Another historic walk - Honeydew Creek

The walk for today was around the bottom of the May Creek area, the Honeydew Creek Trail. I was hoping to find a clear location for the old trestle bridge that crossed May Creek from the old railroad . However, I don't think we were that close. We did get to walk down on an interesting old closed-off road, though. The sign at the top said "Warning, slide danger". This landslide is what I think they were talking about.

Finding a geocache along the way.

An old car that must have crashed from the road above. Strange, though, because the road above was a dead end. 

Saw this treehouse on the way down from the northeast trailhead.

This is the from the website that allows you to layer historical maps over current maps. The map below shows my next target, which is the old road that previously led to the top of Somerset. I encountered it before, in the woods above South Bellevue Community Center. It was pretty clearly an old road, and now I can see where, exactly, it went. We'll head there today or tomorrow. 

A historic walk along Coal Creek

I've been interested in the old railroad track that delivered coal from the mines around Coal Creek to Lake Washington. I found some old maps online via the USGS historical map viewer (https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/viewer/), very low resolution, though.

We took a walk around this area, and I was able to see the old map, overlaid on the current map, on my phone as we walked. Very nice.

Now that I've been looking at these old maps, I was particularly interested in seeing all the coal mining relics along the trail. This is an old flume that delivered water to a power plant, that boiled it, with the coal from the site, to produce power that pulled the coal carts up from the mines.

Not quite sure what this was.

Here's a video of me doing some finger-picking (for the first time) on the ukulele.

Here's a few pictures from yesterday. We drove down to Gene Coulon park, the boat launch area. Eric and the kids went for a walk, and I took out my new Orukayak Inlet to do a little paddling. I made a few phone calls while I was paddling - my mom, via a Duo video call, was happy to get a live feed, including bald eagles. The orange thing on my paddle is the replacement drip guard I made out of a pool noodle.

The Boeing factory building. I assume it's pretty unoccupied now.

Ukulele videos on Youtube, litter pick-up and hair cuts

Before anyone else was up this morning, I made my first ukulele YouTube video. Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CCvDTf0XlQ&t=2s

It's very imperfect. Some improvements to make are - either memorize the song, or put the lyrics and chords behind the camera, so it's not so conspicuous when I look at them. And make sure I actually can play the song without stumbling. 

But, it was fun to do, and so easy. I was just thinking about making a video, and wondering idly if I could do it directly through the YouTube app. Turns out that you can - just press the video icon on the main screen, and away you go!

Later on I went out with Jean on a litter-cleanup mission, behind the Walmart next to the Larson Lake blueberry fields. Last time we were there, a couple weeks back, there was loads of litter. This time, we were surprised that there was far less. Somebody must have come by and picked up much of it. But it turned out that if you looked a little more closely, there was still quite a bit of trash to pick up. We ended up mostly filling 2 kitchen-sized grocery bags. And then took a walk.

Then I gave the kids and Eric haircuts. I have almost a professional level setup - I have 2 trimmers, a cape, and a little brush to get the bits of hair off the skin after the haircut, etc. I always do them in the garage, even though it's a little chilly, because there's so much less clean-up. Nobody cares if there's a few stray hairs around.

Shopping, Cedar River bike ride, and "strawberry shortcake"

Peter has been talking lately about wanting to be a voice actor. So, I got a few nicer shots of him, sitting up against the stone wall. This is a natural smile - Kenny was making funny faces or something. 

Biking the Cedar River trail. It was pretty popular (although nowhere near crowded) despite the fact that all the parking areas were closed up. We stopped at the stony beach below, and had a snack. I picked up some litter that was scattered there. I think I'll try to make a point of doing that in the future. I put some plastic grocery bags in the daypack I always carry, to make it easy.

On the way home, we stopped at the McDonalds drive-through. Kenny wanted to get his standard pancake meal, but they now have a very limited menu, and that wasn't one of the options. I wonder how many people are still working there...

And this was Peter's project this afternoon. He wanted to make strawberry shortcake, and this is what we were able to make with what was on-hand. Yellow cake mix, half-and-half mixed with pudding powder (to stiffen it up), and then some sliced strawberries on top.

Catching up on a few days...

It's been a quiet few days. I did some productive consulting work the first part of the week. Another project now is getting some of my favorite songs set up in my Ukulele songbook (my personal one). I was introduced to most of them via The Daily Ukulele and The Daily Ukulele - Leap Year Edition. I gave Kenny a programming project, which was to format the song lyrics and ukulele chord notation in a certain way, to make it easier for me to read. Wonder how he'll do with it. If he can make something that works for me, he'll get screen time and I'll also pay him.

I sold another copy of my book Weigh Every Day yesterday. I haven't sold a copy in about a month. The sale made me think - should I start working on it again, the website and promoting it? It's interesting that obesity is such a huge risk factor for coronavirus. Will this cause a surge of interest in losing weight?

The below is from a walk we took at Gene Coulon park. I've seen this kind of thing a few times - people meeting up in parking lots, but still maintaining lots of physical distance.

