Category: Switzerland
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A Sunrise Ride Into the Wind
Reading Time: 4 minutesI set the alarm for 05:30 this morning and when it went off I was tempted to ignore it and sleep more. I had the self-discipline to get up anyway, shower, and then dress for a bike ride. When I was ready to go the watch told me “sunrise in 10 minutes”…
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On group Activities that Challenge Me Physically
Reading Time: 3 minutesTwo days in a row I participated in activities that pushed me physically. On sunday it was a 60km ride with 900m of climbing and a 25km/h wind and the next day it was a 9.4km walk which is pushing my endurance further than usual. I found myself thinking that I should…
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On Cycling into La Bise
Reading Time: 2 minutesYesterday before the ride I could hear the wind playing with the shutter slats. I could also hear it against the combes, or roof, if you prefer that word. I looked outside and I could see that the wind was moving branches around. I also looked at the temperature and thought “Do…
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The Declining Case for Social Media Giants
Reading Time: 3 minutesYears ago I was interviewed by the RTS to speak about Twitter and my conclusion is that it would never pick up in Switzerland because there are too few users and they’re too dispersed. That is still true. Social networks that are alive and well are Meetup, GoSocial, Strava and Whatsapp. It’s…
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The Sense of Fatigue
Reading Time: 2 minutesYesterday I went for a run and I struggled. The distance was four point five kilometres so it was short. I suspect that it’s running straight after lunch that made me find the run hard. Last night I felt fine. I felt like cycling today, and I hesitated between the group ride…
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The Over-Inflated Tyre
Reading Time: 2 minutesToday, for the first time during a bike ride, I had a tyre puncture. I suspect that it wasn’t a tyre puncture but rather that I over-inflated the tyre, and that due to the wet, gravelly conditions of the roads, the inner tube eventually failed. The irony is that it’s because I…
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Weather To Be trusted
Reading Time: 2 minutesLast night at around 05:30 the alarm went off and either before or afterwards I heard lightning. I also heard very heavy rain. The question was whether the weather app was to be trusted. I could see that it would rain heavily while I walked from home to the meeting point but…
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Migrating to kDrive from Flickr, Apple and Google Photo Clouds
Reading Time: 4 minutesAs I write this my consolidated photo album is being uploaded to kDrive, to serve as an offsite backup but the journey to this point took about two weeks, due in part to experimentation and learning to use various tools. Tools I used rsync Google Takeout Flickr Export jdupe Gemini Euria Le…
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Nosferatu The Spider
Reading Time: < 1 minuteWhen I see spiders in nature they don’t bother me but when I see a large Nosferatu spider waiting in ambush in the stairway/hall it makes me deeply uncomfortable. If you’re hiking on snow, in April, in Switzerland, you will often see hundreds of spiders crawling across the snow. It doesn’t…
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A Sunrise Run
Reading Time: 2 minutesToday I woke early. I set the alarm for 05:30 and again at 05:40 and yet again at 06:00. The reason for so many alarms is that it’s easy to set the first, wake up to turn it off, and then wake too late. It’s also as a backup. Usually the first…