May 26th

It's been pretty gusty, so I gave up on cycling, so we had lunch with Vince, and I went to the airport again.  I got in a few more circuits before it started getting bumpy again, so I went home.

May 25th

I started the day washing the solar panels.  I've installed a shutoff valve up on the roof, so I can take the nozzle off and use window cleaning chemical stuff, which is easier than using the mop :o)

We cut up the wood that we've got as we pulled it out of the van.

I went for a longish bicycle ride, then went to the airport to take the plane out.  The first climb out, it seemed to get quite hot (437F), but after that it was OK, even of subsequent climb outs.  I only did 3 circuits, as it was bumpy.  Taxiing back the last time, I saw a couple of coyote pups run across the taxiway - one stopped and looked at me  like he had no idea what I was doing.  Maybe they'll keep the rabbits down.

May 24th

We went to Lowe's to buy a shed thing that they didn't have in stock, and a bunch of wood for Vic's vegetable garden adventures.  We went through all the 2"x6"x8' redwood that they had, and found 14 that weren't too warped, split or barked.  We need 18 :o(  Oh well, part way there.

May 23rd

I got up horrifically early to ride the DRZ to San Francisco for work.  After a tedious ride home, we were watching TV when Vic felt and earthquake.  Call that an earthquake?

May 22nd

I'd been into our local big box store and looked at the Panasonic TC-P55ST60 plasma TV, and thought it looked OK, but the input source was terrible (DirecTV, with their overcompressed MPEG-4 stream).  We went in to look at it with a thumb drive with at lot less compressed MPEG-2 files, and it looked a lot better.  The guy in there treated this like the most amazing thing he'd ever seen, and I found it amazing that a) they don't do this to make the TV look better and b) I'm the first person who's ever done this.  Anyway, still interested in getting one.  the Sony 4K TV looks good, but won't fit in the space I have for it as the speakers are on the sides.  I have a surround sound system, so why would I?

May 21st

We went and had dinner with Vince, so I could pay him for the engine work on the plane.  Through ham handedness, I think i managed to stiff him for $20, but I don't think that's the difference between eating and going hungry just yet.

May 20th

I spoke to Vince, and the planes all ready to go.  It was a cold seizure, and we have a few theories about what happened - basically the new pistons make everything tighter, and the air scoop means that the engine gets colder on a power off approach than it would with fan cooling.  Meh, I'll just make a note to try and keep it >3500rpm when flying.

May 19th

It was bloody windy, so I gave up on going for another cycle ride.  It was even windy enough that Vic bugged out of the hang gliding meeting, having won the speed glide award.  I got all the usual chores out of the way, and when Vic got home we watched the interesting (but not outstanding) MotoGP race.

May 18th

I spent the day playing Warcraft, getting all the recycling dropped off, and going for a cycle ride.

May 17th

Vic was off to the Coyote Howl at Lake McClure, so after work we packed the van up, with the hang glider on the roof.  Poor Tilly was all excited that we seemed to be going camping, but somebody needed to stay home and look after the guinea pigs.

May 15th

I took the DRZ over to Lincoln for the EAA meeting.  I'd been hoping to see Jack White there, as Ken's bailing out of the hangar business, and I believe Jack has space available.  I'm pretty sure I don't want to take over the running of the hangar and all the associated headaches.

May 13th

Taylor's doing some food drive thing, and wanted a large number of items, so I went to WinCo and bought a bunch of cans and cuppa-soup thingies, and dropped them off at her house.

May 12th

I cut the grass, then fixed the lights in the van - it was a broken (not blown, just old and broken) fuse.  Doy.  While I was in there, I found a ground wire that was chewed up, so I ended up doing a little tidying while I was in there.  Of course, now it's all buttoned up, I've thought of some more stuff I want to try when I'm _next_ in there.

I spoke to Vince about the plane, and he agrees that it sounds like a cold seizure, but that that shouldn't have happened.  We talked about the Teflon coated pistons, and how Jack's seen a lot of the Teflon scuffed off after ~10 hours on one of his engines, but we won't know until Vince gets into the engine.  He'll order a top gasket set tomorrow and hopefully be unbolting stuff by next weekend.

I went for a ~10 mile cycle ride, and it wore me out as it was ~95F here.  Still, I drank around half my Camelbak's worth of water, so I'm OK to go further if I get fitter.

