Nov 13 - so far so good

Vis-a-vis the thermostat work -- I did some driving around, church, Home Depot, a dozen miles on I95 and then back home. Late in the day I checked the coolant level (have to wait until it's cool) and it hadn't gone down as far as I could tell. I have to do more extensive driving to come to any real conclusions though. I'll keep my fingers crossed for now !

Vis-a-vis the leaky faucet -- I did find out that it's a Pegasus, model not currently available, and have an 877 number to call for parts/service. Riley had left a bunch of installation booklets here for anything that he'd done. I asked a plumbing guy at HD and he said that Pegasus is HD-owned and being phased out. Yes, I gathered that from the dearth of models available on the website. I described the issue to him -- removing that huge Allen-nut to replace the o-ring -- but he had no solutions other than call the number and they'd probably just send me a new spout or a whole new faucet.

Vis-a-vis nice day -- yes, I went for a bike ride. The wind was from the ESE or perhaps that was EEEESE but in any event it was nice to go south for a change. I only saw one gator, but I wasn't paying close attention to the ditches at the side of the road. I took the Lynskey; I've mostly been riding the Hummer (Litespeed) since it was handy. It behaved itself ... more on that ...

A couple of days ago, not mentioned in the blog, I spent a couple of hours doing routine and non-routine maintenance on both bikes. I removed the front lights from the Litespeed, since I won't be riding in the dark for a while, and took off the rando wheels (Peter White wheels, front one with generator) and put on the Mavic Heliums. In doing so I discarded the rear tire from the PW wheels, very worn, and installed that on the Mavic front. That's a 26mm tire. I installed a new 28mm tire that I had from last year on the rear wheel.

If/when I ever buy/build up another bike for randonneuring, it will accommodate wider tires. The 28's barely clear the front fork and any bit of dirt that gets stuck on the tires ends up wedged at the top for a few moments squealing against the tire. There's a little more clearance at the rear, but ideally I'd have cantilever brakes vs caliper and be able to mount/dismount wide tires easily and not have the clearance issues front or back.

28's, from my experience, are more comfortable for riding on rough roads (much) but don't compare to riding something like 32's. One of these days ...

Back to the Lynskey -- the other maintenance that I did on that bike was checking the derailleur hanger. From day one that bike has had some shifting issues with big chainring / big cog. Sure enough, the hanger was out of line. I bought the checker/adjuster during the summer and used it for the first time ... shifting is now perfect ! Wonderful ! It may have come from the manufacturer that way or been bent in shipping to me. The bike has never been dropped or otherwise abused.

The way my riding goes, I'd be best to sell the Lynskey and build up a new rando bike. The Litespeed could be relegated to backup position for those really long rides as well as a lighter setup for short rides. I'd love to have a light weight setup for the 200/300 rides with a battery powered head-light and tail-light, no rack etc. etc. Oh well. It's nice to dream. When I win the lottery. Of course that won't happen since I don't buy tickets !

It continues to stay warm up north; hopefully that will change soon and we'll have ice on the lake at Christmas. It's still early but as the internet shows me -- 48F there and 55F here, 1500 miles doesn't make very much difference.

Jeffrey pretty well has his plans nailed down for Christmas, planning on leaving Chesapeake Beach MD on the 26th, heading north to the cottage. It's a full 15 hours driving from there so he may end up stopping along the way at Stef's or David's or not, depending on how they feel. Chase will be coming with them; they've got lots of room now that they have a van.

Of course Sara being pregnant means that most likely they will NOT be coming up next summer. Arlene had given some thought to coming to the cottage at Christmas but I haven't heard any more on that score; Philip's girls are going to Thunder Bay for Christmas so I'm campaigning for them to stop at the cottage on the way. We'll see.

Our first banana-shoot has appeared ! Yes, the purple shoot that we've heard about has appeared on one of the banana plants ! It will take many more shoots, however, before they catch up to the papayas that I've been eating every day. I need to get in there and take a picture ... hmmm.

Today ... I have a couple of things to do at Saxon ... I have to pickup a pee container for tomorrow a.m.'s annual labwork ... there must be more, I'm sure that the day will go by.

I've been watching Warehouse 13 on Netflix, now into episode 5 or 6. It's not pulling me in yet. It may never.

We had rotisserie chicken last night. It was perfectly cooked. This grill has four burners, left to right, so I can leave the sides on with the center burners off and the broiler burner, for want of a better name, on as well. The 4.3 pound chicken cooked in about 1:15. I actually used a meat thermometer !

Oh yes, I went to the gym this morning before breakfast ... I need to get back into that routine.

Onward !