It is beginning to stick, but for how long is anyone's guess. Very large, wet flakes. Any accumulation is going to weigh heavy on tree branches.
It is pretty though. Saw a deer run across the street down by the pond.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 16:25 Thursday, 21 November 2024
Rained hard last night, only .3", but it was often horizontal so I don't know how accurate my rain gauge is. 33°F this morning, but clear. We could see fog rising from Seneca Lake, but I had to wait a while before launching the drone and a lot of it had cleared.
It's so pretty here.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 09:08 Thursday, 21 November 2024
Busy evening yesterday, installing an over-the-range microwave. We've been very fortunate here to encounter some remarkable people in the trades. Derrick Marsh is just the nicest guy. He was here for about two and a half hours getting this microwave wired and installed.
I'm loving it here. We took a little walk around "the property" (sounds very pretentious), and imagined where we might build another house, keeping this one as a guest house.
There may be some snow in the offing tomorrow night, we'll see how she feels then.
Got the weather station on the new network. YouTube is your friend here. Ordered some flood sensors. We're not here long enough for me to figure out setting up a solenoid valve to cut off the water in the event of a leak, but that'll be a project for this summer. As it stands, if we get a report of a leak, we'll ask the neighbors to check it out.
It's a gamble, buying these IoT devices. A significant number of the reviews are negative regarding connectivity issues, device malfunctions or battery life. I went with Aquara, as that's what I'm using for cameras. They're not ideal, but they seem to work and I was able to switch them over to the new network without developing a throbbing vein in my temple.
Spent a lot of money at Home Depot yesterday, adding tools to what I brought up here from home. Partly trying to anticipate price increases due to tariffs, and partly as a hedge against a potential SHTF scenario. I'm certain I don't have anywhere near what I'd need, but I'm in better shape than I was yesterday. Being friendly with the neighbors is probably the best investment in that regard.
It was cloudy most of the day, clearing a bit toward the afternoon. I'd put the little Olympus XZ-1 on charge earlier today and used it for this shot. It may be my imagination, but there's something about this landscape that "feels like home."
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 16:39 Wednesday, 20 November 2024
Got up early hoping to get a shot of the waning gibbous moon, but not early enough I guess. Just as I stepped outside, a line of clouds passed overhead. They were thin, and I could make out the moon, but it would have been a very soft shot.
The clouds were drifting south, so it would be a while before the moon emerged again. I came inside and checked my RSS feeds.
Stepped back out and the clouds had spread, thinner now, but the moon wasn't going to emerge from them anytime soon. I took a few shots, all soft. Looked behind me and saw this.
Always look behind you. "Never look back," may be good life advice, but it doesn't apply to photography.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 06:26 Tuesday, 19 November 2024
<img src=“https://nice-marmot.net/Archives/2024/Images/IMG_0314.JPG" alt=“Photo of a baseball cap with the words, “Don’t give up the ship” embroidered on it.">
This is the hat I wear on my morning walks these days. You can see the sweat ring beginning to form, and the darkness of today's perspiration.
Anyway, Leonard Cohen's Suzanne came to mind as I walked this morning. I was thinking about encountering a neighbor who might "thank you for your service" me. (I didn't.)
As you may be able to tell, I'm coping with recent events by blogging a lot here. So, in that vein, let me say to all the hypothetical, insincere people who might feel as though they ought to "thank you for your service" me: Your thanks are not required.
It was an honor and a privilege to serve America under oath, in uniform for twenty-six years, twenty-two of them as a commissioned officer in the United States Navy.
And I am so very grateful to this nation for entrusting me with this honor and this privilege.
I would do it all again, in a heartbeat.
Finally, Leonard Cohen's Suzanne came to mind as I walked the sidewalks of this over-55 community, where probably two out of three of my neighbors voted for the man who is the antithesis of everything my service stood for. It came to mind because of the analogy I made of character as the vessel that conveys our souls.
