Dryden Is Home

1960 Then and Now

1960 is the address of my house. Recently I was contacted from the outside from Beth. Beth's parents built the house at 1960 over 50 years ago. This week Beth is on vacation (from being a nurse). For her vacation Beth decided to clean her garage, dig through boxes of old house photos, scan photos that had exterior shots of the house, name the digitized photos and email the photos to me!

Today (since I work from home) I took my lunch break and went out into the yard and photographed my house and yard from the same (approximately) places that Beth's family took pictures from 1959 to 1975. Above you see that there was once a carport, a stone walkway, and a little tiny maple tree. Below you see my car, a stairway of stone and wood and a much, much large maple tree. Fourty-seven years later and we are still using gas propelled cars. I wonder if Beth's parent's car had better mileage than my VW Jetta. Any ideas? Look at the other pictures here:
http://www.544productions.com/2006/BeforeAndAfter/index.htm

Beth posted some of the pictures on her blog here:
http://mysteriousladyclues.blogspot.com/2006/07/house-my-dad-built.html

A Visit to the Varna Fire Department

Thursday evening I made my way over to Varna Fire Department's weekly open house and training day. I met Natan Huffman, the fire chief for Varna and Duane (a 53 year veteran of the Varna and Ithaca departments). I had been driving by the station house (at 14 Turkey Hill Road) for the last year or so in my trips from my house to Etna, Dryden and Freeville. They have a large sign at the street that has the number of calls to date (over 150, mostly rescue calls, not fire calls) and the words "Volunteers Wanted".

I grew up in the town of Berlin, Massachusetts where the population was about 2,200 people. The town's emergency and rescue squad was volunteer (I think 100%). When there was an emergency a siren from the top of powder house hill would broadcast an alarm that could be heard throughout the town. Everyone from the local construction crews to the guy who owned the green house to the guy who's wife was the town's doctor to my neighbors and my baby sitter's husband and sons would drop what they were doing and head to the call. [Berlin Fire Dept.]

For the 10 years I lived in Boston I had conversations with paul and joe about joining a fire department just about every time we would see fire trucks on the way to calls. It was something I thought I would if I ever landed in a place with a volunteer squad.

For the five years I lived in Boston after college (1999 - 2004) I lived in 6 different places, but never got involved in much of anything. I worked, I played and I made vague plans to move some day and because of that I never joined any organizations because I didn't want to leave after making a committment to doing something. I skipped out on joining sports teams, joining clubs, volunteering too much, because I kept telling myself I wouldn't be able to be committed to be in any place every week or every month for any said time. It sounds silly, but it made sense to me at the time. Since I moved here I have jumped at doing a lot more things, like I did when I was in college (ACM, Newman) and high school (scouts, cross country, school play, math team, ski club, science club, jazz band). I like to have hobbies and my post-college hobbies were traveling and reading.

Here in Ithaca I've found my way to the Ithaca Practitioners of Ale Making (I.P.A.), Ithaca Dragon Boat Club, BNI, NWAEG, Ithaca HOURS board and ACFU budget committee. All of this but I really haven't started to give anything back to the community. My friend Jim F. told me that a lot of people don't have a lot of money to give to do too much. Between bills and taxes and our own expenses it is hard to give cash to the places we want to help. One thing we all have or we can all make is time. We can contribute to non-profit organzations and public entities by volunteering and by giving our time.

I took a bunch of pictures of the training from Thursday night, you can see them here:

http://www.544productions.com/2006/VarnaFire/

This was also covered by Mary Ann at Five Wells blog:

http://fivewells.blogspot.com/2006/06/varna-firefighters.html

The Rhythm

About a year ago I read a great article online about how to get more work done. The basic idea was to get up earlier. The idea behind that was to go to bed earlier. Since most night owls (like myself) love to stay up late it seems impossible to get to bed before midnight (or occasionally 1 or 2am). The method was so useful that I book marked the page and followed it for most of the summer. Here's the plan:

1. Get up at the same time every day. For me the time will be 6:30am.

2. Live your life like you usually do, just make sure you keep following rule 1.

3. Eventually your body will tell you when you are tired and when to sleep. You may start to go to bed at 11pm or 10pm or 9pm. Your body knows when it is time for sleep.

