Kitchen Work

Boring update but this is what Ive been doing ... so there!
As threatened I have now installed a dishwasher in my kitchen :)

A couple of weeks ago, I searched around in the local appliance stores and found a quiet and not too expensive dishwasher on sale. So I bought it and figured Id sort out all the installation issues later.
I got it delivered mid last week and promptly started making a big mess in my kitchen...
The dishwasher was plonked on the floor in the kitchen and I was initially confronted with the spacial geometry problem of figuring out where to fit it in.

No huge problem, but my house was built over fifty years ago by someone who was not really a builder, and there are all sorts of "not quit standard" little surprises I find when I get down below the surface details on a maintenance job...

Right, well, I measured things up and selected a section of the counter where I wanted the dishwasher to go. I removed the two cabinet doors and the drawer that would be replaced. I measured the height of the counter and found that there is only just enough vertical height for the dishwasher - phew!
OK, So I inspected the cabinet frame to see what I have to cut to get it out of there - Hmmm Its all made of 2x4 timbers which are about twice the thickness of regular cabinet wood - some work but manageable.
So, then I spent an hour or two cutting out the shelf and the timbers and its a pretty good job :)
Now for the floor - well, I made the same cuts as for the rest of the space and the bottom shelf of the cupboard came out fine, but there was no sub-floor under the cabinets...just the joists for the floor! ...This is the sort of thing that I always find. It would be normal to have a subfloor under the cabinets but the guy who built this house installed his cabinets before he put down his subfloor (OK, whatever...)
So then I spent another hour building the subfloor. Then I cover over the side of the shelf I have cut through and I have a more or less finished space for the dishwasher.
Trial fitting of the dishwasher is good - just enough space for everything.
One more session of wood cutting and trim painting and the "hole" is finished.

Now for the hook-up : waste water, hot water and electrical power .
This is a nice potentially fatal combination of utilities if I get it wrong :)
Technically not challenging but access wise - difficult.... A few more hours of fiddling around with things and Im done - move the dishwasher in front of the hole, hook-up the utilities, push it into the hole and Voila! Now I have a dishwasher - And it even works :)

Whats next? New counter tops or new paint? - Paint is cheaper, so I'll probably start there :)

Whats been goin on (again)?

Whats new with me... not that much but here's an update:

1) The little yellow motorbike.
Well, it seems the insurance people feel it is a write-off. However, they of course do not want to pay me what it would cost me to replace it as it was - only what they feel market value was worth. So, it seems that I will have some haggling to do with them and this will likely take some time to sort out. Fortunately, this is not too much of a problem since I have my touring bike to get around on, and the weather here has turned rather wet...(so riding the little sport bike was less fun anyway).
I have been seriously considdering rebuilding the bike with the insurance money, but the more time that passes, the less attached to this idea I am... so I suspect not but we'll wait and see.

2) My health after the accident.
I seem to be basically fine. I have some stiffness still but I think that's not unusual. Normally when I do heavy exercise (say a sporting event or a big hike) I get stiff for a few days and then I'm back to normal. But that stiffness is self inflicted by my own body's muscles.
The "rag-doll" effect of being tossed off a motorbike at traffic speed and into and over a car are a completely different set of forces. So, I'm not surprised that its taking a couple of weeks to get over it.
Initially I had some VERY nasty bruising in the groin and a limp to go with it. However, after about a week, the "turgid tissue" colour, pain, and stiffness associated with that was pretty much gone. The longer lasting stiffness is in my upper body (ribs, shoulders and neck) but it is very generalized and not stopping me doing anything I usually do. I'm getting some massage (no, not for the groin!!) and we'll just see how things progress.

3) Work
Ticking along quite nicely now. I'm happy with the situation at work and happy with the current planned end date of the contract. The biggest down side is that I now have very limited time at home to get done all the stuff that I want to get done (selling things and fixing the house etc...)

4) Home
I'm still on my plan to mobilize as quickly as I can so that I can be free to do whatever life puts in my path. I have so far got rid of about half the stuff I had planned to, but it was the easier half, so it gets a bit harder now. The remaining larger items are a few pieces of furniture, my smaller aquarium, and my woodwork machine tools in the garage.
There is too much stuff for me to store but its now far more manageable... I'll keep at it :)
I did successfully finish the storage container in the back yard and it was just in time since the rains seem to really have started up here.
Upcomming projects are to install a dishwasher (already purchased) and replace kitchen counter tops...

5) Other stuff
Well, I managed to get a nasty virus on my home computer that took me a while to get rid of (took it to a more computer savvy friend at work)... that's fixed now.
I also managed to misplace my passport and have had to declare it "lost" (police report and notarized statement etc) so that I can apply for a new one - since the old one only had another seven months validity... but that's done now too:)
I'm busy scanning thousands of my old slide photos into my computer but its a huge task and I may not complete it before I "transition" to the new life... oh well, back into storage they go :)
Ive also been looking at alternate motorbikes for a future adventure and have compiled all sorts of specs from the web. At present it looks like the just released BMW F800GS is the pick of the litter but at about $15000 it costs about twice as much as other candidates!! - Im still thinking about it though...

DL650 "Giraffe" Edition !

Ive been working on Bertha!

Bertha is the name that I randomly used at one point to describe my motorbike while on my trip. It was at some point while I was traveling with Marie and I was being a little disparaging... The actual phrase was "big Bertha" since my bike was far heavier than Marie's smaller KLR.

Anyway, the name seemed to stick (at least in Marie's mind) and thats what the bike has been called since...