I guess I'm feeling kind of religious.
Anyway, this came to mind:
And Jesus was a sailor
When He walked upon the water
And He spent a long time watching
From His lonely wooden tower
And when He knew for certain
Only drowning men could see Him
He said, "All men will be sailors then
Until the sea shall free them"
Finally, may I humbly request of my small audience, if you feel any today's posts have any worth or merit, today at least, please share them. (Use the permalinks. This will scroll off the home page tomorrow.)
Thank you.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 07:54 Monday, 11 November 2024
I'm not walking for pace yet, so I'm bringing along the OM-5 with the 14-150mm zoom mounted. Stepped outside the other morning and there were three of these guys on the wall. This one was the largest.
Mitzi had some exterior lighting mounted in the soffits and they attract bugs, making for a kind of buffet for tree frogs. So maybe it's a little easier, bein' green.
Shot a rose and a little blue heron this morning. Couldn't decide between the rose and the heron, so the frog was it.
And, huh...
Just noticed that I managed to lose the viewfinder eyecup on the OM-5. Bummer. I'm sure that little piece of plastic is going to cost $30 or more... Not the first time. Probably won't be the last. I'll order a new one when we get back in December.
Mitzi and I had dinner tonight with a couple I've known for more than 30 years.
We talked about my "risk assessment," and found that they agreed. They're looking at property in North Carolina, though Helene has altered their thinking regarding location, hydrology becoming a key element. North Carolina being "less red," also factors into their choice, along with an intolerance of northeast winters.
Anyway, life goes on.
And always remember...
No matter where you go, there you are.
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 21:09 Saturday, 9 November 2024
But it is a bird. Red-shouldered hawk we spotted back on the 1st when we were out for a walk. I'm walking more slowly for now, so I'm bringing a camera along. The OMDS OM-5 with the mZuiko 14-150mm mounted. Edited and cropped in Photos. The little light spot to the left of the hawk's eye is the sunlight focusing from over the bird's (red) shoulder.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 11:36 Monday, 4 November 2024
Not a bird, and not this morning's.
Shot this back on the 30th. There are two blooming from this plant now. Other folks seem to have better luck with theirs than we do. These are dwarf or miniature, apparently. Mitzi's the gardener, so I don't know.
Anyway, a photo.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 11:30 Monday, 4 November 2024
A picture is worth a thousand words.
Certainly clearer than my description.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 16:45 Wednesday, 30 October 2024
Brought along the OM-5 with the 14-150mm/f4-5.6 mounted. Most of my shots were of Juro spiders. They were nearly everywhere. Very active in their webs too.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 14:44 Saturday, 26 October 2024
The view from the hotel window this morning. Weather has been wonderful. Took a little walk along some greenway. Juro spiders everywhere!
Wedding in a couple of hours. Tomorrow dropping Mitzi's kids at the MARTA to get them to the airport, then we're off to her sister's place in Blue Ridge for another family event on Monday. Back on the road Tuesday.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 14:39 Saturday, 26 October 2024
I forgot to mention "the enemy within."
"Round 'em up!"
Anyway.
Moon was directly overhead. Hardest elevation to shoot. Got two decent shots. Here's one.
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 06:32 Tuesday, 22 October 2024
<img src=“https://nice-marmot.net/Archives/2024/Images/PA170023.JPG" alt=“Telephoto closeup of the full moon, technically a couple of hours from being officially “super”">
Technically, it's a couple of hours from being officially "super," but close enough.
Photographically, the full moon (100% illuminated) is less interesting. No shadows to generate relief. This is contrast enhanced, but little detail.
Sure was bright up there though.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 05:40 Thursday, 17 October 2024
Hadn't done one of these in a while. Went out to look for the comet, but suspect my horizon is too cluttered, or sky is too bright. But it was clear and there was the moon.
