Will give it a look as soon as we have good daylight.

ps later Saturday: 40 mph sustained with 55 mph gusts, tides 5' over normal.  The Hole overflowed onto Bay Avenue, but just barely.  Here's a photo of the trash line, right down the middle.

The Terabyte Coffee Machine

Article at cybernews.  TLDR: An internet-attached Keurig machine blurped out an astonishing amount of data over the users' home network connection.  Probably a bug.  Wry commentary follows.

Do you ever look at something and think to yourself, "This makes no freekin' sense."?  I don't mean the fact that a coffee machine pushed out 1,000 gigabytes of data in ten days, that was almost certainly a glitch in its network system.  I mean, why in the name of St. Kaldi would anyone hang a coffeepot on the internet?  When a heat-producing device is at hand and best operated by hand, does it in any way shape or form need this capability?  It's akin to having a remote control for a car radio, except worse because it reaches out into the rest of the world – and lets that world reach into your coffee pot.

Look, the internet of things has its uses, but you'd better have some competent programming and real security to back it up.  A coffeepot isn't worth the trouble.  Best comment is in the inset image.

Back to your regularly unscheduled October Surprise hurricane.

Close.

As of right now, things are probably OK, but we'll see.

Will be busy for a couple of days, might need a little maneuvering room here.

A Link To: A Media Guide to Amateur Radio

Suitable for emailing to your favorite media outlet, with its own pdf link included, at KB6NU.

Good stuff, both for media folks, or just good background in a compact form for everyone else.

In other news, rain rain go away.

Looks like it will be a few more day.  [sic: dropped the 's' to keep the rhyme]

When cool weather gets here, I just can't say.

Two antenna climbs scheduled for first clear day.

Well that was pretty bad, but being rained in since last Thursday does something to people.  Storm drains here are being pressed to their limits, even after all of the repair efforts by the City over the past year.  Good thing those repairs have been made, we'd be somewhat literally up the creek without 'em.  "Pack it up, see what tomorrow brings."

Raccoons Borrowed My Bike – The Comic Series

It's somewhat less literal than the title, mostly drawings of animals and off-road bikes & related gear, with wry commentary below about the sort of riders and other people who do something somewhat related to the critter in the cartoon.  Best bike art I've seen since the early days of Dirt Rag.  It was supposed to be compiled into a book, but I can't find an actual working link anywhere.  If I can, I'll post it – right after I buy a few copies.  Anyway, here's the link to the 12 installments of 5 series at nsmb.com.

 

A small sample of what's in store.  Still can't find the book though.

Two Transportation Reveals Set For November

• REO Trucks has their initial design for their new Runabout scheduled for sometime this November.
• Surly Bikes has... something? scheduled for announcement on November 2nd.  No idea.

In the market for one, probably not in the market for the other.  We shall see.

Coffeeneuring '26

Briefly, the rules have been announced here.  Starts October 10th, runs thru November 25th.  Give or take; there seems to be some play in the rules with "Early Bird" this and "Secret Bonus Day" that.  Eight rides of at least 2 miles each, eight cups of coffee.

My "probably not" thoughts here.  OTOH, maybe I will this year.  You never can tell until these things happen, or they don't.  Maybe start it and fail to complete.  That sort of fits the mood of life these days anyway.

On This Rainy Saturday

Go read a book.  Which book?  See previous post.

Four Your Consideration

Through following links from an email I received yesterday, I stumbled across this some-months old article:

4 Sci-Fi Books Veterans Say Every Service Member Should Read Once

TLDR, from the closing paragraphs:

Starship Troopers asks what duty is worth.  The Forever War asks what war takes from those who survive it.  Armor asks what repeated combat does to the mind.  Old Man's War asks what happens when the military rebuilds a person for its own needs.

To be clear, the last time I swore an oath and wore a uniform was in the Boy Scouts.  (I did get kicked out for fighting though, so there is that.)  Nonetheless, I've read Starship Troopers many, many times and have read Old Man's War and even reviewed it here.  Armor and The Forever War however have thus far escaped me.  Will get on these two over the winter.

