{"id":242,"date":"2007-06-16T14:15:40","date_gmt":"2007-06-16T21:15:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=242"},"modified":"2009-05-27T15:07:01","modified_gmt":"2009-05-27T22:07:01","slug":"hot-saturday-blogging","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=242","title":{"rendered":"Hot Saturday Blogging"},"content":{"rendered":"

Our Saturday morning bicycle ride gets earlier and earlier.\u00a0 In the winter we started at 9:00 AM.\u00a0 Today we started at 7:00 AM, but it was already 95 degrees by the time we finished, so next week we’re starting at 6:30 AM.\u00a0 I suppose by the time daily highs reach 110-115 degrees, we’ll be meeting at 5:00 AM.<\/p>\n

So, basically, it’s a siesta Saturday here in Tucson.\u00a0 Our ride is done and we’re hunkered down indoors with the air conditioning set at 76.\u00a0 You’d think we’d stay put until evening, but no: we’re going to a hash<\/a> at 5:00 PM, right at the hottest time of day, and a bicycle hash tomorrow at 9:00 AM, which we won’t finish until noon.\u00a0 Fools.\u00a0 That’s what we are, fools.<\/p>\n

One of my indoor tasks today is to prepare ribs for smoking, a process that begins at least five days before setting match to charcoal.\u00a0 Secret rib lore: when I was in Missouri recently, I talked to the owner of a barbecue restaurant.\u00a0 Since we’re step-cousins, he told me what I needed to know, and now I’m going to try it on my own.\u00a0 In a future entry I’ll tell you how the smoked ribs came out.\u00a0 If they come out half as tasty as my step-cousin’s ribs, though, don’t expect me to share the secret!<\/p>\n

When I’m in Missouri I usually buy a Harley-Davidson T-shirt from the local dealership.\u00a0 I ride a Goldwing, not a Harley, but I like wearing\u00a0biker\u00a0T-shirts that say “Cape Girardeau, Missouri” on the back.\u00a0 The last time I went, I thought I’d get right with Honda by buying a T-shirt from their dealership.\u00a0 “T-shirt?\u00a0 What’s that?\u00a0 Why would we want to sell T-shirts?”<\/p>\n

You know, motorcycle riders all over the world wear Harley T-shirts from cities and countries they’ve visited (when I went to Tasmania, my first stop in Hobart was the H-D dealership, and I wore that shirt until it literally fell apart).\u00a0 Triumph dealers sell them, Victory, BMW.\u00a0 But Honda dealers?\u00a0 They just don’t understand.<\/p>\n

Our bird feeder’s right outside the home office window, and\u00a0the digital camera’s next to the keyboard.\u00a0 I’m waiting for an interesting bird to come by . . . a Gila Woodpecker, maybe,\u00a0one of those orange-eyed Thrashers, even a Cardinal . . . and they do come by, but they’re camera-shy: whenever I pick up the camera, they see my movement behind the window and flit away.\u00a0 I do have a shot of the goddamned ground squirrels, though:<\/p>\n

\"Ground
Ground squirrels<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\n

I’ll get better at this, I hope, over time.\u00a0 What did you expect, the National Geographic?<\/p>\n

My father had a pellet gun to shoot the squirrels that came to raid his bird feeders.\u00a0 I have that pellet gun now, but haven’t yet steeled myself to shoot squirrels.\u00a0 Our dog Schatzi is a natural-born squirrel killer (she got one last week and snapped its neck with one shake of her head!), so I should really turn the job over to her.<\/p>\n

Why, you ask, do I hate ground squirrels?\u00a0 Because I fear they’ll burrow under the foundation of our house.\u00a0 Because they’re vermin.\u00a0 Because they abduct children and sell them into slavery . . . ooh, sorry, that would be the Chinese<\/a>, suppliers of Wal-Mart<\/a> merchandise.<\/p>\n

But there I go again!\u00a0 Think globally, act locally . . . killing ground squirrels is so<\/em> much easier . . . and so is being more choosy about where I shop!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our Saturday morning bicycle ride gets earlier and earlier.\u00a0 In the winter we started at 9:00 AM.\u00a0 Today we started at 7:00 AM, but it was already 95 degrees by the time we finished, so next week we’re starting at 6:30 AM.\u00a0 I suppose by the time daily highs reach 110-115 degrees, we’ll be meeting […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,18,40,10,5,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bicycling","category-consumerism","category-critters","category-current-events","category-motorcycling","category-personal"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=242"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2139,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242\/revisions\/2139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}