Author: kwiernicki

first real ride of the Spring

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Edda and I hit the trail this morning. She was telling me about an upcoming ride that she is doing. Midwest, I think she said 6 days. She’ll drive to St Louis and they will shuttle her 400+ miles west, set her up with a nightly tent (for a fee) every night. I would definitely do this! I will be asking Edda for more info…




Edda also showed me that Map My Ride now has auto-pause…no more forgetting to un pause it when we stop for water breaks, potty stops or just a stop to smell the roses (the bike trails have some really beautiful views)

Things I completely forgot…

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I have been going through alot of paperwork trying to get my tax info together and realized some of the things we’ve done around here that I had completely forgot about.

The first thing I did when I bought the house was gutting the bathroom. The only things that I didn’t replace were the toilet and the tub. When I ripped out the wall behind the tub, I found there was a stained glass window enclosed in the wall. That is the point where I realized that at some point that was the exterior of the house and they had added on to the kitchen. The other thing that stood out was when I removed the dry-wall from behind the sink, there were enough razor blades to fill a shoe box…It was crazy…and rusty…and gross. I wish I had taken a picture of that. I ay have some picture of the bathroom gut, but I won’t try to find them now.

I replaced the outside front door, the inside front door and the outside back door. I may have pictures of that too…That was done by Dan Crawford (DCraw Construction), the same guy that added the steps to the attic and the back deck.

I may need to review the blog to see if I ever added the deck build and the shed build. But I’m sure that there were other things that I forgot…we shall see.

Categories: Around the House

Anniversary GetAway day 3&4

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The plan for Sunday is to take the bikes (first ride on my new bike) to Assateaque and look for some wild ponies!

We stopped at this little surf shop for breakfast or a sandwich on the way to Assateaque Island. This place possibly had the best coffee I have ever had.

We finally made it to “relaxed” status!! We decided to drive around the park first, then park and ride the bikes. As soon as we parked, we saw a band of ponies on the dunes and that was it…we fell in love with this place. We rode around the bay side first, that’s where we saw the eagles (right over head) and cactus. I found that weird! Then we road out of the park and set out for the snack bar, which was closed but it ended up being ok, we saw a second band of ponies, they were sunning in one of the parking lots.

Monday fucking morning! 5:50AM, the fire alarm/evacuation -working from the hotel room on my laptop…wasnt ready for this

We decided to head home earlier than planned, but with the early wakeup, we knew we’d be tired early. While Jen packed us up I set of for a quick ride down the boardwalk on my bike

We decided to take a nice leisurely ride home, so we stopped in Rehoboth for a late lunch. The reason I like Rehoboth so much is because they dont fold up in the winter…some shops do, but you can always find a good place to eat. So we tried the purple parrot they had delicious food and money hanging on the walls…doesnt get much better than that!

Anniversary GetAway day 1&2

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This is our 10th Anniversary, so we decided to get away, so we both took off on Friday and Monday. Got Shirley B to dog/house-sit.

We leisurely got up and moving around on Friday morning (I needed to get up early to do “morning checks” as part of my daily work routine, that I don’t want to push onto my co-workers…it takes ~an hour and then I’m done! Lots and lots of rain…not heavy rain, just non-stop for the entire drive. We stopped in Rehoboth for lunch at the La Tonaiteca Mexican Restaurant..love going there! We also stopped at a couple of the outlet stores on Route 1, but we didn’t hang out there too long. But Jen grabbed a really cute white flowered denim jacket…so it wasn’t a total waste of time 🙂 On top of a great lunch, the sun kinda peeked through making it a little more exciting to get away.

We arrived at the hotel and since it was raining, and a travel day, we put our feet up and relaxed!

Saturday morning, we set off down the boardwalk, we found a little place that was open for breakfast (and apparently one of the very few OPEN places), Ocean’s 13…Jen had “avocado toast”…it looked really awesome and I had “the usual” (eggs toast, potatoes and sausage)…Heading back to the hotel, we hit most of the open stores, some of them have the same feel as the Jersey boardwalk stores…t-shirts, sales, loud music that isnt too loud, just rude lyrics that doesn’t give a good feel to anyone…although, I didnt see any t-shirts that announce that I pooped today LOL…

We were also treated with watching several pods of dolphins break water heading north. We got to watch them for about 15 minutes. My camera was still in the truck, so I didn’t get any pictures…except in my own memory cache

Once we set out again, we hit the outlets and had dinner at the Outback. We both wanted something that we didn’t have access to at home, but our choices were limited because of it being the off season, we weren’t ready to leave the outlets and we were getting Hangry

The prices at the outlets..dind’t feel like we were getting any “deals”…Kmart prices are better for the same things…so we didn’t go crazy getting anything that we didn’t need. The sights made it worth it!