On The Beach

And from an isolated, undisclosed location.

BTW, those objects nailed to the piling are decorated palm frond bases.  Seems to be a thing now.  These were also all over some old pier pilings on the way there.  Not my thing, but it does liven it up a bit.

The concept, the bike, my legs & lungs: all worked great.  I was able to average 8 mph over a 15 mile out-and-back route.  The pace was deliberately moderate today because I had no idea how little or much energy it would take, and I didn't want to run out on the way back.  I needn't have worried.  Could push it and maybe averaged 10 mph.  A lot will depend on the tide, and whether the hard-pack down by the water is covered.  If I have to ride up in the soft part above the average tideline this could drop to 5 mph.

One more thing: Yes, it was probably wise to go with these fatter 4.8" tires vs. the narrower (but still mighty wide) 3.8's on the more all-rounder Wednesday.  Down on the hard-pack it probably wouldn't have made any difference, but when traversing the loose stuff I was wanting all the tire I've got (and maybe a tad more a couple of times).

Anyway, success!  I'm looking forward to the coming cooler weather, but today's 85º was entirely tolerable.

Cheap-o Helmets

Article about these cooler-styro-grade POS's at Singletracks.

TLDR Takeaways from the article:

1. Know the helmet brand.
2. Look for safety features / safety technology.
3. Expect to pay at least $50 for a safe helmet.  (added: at least $50 – but realistically, budget more for $100, and be pleasantly surprised if it comes in lower.  I mean, what's a whole bunch more comfort and safety worth?)

Those are good, but if you're new to bikes, knowing the brand and knowing what tech to look for may not be in your realm of knowledge.  Here, let me add a few more:

• Buy your helmet from a local bike shop, because you can try it on, and fit really matters.  For that matter, so does supporting your LBS.
• If you don't have a LBS and have to order online, buy from a bicycle-specific vendor.  Amazon's getting crap-tacular lately, being flooded with cheap garbage.  And don't even get me started on some of the more general merch sites.  Anyway, my two go-tos these days are Cambria Bike and Modern Bike.  YMMV.
• If it has a goofy name like "GuudLuk," well, you already know.

Graphics?  No, not really today.  The linked article has some though.  On second thought, here's an oldie-but-a-goodie from this 2012 post:

Not pizza sauce.

Kunstler Ruminates

On suburbia, the somewhat thwarted promise of New Urbanism, and how a decentralized project to re-make American towns into places worth living in has gone off the rails.

The Late, Great Debate about Suburbia, an Apologia

It's a worthwhile if slightly depressing read.  I have my own thoughts on these and related matters but will keep them to myself for now, being in the middle of various situations.  However you can glean that I'm largely in sympathy with Kunstler's views on these matters simply from that fact that I'm posting this link.

Learning to Shift for Yourself

A two minute video on a school that teaches how to drive a manual transmission, from CBS News via youtube.  One of those little trials we all should pass.

Coffeeneuring in 2026

I received the email notice two days ago that The 2026 Coffeeneuring is go, and will begin on Saturday October 10th.  I like the idea, and there's an off chance that I'll participate this year, but most likely not.  The entire event more or less culminated for me in 2020, on my first official day of retirement, and in the aftermath of Hurricane Zeta no less.  After moving to Apalach I participated again in 2021, but with the two coffee shops in town only one and two blocks away, and local bike friends being not at all into the event, it felt vaguely contrived.  (note: not in general, just for me in this location)  Especially in comparison to epic multi-county treks to cool little book-and-coffee places, or to an alligator-haunted private palm tree paradise, or to that very first run downtown to the Mockingbird back in '17.  Kind of hard to top.

Anyway, Coffeeneuring returns, and is worth a mention here.  It is fun and worthwhile, if your locale suits.  Here's the main site, watch for any coming details.  And who knows, I might jump in after all.

