Author: Bob Harrison

The most impressive thing I ever fixed was changing the front forks on a motorcycle I owned when I was 15. Of course I was the one who'd ruined the original ones in the first place. It was a wash.

These days I can change a flat on my bicycle, but beyond that I'm lost.

Broken chain. I’m not sure what’s up with that, but I think I probably stressed the chain a bit much yesterday riding up into Kaimuki. I had a cross-chaining incident and that might have done it.
In any case I was about 3 miles from home when my chain went. Of course I didn’t have a chain took with me and I would have been at least two links short. That might have been okay to get me know, but I’d have to check on that. Besides the lack of the tools, the other problem was light – there wasn’t much being night and all. While I did have plenty of light with me, it’s always hard to aim light exactly where you want it when you are tired and frustrated.
Luckily my friend Andy, who lives in the neighborhood I broke down in called me. I had thought he was sick so I didn’t think to call him. But it worked out well. He was feeling better, got me in five minutes, and I’m home safe and sound.
I could have walked home, but it would have taken a major toll on my right leg and I wouldn’t have felt much like riding a bike the rest of the week. Now I’ll be fine – or at least I hope so.

Aloha!

After packing up my bike I got worried as I mentioned earlier. So off to Longs Drugs I went. I had remembered that in their travel section they’d had a travel scale for under $10. Just under as I recall.
I could have gone the luggage shop at Ala Moana, Bag 'n Baggage. I recall an ad from them about a much nicer scale than I bought, but alas, it has a much nicer price as well.
The upshot of all this is that my bag comes in at almost exactly 50 lbs. I’m going to take the pedals out and put them in my carry-on to see if that drops it to just under 50 lbs. As I said, United is…expensive. For me, given the date of my purchase it would be $100. Had I purchased my tickets more recently, it would be $175. Ouch.
Enough of this though. For some reason the word “antipodes” came up on my screen the this morning.
From Dictionary.com:

an⋅tip⋅o⋅des
   /ænˈtɪpəˌdiz/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [an-tip-uh-deez] Show IPA
–plural noun
1. places diametrically opposite each other on the globe.
2. those who dwell there.
Origin:
1350–1400; ME

I had an idea I knew what it meant and I wasn’t far wrong. It’s literally the other side of the world. In my case, living in Honolulu, the location is somewhere in Botswana near Ghanzi, the “Capital of the Kalahari.”
I found out the location using a Google Map derivative at the:
.
I learned a bit more at PRI’s “The World” site. Here’s what I’d see.

It’s flat so biking might be all right for me. 🙂
Aloha!

I packed up my BF NWT today and got it ready to go to Oakland. Then I looked at the United Airlines overweight/oversize charges and my goodness, they are trouble. For my own piece of mind I’ve got to get a scale that works with suitcases. I should be okay, but until I know for sure I’m going to worry. I hate that. 🙂
It’s getting easier. I think I could even do it without the instructions if I had to do so. This time I improved the process by purchasing a lot of rubber bands. Mostly they are for holding the protective cloth socks, but the do excel at that.
Anyway know I just have to figure out how to pack the rest of my stuff in one carry on.
Aloha!

I got to thinking, here I’ve got this relatively expensive bicycle that’s built to fold up and go with me on trips and I wasn’t planning on taking it. The problems with taking it were fairly simple…

1. Cost to and from HNL. It’s about $30 each way to the airport in a cab. Without the bike I can go on my moped and park for free.
2. Getting the bike from SFO to the Oakland Marriot. True the BART goes almost exactly where I want, but could I take my F’lite case?
3. The F’lite case was slightly damaged and was has been a bit of a pain – the sliding handle didn’t slide.

Anyway I got to thinking just how cool it might be to ride across the Golden Gate and…well…problems got solved.

1. I’ve got a ride to the airport. I’ll have to pay to come back from HNL, but it’s a lot easier to pay after payday than it is before. No, I’m not rich – and after Mexico a couple of months ago I’m on a budget.
2. BART apparently has no real rules. I checked with the peeps on the Bike Friday mail list and it seems that several folks were encouraging. So that’s not a problem.
3. The case itself. Well it’s not fixed, but it’s a bit better. I went and bought a Torx (star) screwdriver, pulled off the slide, and banged it a bit till the slide moved a bit easier. Much nicer, still not great. Still it’s likely to keep the slide in place which means it’s less likely to get damaged.

And that leaves…the weather. There’s not much I can do about that, but there ought to be at least one day I can ride a bit. I’m hoping for more.
Blazing Saddles Bike Rental and Tours has this great map…

I’d rent a bike from them, but…well you get the idea. If you want to rent a bike and come along with me, I’d suggest them though. 🙂
So the new plan is…

• Get to SFO and take the BART to Oakland
• Go to my hotel and check my stuff since I probably won’t be able to get my room at that time of day.
• Assemble my bike and head out to Walnut Creek on the BART. Why Walnut Creek? Why because of Rivendell Bicycle Works of course.
• The next day I’ll take my bike on the ferry SF, then ride around and across the bridge to Sausalito. See the map. 🙂

After that it’ll be riding catch as catch can, but I should have at least a bit of time on Friday and Sunday, Monday morning even! Cool.
Yeah Bike Friday!
Aloha

Besides running off to Rivendell Bicycle Works while in Oakland, I may try to get in a bit of actual riding. Because of the fact that I’m headed into SFO and don’t know if I can take luggage on the BART, I’m not taking my Bike Friday NWT. Shucks.

But there’s a place I can rent a bike, at least on the San Francisco side of things. I may try for a ride across the bay, a bike ride, lunch, and a couple more rides across the Bay. We’ll see. 🙂 That is, unless I can figure out something for my BF quick!

There’s a place called Blazing Saddles which does rentals and tours and looks like it might be just the ticket. There’s a bike path across the Golden Gate which looks – well cold this time of year if you must know. 🙂 But it could be fun.

This shamelessly linked. 🙂

Aloha!

First the great news…the UH Rainbows (2-3) won their first road game againt Minnesota yesterday! Road games can be on the ‘Bows so it’s always great to hear about a win.

It think that’s our third baseman Vinnie Catricala who seems to be cleaning up at the plate so far this year. Go Vinnie, go!
And, against my better judgement, I’ve signed up for MLB Fantasy Baseball again this year. I went with the simple draft again, meaning I don’t have to spend any time figuring out who’s on my team. Given my baseball knowledge I’m pretty sure I’ll do just as well this way as I would if I did my own homework.

Aloha!

I remember Tim O’Reilly tweeting something about Trollope a while back and I decided I’d try reading a bit of him. Well now that I’m on my last installment of Wind in the Willows, I’m going to give Barchester Towers a try. Tim apparently didn’t care for it as much as The Warden, but DailyLit doesn’t offer that title.
So, for the next 233 days or so, I’ll be amusing myself daily with Barchester Towers.
I’ve also discovered this…
Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope

My review

I haven’t started, but I remember Tim O’Reilly mentioning Trollope on twitter. He likes “The Warden,” but DailyLit doesn’t offer it, so I’m going for this instead.

View all my reviews.

I was fortunate enough to be able to travel to Mexico DF in the fall of 2008 and spent some time at Teotihuacan. I arrived very early, before it even opened, and had an excellent time. It was definitely one of the highlights of the trip.

https://statrix-redux.netlify.app/mexico/day10/images/mc_day_10_a-374.jpg