lumensoutdoors.org - Page 19

• I want to quite the apartment! - September 19, 2006

  I went and quit the apartment this morning. It was a lot easier than I thought it would be. First I stood around while everyone talked on the phone, then I filled out a form. It only asked a couple basic questions, like why I’m moving and when I’m moving and what my forwarding address is. For a reason, I checked the “price” and “adding/losing roommate” boxes. I thought for a moment about checking the “road construction” box, but I didn’t think I could make something up if they asked me why. Too bad I probably won’t be getting any money back from this, since I don’t remember there being a security deposit when I signed the lease.

  Now just ten more quick weeks and I am out of here.

• This body climed Mt. Washington - September 17, 2006

  Today, I finally climbed Mt. Washington with my friend Lon. It was an amazing experience, and full of strange contradictions that I’m still sorting out in my head. It was perhaps the most difficult hike I have done this year. While the Franconia Ridge hike might have matched it for elevation gain, the Mt. Washington hike took a few fewer miles and was therefore much more steep.

• Moving season - September 16, 2006

  As I previously wrote, my rent is going way up at the end of November when my current lease ends. I don’t really like paying $893 a month for this place, and I like the idea of paying $1019 even less. David is in a similar situation, and his lease is also up in November. So we put our heads together and decided maybe it would be time to do the roommate thing again and save some bucks.

• Keeping resolutions - September 14, 2006

  Way back in January, I posted a list of things that I didn’t want to call resolutions, but really were. I’d like to point out how well (or not) I’ve been keeping those.

• More running in place - September 12, 2006

  Somehow, we fell off the exercise routine six or eight weeks ago and just never bothered to get back into it. We had been going pretty strong from March up until the beginning of summer I guess the crazy FC6/RHEL5 schedule is to blame, though laziness probably has a lot to do with it too. Anyway I finally got sick of not exercising so we went back to the gym downstairs this afternoon. Even though I didn’t push myself, it was still pretty bad since I haven’t done anything but occassional hikes in a long while. I’ve lost a lot of flexibility from not doing regular stretches. My running has also suffered - I only did 20 minutes at 4.5 mph, though my joints quickly reminded me that they still hated it. Outside is much better for running than the treadmill. I finished up the exercise with some arm weights on 85 pounds (not so good) and some sit-ups.

  Doing regular exercise the past couple months really made me feel good and it was nice to see actual progress after a week or two. It definately helped the hiking over the summer. But with that season winding down, it’s important to get back into the gym habit for the winter or it’ll be like starting all over again next March. Really, the goal all along has been to make hiking much less painful. I just need to stay in shape for the next year’s hikes.

• Overpriced - September 11, 2006

  I just checked the mail and found my apartment renewal notice in the box. Here’s the exciting part:

  Our records indicate your lease is schedule to expire on November 30, 2006. I would like to take this opportunity to invite you to renew your lease with us at considerable cost savings As you are aware, rising cost of everyday consumer services (including fuel, utilities, etc.) is an enormous concern for us all. To help contain necessary rent increases, we would like to offer you the following renew options:

  1. Upon renewal of your lease for 12 months your new rental rate will increase from $893.00 to $1019.00.

  2. If you sign your new 12-month lease prior to September 22, 2006, your renewal rate increase will be reduced! Your new monthly payment will be $989.00

  Is it any wonder I’m looking to move in with a friend at the end of my lease and cut down on costs?

• No hiking this weekend - September 10, 2006

  For a change, I’m not going hiking this weekend. Earlier in the week, I was thinking about going up Washingon and Monroe. I was probably going to have to solo it too since my usual hiking partners are out of town. Well, on Wednesday or Thursday I started to get sick and today I’ve got all sorts of symptoms. I figure it’s not a wise plan to solo the tallest mountain in the northeast in the middle of a cold front (isn’t that always?) when I’m weakened and ill. Even if I could do it, I wouldn’t enjoy it much. So hopefully next weekend will be better. It’s been about a month now since the last hike, and there’s not too much time left before winter sets in up in the mountains.

• mitchell - still under development - September 8, 2006

  There haven’t been any mitchell updates in a long time. I blame myself for that, but let me explain what’s going on. First, life has been keeping me busy lately. I’ve been travelling and having visitors a lot, going up to the mountains to hike as many weekends as possible, and working like crazy at my job. So that really cuts down on the amount of time I can spend working on my own personal programming projects.

• Big Wedding Time - September 8, 2006

  This past weekend, I went to see my good friends Will and Leah (of the Willrad comic fame) get married in Greensboro, NC. I’ve known Will since back in the Slackware Alpha port days when he worked at Compaq on Alpha Linux stuff, and I met Leah through him some time later. Will was also responsible for getting me my current job and I now live right down the street from where he used to live. So despite knowing me, he still asked me to be in his wedding.

• Changing things one more time. - September 6, 2006

  It’s once again time to change the website. For a couple of years now, I’ve had the content scattered all around. There’s the articles on the main page, the journal on my own personal website (why have a personal site when the whole domain is mine?), the projects pages, some useless static information both on the main site and my personal one, and then a bunch of random pictures and things. I started the journal with the idea that I would post frequently and for a while I did. But I fell out of that habit and the website has been stagnating ever since. Of course, most people didn’t even know that there was a journal so to them it looked like it had always been stagnating.