Equinox Noted

Time marches onward and two of the local palm trees have marched upward, so my usual living room equinox light show – in which the rising sun formerly beamed through the kitchen window, bounced off a picture of a gargoyle, to a picture of Horus, and finally onto the living room wall shared by my office – anyway, it seems to be a thing of the past.  At least, so long as those two palm trees block the way.  And yes, I realize that sounds like something out of Raiders of the Lost Ark, but I swear it all just happened by accident.  Anyway, the inset picture is from spring 2023.  I had forgotten until I looked it up just now how bright that reflection had been.

Also worth mentioning, here's an old post noting this day in aviation history when, 22 years apart, the B-29 and B-70 prototypes first took wing.  What a Difference 22 Years Makes  Somehow, 2004 just doesn't seem all that long ago.

Finally, I see that the morning cool forecasts for this Thursday, Friday, & Saturday have been revised downward to 65º.  I'll take it!

ps: Speaking of weird chance celestial alignments, take a look at today's NASA APOD.  Huh.

pps: We seem to have the leading edge of the first ragged cold front about to pass over.  Ragged or not, I'll take it.

Sweet relief.

Fall Weather

I see that Tuesday's the fall equinox, and at 8:04pm EDT to be precise.  Let's check the forecast...

88º!  Well, with the equinox so late on Tuesday, maybe fall's in store for Wednesday?  Huh, 89º, hm.

On the bright side, lows Thursday, Friday, and Saturday are in the 60's – admittedly, the high 60's –  but at least that's something.

Maybe later, punkin' spice.  Definitely not in September around here.

Out In the Hot Early Fall Sunshine

Sprayed frame protector lube up into the ICT today.  Messy, but at least I've (sort of) got the job down now.  Here's a link to last year's spray job on the Straggler, which includes a link to a how-to video.

Bleh.  Now I've got to clean all the outside stuff with windex and put it all back together.  Pain in the butt, but for a steel bike that's going to see beach action it's a mandatory before-you-go treatment.

On the easy side of things, one of the guys at Epic Bikes recommended putting tubeless tire sealant into the tubes, rather than going full tubeless on fat bikes.  Injecting the sealant was both neat and painless, to my great surprise and relief.

Just... Around... The... Corner...

Today's xkcd:

Meanwhile here in NW FL, August continues into its 48th day.

It's the Little Adjustments

It's the little adjustments that make a bike your own.  Epic Bikes set the ICT up right, but they can't know about when I broke my left wrist in 4th grade and so I prefer the left brake lever slightly higher.  Nor do they have my notebook with 30 years of "now it feels right" measurements all on paper.  Again, they set it up right, but not exactly dialed down to right.  Right in the ballpark though, and a good starting point.  Perfectly rideable right out the door.

One example of this dialing in that will actually show up on camera is with the back rack.  Here's the before pic:

and after:

Apart from the time of day (and wow did that change the apparent paint color), the change is subtle.  Initially, the rack bolts protruded just enough to occasionally knick the inside of my knees.  Rearranging things so that the support rods run to the inside of the frame bosses changed all that for the better.  I don't mind occasionally bumping a smooth seat stay when standing up, but scraping across a square-shouldered bolt head was a little much.

Another example of dialing the bike in was the choice of pedals, Raceface Rides.  Flats, OK, but why relatively inexpensive ones without metal teeth?  Simply because I don't want to tear up my fishing shoes while riding this thing.  At the same time though, the plastic teeth give enough grip for off-road.  Certainly not  as grippy as metal – call it an engineering compromise.  Surprisingly, they can be serviced and there are even rebuild kits from the manufacturer, not something I'd expect at their $40-ish price point.  We'll see how they hold up, but in any case they are easily replaceable.

Anyway, it's these sorts of things that need dialing in for the first month or so, before a bike is ready for serious use.  Don't ever be afraid to take a wrench to your new bike.  It's yours, after all.  Might as well get it right.

