thebaldgeek

I think this is about the last in the series, and I have kept the best for the final.

SPEED!!!!

The Americans have it right on this one. Speed does not kill and so you don’t need to take photos of everyone who is greater than 2 mph over the limit……As a result, driving is a lot more relaxing, and its a lot easier to be more attentive to the road when you are not obsessed with the speedo on the dash board.
The other nice thing is that you can really cover some distance (we use ‘country’ freeways mostly and those city ones we do use, we are on them at off peak times) very quickly and smoothly.
So what sort of speeds are we talking about?
Well, I cut up rough and wonder whats going on when I drop below 120kph. Its not unusual for me to be going 125-130 for 45 min or longer. Now and then we nudge 140, I have not been over 145 as yet.
The average is about 115 to 120 kph. Its amazing. I really love it.

The nice thing is that none of this is ’speeding’, I am just moving with the flow at this speed. There is ‘always’ someone moving though the bunch at a higher speed, and thats fine, you always have them, gives the cops some one to pick on.
Yes, at this speed the whole bunch is speeding, we are all over the limit, the whole freeway, 24*7, is breaking the law, and I feel quite safe. (Not just from getting a ticket, but in general).
I’m very grateful for the little 1.8L Passat because at these speeds its returning an honest 30-35mpg. Sure, I may not be too comfortable with my hip and back in it, but its hard to beat performance like that!

Anyway, its great. It flows really well, its easer to get around, there is a lot of traffic, but it generally flows pretty good.
The one place they are careful is around pedestrians, we have covered this, schools and the like they do the right limit. Arterial roads and the rest are a treat, 80kph+. The big thing is no cameras. You just get on with driving!
We are heading off to LA for the weekend…..wonder what my average speed will be this time…… 118kph????

I was going to do this as one huge blog, but in the interests of my sanity (and yours) I have decided to break it up. Besides, I just don’t have the time to sit and do it in one hit, but spreading it over a few days makes more likely to happen. 

The freeways are concrete.  ‘Big deal’ you say, ‘how is that blog fodder’?
Well, it gives rise to some interesting effects….. In no real order here are some that I have noticed.

* It makes a funny noise. Because of the fact that its poured in slabs you get rhythmic clack-thumps, but because of what ever reason, often the slabs are not the same lengths, so you get a pretty weird syncopated beat cruising through your car.
* Adding to the noise is the rain groves they cut in them. Often the rain groves are not exactly in parallel with the direction of travel, so you get these weird humming  / buzzing noises that also wiggle through the car (it goes through because the front and back wheels make different noises, as do the left and and right tires, its often like being in the middle of a quadraphonic stereo gone bad).
* The rain groves make motor bikes look down right scary. The bikes ‘thin’ tires are constantly fighting against the groves and so they wobble all over the shop, some bikes are worse than others.
* Where the concrete is repaired (or not), or joins other different surfaces you get some pretty big ugly pot holes or ledges. This just adds to the noise and movement of the cars.
* Due to the above, you will often get lanes or entire off/on ramps shut for ‘grinding’. When said ledge gets bad enough they close the road and bring in the big machine that grinds the last 3-4 inches off it. You get then a little ramp that drops you (or lifts you, depending on the flavor of the last earthquake) to the next slab, which just adds to point one, the funny sounds.
* Every now and then you will get normal suburban roads made out of the stuff as well. Its not as exciting because you are not going as fast over it. I have seen a lot of asphalt suburban roads have small sections repaired in concrete as well.

I’m pretty sure they use it for two reasons. 1. It wares pretty good, better than asphalt from what I have seen of roads that use both and 2. It stands up better in the heat. (Which we have not had any of, but heaps of people have warned us about).
Its important that you pick something that wares well in this place because you really don’t want to have to go back and fix it.

