Snowpocolypse

I have seen a lot of snowstorms in my life but I can only remember 3 that deposited over 2 feet of snow. This storm that happen Sunday into Monday was one of them. We got somewhere around 28 inches of snow with drifts of 3 to 4 feet. It was hard to actually know how much snow we got because during the blizzard because the blowing snow stuck to the screens and windows. 

 

It wasn't until late Monday that the windows cleared and we could see to amount of snow we actually got. I had to carefully open my sliding glass door to the patio to shovel the three feet of snow that was leaning against the door. I didn't want the melting snow to possible leak into the house. Here is what I found in my backyard. 

Yes, it's kind of pretty but the snow from the last storm we got a month ago had finally melted and I'm really sick of snow and this cold winter we have had. 

It is hard to show how deep the snow actually is but here is a picture of the amount of snow on top of my outside table just to give you some idea.

 

I feel bad for the people who had to shovel their driveways as it's a monumental chore with this amount of snow. In January of 1996 we got 30 inches of show and I remember going out multiple times with my snowblower and then having to hack my way through the wall of snow at the end of the driveway. It was a lot of work that took over half a day. I'm glad I don't have to worry about that now since the community where I live uses backhoes to clear the driveways for me. It did take close to 24 hours until they got to my house as there are 1400 homes in my community but I did a rough calculation. I would have to had to remove around 1500 cubic feet of snow from my driveway and that would have hurt. To give you and idea of how much snow that is just look at the pile of snow on the left side of my cleared driveway. That 5 foot wall of snow is only half of what was on my driveway.

 

I haven't been out on the roads yet but expect they are not in great shape so let's hope we get some warm weather so that the roads will be good enough to get back to doing some riding soon. 

The Olympic Spirit

I spent a lot of time watching the winter Olympics over the past couple of weeks. I normally follow some of the winter sports like alpine skiing, cross country skiing, and curling during the winter so was really looking forward to the Olympics. The competition always has some interesting drama's and stories. This time was no difference. There was Lindsey Vonn's come back. She had recently come back from retirement and actually won a few races before the olympics so was hoping for a medal but instead had a horrible crash which is an unfortunate part of the sport. (The "trill of victory and the agony of defeat" all rolled up in a single person)

There was Federica Brignone on the Italian alpine ski team. She had just come back to the sport after almost a year off because of a fractured leg. She wasn't sure she was even going to be able to compete at the games and was just happy to be there then went on to win two gold metals through shear grit and determination. At the end of the race the silver and bronze metal winners bowed down in tribute to her acknowledging her amazing performance. 

And that is what is good about the olympics. Even though every one there is competing to win the gold metal there is not a lot of animosity between competitors. In fact they tend to cheer each other on and support each other. Very few people can understand the effort and sacrifice it takes to be a olympic athlete so it tends to be a close knit group. 

One of the best examples of this olympic spirit was at the 50k women's cross country ski race. Jesse Diggins is America's and the worlds best female cross country skier this year. She excels at a sport that America has never been good at. Most of best athletes on this sport are usually from Nordic countries which makes Jesse's medals and world titles all that more impressive. But her athletic endeavors are not the best thing about her. It is the joy that she has when she approaches each race and the sport in general. Its infectious and inspiring as any of her teammates or competitors would tell you.   

 At the end of the 50k (that's 31 miles on skies at about 14 mph) Jesse was racing for the bronze but her ski wax was wearing out and she was cramping so she ended up a close 5th. At the end of a cross country skiing race the athletes have used every ounce of energy that they have and so they usually collapse right after the finish and have to recover for a few minutes before they can get up. The picture at the top of the post is her right after the finish. She was totally spend and breathing heavy with the pain that comes from a long hard effort. Heidi Weng, from Norway, who took the silver medal walked over to Jesse and help her undo her skis and comforted her until she recovered. It was a beautiful jester of sportsmanship and shows that even in intense international competitive situations people can get along and be kind to each other. 

 I hope the people watching the olympics saw these moments and took them to heart because we could use more of this olympic spirit in our daily lives 

The Glaciers are Starting to Receed

After having an unusually cold few weeks the temperatures have returned close to normal which has meant that a lot the snow we got a few weeks ago has melted. It's not entirely gone as there are still big piles of snow around. But the roads are clear and I can see my grass again. 