More Meh, this time on VHF

SG comments on how the VHF contest weekend was going Saturday: about what I expected.

VHF has its uses, but they are mostly limited to practical line-of-sight work here in the flatlands of the Gulf Coast.  The fun propagation effects you get in mountainous terrain just aren't here.  Best part of the whole post was the term "August 43rd" to describe the weather.

Anyway, after reading SG's comments I didn't bother and moved on to other matters.  September here in the Infra-Deep South is a frustrating time of waiting, and trying to keep spirits up while getting plans and gear ready for cooler weather.

Meh.

Not nothing, but nothing to freak over.

Rode the fat bike today, made a few more adjustments.  More tomorrow.

Down at the Bike Shop

 Last week they received the summons:

And this week they delivered.  Hoo boy, did they ever deliver:

Yes, that's a palm tree it's leaning against.  Of course it's a palm tree.  Rum bottle not included.

It's a Surly Ice Cream Truck fat bike.  For starters, it's near stock with only the addition of the manufacturer's fat bike-specific rear rack and a set of Race Face Ride pedals.  Epic Bikes in Tallahassee delivered it pretty well dialed and ready to go.  Too bad it was raining so hard yesterday, or I would've ridden Munson on the way home.

So, there's the obvious question of Why?  Simply because, while there are no real bike trails nearby, there are any number of crappy, sandy, multi-use woods trails around here as well as several suitable stretches of beach.  None of these are all that great for hiking, but with something that can cover some ground a bit faster, now that can make them interesting and worthwhile.  At least, that's my hope.  Well, cooler and dryer weather is right around the corner, and we shall see.

More later.  I need to go find a rum-themed bike bottle.

Four Out of Three

Earlier, I briefly mentioned that I had a batch of ham students going for their test Thursday evening.  All three passed the foundational Tech test, and then two tried the next step General test with one passing.  I'm proud of all of them.  Now the real work begins – getting them on the air.

Bonus Tab-Clearing Post: Leon Sinks Geological Area

Planning on a day trip once the weather cools a little.  Links:

• https://www.fs.usda.gov/r08/florida/recreation/leon-sinks-geological-area
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Sinks_Geological_Area
• https://floridahikes.com/leon-sinks/

Wow but that is a beautiful picture of Big Dismal, shamelessly stolen from the first link:

Expect a follow-up post in the coming months.

Peak Hurricane Season, and...

Noted not gloated.

(Was that ever a saying?  It sounds so trite and flippant that it should have been, decades ago.)

Anyway, on to today's NHC forecast:

I'll take it!

I've got a batch of students going in for their Tech ham license test this evening, and many-many more interesting things for  later this week.  Stay tuned.

Bonus Tab-Clearing Post: The Fall of the USSR in Two Podcasts

Kind of lightweight, but still a good survey of the late 80s into the early 90s over at Stuff You Should Know.  About an hour for each segment.

• Part 1
• Part 2

Bonus Tab-Clearing Post: Doomsday Ain't What It Used To Be

Over at JMG's weekly essay blog: Economics: The Y2K Fallacy Revisited

Or, why bad times won't necessarily be all that bad.  Just keep your head out of the sand, out of the gloomy clouds, and on straight.  Push come to shove, we still have plenty of paper how-to books in libraries.

Bike Repair Stand Score!

So I dropped by the local bike shop this morning, and some guy who's moving had dropped off a bike repair stand just to get rid of it.  The owner didn't have any use for it, so he moved it on down the line to... me.  It's the same model as in the picture, though that's not my picture nor is it my stand.

Never had a bike stand before, though I have used any number of them through the years.  I'm sure I'll get decades of good use out of it.  In fact, I have one of these frame protector spray jobs coming up, and I'm sure this stand will be a great help.

Anyway, Skunk Monkeys Bike Shop, 41 Market Street, Apalach.  Great folks.

