Jan 24 - alive or dead ?

People tout the benefits of probiotic yogurt but how do you know if all those little bacteria guys are still alive ? Well, there is one way. Try making some yogurt out of that plain yogurt that you just bought. It happens only once in a while, but I'll do my thing in the yogurt maker (skim milk powder, water and a couple of tablespoons of bought yogurt) and ... nada. What exactly does that mean ? Well, it means that there wasn't enough live bacterial culture in the bought yogurt to consume the lactose in the skim milk in the course of a day so you have throw-away thick, slightly off, skim milk. That happened to me yesterday. It's so annoying.

Since we retirees don't have the normal annoying things at our jobs to keep us "worked up" (no pun intended) we have to be creative in finding minor annoyances to get our heart rates up.

It rained on the way to church this morning and while I was in church, but those showers seem to be off to sea now. I expect that we'll follow through on our plans to go boating, but no-one is moving very quickly here this morning so we might not get fishing. In spite of the 100% cloudy day that was predicted I see the sun out. Perhaps that's payback for the rain earlier ?

While I'm at it, catching up from things not mentioned earlier -- I did change the oil in the X5 yesterday. Even though there was only 8000 miles on it since the last change (and one month), I figure that it was a hard ride across the country. I forgot and only bought 8 quarts of oil ... I also need to change the oil in the M5. They each take 8 quarts of 5w30 fully synthetic Mobil 1 -- expensive stuff but a lot cheaper than getting the dealer to do the job. I change the M5 annually even though it probably only gets driven 2000 miles in a year.

I'll get back to this later ...

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Stupid, stupid. Somehow it's the stupid things that always attract your attention. Whether it's a minor flaw in some work that you've done that always catches your eye or in the case, a couple of abrasions on a bike ...

I discovered that falling over on a motorcycle from a dead stop is about the same as falling over on your bicycle. The Harley might be heavier but it only has a couple of contact points on its side; same as the bicycle. Of course the other contact point in a three-point landing is yours truly ... and road rash is road rash, no matter the source. Here's what happened ...

I went out for a ride, which is obvious. It was late afternoon, everyone was just kind of sitting around. Sandy was reading inside, David was reading outside, Meagan was on the computer, Kim was somewhere ... so I decided to go out for a spin. It was very windy, so I headed for the mainland, driving beachside to Flagler and then across the north causeway. I grimaced as I rode across the open grated area on the lift bridge, which causes the bike to squiggle a bit, then turned right along Riverside. Riverside turns left after about a mile and becomes Wayne. Continuing across US 1, it's a nice ride as it turns into Pioneer Trail and continues to head west. I had about 90 miles on the trip odometer at that point and intended to stop at the gas station where it intersects with Sugarland. I did so, turning off the bike, turning the handlebars to set it on the stand ... and didn't set the stand. What was I thinking ? No, obviously I wasn't thinking. Down we went. Once you get past a certain point the 600 pounds of bike keeps going. It didn't go down hard. I was partly under it and have a small scratch on my left shoulder to prove it. The driver's footpeg will carry the weight without bending if it goes down gently; the turn signal light at the back extends far enough out to be support point number two, and where the clutch meets the handlebars becomes point number three.

The abrasion at the clutch looks similar to abrasions on my Dura-ace shifters from my bicycle going down. It's a cast white metal, which is aluminum and soft. The footpeg bracket is black; the peg itself pivoted up and it was the underside that scratched; the rear turn signal is stainless steel and if you look for it you can see the small scratched area.

Grrr. It obviously could have been worse. If it had gone down moving on wet roads, leaves, whatever ... but no, this was a pure act of stupidity. Luckily there was only one car at the pumps and they were asking if I was ok ... yes, I was ok, my ego was all that was bruised. I found out another thing -- it wasn't hard to right the bike -- or perhaps that was because I had a shot of adrenaline at that point ? !?!?

Then, to add insult to injury, as I filled the gas tank I found the one gas pump in the area where the auto shut-off doesn't work as the nozzle hits gas in the tank and I overflowed the gas tank. I found a rag and wiped that off and then we -- the bruised bike, my bruised shoulder and my bruised ego, rode off into the sunset. My shoulder is fine. It's about a one inch scratch. The scratches on the bike, always visible to me if not to others, will be there to remind me of my stupidity. I'll see them forever. I'll see them in the dark. Grrr.

Ah well. The rest of the day was kind of a wash. We did go boating, heading out into the high winds towards the inlet and then out towards the ocean. The waves hitting the breakwater were huge, but they didn't stop us from clearing the inlet. What turned us back was that we were getting soaked. The waves were running east to west, actually slightly northeast, but the wind was coming from the south. The winds were high, running at their predicted 20mph or so, and the waves were breaking way beyond the breakwater, long before it got shallow. Had it been less windy we might have spent more time out there.

We turned around and headed for the island, deciding to go to a protected area. That didn't work either. The wind was so strong that we couldn't get the anchor to hold; everyone needed to use the bathroom and was reluctant to be the first to christen the porta-potti ... or to go to the bother of unloading everything that was piled in the head; we started back to the marina, eating our lunch on the way. Abby was terribly disappointed because she didn't get to run on the beach.

At 5:30 we left for the club. It was windy there too, surprise surprise. Everyone else was inside the sheltered area at the Tiki; we found a table and had a good but cool meal. David's Philly Cheesesteak; Meaga's footlong hotdog; Kim's hamburg; Sandy's hamburg; my cheeseburger; orders of onion rings, sweet potato fries; regular french fries ... we ate well but I must admit it wasn't a great dining experience.

Back home, we turned on the TV and waited for 8pm to watch Sweet Home Alabama. I read the synopsis on IMDB, knowing that I wouldn't last out the movie; Sandy came to bed right after 10pm so that must have been the end.

Today, day four of four, David is interested in going to the Harley dealership and looking around. We'll head up to Ormond Beach ... it's an amazing experience, I think, to walk around that place. We'll see who else is interested. We're getting some thunderstorms right now but they are moving out of the area a little later this morning. It's not going to be terribly warm though -- 68F is the predicted high -- so it remains to be seen what we'll do with the rest of the day.

Life moves on. It's just before 6a.m. and Abby will want breakfast as soon as I move off this chair.

Onward !