Sometimes the gloom and doom gets too much. As much as the news is ripe with topics to spawn plenty of opinion talk, I choose to leave it alone as it doesn’t age well. Today I relive memories about why I look forward to summer. You don’t have to identify with my experiences but allow yourself to go into those good times of the past. This has been far from my favorite summer but based on the track record, it is bound to be good again.
Tag: Summer
May 9, 2024 – Don’t Blink, Summer is Coming
This is going to be an unprecedented summer for me. Of course, it is going to be centered around my wife’s treatment. We are going to have to temporarily move to Portland to be near hospital. It is looking that is going to be mid-July and run through mid-August to be optimistic. I knew this in general terms which is why I haven’t even tried to do any sort of gardening this year.
If I look at it objectively, it is no different than me travelling for work. I have been gone for nearly months at a time many times in the summer. Not only will I have to be working but I will also have to be a health-care support person as well. I am going to do my best to keep doing what I am doing now, We’ll see if AltF4 has to go on hiatus, kind of like last year.
One of the options to stay in Portland is to park an RV. We have battered the idea around a little bit. I grew up around RVs and I have mixed feelings. On one hand, I hate camping in an RV park. I don’t like the proximity to people. To me RVs shine when you want to do something else. When hunting or fishing, it is sure nice to pull in and not have to setup camp. Indoor lighting makes it much easier to get the most out of your day outside. It sure beats a tent when the weather turns sour as well.
For me, I think the ideal setup would be a class B RV. This is essentially a converted van. I feel like this would allow me to reasonably get off the pavement. I could see weekend excursions to fish coastal steelhead or a week long deer hunt. Add a trailer hitch bike rack and figure out a place to stow the Kayaks and this is pre-canned adventure. This really is not the vehicle to park for a month and work and heal. It is too small to really live in, we would need to live out of.
I would like to hold off a little bit. I don’t think it is the right fit for spending a month. I also feel like we don’t need extra expenses nor do we have a place to park it. That being said, this is my third reminder that life is fleeting. Once we get through this business in Portland, it may be a good idea to make some changes regardless of prognosis.
The primary downside of class B RVs are they are expensive. The one I really want costs around $200,000. Even used ones are running $40K on up. The more ubiquitous class Cs can be found much cheaper used but that is not really the format I want for the type of recreation I want to do. These are the perfect pull into the RV park for a couple of days. They may be much more suitable for parking for a month as well.
The truth is, we probably need new cars much more. My pick-up is 21 years old and my SUV is 14 years old. So, it is hard to justify an occasional vehicle when we really depend on a reliable vehicle. But, this is the same story that has held me back for years on looking at boats too. Once again, I am going to defer this.
End Your Programming Routine: The reason I titled this the way that I did was that if you want to make reservations somewhere you are running out of time. Memorial Day is right around the corner. I was thinking about it in context to RVs so if that is your jam you better get on it. It is hard for a fiscally conservative with an uncertain economic future to pull the trigger. That being said, we only have one life to live and sometimes it changes without our input.
August 8, 2023 – Coctel de Cameron
It has been a week since my wife left for France and I have not cooked yet, subsisting on leftovers (almost). On a side note, I think that it is pretty ridiculous that I would even have this quantity of leftovers in the first place. I opened the refrigerator and saw that there was a half pound of bay shrimp in there. Uh oh, not something to be hanging around too long,
I did have to do some prep and mixing to make this shrimp cocktail. This is why I said almost none. While technically it is not cooking, it is more than microwaving a plate or simply eating out of the fridge. This particular version is the Mexican one and my favorite style of shrimp cocktail.
You can find a number of different recipes for coctel de cameron. I will use my words in the basic groups for simplicity: shrimp, pico de gallo, cucumber and avacado in tomato juice. My wife likes hers’ on the sweeter side so that is where I gravitate. Ketchup and orange soda in the right proportions for sweetness and thickness go into my version. In addition to my mystery shrimp, I also had a side container of ketchup, tomato sauce and sliced tomatoes from burgers we made. So, I got to use all those things up as well.
Strict adherents to Mexican food would say things like use white onion in your pico de gallo. It is true that I think that it works better but I use what I have. The same goes with quantity. I mean who really knows what is 1/2 cup of diced onion? From my experience, I would say about a quarter of an onion, but don’t get hung up on things. I used the quantity I had leftover.
