A Thunderous Night In Texas With A Gloomy Morning Of Computer Doom

It is a wet second day of September in Texas. The damp gloom is matching my mood. Thunder rumbling for hours, every time I woke up Thunder was rumbling. I assume it must have rumbled all night.

I was up well before dawn, but did not get around to taking a picture of my morning view, due to the fact that, at the time, I would have been unable to get the picture off my camera.

Two days ago I started having computer woes. I thought all was well. I only had one easily fixed computer problem yesterday.

And then this morning, something took over my computer as soon as I woke it up. Re-starting did not fix the problem. All would be fine on start-up, and then the PF Usage would start to rise, to the point where the computer would slow to a crawl, if moving at all.

I had nothing running. Except the Microsoft Security Essentials anti-virus program I installed 2 days ago. There was no option to turn of MSE to see if it was the problem.

After an hour or two of trying various solutions I decided to un-install the Microsoft virus checker. It took about 15 minutes for the slogged down computer to populate the program list. I clicked to remove. After about 5 minutes the very program I was trying to remove told me it was doing me the favor of stopping the operation because it could harm my computer.

I decided to look in the program files to see if I could find the MSE problem. I found it, saw the name of the executable, went back to Task Manager and stopped that process.

Instantly my computer was back working correctly.

Now I have to figure out how to remove this Microsoft virus off my computer totally.

I always end up bailing on anti-virus programs for the same reason. They seem to be a worse problem than anything they are stopping from happening.

I thought Microsoft's Window Defender was supposed to stop bad stuff like Malware. It updates its definitions daily. But, during this recent debacle I learned that Windows Defender had not run its check of the system for 2 weeks.

Anyway, it's been a very frustrating morning, so far.

As The Sun Begins To Set On Fort Worth A Double Rainbow Glows Bright

Miss Puerto Rico called me about a minute ago to tell me that a Rainbow was hitting my gutter. I went outside and was shocked to see that this was true, along with another Rainbow hitting my closest tree.

I braved the rain to look for a pot of gold in the gutter and under the tree, to no avail.

This is only the second time I have ever seen a double Rainbow. Combined with no spelling errors on my first blogging of September, this is looking to be a most auspicious month.

Looking At The Stormy Afternoon Of The First Day Of September In Texas

We are looking at the somewhat stormy view from Miss Puerto Rico's balcony around 5 in the afternoon of the first day of September.

It is being a bit breezy. At Miss PR's the wind was howling like a sound effect in a movie blizzard.

I was over at Miss PR's because she told me her computer was acting up. I thought it might be suffering the same malady as what has been maladizing mine the past day or two.

Speaking of which, my computer is behaving so much better. I had acquired, despite always practicing safe computing, several nasty infections of varying degrees of direness.

Speaking of direness, I just heard a loud thunder boom. I think we may be in for some storming in my zone of East Fort Worth. I'm prepared, the hatches are battened. The wind has let up, while wet droplets are now falling.

Texas Thunderstorms are one of my favorite things about Texas, as compared to relatively Thunderstorm-free Washington. That and extreme downpours. My zone of Texas gets about the same amount of rain, per year, as Seattle. With the delivery method being totally different. Seattle delivers its annual inches over long long periods, day after day, month after month. While my zone of Texas delivers its annual inches in a few short storms delivering, often, several inches per dose.

I remember one fall in Washington, 5 inches fell in a couple hours. That very very rarely happens up there. The result was the worst flooding I've ever seen. And the sinking of one of Washington's floating bridges, among other dire calamities, like failing dikes and massive mudslides.

In Texas you don't have the flooding problem Western Washington has, because no Pineapple Express can deliver warm rain to the mountain snowpack, causing a rapid melt, because there are no mountains with snow to melt in Texas.

In Texas a lot of the severe flooding is not really Mother Nature's fault. It's Mother Nature's children's fault, pouring too much concrete without proper drainage, resulting in deadly flash floods that need not ever have happened.

Speaking of which, I imagine the Flood Queen of Haltom City will be keeping a watchful eye on her killer creek if this wetness onslaught accelerates.

