Hobbies

Wow, I just stumbled across these two videos and they are both so damned good. This song got played to death on the radio when I was a kid and the familiarity made me miss out on what an amazing song it is. I think I'm starting to find that that is some sort of universal truth in my life. I overlook or miss the amazing beauty and value of the things and people most familiar and closest to me.

Freddie King: Ain't no Sunshine

Bill Withers: Ain't no Sunshine

I would love to be able to write this kind of music. The dude on the guitar in the Bill Withers video is so cool and plays some really nice guitar accompaniment, and Freddie King, well, he just rocks my world. You can tell these guys feel these words to their core. I swear if you look closely at the beginning of the second clip that Bill Withers is crying while he singing this. Please take a few minutes to check these out, they are just amazingly beautiful, simple and poingnant. The rest of your life will still be waiting for you when you finish

Woke up with this song in my head today. I'm certainly looking forward to the summer when the light of love will be burnin' bright!

(M. Jagger/K. Richards)

And it's sure been a cold, cold winter
And the wind ain't been blowin' from the south
It's sure been a cold, cold winter
And the light of love is all burned out

It sure been a hard, hard winter
My feet been draggin' 'cross the ground
And I hope it's gonna be a long, hot summer
And the light of love will be burnin' bright

And I wish I'd been out in California
When the lights on all the Christmas trees went out
But I been burnin' my bell, book and candle
And the restoration plays have all gone 'round

It sure been a cold, cold winter
My feet been draggin' 'cross the ground
And the fields has all been brown and fallow
And the springtime take a long way around

Yeah, and I wish I'd been out in Stony Canyon
When the lights on all the Christmas trees went out
But I been burnin' my bell, book and candle
And the restoration plays have all gone 'round

Sometimes I think about you, baby
Sometimes I cry about you
Lord well well well

Sometimes I wanna wrap my coat around you
Sometimes I wanna keep you warm
Sometimes I wanna wrap my coat around you
Sometimes I wanna burn a candle for you

Bicyclist fatally injured by truck
NCSU junior, 21, faces DWI charges

http://www.newsobserver.com/news/crime_safety/v-print/story/1048055.html

RALEIGH - After shin splints sidelined her running hobby, Nancy Leidy turned to biking. It was something she and her husband, Ross, enjoyed together.

So when she called Ross on Wednesday morning with plans to bike a 10-mile path the two maneuvered together Sunday, he simply reminded her of a good parking place and then wished her well.

Nancy Leidy, 60, was half-way through the trip when police say an N.C. State student hit her with his pickup truck about 11 a.m. She died just before 8 p.m. Wednesday.

Brian Anthony Reid, of 302 S. Sixty Court in Graham, had turned 21 on Wednesday. The arresting officer said he smelled of alcohol, had glossy eyes and slurred speech at the scene. Records indicate Reid had a blood-alcohol content of 0.12. A level of 0.08 is considered impaired.

He was charged after the accident with one count each of felony serious injury by vehicle, driving while impaired and failure to reduce speed. Those could change because of Leidy's death, Raleigh police spokesman Jim Sughrue said late Wednesday night.

According to the police report, Leidy was riding on the right side of the road when she was hit. She was thrown 58 feet by the impact. According to the police report, she was wearing a helmet.

Leidy was taken to Wake-Med Raleigh Campus, where she died, officials said Wed-nesday night.

Reid was not injured. He was released from Wake County jail Wednesday after posting a $10,000 secured bond and signing a promise to appear in court next month to answer the DWI charge. He will appear in court today on other charges.

Leidy's interests

Ross Leidy said his wife took on many tasks when she stopped working in 1991.

She worked for free as an entomology professor at N.C. State University. She ran a local support group for wives of soldiers stationed overseas during Operation Desert Storm. She also hunted for antiques and racked up ribbons for her jellies at the State Fair. And she biked.

"She was the kind of woman that when she got into something, she really got into it," he said.

Wednesday night, as Leidy mourned his wife, he also empathized with the young man charged with hitting her.

