Gracious! I have neglected my blog

Long story short, I have been busy doing things and haven’t had the spoons or time to write about it, but I really wanted to. Weather has been “Texas winter” as in bouncing between extremes of cold and heat from low 80s Tuesday to low 20s with freezing drizzle Wednesday, the day I had an appointment with my brain doctor. So the doctor’s office was closed but I had a televisit over the phone, and the doctor is disturbed about my depression, which we can’t do anything about until I go on Medicare and can see a therapist, and my electrolytes which requires an in-person visit to draw blood to test my levels. We know I need to supplement my magnesium, but how much we don’t know without testing. Also I need to take the nerve meds at dinner to deal with leg twitching before I go to bed at night. Leg twitches are annoying but not dangerous in themselves, but more of a warning that other things may not be operating within tolerances. I’m basically going from 300 mg to 600 mg of the Gabapentin per day, and the pharmacy has been sent prescriptions for a 6 month supply, basically 360 pills.

In other news the race at Daytona was excellent, some equipment and parts failures that were concerning due to the lack of experience with the Gen 7 (or is that Gen7?) including wheel failures either from the lug nut not being tight enough, or the wheel not seating firmly against the hub even though the nut was TIGHT. The Penske cars have been cleaning up the wheel machining to seat square against the hub, but NASCAR confiscated 2 sets of wheels to see if Penske exceeded safety margins (and rule limits) during the “cleanup”. From what I took from the press release they took a few thousandths of an inch out of the socket for the drive pins and the ID of the pilot hole that centers everything on the hub, plus all the coatings in the area of the hub seat so that there was nothing between the metal of the wheel and the metals of the hub.

My car is also not proceeding as planned, and the lack of progress is starting to make me angry as in “Mad Scientist” angry. Reminder if you want to see progress on the Sprint-T there is a link to my Ko-Fi account on the front page of the blog and I promise to use the money to buy more parts for the car and not waste it on medical bills or food.😌No guarantees about not buying copious amounts of gourmet-quality dark chocolate which (for me) is both food and medicine. More on that later. Anywho, I still need an engine and transmission that I need to know the weight of within a few pounds to know how far to the right I need to mount them for balance as opposed to how far to the right to mount them so my feet fit between the bellhousing and the inside of the body. Hopefully the “room for feet” distance is less than the “balance left to right” distance, or I’ll have other problems down the line.

Back to the dark chocolate. Back a little over a decade ago I was part of a study on the effects of really dark (basically the stuff they use in baking without the sugar) chocolate on the body, and let me tell you if it was a drug it would be a miracle drug: it lowers systolic BP 5-10 points, it reduced the effects of stress beyond blood pressure, it’s an effective antidepressant. Any kind of real, botanical (as opposed to synthetic flavoring) chocolate can do that, but the closer to pure unsweetened chocolate liquor you get, the greater the effects and fewer the side effects like zits and weight gain. I weighed about 210 pounds back then so my dose was about 3 ounces a day of bitter chocolate or I think 6 ounces of milk chocolate, fortunately I like the bitter chocolate. If there was any drawback to using dark chocolate as a drug it’s the dose needed to see results, usually drugs are prescribed in milligrams, not ounces, and are taken in tiny pills, not in huge blocks. On the other hand the overdose limit is in the tens of pounds range , and it’s in the GRAS list of substances you can put in your body as food. I’ll leave it for the reader to calculate how much chocolate they would need to die happy, but let me just say a toxic amount of chocolate would make you so sick to your stomach that you would not “die happy”.

One more reminder that I have a Ko-Fi account you can donate through at the bottom of the sidebar to the right and I’ll put this one to bed.

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Happy Singles Shaming Day! Go hug a shelter animal

For the rest of you this is Valentine’s Day, or Cheap Chocolate Day Eve, but for the singletons out there this is a day where almost every advertisement throws subtle shade at the unpaired. There’s a whole separate deal for married couples and expensive jewelry purchases that Mrs. the Poet likes to poke at me about because we are P’ and can’t afford a ring out of the vending machine next to the bubblegum machine, but that’s a different post in about 4 or 5 days. But if you are lacking an S.O. and live in a no-pets apartment, there are abandoned and lost cats and dogs at the shelter that need someone to show them some affection and who don’t care that other humans don’t like you, or you don’t like other humans. Just so long as you convincingly fake loving them they are happy, and ecstatic if you are not faking it. And it will make you feel better too, because you will connect with another living thing on an emotional level. Give it a try. You’ll be doing the both of you a favor.

