Tag: errands

A Shorts Story

A few days ago a cold, snowy week gave way to temperatures above 40 degrees. I decided to brave the snowy trails and bike lanes and ride to DC to drop off some books at a used book shop. What normally would have taken 90 minutes each way took 115 because there were so many places where snow and ice made my route unrideable. Having made it about ten miles riding and walking, I decided to take a chance on some snow and slush on the trail that connects the Crystal City neighborhood of Arlington to the Mount Vernon Trail. I made it about 100 yards before encountering more snow and ice. I decided to hell with it and rode over it. Bad idea. I went down on my side, fortunately landing in a pile of powder on the side of the trail. This is why I don’t like winter riding. Had I landed on a hard surface I’d have been in a world of hurt. I picked myself up and continued on my way, making sure to avoid another crash. I made it back home without any further calamities.

Today is January 26. I rode The Tank to Friday Coffee Club, leaving just before dawn. The temperature was around 60F. I wore shorts. Yeah baby! It is amazing how much nicer bike riding is in shorts as opposed to long pants. On the way I encountered dense fog and somewhat cooler temperatures along the Potomac River.

The Washington Monument from Gravelly Point Park across from DC

Our band of merry bike riders enjoyed their coffee outdoors today. A week ago it snowed and, for all I know, nobody went to Coffee Club.

After a couple of hours of discussing our various medical woes and discussing other pressing issues of the day, I rode back toward home. The fog had lifted and the sun was burning off the rest of the clouds. The ride downriver was as good as it gets for January.

Today was a good day to put in some extra miles so I stopped at an Ace Hardware store in Old Town Alexandria. After a quick transaction, I was back on the bike riding further south to pick up some milk at the local grocery store. (So far, the only downer to the morning had been the near sour milk I had poured over my Wheat Chex before leaving home.)

Once at home I read the paper and grabbed some lunch before heading back out on the bike to buy some tax software at an office supply store. I dropped the software off at home and headed back out again to drop off my lawn mower blade to be sharpened at the neighborhood hardware store. While there I picked up 15 pounds of bird seed which fit nicely in my two large Ortlieb panniers.

Once back at the ranch I gave The Tank a look over to see how the salt and sand and brine was treating its chain. The chain had rust spots along the side plates so it was past due for some new lube. I took the bike onto the back patio operating theater and successfully made things right.

While I was working on the bike, the air conditioner kicked on. The inside temperature and humidity felt like June. It was a muggy 80F degrees outside when I finished my chores. Dang.

Errandonnee Encore

My Christmas stocking contained a small packet of ground Texas Turtle coffee from World Market. Judging by the name I had my doubts about the taste but it turned out to be the best coffee I had in years. Today’s first errand was to ride 15 miles to a store in Bailey’s Crossroads, Virginia to restock.

I am easily spotted around town my the humongous saddle bag on my Surly CrossCheck. It holds a ton of stuff and easily handled two packages of coffee and a box of tea.

IMG_3351

I had planned to ride a long way but I dressed inadequately for even the warm temperatures so I made my way back toward home. I stopped at District Taco for lunch. I had picked up a $10 gift card at the Hains Point 100 and finally got to cash it in on a California Burrito.

IMG_3352

Muy deliciosa.

I hit 30 miles again.

To recap:

I’ve totally crushed the mileage requirement. Living in the suburbs has its advantages after all! And I’ve done four errands in three days. Not too bad. However, I can see that I will have trouble covering enough categories. (There are nine. You have to use seven.)  Life is hard. Then you get a needle in the back. Maybe I’ll ride to the pain doctor on Friday. It’s only a half mile from home.

The weekend, by the by, was brutal. My back went out in a big way Friday or Saturday. This was the worst stenosis pain in a long time. I couldn’t stand up straight so I spent a lot of time sitting with an ice pack on my back. I made it to a Super Bowl/birthday party and had beer instead of pain killers. I woke up this morning and my back felt much better. I highly recommend Koltsch as a stenosis remedy.

