Looks like our whole town just lost power. It has been super windy all day. Must have brought down some trees. Hope this gets resolved quickly otherwise it will be a cold night.
In 2023, I was fortunate to witness and photograph two extraordinary astronomical events:
Annular Solar Eclipse in October
The story of Centralia, PA and its everlasting coal mine fire that has been going on for the last 60 years keeps coming back. It was in one of the recent episode of 99%invisible.
On yesterday’s hike, the trail was blocked by a flooded stream so I decided to go off trail and bushwhacked. The woods consisted of mostly mountain laurel and in places it got very crowded with barely any room to pass through. After I continued for about a quarter mile, I realized how bad idea that was. In these woods, there are black bears and packs of coyotes. If I had gotten into a den of these animals, it would have been bad. With the thick vegetation there was no way I could have run away from any animals. Hibernating bears probably were not much of a risk but, if there was a six pack of coyotes, that could have been trouble. Thankfully I found the other trail I was looking for through the woods and came out of it safely. Hopefully, I’ll think a little bit before undertaking such adventure next time.
Went on a hike on this foggy morning after a lot of rain overnight. The trails had turned into streams. Had to bushwhack about half a mile as the trail was cutoff by a flooded brook. It was the most adventurous hike in a long time.
A look back at 2023
It is a little late but, want to get this post written. 2023 was a very busy and eventful year. It was a major shock for us when my father passed away in April. He was a big presence in all our lives and left a big void but, we have so many happy memories with him that we cherish.
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Vacations:
Annular Solar Eclipse; Oct 14, 2023
Rosette Nebula
Ahead of Monday’s caucuses, Republicans have spent $200+ millions on advertising in Iowa that has a population of ~3million. That is ~$70 per person. Considering that a small number of Iowans will actually participate in the process, it is easily ~$500 per caucus participant. Election process in US is totally out of control and ridiculous.
This morning, several fire engines rushed by when I was driving to work and I was wondering what could have happened. Turns out that there was a house fire less than a mile away from my home and 2 people died in the incident.
Micro.blog is not like other social networks and doesn’t need a built-in ‘news’ feature. Here users have already paid their subscriptions and are reading what they like. M.b is not making money through advertising and they don’t need to catch eyeballs by splashing breaking news etc. What’s next? Another feature that will show things like “10 ways to improve performance in the bedroom”?
Needed to pick up my car from the shop after oil change. Instead of waiting for someone to give me a ride, decided to go for my first outdoor bike ride of 2024. Had to be super careful as there was still some snow/ice from the weekend on the road. Made it safely without an incident.
The Horsehead and Flame nebulae from Orion. The bright star (Alnitak) between them is the leftmost star in the belt of Orion. Can’t take enough photos of this view.
Rowing on Concept2 rower is so enjoyable and have been doing it for the last few months. All this while, I was doing intervals (500m or 1000m followed by 1 min rest, repeat). For the last 2 days, decided to try endurance training. Happy to see that I can hold a moderate pace for 30 minutes and rack up ~6500m. Will continue this for some time before going back to intervals.
After the pandemic hiatus, my airline traveling picked up significantly during 2023. Went on 4 international and 3 local trips. While flying for these trips, I used good noise-canceling headphones and realized what a big difference they make. The airplane noise over several hours is so exhausting. Eliminating that fatigue from noise, I felt that it was easier to recover from jetlag.
Made a college payment for my daughter’s Spring semester. This is her junior year and that means only 2 more payments left for her college education. Ah! The end is coming near. Next January, we will be (hopefully) done with one college expense. Three more years of the second one.
Barcelona - Day 7 and 8
After spending 6 wonderful days in Barcelona, we were supposed to come back home on day 7 but, American Airlines had a different plan. Our scheduled flight on Jan 1st was initially delayed and then canceled because of airplane issues. The plane that we were supposed to fly on, never made it to Barcelona due to mechanical issues and was diverted to Lisbon. We were put up in a hotel near the airport and was booked on a flight on the following day.
On Jan 2nd, we got to the airport, checked-in and waited to board but again there was no plane to board. This flight was canceled too. At this point, instead of automatically re-booking, the airline asked us to call customer service and find alternate booking by ourselves to go back home. What a disaster! Again we were put on a bus instead of a plane and sent to another hotel near the airport instead of back home. Fortunately, we found seats on a flight going non-stop to our destination on the following day.
On Jan 3rd, we woke up early to get to the airport but received a notification saying the flight was delayed by 3 hours. At this point, we were numb and didn’t really care about what was happening. We made our way to the airport 3 hours later with full expectation that the flight will be canceled. To our surprise, there was a plane for us to board that took off from Barcelona and brought us back home!!!
One takeaway from this experience… Never fly on American Airlines (or any american airline) to international destinations. It seemed like they had bare-bones operation in Barcelona with no capacity to deal with the issues we faced. I can imagine the same situation at most of the airports around the world. Probably a good idea to use an airline local to the country of travel. They definitely have enough staff and infrastructure to help customers when there are problems.
🗺
Barcelona - Day 5 and 6
On the last two days we decided to take it easy. Planned only one activity per day in the afternoon leaving the mornings free. I used this free time to rent a bike and went riding around town on both mornings.
We decided to make use of public transportation and took the subway and a funicular to go up on Monjuic. It is a hill just outsider of city center and a good place to take in the views. There are clear views overlooking the harbor area and the Mediterranean but not towards the city. It was a nice easy walk on the hill while we chatted. The weather was nice and we had a good time.
On the last day of the trip, another architectural showpiece by Antoni Gaudi, Park Guell, was on the schedule. It was supposedly a failed residential venture on a hill on the north side of town. No one bought the houses proposed to be built. All the work done to create the neighborhood was then turned into a park. This was kind of underwhelming compared to all the other places we visited in Barcelona. Being on a hill it had some nice views of the city. All the walking around helped build a good appetite for a nice Spanish dinner New Year’s Eve party that we had planned for.
Overall, it was a great trip. We had a wonderful time in Barcelona. I have a feeling that we will come back for another visit in the future.
Have been using Lillihub for a few days now and absolutely loving it. Wish the official Micro.blog app on iOS looks and works more like this.
At Barcelona airport for third day in a row. Hopefully, we will get out of here and reach home today. I won’t believe it until it actually happens. The plane we are flying on is already here and boarding starts in less than one hour. 🤞🏽
Barcelona is turning into Hotel California. Can’t get out of here. Not sure if I should laugh or cry. More airline problems. Now we will be traveling on Jan 3rd.