Bonus Tab-Clearing Post: Cave Rescuers Use Ground-Penetrating Digital Radios

Waaaay down in the 2200m band around 137kHz.  This article at Dan Romanchik's blog initially alerted me to it, but here are all the other links:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrsuT64SFB4
• https://qrp-labs.com/qdxm.html
• https://makezine.com/article/electronics/cave-radio-talking-through-solid-rock/
• https://calgaryherald.com/news/local-news/new-rock-piercing-radio-tech-helps-rescue-tourist-trapped-in-canmore-area-cave

Interesting stuff.  If I had any spare time and collaborators, I'd look into how this band propagates across large bodies of salt water.  Vertically polarized, of course.  If I get around to building something, I'll call a few friends over by Biloxi, or maybe contact some Tampa area hams.  Yeah, real soon now.

Reminder to Self: ARRL September VHF Contest This Weekend

It runs from 2pm on Saturday to 11pm on Sunday.  Think I'll try at least to pick up some 6m traffic.  Since putting up the new antenna last winter, I've barely been using it.  Anyway, links:

• https://thesilicongraybeard.blogspot.com/2026/09/alright-hams-next-big-vhf-contest-is.html
• https://www.contestcalendar.com/weeklycont.php#20591
• https://www.arrl.org/september-vhf    <---<<< Rules.  Kind of important.

Sorry, no spiffy graphics for this post either.

Bonus Tab-Clearing Post: Physics and AI

Article over at Quanta.  Impossible to describe, go read the whole thing.

And yes, Demers' take is pretty close to mine too.

Bonus Tab-Clearing Post: Bears, Bear Spray, and Pistols

A look at the actual data at The Truth About Guns

TLDR: Use what you have at hand.  They both work, and the differences are statistically meaningless.  Use one.  Use both.  Use whatever's legal.  Use whatever you've got.

Fingers Crossed...

I'll just leave this here, and leave matters well enough alone.

Year of the Straggler

And it's been a great year on the new bike that still hasn't seen any real adventure.  No new pics, just rides around, through, up, over, and occasionally under town.  For a nice pic, see the original post announcing the acquisition.  Also, see the one month review.  Hopefully it'll see some roads up in Tates's Hell Swamp this winter and a little more adventure, or at least a trip to the Dwarf Cypress Forest.

As for changes, not really many.  Added a seat bag, have a handlebar bag ready to go.  Shorter stem, dropping from 100mm to 70mm; makes all the difference in handling.  Um... the shop here in town replaced a broken spoke, but that's not really an upgrade, nor even much of a change.  Rebuilt the pedals.  Wore out the rear stock tire; replaced it with a Ritchey SpeedMax, which is marginally faster.  I guess that counts as an upgrade.  Anyway, none of this has substantially changed the look of the bike, so that initial picture still holds.

Thinking back to getting this bike just before and unbeknownst to me the release of the new model, I'm glad I have the one I have.  I'd always admired the Straggler's predecessor, a model called the Cross-Check which was essentially the same bike with rim brakes.  Also, I was curious about Avid mechanical disc brakes, which are not on the latest version.  If I had the latest model, I'd have always wondered about what I'd missed.

All told though, I am quite surprised at the lack of pics of the bike in the photo album.  Will have to remedy that soon.  Cooler weather is just around the corner, and adventure awaits.

The Calendar Says "Fall"

But the weather says "not quite yet."  At least with my cleaning frenzy of last week, my sweaters have been located.  They'll probably be needed in a month – or two.

ps, later in the day:

The view is facing east; the red hue is sunset reflected off the fluffy popcorn clouds over Tate's Hell Swamp.  Definitely a September sky, even though the thermometer is saying "yeah, but not too far out of August either."

More Tropical Slop

Stuck inside for the... third day now.  Yes, that is a center of rotation around some weak tropical system south of the Alabama beaches, but I don't think it'll amount to much.   Neither does the NHC, which is comforting.

