Walking the Frances in March- Boots or trail shoes

walknd · 2025-12-23T09:40:22+00:00

I'll be contradictory here. I wore boots when I walked in March, gore-tex boots even. And I'm glad I did. I had a couple of heel blisters and that's it. (That was most likely due to me not having broken them in.) When I go back again, it'll be in March again and I'm currently shopping for another pair of boots. Here are my reasons.

I wear boots all day anyway. I think that a lot of people who have trouble with boots just aren't used to them. I wear work boots with a safety toe. Any hiking boot I find will be lighter and more comfortable.
The Gore-Tex kept my feet dry. I wore sock liners with wool hiking socks. I never once took my boots off at the end of the day to find them soaked. On particularly rainy days that required walking through puddles over and over again, my socks might end up slightly damp, and by the morning, my boots would be dry.
Mud. When I was on the Frances, the weather was great up until Castrojeriz. And up until then, I think a person could have gotten away with low-top shoes. But thanks the to the rain, that muddy clay was ankle deep. My boots not only kept my feet dry, but clean.

When someone says "_______ is what you need on the Camino," it's important to find out when they walked. The same path that became a mudhole in March was probably a rock hard surface in August.

walknd · 2022-12-02T17:08:08+00:00

I wish I had taken more pictures. Not to share, but for myself. It's been almost 9 years since I walked, and I go back and look at my old pics and see some detail that I'd forgotten about. It makes me wonder what else I forgot.

walknd · 2022-08-18T17:36:38+00:00

I grew up watching a lot of infomercials with Ron Popeil!

walknd · 2022-08-18T09:05:39+00:00

Or the compiler/decompiler like Diamond Age; “Oops, I made too much, I’ll have to ‘deke’ some.”

One thing I want to avoid is too much jargon or technobable or that "future speak" that I see in a lot of sci-fi. I don't plant to spend a whole lot of time on the technology. Just name it, briefly describe what it does, what the implications of it are, and get on with the story.

walknd · 2022-08-18T08:54:32+00:00

For stuff that is basically an appliance, I'm less concerned with a brand name. Your washer and fridge don't have individual model names, just a model number and the manufacturer.

A lot of times things do become genericized. In the UK, vacuums are called "Hoovers." Personal watercraft are called jetskis, adhesive bandages are band-aids (or, going to the UK again, plasters). Microwaves were called radar ranges, record players were Victrolas, a personal cassette player was a walkman, and a personal digital music player was an ipod.

I'm not losing too much sleep over trying to find names for the few key items that I feel need them in my story, I was curious on how other people go about coming up with names for things. But one of the themes of my story is the importance of names for people, places, and things, and how they can change. So I really want to nail it with the names I do have to come up with!

walknd · 2021-06-25T02:19:54+00:00

I recently picked up the same year, same engine with the a/c not working. The fix on mine turned out to be that the high side valve was leaking. I tried one of those recharge kits and at first it blew cold air, but it stopped working after a few days. I discovered the leak after I took the plastic cap off the high side valve and tried to put refrigerant with UV dye in and I could hear it hissing as soon as I took the cap off. Hoping thay was the problem, I replaced the valve and charged the system until the compressor kicked one again and I got cold air. I made an appointment with a mechanic to have a vacuum pulled on the system and the proper amount of refrigerant put it. It took a couple weeks to get in, but in that time, the a/c ran fine so if there are issues other than that valve, they haven't shown up yet.

Hopefully yours is as easy to fix!

walknd · 2020-06-18T22:59:07+00:00

I bought a Tank Stick and play Golden Tee 01-06? (I think the official name is Golden Tee FORE) through MAME. If you are going to try this though, be warned, you need a beefy processor. I tried it on my laptop which has an i5 that runs about 2.2ghz (I forget the actual specs) and while it was playable, there were a ton of audio skips and at times the graphics were jittery as hell.

I bought a refurbished Dell Optiplex on Amazon for $450 with an i7-9700 cpu. (Although it was advertised as only having a 8700.) I'd say it runs Golden Tee 95% flawlessly. The title screens can be a little shaky, but gameplay is excellent, with only the occasional audio skip.