4. Enjoy the extra hours each morning, get that book written, reply to those emails, do some programming, go for a run.

Which of the following is the Circadian Rhythm?

A.

B.

C.

Can you guess the other two pictures? Use the comments link.

Go Ahead, Ask Me

Go Ahead, Ask Me if I left the house today. Go ahead, "did I leave the house today?" or "Did you leave the house today?"

The answer is no, well I did take a brief walk out to the compost pile and to the mailbox, but other than that 5 minutes outdoors I didn't leave the house and didn't leave the property of 1960. A lot of today I worked on projects for customers. That is what I need to do after yesterday's all out onslaught on touring around town. As I kick BNI - Ithaca into gear I find myself taking at least one day a week to visit, chat, work, meet and show apartments.

My friday was boring if you had to watch it, as it is, right now it is 11:41pm and I'm hope writing to you, someone who more than likely found this blog because you were searching for a picture of Rachel McAdams.

Thursday's recap:

12:40am - After sleeping for about 90 minutes I get a phone call from a rampant friend / customer who is detailing the different aspects of his Wednesday night MySpace date. I advise cautiously and find my way back to sleep by 1am.

5:50am - NPR kicks on telling me to get ready to get up and get going for the day

6:35am - Having dressed, made some tea and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (on toast) I am ready to head north to Lansing for my meeting, I end up leaving my house at about 6:36am or so.

6:50am - About 2 miles away from the meeting spot (and 6 miles into my trip) my car's thermostat starts to flash and beep, hey! hey! we're telling you the engine thinks it is 260 degrees in here! Hey!

6:55am - After coasting and stopping and shutting the car off and turning it back on I finally roll into the driveway of the meeting spot. The meeting starts in five minutes. I'm the first one to arrive.

9:05am - After the meeting (and a quick stop to Tops @ Pyramid Mall) I begin my decent into Ithaca via route 13. I drop off a coffee mug and then head over to Gimmee! Coffee to meet with a customer. After our meeting I stay at Gimmee for a little while as the weather turns to snow. Around 10:45 or so I head out of Gimmee, get in the car and drive up state street to CognoscenTea. I find a seat and get about 2 hours worth of work done. I call a friend and he meets me there for lunch with his wife and daughter. Around 1:45 or so I depart. I drive around the commons to the Seneca Street garage. I run to see a customer and talk about email campaigns for about 30 minutes. Then I drop in on another customer and show him the updated website for his business. We sit together and I update his site over the wireless Internet. I depart around 3:25.

At 3:35 I do a showing at the apartment building (Do you need a furnished apartment in Ithaca, near Cornell University on Stewart Avenue?). After the showing and a few phone calls I head home. About halfway home the car starts to think it is overheating again. Even though the coolant level is high and the engine isn't actually getting hot, I pull over and let cars go by. I end up pulling off the road and just read some of this month's WIRED magazine for about 15 minutes. I start the car up, it has cooled down. I drive about a mile and it is hot again. I wait. I drive. I wait. I drive. Finally I made it to Crispell's (.5 miles from my house) and I put the car in neutral and coast all the way down the slight hill to my house.

I made a quick dinner from the left over polenta, spaghetti sauce, cheese and hamburg meat. I put in another 45 minutes of work for a customer. I write down directions to a house about 5 miles away and I drive again. There is no snow, the roads are clear and I make it in 10 minutes. At the house I meet someone (in person for the first time) who I had met via the blog. We drive 15 more minutes to downtown Dryden. I attend my first meeting of the Dryden Democrats. I live in Dryden, have an Ithaca mailing address, fall into the Hamlet of Besemer and tell people I live near Brooktondale. I probably couldn't live too much further from downtown Dryden and still be in Dryden.

The meeting was interesting. I might join. They meet once a month to help to elect democrats to offices in Dryden and to other places that Dryden falls under (Tompkins County, 24th US Congressional District, etc.). Perhaps I'll write more next month.

The drive home is hampered by a squall. I finally get back to 1960 around 10pm or so. At 11 I was wondering why I was so tired. Then I remembered getting up long ago to drive and start BNI. That was all in this day. So I went to find my bed to get some sleep.

