Getting in Shape

I decided to do it right this time. No rushing in and getting hurt. I am 48 now, not a kid. So, a few weeks ago I started jogging, walking, jogging. I am now up to 2 miles of non-stop jogging. That isn't bad, but it seems terrible to me. I am the guy who was running 38-minute 10ks just a few years ago.

I figure to work up to 5 or 6 miles of jogging, then start doing some speed work. I got into that last time I was in shape, and it was really fun. I had forgotten just how much fun it is to cut loose and run at an all-out sprint. I am looking forward to it.

Paint the Car

Working on the car. Got it started this morning, after several days of trouble.

It is an older Town and Country, and if you look a number of these over you see they almost all have rust in the exact same spots, over the rear fenders and at the lower edge of the hatch.

I did some Bondo repairs last summer, and repainted the car. I wasn't happy with the result, and get a little rust-through returning.

So I have been sanding down the bad areas, grinding out all the rust I can get at and spraying a phosphate rust inhibitor on everything that I can't get at to remove. Hope it holds for another year.

So the prelims are done, now to paint the car. The hardest part is actually the taping, masking everything you don't want paint on. The paint spray mists, and travels a long way, so if you are spraying the rear hatch, you have to cover all of the windows or get a nice, fine coating on them.

This year the car will be gold, a fairly bright one.

Synopsis, the Toughest Two Pages I Ever Wrote

I have been writing and rewriting the synopsis for my novel 'Eden's Rat'. Writing the novel was hard work, but it was more fun than it was work.

Writing the synopsis is only work. So far I haven't found one fun thing about it. I have been writing variations, posting them over at YALITCHAT for critisism, then taking them down and rewriting again.

What is disheartening is that they are getting worse rather than better. My first few attempts at least were humorous. The last one was dry AND confusing, according to the critics.

The story itself is not a straightforward adventure, but has several character points of view, and some complex motivations. Even the main villains have honorable goals, though their methods may be doubtful.

All this is hard to convey in a synopsis in a way that even begins to make sense. I am working on a new one now. It is narrative form, A to B to C, and quite dry. My goal in this one is simply to explain the story in a way that makes sense to someone who hasn't read the novel.

The Car, the Lawn, and Other Money-Sucking Hazards

Mowed the lawn today, after letting it get pretty long. With the wife and kids away I tend to let these things go. The grass looks great, so much rain this year.

Put $170 bucks into the car last week, new brakes. Didn't expect it so soon, had work done just two years ago. Sad to say, the shop didn't guarantee the work past one year. So I went to another shop.

That was fine, sort of, but this week suddenly it won't start. Turn the key, plenty of juice in the battery, but nothing, not even a solenoid click. Bad connection somewhere? Maybe, but hard to test, because it only happens sometimes, and I can't make it happen when I have it at the shop. It didn't start this morning or last night. But it did later this afternoon, after sitting in the hot sun. I suspect moisture is getting in somewhere, so it works when it is dry but fails when wet. 12 years old and 100,000-plus miles, things break.

The River Ellan

In my fantasy novel the River Ellan is the Great River, equivalent to the Nile or the Mississippi. It bisects the mostly flat, bowl-like continent. By the time it reaches Selzburg, where most of the action takes place, it is nearly two miles wide, MOL.

The city rests on a rare rocky outcroping, and the river is forced into a narrow channel, so it is deeper and much swifter than any other stretch of the river, other than the far northern tributaries coming out of the mountains.

The Ellan is central to the story, and all of the action takes place within a day's walk at most from its banks.

Best Season of the Year

It's my favorite season. Berry season. The strawberries are almost done, but the wild black raspberries are just starting. Those are my favorites. The mulberries are also just starting, and in a few weeks the blackberries and red raspberries will be ripe. I love grazing in my back yard.

Its a nice break from mowing the lawn or working on my car and painting the bathroom, my main projects for this summer.

Meat-eating Squirrels?

Saw something funny yesterday. A squirrel was being pursued by a robin and a blackbird. They were flying after it and pecking it. Chased it across the road and beyond.

I wonder why. Do squirrels eat eggs or baby birds? Wouldn't surprise me, though I usually think of them as herbivores.

That is also the first time I have seen two birds of different species attacking another animal at the same time. It is common to see swallows dive-bombing cats, crows attacking owls, or just about any small bird harassing hawks, but always before one species against one other.

Easy, Natural Gardening

We have been eating lots of greens this year. I didn't plant them, they just came up from last year's plants, that I allowed to go to seed naturally.

Lettuce was the best, we had several varieties of lettuce big enough to eat before most people even got their gardens planted. In the fall I allowed a few plants to mature, they flowered and set seed. When the seed looked mature I just shook the plants over the garden where I wanted the lettuce to grow. Some of it sprouted in the fall, and I covered the young plants with leaves. They survived the winter and started growing as soon as the ground warmed up a bit.

We also have several other varieties of greens, including rocket, and some Japanese varieties, all from last year's plants. Free seeds!

We had a lot of pumpkins last year, and I threw the old ones, after Halloween, onto the garden and spread the chunks aground. Dozens of pumpkins sprouted and I just left them to grow. When they got bigger I thinned out the weaker-looking ones and left the ones that looked good. Should have plenty of pumpkins again this fall. This will be the third year for these.

Tomatoes will also grow from last year's plants. This can be hit-or-miss, as they don't always come back as the same variety as you had before. Sometimes I get great tomatoes, and sometimes they are tough and tasteless. In that case just pull out the plants that don't produce well as soon as you find out, late summer, and plant other vegetables in that space. We had good results the last few years, some really excellent tomatoes, but one plant had tasteless lumps not even worth cooking.

You may have to dig up and replant some things, if they are not in a convenient spot where they happen to sprout. I replanted several tomatoes and may still do a few pumpkins.

Last year I decided to try growing peaches. I threw the pit of every peach I ate, out onto the garden. This year I have two peach trees growing. I hope they turn out to have good fruit. It can be a toss-up with fruit, whether seed-grown trees have good fruit or not.

Grilling and Charcoal, How to Make Charcoal

I grilled a lot of meat yesterday, and then I made charcoal. It is easy, if you have a supply of wood, to make all or most of the charcoal you need for grilling (I never use gas. Why? Might as well cook indoors on the stove.)

Start your grill as normal, with a pile of store-bought charcoal, grill your food as usual. Then...when you are done cooking, take the rack off and pile the grill full of small sticks or split wood, right on top of the coals.

Any size wood works well, as long as it isn't so small it immediately catches fire, or so big it won't fit inside the grill with the top down. Too thick however and only the outside will turn into charcoal.

Fan the wood until you get a small fire, then close the top and leave it closed until it is cool.

DO NOT open the top half-way through the process, as the sudden increase in air supply may cause a WOOF of fire, which could be dangerous. Almost like when you light a bit of gasoline. It woofs.

My grill is not perfectly air tight when closed, so enough oxygen gets in to keep the coals lit for hours. The wood I put in chars and turns to charcoal, which is nothing but incompletely-burned wood. Some of the wood, at the edges, remains just wood. That is fine, it is really dry and is good for getting the next fire started when I am ready to grill again.

Save money and make your own charcoal. I use oak and hickory, from the trees that overhang my back fence. There are branches down after every wind. Oh, final notes, don't use plum or cherry wood to grill. Poisonous. Pine tastes bad.