It has really been hard to get a ride in over the past few weeks. Initially I resorted to just riding around my community until there was enough melting to make the local side roads safe. The main problem was after the last major snow storm they only plowed the roads wide enough to clear the main part of the roads. This meant the shoulders were still covered in a foot or more of snow which made it a little dangerous to ride on the roads. 

Usually it warms up enough after a major storm to melt the snow on the side of the roads but i was in the teens and twenties so there wasn't a lot of melting for the first couple of weeks after the storm. 

The past couple of weeks have been better and I have been able to do short rides on local roads. It's still not that much fun riding in cold and windy weather but it is better than riding inside. 

This past Saturday was my first official PFW ride of the year and my first weekend ride of February. The plan was to start from Etra park and do a 30ish mile loop to Millstone. On my way to the park I got a text and a phone call telling me the gate to the park was still locked. There was no sign on the gate so I have to assume that the person who was suppose to open it was sick or something. 

We decided to park at the athletic lot of Peddie school and though phone calls to me and people passing the word on we all managed to end up together in the Peddie school lot at the appointed ride time. I had a full ride of 10 people plus someone else who said he registered but I didn't see him on the PFW ride list. I knew him so let him join us. 

We spread out a little and had a few minor mechanical problems at the beginning of the ride but no major problems. The roads were a little wet but clear of snow and gravel. We did our usual stop at Wawa before heading back. The group got spread out a little more so I hung at the back to make sure everyone got back to the right place. 

I was happy to see all our cars still there as I wasn't 100% sure we were allowed to park at Peddie but it is good to know that it is there as a backup if needed. 

This has been a cold and snowy winter so it was good to get out with the posse again. Of course it looks like we are going to have another big snow storm but at least we are only a few weeks from spring so hopefully this winter weather will be over soon.  

Cold and Snowy

I had hoped that one of the advantages of being retired is that I could get more rides in during the winter. That hasn't worked out so far. Last year, when I was working, I remember a number of times during the week where the weather was warm enough to ride but I couldn't because I was working. This year has been one of the coldest winters in at least 10 years. It didn't get much over 20 degrees in the past week and has been in the single digits most mornings. We also got 10+ inches of snow last Sunday and there is no chance of that melting anytime soon. It may get above freezing next week for a little while but I think it might be a while before we can get any real riding in. 

Tomorrow is Feb 2nd and I sure that useless over pampered rodent Pucxsutawney Phil will probably predict 6 more weeks of winter. Not that I put any weight against his or any other predictions as the farmers almanac said this winter would be milder and drier than normal. The truth is that a coin flip is as good as any prediction model that tries to predict the weather more than a week into the future. 

My theory as we why we have this cold and snowy weather is that we pissed off Greenland and because of that they turned on their weather control machine and created the Greenland Block (check out the link). Hopefully they will have mercy on us soon as my heating bill is becoming a significant expense. My heater also objected to the cold as it malfunctioned right after the snow storm because of ice and water in the intake. Luckily I was able to fixed it before the house got below 60 degrees. 

Exercise is important to my sanity. I know the posse feels the same way as I got a few emails asking if anybody is using indoor trainers. I actually when to the gym in my clubhouse and spent an hour on an exercise bike. I hate indoor riding but need to do something to stay in some kind of riding shape until it warms up. I have some bathroom remodeling work that will keep me busy but I hope to get some kind of riding in. There are a few places like Tyler State Park, Pennypack and Sandy Hook where I could ride if it warms up and we get some melting. 

The temperatures have been abnormally cold almost 20 degrees below normal. At some point we will have to revert to the mean. I hope that it is sooner than later so I can get back out on the bike again and forget about this cold winter.  

 

 

 

Filling My Free Time

I still don't feel like I'm retired. I haven't had to go to or worry about work for over a month but I have still been pretty busy. I guess I just had a lot of things I wanted to do and now have time to do them. The last week of December and the first few days of January were pretty cold with most days not even getting above freezing. Because of that I had the posse come out where I live and do a hike instead of a ride over the Christmas break.

Luckily we had a warm up this week and I got out a couple of times. The one good thing about retirement is I can now ride whenever I want so can plan my riding around the weather as oppose to hoping the weather is good on the weekends or my days off.  