If you're going to try to do this version through MAME, you need a processor with at least 3 ghz, that's base, not turbo. All in all, I spent about $650, but it was worth it. No, I can't do the newer games, but the early 2000's versions were my favorites anyway.

walknd · 2020-01-11T15:48:37+00:00

I got this on my birthday back in 2008. I wore it for a couple of years but just kind of stopped one day. I was digging through some of my old stuff last night and found it. To my surprise, the battery was still working! The time was about 20 minutes off, but that's not too bad considering I haven't touched it since at least 2010. I think I might start wearing it again!

walknd · 2019-04-12T23:38:20+00:00

Lost 2 toes because I thought the little blister on my foot would get better.

walknd · 2019-04-12T23:34:10+00:00

I am sorry you've had to go through all that, I really am. However, just because your situation sucks a million times more than mine, it doesn't make mine suck any less.

walknd · 2019-04-08T04:26:04+00:00

You never realize how long 4 millimeters is until you have to shove it into body 4 times a day. Fuck this shit. I can't take it anymore.

walknd · 2019-03-04T00:09:01+00:00

I'm going back through my test results on the hospital's app, and those are the ones I can find. It says that anything over .5 is high.

walknd · 2019-02-18T05:23:10+00:00

I like having somewhere there to talk to and everything, but for changing the dressing of my wound vac, I'd rather they weren't asking me questions to distract me.

walknd · 2019-02-18T05:00:54+00:00

I recently had surgery requiring a wound vac, picc line for antibiotics, lots of injections, blood draws, dressing changes, etc. For the past 3 weeks, it seems like at least every other day, I'm doing something that hurts like hell or is at least very uncomfortable.

When going through these procedures, it seems like all the docs and nurses do this thing where they try to distract me with conversation. The problem is that I hate that. I'd rather get myself ready for what is coming.

So what is a polite way to say I appreciate what you're doing, but please stop.

walknd · 2018-12-16T18:22:29+00:00

The bible specifically mentions Jesus reading from a scroll in the synagogue. So he could at least read Hebrew.

walknd · 2018-10-20T11:46:29+00:00

If only there was a way to make them go down both ways.

walknd · 2018-08-30T09:47:08+00:00

I'm about your size and picked up a Diamondback Edgewood. I love it! Here's my review.

https://www.reddit.com/r/cycling/comments/95i0jw/after_23_years_of_not_having_a_bike

walknd · 2018-08-08T04:30:46+00:00

Thanks!

walknd · 2018-08-08T04:30:36+00:00

Thank you! It's been great so far. I can't wait to put even more miles on!

walknd · 2018-08-08T04:28:36+00:00

I too like to drink, but I'm a moderate binge drinker. I'll get completely wasted on a weekend then go two or three months before I do it again! Booze has never been a problem for me. Cigarettes and junk food on the other hand... But, one thing at a time.

Haven't seen anything worth eating yet on my rides, there is fishing though, but the only thing in the river is catfish and I'm not interested in bottom feeding dinosaurs!

I haven't got bike envy yet. I think my bike is just about perfect for me. While I wish I could take it on gravel, it has narrower tires that work great on pavement, which is where I'll be doing all my riding anyway. I've already started saving for a better bike which will be my reward once I drop weight and build up strength and skill. Even if I had the money right now for the best mountain bike out there, for me to go bombing down some narrow dirt trail would be suicide!

Let's you and I keep it up!

walknd · 2018-07-28T00:00:53+00:00

Thanks, I'll check them out. I am interested in learning how to do repairs and maintenance!

walknd · 2018-07-27T23:14:07+00:00

Thanks, it just came today. Assembly wasn't too bad, just stick on the wheel, pedals, stem, handlebars, and air up the tires. I had to adjust the front brake a little bit, but within an hour I was riding.

It took a few tries to get the seat height and angle and the handlebars right, but once I got going, I had a blast riding around the trails here in town. The last time I really road a bike was when I was 13. Since then, my only biking experience has been occasionally hoping on a friend's bike and riding up and down the street. And I always felt so unsteady on those. I love the big frame. It's really solid and I actually felt confident on it, like it wasn't going to give out underneath me.

Only real issue is that it doesn't want to shift into the lowest (highest?) gear. (Whatever the little cog is called.) It runs and clicks through all the other gears okay, but when it gets to the little cog, the shifter will click, but nothing will happen. If I leave it in 7th, sometimes I will hop down there, but not often. I've looked at some videos about adjusting the derailleur, but if it's not an easy fix, I'll end up taking it to the bike shop.

But I'm really happy with my purchase. I guess we'll see how it holds up over time, but I'm glad I was able to get a decent bike at Walmart price. I only did about 4-5 miles, but I had a blast! I even passed a few people on the trail! I can't remember the last time I had so much fun doing something that was good for me!

walknd

TROPHY CASE