THE WEISS CHRONICLES

 

We had a combination of heavy rain and strong East and Southeast wind today.

These two factors combined for some local flooding near the Potomac River (and bay side places such as Annapolis and Baltimore).

This scene in downtown Alexandria was from mid afternoon today and posted on the Capital Weather Gang site.

At our house some deck chairs were blown over and a lot of leaves came down but that's all fortunately.

 
We went for a drive today to Shenandoah National Park and Shenandoah River State Park.

These first three images (click to enlarge) are from the former and taken by me.  They are all taken on Skyline Parkway.

The first is at the Dickey Ridge Visitor's Center.  It is about elevation 1600 feet. Although it doesn't show in the image, we could actually see the moon in the sky even though it was about noon.

 

The second was at Signal Knob Overlook. It is about 2000 feet in elevation.

The third is at Browntown Valley Overlook. It is about 2900 feet in elevation (yes the tree to the left of Ann is dead).  Later that day we drove through Browntown in the Shenandoah valley.

 

The tree were not usually at full color although in some places they were.  The fourth picture shows a 'trees at peak color' scene from one of the park's websites. Some of the road had beautiful trees on both sides with intermittent lighting but it didn't allow for good pictures. 

 

This last image reminds me of the time I was working for the Federal Highway Administration and our Administrator would send a weekly 4-6 page essay on what he was thinking - this was to inspire us. One week he spent about 3 pages praising the colors of autumn leaves.  I showed this to my daughter, who seemed to inherent my distaste for excessive adjectives and irrelevant verbiage (apparently inheritable traits). After reading this she asked, "Is that what your top boss is supposed to be doing?"

I responded, "Well he is the top boss so he may do what he wants mostly." 

She thought for a bit then said, "I have an idea daddy. Why don't you and some of your friends each give this man some of your work to do. Then he could be happy and maybe useful".

I told this to many people. All enjoyed the story.

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This is a relatively small park (about 5 miles of River frontage and ~1500 acres) compared to Shenandoah National Park (100+ miles long and ~80,000 acres).

It does contain the Shenandoah River, which, notwithstanding, the 1971 John Denver Song 'Country Roads' is almost all in Virginia with only a small section in West Virginia (also only a small section of the Blue Ridge Mountains is in WV).

 

(Click on images to enlarge them).

Image one is Ann at the Everette Culler's Overlook.

The second image is a 'do not feed the bears' instruction that is affixed to many picnic tables in the park.

The third image shows part of the river that is visible in the first image except it is close up.

We saw this park after the Skyline drive visit. It is off route 340 about 8 miles south of Front Royal. Although I can remember several visits to Skyline drive this is the first time I've visited this park as it only opened in 1999.

Labels: weather, work story

We took a pm trip to Sugarloaf Mountain today.  We've been there before.

 

Image one is Ann at a table on the east side of the mountain.

 

Image two was taken in November 2019 and it is from the website of NisasDiary.com. 

 

The second image shows the scene if you go a bit east from where I took the picture and if you had a better camera and better sky and vegetation conditions.
 

 

At the bottom of the image is the genicular nerve area.  It is where the knee is.  For quite some time, since late spring of 2020 or so I've had knee pain.  It is possible that when I wasn't able to use the aquatic center for a year or so it led to my chronic knee pain (per some websites, somewhere between 15% and 30% of all Americans experience knee pain).

Anyway, after many months of physical, hydro and  acupuncture therapy I am a bit more flexible and the pain is less. However there still is pain and I don't walk well. 

I had n appointment with my arthritis doctor today and I'm going to try the Iovera procedure. This procedure was introduced in 2013 and apparently works better and provides more long lasting relief than cortisone injections. The procedure deadens nerves by freezing them. The procedure is scheduled for mid December (lots of people want this done apparently). 

 

I went on line this morning to see the weather forecast as wunderground.

It said the temperature was -40F.

 

Apparently I was unaware of how cold it was yesterday since the website said that the -40 was warmer than yesterday.

I suspected problems when underground was bought by Weather.com but nothing like this.

 

Yesterday, I was discussing my work schedule with a restaurant owner. 

We agreed I would come in at 9am today.

Late yesterday, she sent me a text asking if I could make it 8am (her customer increased the order and advanced the time of delivery).

I agreed.

 

The restaurant owner thought I had done her a great favor and had this bouquet ready for me when I finished work.

That is the slogan on the buses that transport the students of Charles E Smith Jewish Day School, CES JDS.

The slogan sounds like some marketing fluff Disney Corp or Exxon would have but today I came across a real example.

I was on mashgiach duty at CES JDS.  I asked the chef what was on for lunch. He said, "Sloppy Joes, Macaroni and cheese and potatoes."  

I must have seemed befuddled (mixing meat and cheese is a no-no) because he then said, "The sloppy joes are vegetarian". 

 

I had some.  The main ingredient of the joes was one of the meat substitutes (second image) but the chef added carrot slivers, onions and what tasted like a fair amount of sugar.

I can't say I was impressed but then again, regular Sloppy Joe mix doesn't impress me much either.

 

It is October but we still have lots of flowers. 

The big patch of white flowers on the left are Montauk Daisies (though I think they are native to Japan). They are a fall only flower around here.  The small dark red ones just above the vase are asters, also a fall flower - this is my first successful attempt at asters.

Above the asters are roses, one red and the rest pink (the pink ones are easier to pick as they have almost no thorns). These bloom in mid spring and then come and go all the way through the fall.