Switched over from fidget spinner to doing some hi-res graphics stuff in Virtual ][, at least until I can figure out what's going on, then I'll play with it on the IIc. I need to look at an old issue of Creative Computing magazine, which is easier to do here at the iMac.
It's from the July 1984 issue, The Sierpinski Curve: A Lesson in Debugging and Conversion, by David H. Ahl. I'd link to it, but Archive.org is still offline after being hacked. If you google Sierpinski, you get a lot of stuff about the triangle, not so much about the curve. The article includes a nice capsule summary of the curve. Wikipedia does too.
In the article, Ahl is trying to convert a version of a program written in BASIC for the NEC 8801 computer, a Japanese computer, to some other variant of BASIC. Ahl wasn't very clear on which version of BASIC he was converting from and to, but both seemed ultimately to be some variant of Microsoft BASIC, which Applesoft is as well.
Apart from just being kind of interesting to watch as it is drawn onto the screen (which takes ~2m40s for the 5th order curve, at stock Apple II speed), it also deals with the concept of recursion. I have some notional understanding of the concept, but since I seldom do any real programming, as a practical technique, it remains kind of opaque to me. From the article:
This program, incidentally, takes advantage of the feature in MSX Basic and MBasic that permits a subroutine to call itself. This is known as recursion. It is often said that languages such as Basic and Fortran do not permit recursion. This is simply not true. While not all versions of Basic permit a subroutine to call itself, there are other ways of achieving recursion, but that is a subject for another day.
There are several subroutines in this program that call themselves.
The program that Ahl was converting would overlay curves of different orders, so you could have the 2nd order curve appear over the 1st order curve. It makes for a somewhat more interesting display. So far, my version works in drawing a single curve of orders 1 through 5, but it gets buggy when it begins to overlay two curves, so that's what I'm trying to figure out.
Ahl implemented a stack array to keep track of, well, something. I was confused because he didn't dimension (BASIC "DIM" statement) the stack array first. Looking at the Applesoft Reference Manual, apparently Microsoft let you get away with this and it assigns memory for 11 subscripts (elements 0 to 10) automatically. I'm not getting a BAD SUBSCRIPT ERROR, so I don't think that's the problem.
Anyway, it's something to distract me from the election. I cannot fathom how this thing can supposedly be this close. On the one hand, I'm somewhat encouraged by Harris's consistent, albeit slim, lead. I'm also encouraged by the evident lack of enthusiasm for Trump exhibited by my neighbors.
Four years ago, my street, and many if not most of the streets in this development, were positively festooned with American flags. This was code for Trump supporters, since the HOA doesn't permit partisan flags of any kind. Nothing like that today.
We were also having regular weekly "Trump flotillas" and boat parades. None of that has happened. Yet.
I don't see a lot of golf carts or pickup trucks driving around flying enormous Trump flags.
I'm rather certain that most of those folks will vote for Trump again; but they're not proud of it anymore. They don't want to own it.
Which is of absolutely no comfort.
"Plausible deniability."
It's almost more chilling.
And it's not just "rural Americans" who support this monster. These are wealthy suburbanites who embrace this fascist.
I'm eager to cast my mail-in ballot, so I can go online and verify that it has been counted. Then, if I have a stroke between now and election day, at least I'll have done what little I can to stop this catastrophe.
In the mean time, I'm going to distract myself by playing with old computers.
I need to order a 16-pin ribbon cable to plug into the Apple IIe in the garage. I want to bring those signals out to a breadboard to play with. This program is nothing but subroutines. Maybe add a line in four of the subroutines to ping one of the four annunciators available at that connector to light a different colored LED for each subroutine and see which one is lit most?
Well, mostly just because blinky lights are cool.
Something to look at...
Instead of staring into the abyss.
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 05:53 Monday, 14 October 2024
I should have used that fancy "markup" thing that MacOS has, but this is pretty easy.
Red is Zone A. Green is Zone D. (Yellow is Zone C. I initially wrote that my neighbor across the street was in Zone C. Nope. Zone D. D!!!)