When I got back from my trip I had a wealth of experience about using this particular model of motorbike for this type of overland trip and I even wrote up my assessment in an earlier Blog entry.
There were a couple of things that really made the bike hard to live with that had been on my mind for many months and now that Im back and have done some clean-up work on the bike, Id had some more time to think about things.
The first thing that I already knew was that due to all the rust (from the crossing of the Darrien Gap) and the scratches and scrapes (from the crashes and off roading I did), the bike was NEVER going to look like a pretty road touring machine again. So there was no point in me spending money on trying to make it look like new before I sell it - I would fail...

So, the alternative is to leave it as is, or make it better at the adventure touring job.
So reallizing that I will never get back any further money that I decide to invest in it, I decided I would try to make some of the changes I wanted anyway...

Number one on the list is better ground clearance!
Then fix the handle bars (they were bent from a crash and were way too flexible)
Then a more comfortable seat....

So I thought about it and I figured out how to do what I wanted and then I had a bike shop do the machining and suspension work and I have been doing the rest.
The result is that I have spent about a thousand dollars and I have a much better adventure touring bike!! Though, I expect I will still sell it and get something else for my next big trip. In the mean time however, since my little city bike got written off in an accident a couple of weeks ago, I am riding "Bertha" (I actually really dont like that name... I think I preffer Bess!) around and really liking the feel of the new machine :)))

Suspension:
I had the rear suspension links replaced with shorter ones which means the rear wheel is now 50mm lower than before.
I had the front shock absorbers lengthened by machining new extended end caps (complete with the pre-load adjustment bolts) so the front wheel is now also 50mm lower (and can be 15mm lower again if I want).
This changes the ground clearance from 15cm to 20cm which is great :)
But this meant that the old side stand and centre stand wouldnt work, so I also had them cut and extended to compensate.

Handle Bars:
Well the old steel ones were flexible and bent and rusty, so I got some new alloy ones with a good brace (no more flexibility) and spent a few hours swapping over all the fittings. I also installed a front fork brace to add stiffness to the now even longer front forks (even better feel of the steering and front end).

Bash Plate:
The one I had used on the trip took a real beating and I had to straighten it out several times - It was not strong enough, so I replaced it with a new one made of thicker alloy :)

Seat:
Well the bike is 50mm taller than before and I can only just stand over it now with my feet flat on the ground (called "flat footing" the bike). So this is OK, but in rough terain this can be difficult. So I got a second seat from my friend Mike who I bought the bike from (he had replaced the original seat) and I took off the vynle covering and I got some high density foam and then I took to it with a carving knife! :)
I'm not finished with it yet, but I have a seat that is now about 20mm lower (improving the stand-over height that I lost with the suspension lift) and far more comfortable for me.

Other:
Then, I had to replace the tires since the ones I had on it were completely bald... and last but not least I will replace the front sproket. The one currently on the bike has done 60 000Km and is baddly worn. When I replace it I will put on a 14 tooth one instead of a 15 tooth one so that the bike will be lower geared and better at off road manouvering (more powerfull, less jumpy on throttle, and less dependent on subtler clutch work).

So, here it is, the "Giraffe" edition of the DL650:

Up Up and Away

A couple of years ago, my good friend Christine decided to give me a Hot air baloon ride as a birthday gift. I thought this was a great idea since I have always loved flying in all forms and I had never been on a baloon ride before, So all seemed well and good.
Bookings were made, indemnity forms were signed, and directions to take-off fields were obrtained etc.
Unfortunately however when the appointed day arrived, a check-up phone call the evening before resulted in the flight being canceled due to probable bad weather - and it was true, the weather didnt look great. So, we did other things that day and set about rebooking the baloon flight for another date.
However, apparently the balloning is quite popular since we were unable to make another booking for a couple of months. So we did that and waited patiently for the date to arrive.

But we were foiled again and on the appointed day, again the weather was not the best and the flight was canceled... Back to make another booking...

But the season had ended and we could not make another booking that year... We had no choice but to make a booking for early in the next season - about seven months away...
The Winter passed and Spring commenced but fate was not ready to play along yet, and my Job ended suddenly! So, then my plans all changed and I was off to climb mountains in Pakistan.
Christine and I planned around this and made a booking for after I returned from mountaineering but before I went away on my motorbike tour...

This time, things were looking great we had a good spell of fine weather, and hopes were high...

BUT, Just a few days before the flight there was a very unfortunate incident with another ballon flight where the fully loaded baloon was about to take off and some how it caught fire!
Most of the people managed to jump clear of the baloon but two did not and they were carried high into the air in the basket as the unloaded and flaming baloon shot into the sky before colapsing and crashing back to earth - tragically, both the remaining occupants perished!

This very sad incident was of course all over the local news media and the balooning company decided to close down all flights for a couple of weeks out of respect for those affected...

So then I was off on my year long odysey riding to Ecuador and back. Again Christine and I planned around this and a booking was made for when I returned in August (a very good time of year in Vancouver).
Again the fatefull day approached and the weather looked great but the phone call the evening before said the flight was cancelled due to "upper level wind sheer" which means that just because it looks OK doesnt mean it is... Foiled again!!!

So yet another booking was made and again it was the last for the season, so we didnt really have much hope ... but what can ya do?

But lo! The weather was fine and the phone call was made and the flight was still on...

So last weekend on Sunday morning at 7am in the early light Christine and I found our selves with big wooly coats standing in long wet grass in a field next to a large cane basket and a pile of fabric being rolled out....
:)))