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Thursday, July 31, 2003
Since the Lewis and Clark expedition 200th anniversary is rapidly approaching, thought I would find out what info is available online. ESRI, the GIS software company, has a good introductory site on the expedition that contains links to many map-based sites. (0) comments
The new Garmin iQue 3600 GPS/Palm device is an amazing device. It contains an embedded GPS with a Palm organizer and sells for around $550. (0) comments Wednesday, July 30, 2003
I'm anxious to check out the Sharp Zaurus PDA that runs linux. There is a review on BargainPDA.com that seems to be suffering a mild case of being slashdotted. Advantages that I see in this unit over a PDA is that it contains a real OS on which real work can be accomplished. The keyboard seems almost touch-typeable. (0) comments Tuesday, July 29, 2003
Back from a quick trip to Vermont, the land of clean water and clear skies. Not many families can celebrate their parents' 60th wedding anniversary. (0) comments
Finished reading How to Shit in the Woods: An Environmentally Sound Approach to a Lost Art, an excellent book on the importance of proper hygiene in the woods, and the consequences of not doing so on the water and the environment in general. Good section on purifying drinking water. (0) comments Thursday, July 24, 2003
What a great day yesterday was for American cycling. Tyler Hamilton, riding with a cracked clavicle since stage 1, raced to his greatest win ever, the 6th American to win a stage of the Tour. Tyler describes his day in the diary he keeps on his website. (0) comments Monday, July 21, 2003
Today was a crucial stage in the Tour de France, and Lance showed what a true champion he is. On the final climb, as he took off on a breakaway to try to gain some time on Ullrich, his handlebars caught on a spectator's bag and he took a nasty spill. It took a few seconds to recover, get his chain back on, and try to catch Ullrich and the others in the main lead group. To Ullrich's credit, he didn't take advantage of Lance's misfortune. A minute or two later Lance caught the group and broke again, this time to gain 40 seconds on Ullrich and catch the race leader. It was probably the most spectacular win of his career, and just another exciting day at the 2003 Tour. (0) comments
From what I can tell, one no longer needs to change the archive date format used by Blogger. I had a script that I was using that recently stopped working. I couldn't figure out why, so found another script online that I tried to use with strange results. When I turned off the script and used <$BlogArchiveName$>, it worked fine. (0) comments
Back from a few days spent at Myron Glaser cabin, one of the Potomac Appallachian Trail Club rental cabins. Even though the cabin is within 60 miles of here, it seems very remote. It was a learning experience. The last time I backpacked in this area it was safe to drink water directly from springs, and lyme disease was not a threat. I've overcome my objections to DEET-based insect repellant given the alternative of catching lyme disease. I used a PUR Hiker water filter for drinking water, although the first time I used it I dropped the "clean" end into the stream, thus contaminating it. I then boiled all filtered water for five minutes before drinking it. The trip allowed me to get back to a more natural rhythm, if only for a couple of days. Here's my watercolor rendition of the cabin:  (0) comments Monday, July 14, 2003
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Spent most of Sunday on a 40-mile ride along Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. The first leg, 20 miles to Hogback Mountain overlook, is mostly uphill. The return trip is worth all the effort it takes to make the climb. It was one of those rare, clear days when we could see almost to the Washington Monument. (0) comments
It was a sad day in the Tour today as Beloki crashed just before the finish. Lance somehow avoided hitting Beloki and ended up riding across a field and back onto the route below after the hairpin turn. This has been the most exciting tour in years, but it's unfortunate that Beloki won't be there to contest the rest of the race. He broke his femur, wrist and elbow. (0) comments Tuesday, July 08, 2003
The Tour certainly has been interesting so far. Tyler Hamilton is hanging in there with a cracked collar bone, and Lance barely missed falling in the same crash at the end of the first road stage. There was another crash at the end of today's stage, when Rene Haselbacher went head over heals and suffered some major road rash. I only hope the pack settles in a little over the next few stages. Alessandro Petacchi is continued his winning ways from the Giro d'Italia by winning his second stage today in a mass sprint. (0) comments Wednesday, July 02, 2003
Slowly recovering from a cold, probably picked up at Bike Virginia. Read Recollections in Black and White by Eric Sloane. It contains some elegant pen and ink drawings he did when he was starting out as an artist. I often find that I like pencil and pen and ink drawings more than the finished work based on the drawing. Sloans books are now selling for quite a premium. I think that the appriciation of fine drawing is on the rise. One indication is that American Artist magazine is getting ready to publish a new magazine on drawing in September. (0) comments |