 

 

A Sort of Boring Day

Enough with this sitting at home nonsense. Today, I had Mrs. Rootchopper’s car towed to a mechanic to have its electrical system fixed. I followed in my son’s car.

After that I went to the drug store for a couple of prescriptions. I lost 1/2 of my blood thinning pills somehow. I think they probably got swept up in post-Christmas kitchen table cleaning and are now somewhere in the landfill in Lorton. It’s kind of important that I get some more. The pharmacy has called and faxed the prescribing doctor to no avail. The doctor specifically warned me not to miss a dose and said I should let him know if I misplace any of the pills. I have three left, enough to get through Thursday morning.

Tomorrow I get three bites at this apple. I will call the prescribing doctor myself and explain the situation. Later in the morning, I am going to see my personal doctor. Maybe he can fix this. My final option is to simply fill the follow-up prescription, which is a different dosage. I think I can tweak the timing so I get through the next week without a calamity. Good thing it’s only a life threatening situation. American medicine really is effed up.

After the pharmacy, I refueled my car. What the heck? Oh yeah. I don’t do this very often. I didn’t even remember which side of the car the gas tank was on.

Next up was the hospital. As I was being discharged, a doctor told me I’d need an MRI and that this would be arranged for me. That was 10 days ago. I haven’t heard from the MRI facility. I have no idea which doctor is submitting the order. In fact, the hospital didn’t give me a list of which doctors saw me. After walking all over the damned place huffing and puffing all the while, I found medical records. They gave me a list of specialists. I am sure the list in incomplete but it’s a start.

After all this was over, I put the expiration sticker on my son’s car license plate. Only one stuck. So tomorrow I get to go to the DMV to get a replacement. We’re having fun now.

Back inside the house I started to read my book (Beartown by Fredrik Backman)  Mrs. Rootchopper came home and fell asleep in a comfy chair. Now I know I am getting better. Despite the fact that I had a pretty normal day of running around from one place to the next, I managed not to need a nap.

I am also pretty consistently hitting above 2,000 ml on the spirometer.

I think this is a pretty boring blog post. After all the drama, boring is good.

 

 

 

 

April Chores before February Storms

For yet another day it was April in February. My mind turned to thoughts of spring. Well, old fart thoughts of spring.

I rode Deets to the Hardware store to pick up my sharpened lawn mower blade. While waiting for my blade, I read the local free newspaper. An injured bald eagle had been found on the farm next to my house. It had a full head of white feathers so it was probably mature. This is egg laying season. One injured eagle means another may be without a mate. Not good. (This eagle is not one of the eagles that nests at the Arboretum in DC. Those eagles probably forage for food along the Anacostia River some 10 to 15 miles from my house.)  I bought some stuff at the drug store nearby then rode home.

I pulled out The Mule to see what I could do about it’s screeching front brakes. Well, the short answer was not much given the fact that the brake pads were almost completely worn out. So I hopped back on Deets to ride four miles with a tailwind to the local bike store for some replacements. Alas, they were out of stock so I rode a couple more miles into Old Town where my not-so-local bike store had one pair of the kind of brake pads I prefer.

The ride home was into a strong headwind, a sign of an approaching storm front due to reach us in early afternoon. Along the way I passed a woman running. She stumbled as I passed and fell flat on her face. I stopped to see if she was okay (she was). Of course, my concern only made her feel embarrassed. Onward.

Pedal pedal.

Back at the ranch, I put the brake pads on with a surprisingly limited number of f-bombs. When I am working on a bike, I use a lot of lube and a lot of f-bombs. They just make things work better. I don’t know why.

Next, I drained the oil from the lawn mower and replaced the blade, the air filter, and the spark plug. When I went to put new oil in the engine, I found that the oil I had in my shed was last winter’s dirty oil that I had yet to dispose of. Derp.

