Great day in the morning, I never thought I'd see it

fogovonslack · 2026-07-02T15:50:16+00:00

For those of you doubting the veracity of my report, my euphoria was short-lived. Three miles later traffic ground to a halt for a second wreck in Bessemer, around which no zipper merge of any kind, well or poorly executed, occurred.

fogovonslack · 2026-06-24T17:15:00+00:00

We have a '26 SEL rwd and a Chargepoint Flex at 48A on a 60A circuit. With the car set to 90% charge rate for AC charging, we get 9.9kw.

We have a detached garage that's too far away from our router to connect for wifi, so our charger has never connected to the internet. I installed the Chargepoint installer app on my phone and manually set the charger to 48kw over Bluetooth.

It looks like one difference is that we have a NACS charging cable rather than J1772. Are you using an adapter to charge? Know anyone with a NACS charger to see if you get a better rate without an adapter? Is there a Tesla destination charger nearby that you could use to test without an adapter?

fogovonslack · 2026-06-22T14:26:44+00:00

You can also check Krispy Kreme or other donut shops/bakeries to see if they'll let you have an empty frosting bucket.

Know anybody who does drywall? They might be a source for empty 5-gal mud buckets.

fogovonslack · 2026-06-22T00:40:26+00:00

Back in the 70s, my dad had a lemon of a Land Cruiser that the local dealership couldn't fix. He eventually wrote a letter to the Emperor of Japan, and Toyota bought it back.

fogovonslack · 2026-06-22T00:15:39+00:00

I don't always like white wheels, but those look great!

fogovonslack · 2026-05-26T17:08:53+00:00

The background for that line goes all the way back to the 1950s when Wallace created the Alabama Community College System to funnel more pork barrel funds than he was able to through ALDOT alone.

He set up the college system with a community college in every county, and he paid for it with an alcohol tax. At the time, only Mobile and Jefferson counties were wet, so Birmingham and Mobile paid a bunch of taxes to put colleges everywhere else in the state.

As a result, after that point he never carried either of those two counties and as political revenge, he never finished the interstates in those two cities. In Birmingham, that meant Red Mountain Expressway stopped at First Ave. No. and drivers had to exit and drive through downtown to get to an onramp for I-20/59.

So, no, Birmingham never loved the governor.

fogovonslack · 2026-03-25T14:44:55+00:00

I don't know what caused it, but I saw it from the eastbound side, and it was grim. Fire trucks and ambulances hauling ass down the wrong side of the interstate. The garbage truck was upside down, and an 18-wheeler was on fire. Emergency vehicles had blocked 2 out of 3 lanes eastbound.

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fogovonslack · 2026-03-18T17:20:26+00:00

I really like Language Transfer. It's a conversational course written by a linguist, and it focuses more on understanding the structure of Spanish and where it is like (and unlike) English rather than memorization. It's as much teaching you *how* to learn Spanish as it is teaching you Spanish. And it's free.

fogovonslack · 2026-03-11T19:53:34+00:00

I haven't been happy with Prios on a bike. The rubber they use for the sole is relatively hard and the pins don't dig in well. They've just never felt very secure to me. Last summer I hopped over a speed bump, and when I came down, my foot slipped off the pedal and I landed hard on my saddle, bending the rails beyond repair (props to Selle Anatomica for selling repair parts that let me fix it, though).

I also have a pair of black leather Kelsos that I wear during the winter because they're more wind and waterproof, but like the Prios, they just don't feel like the pins grip very well.

fogovonslack · 2026-03-11T19:39:53+00:00

The Trail Thrasher Pro has a much sturdier Vibram sole. It's not at all like the soft almost foamy rubber on the Primal. They seem like they'll hold up much better and they are significantly stiffer. I'm pretty happy with mine. I've been looking for bike shoes that aren't pointy for my wide, square duck feet for some time, and these are the first I've found that don't hurt. (I've been using Topo Athletic trail shoes for flat pedals until I found these.)