I don't have a creek to worry about. But I do need to go get my swimming suit from its drying location before the wind blows rain on it. I need it dry for my morning swim.

Safely Back In My Abode After Surviving Yet One More Fort Worth Near Death Experience

You are looking at the 2 in the afternoon view from my patio, well after the sun has lit up the place.

I am waiting for lunch to launch from the oven.

I had a near death driving experience this afternoon, coming back from North Richland Hills.

When you go from Davis Boulevard to I-820 south, you have to move over a couple lanes in order to avoid heading to Fort Worth on 121, aka the Airport Freeway.

I'd moved over well before the freeway split. And then suddenly I saw a big semi-truck ahead of me was not moving. I slammed on the brakes, as did the car behind me. I came real close to hitting the truck and the car behind me came real close to hitting me.

Traffic was a dead standstill on 820. I was able to get back on to the lanes that become 121. A lot of people were doing that. Exiting 121, at Handley-Ederville, is an easy detour back to where I am right now.

As I drove south on Handley-Ederville I glanced over at the 820 freeway and saw emergency lights flashing near the bridge over the Trinity. That is a real scary stretch of road that loses a lane right before the bridge. I've seen a bad accident there more than once.

Anyway, this was my first scary driving incident in a long, long time. I don't remember what the previous one was, but this one was real close to becoming a real bad thing.

The buzzer just announced that lunch is ready to launch. So, I am in food mode now.

Up Early This First Day Of September Thinking Of Biking 100 Miles While Hotter Than Hell

I am up early on the first day of September. It is a dark quarter moon Wednesday morning. We are looking out my bedroom window, at the darkness and the pool, in the picture.

The weather predictors are predicting it will be very cloudy today, with a chance of wet stuff falling on the first 3 days of September.

Yesterday morning I was quickly greeted by computer trauma. This morning, I am at least an hour into being on my computer, with very little trauma, so far. Knock on wood.

This morning I feel no sore after effect from pedaling my bike for 13.646 miles yesterday.

This morning I read Steve A's blog account of his 100 mile ride in the Wichita Falls Hotter 'n Hell bike ride. I can't imagine pedaling for 100 miles in pleasant temperatures, let alone 100 degrees or hotter.

I think I'll be in the pool as soon as the sun makes its expected arrival and stay in it an extra long time, due to yesterday's time being cut short due to my computer malfunction worries.

And then, mid-morning, it is off to points to the north. If I get on my bike today, it will be late in the afternoon. I see a trek to the Tandy Hills for some relaxing, salubrious hiking to be more likely than biking.

P.S. September is off to a start with a good omen. I clicked on the spell check and was told "No Misspellings Found." This happens about once a month. To have it happen on the first blog posting of the new month has to be a fortuitous sign of something.

I Am Hoping Microsoft Security Essentials Keeps More Bad Stuff Away From Me

I started having computer problems early this morning. Before the sun came up. Everything was slow.

Then, I was writing a blogging on my TV Blog when the computer went into nuts mode. I hit the off button.

Upon restart I started up the browser so I could finish with the blogging. It took a long long time for the browser to open up. Eventually I hit the publish button on the blogging.

Then I started up Outlook Express. Usually this is pretty much instant. This morning nothing seemed to be happening.

I decided to walk away from the computer and go swimming.

But, I was unable to enjoy swimming due to worrying I was facing a major computer problem.

I returned to the computer to see that Outlook Express had finally started up.

I ate breakfast while playing Facebook Scrabble.

After that I started working on my website. That was going fine until Windows Defender did an update. When that was done Windows Defender told me it had found something bad. When I told Windows Defender to take the proper defensive action, all hell broke loose.

Something popped up telling me I had some horrible problem. I could not open things like Control Panel. Trying to open some things would generate a message telling me the problem contained an infected file "click here to run an anti-virus scan."

I'd been to a lot of webpages this morning, finding links. I figured I'd picked up something bad. I looked to see what processes were running. I saw one I knew should not be there. Stopped it. That stopped the bogus virus/infection warnings.

I found the same thing in the MSCONFIG start-up file. Disabled it there. Went to eliminate it from the Registry. Was told the Administrator (Me) was denying access.

