Feb 19 - skiffing again

Jim spent 2-3 hours washing and waxing the X5 ... it's embarrassing how dirty it gets !  The most I ever do with it is a spray wash ... well, that's not quite right, I have hand washed it, but never waxed.  The only good washes it's had, other than yesterday, are at the dealership, but that's mostly machine.

I have washed and waxed the M5, however.  It is due for some work too. 

We were expecting to see Shane, the paver guy, were also expecting to see him the day before ... and the story goes on.  If there was another real game in town I'd give up on him.  This is beyond ridiculous.  I have no confidence that any schedule that we set will hold fast.

I took Cassie out in the skiff; it was a beautiful day.  I'd actually expected it to be cool and windy but it was neither.  She got in a lot of running and some swimming.

I fussed with the bike for a while, trying to sort out what was going on with the electronics - the Garmin charging circuit.  I thought that I had a dirty cable connection, cleaned the cable, no go.  I changed cables, no go.  I changed Garmin's, no go.  What the heck ?  What it was happening was that the Garmin was shutting itself down when the charger started up.  That can happen a lot on the road because a stop for any appreciable amount of time depletes the standby battery (capacitor) in the headlight that is the brains of this.  I then tried unplugging the screw-down connection which is basically a two lead power connector that might come from an ac adapter ... and it worked.  ???  Why ???   That's either making contact or not.  I really don't get it.  I've had a problem with that connector before but have no idea why. 

At any rate, it's working again.  I'm going to carry the Gomadic 4xAA charger with me this time though.  I'll switch over if there's any issue tomorrow -- yes tomorrow -- Sunday I'll be doing the 400k with Paul and Judith.  After it's over, Judith has to get to Disney to work at 7am; Paul has to get to St. Peter to teach a class at 11:something; I have a dentist appointment at 8:10.  If we finish in 24 hours we'll be back at 5am and all will be well.  The time limit for a 400k is 27 hours ... if we basically hit the same pace as the 300k we should be finished in 22 hours.  We have a little leeway but not much.

I will probably fall asleep in the dentist chair during my cleaning !  At least I can go home to sleep afterwards; Paul and Judith have a day's work ahead of them.

As usual we've been eating well.  We are trying to use up some of what we've accumulated in the freezer -- pompano the night before, pork chops last night -- but that leaves, at least, a couple of meals of lamb, salmon etc.

Onward ?  Next blog probably won't be until Monday sometime or maybe even Tuesday.