Posted on

Marathon

 I’ve been planning my attack on the standing marathon record time of 26 ½ hours.  I should just do the whole thing at one time and cut my record in half. A big part of the challenge is to find a route that would provide some interest for 10 to 12 hours straight.  Without something to look at, this could be a tedious day.  Wouldn’t want to count it off on a ¼ mile track either.  I love to walk, but I have to walk a different course every day.  It would be nice to find something of a straight-line route, but I can’t work that out without encountering more vehicle traffic than I want to walk with. So I’ve been looking at this effort as a series of 5 mile segments.  I’ve got a straight line out-and-back bicycle trail of 5 miles that gets me to a nice state park where I can walk a 5 mile loop.  All I have to do is figure out two more interesting 5 mile segments and I’ve got it.  There is an out-and-back seldom-used road from the state park I could probably turn into a 5 mile segment.  Then the walk back the original 5 mile trail to where I parked the car.  That would be 20 miles.  By then, it’s liable to be dark on these short winter days, so maybe I drive back to the park and finish with 9 laps around our neighborhood inside our park. That could work.  That has been my thought process.  ….until today.  Today I ventured out to test several things: the state park loop, the out and back walk on the seldom used road, the pre-dawn start, and the provision for food and water along the way for such a long walk.  At 10 miles, something happened.  The conditions were good.  I felt good.  I still had enough food and water.  All my careful planning was set aside and I didn’t stop.  No more pre-planned routes, I just kept walking.  I walked roads, canals, brushy trails, and looped around, around, and around again inside the state park. First, I established a time of slightly under 4 ½ hours for a half-marathon.  Then I went on to walk the entire thing straight through.  I’ll have to say I wasn’t as cool the last 6 ½ miles as I was the first 20.  I thought only runners hit “the wall” at 20 miles.  I never saw that coming. The wall kicked my ass, but I pressed on, not finishing in good form, but finishing nonetheless.  My legs are now screaming obscenities at me, but I’m very happy with the result of my effort.  9 hours 50 minutes.  I have a marathon time that can be described without reference to a calendar! I suspect the only way to substantially improve my marathon time now would be to actually run some part of it… 
Posted on

We never had a house with air conditioning

 …until we got the motorhome.  We always just slept with the window open. But in the motorhome we could control the temperature and didn’t have to have so many blankets on hand, so we got used to sleeping at 65 degrees year-round.  Furnace in the winter, air-conditioning in the summer.  65 degrees. We continued the tradition when we moved into the house a couple years ago.  65 degrees for sleeping.  But recently the air conditioner started giving us trouble.  When we woke up in the morning, it would be warmer than the thermostat setting and the air wouldn’t be blowing.  We called the air-conditioning guy.  He came out, said the machine was working just fine, and replaced our thermostat.  That didn’t fix it, so the next day he replaced some valve or sensor out there.  When he came out early the third day, he took the cover off and found the unit covered by a big block of ice.  When we told him our night-time setting he advised us that air conditioners won’t work right at settings below 68 degrees. We received that bit of news with some skepticism, since this is what we’ve done for years now with no problem.  When we got back from our summer and fall travels I looked on the internet and found his opinion repeated though; that outdoor household air-conditioners like we have, don’t like to be set below 68 degrees.  I also read that air conditioners don’t like to run when the outside temperature is below 60 degrees.  That’s where we are now, cooler temperatures overnight, but with the heat-lag for the house cooling down as the outside air cools, we still want the air conditioning.  We have the arctic insulation package, 6 inch walls, so the house retains heat REALLY well. It’s not like our air-conditioner doesn’t work.  It works great on hot days.  We only have trouble when we’re trying to keep cool overnight on a cool evening.  We just want it to work like it always has.  We don’t want to change our ways and sleep warmer.  I guess we need to try a different air-conditioning guy.  Maybe we’ll get an answer we like better. 
Posted on

Mystery Solved!

 Remember that mystery bird call in Bandera I ascribed to Townsend’s Solitaire a few months ago? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofMtVJwZFHc&feature=youtu.be Really?  You really don’t remember? To me, it sounded like the Townsend’s Solitaires I hear in Colorado.  Here is one for sure (I located him right after I turned off the video): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6j97USytDk  (turn the sound up a little higher for this one)(never-mind the robins in the background) Here is a recording of a Townsend’s Solitaire from Cornell.  Double click it to play…  That bird in Bandera sounded so much like a Townsend’s Solitaire to me that I put it down in ebird even though Townsend Solitaire is not supposed to be there then.  As expected, I got a challenge from an ebird monitor.  I directed him to the call and after a few days he directed me to a different recording:    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnMUbKBCnt4 It’s a recording of a Rock Squirrel!  Oops.  I attributed a squirrel sound to a bird!  Silly me.  Well, the quality control system for ebird works like it’s supposed to, even if I don’t.