• Specialized Invades Santa Teresa Park

    Specialized Invades Santa Teresa Park

    Today I did a mountain bike ride in my local park. As I was wending my way around the park, I noticed something odd. I passed an amazing amount of cyclocross bikes on the trail. Trust me, if someone is off road, doing some serious dirt riding with drop bars, it is a a cyclocross…

  • Apple Photos – it sucks big tool

    Apple Photos – it sucks big tool

    Like many Apple users, when I bought a digital camera in 2003, I naturally gravitated to using the bundled iPhoto. It worked well, and my original camera, a Canon Sureshot 2.1 megapixel camera, integrated with it well. We took a couple of international vacations, and iPhoto was a useful tool for managing the photos. Of…

  • Getting there – Weight loss in progress

    Getting there – Weight loss in progress

    The diet is continuing well, and apart from two visitors this week, with a couple truly egregious cheater meals, I made some progress. The statistics so far: 3 weeks (started July 3) down 11.6 #’s (that is a 4.54% loss) Exercise is trending up – both walks at lunch during the week (2.4 ish miles),…

  • Got Called a Hipster

    In a discussion on slashdot about the Apple Watch, where the consensus was that it was a product looking for a solution, and that there weren’t any compelling applications for it. The comment that I offered as a valid use case was as a remote display of the exercise statistics while cycling. When I ride,…

  • Spotify – It’s Over

    Apple Music has won my latest battle for my ears. As is often the case, Apple isn’t first to market (or even second), but when they do get to market, they have the best service, most polished interface, and it “just works“. After only 3 weeks of my 3 month trial, it is time to…

  • Back on the Diet Train

    Two weeks in, back on the Perfect Diet Tracker, counting calories, and making sure I track everything. Down 9 pounds – I am sure at least half is water, I am beginning to feel better. The old adage rings true. Calories in less than calories burned = weight loss. Yes, it was easier before I…

  • Bad Luck – Guitar

    Bad Luck – Guitar

    Sometimes you just can’t catch a break. This one involves music. Over the weekend, I fired up the guitar and did some warm ups. Then I tried what I had tried 1000 times before. Alternate picking. The 999 times before it sucked. I couldn’t get my right hand and left hand synchronized, and I was…

  • Product Review – Wahoo Fitness Cycling sensors

    I grew up bicycling, and returned to it semi seriously many times. Gear is important, and the changes in gear have been stunning. I remember my first good road bike, splurging for clipless shoes and pedals. My first cycling computer. A tiny Cateye thing. Worked great, put several thousand miles on it. Fast forward to…

  • The Long Slog of Getting back into Shape

    Every so often I get tired of be a fat slob, and need to get back into shape. This time, months of moving, living in a crappy apartment, and high stress at work has lead to me, uh, putting on a few pounds. When the 40″ waist jeans stopped fitting, and the 42″ pants were…

  • Nextdoor – NIMBY to the max

    When we moved to the new neighborhood, one of our new neighbors invited us to this neighborhood social media thing called “NextDoor“. Like Facebook, but instead of friends, it is your neighbors, and broken into logical groupings like small neighborhoods. We are in Santa Teresa-Oak Grove, and it has a hundred or so houses in…