Scratch another pair of jobs off the “honey do” list! For a month or two, the kitchen and main floor bathroom faucets have been needing some TLC. Today, Ian and I rode our bikes down to Home Depot and picked up some new ones.
New faucets: Moen Adler and Essie
The kitchen faucet had a slow, persistent drip. I’d taken it apart and cleaned the internals, but that didn’t really solve anything.
I wanted to just replace worn parts, but at Home Depot, I couldn’t find replacement parts or washers, so I chose to upgrade. Tammy’s been missing having a rinsing wand with the kitchen sink ever since we moved out of the townhouse in Prince George. So I chose a model with one that I figured would fit. It really wasn’t that hard to replace.
Yes, it all works
The bathroom faucet, on the other hand, was a pain. The cold tap had developed an annoying habit of not shutting off all the way and then making a high-pitched whine as it leaked. But that was just part of the problem. The other part was that the sink wasn’t really installed well. It was slightly wobbly: I’d known that for a long time, but this was an opportunity to fix it.
I took the whole thing apart, finding that except for some gravity anchors on the wall, it was only attached by caulk. 🤦♂️
A lot of time on my back and patience from Tammy later, the sink is now anchored to the wall and the faucet is ready to go. There still is a hairline crack in the sink, but at least now it’s solidly attached.
This afternoon Tammy and I got our second COVID-19 shot. This time it was Pfizer BioNTech.
On the train to downtown
This time we were ready for a long wait but wouldn’t you know it, this was the time when we could walk right in.
Updated the next day
So far, our side effects have been limited to a sore shoulder. I didn’t make any big plans for today because I expected some. As the morning crept on and still no fever, chills, nausea or diarrhea showed up, I chose to ride out with Ian to Home Depot and Bow Cycle (to pick up my 2021 BCC uniform). Let’s hope my fortune holds!
This time, Tammy and I went to the same nurse, an R.N. named Claire. Tammy’s bled a bit, but mine didn’t. Claire gave me a band-aid anyways, so I wouldn’t be jealous. I asked for a Hello Kitty one, but she only had beige. No pain at all.
It seems odd to imagine doing things, but once the kids have their second and they’ve taken effect, there’s no telling what we might end up doing. Will want to figure out how to prove we’re fully vaccinated, though.
Been busy with work and the kids so I really didn’t have time for painting. Was half done with this one for the longest time until I finished it the other day.
With the month being busy and every other week I get the kids, I realized that for Dad’s birthday I had to celebrate it today! We had KFC and a fourplex of cake (lemon, double chocolate, oreo and snickers) every one could pick something they liked!
It was overcast but nice until the mosquitoes came.
On another note. Upgraded my phone to an IPhone 12. Purple!
got a clear case with sparkles so now it Purple Sparkles 😁 Bri got my iPhone 7 (upgrade from her 5s) and she’s happy
A week or so ago I got an email from Coop inviting me to join a virtual cocktail making class through zoom. I subscribe to coop for deals and special events. I decided why not. It’s a Thursday, but the clincher was the elderflower liqueur ingredient. So tonight was thew night. it started at 7 and went until around 8.30. the ere were 4 recipes on the list and i got the ingredients. simon joined m. the 3 that we made were the ;peach mint julep, the strawberry lemonade mojito,. and the elderflower one. I don’t like campari, so we didn’t make that one. I preepped a lot before then and did some shopping for it. it was a lot of fun. there was no sound at first, but then that was fixed. We started wayth the julep because it had to soak for 15 minutes. we moved onto the mojito which is not simon’s favourite because he doesn’t like the herbal mint flavour. After that we went back k to the julep and finished making it. Thwe last one we did was the elderflower one which was really excellent,lent. I knew it would be be aus ei love elderflower. The surprising one was the julep. I donor’ like them much. but this peach one was good. Simon also chopped some cheed and meat and crackers for us to try sn counter the booze. It was great!~ There was a bonus recipe of iced coffee with baileys and I think i might try that one. The elderflower was the best and the julep was second best. I like my mojitos sweeter and Iuse malibu instead of plain white rum. I hop[e they do more of these. I don’t get hosed often but right now i can’t feel my findgers or legs.
Work in Progress
Strawberry Lemonade Mojito
Peach-Ginger Julep
French Elderflower Kiss
The webinar
Update
Surprisingly we didn’t have a hang over this morning. I guess the thunder storm at 1.30 this morning shook it out of us. I won’t say that I don’t feel tired and was a little stiff getting out of bed, but no headache.
I’m attaching the recipes for the cocktails here. We didn’t attempt the Tequila Fresca one, but we might in the future (without Campari).
The Alberta COVID restrictions have lifted enough for our club to have outdoor bike rides of groups of 10 or fewer as of June 1st. June 1st was a Tuesday, so we had our “soft launch” on the Tuesday morning ride and our first evening ride last night. The idea of having the first ride be Tuesday morning is that it usually only attracts a dozen or so riders. Not so with COVID FOMO: we had 28 riders. I took some time off of work to ride down to the shop to help organize, but only stayed with a group until Tuscany when I peeled off and returned home.
