Larger Continent, Longer Trips, Hotter Days, Grandiose Daydreams

Having just returned from abroad, many important matters were on the agenda. Naturally, one of them was a trip to Harris Cyclery. The shop is 9 miles from our place and the temperature was over 100F, but nothing could deter me from going on a ride after sitting still in a airplane for hours.

Good thing the Co-Habitant had those two bottles on his bike, because the heat and humidity were brutal. In Vienna I had gotten used to taking many short trips throughout the day and almost forgot that "commuting" and "errands" in Boston are a bit different. But I am clearly in better shape now than I was even a couple of months ago: The 18 mile round trip to Harris Cyclery used to feel like a "pilgrimage," but now it's just a casual trip.

As for the sun and heat, these are my solutions. Over the past year, I have been trying to switch to natural hygiene products: essential oils instead of perfume, herbal deodorant instead of aluminum-based antiperspirant, and mineral-based sunblock. It has not been easy. In Vienna I've finally found Eco Cosmetics SPF 30, which I love. Its only active ingredient is titanium (to which I am, thankfully, not sensitive) and the rest is herbal moisturisers. It works perfectly and is soothing on the skin. Finding a deodorant was even more challenging, but I've finally found the Queen Helene Tea Tree Oil Deodorant Stick. It works for me as well as the real stuff, and I like that it has a dry, matte texture, as I hate the feeling of sticky roll-ons. So there - if you are looking for natural ways to deal with sun and heat, these have worked for me. On the ride to Harris I neither got sunburnt nor had a "deodorant failure".

At the bike shop I picked up a couple of things I had been meaning to get, and also something unexpected: They had a stack of boxes with clipless shoes on clearance, and I bought these for $25.

They are SPD shoes that can be worn either with cleats attached on clipless pedals, or as regular shoes on platform pedals. I know, I know - I was just making fun of the Co-Habitant for getting clipless shoes and pedals. But I will explain that these aren't for any of my regular bikes; they are to practice for the velodrome (I plan to get a license when I return to Vienna in November). I brought a vintage frame back from Austria for fixed gear conversion, and I will need to put a foot retention system on it and finally force myself to learn. I did not plan to buy the shoes so soon, but here they were in just my size and at a great price - so now I have them.

Clipless shoe love? I don't know. The Co-Habitant was victorious as I made my purchase, suggesting which pedals I should get to go with the shoes (and me vehemently disagreeing). Later in the day, I wore the shoes (without cleats) on a 26 mile ride, just to see how they felt or regular pedals. Frankly, I am not in love with the super-stiff soles. I like moderately stiff soles, but these felt like overkill and detracted from comfort. Is this degree of stiffness an acquired taste that you get used to gradually? And I wonder whether the "ugly as sin but comfortable" Keen sandals everyone is getting have a similar feel to them?

In any case, I have my bike project plate so full at the moment, that it is comical. In the coming weeks, we will finally build up my Royal H mixte, make some much-anticipated updates to my Raleigh DL-1, and oh yes, create a fixed gear bicycle. Stay tuned, and try to stay sane in the heat!

A day in Zandvoort

This month, June has been such a terrible weather month. It is supposed to be summer now but it’s been raining non-stop for days and weeks already with low temperatures between 10C and 15C by day. It feels like we are stuck in a time warp, like we are still in spring or have fast forwarded to autumn.

At the beach we rented a pair of sunbeds and a wind cover. I am sure this book is great, a bestseller in the Netherlands but I could not finish it. I am not into tear-jerking, overly romantic and sentimental storylines, and that goes as well with music . I honestly thought I could read this to improve my Dutch (book was referred to by a friend) but helaas I am not motivated to read further. I will just stick to reading newspapers and business and travel magazines, in Dutch.

