I'm awake neaer 5 am on Tuesday and cannot sleep. I talk myself out of cycling and instead go for more than an hour long walk. I get cleaned up and take the Yamaha YZF-R1 out for a ride to keep it running. Back at home I try to look through my list of things to do and cull it down to ones that need to be worked on. The Moto3 race from Mugello, Italy is just medium fun because its all about the slipstream on the long straight. A rider can be leading and be passed by almost ten riders down the straight and have to try to work his way back up - so the result is a lottery.
I start Wednesday a shade late - getting out the door at 6:25 am for a good road bicycle ride. Mentally I'm not here and I keep saying "I'll take the turnout or cut the ride short", but I keep going and end up with a good 65 kilometer ride. I do some shopping and watch a good Moto2 race from Mugello, Italy and then I watch, for a second time, the Danish film Pusher 1 from 1996. There's a short break to trim roses and bring fresh blooms into the house. And I can't quite get motivated to finish off the encryption of the database.
Thursday starts with a mountain bicycle ride to the old yacht club and back to home. The bottom bearing is just clicking away - its annoying but still functional. So when I get home I undo some bolts and drop some lubricant in the area and let it sit for an hour. I'm not at all sure what I'm doing so I'll just try some things before I take it some where for a new bottom bearing. I pull out the hedge trimmers and trim the front and side bushes that have become overgrown from spring growth. After getting cleaned up I make some progress on the encryption and I'm thinkiong that Friday will be a final push of coding and testing to declare it ready. Throughout the day I mix in some wattching of ice hockey playoffs and golf just to stay occupied as I rest from the cycling and yardwork and hope to get some mental motivation.
I start Friday at 6:05 am and I'm on a mission to get the encryption/decryption of the database working. I just keep pounding away and once I've figured out the process for one subroutine, then the others fall into place rather quickly. It still takes until noon to work through this, but its ready to be moved over into the production products. I take a break to get in a good session with the weights and then spray the juniper bushes since I'm seeing signs of a spider mite attack again. The last few attacks that required action were in 2012 and 2017. I just use water as I'll have to get out and get some environmentally-friendly pesticide in the next day or so. After a shower I have a Zoom meeting with CSULA professors to have a post-mortem of this past year and to think about the fall when in-person learning should be back. And then I watch FP2 for MotoGP from Spain and the last bit of Moto2.
I'm out the door on Saturday at 6:10 am for a road bicycle ride. It's a good ride but at about kilometer 50 I just start losing mental interest. I push on and get to my usual turnaround point but there are some other cyclists gathered there so I keep going a bit farther and turn around. I end up back at home with a decent 70 kilometer ride. After getting cleaned up I make a trip to Home Depot for spider mite spray for the junipers and a trip to the grocery store for supplies. F1 qualifying from Azherbaijhan is decent and MotoGP qualifying from Spain is not what I hoped for. Throughout this day I just feel mentally disinterested, as from the bicycle ride, so I don't get much done.
I get on the mountain bicycle on Sunday and the bottome bracket bearing still clicking away. So I'll have to get that fixed soon. It still functions well but is just annoying. I get in a good ride to the old yacht club and back again. At home I trim the roses and bring new blooms into the house and then spray the junipers in the front of the yard with the spider mite pesticide. After a shower I watch a long F1 race with one yellow flag, a red flag stoppage, and a very surprising podium. And I save the MotoGP race from Spain for Monday.
I'm out of bed at 5:55 am and I walk to the grocery store for supplies. Back at home I start pounding away on the website encryption (and decryption) and have it working well by 11 am. This is AES symmetric key encryption that is used for government secret documents. I'm sure there will be some little discrepancies found during further testing, but all of the required processes work well. When this is working I drive over to the ATM and Target to pick up other cash and supplies and return home to cut my hair and lift weights. It's a good session with the weights and after a shower I finally watch the MotoGP race from Spain. It's an exciting and tactical race and I'm happy for the winner though not happy with other results. With the encryption finished I spend a little time generating a couple other plots of database metrics. I relax for the rest of the day with ice hockey playoff games and some Netflix.