A couple of well-spaced, masked groups forming Tuesday
The weather has continued to improve, to the point where Calgary hit 29 degrees yesterday and is forecast to hit 31 today. That made for a weird situation of my first club ride being scorching hot. Normally we would have fought off mixed weather for a month before now. Again, I was the greeter and organizer, and we had 50 riders signed up. When three groups had already formed and left, there was the “C” group and a mixed “B” group remaining. Each had only one leader, and I elected to ride with “C”, as Colette was leading it. She’s been in the club for a long time, but it’s her first year as a ride leader. The “B” group was being led by Daniel, who’s a couple-year veteran. That plan only lasted about 200 metres. Daniel’s group was ahead of Colette’s leaving the shop and we’d barely pulled out onto Bowness Road when there was a sound like a gunshot. Daniel’s rear tire had blown, coming off the bead. It was not easily fixable, so he had a short walk back to the shop and I took over the “B” group to lead it.
We had a great ride, and didn’t want to head back. The evening got nicer and nicer as the temperature dropped.
Me, Connor, Jason, Matt and Ryan
The only problem was that 66km later as I pulled into the driveway, I was out of water and in need of more. Drank a large bottle with electrolytes, so I’m doing fine.
Tonight is the first ladies’ ride and gravel ride. Hope they remember to take enough water.
We’re getting some nice weather now. It’s even supposed to get over 30 degrees later this week. We enjoyed today’s with lunch out on the deck. Even Murphy got in on the action!
Murphy not appreciating his leash
Ready for smokies
Miranda taking Murphy for a walk
Got a couple of bike rides in to celebrate. Club rides start up this Tuesday…
The AC3M concert body cutaway guitar, features all-solid mahogany back and sides with sitka spruce top with Yamaha’s original A.R.E. wood-torrefaction technology. Natural, dynamic plugged-in tone from the SRT2 pickup system perfectly suit your performance on the stage.
Yamaha
It’s in great condition, and even has an aftermarket additional pickup (the silver thing you can see across the sound hole). I picked it up at Long and McQuade this morning. As Tammy rightly pointed out when I brought it home, it didn’t take very long once I’d made my mind up. I consider it most providential that this guitar was there for me to find.
It started when I bought a looper pedal. It’s the kind of pedal that can record a short bit of playing, and then plays it back infinitely. You can then layer more parts on top of it.
MeloAudio Loop Play Pedal
Having the looper was having the intended effect: I was playing more (i.e. more than zero) and having fun. But the issue was you can only loop what comes in from a pickup: my old BC Rich acoustic guitar does not have one. I was playing my Stratocaster and my Yamaha electric guitars (which was good, especially for blues licks) but I wanted to loop an acoustic guitar.
I started looking for an acoustic-electric guitar. They are acoustic guitars with a pickup for plugging into an amplifier. And just like with bikes, there are budget guitars, there are midrange guitars and there are high end guitars. I didn’t want a budget guitar, and I am not a good enough player to look at multi-thousand dollar high-end ones. I was looking at guitars between $500 and $700, and there were a few I was interested in, including some by Yamaha. Yamaha has an F-series that seemed a good match, but L&M didn’t have any in stock. Carl at the store was showing me a $499 Epiphone EL-00 in a tobacco burst that was a contender, but then he pointed out this guitar. He actually said “There’s that used Fender up there you might be interested in.” I looked and looked, feeling dumb because I couldn’t spot it, and finally he pointed at the guitar and we had a laugh because it was a Yamaha, and not a Fender. He’d misspoken. When I looked closer, I realized that this was an A-series, the top of the line from Yamaha. It had all the bells and whistles, came with a case, and it played well. I have nothing against buying used guitars: Tammy bought me my Strat used, and I bought my classical guitar used as well. This one was $599.
I’ve brought it home and showed Tammy. At this point, I don’t have a lot more to say. I’ve hooked it up and played some songs with it. I’m very happy with it and am looking forward to playing it a lot more. My fingers are sore: need to build my calluses back up again.
With the delayed start of the BCC riding season and the end of the winter Zwifting season, I’ve been at a bit of a loose end. The weather hasn’t been cooperating, or my schedule hasn’t. Today I chose to change that.
With Tammy’s assistance, I did a ride that I’ve never done before: riding from Calgary to Canmore.
I didn’t think I could ride there and back, so Tammy agreed to drive to Canmore to pick me up at the Visitor Information Centre.
I followed the secondary highway 1A all the way from Tuscany to Canmore. There were parts without a shoulder, but there was so little traffic and what there was was very considerate and gave me space. The most stressful riding was the last couple of kilometers in Canmore. I thought small-town drivers would be laid back.
The scenery along my route was much nicer than on the Trans-Canada.
View over Cochrane towards the mountains
A WW2 memorial along the way
Getting closer
Yours truly
Stopped to say hello
Exshaw. Almost there
It was successful, even if I had to fight a headwind most of the way (and it’s uphill). I would ride that route again sometime.
Today was the day that the kids got their first dose of Pfizer/BioNtech. Tammy dropped us off downtown and headed to do a bit of shopping and recycling. I got to run through the rat maze with the kids.
Almost to the cheese
We got to the Telus Convention Centre at 3:15 for the 3:30 appointment. We had to wait until 3:20 to line up. It took until 5:00 to get the kids vaccinated. It took a long time, but not as long as ours.
Ready for their shots
There was a brief scare when someone said that they were out of the Pfizer (that’s the only one approved for the kids’ ages) but that was a false alarm. Shannon gave them their shots with a minimum of fuss.
Tammy picked us up and we stopped to get Wendy’s on the way home.
Here’s what chaos breaks out when I ask them to make a muscle pose
In ten short days, they’ll be 90% resistant to COVID.
As a parent, there are no words. I want to cry right now.
Updated
On a more upbeat note, Ian was excited just to go downtown. He hadn’t seen the skyscrapers close up since forever.