What I would like to share to you is a trip to Zandvoort aan Zee, one of the Netherland’s coastal villages in the North Holland province. We went there on a Monday last month, May. Mondays are always busy days, traffic on the highways, meetings at work, doing the necessary administrative stuff, etcetera but it was such a fine feeling, quite liberating in fact, to be at the beach instead. It kind of gives you that ‘I have finally retired’ or ‘I have won the lotto so I don’t bother with working’ feeling. Well, at least for a day.

The weather was not really that warm but it was warm enough to sit outside in a bikini and drink a glass of chilled rose.

Zandvoort also has a nice little centrum with amusing shops and appealing café terraces. All in all, it is an enjoyable little coastal town and we had a very relaxing Monday.

Not busy on a Monday here at the beach.

Zandvoort beach. There were quite a number of kitesurfers that day.

Nice little centrum of Zandvoort.

Did some people watching while sitting on a cafe terrace.

The Zandvoort aan zee train station is actually pretty. This train station was opened in 3 June 1881 and is connected to Amsterdam via Haarlem.

Residential part of Zandvoort aan Zee.

When Traditional Meets the Unconventional

I truly love the life we are living, and normally embrace the unconventional aspects of it. It has been good for me. It has grown me as person. I confess that when it comes to holidays, I have a real problem with it though. There are two dynamics that I've noticed are becoming a part of our holiday theme. One is that we no longer have that same excitement about holidays. We live the life we normally looked forward to when holidays did occur. So holidays are just not all that unique or special in the same way. We don't have the same need for days of rest or for family time since that is how we live pretty much every single day.

The other thing I've noticed is that I still tend to want to cling to the traditional while the rest of the family is like...not so much. They want to keep our holidays more in kind to our whole lives and feel no need to continue doing the same things we used to on those days. And really, I understand the logic in that thinking. Because it makes more sense to overall live the life you want than to strive for that a few certain days out of the year. But the emotional side of me is having a temper tantrum because I still want some days that are really different than the rest. I like special sometimes, even when I'm not sure how to make that happen. Our desires have clashed in some pretty ugly ways because of it. It has me feeling a bit like this:



Today, I decided to try something that would in fact make the day different for me. If the old traditions aren't working, maybe it is time for new ones I thought. So I hopped in the truck and went and took one of those Sunday drives that I said last year that I was going to try to do and learn to like.



It was a great day for it. Sunny and warm. The air smelled sweet from blossoming flowers. And since it was just me, I could go at my own pace. I confess, I rather liked this Sunday drive thing. I still don't see myself doing it on a regular basis, but I really might be able to make this one of my new holiday traditions.





I've been stressed about some things to do with my girls. I could feel that stress just melting away the longer I was out and snapping pictures.

I don't think I really hit my groove with the whole thing though until I came across these fine creatures.

I was pretty captivated by them. They were somewhat intrigued by me. Mostly, we just stared at each other. Ok, I confess that they were probably staring at me because I was in a noisy dually truck. Standing on the hood to get better shots. In a skirt. I stared at them because it's been a long time since I realized how awesome cows are.

And somehow, that was enough for me for the moment. Just being outside, alive and aware of the life around me seemed special enough. I'm a woman in my forties, so it remains to be seen if that will be enough next time. But it was good for today and today is all that matters, right?



Happy Easter from Florida! Hope your day was special too!

Pleasanton Family History Expo

By all accounts, the recent Family History Expo in Pleasanton, California was a success. I'll add my kudos to all of the reports with one exception...

The speakers were good. The topics presented were varied and interesting. Visiting with geneabloggers previously met was wonderful. The exception? In plain and simple terms, the venue was awful. Two classrooms in each building separated by fabric curtains certainly did not enhance the learning experience. To give her credit, Holly Hanson (president of Family History Expos) apologized for the classroom environment in her end of the Expo presentation, saying that the Expo will return to the area next year but in different and hopefully better facilities. That's good news for everyone! All in all, the Expo was well worth the time and money.

The first session I attended was with Arlene Eackle. And even though I have few ancestors in the south (a couple in Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky), I learned a great deal about locating the “right” ancestor through property records.