Sick Super Sunday

I've been sick the last couple of days. I think it is the change in the weather that is doing it. One day it is 50, then 20, then 10, then 40, then 50, then repeat. I think my body doesn't know if it should keep me cool or warm me up. Eitherway I've had a bit of a sore throat since Thursday and somewhat of a running nose as well as a spot of congestion. For the last two nights I've downed a shot of single malt NyQuil and drifted off to sleep within 20 minutes. That stuff will bring down an insomniac.

What does this mean overall for my well being? Well, I've been tired a lot the last few days. I sleep in, but when I get up and start doing things I get exhausted and then hours go by and I don't get anything done. Yesterday I napped off and on for about 2 hours in the afternoon. I went to see a customer downtown after that, had some more tea (I've been brewing ginger root and lemon juice at home) and then raced home to prepare dinner for a potluck in Varna.

I probably stayed out way too late last night, getting home close to 1:15am, but I had little to drink and lots of good food to eat. I've been re-hydrating all day today, but still the throat is sore and the head is heavy and the sniffles are here. I'm going to a Super Bowl party in about an hour or so. I made some fried flautas with winter squash and brown sugar inside for dessert. The superbowl party is mexican themed (or mexican food themed).

Aside from hydrating myself I found that my house was hydrating itself too. The sump pump which has been running consistently since we installed it last January decided to stop running sometime yesterday afternoon. Result: this afternoon I went downstairs to find up to three inches of water in some parts of my basement. Entire cardboard boxes were soaked with water and it took me about an hour to push all the water to the sump pump whole (as soon as I touched it - it kicked on and ran for about 3 minutes). I now have more cleanup to do down there.

I also have lots of work things going on. I need to get some of my current customers to pay their invoices and I need to get some projects that are half done more to the "all done" stage so I can bill them. I have a number of leads, but since last week I've been procrastinating for some reason. Perhaps because I've been sick. I just sneezed a second ago and my throat is burning. I'm going to finish this tea and gargle some salt water and maybe take a nice warm bath before heading to the party. I hope I feel better soon.

The Desire and Ability to Sleep In

Today I finally slept in. I got up at 9:20am and that was late. For the last couple of weeks I have been getting up at just about 8am every day. This is not that big a deal, if I went to sleep at say 11pm or midnight. However my erratic programming, website design, poker and Ithaca socializing schedule has shifted my bed time to closer to 1 or 2 or 3am. Last night post-poker at Jeff's I headed to the Chapter House for a drink. A $5 cover and a 10 minute wait in line for a noisy band and crowded space later I departed with my buddy D. and we headed up the hill to Stella's on College Ave.

The first time I went to Stella's was the day I bought my house. I wandered around the bar, looked downstairs and listened for a second to the jazz trio and then headed back upstairs. I waited a minute and then feigning hunger and seeing the menu prices I drove to Napoli's for a hot sub to go. I ended up eating on the floor of the bedroom in the new house with an Ithaca Beer by my side. My Stella's experience was a little better this time around. The curved walls felt like we were in a cave deep underground in a place where people go to hide and do suspicious things. I couldn't tell if the place was designed that way to seem city style trendy or to mimic the Iraqi bunkers featured in Three Kings (1999).

D. and I sat in the back out of the way of the drunk and overdressed college crowd. Were these people living in the same town as Moonshadow and the farmer's market? I guess Ithaca has a diverse set of people after all (at least in the diversity of the ways we consume foods and drinks). Jeff showed up a little later, he ended up winning the game and joined us for a drink. Probably the best feature of Stella's at night is that it is so damn loud that you can sneak in a few private conversations while out and about and noone can head a thing you are saying. You can tell dirty stories and make big plans for the future and noone will take any interest in what the people in the back are talking about.

We finally got moved on from Stella's and I made it home around 2am or so.  When I awoke I hoped it would be after 9am. I didn't want to put on my glasses and stare at the clock and see 8am again (or earlier!). I looked over at the glowing red numbers and it was 9:30. Ahh, satisfaction of getting sleep. No matter when I get up, once I am awake (and it is light out) I have been having a hard time getting back to sleep. I end up getting things going but I crash out sometime in the afternoon. I really just need to sleep earlier and learn to shut off the computer and close the books.