"I feel bad for the guy," Leidy said. "I was young once, and I remember getting [drunk] before. I don't think it was at 11 a.m., though."

Here is my fundraising total for this year:



Here is the GPS data from the Friday night ride:

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/player/4308372

And a few photos:

Habitat for Humanity - Full Moon Meander

The ride was great. Wish I could have ridden in the Saturday 50k also.

I owe a few folks some mugs and Habitat gets 6 hours of volunteering from me.

It was a great week. Can't wait until next year

Here's the second entry in the "Stuff I've bought" category. I ordered this a week or so ago but since it just came I'm going to include it. Here we have 12 pieces of rubber and two wiper arms for my MG Midget. The shortbread is a little treat that this vendor throws in. So 12 pieces of rubber which more than likely were made in China, and will probably not last very long since Chinese rubber is crap, plus two wiper arms which were made in Taiwan, plus shipping comes to $57.

Now it would be one thing if these parts were up to the same quality of the original parts and I could put them on the car and expect to get a good 20 - 30 years worth of service out of them. But these are not the same quality and will last no where near as long. Oh the joys of globalization and putting corporate profits above all else. I should start keeping tabs on how long the parts last. I just put in a new signal / high beam low beam switch on the steering column just a couple of months ago and the other night the high beam switch stopped working. At this rate I will probably be better off in the long run financially by buying a new Porsche Boxster than to pay to continually replace substandard parts on a 37 year old MG.

I'm sitting here at work, waiting to go to a meeting and that thought just crossed my mind that there are some things I'd like to do with my life beyond get up, go to work, go home, have dinner, go to bed, get up, go to work, go home, spend the weekend doing chores..... I figured I'd put them here when they cross my mind so I won't forget them.

1. Ride a bicycle across the country or at least across the damned state. I've wanted to bike across country since I was in high school. I'll probably have to wait until the kids are older, yadda, yadda, yadda
2. Along the same lines, get back to riding 3000 miles / year on my bicycle. This year has sucked for bike riding
3. Buy and restore to show condition an old MGA
4. Go camping more
5. Become a better guitar player
6. Become more creative
7. Work less and have more money at the same time. (Sure, yeah, right)...

As my 5 year old son would say, whatever.............

This has been a particularly hard summer with me being sick almost constantly and when I haven't been sick it seems like one or both of the kids were. Anyway this seems an appropriate quote / lyric to describe how I've been feeling. Score one more for the Drive by Truckers:

What used to be is gone and what ought to be ought not to be so hard
So I'll meet you at the bottom if there really is one
They always told me when you hit it you'll know it
But I've been falling so long it's like gravity's gone and I'm just floating

Mike Cooley / Drive-By Truckers ©Wayward Johnson's Music (BMI)

Here's a video of the acoustic version of the song and more proof the Mike Cooley is the coolest:

I just spent five days straight working on the new MG. I'd wake up early in the morning and work until late at night. I spent the first day cleaning out my shed / workshop, organizing parts and tools. Here's a partial list of what got done on the car in no particular order:

• Put in ebay radiator.
• Remove leaking ebay radiator
• Rebuild brake calipers
• Install Crane electronic ignition
• Go to local MG club tech session on carbs
• Adjust carbs - they were set way too rich
• Polish Carbs
• Take soft top off of '69 and install on '70
• Take spin on oil filter fitting off '69 and put on '70
• New sparkplugs
• Strip and paint shift lever
• Polish chrome
• Replace door outer window rubber seals
• Remove overspray from parts
• Replace defroster hoses that had been painted red
• Strip black paint off of chrome grille surround and poilsh
• Re-install grille surround and install new top piece
• Clean out oil pressure flex line
• Replace all hose clamps
• Replace flex gas lines
• New fuel filter
• Adjust drum brakes
• Re-glue console covering
• Attempt to fix reverse light switch

There's more but I can't remember it at the moment. One thing is for sure. It sure beats sitting in front of a computer all day.