Your birthday

Just follow this link to find out absolutely, positively all the information there is about your birthday. None of it is at all important to you, but it’s a fun read…

The Jimmy Fund Walk

Today I watched as approximately 6500 people walked past me, headed toward Boston, some from as far away as Hopkinton, about 22 miles or so from where I was. They had another four miles to go. Every one of them was walking to fight cancer in the Boston Marathon Jimmy Fund Walk.Some were walking to remember someone lost, some were walking to prevent cancer for children, grandchildren, and loved ones to come. They were walking for a cure. Me? I communicated with a crew of other hams to make sure buses came to pick up those unable to continue, schedule water and supply deliveries, and trash pickups. And I carried 5 gallon water bottles, carried off bags of trash, and I kept a continuous stream of Gatorade juice boxes going into the cooler full of ice. Gatorade was wildly popular today (well, maybe not the grape Gatorade…) and we went through stacks of the stuff.

Mason Railroad Trail

Yesterday ( 2 September 2006) I went for a bike ride on this trail. It starts in Mason NH, very near the NH-MA border, and seems to keep on going. The guide lists the trail as 6 miles long, but there was nothing at six miles that made me think the trail ended. So I kept going. Some 13km into the trip (I really do need to reconfigure my bicycle computer) I still saw no end in sight, but had seen a sign indicating that I’d reached the end of allowed use, so I ate a couple of Clif bars, drank more water, and headed back south.

The trail itself is moderate-to-difficult for bicycles, but even such an unskilled rider as myself was able to negotiate the trail for a total of 26km. It’s a great trail for horseback and walking, and in the winter it would be wonderful for XC skiing, and snowshoeing. There are many side trails that branch off from the rail trail proper, but I didn’t stray from the path (well, that would have incurred more work, pedalling uphill and such, and I was working quite hard enough on the trail’s rather soft surface. There were signs along the path that indicated a certain level of popularity with snowmobilers, and the number of side paths would seem to bear that out.

So, I definitely got my exercise in yesterday!