morphsci

Finished putting the new grill together I owned two original Weber kettles previously and loved how they performed as grills. But the original had two major problems. First, the ash collection was simply awful it was exposed and removing the ash tray was an ordeal. No longer … Both the original premium and the Master-touch have the new and improved ah collection. The second problem was adding charcoal during the cook as you had to lift up the main cooking grill. That is no longer a problem on the Master-touch with side panel hinged grates It also has the gourmet BBq system that allows you to remove the center section and replace it with another option such as the griddle a wok, pizza stone or sear grate it also has a removable heating grate So all-in-all it is a pretty nice upgrade from the last Weber kettle I used.

We hiked a little higher than usual to the summit of Mt. Abraham.

Yeah I gave up on Drobo about 15 years ago. I could never get it to work the way I wanted to so when it came time to upgrade I went with a Synology NAS and never looked back.

Don’t tell it to me, tell it to the snake.

It was a rainy day today so rather than hike we saw a couple of historic sites in Vermont. First we saw Billings Farm and Museum and the Calvin Coolidge Birthplace and Home . Learned a hell-of-a-lot about Coolidge and was impressed.

I had a lot of snakes and lizards growing up but my favorite was a beautiful California King Snake whose favorite activity was me carrying her around draped across my shoulders. She was very content to just chill there for hours.

You nailed it. A pretty adult milksnake with a very chill attitude.

Was straightening up our upstairs garage and I came across this trespasser trying to be inconspicuous

Condolences, Todd. RIP “Aunty Joyce”

Yesterday we took a day trip to Montreal so I could practice not speaking French. Visited the Archaeology Museum, had a nice lunch at an Asian bistro and walked around the city for a few hours.

Not that I am aware of, though I’m not so sure about mushrooms.

Some random black bear.

Happy Birthday, Rob!

Found these this morning: The bird feeder formerly hanging on our porch and a remembrance of what was in there

Dropped Peter and Karen off yesterday for their four day backpacking hike up a chunk of the Long/Appalachian Trail

Happy Birthday, Chris!

Happy Birthday, Shelly!

Gordon Lightfoot was very important to me in my formative college years. I spent the summer of 1976 at Forestry summer camp at Cloquet and Isabella MN with “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” playing on the local radio stations a bit before it hit the national airwaves. But “Don Quixote” was and is my favorite song of his as it seemed to tell a story I was very familiar with. Luckily, I was able to see him in concert twice. The first time at Ravinia (Highland Park, IL) in 1983 and the second at Chastain Park (Atlanta, GA) in 1995. This one hits real hard. I will leave with the following excerpt from Nicholas Jennings biography, Lightfoot . Like many great artists, he was a complex person.

Happy Birthday, Ryan!

Happy Birthday, You Troublemaker! Edit: What are the going odds for Ray posting here?

I would put the miniDSP on top of the phono stage as I never feel good about putting anything on or under an amp. I also have a big box full of RCA cables that I will never use. If you tell me what length you need I can check to see if I have any that would work for you. You would make my wife happy because I would be getting rid of “useless crap”.

A slightly belated happy birthday, Al!

Happy Birthday, Fitzy!

A Belated Happy Birthday Wish, Nate!