And these pictures are from making microwave potato chips. They're extremely tasty. A little tedious to make, though. I use the mandolin to make thin, even slices of raw potato, brush oil and sprinkle salt on them, and then put them in the microwave (on a sheet of parchment paper that can be reused) until they turn brown.

Coronavirus quarantine - Kayaking, and some consulting work

I went on another scheduled kayak trip, "with" Jean (she and I were kayaking at the same time, she in Lake Sammamish, and I in Lake Washington.). Worked out well, as before. I really like my new Orukayak. It's definitely not as fast, but so easy to assemble and disassemble that it makes up for it. I put the kayak in at the boat launch right next to Newport Shores. There was already a kayaker there, who gave me the lowdown - free car parking, but there's only 2 spots, so get there early. I went into the Newport Shores neighborhood, the one with canals. Interesting to look at all the houses there. 

Then I kayaked over to the Slough area. There were about 3 kayakers that I saw around there. Apparently the boat launch there is still open, I didn't think it was with all the Light Rail construction

Funny "lighthouse" at the entry to Newport Shores. Very dilapidated, like the house it belonged to.

This house had LOTS of seating. A party house?

Cormorant, sunning itself

Some turtles

Then in the afternoon, 5 solid hours of consulting work. Actually, Trish had contacted me in the morning, asking if I could be there for a 10 am conference call, I said no. There was a lot of stuff to catch up on. I got some good information on deadlock reporting - there's some built-in to SQL, in the later versions. Not a lot of good info on them, though. Maybe I'll write up another "databases are fun" blog post on this deadlock reporting that I'm working on, especially once I have it really going. 

We ordered out for dinner today - 5 guys.I didn't have Eric order anything for me, I stuck with a sandwich at home. 

Coronavirus - April 19, 2020 - grocery shopping at Winco and bike ride to Mercer Island lid park

The big new today was that I went grocery shopping for the first time in many weeks, to my favorite store Winco. I was wearing a mask, as most people were - probably about 80 percent. None of the employees were, though. I was disappointed that the bulk foods section is shut down, though I guess it's no surprise. Also I was surprised at how uncomfortable my mask was. It constrains my breathing a lot. It's probably a good thing for limiting virus transmission, but not so good for breathing. As soon as I was in the car I took it off.

It was honestly a little eerie to see how much things have changed since the last time I was in the grocery store. We've been doing delivery for some time now, and things have changed dramatically. At Winco, even though I was there between 7:45 and 8:15 in the morning, there was a long line to check out. It wouldn't have been that long if people hadn't stayed apart 6 feet, and it moved pretty quickly.  It must be really inconvenient when the store is busier, because even so early the line reached halfway down the store.

In the afternoon we took a bike ride to the Mercer Island lid park. I decorated Peter with dandelions, he did the same for me (though I'm not showing that picture).

I video called my mom later on in the day with Duo, and played some songs on the ukulele for her. It worked out quite well. I might try doing that for other people too...could do a mini "concert", maybe, on Facebook live?

Coronavirus - April 18. 2020

I took a walk with Jean this morning at the Larson Lake area, observing "social distancing". Instead of trying to walk side by side, we walked one in front of the other, and talked on the phone, with our headsets. Worked quite well. It's the first time I've seen her in person for a long time, though we've talked most days.

There's frequently quite a few police officers at the Starbucks close to Larson Lake. Well, today a huge group of police officers met at the parking lot next to the Starbucks instead, standing quite far apart from each other, and had some social time.

It's crazy how empty the roads were. That intersection we need to cross to get to Phantom Lake - 156th Ave SE and SE 16th St - was utterly free of cars. We just waltzed across it.

Peter has really been wanting to go biking with a neighborhood friend of his. I'm still saying no.

Later on we took a family walk around the Vuecrest neighborhood. This house, with a Japanese style garden, was interesting.

Coronavirus - April 16, 2020

Went kayaking on my new Orukayak folding kayak today - the Inlet. It's designed to be much easier to assemble, and it is, it's a piece of cake. Not nearly as sea-worthy as my old one, but that's okay. I don't go out in stormy ocean conditions anyway, I just go into lakes and easy rivers. 

I'm not big on kayaking on my own, so the way I did it is that my friend Jean went at the same time. But she put her kayak in at Lake Sammamish. So, we did simultaneous kayaking, not together physically but talking on the phone the whole time. Worked out really well! The weather was absolutely beautiful and sunny. Calm waters, until around 11 or so, when I was almost back at the boat launch. There were very few boats out. 

I liked the looks of this house - simple lines and not very ostentatious, unlike many of the others on the waterfront

I also did some consulting work this morning. My idea for improving performance did not seem to bear much fruit. I need to do more testing, but this may be the wrong avenue of attack.

Coronavirus - April 15, 2020

This will be a short one. Worked this morning - 4 hours - for KA. Emailed their accountant, I haven't gotten paid for my February or March invoice yet. Hmm... Chatted with Judy on the phone, and then also Jean on the phone (while walking around the Woodridge neighborhood with the family). There were quite a few families walking around there, taking up the whole street.