Anyway, see that corner down there where green kind of stabs into the red? That's where I live. That bit of gray road that forms a loop? That's Wood Pond Loop. The south end of Wood Pond Loop, where there's another, fractal, little corner of green marrying up to the red? That's the point where the houses on our side of the street become part of ZONE D!
Despite being backed up to the same swamp that we are!
So, yeah, we're not going anywhere. If we have to, we'll go knock on our neighbor's door.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 17:25 Tuesday, 8 October 2024
<img src=“https://nice-marmot.net/Archives/2024/Images/IMG_0021.JPG" alt=“Apple II hi-res image of an “Archemedes spiral” (3d mathematical plot) on a 32” LCD tv.">
Took the last dose of Paxlovid this morning. I suppose that means I'm "cured."
An encouraging sign was my tooth didn't hurt as much. At first. I was able to eat a bagel and egg sandwich for breakfast. No real pain at first, some discomfort. By the end, it was pretty painful, but it wasn't in the "goes to 11" range. 9 to 10, maybe. It's calmed down since then. Some new pain in the lower jaw, right side, but not severe. Believe this may be the last holdout of the virus.
Too bad I'm out of Paxlovid. Hopefully my immune system can mop up from here.
Nevertheless, it was very encouraging. I thought I was looking at another root canal. Maybe I still am, but... maybe not.
Anyway, minor congestion/gunk here and there. Unsure how I would have fared minus the anti-viral.
In other news, spent most of yesterday and earlier this morning partying like it's 1985.
I have a Floppy Emu from Big Mess O'Wires for the //c. The main //c I use is a model 4100, so it can boot 32MB ProDOS images, essentially giving me a hard drive. The "other" //c (with the broken keycaps) is a 4000, so it can't use volumes larger than 143K. A ROM swap would remedy that, but I'm not planning to do that at this point. Maybe later when I get the ROM+cx installed in main //c. That'll give me a 32K ROM I can install in the 4000.
The next challenge is creating 32MB HD images to place on the micro-SD card for the Emu.
I use Virtual II on my Macs, and it has an "OmniDisk," a fictional peripheral that can read ProDOS volumes larger than the 143K of a 5.25" floppy. You can "create" new disks in the app, so I did, and proceeded to copy a bunch of programs and utilities onto it, creating subdirectories and so on. That way I could play around on the //c without having to fuss with the Emu to change floppies.
Well, after a lot of work, I went to go boot my //c from my "OmniDisk" .2MG 32MB disk image. Long story short, couldn't get it to work.
I'm still uncertain exactly why it's working now, but I essentially started from scratch. The key thing, I think, was formatting the new OmniDisk in ProDOS. You can mount a folder from MacOS as a drive using the OmniDisk, and I suspect I may have just been creating a folder, which is meaningless to the Emu and the real //c.
Anyway, that's "Archimedes Spiral," which takes a long time to plot in BASIC on real hardware. I didn't time it because I decided to just go make breakfast.
More playing around to do now. Hopefully I'm past this Covid thing, though I'm not certain.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 10:09 Sunday, 29 September 2024
<img src=“https://nice-marmot.net/Archives/2024/Images/IMG_0010.JPG" alt=“Screenshot of the Ambient Weather app in iOS showing the distinct “v” in the barometric pressure graph”>
Been mostly awake since 0300. From the screenshot, this was from 0416. We're now in Helene's wake. Haven't checked the news reports yet.
Very little here as a rain event, less than half an inch. (I checked another Ambient station in the neighborhood, similar reading.) The wind sensor is nearly useless, but from the sounds of things, it was mostly a wind event. Could hear it howling last night.
It will be difficult to assess the affects of this hurricane for some time. Any thorough understanding will have to include the experience of Florida's insured, and they are very often quite forgotten.
