Today’s frontier adventure involved snaking out the bathtub drain. First we tried using a Zip-It flexible strip. These plastic drain cleaners are a gross, yet effective way to de-gunk most drains. Problem is that a bathtub drain takes a left turn at Albuquerque, leaving you without much room to move the strip. Liquid Plumber failed…
Daughter Em and her husband Matt and their four dogs – more like a single four-headed whirling entity from Hell – landed on our doorstep two weeks ago. And it’s killing my routine. My attempts at running, attempts at writing, attempts at riding…everything has gone to the dogs. As it were. I’d like to post…
The plan was to be in Merced by now, well on my way to Yosemite, Bodie, Tonopah, Tuweep and parts beyond. The reality is that the bike is in the hospital, getting a blood transfusion. If they get the ABS system sorted out (soon let’s pray) then I’m changing plans and heading for the Range…
For those of you kind enough to be following along with my story arc, I set out a couple of weeks ago to lose some weight. My short term goal was to be able to fit into my Adventure Pants, so that I could…you know, have an adventure. I’ve been following a glycemic-index diet for…
So here is the first point in my story arc. I finished the first week of my new diet and exercise plan. My near-term goal is to get back to where I can fit into my Adventure Pants. Started the week at 230 lbs, ended at 227.2 lbs, two week rolling average is 229 lbs.…
In case you were wondering what you should do with the fuzzy cream cheese in the back of the fridge, now the U.S. government has the answer. (Hint, dry salami and hard cheese can be cleaned up and used. Toss everything else out.) You can also use this handy guide for your next backpacking trip.…
Awesome video of a bighorn sheep taking on a Toyota 4-Runner. Courtesy of Wend Blog.
Good news for lazy bloggers like me! Now the Wikimedia Commons is not the only source for FREE PHOTOGRAPHY you can put on your blog! Thanks to the U.S. Federal government you can have access to almost 7,000 high quality pictures that you already paid for with your tax dollars. These photos, with a…
What kind of blog posts do you find the most compelling? A decade ago someone pointed out to me that the surest path to get on a best-seller list is to have “Ten Easy Ways to…” in your title. The Blog-o-sphere bears out this line of attack – list posts (ie “Merlin’s top 5 super-obvious,…
I think I’ve put together some nice little blog posts here at Wild Rye. Just nothing as FREAKIN’ AWESOME as it could be (at least in my head.) Why would that be? It reminds me of my GI Joe. I was seven years old when Hasbro’s action figure first hit the market. The Unique Selling…
Now that’s country. Amazon.com Widgets
I love the wallpaper pictures that Patagonia offers free of charge on their website. I particularly love this Christian Pondella photo of Lonnie Kauk leaping from a boulder in the Buttermilks. But when I showed this photo to a friend at work, a person who has done considerable photo retouching professionally, he instantly said the…
As I posted last week, I’ve hit an emotional rough patch. A real feeling of burn-out. The cure, according to the proponents of Positive Psychology…and doesn’t the name of that discipline just inspire trust? Anyhow, the cure for depression is to block out significant activities where you can focus on the area of your greatest…
Something happened earlier this month and I lost my will to live. Just reached a point where everything seems pointless. A lot of this is because of my job. Much of my effort is going into stuff that I am very qualified to handle, I’m arguably the most qualified and knowledgeable person in the organization…
My astute reader will note that I haven’t posted for a while. Fact is, I’m burnt out. An emotional cinder. Extra crispy. Too many irons in the fire. Too many candles burning at both ends. Too much heat, not enough light. So today I decided to hit the reset button. I purged all the items…
