Snowdog-Kodog

More snow. Paws and a furry face...with whiskers.

According to K-Dog snow is the business. Good walking weather apparently. Can't say I agree, but this is my main exercise for the time being until the neck disc issue heals.

K-Dog poses against the backdrop of January snow piled high. Late afternoon light with a pastel tinge.

Fall-Winter Dog Walks

Walks with Koda and Gordo may be cold this time of year, but with few leaves left in the trees, there is little to obscure the vista from the top of Longview.

One of the tallest hills in the area, it offers some prime scenery. But sometimes it's not so much the horizon that catches your eye, it's a cloud formation.

On a bike I'd have been going 28 mph, or faster if there were no stop signs. But walking the dog, you have a little more time to savor the paintings in the sky.



Here's a sunset from the end of a recent walk in December with Gordo and Koda. Cell phone pic -- but it captures something of the ambience of the sunsets you get around the Solstice.

Gordon requested a bevvy of cell phone shots, including this one of him and Koda at the corner of Main and PW Boulevard.

Gordo and Koda, before the snow season started in earnest.

Today's walk, however, started late, and finished in cold windy darkness. This is what a photo of black dog looks like on a dark evening, taken with a cell phone whose flash fires after the pic is taken.


Brilliant eh? You had to be there!

Search for a replacement Wind/Bike/Surf mobile suspended indefintely

The search for a replacement Wind/Bike/Surf mobile is suspended indefinitely. At least until I recover from the neck injury and get a better idea of when or if I can still sail, ride, surf, golf, etc. Trying to avoid surgery, as most say the results are 50-50 with some ending up worse.

This is an old photo from 5 years ago, long before all the crew were riding full-size MTBs. Four bikes in the back.

But even later, when the two small bikes grew into two more 26" wheelers, you could still get 2 or 3 MTBs in the back, front tires on, ready to roll if you wanted. Amazing for any vehicle short of a cargo van, remarkable for a minivan.

Just takes a lot of finagling. Things get exponentially trickier of course with windsurfing gear in the hold, or golf clubs or surf paraphernalia.
Today was a great riding day despite the snow lying around. Also a tremendous day for dog walking with warming 40-55 degree temps. The roads were finally mostly clear, so I got in a short test ride to see how the neck held up. Not great come evening, hopefully a night's rest will unwind it a bit.

Bikes don't play well with the other sports gear. Pedals hang up on windsurfing boom harness lines and ding up golf club faces, gouge surfboards through the brittle fiberglass or epoxy into the tender foam interior. So the back hitch was a godsend. I just don't find it standard on the new Grand Caravans. Add $600 for parts and installation by the dealer.

Did a little car shopping and found the new Grand Caravans to be a much tighter squeeze for nikes and other gear with the addition of all the new side-wall compartments. Checked the 4Runners and they offer very little interior space to work with for the Multi-Sport family and no room under the second row seats to slide any board noses, masts, etc. Marg was dismayed that the stow-n-go seats were not as comfortable as the old bench seats for long trips.

The old bird is struggling with the toll of 118,000 miles, but I'd prefer to try to keep her going another year if possible, as the van carries so much so well and so easily. Will figure out what's next in a year or two's time, when the boys are a little older and maybe we don't want such a large vehicle—and whether I can still sail or surf with this neck is another question.

That said, when I was a dedicated windsurfer, a full size cargo was bliss, enabling one to keep the gear at the ready when the wind called. No hours lost loading sails, masts booms, parts and boards...just turn the key and go. The other great part about large vans is the wetsuit changing room in winter, of course. Hard to beat changing inside versus doing the drysuit limbo in a small vehicle, or worse, changing wet clothes outside in freezing weather.

Rising Appalachia: Scale Down

And now for something completely different ...

I'm not sure I'm scaling anything down right this moment ( a lot of things are easier said than done), I appreciate the sentiment, but simplify would be a nice place to start.

As the blizzard rages outside with the first massive snow of the season, those arthritic joints and cracked and mis-squozen cartilages are glad for the furnace, access to fossil fuels, electricity, and a vehicle that can get to some tricky places I'm called to serve.

Been walking a lot more hither and thither -- that's definitely good. Can't wait to heal so I/we can bike more, but fie on the felons who would steal your bike when you do try to park it someplace during an errand -- they are almost a bigger curse to cycling than a few other things.

Winter Solstice Pre-Eclipse Moon and "ghost" planet

Moon with "ghost" planet, originally uploaded by PhilMcPhilly.

Winter Solstice Pre-Eclipse Moon and "ghost" planet, passing behind.

A cold night to be attempting flashless DSLR photography without a tripod, for sure.

This one may have been taken with the Tamron zoom. The next needed as wide an angle lens as I could manage with the 18-55, since the "halo" around the moon occupied and almost 20 degree-wide (quintile?) segment of sky.

Surfrider Central Long Island Chapter

Surfrider Central Long Island Chapter is on the move.

Surfrider Blogspot

Jan 12 meeting at Long Beach Library to stop sewage dumping in Reynold's Channel.
Is that what was attracting the XXL Mako sharks.

Kodog gets a "twin peaks" hill walk.

Fortunately the rain abated and the wind was warm and from the south/west. Good for an hour-long dog walk up (and of course, down) the steepest hills around, and back into town, and then another hill to finish.

Main street looking lively during the holidays.