Cycling and Stuff

I did some garden maintenance this morning, watering peppers and cucumbers, weed wacking some areas that were to tall to weed and tilling a place for fall broccoli.  I did a 20 mile ride on the Ditmer route and averaged 14 or so.  I had a very low HR after the ride (79) not sure why.  There is a storm moving in and the temps have dropped a lot with rain arriving now (4 pm). 

Pretty lazy in the morning.  I watched Woodstock (better than I expected).  After lunch I took Bailey down to the river (I never actually reached the river).  The woods are a mess, especially on my side.  Ray has done a lot of work on his side but has not broken through to the river yet.  Bailey found the red ball that we lost last year.

Rode to Flying Pizza in downtown Dayton with Steve, Nick, Rob and Mike.  51 miles.  I got a little tired this was yesterday.

We took the van in for service and then rode the tandem home, getting 17 miles.  Nice ride.

Wednesday

Picked a pound of beans and a squash.  Did a tai chi.  I'm trying to get better at tai chi, so I'm doing the routine and studying one move each day from the great courses video.

It was pretty hot this afternoon so we hauled the kayaks down to the river and splashed around for an hour.  Had to line the kayaks upstream a little as the current in the shalloe rifles was to strong for us.

I had some trouble with the Orion when I tried to use the computer.  The azimuth wouldn't change when I slewed the tube.  I was pretty sure that this wasn error on my part assembling the base, so I took the base apart and reassembled the azimuth sensing parts.  Sure enough, that was the problem.  Now when I tested, the azimuth and altitude both changed with moving the tube.  My test was inconclusive however, as I was confronted with a moon and a limited viewing of the sky (the driveway problem), so when I entered the pointer stars (Vega and Polaris) I was not centred on Polaris, in fact, I was pretty far off.  So, I need to do another clear night.

Sunday's ride from Covington to Greenville was pretty terrific.  Steve, Rob, Mike and Nick joined me for a mostly perfect day out on the bike.  The pace was good and I mostly kept up.  I was a little sore Monday and just spun an easy 14 miles.

Last night was the first clear night since the XT8I was delivered, so I went out to dial in the finder scope, making Polaris the first light.  Pretty nice night.  At around 8:30 it wasn't quite dark enough, but I found Albereo and the double cluster.  I stayed out for about 40 minutes.  Haven't tried the computer yet, but I studied up on it and should be able to try it soon.