At 11:30 I learned what was new in RootsMagic4 with Bruce Buzbee. RootsMagic has some interesting features. I'm almost convinced that I should switch from Legacy! Almost.

The lines for getting lunch were quite long and I missed the 1:30 session with Lisa Alzo that I had planned on attending. Her talk was on Websites You Might Be Missing - a review of some cool tools and useful web sites for genealogists. I'll be able to get some of that information from the Syllabus but I'm sure more information was given in the lecture.

At three o'clock I sat in on Tim Cox's presentation on Hard Drive Organization and learned about how he files his genealogy documents and images. I'm always looking at how other people do that since I have several thousand documents and photos that I scanned before leaving home last September and have yet to organize them. I want to devise a system that will not need to be changed sometime in the future! Probably an impossible dream.

The final classroom session for the day was with Jean Wilcox Hibben on Shaking the Myth: Proving/Disproving Family Legends. Jean has devised a method of evaluating evidence by asking a series of questions to help determine if the legend could be true. It was fascinating to “step through” one of her family legends using this process.

The first day wasn't quite over when the last session finished. I, along with most of the geneabloggers and quite a few other people, attended the live Genealogy Gems Podcast with Lisa Louise Cooke. Her guests were Craig Manson and Sheri Fenley. They discussed writing for the online magazine Shades of the Departed which was created by footnoteMaven. Both Craig and Sheri were fantastic guests, and the dessert bar was pretty good too!

Lisa Louise Cooke and Craig Manson
Day two of the Expo, I was a slacker. It was noon before I made my way to where the Expo was being held. I went in to a session at 1:30 but left after 10 minutes. I couldn't hear the speaker due to the noise from the neighboring session... I went to a 3:00 session but left soon after it started because the subject wasn't what I thought it would be. At 4:30 Holly Hanson gave the final presentation on breaking down brick walls on those troublesome ancestors providing several inspiring examples. And then, it was over... a few days respite and I'm back on the road!

Beachcombing #1

Padre Island National Seashore
Corpus Christi, Texas
February 17, ..

Coyote

Godspeed, Lucy 3-Speed!

Today I said Good-Bye to one of my bicycles, Lucy 3-Speed. I loved having her, but I simply could not keep so many bicycles in my apartment - or sustain the financial expenditure of restoring them. Given that I now have the DL-1 - my dream vintage Raleigh - the Lady's Sports was redundant and I had to set her free. But it makes me happy that she has found a new loving home!

I rode Lucy to Open Bicycle, where I met up with the lovely lady who will be her new guardian. I need to check whether it is all right to post a photo of her and Lucy here; they look great together. Amazingly, the new owner lives in the same city and state as my parents - so Lucy is in fact going back to her home town!

I attached this Basil wicker basket to the rear rack and transported it to the shop as well. It is a handlebar basket that I bought new but decided not to install on my Pashley. Hopefully it will also find a new owner who will love it. This was a big "De-clutter the Art Studio from Bicycle-Related Items" day. But what is in the basket, you ask?

Oh just a few vintage Brooks B72 saddles! I have accumulated these over the past year and they had to go as well - don't need 3 extra saddles! They do look beautiful piled up in the wicker basket.

I am happy that I've been able to let go of these things, because I really never wanted to become a hoarder/collector. I love bicycles and bicycle accessories, but I am looking for a few that are perfect for me, rather than for a "stable". Maybe some day, when I have a house with a barn and more money. But for now, Godspeed!

Oklahoma Wild Flowers

Tuesday, April 12th - - Alongside US highway 70 in Southeastern Oklahoma. These were about an inch or so in diameter. If you look closely, you can see a bumble bee in the center of the picture. It is in between one of the blue and the red flowers. (Double-click the photo to view a larger version.)

Hodge Podge

Pink Peony.



Yellow ?



Mauve Rose.



Petunias.



Temple Square Gardens – Tuesday, June 7th