Four

2-3 September 2004

Thu - hi 69, lo 54, 0.04 in. precip
Fri - hi 73, lo 45, 0.00 in. precip

On Thursday and Friday Aall Aaround Tractor excavated the front yard. I asked them to dig down about 14 inches for 4 inches of pea gravel and 10 inches of root zone mix. They also dug a 2 foot wide trench for about 60 feet of 6 inch perforated drain pipe. On Friday I had to meet Paula Harkin near Greenly and Killingsworth to discuss the Pints to Pasta 10 K race course. While I was gone, the pea gravel and most of the sand was put in place. I wish I could have been there to verify the depth of the pea gravel. Almost all the sand was used up. In contrast, there was a lot of pea gravel left over.

4-6 September 2004

Sat - hi 71, lo 54, 0.00 in. precip
Sun- hi 76, lo 49, 0.00 in. precip
Mon- hi 79, lo 45, 0.00 in. precip

For three days I worked on the sprinkler system. Saturday and Sunday I did most of the work myself. On Monday, Julia helped out a lot with the trenching and gluing.

7-8 September 2004

Tue - hi 79, lo 47, 0.00 in. precip
Wed - hi 77, lo 48, 0.00 in. precip

On Tuesday I started placing the sprinkler heads. Wednesday I finished the remaining heads. I was at Home Depot by 6 AM to get a couple of connectors that were missing from the "kit" I got from Down To Earth. Wednesday evening I put down the fertilizer and seed in the front yard. I used the "heavy" application rate listed on a bag of fertilizer I had bought from Professional Turf Center last year. For the seed, I tried to apply 20 lbs/1000 sq. ft. It might have been a little less than that, but it was close.

9 September 2004

Thu - hi 74, lo 49, 0.00 in. precip

Thursday I dug out the strip of grass between the sidewalk and the road. I dumped the dirt in a pile in the wetlands behind the house, where I later transplanted a pine tree.

10 September 2004

Fri - hi 76, lo 48, ? in. precip

I was up by 3:15 AM to measure the Pints to Pasta course. It took a while to figure out which bike to use. I tried putting the Jones counter on the Van Dessel, but it wouldn't fit. Then I had to take the pedals off one bike and put them on another. By the time I finished calibrating the bike it was almost 5 AM. I ended up riding the course three times (nearly 40 miles). After the first measurement I adjusted the start. On the second measurement I put down a new set of marks, and then recorded counts on the third measurement.

11 September 2004

Sat - hi 72, lo 59, 0.09 in. precip

Saturday was David's birthday! He's 7 now.

I was up a 3:15 AM again. This time I was going downtown to place the permanent marks on the pints course and pick up some signs from Dave Harkin. We met at 6 AM at the old spaghetti factory. He was there to coach a huge pack of runners who were doing a 20 mile training run in preparation for the Portland marathon. After working out the details for the course, I had to rush to get the map completed in time to get it in the mail that day; otherwise, the course certification wouldn't count for this year's race. I felt bad about it, but I was even working on the map during David's birthday party at Chuck-y-Cheese. I finished everything in time and dropped all the certification paper work off a the post office around 2:30. The last pick-up was at 4 PM. That evening I continued to work on the strip by the sidewalk.

12 September 2004

Sun - hi 68, lo 55, 0.00 in. precip

I finished filling in the strip by the sidewalk Sunday and planted velvet bentgrass in it. There is about 3 inches of pea gravel in the bottom, 6 inches or so of garden soil on top of that (including 3 bags of chicken manure and 2 bags of steer manure), and an inch or two of sand on the very top. I used Denver's rototiller to loosen up the soil in the back yard and started grading it with a landscaping rake.

13 September 2004

Mon - hi 67, lo 54, 0.24 in. precip

By Monday, the seed in the front yard had started to sprout. Monday evening I seeded the back yard with a mixture of tuffed hair grass, tall fescue, and perennial rye.

14 September 2004

Tue - hi 69, lo 47, 0.04 in. precip

Tuesday evening was the first night since Canada I really didn't do anything productive. Instead, I spent a few hours on-line looking at parts for my new bike. Here's the wish list I came up with:

Headset: http://www.chrisking.com/headsets/hds_ti.html

Front disc hub: http://www.nabendynamo.de/ and/orhttp://www.chrisking.com/hubs/hbs_disc.html ?or http://www.chrisking.com/hubs/hbs_ISO_disc.html ?

Rear hub (and cog?): http://www.chrisking.com/hubs/hbs_sspeed.html

Chain ring (and cog?): http://www.boonerings.com/cr/cr.html

Bottom bracket: http://www.philwood.com/webcatolog/page14.htm

Chain: http://www.businesscycles.com/tchain-izu.htm (Model V)

Rear brake: http://www.sram.com/en/avid/rimbrakes/singledigit.php (SL?)

Front disc brake: http://www.hopetech.com/products/hyd_09.htm

Brake levers: ?

Seatpost: http://www.lhthomson.com/SPpartslist0.asp

Stem: http://www.lhthomson.com/rstempartslist.asp

Crankarms: FSA ?

Rims (maximum 25 mm rim depth with 32 spokes minimum): HED? Mavic? Velocity?

Bars: ??

Bar tape: ??

Pedals: http://www.speedplay.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.x ? (currently using X/2)

Saddle: http://www.koobi.com/ ? (PRS Enduro? - currently using Au Enduro)

15 September 2004

The grass in the front yard is really taking off now. I plan to take a picture when I get home tonight. I spoke with Leonard Bernhardt today and he might stop by the house some time to see what I've done.