cycling

Day 56 of Self-Isolation in Switzerland – A Ride Towards Storm Clouds

Byrichard 10 May 2020

Today I had a ride towards storm clouds. I was cycling in the sun but as I looked towards Geneva I could see that it was dark and grey. I questioned whether to turn around or whether to keep going. It started to rain but I was reaching the half way point.

I didn’t turn around. I continued going and I passed families or groups on their bikes going slower than me. I flew by them and then I headed down towards the lake before turning right and going through a forest road. On this forest road, I saw children and parents on the road so I had to slow down as I passed them.

During this ride, I avoided passing through Versoix because it’s unpleasant. I prefer being in the countryside. I think that I spotted two people on bikes playing Pokemon Go. I assume this because they went to where I know there is an Ingress portal but it did not change.

I saw what I think was a young child and two parents start to head up a steep hill that I have found difficult to go up after some rides and thought “If that child makes it up that hill I will be impressed.” I didn’t slow down to see whether this was the case or not.

I haven’t cycled through Nyon or any big cities yet, because I don’t feel comfortable doing that for the moment. The countryside still feels like the safer place to be.

Day 48 Of Self-Isolation in Switzerland – Calves And Their Mothers

Byrichard 2 May 20205 May 2020

During today’s walk I saw calves and their mothers. Their mothers were mooing me away but I was taking video so I didn’t move until one after another started to approach me. By then I had the footage I wanted to have. I had a strong fence fixed with wooden posts and a bush between myself and the cows so I calculated that the risk was low enough not to bolt.

@richardazia

##rain ##forestwalk ##hiking

? I Would Walk 500 Miles – MC Vintage

social conscience | Swiss walks

Day 47 Of Self-Isolation in Switzerland – A Walk In The Rain

Byrichard 1 May 2020

Yesterday I went for a walk in the rain. I walked for two hours, took pictures and listened to Echo Der Zeit and this episode of the Thru-Hiking podcast. Gretel Scarlet was the interviewee. She talked about South Bound (SOBO) hiking the PCT.

It’s interesting to see how different her attitude was to most people’s, how being a dancer, and someone who considers nutrition, speaks differently of food and injuries.

Thanks to the rain most people stayed indoors. This was a good opportunity to walk along routes that I have been avoiding for weeks due to the pandemic. In the process, my trousers and shoes got soaked so I was squelching along. Even cars were not that frequent. I crossed two people during my ten-kilometre walk.

I walked through a wooded part and the trail that I usually follow was now a river. I had to step to the side of the path to avoid walking through the “stream” that it had now become. My shoes were already wet from walking through some tall grass earlier on.

I used to be a cold water diver so being wet doesn’t bother me. I was comfortable for almost the entire walk. It’s only during the last kilometre when I turned to walk into the wind that I started to feel cold and tired. By this point my trousers were soaked and the humidity was moving upwards.

I had considered making the route longer when crossing the last village before home but decided not to. I didn’t want to have to walk along the road when agricultural paths were clear of people. In light of how I felt on the last leg that was a good decision.

@richardazia

##rain ##river ##switzerland

? Let’s Do It Again – J Boog

amp | environmental | social conscience

Day 42 of Self-Isolation in Switzerland – A Few Minutes of Rain

Byrichard 26 April 2020

Today at around lunchtime we had a few minutes of rain for the first time in weeks but it didn’t last long. By the time I went out for my daily walk the ground was dry, as if it hadn’t rained at all. There was no mud to walk through so I came back as clean as when I left.

The daily walk is a good part of my day because it forces me to have some AFK (Away from Keyboard) time. That’s the thought I had when starting the walk. For two hours a day I spend time looking at the landscape, at how the plants and fields are changing day to day and more. I notice how paths are being worn where they would not be worn in normal times.

New trails are forming in some places. As people attempt to discover the area around them, and stay away from cars a new set of trails is emerging. Yesterday I was not even appalled by a woman showing off about walking with an umbrella in the mountains. Solitary confinement makes me long for the day when I can go back to hiking with people.

On today’s walk I went to see the cows quickly and tried to get a few seconds of them mooing but they were uncooperative so I have several seconds of cows just staring. Some people think of them as sentient beings that shouldn’t be eaten but the cows I looked at today didn’t seem to have much intelligence. They certainly don’t have the same character as cats.

Cascading Style Sheets and Website Improvements.

I thought that the Latin page I have would take hours to make mobile friendly so I put it off for a few days as I took time to think of a solution. Today I used the viewport meta tag and CSS table options to make that page more modern. What I thought would take hours took minutes.

I went back to my first blog post and worked my way forward from there making twenty to thirty pages AMP ready. In the process I added tags to those pages as well as quickly corrected typos, dead links and related problems.

I also started porting my old “Surfing the World Wide Waves (WWW)” blog to this installation of Wordpress. My reasoning is that since it’s a blog it makes sense to combine two generations. When enough of the content is ported across to the blog I will use content views to provide a more contemporary looking interface.

These are time consuming tasks but now that I’m unable to use Facebook or Twitter due to the lack of social interactions in the physical world I feel no choice but to avoid them. Avoiding Facebook and Twitter has had a positive effect. The less time I spend on either the more I have to show for the day.

It was interesting to read blog posts I wrote as a uni student and articles I wrote as a school teenager. It’s interesting to see how things have changed today.

Having said that I really like the For You tab on Tik Tok. I get recommendations like these. I like these recommendations because they make me thing forward, towards the future, rather than feel negative about the present.

@freeridewtour

Hugo Hoff going to the speed of light! ##FWT20 ##ski ##freeride ##challenge ##foryou ##foryoupage

? Blinding Lights – The Weeknd

ingress | Switzerland | team work | tech related

Ingress Operation Apache, Covering Geneva in Blue.

Byrichard 3 May 20154 May 2015

Operation Apache

Ingress is a selfless game when you play as a team. The driver gets no AP. Other operators get a few AP for breaking portals. Three individuals gets hundreds of thousands of Mind Units (MU). Rather than feel a sense of achievement I feel fatigue.

The first reason is to do with the hangouts. You have to be serious. When I work in a team I want to be able to joke around. The most fun you have is with people who know what they’re doing and despite the stress have fun doing it. When you do something for free this is even more important.

The second is driving a hundred kilometres. I don’t like driving without something to do at the destination. I also prefer to be active during daylight hours rather than once the sun sets. I am not a vampire.

The three day rains don’t help either. Three days of rain, seeing the Arve saturated and very high. The Pont Rolex is a metre from being flooded.

Friday I drove three hundred and seventy kilometres for another operation. I drove an hour to the location and an hour back from the location. On this previous up the engine had run for six and a half hours.

I drove up one slope and fire crews were present. They allowed me to go on and I drove up beside the stream running down. The water wasn’t too deep but there were a lot of stones and mud. I felt the car loose traction so tried to keep my speed up. I saw where a storm drain intended to take water in was overflowing like a spring.

In total I drove 470km on half a tank of diesel so fuel wise it was probably still cheaper than driving to meet people in Geneva. I think I’ll take a break from communal activities and play solo. I’ll stick to Via Ferrata and hiking as team activities. I will feel good about the op in a few days, when the sun starts to shine again.