In the evening we went to dinner with Vince - it's ages since we've done that as he's in hermit mode at the moment.  I think it's because he sold his BMW, but he claims to not be missing it.

May 11th

I started the day doing my daily stuff in Warcraft, and then Vic and I went for a bicycle ride.  We rode ~12 miles, which is the furthest I've been this year.  Must get out more.

When we got back, Fred and I tried to get his new domain set up to use Google Apps.  Sadly the free stuff I use was stopped at the end of last year, but we soldiered on through pretending to set up an application.  The DNS registrar he was using (1and1) doesn't offer anything like the control we'd need to be able to do everything (A, MX, limited CNAME only), but he'd only paid $1 for that domain.  So we registered another domain with GoDaddy, then went through the pointing the domain at Google stuff.  It seemed to work OK, but we're limited to 1 user.  Bah.  I'm going to try and add that domain to my account, but we have to wait a while for everything to be deleted first.

I went out to Lincoln, to fly the plane.  I was at ~550' on my first take off when the little red light came on for the CHT, and then the engine quit, so I turned back and landed.  It restarted OK, but seemed to be running a little lumpy on the way back, which suggests a cold seizure.  The CHT was 230F or so before I started on to the runway (it's something I always check).

On the good news side, the cruise control in the van will hold it at 70mph, but I think I still have a little tweaking to do (it seems to go over the set speed from time to time, and I believe there's a dip switch for that).  I have a few things to fix in it - the light for the gear selector, and the reverse switch aren't working, but I think that's a grounding issue.

May 6th

We watched "Django Unchained".  It's a pretty good movie, even without any space battles.

May 5th

The wind's been... odd... for a while, so I'm not in the mood to try flying.  I cut the grass, and got out for a short ride on the pushbike (which is a lot easier to get out of the garage now).

May 4th

May the Fourth be with you!  Yeah, I think it's a bit tired, too.

Vic had a thing at the SPCA, and I waited in and met Noel, who came and bought the YSR from me.  I now have space and cash, and he now has a small 50cc 2 stroke motorcycle.

May 3rd

Vic buggered up her iPod Nano by pouring salad dressing over it, so I tried to fix it by taking it apart.  I've figured out that the LCD is past saving, so I bought a new one, only to find that it's generally agreed to be impossible to separate from the digitiser.  Impossible?  I like those odds.  I've nothing to lose, so I tried separating it, and broke the digitiser.  Oh well... I've ordered a complete screen unit, as that should be just plug and go.

May 2nd

I'm not a gym member any more, and it's stopped blowing a gale half the day, so at lunch I took the bicycle out for the first time in literally years.

After work, I found that the front brake on the YSR wasn't bled up, so I did it the old fashioned way, then moved the throttle over and made sure everything worked.  I'm calling that ready for Saturday, when a guy's coming to see it.

I played with the configuration of the cruise control on the van, and took it for a drive.  It still wasn't great, so I tweaked it some more, and it seems to be working just fine now.  Yay.

May 1st

The all-important solar stats:

Power we've paid for

Power we've generated

And the DMARC stats:

After work, we went to dinner with Jim and Kathy.

When we got back, I started converting the YSR back to right hand drive - I've installed the proper side brake, and left to bleed the air out.  I played with the new VSS from GoWesty.  I took out, then tested the old VSS with a magnet (using the cruise in "test" mode), and it didn't flash once.  I plugged in the new VSS, and tested it with a magnet, and it caused the light to flash.  I installed it on the speedo, and went out and tested it - it seemed close, so I need to play with the dip switches to make it work better.  Yay.

April 30th

I spoke to the tech dude at GoWesty about the cruise control, and we agree that it does sound like the VSS is the problem.  They're going to send me a new one, and a label to return the broken one.  That's refreshing - getting any sort of help out of the last guy I ordered stuff from was like pulling teeth.

I got tired of tripping over the YSR and looking at the letter from the DMV saying it needs insurance, so I advertised it on BARF, and got a bunch of interested people.  Yay.

In the evening we went out to dinner with Jen.  We've not seen her for what seems to be ages.

April 28th

I was having a crisis of motivation, so I wasted the day, other than cutting the grass.