And for those of you with partners this is the socially-sanctioned day to tear the walls down with your passions. Now if you will excuse me, Clint is sprawled on my lap demanding belly rubs.

Another rough day on the road, and the Feed

I took advantage of accidentally including the first report for today’s Feed having been used yesterday to go out and make a run through the “mall” with my cell phone to get as many of the high point targets as possible so I get that gift card quicker rather than later. And I stopped at the grocery store to pick up coffee, soda, and I grabbed some Christmas Tree Cakes for stockings.

Up first a cyclist is hit just feet before reaching the relative safety of a bike lane in Austin, a couple days’ ride south of WoaB World HQ in the Beautiful Suburbs of Hell. Man Killed in Crash Between Vehicle and Bicycle on Brodie Lane They didn’t say the victim didn’t have lights, just that they couldn’t verify the cyclist had lights on. Nothing confirmed about the mode but as the initial impact was just off the road on the shoulder and the bike ended up in the grass off to the side I would say there’s a real good chance he got hit from behind, so the usual protocols apply.

Over in NYC they killed another one, but wonder of wonders they actually arrested the driver. MTA Bus Driver Arrested For Killing Pedestrian In Brooklyn Crosswalk You would think that bus drivers would be more careful what with all the forward-facing video cameras recording every move.

Just outside NYC another hit-and-run driver kills another cyclist. Ramapo police ID bicyclist killed in Rt. 202 hit-run The description of the wrecked bike indicates either a right hook or a left or right cross, and the moment the driver left the scene it became his fault.

Over in Portland a demonstration of the biggest problem of bike infrastructure shared with motor vehicles: They tear shit up and it needs to be replaced. Paving project adds gravel, bumps and closures to 50s Bikeway route Again the biggest hurdle is motor vehicles tearing things up and getting in the way.

Our Daily Ted. Morning Links: LA cyclist dies from heart attack, Finish the Ride comes to the Valley, and I talk bikes on Bike Talk

Still in CA. Is a raised bike lane a protected bike lane? Why go through all this expense just to replicate what has been done in the Netherlands?

Victim statement from a trial in the Great White North. Parents, widow describe anguish over death of cyclist Tom Samson The words of the survivors are haunting.

Still in the GWN. Cyclist seriously injured near Grande Prairie At this point they know it was a hit-from-behind, but they haven’t determined why (aside from the fact that the driver was not paying attention to what was on the road in front of him).

Over in Jolly Olde a guy hits and runs against a cyclist. Hit-and-run driver Alexander William Coombes gets suspended prison sentence for A29 accident that left cyclist badly injured and Rustington driver left cyclist seriously injured in hit-and-run crash in Shripney also from Road.cc Speeding motorist who hit cyclist and left him at the side of the road sentenced I’m just going to quote a comment left at the second link: ““he was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months; ordered to complete 140 hours of unpaid work for the community; disqualified from driving for 15 months and required to take an extended re-test.
He was also ordered to pay £6,382 compensation to the victim and costs totalling £3,500.”
So he barely received any punishment for a collision that left someone with serious injuries. Mr Bumble was right: ‘the law is a ass – a idiot’ [sic].”

And on the same island. Man arrested over alleged hit-and-run in Corfe Mullen This article shows why I hate UK media laws, there is nothing in here aside from the fact the wreck happened, not even the names of the victim or the perp.

More on that bizarre package of laws passed in Oz. NSW cyclists face big increases in fines – and will have to carry photo ID

Still in Oz, a cyclist dies in mysterious circumstances. Cyclist found critically injured by Sunshine Coast road dies of his injuries They still don’t think he was hit by another vehicle, though.

It’s official, cyclists need to eat moar choklit. Official: Daily chocolate consumption makes you a better cyclist Curious that they used the exact same dose of dark chocolate as I got in the depression and BP trial. (BTW bitter chocolate works great at fighting depression and reducing blood pressure.)

There’s more to cycling than can be found in your philosophies, to mangle a quote. The Three Worlds of Cycling To answer the debate about working cyclists, I put them in a similar category to commuters trying to get from A to B so they could work, their work is going from A to B. Sometimes by going through points C through Z’ inclusive.

I can honestly say that I have never been in a situation where I could use any of this advice. Crash Course: How to Handle a Car-Bike Collision All of my wrecks have either been hit-and-run, something I could ride away from, or both. and most were from times when I didn’t have a cell phone, much less a cell phone camera.

And I think I’m probably done now.

Billed @$0.02, Opus