I ran a Malware detector. It was blocked from getting the latest update. I ran it anyway. It found some bad stuff.

Then I was told Microsoft's new anti-virus program, called Microsoft Security Essentials, worked well, was fast, and did not bog down the system

But, when I tried to install MSE I had the same blocking an update problem.

I tried a couple other things, did a re-start. This time Microsoft Security Essentials was able to do the needed update. And then it quickly found several bad things. Those were removed.

Another restart and suddenly my computer is working better than it has in a long long time.

With everything seeming to be fine, I was back being a happy boy. So, I took off out of there to go on a bike ride.

My First Bike Ride In Over A Year Went Well For The Most Part

That is my newly restored two-wheeled personal locomotion device laying on the ground.

No, it is not laying on the ground due to a malfunction.

I stopped to take a picture. To take a picture I have to remove my sunglasses. If I don't I can not see the camera screen.

About 8, or maybe 9, miles later I realized I had left my sunglasses on the ground. Unlike the Tandy Hills Easter Sunday lost sunglasses incident, I found them today upon my return to the spot where I left them.

I estimate I quit riding my bike sometime last July, or maybe August. I attempted to get the wheel fixed in October, at Panther City Bikes. Or whatever it is called. I had a worse impression about that place than I did/do about Bicycles, Inc., so I did not get my wheel fixed there.

There are not as many bike shops to choose from in the Dallas/Fort Worth zone than in areas that have a lot more bike riders. At least I'm assuming that is the cause of the bike shop shortage.

I am glad I found Colonel's Bicycle Shop.

Getting back in the saddle, after more than a year of not pedaling, went surprisingly well. I was surprised at how solid the bike now feels with its fixed wheel. I quickly realized I put up with that wobbly wheel way too long.

I was zipping along at around 20 mph, with the help of wind behind me, breaking the speed limit by 10 mph. Came to the first up and down, zipped down and up. It was feeling good.

I forgot to mention, my return to bike riding took place at Village Creek Natural Historic Area, then left the VCNHA trail to continue on on the Bob Findlay Linear Park trail.

Which is where the picture was taken. It's in Interlochen. An area with a lot of canals. Betty Jo Bouvier asked me how it manages to be so green here, so I took a green picture for Betty Jo.

Soon after that, at mile 6 or 7, I thought of Betty Jo again. I started off feeling real comfortable on the saddle. I'd forgotten that prior to my bike's long period of rest I'd put a comfy new bike seat on it. But, by mile 6 or 7, not so comfy. I think my seating area has lost some of its padding over the past year. Which is why I thought of Betty Jo, thinking riding a bike might be a bit more comfortable if I had a more ample derriere.

I had multiple issues with squirrels acting squirrely today. Four times the little beasts darted out in front of my front wheel, almost causing a crash each time.

Around mile 10, on my way back to my van, before I realized I'd left my sunglasses behind, I stopped to drink some water. I leaned over to get the water bottle and then had a real dizzy sensation, in a way that felt good. It was at that point I realized that biking is way more exercise, aerobically speaking, than the hill hiking I've been doing for the past year.

By the time I recovered the sunglasses and made it back to my van, I'd covered 13.646 miles. Not the longest bike ride I've gone on. But, it seemed long enough for the first bike ride in over a year. As soon as I stopped and got off the bike, without the motion caused Wind Chill, I switched into heavy duty sweating mode. I'd forgotten this part of bike riding when it's HOT.

So, that was the fun part of today. The un-fun part of today was totally unrelated to riding a bike. If I feel like re-living that in blog form, I may do that later.

The Last Day Of August Starts Dark & Cloudy & Humid

I am up way before the sun on the last day of August. As you can clearly see via the view from my patio. It is a dark, cloudy morning.

I opened the windows this morning before realizing it was 79.9 and very humid. As in 79% humidity. About 10 minutes later the windows were shut and the A/C turned on to try and un-do the damage I'd done to the interior climate.

I am looking forward to my first bike ride in a long, long time, today. I think I'll go pedaling on Village Creek Natural Historic Area's paved trail. That was the location of the last time I was on my bike.