Anyway, I've been promising myself that I'd do some Deep Re-Arranging & Ditching of Crap around the house some nasty August days, and those days have arrived.  One weekday next week after the weather clears, I'll be taking a pickup truck load to the dump.  Still plenty of work to go, but it looks like we'll have plenty of ugly weather too.  "Make hay while the sun shines"?  "Clear junk while the rain falls."

Speaking of ugly weather, it's Katrina+21 day today!  Yes, Katrina's old enough to have a drink.  video  No mention in the Sea Coast Echo (the BSL newspaper), though I see that things have gone trendy in the old stomping grounds.

Let's finish with something good today, a breezy 15 minute run-through of how mountain bike tech has evolved since its start.  I love all the new stuff: 1x drivetrains, decent suspension, disc brakes, improved geometry, even dropper posts.  Better yet, we're seeing steps towards simplifying the new tech, making it easier to work on.  All good stuff.

I Know The Names Are Picked Months In Advance

But still there's a certain, eh, call it coincidence that this week's storm is named Dolly just after Dolly Parton's death.  Anyway, the NHC's current forecast has it weakening to a tropical depression and drifting into the Caribbean over the weekend, before dissipating in the face of El Nino year winds.  I've seen worse late Augusts.

Bookmarked Here for Future Use

Patrick Winston on How to Speak.  One hour at youtube.

If you haven't seen it already, probably worth your hour.

Re-Read Ringworld Engineers

Published in 1979 to tie up the many, many loose ends from his 1970 novel Ringworld (mentioned earlier here), it holds up well, even better than the first one.  Might get around to the remaining two books in the series later this year, but I need a break from Niven stories for the moment.

Perhaps the most entertaining part of the book is the dedication in the front matter, where the author details all of the, um, help he had from True Fans (that last really needs the old html <blink> tag) in fleshing out the Ringworld itself.  Obsessive proofreading.  Design for a seafloor sediment recycling system.  Calculations for the minimum tensile strength of the underlying structural material.  MIT students chanting at a sci-fi convention about the inherent instability of solid rings orbiting stars.  Even Freeman Dyson(!!) got in on the letter writing.  In the end it was all too much for Niven, so he had to write this book.  Honestly, the first one is incomplete without this, so if you read the first, be prepared to dive into the second immediately.  Well, maybe sandwich Protector between reading the two, mostly for the break but also for some in-universe background.

Adventures planned, so onward with the day.

Another Little Rant About e-Bikes

And this time, it's  somebody else for a change!  Listen now and hate me later, but at least hear the mechanic speak (9 minutes).  Especially that part at the very end.  All brutal, but all true.

You can find my previous thoughts on the matter here and here.

Book Mention: Take Me to Your Leader

Continuing this week's alien theme, I finally finished reading through Neal deGrasse Tyson's latest book, Take Me to Your Leader last night.  It's a fun little romp through all of the pop culture, credible sworn testimony, conspiracy theories, and blurry pictures of the last eighty or so years, along with reasonable musings on the Fermi Paradox, what forms extraterrestrial life (and their perceptions and senses) might take, etc. etc.  With all that, we are left with one stark, undeniable observation:

There is not one whit of actual evidence of alien visitation.  No artifacts, no hard data, and – despite upwards of seven billion digital cameras on this planet – no unambiguous pictures.

With that uncomfortable truth in mind, the author plows forward with his usual good-natured skeptical, slightly sarcastic way, considering all sides of the issues and philosophical conundrums.  It is very clear that he's open to any evidence, even an outright personal abduction.  However, to date, there just isn't any there there, and he's quick to gently point this out.

Recommended, but only if you generally like this sort of thing.

Finally, if you do manage to get yourself abducted, please take Seth Shostak's advice and pocket an alien artifact on your way out the door/hatch/portal/whatever.  We've all had more than enough of heartfelt testimony on these matters.  It's time for a metamaterial multitool, or whatever else they're using these days.  Plonk it down on the table in front of skeptics, say a hearty "nyeh-nyeh-nyeh," donate it to the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, write a bestseller, and enjoy the good life.