Today it is rainy in Ithaca (at least its not snow) and my driveway, which never froze is now a big mud patch. I need to complete some projects and write invoices and proposals. Why rest on Sunday when I rested on Saturday?

Notes about the Home

As you might or might not know, I work from home. There, I said it. I work from home. Now I just have to actually do the work part. I've been at work from home for just about two years now. My first customer paid me in early February of 2004, just about the same time I registered my business with the town of Somerville. I've now been doing business in Ithaca just as long as I was doing business in Somerville. In that time my number of customers has grown from seven customers in the first year to over 30 customers in the second year! The growth of the business and the variety of projects have amazed me. I continue to be interested in seeing small businesses grow and seeing how the Internet and a website helps to make business grow. I look forward to making more contacts in 2006 and to helping get more businesses online.

One note about working from home - - breakfast is at 10:30 or so, lunch is around 5 or 6 or 7 and dinner - - well, that's the work from home diet. You eat less and get more work done most days. I've lost 15+ pounds since I moved to Ithaca from a three pronged diet.

First I don't eat too much meat anymore. I don't buy meat when I grocery shop and I don't cook meat at home. I'm sure these calories removed from my diet have made some difference. Don't look at me like I'm lesser of an eater because I don't eat meat or look at me like I'm aligned with my vegetarian friends now and I've become a total Ithaca hippie! When I go out to restaurants I always order something with meat. Sometimes I order chicken, but more often I order something with beef. I still love a good hamburger, I just don't eat them at home anymore.

Secondly I joined the Ithaca Dragon Boat Club which burns calories and pounds while at the same time builds some tone to my long winter indoors muscles and pale skin. I can't wait for April so I can do something that requires going outside!

Thirdly I eat those two meals about five days a week. I have small snacks in between, but they are abnormally healthy snacks. I don't have any dessert food in my house, I don't buy chips, I don't buy chocolate or candy or cookies. That just means that when you see me out rarely at a restaurant I'm much more likely to order a dessert (or that's just a sign that I want to prolong our enjoyable dinner together a little longer, fried ice cream anyone?).

So I'm getting pale and thinning away, two great advantages to working from home.

Its late at night...

It's late at night and I have many decisions to make. The first of which is do I call it a day (or a night) and get some sleep -or- do I rally and try to get a whole bunch of work done until I am completely exhausted. It is now 12:43am and there is no baseball being played, no customers will be calling or emailing and there is limited interruptions from the nocturnal cats in the house. The only thing of any bothersome interest is the speeding cars and trucks out on route 79, though even those start to come less often between now and five a.m.

Here is what I'm looking like right this instant. This is the very first posted picture from my brand new Nikon Coolpix 5900. I've owned it since Friday afternoon and it is already outdated by the 7900 model. Go figure.

I'm starting to swealter in the humid evening heat - which makes me think that blasting my fan at my bed and trying to get some sleep is the best option. I am also still working to recover from Thursday night's sleep mishap - when I stayed in Berlin, Mass at my parent's house and had a fan their cranked at my head all night. The cold air and the fact that I slept / passed out with my mouth open caused my throat to get sore and now three days later there is still some slight pain when I talk too much or even try to swallow. Usually this happens in the winter or when the seasons change and I get sick for about a week.

But I have so much work to get on and I know tomorrow will be full of interruptions. I really have to create some invoices and also work on a whole bunch of different web projects. I haven't even figured out exactly what is the most important thing for me to do tomorrow. I do have a list or two of things I need to get done. I suppose finding roommates should be number one. I will start that fresh tomorrow morning.

I have to do a little smidgen of organizing tomorrow too. I have lists all over my desk and inside Outlook and on my notepad and on the back of an envelope. I have people I need to call back and items to order and photos to post to Flickr and checks to deposit and people to pick up and drop off and ahhhh I guess I really should just get some sleep so I can start functioning tomorrow at a reasonable time.

Tuesday of course will be a very long day, with going to Binghamton and Johnson City for BNI and then to two other meetings after that (which I must prepare for) and then back to Ithaca to go out and see a few customers who I missed all of last week since I was away and do a photo shoot and then go to practice in the evening and all the while avoid the ridiculous construction that has taken over rt.79/State Street between here and the downtown commons.

So sleep it is. Many, many pictures are on their way. Good night!