monday traffic report
Apr. 28th, 2003 11:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7Today I encountered two deer-- one who fled, and a second who stood up and watched me go by. As I paused on a lower peak of the ridge to regroup and prepare for my abrupt descent, a pair of wild turkeys wandered over the top of the ridge. One of them stood on the highest peak, looking down at me, and spread all its feathers to display them all, and gobbled at me. I nodded hello and went down the hill.
I found a way to avoid crossing the hairpin bend of road coming up the mountain, where cars often catch sight of me and get nervous that I'm going to fling myself out onto their hoods. So now I can avoid seeing any humans once I've gone into the park, until I come out onto the road that goes in front of my office building.
I found a topographical map over the weekend of my commute-- terraserver.microsoft.com has not only sattelite photos but also topographical maps.
My house is at about 100 ft. elevation. My work is at about 200 ft. elevation. In between, I climb to 400 ft. elevation and back down again.
So you wonder, looking at a street map, why no roads go across Westchester, but then you realize that they simply can't... It's what saved Washington's ass in the Revolution, and it's what makes commuting such a royal pain.
Dave and I squandered the weekend beautifully. Friday night we discovered the joys of Stew Leonard's. Tons of decent-priced exciting groceries-- I was drooling like the whole time-- animatronics, joy, and happiness. We had a ball. We bought $170 worth of food. We were so psyched to spend the weekend eating. We did. Saturday we got up, showered, ate breakfast, ate snacks, ate munchies, and took a nap on the couch (I'd been sleeping with my head in Dave's lap for about two hours when my neck got too cricked and I moved to bed, but he stayed on the couch all afternoon). It was such a rainy and icky day that it's not like we missed anything. I talked to Dad for an hour-- the power was out, he was home alone, he was cleaning-- and then to my cousin Jessie for nearly another hour. Finally, I thought: Using up some of the minutes I'm paying for on this cellphone. Oh wait: Nights and weekends are unlimited. Ah well... I still have 400 minutes. Maybe I'll call you.
Saturday night we made elaborate drinks and drank them until we got sleepy. Sunday morning we, again, missed church (we have to go to each of the two local Catholic churches at least once for when Dave's family comes to visit, so we can let them believe we go all the time. "St. Matt's is nice, but St. Stan's is a little quieter and out-of-the-way. We like the 8 am at St. Matt's but if we have a late start, we hit that 10 at Stan's.") by sheer dint of wilfully not knowing when it was... We just went last week anyway, in Buffalo. Sunday Dad came to visit-- stopped by on his way down to JFK to pick up Mom and Ann from their vacation in Ireland. It was nice to see Dad-- we fed him all kinds of goodies from Stew Leonard's and were again amazed by how many olives he can simply inhale-- and we discussed a wide range of topics, including how busy he is now that he's retired.
Mom wants him to put a deck on the back of the house. Her favorite summer sitting spot, the kitchen porch, has lost a bit of charm due to the new neighbors being so close on that side. So the other side of the house, facing south, is an ideal spot for a new sitting place. Dad's never liked decks much, so he's thinking maybe a patio. And then the little section of roof outside the bedroom windows could become a second-floor deck-- to protect the roof there that he has to repair first, and get the sitters up above the mosquitos etc. It sounds awesome to me. But he has no idea when he'll get to it...
Holy cow, I've already had two pieces of gum. Ew. I chew far too much of it now.
I found a way to avoid crossing the hairpin bend of road coming up the mountain, where cars often catch sight of me and get nervous that I'm going to fling myself out onto their hoods. So now I can avoid seeing any humans once I've gone into the park, until I come out onto the road that goes in front of my office building.
I found a topographical map over the weekend of my commute-- terraserver.microsoft.com has not only sattelite photos but also topographical maps.
My house is at about 100 ft. elevation. My work is at about 200 ft. elevation. In between, I climb to 400 ft. elevation and back down again.
So you wonder, looking at a street map, why no roads go across Westchester, but then you realize that they simply can't... It's what saved Washington's ass in the Revolution, and it's what makes commuting such a royal pain.
Dave and I squandered the weekend beautifully. Friday night we discovered the joys of Stew Leonard's. Tons of decent-priced exciting groceries-- I was drooling like the whole time-- animatronics, joy, and happiness. We had a ball. We bought $170 worth of food. We were so psyched to spend the weekend eating. We did. Saturday we got up, showered, ate breakfast, ate snacks, ate munchies, and took a nap on the couch (I'd been sleeping with my head in Dave's lap for about two hours when my neck got too cricked and I moved to bed, but he stayed on the couch all afternoon). It was such a rainy and icky day that it's not like we missed anything. I talked to Dad for an hour-- the power was out, he was home alone, he was cleaning-- and then to my cousin Jessie for nearly another hour. Finally, I thought: Using up some of the minutes I'm paying for on this cellphone. Oh wait: Nights and weekends are unlimited. Ah well... I still have 400 minutes. Maybe I'll call you.
Saturday night we made elaborate drinks and drank them until we got sleepy. Sunday morning we, again, missed church (we have to go to each of the two local Catholic churches at least once for when Dave's family comes to visit, so we can let them believe we go all the time. "St. Matt's is nice, but St. Stan's is a little quieter and out-of-the-way. We like the 8 am at St. Matt's but if we have a late start, we hit that 10 at Stan's.") by sheer dint of wilfully not knowing when it was... We just went last week anyway, in Buffalo. Sunday Dad came to visit-- stopped by on his way down to JFK to pick up Mom and Ann from their vacation in Ireland. It was nice to see Dad-- we fed him all kinds of goodies from Stew Leonard's and were again amazed by how many olives he can simply inhale-- and we discussed a wide range of topics, including how busy he is now that he's retired.
Mom wants him to put a deck on the back of the house. Her favorite summer sitting spot, the kitchen porch, has lost a bit of charm due to the new neighbors being so close on that side. So the other side of the house, facing south, is an ideal spot for a new sitting place. Dad's never liked decks much, so he's thinking maybe a patio. And then the little section of roof outside the bedroom windows could become a second-floor deck-- to protect the roof there that he has to repair first, and get the sitters up above the mosquitos etc. It sounds awesome to me. But he has no idea when he'll get to it...
Holy cow, I've already had two pieces of gum. Ew. I chew far too much of it now.