The Florida legislature, like all of Florida's state government apparatus, has been ruled by the Republican Party of Florida for more than a generation, and their recent property insurance "reforms," were nothing more than a "heads I win, tails you lose" gift to the insurance industry.
I guess the insurance lobby could squeeze their balls more than the trial lawyers.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 05:18 Friday, 27 September 2024
<img src=“https://nice-marmot.net/Archives/2024/Images/IMG_0005.JPG" alt=“Photo of the game screen of the classic Apple II arcade game, Lode Runner on a 32” flat screen tv in a cluttered office”>
Faded a bit after lunch, but rallied later. Feeling a little feverish now, but otherwise ok. Tooth is still a nightmare. Maybe I'll lose a little weight?
Figured I'd spend a little quality time with the //c. I'm stuck on level 6 now, because I let myself get trapped in a room with no way to shoot myself out. I recall there was some keyboard combination that basically exited the game, but I don't think you could record your score. So I'll reboot the computer in a minute, but I wanted to post something here.
I mentioned we'd switched to IQ Fiber for our internet service, and I'm very pleased with the service so far. It comes with an app that lets you see everything that's on your network. I have a Motorola MG8702 cable modem/wifi router that we used when we had Xfinity, and there was this MotoSync iOS app that let you see everything on your network. But a later update basically lobotomized it and it was useless. (Cool. Just remembered to delete it.) But the IQ Fiber app goes a bit further and lets you turn internet access on and off, selectively, by device.
I think you may have been able do that with MotoSync, but it wasn't easily discoverable.
I discovered it playing around with the app yesterday. So I turned off internet access to the TV in the office. It's a TCL 32" LCD with Roku embedded in it. I actually use it to watch streaming in the office when Mitzi's watching something I'm not interested in, or I'm isolating because of Covid. But it doesn't need internet access all the time. And I suspect the little bastard eavesdrops on me. Maybe I'm just paranoid.
Anyway, I'm eluding the Bungeling guards and stealing their gold and this little white light keeps flashing at the bottom of the TV. It's a bit distracting and I'm wondering what that's about. Then it dawned on me, it's probably bitching about the internet! Heh. I'll turn it back on later. New episodes of Bad Monkey and Slow Horses tonight! (Sounds like I'm watching Animal Planet.)
So the foul taste in my mouth fades over time. I suspect that's my liver clearing the antiviral. It's a 2-drug "cocktail" and one of them impairs the liver's ability to metabolize the antiviral, allowing it to circulate longer in the bloodstream. A technique, I gather, developed in the effort to fight HIV.
As the taste fades, it seems my temperature is going up slightly. I don't feel particularly "sick," just hot. I don't know how responsive my immune system is to "viral load," and maybe this is all just in my head, The recommendation is to take the two doses, one in the morning and one at "bed time." Well, "morning" and "bedtime" are pretty ambiguous terms to me. Easy to remember, I guess.
Being an eager beaver, I took my first dose when Mitzi got them home, about 1430 yesterday. I did not take one at bedtime, because they caution you against taking too much. They advise skipping a dose if you miss the regular time by more than 8 hours, and resuming at the normal "morning" or "bedtime," whichever was next.
My second dose was at 0500 this morning. I'm trying to figure out what this 8-hour "window" thing is about. Ideally, it seems you'd want to take the doses 12-hours apart. For an early riser like me, that's at 0500 and 1700. And "bedtime" is usually before 2200. Assuming a notional 2200, "Taps, taps. Lights out. Maintain silence about the decks," that's only a 7-hour interval between the "bedtime" and "morning" doses, but a 17-hour interval between the "morning" and "bedtime" does.
A wiser man would consult the doc, but I'm going with the 12-hour interval. My "second" dose would have been at 0230 this morning. 0500 is only 2.5 hours later, and well within the 8-hour "margin of error." And all subsequent doses will be at precisely 0500 and 1700, because I had a Plebe Year. "Time tide and formation wait for no man."
