Making, baking, and (un-)breaking things in Southeast Michigan.
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Testing to failure has shown that standard DAP Weldwood Contact Cement is an appropriate product for adhering neoprene to wood products such as hardboard and plywood. This will work well for acoustic dampening of the disk enclosure shelf that I am currently building for the basement.
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This power supply, the Solytech Enterprise Corporation AC Adapter Model AD5012G came with the Vantec NexStar NST-400MX-UFB that arrived today and I keep misreading the label as ‘Soylentech’. This disk enclosure will eventually be used with the replacement for my Mac Pro, a 27″ iMac with Core i7 processors. Since the iMac only has one internal disk I’ll be using Firewire disks to add additional spindles for virtual machines, Time Machine, etc. I’m still not sure where I’ll put the drives, but my current thought is either on the back side of my desk, or in the basement, suspended from the ceiling.
After first disconnecting it I found the fan in the NST-400MX-UFB to be necessary, as the drives were becoming quite warm without it. As this fan is fairly loud, I think I’ll be placing the drives in the basement, in a slightly soundproofed enclosure. Today after work I picked up a rather lengthy roll of neoprene from the foam factory and it should go quite a ways towards eliminating fan noise that may emanate from the enclosure through the floor. Some smart baffeling may cut down one the sound in the basement too.
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I love what is known as Michigan’s Scanner Law. In short, this law states that if one is charged more than the stickered price for an item rung up via a computer scanning a bar code, one is legally eligable to be refunded the overcharged amount plus ten times the overcharged amount, with a cap of $5 on this surplus. In this case I went in to Office Max to check the price on a Logitech LX8 mouse. It was marked as $29.99, so I purchased it. As expected, it rang up for the normal price of $39.99 and the cashier didn’t notice the stickered price.
After a quick walk out of the store then back in I returned to the cashier and asked her about the difference, which she promptly refunded. I had to remind her about the aforementioned Michigan Scanner Law, but doing so resulted in a manager being called over and my receiving an extra $5 cash. Thus, what’s normally a $39.99 MSRP mouse ($49.99 at Office Depot) was obtained for $26.79.
The last time I took advantage of this I obtained a large quantity of 2GB SD (20 or so) cards from Micro Center, most of which were marked $5.99. I was charged $6.99 per card, and upon visiting the customer service desk I was refunded $1/card. When I reminded the cashier of the scanner law she simply re-rang all the cards at $1.99/ea, essentially a $5 penalty per item. When multiple items have their price adjusted the store must correct the price on all and refund the difference, but they are only obligated to pay the 10x penalty once, but if Micro Center wanted to do otherwise, I was not going to go out of my way to correct them.
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For tonight’s bike ride I headed over to River Bends to poke around the paths and experiment with using my phone for producing maps. I found that the phone should be sufficient, as long as I mark every intersection with a waypoint. Most likely I’ll need to head back out and do the mapping / marking again, stopping more often to mark every interesting intersection and point. From there I’ll be able to make a proper map of the hiking / bike trail, and any other interesting bits of trail that I may come across.
It’s interesting to see that the asphalt (yes, what was limestone a week ago is now paved) to dirt transition occurs directly in line with 21 Mile Road, right behind Utica High School. This makes me wonder what the eventual route will be for connecting River Bends and the Clinton River Park (or whatever the trail is called), just on the other side of Utica.
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New Holland’s Charkoota Rye Smoked Doppelbock Lager is quite interesting. It’s very smokey, somewhat malty, and has an interesting dry taste that I figure comes from the rye. The beer’s website claims that it is an homage to all things pig, including their just-happened Porkapalooza cookout. I’m almost tempted to cook up some bacon to eat with it, just because.
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Today I participated in the Maybury Lungbuster Cyclocross Race at Maybury State Park in Northville, MI. Racing class C I did four laps in just over 30 minutes and was right on the edge of vomiting once I was done.
