Mourning dove family

Spring is really here. The mourning doves have returned to the nest in our back porch awning. If you look at the strata in the nest, this is at least the fourth year they've been using this particular nest. The woman dove has laid her eggs and won't leave the nest, even with Guthrie running back and forth under her as he goes outside a million times a day. The picture doesn't do it justice, but she has a beautiful ring of teal around her eye. I hope we don't stress her out too badly.

You can see our neighbor's magnolia tree blooming in the background too!

Chicken paprikash

I bought a nice Hungarian paprika recently for a recipe. Then I realized that I really didn't understand how to use paprika as a spice and what it really tastes like when it's the dominant flavor. I have tended to use it casually because it's there.

I was flitting around the cooking blogs I read looking for some sort of large, slow-cooked meal I could make and have leftovers for lunches for the week when I came across a description of chicken paprikash. I took the liberty of making my own hybrid of several recipes I found on the internet. The attempt is documented above. I used chicken thighs with bones, but I removed the skins. Aesthetically, I think I should have mixed the sour cream in prior to serving, but it tasted just fine anyway. The Wikipedia article mentions an interesting alternative for a vegetarian version using mushrooms. I'll try that or perhaps use tempeh next time. The sum total of all organic ingredients (except the Hungarian paprika, sadly), was about $12 for enough for two dinners and four lunches. Very tasty and filling for about $2 a meal!

Broken chain

My chain broke this past week. It failed at the link that I had opened it up to clean it a month or so ago. Darn. So much for my confidence with the chain tool. It probably had 1,000 or more miles on it, so it was time. I had wanted to get more of the rainy spring weather behind me before I changed to the next $60 chain.

In any case, a bike drivetrain overhaul needs few tools, but requires some good company. Silas and Guthrie hung out with me. The sum total of tools needed was a chain tool (to add/remove links), a rag, a bit of lubricant, and a bottle of decent beer (Lake Louie Milk Stout, in this case).


Silas is pulling himself up on everything, including things that rotate. I put my trust in the bike, why shouldn't I encourage him to? :)

Getting into the garden

This past week, I started getting the garden set for the spring. I pulled finished compost from the bottom of the bin. The sticks aren't decomposing all that fast, but the kitchen and yard scraps do just fine. Well, eventually just fine. The outer material against the bin walls is dry and dessicated. The upper core spent the winter in nasty anaerobic mode and smells really, really bad.

I still have to remove what's grown up and to turn the compost into the soil.


I also pulled a really beautiful wasp nest from the awning.


For posterity and embarassment's sakes, here is a larger shot of our downtrodden back yard before I did any work. I wish I could say it looks much different now, but it doesn't. I hope the grass seeds I sowed take and fill in some of the patches in the grass.

Earth Hour

It's a little after the fact, but we spent Earth Hour hanging out with candles, poetry, and a little guitar music.

Bridges, the Run, and the Hollow

There have been some nice evenings to ride after work this week. I finally remembered there is a sidewalk on the Fort Pitt Bridge (shown above). It makes for a nicer, albeit longer ride over the Monongahela River to the South Side than fighting rush hour traffic from the Point to and over the Smithfield Bridge. The next picture is crossing the Allegheny on the Fort Duquesne Bridge. The Fort Pitt Bridge can be seen in the distance.


Riding home from the terminus of the Eliza Furnace Trail takes one through 4-mile Run. Big Jim's resides in the Run. In true Pittsburgh fashion, the serving sizes are enormous and are dirt cheap.


Continuing toward Oakland, in Panther Hollow, is this building. I think it's a CHP plant for the university, but don't quote me.

2009 Q1 mileage update

Nobody really cares, but at least I can watch my own progress as the year goes by... The image is just of the Pittsburgh area. There are runs, hikes, and canoe trips not shown on the map above. First quarter of 2009 logged distances:

Biking:
* January - 0 miles (surgery recovery)
* February - 70 miles
* March - 136 miles

Running:
* January - 0 miles (surgery recovery)
* February - 27 miles
* March - 27 miles

Hiking:
* January - 4 miles
* February - 14 miles
* March - 9 miles

Canoeing:
* January - 0 miles
* February - 3 miles
* March - 9 miles

Max-the-cat memorial ride

Our cat, Max, passed away a couple of weeks ago. He had a gritty life, fitting for coming from Pittsburgh. He spent much of his life either feral or being handed down from person to person before we were given him. He was uncoordinated and had a gravelly meow, but he was kind and generally a nice little friend. He went through several severe bouts of sickness last year that he pulled out of, but the vets couldn't figure out what was wrong. This last episode was an order of magnitude worse, and it was pretty clear that it was the end. We're sad to see the little bugger go. We gave him a solid and comfortable home the last two or so years since he came to us.

We had his body creamated. The day I went to get his ashes was a gorgeous crisp spring Saturday, so I rode my bike. It was only 16 miles round trip, but there were some substantial hills to climb to get out to the crematorium (different than a creamery!). That meant that the ride back home had some very fast, winding downhills. It was a nice ride and therapeutic to have him with me in my backpack. It felt really good to use my own muscles to get him, instead of driving a car. He never drove a car. He just strolled everywhere he went.

Flying down one of the downhills somewhere around 40 miles an hour, I could swear I heard a gritty "whee!" I think he enjoyed the ride.

While we were paddling...

Alongside the Youghiogheny River is the Great Allegheny Passage trail. The trail goes from Pittsburgh to Washington, DC. Maybe the latter part is called the C&O Towpath. Bethany, Silas, and Guthrie had a nice hike while Kevin and I were on the water.

Guthrie was actually pretty upset he wasn't in the canoe. Normally, he'd rather be out of the boat running on shore. This time, when he wasn't invited into the canoe, he wanted to be in it really badly. The first picture is at the put-in in Dawson. The second shot is of Guthrie sprinting back and forth on shore when we caught up to the three of them near the take-out.

Youghiogheny River day trip

On 22 March, Kevin and I did a nice section of the Youghiogheny River from Dawson to Whitset. It was a really nice spring day, despite how cold it looks in the GoogleEarth image of the route below.