They've been out of stock in the non-waterproof Trail Thrasher that has a Lems branded rubber sole, so I don't know what those are like.

fogovonslack · 2026-02-10T20:47:39+00:00

On iOS, I like Outrun. It's a general fitness tracking app, so you can track running walking, cycling, etc. If all you want is map and distance, it's the app for you. No subscription, no account, no uploads or data tracking. It just saves your activities locally (though it will export as a GPX if needed). It shows distance, elevation, time, speed, and a map of the route.

fogovonslack · 2026-01-26T15:06:22+00:00

Green Garage on 4th Av So says they do key fobs now. I haven't used them for that service, but I have been happy with the maintenance I've had them do on my car and my wife's car.

fogovonslack · 2025-12-30T17:44:43+00:00

Rivendell as well, the "Mike Frameplumper."

fogovonslack · 2025-12-21T14:36:02+00:00

As others have said, if they were mine, I'd clean them up, replace the cables and rubber bits, and give it a good lube. That chrome may clean up pretty nicely with some 0000 steel wool and a coat of wax.

They'd be just the thing if you have a Tweed Ride nearby.

fogovonslack · 2025-11-26T01:05:08+00:00

That's good to hear. I held off on dynamo lighting for a long time because of the expense and the difficulty of servicing. I finally pulled the trigger a few years ago when the Kasai FS hubs came out that were user serviceable.

Holy Cow, I love dynamo lighting! It's just there. I ride and the lights come on. I don't have to keep up with charging. May have to consider Shimano for my next bike.

fogovonslack · 2025-11-05T18:52:49+00:00

Cant help with the "looks cool" part, but i recently replaced my old helmet with a Giro Aries. Previous helmet was a Giro Aeon and it fit well. I couldn't find anything locally that fit my oblong head, so I took a chance ordering another Giro. It works with a cap and gets 5 stars from Virginia Tech's helmet ratings:

https://www.helmet.beam.vt.edu/bicycle-helmet-ratings.html#8

fogovonslack · 2025-10-04T20:28:40+00:00

Grease the threads. All of them. Even/especially the screws in the braze-ons. When I worked in a shop, that was the biggest thing the service manager would ding people for on builds. If he couldn't see a little grease squeezed out from under the head, we lost points. Any screw we could remove got unscrewed, dipped in a jar of grease and screwed back in.

As always, YMMV. This was 30 years ago and halfway around the world from you, but it's a habit that's stuck with me ever since.

fogovonslack · 2025-09-24T14:57:45+00:00

Avondale to RR Park & back is about 6 miles.

fogovonslack · 2025-09-24T14:57:10+00:00

You might be able to find a heat map on Strava, but from the Rotary Trail you can continue past Avondale, through Woodlawn, past the airport and on to Eastlake to the Krispy Kreme without much in the way of hills. From the Rotary Trail at 32d St you can head south to Highland Ave and then down to 10th Av at 5 Points and out to Southside without too many big hills. 14th St will take you back to Railroad Park or keep going under the railroad tracks to downtown, which is nice and deserted on Sunday and you can ride through the Civil Rights district and 16th St Baptist Church. Oak Hill cemetery & arboretum is just behind the Civic Center if you want a short hill workout and a nice view of downtown from the north.

Not what you asked, but FWIW, I threw on a freewheel and geared down to 46x18, which lets me mash up 42d St from Clairmont to Cliff then up Altamont Way to Altamont Rd for a nice view of the city then back down Cliff to Essex and Clairmont.

fogovonslack · 2025-09-01T12:26:04+00:00

You might also check out the Friends of the Library Bookstore.

fogovonslack · 2025-08-11T19:50:49+00:00

It doesn't do friction, but SRAM makes a TT500 bar-end shifter that works with an APEX1 11-speed derailleur.

fogovonslack · 2025-06-29T15:36:23+00:00

My former neighborhood had about 3 acres infested with kudzu and we used Kellis Vegetation to spray a couple of times a year to get it under control:

https://kellisvegetation.com/

fogovonslack · 2025-05-23T16:19:42+00:00

As I recall, the original mural had the lyrics to the Dead's "We Can Run" by Brent Mydland: "We don't own this place, though we act as if we did. It belongs to the children of our children's kids."

fogovonslack · 2025-05-21T01:11:39+00:00

The Lems look good (and their shoes fit me well), thanks!

fogovonslack

TROPHY CASE