As of this moment, that's about seven minutes from now. So let me conclude this little chronological ("horological"?) inquiry and post!
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 16:13 Wednesday, 25 September 2024
Technically, it won't be "super" until 2246 tonight. It was hanging above the western horizon this morning and so I figured, "Why not?" Haven't seen one for a while. Olympus E-M1X with the 100-400mm, handheld high-res shot. Edited, hastily, in Photos.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 07:42 Tuesday, 17 September 2024
So here it is. I just noticed the battery has a huge sticker on it that says "20mph." So I guess I can get this thing to go faster.
The battery is actually pressing down on the water bottle holder, so I suppose I'll have to remove that. Don't think the other location will be any less useless. Fortunately, I seldom ride far enough to have to worry about hydration.
I haven't completely zip-tied everything, because it's hard to know exactly what the neatest configuration might be. I just put enough on there for now to take it for a ride.
I need to get my light mounted and the little tool bag back on there, but it's basically done. I also need to get everything put away, and try and find my little flashlight.
Did you notice the front wheel was silver? Neither did I.
Still bugs me.
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 15:46 Monday, 16 September 2024
Well, ynto yt anyway.
I enjoy riding my bike, but not always. There are two times when I will forego riding. One is when it's hot and muggy, the other when it is windy. (Or wyndy?)
Wind is perhaps worse than heat. The heat thing is mostly that I'm soaking wet whenever I get where I'm going. Wind is just discouraging. You're pedaling hard and going nowhere. Well, almost nowhere. I don't know what the thermodynamic efficiency comparison is between riding into the wind and walking, but, subjectively, walking is less unpleasant.
Today is "windy." I don't know what the threshold for me is, but it's definitely below the 12mph we're seeing right now. I would normally not ride my bike today, so it was a good day to test out this conversion.
I have a Priority Classic, 3-speed, very upright riding posture. It's not "built for speed," and neither am I. Looking over the Fitness app, I didn't ride at all in July. Unsurprising, we were gone for much of the month and it's one of the hottest in Florida. My average figures for June were 5.8 miles at 11.7 mph, for 29m 43s expending 213 calories.
My best "workout" rides were between 28m 30s and 29m 31s, 6.03 miles and my best speed was 12.7 mph. Average HR was in the 140s, and calories expended were >290 calories.
The test ride this afternoon was not a workout ride. So I was faster, and expended fewer calories. Despite not being intended to be a workout ride, I nevertheless still had a workout. 136 bpm average HR is right up there with my "Nordic walking" workouts with the polls (though they expend far more calories). And I'm feeling it in my legs. So I was making an effort of some kind, mostly to see how fast I could go.
I don't recall what level of assistance I was in, I think it was 3 (out of 5). I'm still unfamiliar with the control and the display. The speed tops out at 25kph, or 15.5 mph. That's the limit in Britain, faster than that and it's no longer a "bike" and you need a license and registration. We don't have that limit here, and I think there's a setting in the controller where I can bump that up a bit. I'd be happy with 20mph, because that'd let me keep up with the golf carts, mostly. Except for the ones that have been modified for "street use." (I think they go up to 35mph, and good luck to you if you have an accident.)
But I could definitely feel the assistance, particularly in starting out. Normally I have to start out in first gear, but the motor kicks in really quickly and I'm able to start out in 3rd gear as easily as I could in first. The sensation of speed was less pronounced. My maximum recorded in the Fitness app was 16.9mph with the wind. And when I started getting up there around 25kph, you could feel the motor cut out. Much of the trip was into the wind, so the feeling of speed wasn't really present, but I could hear the wind roaring in my helmet (probably 25mph relative wind). My helmet is more of a skateboard helmet than a bike helmet. I look stupid in either kind, and don't normally wear one at all. I think there'd be less wind noise with a bike helmet because it doesn't cover your ears.
The big takeaway for me was that today was not a day I'd normally choose to ride, but now I know I can.