Tomorrow I'll be taking a kayak trip with Jean - a "virtual" kayak trip, will be chatting on the phone while we get set up. It worked out well for us yesterday, when I biking the Snoqualmie Valley Trail, and made the long boring straight stretch fly by, so why not try while kayaking?

Coronavirus - April 14, 2020

This morning for the first time, I saw a woodpecker trying to get at the bird feeder. Didn't seem like it was successful. 

In the afternoon, I went on a bike ride out at the Snoqualmie Valley Trail, down by Snoqualmie Falls (starting at Meadowbrook Bridge, hauling my bike up the steps). It's a nice enough rail trail, but perfectly straight, which gets old after a while. On the way home, I was chatting with Jean on the phone. Tried using my headset, but she couldn't hear me (I could hear her, though). So, I talked, holding the phone to my ear while biking on the gravel trail. A little risky, but it worked.

Coronavirus - April 13, 2020

Yesterday when we were biking, it was pretty chilly when we first set off. My hands were cold and uncomfortable, exposed to the wind. So, I made something that I've been wanting for a long time - ultralight wind mitts for biking. Which doesn't even appear to be something that's available, based on searching online. There are winter gloves for biking, but nothing like this - a very minimal, lightweight glove designed just to cut the wind.

This is the first iteration. I made a cardboard shape, put plastic (from shopping bags) around it, and ironed the edges until they melded. Then a cut a hole for my thumb. So, this is basically a plastic bag, shaped for my hand. I was originally going to make it in a standard shape, with a space for my thumb, but that got a little complicated.

Will it work? Who knows? We went for a bike ride today, but it wasn't very cold, so I didn't use them. But I think I'll try another version, out of some very lightweight nylon fabric that I have. Not waterproof, but it feels quite windproof. And it's actually lighter than the plastic. I will sew the next version. 

Here's some pictures from the bike ride we took, on the east side of Lake Sammamish. Some very nice houses, some older ones that will probably be torn down shortly.

Love the balcony on the rooftop.

 A very skinny house. There were a lot of these - I guess the lots are very narrow, and they want to have a lot of windows looking out onto the lake

My cooking experiment today was flatbread - the basic, simple, unleavened bread that's been around for thousands of years. Tasted pretty good, but I don't know that I'll make it again.

Had a Zoom call with Andrew and Linda. Nice to see them again, but virtual visits are definitely second-best compared to actually seeing people! And tomorrow Jean and I are going to be doing a "virtual" kayak trip. She in her kayak, me in mine, different locations, but talking on the phone while doing it.

I was just thinking...doesn't this "flattening the curve" thing mean...the economy would need to be shut down, for months?

Coronavirus April 12, 2020

An Easter egg hunt this morning in our front yard. There were 27 eggs, the kids each found 13, and one was never found. And the Easter bunny has no idea where it was placed...

This afternoon we took a bike ride on a gravel rail trail, from Landsburg Park to close to the Fred V. Habenicht Rotary Park. About 8 miles one way, we took a picnic lunch. It's a truly beautiful trail, very green and peaceful. When we started out it wasn't that busy at all, and even as we biked back there weren't that many people although the parking lot we started at was almost full. People were very spread out. Lots of families out for Easter outings.

Coronavirus April 11, 2020

I was hoping to take a long bike ride today, to the southern end of the Cedar River rail trail. But the weather was cloudy and a tiny bit drizzly this morning. I ended up instead making another loaf of no-knead bread, oatmeal cookies, called Jean, called my mom, washed the windows accessible from the deck, and vacuumed the master bedroom. Lots of multi-tasking.

Today's batch of no-knead bread. 

Then Eric and I took a short flight, mostly over Vashon Island and the surrounding area. By then the weather had turned very nice. We went for our daily walk in the Newport Shores neighborhood - lots of nice loops to walk. I was chatting with Judy on the phone the whole time. 

The above marble run is something I advertised in NextDoor, and just sold today ($5). I had told the kids that any toy they decided they didn't want, put together so we could tell if all the pieces were there, and I could get a good photo, would earn them an hour screen time. Kenny would play Grand Theft Auto all day long if we let him, so he was eager to find old toys to get rid of. 

Coronavirus - April 10, 2020

Made nettle soup again this morning. I foraged for them along the trail close to Lewis Creek, where I got them last time. The whole time I was out I was chatting on the phone with Jean. She was exploring the ravine area behind his house to see if there were nettles there.

Here's the nettle soup, I had some for lunch. And the kids had some too - after I told them they'd get an extra half hour of screen time.

The kids and I took a bike ride on the Soos Creek Trail. It's a beautiful bike trail, but too short - we were at the end in a little more than 30 minutes. Normally we'd be biking back, so it would be doubled, but Eric picked us up at the other end, so it was just a one way. And despite the signs saying that the trail is closed unless you're on essential business, there were lots of people around, enjoying the trail.

Other than the nettle soup and bike ride, didn't get much done today. Chatted with Ann on the phone about bread and baking. Planned a little for a longer bike ride, either on the Cedar River Trail (I can't figure out if you can bike along the Cedar River Trail, east of Landsburg Park, on the old rail bed), or perhaps the Iron Horse Trail. That will be a trip for this weekend sometime...