First Ride 2019, last ride…

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I pick up the new bike tomorrow, but since it’s the first day of 2019 that it’s above 70* and I need to get a ride in. Kanicki set this ride into motion and I put it out on facebook (side note: make a biking facebook list). No one else is joining us. We are meeting at the 420 parking lot at the heinz refuge (Kanicki got there before I did)

Everyone else in the tri-state area had the same itch…there was only a couple parking spots left and when we were coming back, there were cars/trucks parked on 420.

I was telling Kanicki about Death Valley (it’s about a 1/2 mile strip that is closest to the sun…and the biggest Thistle I have ever seen)…she stopped to take off a layer and I kept going…way slow….a doe jumped in the path and I watched her move through the brush and jump the path right in front of Kanicki…then I saw the buck, but he decided to go in the opposite direction of the path. Kanicki said that she learned in horseback riding on trails, she was taught that the first deer doesn’t get you…the second one always does!

It was a quick, really nice ride…the last for my old bike…but a new beginning…

ToDoList for today

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Carpeting Project 2019-02

It’s only Sunday…we have until Tuesday morning to empty the 3 rooms…but we also need to work Monday (and I am on-call, until Tuesday morning)…so today, we need to move as much as we can. I have already moved mostly everything that is not critical…especially the bedroom, since we painted it last weekend and left everything out knowing that if we moved it back in, we would need to move it all back out again.

Leaving everything out sounded like a good idea, but it made for a tense week…I don’t like clutter…and having everything crammed in to every corner/open space in the living room made everything feel like chaos and confinement.

Jen has off on Tuesday to help deal with any chaos or last minute moves. Home Depot installing company has a standard furniture move but what they really mean is, empty all of the dressers, take the bed frame down, 4′ from the floor access to the floor in the closets.

Our dressers don’t easily let go of the drawers, so removing the drawers and moving them doesn’t work…and if we were to empty the drawers into boxes or bags, now we have to find room to put them as well as the ‘furniture’…they will charge $75 to take the bed apart, but move the taken down bed for free as part of the standard package. If I take apart the bed, then I also need to move the mattress, box spring and frame to do that…so I call BULLSHIT!

Yesterday, we stopped at PetKraze to get a stuffed animal for Raz…I have never seen a dog get SO happy when she sees a stuffed animal…or the saddest when it’s not for her. But anyway…there is stuffed animal inners and carcass all over the living room, that should be a fun clean up!

Just did a walk through with Jen on what’s going where…and my biggest project of the day will be running and making an ethernet cable so I can put my PC anywhere and it not be in the way.

Categories: Around the House

Still too damn cold

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It is 30* right now, so I am glad that we called off the first bike ride of the year. Jen was planning on riding with me and Kanicki was wanting to ride too, but she had places to be in the afternoon, so she would have had to ride early…

A few years ago, Jen and I went out for a ride when it was 55*…I was thinking that would be a nice temp, but I knew Jen would be cold, so she under-armored up with sweatshirt layers…yeah, no…we rode until we were warm but the noses running constantly made for a lousy ride…so we decided to not ride unless it’s over 60*

I am still on the fence about buying a new bike, but Jimmy is working at CycleFit today, so we are going to stop in and see if there is a ‘perfect fit’ bike…

found it!! Trek Verve 2…Jen says that it was made for me

My Birthday Present

Getting the Itch

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I miss riding my bike!! This Sunday, it’s supposed to be 65*, perfect temperature for a first ride of the season…(it may be too cold for Jen)…I wonder if Kanicki would be interested? My bike also needs some love…do I want to invest in new cables or is it time to replace my 20 year old bike? I love my bike…love the color, love the ride, love the memories behind it…but a new bike would be lighter and a faster ride, maybe even ?safer?….decisions, decisions