Overall, I'm largely satisfied with the device. It leaves a lot to be desired from an appearance standpoint, and the company's support in terms of assembly is unacceptable. But if you can overcome that, you do have a bike that will expand your capabilities in terms of biking significantly.
It's a tough call in terms of the value proposition. To receive the wrong wheel, have to struggle through inadequate and misleading documentation, and be left with something that looks kind of jury-rigged, I certainly wouldn't spend more than $509. If the documentation had been first-rate, I'd say it was a reasonable price, and I'd have had a less frustrating experience.
I'd like to say everyone should go out and get one, but I can't. If you really want to convert an existing bike, this does have everything you need to do so. Be prepared to "figure it out" on your own, though. I don't know if there are better kits on the market, with clearer instructions. Swytch came with good reviews, but I'm disappointed with the company, and the experience up to the point of getting it on the road has been unpleasant.
Riding has been another story. Time will tell if this has been a good purchase.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 14:40 Monday, 16 September 2024
So here's how my day has been going.
I've been trying to assemble my Swytch ebike conversion kit. It has not gone well, despite all the glowing YouTube videos about how easy it is.
It is not.
The first disappointment was that the wheel in the box wasn't black, it was silver. I was pretty sure I'd ordered the black rim. The first confirmation email didn't mention what color the rim was, and I didn't think anything of it.
The second confirmation email mentioned that the order included a silver rim, but I missed it.
They sent a third notification, on September 7, while we were in NY and I wasn't paying close attention to email, also disclosed they were sending me a silver wheel. I wasn't expecting the kit until October, so it wasn't high on my agenda in terms of paying attention as we were trying to get the new place set up.
As mentioned, I'm pretty sure I ordered a black rim. But my last long-term bike was a bit of a franken-bike with a fork from another bike of a different color. I'm not that bent out of shape about it, but it was a disappointment.
No printed manual is included. So I was using my iPad in the garage. I tried to download the pdf manual, but for whatever reason, all I ever received was the cover page. There's an "interactive" web thing that purports to step you through everything. It sucks. Out loud. Once again, a company has opted for glitzy web effects, transitions, etc, rather than clear illustrations and straightforward text.
Everything is black, and things have to fit into slots and holes and it's hard to see. If you buy one of these things, you should probably wear a headlamp to see what you're doing. I took both of my headlamps to New York. I don't know why.
I muddled my way through nearly everything, over about three hours. I was at the last step of connecting the wiring harness, and I was stuck.
These connections are supposedly "color coded." That's just a cruel joke.
I couldn't figure out what cable was supposed to connect to the handlebar controller. Do they tell you what each of those connections is for? No. Because why would they do that? It'd just confuse the user! It's color coded!
I went to the support web site, thinking maybe there'd be some document or something that elaborated on the harness, or, failing that, some "chat" support. Well, no elaboration, and chat is with an extremely lame bot.
More disappointment.
So I filled out a support request. Unclear when I'll get a response. This wasn't encouraging:
Our team is committed to addressing your request as quickly as possible. While we typically respond within 48 hours, it may take a bit longer during this busy period. Please know that your request is important to us, and we are carefully reviewing each one.
Well, I wanted to ride my ebike. See that cable that's capped? Why is it capped? I don't know and Swytch ain't sayin'. Bastards.
I figured it was covered on purpose, like "do not mess with this cable." Then I figured, "Screw that, I'm pulling this thing off."
There was my connection!
What a bunch of bullshit.
So I got everything wired up. The two mystery connectors remain... mysterious. I picked the bike up, turned the pedals and the front wheel spun!
Then I did my best to cable tie the miles of excess wiring and took it for a spin.
It works!
I'll do another post about the riding experience later. I just want to conclude this one about the assembly experience.
