First ride of the year!

Hello dedicated reader(s)!  Welcome back to the blog.

A few days ago I took the Giant Defy and newish Garmin Edge 500 computer out for a spin.  18 miles at 13mph...not too shabby considering.  I still have winter weight (and Iowa weight) to lose and many miles to put into my legs before that average speed goes up.  But I'm happy at doing 18 miles with little to no trauma.

The Giant Defy is much more comfy with it's new saddle.  I'm still not a fan of the Shimano 105 and triple chainrings, but it sure is smooth and makes hills easy.  One of these days I'll get around to fitting SRAM gear on it.

The new house (well, a year new anyhow) is awesome.  I've got an area of the basement all scoped out for a little bike shop.  Job is good, all is good up here in the corn fields.  The mild winter and early spring have been fantastic.

Carry on.

Cycling through the Corn

Howdy, any faithful viewers that may still be around.  It's been awhile.  To bring you up to speed, I got laid off from Pfizer, enjoyed 6 months of leisure (while getting my unemployment check taxed, thank you Government) and then found a job with a large agricultural company.  In vast irony, this company is headquartered in St. Louis, but my job is in Des Moines, Iowa.  Working on robots, of course.  I moved up here, bought a house, and Bob's your uncle.  All that happened around the beginning of 2011.  Now it's nearly the end of June.

I just got back from a short ride with my new Garmin Edge 500.  Mitch the Mashor indirectly introduced me to the marvel of GPS bike computer technology, and I finally took the plunge.  It's great.  Now I can have one computer to easily move between my numerous and varied bikes, no pesky sensors or other nonsense to worry about.  It updates the speed pretty quickly...I'm not sure how they do that, being based on GPS and all.  And of course I can upload rides to Garmin Connect and ponder my pitiful performance.  All in all, based on one test ride, I give it two thumbs up.

As well, the test-mule for this ride was the mysterious Giant Defy 1.  I bought the Giant a couple of years ago, simply because it was such a gorgeous bike.  Geometry seemed good, everything seemed fine...but I never got comfortable on it.  I've decided to give it another go, because it really is a nice bike.  Put a new seat on it - the Arione Versus or whatever the newer one is.  Seems comfy so far...albeit it was a 2mile ride around the subdivision in cargo shorts.  I still think it's a nice bike, hopefully I can pin down whatever isn't "right" for me and turn it into a workhorse.  It may get upgraded from Shimano 105 (triple crank, blech) to some nice SRAM Force this winter.

So there you go.  I'm in Iowa.  It's ok.  Not the best, I still miss STL, but it's not so bad.  And the bike trails can't be beat.  Time to go cook some dinner.  Take care dear reader, if there are any left!

Life With Corn

Actually it's just a bunch of empty corn fields, as winter is just now being beat back by spring.  As a quick update, I'm up in Iowa, in my new house (closed Feb 10th, thank you) and settling in.  Job is going well, my first robot project is about to switch to production work, house is awesome (three car garage, yeah!) and the bike trails are as vast and asphalt-y as anyone could wish for.  Seriously there must be 80+ miles of interconnected, luxuriously paved trails going every which way up here.  I've even seen a few cyclists out on the roads, so it may be a popular pastime here.

Life away from my family and friends in STL has been a bit lonely, but I keep in touch and travel back down from time to time.  I'll adapt, I'm still new here.

Technology in the Corn

My migration to Iowa continues unabated.  Realtor contacted and in motion, movers scheduled, blah blah blah.  All very exciting, especially while trying to organize Christmas concurrently.

Due to the "aggressive timeline", I'll be in short-term housing for a month or two until I get into a house.  During that time, my main PC (and most of my other belongings) will be in storage.  The Droid is great as a miniature computer, but its small screen and tiny keyboard make casual web surfing, blog updating, and email composing less relaxing than I'd like.

Enter CostCo.  They have the Acer Aspire One netbook for $300.

It fits the bill as a temporary computer perfectly!  I can use the WiFi to do email, surf the web, etc. etc. with a relatively comfortable keyboard and screen.  8 hour battery life means I'm not tied to a power outlet.  And then I remembered that with the latest update, the Droid can serve as a WiFi hotspot!  So here's the scenario.  I'm driving to Des Moines.  I get the urge to update this blog.  I pull into a convenient location, fire up the Droid, set it as a WiFi provider.  Fire up the Acer, and POW!  I am composing essays on the glory of corn in the middle of a cornfield!  Oh, the delicious irony of it all...

Needless to say, I am now the proud owner of an Acer Aspire One netbook.  Merry Christmas to me!  Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go schedule an "on-sight survey" so the movers know how much truck to bring.  Carry on.

New Job

Well, after a long summer of leisure,  I have finally found a new job to my liking.  It is in Des Moines, Iowa, about a 6 hour drive from my current home.

That's where it is.  I'll be helping to develop the next generation of high-throughput robots for a well-known agricultural company in the area, should be fun.  In addition to corn, Des Moines has a downtown:

They also have a nice big lake, tons of bike trails, and minimal traffic.  I start on January 3rd, which leaves me little time to find a place to live and get my backside up there.

Retirement is Tiring

My life of leisure is anything but.  I've become brainwashed by Costco, and promptly bought some shelves and a big pile of totes to store my stuff in.  Rather than merely on the floor, which is where most of it was this morning.


**Due to privacy concerns, the content of this blog section has been deleted.  And by privacy, I mean my shoes.  And by concerns, I mean I don't want them eaten by the dog whose tail is in the picture that was previously in this location.**

I'm still working on Colorado pictures.  Hold your horses.  I'm retired, it's very busy.

Update - No Time!

So faithful reader(s)...it's been a while!  Since my last post I was laid off from work, coincidentally started summer vacation, found a woman who tolerates me, paid off the Super Wagon, bought a motorcycle (2008 Honda CBR600RR, great-grandson of my 1992 CBR600F2), and went to Colorado for two weeks of adventure.  Rafting, high-altitude hiking, rock climbing, living without plumbing (outhouse!), and great fish tacos in Salida, CO.

Someday maybe I'll post up some pictures.  Right now I'm too busy enjoying my life of leisure.

Carry on!