Welcome to 2020

It's 2020 and I have to say I'm a little disappointed. By now we were suppose to have flying cars, robot servants and vacations on the moon. Predictions about the future are never very accurate especially when they try to predict decades in the future (Just look at some predictions from the 70s and 80s). At the beginning of each year I try to look forward and plan some interesting rides and trips. I don't have any major plans for 2020 yet but hopefully we can have more rides like this Saturdays.

Today the temperature was in the high 60s. It turns out that on average there are 1 to 2 days each January are over 60 degrees. Luckily the 60 degree day was on this Saturday. It had rained overnight and it was a windy day but it was still as good a day as you are going to get in January.

I had 11 people join me at Reed Recreation Area as a lot of people wanted to take advantage of the weather. We did this route which headed through the Assunpink before heading south into the wind. The wind  was blowing 10-15mph with a few higher gusts but it wasn't too annoying.

Our rest stop was the Charleston Coffee which is becoming one of our favorite stops when we head south. After the break we headed towards Cookstown via our favorite longhorn ranch.

Some of the roads were strewn with pot holes and Ricky hit one and got a flat but he made quick work of changing it. Once past Cookstown we headed north back towards Allentown and had a strong tailwind pushing us back for most of the last 12 miles. Even with the tail wind I was still dragging a little in the last few miles as I'm not use to doing rides over 30 miles in January.

Besides getting 46 miles in because of the warm weather I also got to break out my new light weight tights I got from Running Funky. They did not have my first 3 choices for pattern but she had this new space nebula pattern which I thought was cool and unique. I know we are entering the coldest days of winter and have some cold and crappy rides ahead so it was nice to get a warm one in to start the year.

What I did on my Christmas Break

2019 was a busy year in a lot of ways so it was nice to have a full week off after Christmas. I managed to get 2 1/4 rides in. The 1/4 ride was the Thursday after Christmas. I sent out an email for an off the books ride out of MCP. On Thursday morning it was foggy but I thought it would clear up like it usually does. As I was riding into MCP the fog actually got a lot thicker and by the time I got to the park I had decided it was too dangerous to try and ride on the road. So after talking to Ricky for a few minutes I headed home.

The weather was better on the Saturday after  Christmas so I had a good turnout for the ride I lead  from MCP to Bordentown. The route I did zig zagged through a couple of different neighborhoods on the way too and from Bordentown to see if we could see any interesting Christmas decorations which we really didn't.

My last ride of the year was with Jack. We did a loop from Cranbury to Jamesburg. It was a cold and cloudy ride but it got me to my mileage goal for the year. When I looked at my year end stats I noticed that I actually had more miles on my mountain bike than I did on my Synapse that I use for hillier rides. Mostly that was because of the ride on the GAP trail and the training for it. I did enjoy doing mountain bike rides in warmer weather so may did a few more this summer.

Besides getting in a few rides in during the break I also finished a wood working project. I made a simple napkin holder. When I say I made it I mean that in the fullest possible sense. I didn't just buy some wood and make it. I actually planted a popular tree about 20 years ago that I had to recently cut down.When I cut down the tree I notice there were a couple of long straight logs and I thought that I might be able to cut some planks from them as I always wanted to try that.

 So I made a jig for my table saw to cut the log in half.

Then I cut a plank out of the half of log and planed it smooth which took a while because I really don't have a band saw or planner which would have made it much easier.

Now that I had a board, I could now cut out the parts for the napkin holder.

I decided to use finger joints to join the sides. This required building a little jig which worked well.

 

With all the parts cut all I had to do was to glue it together.

I used a simple danish oil to finish it because I wanted to keep the wood as natural looking as possible.

Popular isn't the best looking wood which is why it is used for moldings that get painted but this one does has some interesting color variations so it looked decent once I got it finished.

However there a lot of wood like tiger maple, koa or rosewood that would have looked a lot nicer. So although I proved that I could cut down a tree and actually make something from it I don't think its a very practical way to get the wood I need for my projects.