After making the pico, dice the avacado and cucumber and dump all of the ingredients together. Salt, sweeten and bitter to your own tastes. I like to let it set together an hour or two. Serve with saltines or tortilla chips and enjoy with an ice cold cerveza.
Feel free to add your favorite hot sauce as well. It is also often garnished with additional limes. I think it is a little weird, but some restaurants offer you a choice of tepid or cold. I suppose that it is really an homage to the traditional lack of refrigeration in Mexico.
End Your Programming Routine: When you are sweating outside, eating a chilled serving of shrimp cocktail is refreshing. You know when you are hot and you don’t feel like eating anything? This changes that dynamic. It is also a good platform to use up little bits of leftovers juices, sauces and vegetables outside of prescribed recipes.
June 20, 2023 – The Rhythm of Summer
It seems like I never stop whining about not having time to do anything. The reason is choices of course. My choices are erroring on the side of getting stuff done and if you remember I am staining the deck? Well, that is still going on. My weekdays go like this.
- Wakeup and go to work.
- When work is completed, clean-up the mess in the kitchen and start dinner.
- When Dinner is completed, go outside and stain the deck.
- Repeat.
It is number three that has me occupied. This was something that I wanted to do last year but I ran out of weather to do it. I figured that I could do this in a couple of weeks, but I am finding that it is taking much more time than I had guessed. One, I have never worked with an oil based deck stain before. Two, I am spending an hour or two a night so not much productivity per session.
Maybe I should enlist my natural labor force (family)? I am going to talk about this in my next podcast but I actually enjoy the solitary labor. I can turn off my brain and just focus on the task at hand. It really seems like my Zen time, I look forward to it. I would love it if they would help but that would deny the summer pool parties and standing tennis practice.
Life is like being in a tide. If you are going with it then you are making double progress but if you are trying to go against it, it is a struggle. The tide is like the school year. There is the schedule when it is in session and the schedule when it is not. While I have traded the tennis matches and award ceremonies for summer jobs and personal activities, one isn’t better than the other, it is just different.
It won’t be long and summer will be over. We are more than halfway through June which means the fourth of July is over the horizon. Then I will have an exchange student for month and then my wife leaves for Europe. By the time she returns, my other son will be leaving for Taiwan. Just looking at my calendar, this is likely the only thing I will get done this year.
By no means am I saying that I am not feeling the pressure. But what I am saying is that I am enjoying my time while I can. I think that is the true rhythm of summer. It is not endless, but making the most of what there is.
End Your Programming Routine: I am cutting this relatively short due to the fact that I have to get back out to the deck. Not really but kind of. As I write this, I am on the way to getting my son to a doctor’s appointment for his Visa application to Taiwan. Despite the fact that I am in Minneapolis this week, all I can think of getting back home to keep working on getting this project finished.
June 22, 2022 – Time to Look Ahead
Wasn’t that great? We are a couple days from the end of our time here in Spain. I will spend time next week unpacking the important items from the trip. Today, I am starting to change my mindset into looking forward beyond vacation. And boy, there is work to be done.
- My summer project. It is time to start ripping off siding and fixing the rotten siding. In theory, I think that it is going to take a couple of weeks. Those ideas always get waylaid by everything else going on. I am going to estimate that this is going to take all summer.
- Fourth of July. Since the fourth is on Monday, this will be an entire weekend fireworks, parades, barbeques and carnivals. I don’t mind a fireworks display or drinking some beer. But, I have to say that one day is enough for me.
- Chess in the Park. When my son has a dream, it quickly becomes my dream (responsibility). My son has created eight Saturdays where he is running chess in the park. Basically every Saturday between the Fourth and Labor day has a commitment of several hours in the park to run this event.
- Of the age of Summer Jobs. My other son will be driving tractor for five weeks. This entire time will be before having a drivers license and therefore we will have to drop off and pick up every day.
- Birthday week. The last week in July is birthday week for my wife and son. This is usually the most hectic week of the summer with activities.
That is just July (mostly). What happened to camping and fishing? I don’t foresee this happening this year. August starts to look ahead to the next school year, harvest time and finishing what we started for the summer. Hopefully, I can sneak some respite and recreation in there before the summer is over.