Part of what I did over the last few weeks is put together list of things I want to do with my free time. One of the things on the list is to go get a few pictures of the seals at Sandy Hook. As the water has gotten clean over the last couple of decades more wildlife has come back to some places along the shore. For the past 10 years there have been seals at Sandy Hook in the winter. So if you go there near low tide on a sunny day without a lot of wind you have a chance to see them.

They gather on the rocks and sandbars to relax for a few hours. We tried to see them last year but couldn't find them. This time they were easy to see. 

 

They usually gather at the top of Sandy Hook by the church and old barracks. There are some sandbars and rock outcropping that they like lay on that are only about 100 feet from the shore. We parked in a parking lot behind the barracks and walked out to see them. 

 

There were probably 35-40 of them laying on the rocks and swimming around. I had my good camera with the telephoto lens so go a few good close up shots even though I was shooting into the coming sunset. 

 

We watched them for about a half hour as they laid there and moved around and played with each other. After that we headed out to a place on the water for dinner. It was a nice relaxing way to spend an afternoon. I have a lot of other things like this that I want to do so it is nice to now have the free time to do them, 

This is My Year

 

Welcome to 2026!!! 

I hope you all enjoyed your holidays and wish you all have a good new year. I know people who take this moment to set some goals for the year or create a vision board to guide them to greatness or some other silly stuff. I have never done any of that as most of these goals people set for themselves at the beginning of the year fall away as soon as life starts back up again. 

I'm not saying I don't have some things I could improve upon or that there aren't some adventures I want to go on but I'm more a continuous improvement person than doing a yearly review. However this year is a little different.

For the first time since college I no longer have a full time job. I'm medically and financially healthy so there are no real limits to what I can do with all my free time. This past month I have started adjusting to not working. I have mostly been busy with making calls to get all my benefits setup and taking care of all those small project that I didn't have time for because I was working. 

It is still going to take some time to adjust to my retirement and get into a new routine. Now that the new year has started and things have stabilized I'm going to look for new things to occupy my time. My wife already volunteers at a farm so I will probably help her more with that. I want to do some teaching or mentoring to help keep my technical skills fresh. I'm also going to look for some ways to give back to the community. I have always done some volunteer work that has helped me keep a good perspective on life so I want do continue and do more of that.  

Of course I will have more time for biking and my other hobbies so I look forward to not having a job that will interfere with any of that. I'm excited by the possibilities so am looking forward to the new year. It should be a good year. I know that it is 2026( or 5786 on the Hebrew calendar or the year of the horse on the Chinese calendar). However I'm unofficially naming it "The year of Tom" as this is my year to do as I please and I plan to enjoy it to the fullest.

The Winter Solstice

This past Sunday I started my ride exactly at 10:03am. I'll explain why in a couple of paragraphs but the short explanation is that I couldn't pass up mixing a bike ride with an astronomical event. 

The winter solstice occurs exactly when the sun is at it's lowest point in the sky and is directly over the Tropic of Capricorn. This is the moment the sun stops getting lower in the sky and starts its journey back towards the equator. The earth is tilted 23.5 degrees to it orbit and so the sun's elevation at noon appears to rise and fall (-23.5 to +23.5). That is why if you took a picture of the position of the sun at noon every day you would get a picture like the one below.

 

Its call the analemma and it looks a figure 8. The lowest point is the winter solstice and the highest point is the summer solstice. The middle of the figure 8 is where the spring and fall solstice occurs (when the sun is directly over the equator.)

This past Sunday (the day of the winter solstice) I had planned a ride starting at 10 am but when I saw that the time of the winter solstice was 10:03 am local time I changed my ride to start then. The exact day and time of the solstice changes because of perturbations in the earth's orbit which I won't go into detail explaining so it was just lucky happenstance that the winter solstice was almost exactly when I planned to start the ride. Laura was the first one to notice the unusual ride start time and because she could not attend we sent her a picture to welcome her to the winter solstice.  

We sent it at exactly 10:03 am of course. The ride itself was fine for a winter ride. It was in the mid 40s so not too cold but it was a little windy at times. We did 33 miles which helped me reach my mileage goal for the year. I'm sure I'll do a few more rides in before the new year. 

I know it will be few more months before winter is over and the weather will be warmer but it is good to know the sun has started it trek back north and the days will now be getting longer.