I wake up near 4:30 am on Tuesday and can't sleep. EVentually I get out of bed at 5:15 am and out the door for a 70 minute walk starting at 5:30 am. I trim the roses and grab a shower and ride the Yamaha YZF-R1 to the medical facility for an appointment with the ear doctor. I finally get to see pictures of the contrast MRI that I did about a year ago and he shows me the light and dark areas and explains that everything looked normal. But he does dig a ton of wax out of my hearing-disable left ear and prescribes an oil to use to maybe reduce the dead, flaing skin inside the ear that could contribute to the "junk" buildup and hamper my hearing. I had intended to ride down to the main Long Beach library, but the appointment goes so quickly that I'd have to wait an hour for the library to open. So I go home instead and watch the Moto3 race from Spain and water and feed the roses. And just lose myself in ice hockey playoff games.
Wednesday starts a bit late but I get on the road bicycle and start riding. The body feels good but I'm again not mentally into this ride. But I keep going and end up with a good 65 kilometer ride. At home I mow the lawn, trim a few tree branches, and try to "cut out" parts of the juniper bushes that may be infected with spider mites. I'll keep spraying. After a shower I watch a fun Moto2 race from Spain and then read the news and markets. Today the ride takes more out of me than usual so its a slow day.
It's been ten days since I've had a day off from working out and today might be it. I originally intend to get out cycling in the morning but I just don't answer the call. Instead I go to the grocery store to get the shopping done before many people get to the store. And then I continue working on website and encryption enhancements. I have a number of convenient stopping points throughout the day where I could go lift weights or do a core workout, but I don't. It's just a blah physical day even if I'm mentally making good progress. I take some time out to look through all of the tasks that I want to get accomplished and I consolidate it to one list that I'll have prominently displayed for extra motivation. I take some time to trim roses and bring more new blooms into the house. I see a few of the neighbor's bushes growing up towards my Internet cable again and I think about climbing up the ladder and trimming them back and but decide to put that off for a couple of days.
I've set up the previous night to go cycling on Friday morning but I, again, do not answer the call. Instead I go walk for 70 minutes, trim the tree branches near the Internet cable, get cleaned up, and ride the motorcycle to the main branch of the Long beach public library. It has been 16 months since I've been here and I enjoy browsing the stacks of new books. I end up with five new books to read and I ride on home on the motorcycle. From here the day turns slow. I've only ridden once during this five day week. Maybe I needed a couple extra days off. But it has still been March 2020 since I missed cycling three days in a row.
I start Saturday early for a road bicycle ride. When I get on the Los Angeles river trail I see a thick, narrow cloud of black smoke rising in the distance. A couple miles down the trail and I see a good-sized fire up a bank but under the Santa Fe railroad tracks where homeless people tend to stay. I just keep riding past as the fire appears to be about 10-12 feet in diameter. I get in a good 65 kilometer ride and note how fast some of the participants in the Bayshore triathlon are riding as I'm coming back down the San Gabriel river trail. At hoome I trim the roses and bring more blooms into the house and then have a very slow day.
I procrastinate a bit on SUnday morning and don't get out the door for cycling until 6:25 am. I have a good 60 kilometer road bicycle ride where I only start to tire - more mentally than physically - towards the last few kilometers of the ride. During today's ride my mind is all over the place with past good memories, past "stupid incident" memories, foreign language practice, and website ideas. When I get home from the ride I write down the website ideas that will better automate a database encryption process. After a shower I just relax and stay occupied with IndyCar racing, ice hockey, and golf throughout the day. The database idea will wait for Monday morning as I'll have a day off of cycling.
I'm out of bed on Monday at 6am and start working on the "seamless" encryption and hashing idea that I thought of during yesterday's bicycle ride. I clone the original site first to make sure I don't mess things up and work away. It takes a fair amount of effort to align the htm, javascript, cgi scripts, and database definition, but I get it finished in two marathon sessions throughout the day. I break up the sessions with a trip to the post office to send, for the third time, a form to the state of California Registry of Charitable Trusts (because they keep sending me a notice that it wasn't received though I have the certified mail receipts indicating they were delivered). And I get in a session with the weights though it wasn't my best effort. And later there's some Netflix and an ice hockey playoff game.