I think I'll hit a paved trail, or two, to make sure I am comfortable back in the saddle, before hitting a mountain bike trail. I suspect new trails have been added to my favorite nearby mountain bike trail, that being the River Legacy Park mountain bike trail.

But, before I go biking, I am going swimming. But, I need the sun to show up with some brightening before I do that.

Fort Worth's Colonel's Bicycles Has Me Back On 2 Wheels

Well. I am back in bike riding mode. It has been quite a long time since my bike became unstable, due to the rear wheel getting way out of round. Or un-true in bike wheel-speak. Or is it out of true?

My biking had sort of gone the way of my roller blading. With roller blading I decided one day that the fun quotient was out weighed by the lack of a desire to go through another long recovery from a bad blading fall.

And then I sort of got addicted to heavy duty hiking and its resultant positive effects.

But, I sort of missed riding my bike.

And then a couple weeks ago I was walking the paved trail at River Legacy Park. Walking it. And way more bikers than I ever remember seeing there, reminded me of how often I'd biked that trail. I decided then to get back in bike mode.

Part of my reluctance to deal with the bike woes is I have had bad luck with bike shops here in Texas. And I was never all that happy with bike shops in Washington, except for the bike shop in Fairhaven in Bellingham. I think it was called Bellingham Bike Shop. I bought my favorite bike there. And then a Texas trail killed it. Killed it good.

I think it was back in October I mentioned taking the wheel to Panther City Bikes on Magnolia in Fort Worth. Fort Worth Weekly picked it as the Best Bike Shop, in last year's Best of 2009 Issue. It took me about 2 minutes in Panther City Bikes to turn and run out. I think I blogged about this and my previous experience with taking the wheel in for help at Bicycles Inc., in Bedford, which left the wheel still wobbly. slightly improved, but still wobbly.

I believe it was after that that Steve A pointed me to Colonel's Bicycle Shop on University Drive in the heart of purple TCU territory. It seemed like a long ways to go at the time Steve A mentioned it.

But, I wanted a working wheel. So, last Thursday I took the wheel to the Colonel. I was told I needed a new wheel. And that it should be ready by Tuesday. Well, this afternoon, just as I was heading into Fort Worth for another reason, I got a call from Colonel's. The wheel was ready.

When I was in Colonel's on Thursday I lamented about my bad Texas bike shop experiences. The bike guy I was talking to joked that they'd try and not be another bad bike shop experience. I told the bike guy I had a tendency to blog about my bad experiences. And my good experiences.

I was fairly certain I was going to have a good experience at Colonel's Bicycle Shop, due to the fact that Colonel's has a good website that oozes competence. And a lot of good customers comments.

So, I got back here, figured I'd have an easy time attaching the tire to wheel, with a tube inside, and then sticking it on the bike. It'd been awhile. Eventually I got the tire on the wheel, with the tube inside. I figured sticking the wheel on the rear gear thing would be easy. Done it many a time.

It took at least a half an hour before the wheel suddenly, correctly slid in to place. By then I'd somehow mucked up the brake cable. But that was easily fixed.

So, now, after way too much effort. I am ready to roll. But not right now. The rolling will have to wail until tomorrow.

Hot Tandy Hills Hiking With Purple Bruisers

It is one day before the end of August and there is still plant life coloring up the Tandy Hills. Not a lot of it, but there is still color.

Today I saw a delicate looking tiny orchid-like pink wildflower. And the big Purple Bruiser you see in the picture.

I think the Purple Bruiser belongs to the thistle family. It was quite thorny.

A slight bit of rain damped us up a bit a bit before noon. This shot the humidity way up. So, even though it was only in the high 80s, it was one HOT hike today.

When I stopped to take the picture of the Purple Bruiser, it was near the end of my hike time. The act of stopping and getting low to the ground, to take the picture, turned me into a fountain. I'm sure the Purple Bruiser appreciated its second watering of the day. I know I would have.

I am ready for fall to fall. There were signs of the impending hall on the hills today. Leaves in some trees starting to slightly change their color. It is only 22 days til fall.

I am out of here, back out in the HEAT. I've something I need to attend to.