I do have some other expectations for the summer. My wife wants the lattice replaced on the deck. Now that my son’s car is in the garage, I need to block off some time to see if I can help him get it working. This isn’t mentioning things that I want to do like take my dad out for belated Father’s day and restart my range trips that have fallen off in recent months. Culinary book club has restarted and I am planning on an AltF4 series on Atlas Shrugged. Plus, I wanted to put some time into making Adirondack chairs while we can still enjoy them.
End Your Programming Routine: In many ways, I have put my life on hold for the sake of this vacation. To be clear, I did have a good time but I am glad to be moving on. I am anxious to get my project started that I have been putting off for months. It’s a beautiful country with lovely food and people. It is not just me to live my life as a party and lay on the beach, even on vacation.
May 16, 2022 – Another Tough Week
I had about 80% of Friday’s post written but couldn’t quite get it over the hump before I ran out of time. I will do my best to use it this week. But, I have another long week ahead. I am not making any promises.
I would be remiss not to mention that summer is approaching quickly. For myself, I have one month before we are off for a family vacation to Spain. I will be away for ten days on that trip. That will put us into July and I will need to spend between July and August working on my summer project.
Summer is always a super busy time. I addition to what I am planning to focus, there are other activities like Boy Scout camp, gardening, family gatherings. Don’t forget, there could be be a funeral thrown in there at any time. What I am trying to say is that as busy as I am with work, there are certainly opportunities to accelerate everything outside of that as well.
End Your Programming Routine: I will do my best to keep up. Ideas keep popping up all the time. I keep taking pictures and building a war chest of ideas. I am sure that the volume of things that will happen over the summer will generate plenty of material for the coming months. I hope that I can keep my head above water.
June 3, 2021 – ‘Tacticool’ Thursday
We are starting to get into a tough season. This weekend is the only free weekend we have this month. July has at least half of the weekends claimed already and at least one in August. I love the summer but it is hard to do the things that I want to do.
Since I haven’t been to the range since February, I am very delayed in my planned goals for the year. In my head, I am OK with it because I have shot trap a couple of times and there is no ammunition to refill once it is gone. But I thought that I would share my plan on how to make the most of my time.
I am going to do my best to get there this month. But just in case, I will call it my next range trip plan. I have two 20 gauges. Last year I purchased a shorter barrel and a red dot sight for one. Neither have I ever had on the rifle range to see how slugs would perform, let alone sighted in. I would like to see the difference that a longer barrel vs. a shorter barrel would make. I would like to switch brands of ammunition to verify effect.
Said another way, I plan to sight in the red dot with slugs at 50 yds. Then I plan to check the difference of ammunition. After that, I plan on checking the pattern of buckshot at that difference. Along the way, I am going to switch barrels and firearms to see if I can tell the difference of different variables on the same ammunition. Below is the breakdown of my plan.
| 870 20 – sight in red dot on 18″ barrel (15) |
| 870 20 – slug test field barrel (5) |
| 870 20 – brand change (5) |
| R22/20 – test fire on range (5) |
| 870 20 – pattern buck on range |
| 870 20 – field barrel buck pattern |
| R22/20 – test fire buck |
If you look carefully at the picture, you can see that the Remington slugs are 5/8oz and the Winchester slugs are 3/4oz. Reportedly, both are at a muzzle velocity of 1600 fps. It is highly likely that they will not zero at the same point with the red dot. And certainly, the heavier slug will have more drop at distance. This is why it is important to take your check your hunting ammunition at the range.
This is a fairly simple plan. It will likely take a couple of hours to perform. And even at 40 shots at most, it is still $125 worth of ammunition. My dad wants to go as well, so it will probably go a little longer, I would say it will be a good half day,
If the cost (and availability) of ammunition wasn’t so much of a problem, I would also have liked to try more ammunition variations like 2 3/4″ vs 3″ shells of the same brand, standard vs reduced recoil of the same length shell and some different chokes. I would also like to move out to 100 yards and maybe even 200 yards. I would also like to do some similar variations with buckshot as well. I am just not going to be able to get this done at least at this time.
Change Your Programming Routine: When time and resources are limited, planning makes the most of both. Being deliberate with your actions is the most efficient training that you can perform. I don’t know anyone personally, but I have heard through podcasts and radio people that shoot 1000 rounds a session. I have never had the inclination to shoot that much from a cost and time standpoint. I just want to make everything count.
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