Clouds loomed.

I jumped on The Mule and headed for the hardware store so I could get some oil and test the brakes.

Pedal pedal.

Raindrops fell. Then the sky cleared. I bought some oil and made it home warm and dry. The brakes worked and didn’t squeal.

The oil went into the mower. I put some gas in. And started it up. It went clank. Then it ran normally. I repeated this. It went clank each time I started it. Clanky sounds aren’t good but the thing worked. I will unclank it another day.

My final task of the day was to polish my shoes. Do people still do this? I learned it from my father who wore the same shoes for 35 years. Good shoes last forever. I bought this pair over 20 years ago. Good shoes are kind of like bikes. Trust me. Someday you’re gonna need a quality shoe.

Having finished my chores, I sat down with a bagel and a newspaper to enjoy a sunny day on the deck. Ten minutes later the front came through.

It’s February now.

 

Fresh Air for the Win!

I wanted to go for a hike today. Unfortunately, 150+ miles of bike commuting put the kabosh on any hopes for a long excursion. I needed to do some errands anyway. Why not jump in the car and have a miserable time? No? Well,  I needed to break in my new shoes so I decided to hoof it to the barber shop. It was perfect weather for this sort of thing. The shoes took a little getting used to but they are a vast improvement over my other footware.

The barber did his thing, all the while telling me about his airship fetish. He’s going to decorate a Christmas tree with airship decorations. Let’s hope it doesn’t go all Lakehurst on him.

Who needs sidewalks?

From the barber shop I decided to truck on over to pedestrian hostile US 1 to buy a new coffeemaker. My old one had sprung a leak about a week ago. So I made my way north-ish on Fort Hunt Road. The sidewalk disappeared leaving me facing oncoming cars. Oh, joy.

After a couple of blocks though a side path appeared. This is what Fairfax County calls a trail. It is asphalt and tree routes. A total mess. It was better than walking on the unpaved shoulder of the road.

Leaf Riot

If you’re going to take your life into your hands you can at least admire some pretty fall foliage. The DC area is just past peak foliage but there is still much to ooh and aah at. Lucky for me there is a sidewalk on at least one side of Sherwood Hall Lane. I used it. After about a mile, I made it to a cross walk only a block from where my wife was run over in 2010. After looking both ways, I started crossing. I got about half way across when an approaching motorist honked at me. I stopped and turned at him and mouthed saucy epithets.

Safely across the street I made my way closer to US 1. About a block away, the concrete sidewalk gave way to crappy asphalt on dirt. Why can’t one of the wealthiest suburb in the US build proper sidewalks?

Memorial to fallen pedestrian

To cross US 1 in a crosswalk and make it to a continuous sidewalk I had to take a left through a crosswalk on my sidestreet, take another left to use the crosswalk to traverse US 1, take ANOTHER left to cross the re-cross the sidestreet to get to the continuation of the sidewalk. Along the way I saw a memorial for a pedestrian who was killed (by a Fairfax County police officer driving a police car, no less). When I got across US 1 I gave up on the 3rd crosswalk and just used the street. There you have it. Someone gets killed and they still can lift a finger to make an intersection safe for pedestrians.

I made may way through the parking lots to the store and bought my coffee maker. I took a different route back. Along the way I encountered an intersection that had been recently stiped and paved. Not a single cross walk to be seen. HOW HARD IS IT, VDOT?

Division of labor

I made it home and saw that Mrs. Rootchopper had come outside to do battle with the yard. She seems to like raking leaves. There are plenty more so come on down and help her out. I am sure you’ll have a blast. (In the division on labor at the Rootchopper Institute, I do lawns and snow shoveling.)

So I walked about 5 miles. The verdict on my shoes is thumbs up. They aren’t perfect but they are quite a bit more comfy that my old Dunham boots. I hope to give them another go on Tuesday or maybe next weekend. Oh, and the coffeemaker does the job.

New coffee maker - yay!