Big weather changes

November 26, 2008
Peoria, AZ

We awoke this morning to the sound of raindrops. After almost 100 days without measurable rain (nowhere near a record for this area but still a pretty long time), we may be in for a record rainfall over the next few days.

It's interesting to gauge the level of excitement around the weather, no matter where we go. It's more pervasive than predicting the outcome of sports events and more universal than prognosticating about the financial markets (well, maybe not lately). Where we're from originally (the Northeast), an inch or so of rain over a few days would be no big deal. A couple of flakes of snow - that's a whole different ballgame. Here in the desert, the prospect of even some clouds brings out the "we're tracking the storm for you; details on the evening news" messages. Given the probability of significant rain, all the news outlets are in a positive tizzy. Fascinating.

In any event, we've been productive over the last few days, tackling projects from the various to-do lists and some that weren't forseen. I took a shot at fine-tuning the alignment of the DirecTV dish to make sure that we get all the HD channels as they transition to the new "birds" (these new dishes require more accurate aiming). I found that the fine adjustment screw on the dish arm has come loose, but I think I managed to get it pretty close anyway. Having a quality hand-held meter is a big plus.

While I was fussing with the setup, I ran another cable to the DVR, replacing one that wasn't showing a signal (the DVR has two tuners, allowing recording of one channel while watching another). I think it's OK, even though I wasn't able to completely figure out where it was going wrong. It seemed like the signal wasn't passing through the outside grounding block (needed in case the dish gets hit with lightning), so I replaced the whole cable and shifted it to another block and was able to get a signal through to the receiver. It still doesn't seem to want to record from the second tuner, but I think a reset of the box may fix that. Of course, I had to remove the wooden trim strips I used to cover up the three cables (2 dish and 1 over-the-air antenna) running along the side of the house, and I need to upgrade the wall outlet box in the living room where the cables come in from outside. I'll reinstall and repaint the trim when the weather clears, and replace the box next time I'm in Home Depot.

We went for a bike ride the other day, now that the temperatures have eased. Now, our rides are nothing like our friend Dave's; he does 70 miles in 5 hours while we do 5-10 in one hour, but at least we get out there periodically. Unfortunately for me, my recumbent turned up lame as we were getting ready to leave - the rear tire was flat and wouldn't hold air. I was surprised, since I'd aired up the tires after the summer storage period and all seemed OK. I had the mountain bike as a backup, so our ride wasn't impacted.

We tried out the new riding/walking trail that was installed last spring/summer along the wash that runs behind our development. The parks department has installed several miles of paved pathway, complete with "rest areas" (benches and water fountains). Apparently, there are plans to interconnect several of these existing and planned pathways over time, so we'll have miles of trails to ride without dodging vehicular traffic.

When we bought the recumbent bikes several years ago, I bought spare tubes, so I had a replacement on hand and made the swap. I have no idea how you're supposed to remount a bike tire by hand; I cheated and carefully used a pry lever to get the tire back over the rim edge. I don't think I damaged the tube in the process. This is the second flat this year; I got a thorn in one of the mountain bike tires in Santa Fe, but cheated and made a temporary fix with a sealant. I'll replace that tube over the winter; it's not critical as I don't use the mountain bike much while we're here. It was nice to have a backup, though.

There's not much new to report on the food front. Sunday, we tried another new recipe, Maple-Mustard Glazed Chicken, which was a tentative "keeper" (we'll try it again with better quality maple syrup), and yesterday we had a nice crusted tilapia with curried couscous.

Well, that's it for now - we're off to Geri's periodoontist for a checkup...