The documentation and web support is horrible. Swytch has invested far more effort in making the web site "pretty" than they have in good documentation. The YouTube videos are all misleading. I'm a bike "rider." I take it to the shop to have a spoke replaced. About all I can do is put air in the tires. I replaced the inner tubes on Mitzi's bike and managed to put one of the tires on "backward." Since when could you do that???
If you see a bike stand in a YouTube video, then treat all claims of "simple" and "easy" with a significant amount of skepticism. It's doable, but it's not easy.
Work in a well-lighted area. Our garage has a two-bulb fluorescent overhead light and it's just plain dark in there. I have to keep the garage door closed because Florida. So have a couple of flashlights handy. A couple, because you will constantly lose track of where you put one of them.
The nuts on the wheel are 19mm. My largest wrench was 16mm. I don't work on bikes, obviously. 11/16s works almost as well and better than an adjustable wrench, IMHO. The instructions for mounting the sensor to the peddle arm are confusing if they're not outright wrong, and I'm pretty certain they just plain outright wrong.
There's a tiny nut and bolt thing that holds the arm to the sensor disk, and you are almost certain to drop that little nut and lose it, so be extremely careful.
All in all, assembly is a horrible experience, because the instructions are incomplete, misleading and sometimes wrong.
But if you persevere and don't just give up and demand to return it, you do get an ebike. Looks kind of goofy. The battery is big and basically makes the water bottle holder useless. There are miles of cables everywhere.
But it'll make your ride a lot easier.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 11:20 Monday, 16 September 2024
Show went on until the sun was below the horizon. This was with the little XZ-1, edited in Photos.
Watched the debate last night. Like most people, I think, it seemed to me that Harris dominated the debate. More importantly, Trump appeared old, unhinged and angry.
I tried to imagine how people who support Trump would view his performance, and I think most of them would be satisfied with it. He validated their grievances, their prejudice, their resentment and I think that's his greatest appeal for them. He's the vessel for their anger. These are not people who are "for" anything, they're just "against" everything.
It's still just remarkably depressing that nearly half the electorate views him as a credible candidate.
But I think Harris and her team have Trump's number and they know how to play him.
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Originally posted at Nice Marmot 08:51 Wednesday, 11 September 2024
This is kind of the payoff.
Productive day today, with some frustrations that I was able to overcome.
I got the secret to resetting the Kwikset lock from a lock-picking web site. Kwikset's helpline won't give it to you, but count on the hacker mentality to share valuable information. Our model wasn't listed on the page I found, but the procedure worked anyway. Factory reset achieved, new access code successfully installed.
The Ambient weather station is mounted on the shed instead of the garage. Too much overhang on the garage roof. Two trips to the lumber store for lag screws, first ones were too short. Used a satellite TV antenna mount. Lost one of the lock nuts getting it set up while on the ladder, but one should be adequate until I can get another nut.
Got two Aqara web cams installed and connected to HomeKit. Another exercise in frustration, and I couldn't tell you exactly how I did it, except to say it had little to do with what the instructions actually say. Took probably four times as long as it should have. And it's just another aggravation that one device defines what your whole network password can be. Had to change the password to omit certain characters for the cameras, which meant re-entering it on everything else.
This place has radiant heating in the slab, and an electric boiler of some kind. I read the manual and it's quite intimidating. It was long on installation instructions and short on actual operation. In the end, I just turned it on and hoped for the best. So far, nothing horrible has happened.
When we come up here for a longer stay, I'll try and get someone who installs these things to give me a tutorial on how to ensure it's working properly.
But the weather was gorgeous today, and Mitzi and I spent a couple of hours sitting on the porch just looking at the landscape. She's negotiated lawn mowing service with the seller's parents. A bit pricey, but it's two acres, so maybe it's reasonable.
I hope we can spend several months up here next year, from sometime in May to sometime in September.
Tomorrow's our last day. A few more preparations to complete. We're thinking of coming back up for Thanksgiving, but we've got two more trips coming up and we may be over traveling in November.
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 20:03 Tuesday, 10 September 2024