On a totally different topic. I was trying to take a  photo of the humming bird in the tree outside the apartment when it flew off the tree and hovered about 1/4 a meter away from Freddy and I and took a quick drink out of her feeder. I had the camera in my hand, but did not want to move it. At this stage we are being very careful on the deck till they get to know the feeder is there and gain some confidence in drinking out of it. While it was really cool to have the little guy (girl?) hover so close to us, the best thing was Freddys reaction once it was gone, she was just about busting with excitement, I have never seen her so over the moon, she was just about crying with excitement. You have to remember (or need to know) that she has been mad over humming birds since our first trip in 2003. She has had little glass ones hug all over the house for all these years and has been looking at photos of them on the net and in general been dreaming about that exact moment for years. It was great to be there with her. I wish I had been able to video it some how.
I’m looking forward to getting a camera set up. I might need two, I want one outside anyway, but it would be neat to set one up just on the feeder that had some movement actuated recording software so we could just watch footage of them feeding…….Where is Gary when you need him?? (Oh, thats right, he’s sitting at home sipping good port while resting his arm on his digital video recorder……)

Twas a really good weekend.
Its really great to do some really different things……..
Saturday we did not drive up to LA. Our friends, Jason and Brittany, drove down, we just hung out and talked about all sorts of stuff. It was really good and very helpful for all of us.
Saturday night we drove an hour up into Palomar mountain, and at 5000 feet we had a star party!!!!
It was really great, the stars were fantastic, I had no idea of what I was looking at, the guys were really patient and pointed out star names and constellations, they slewed their scopes all over the place to give Terry and I a really good look, it was just a great site, with a great range of scopes under clear skies.
The girls bailed back to the car after about 20 min (it was really cold and none of us were really dressed for it), Terry lasted about an hour, he got his first look at a whole bunch of objects from galaxies to clusters. I was pumped, I could have gone for hours, it was the first ever real star party I have ever been to and to have it on the front door step of the Hale telescope was just amazing for me. (Just between you and me, I took a wrong turn and ended up looking right at the dome, and it was open! It really freaked me out to see it by star light!)

We got home at about 12:30am, puke boy managed to keep the contents of his stomach off the car floor (and paint work), so it was a great night, and I believe they do it once a month on the Saturday night of the new moon, so we will be back from time to time.

Sunday morning after the family slept in (Im still not sleeping well) we drove about 50 minutes down to the telescope shop in San Diego. Its amazing how cheap telescopes are here. I did not go down for a scope, despite how I felt after the night before. We drove down to get a tripod for my camera. I left mine in Australia, there just was no room to take it. I ended up taking about an hour to pick a base and head. There is so much to chose from. It was great to have a hands on experience and try my camera on all of them. I ended up with a really good base and a great head that will do me for years to come.
I also went to look at tracking mounts. I thought I would buy a mount soon and it would take my astro photos to another level. In fact,we found out it a little harder than that. The manufactures have really priced it well, its like about 500 bucks cheaper to get a mount and scope as one than to buy each. Thats real money, so we left it and am going to think about things (and look at the 2nd hand market).

After the telescope shop, we drove down to Frys Electronics.
Odd how every time I go there I think of Gary. One of these days I am going to get the courage to take some photos inside the joint……
It would be about 1/2 as big again as Bunnings in Sebas, ie super mega huge. And, to top it off, its just electronics. Nothing else. It has a mini ‘restaurant’ in the middle, thats to refuel the body to cover the other half of the shop. There are about 40 check outs, its huge.
I went there to get a soldering iron, battery charger, keyboard and mouse (well, trackball)…..and that I got, and nothing more!!!! The photo (in case you don’t get a chance to look at it) is me out the front pretending to hand my credit card over to Freddy before we walk in.
Seriously, at this stage its not hard for me, we don’t have the space for stuff and we just don’t know how much spending money we have, I have got my first pay check, but I don’t know what the living expenses here are yet, we have not had a full round of bills yet….anyway, point is, at this stage its no problem me spending to much, Gary on the other hand…..? Well, we will leave that one for now…….. There is a whole isle of about 20 meters of cameras and stuff…..you have any idea how many different cameras you can fit in 20 meters!!!!!?????

It was a great weekend of friends, stars and soldering irons.