In cyclocross one has to frequently dismount the bike and (ideally) run up hills or hop over intentionally placed obstacles (barriers and logs, in this case) before hoping back on the bike; all while not stopping. I generally didn’t have a problem getting off the bike, but because of the fine clay-bearing soil at Maybury my cleats kept becoming packed full, making clipping in difficult. Being particularly ungood at running and not in that great of shape, the running up hills was particularly challenging as well.
Now that I’m back at home, I’m feeling absolutely exhausted. My right tricep is also sore, which is likely from picking up the bike to hop over the barriers. I think a bath and beer may be in order, but only after eating the Apple Crumble which Danielle currently has in the oven.
If you’d like to see a few more photos from today, here they are:
· Geocache unexpectedly found near the long runup at the Maybury Lungbuster CX race.
· Looking up at people from previous races waiting for Class A racers at the Maybury Lungbuster CX race.
· Two Class A riders from American Cycle and Fitness running up the runup at the Maybury Lungbuster CX race.
I must say, I particularly liked that a race named Lungbuster was held on the grounds of an old tuberculosis sanatorium, Maybury Sanatorium.
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Here, have a photo of the Masala Dosa from Rangoli Express that I ate for dinner before meeting some friends to see a mountain biking movie called Race Across The Sky. While the dosa was excellent, too large to easily fit on the tray, and requiring some 16:9 cropping to look passable, I thought the movie was just okay.
I really enjoyed the footage of people riding through interesting and beautiful places, but much of the fanboy / celebrity worship bits wore on me. In particular, during the panel discussion portion before and after the movie the presenter’s strong desire to talk about Lance Armstrong whenever possible wore on me. Although, I guess he is a brand to be sold, and one which brings lots of attention to the race…
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I mentioned this before, but today the tickets arrived. I suspect (and hope) it will be An Adventure.
(It is not possible to purchase electronic tickets on Amtrak, yet one can make the purchase online. The tickets were then printed and sent via US Mail.)
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After breaking my normal biking headlight I fitted Danielle’s bike light, a NiteRider MiNewt Mini-USB Plus to my bike. At 110 (stated) lumens it’s probably not going to be enough for riding single track, but at least I’ll be able to go ride around the normal paved loops, as long as I pay particular attention to cars, since they won’t be able to see me as well.
This evening I sent my light off to NiteRider for repair via UPS’ 2-Day Air. It cost $23 to ship, but if I get the light back two days sooner, it’ll be worth it. After talking with a customer service person on the phone I expect the repair (and new helmet mount) to cost US$60 – US$80 with a five day turnaround. While not cheap, it’s still cheaper than a new, comparable light.
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Tonight was a perfect night for a ride. Beautiful clear skies, upper 50s, and a light breeze greeted us as we rode from my house to River Bends Park to poke around the new limestone path and some unofficial single track. Not long after entering the park we even ran into some other people we knew who were out enjoying the same trails.
Heading back into the woods things were going well, until I ducked some overgrown brush and caught my head light. While I stayed on the bike, my NiteRider TriNewt stayed with the brush for a bit, breaking off the mount and apparently stretching the cable to uselessness. I was then left holding a non-working head light, roughly two miles into overgrown single track trails which were frequently bench cut along ponds. Thankfully the two people I was with rode behind me, so I was able to see well enough to make it out, even if some of those points involved ensuring that the front wheel was pointed at the narrow, dark shadow in front of me.
Once we made it back to the wider limestone / paved paths in River Bends things were much easier, and I was generally able to ride along next to people, using overflow light to see by. We were then able to finish up a nice loop, totaling ~17 miles. I’m quite lucky that I wasn’t out alone tonight, as a broken light six miles from home on trails would have meant lots of walking and not-safe riding.
Tomorrow I’ll try contacting NiteRider about getting the light fixed. Per their warranty website this should cost $30 in bench time, plus a new cable and light mount. I opened up the light briefly to check for broken solder points, but everything looked fine, so I suspect the cable. Since the cable and its strain relief is not something I can easily remold myself, I think I’ll just pay them to do it. Hopefully I can have it back quickly. Until then I will probably be using a borrowed HID, which should be interesting. There’s a reason why people are moving in droves to LEDs for bike headlights.
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