New Video. Click the “Watch on YouTube” link at the bottom left for better quality video.

When I heard the US was playing a soccer game in St Paul, MN in February, my first thought was, “Who is the nitwit that thinks this is a good idea?” Originally I was blaming US soccer. Recently I learned that it was the coach.

It’s very common around the world that when in inferior team is meeting a highly superior team, the minnow looks for any advantage. Playing at altitude and or heat. Cutting the turf a little higher, and narrowing the field dimensions are a few of the common tactics. When Venezuela plays Brazil for example. They need to do whatever to give them a chance. On the flip side, a team like Brazil, never needs to do that when playing anyone in the world.

The US is the Brazil and Honduras is Venezuela in the example. The US is the best team in Concacaf. (Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football). Honduras is the bottom of the heap. No wins in 10 qualifying games. The US has players starting for some of the best teams in Europe. Spain, England, Italy, Holland and France, to drop a few names. Honduras has trouble finding players with the quality to compete at this level.

To play under those conditions was not only leaning toward the insane, but it was also physically dangerous to the players and fans. Two Honduras players were taken of the field with hypothermia as their manager rages at the US team. Read it here. The US team took advantage of the Vikings staff who offered cold weather gear and other ways to keep the players as comfortable as possible. The Honduras players were so unprepared, they made a trip to a sporting goods store to by layers of clothing.

I wanted to attend one of the three games in this qualifying window. looking at US/El Salvador in Columbus OH. US/Canada in Hamilton or US/ Honduras in St Paul. It didn’t take a lot for me to decide on Columbus. Unfortunately, Covid kept me home. I was able to score a ticket and make decent arrangement for a game in the final cycle of World Cup Qualifying, traveling to Orlando FL, at the end of March. Trading in my thermal wear with shorts and sunscreen makes me smile.

A few years ago the town of Fairhaven, MA plowed the bike path after a substantial snow. It was done by a pickup truck with rubber covered blades on the plow. One year they went to Town Meeting and asked for $30K to buy a special snow removal piece of equipment. Town meeting denied the request and from then on those pickup trucks with the rubber blade covering, were too detrimental to the path surface.

A town policeman using a pickup truck with a rubber coated blade, volunteered to plow the path. The DPW superintendent stopped him, saying it’s the DPW’s job. Following that, a member of the DPW board using a pickup truck with a rubber coated blade, took it upon himself to plow the path. He was also stopped by the DPW superintendent. It’s the DPW’s job to plow the path.

Previously there was an incident where an inexperienced employee was sent out to clear the path using a large overkill piece of machinery. He back it into a ditch and that was the end of the DPW’s involvement servicing the people of the town.

Now the excuses are very creative whenever anyone brings up why the “pedestrian and bike route” into town is not plowed.

-The surface is too thin.

-It’s used by a x country skier. (there is an 8ft wide grass abutment to the path for horses and x-country skiers).

-We did it once and an employee almost got killed. (my favorite)

-The pickup trucks with the rubber coated blades will dig up the tar.

-Vehicles on the path are excluded because of their weight. ( Except the two three and four ton trucks that travel the MUP almost daily when there is no snow. And on and on.

There may be other Multi Use Paths not cleared but a search of all the popular paths in the state found that all were plowed. Locally: New Bedford, Falmouth, Cape Cod Canal, Mattapoisett, Cape Cod Rail Trail and all the paths in R.I. are plowed. There is only one not cleared for use by it’s citizens. Fairhaven, MA.

A pickup truck with a rubber coated plow could clear end to end, out and back in 45 minutes. There are town residents with plows, that would comp the job. But it’s the DPW’s job. Which they refuse.

DO YOUR JOB. 45 minutes is all it takes.

It’s 25 F in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada for today’s World Cup Qualifier. I had to stay focused shoveling snow, walking the dogs and editing the video. I got it done and am posting this five minutes before kick off. Talk about cutting it close.

A difficult beginning to the year. The cold and snow limited my miles/ride to six or eight. Omicron kept me isolated for almost two weeks. I was feeling good, and now we are awaiting a blizzard.
The calm before the storm begged for a bike ride. So I did.

Sue got her hair done last week. In the salon, there were a few customers, all wearing masks. None of the six hairdressers wore one. The owner who did Sue’s hair said, “I’m done with the mask crap. if I get it, I get it”. Three days later, Sue got sick.

The local FD, does Covid testing every Wednesday and Sue decided to go. I offered to stand in line for her and rode my bike to the test site. She was second in line when I arrived and I decided that, since I was there, to also get tested. It was a 72 hour window for the results. The following day, I began feeling sick and all the evidence pointed to Covid. My test came back negative, hers positive. Having the same symptoms as Sue, there was no need for a retest for me.

It’s been five days and we are both fine. Both of us are vaccinated and boosted.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

While I was sick, we has a few days of frigged weather making it pretty easy to isolate. The temperature rose to a decent 22 F today with sun and no wind. I have been learning some new video techniques online and a bike ride around town to experiment with some B roll practice called me.

I have been working on some video techniques filming b rolls. Those are the short clips you see in movies and videos linking the scripted parts. I finally sprung for a couple of essential hardware to smooth out and be more creative in my clips. They should arrive in time for me to learn how to properly use the gimble and wide angle lens for my iPhone. That will make the video quality much better than the so so one below which is a mixed bag of iPhone X, Go Pro 8 and Nikon A1000 camera.