Shopping the Way I Like it...

I haven't seen Susan for over a week and it is time to catch-up, we made a plan to go for a hike to see and smell the ocean. On my way to Marin I stopped at Lamer Electric to pick-up the order for the monday job. Then over the Richmond Bridge to Corte Madera. Susan lives on this street that has a centre strip with Palm-trees growing tall into the sky and some other trees in between the palms... I love that look every time I turn into her street. The last time I did that a few weeks ago there where the other trees that were in full bloom and I did not had my camera with me. Today I just take this picture to have these palm-trees in a row, in front of the blue sky.

Baltimore Ave... no not in Florida!!!


We take Susan's car to drive to Tennessee Valley parking area. Hike all the way to the beach, I love that place and by the time we were there the sun must have just come out from under the cloud-layer and the sun-rays hit the mountain, a stunning picture in my mind... not sure about the one in the camera, see for yourself.

Tennessee Valley...

From Places I visited with Susan

After hanging out there, it started to get too cold, and also a bit dark and so we headed back to the car. Dinner we'll hade at the nearby Italian restaurant Frantoio quite a splurge but we only ordered 1 appetizer, the ZUPPETTA DI PESCE, a seafood soup and 1 entree the TORTELLONI DI RICOTTA E BIETOLE, a home-made pasta with rabbit-stew, that comes with lots of bread and olive-oil... what a treat.
Back at Susan's place, tired form all the adventures and fresh ocean-air we go to bed.
In the morning had to battle some traffic to get back home to change from Honda to Van and from out-door clothing to work-cloth, go to John and Eileen's house in Kensington to tackle the next electrical problem. It sounds simple to "just" replace a lighting control-relais, I've been waiting for that for weeks, then carry around in my van for couple of more weeks, until finally today, to installed it. But wait a minute, the whole doubt about this operation started yesterday when I realized that I also forgot to bring that part with me. My plan was yesterday to get this darn thing installed. But since I already forgot the check-book, Laner Electric closed in front of my nose, why not have one more thing go wrong. At home then when I looked at this darn thing a bit closer I discovered that it had 4 wires not like the old one which has only 2... now what. I took pictures of the old one and of the new one and send of an e-mail with more details to this company, Touch-Plate, in Indiana. After a while it dawned on me that the 2 extra wires are a auxiliary contact and the other two are the coil that operate the mechanics inside this thing to make the lights come on or off. So I just had to put an ohm-meter to it to figure out which ones are which. Now, here I am, got this new thing installed in this box that is completely overloaded with wires and 11 other of these controllers. I go upstairs to the switch to push the button and, bingo, the lights turn on, push again and, another bingo, then push again and all it does is a shortest little blink and nothing more, I keep pushing and thats what it does from now on... dang, what's next. Lots of back and forth, then Eileen helps me with pushing the button while I study what is going wrong with the switch. At some point Eileen goes to Al Lasher's Electronics to buy a rectifier, I started to think that the old system is an AC and the new kind is a DC system and the switch I got here is for the new system until I had to cut the wires to tie them together with the existing wiring... a mess. So I connect that rectifier which makes DC out of AC and nothing has changed in the action of that darn thing... I begin to wonder if maybe burned out the new coil already... so what the hell, lets get a small screwdriver and take it apart. With success, after fiddling and probing I figure out where the problem is, and it is a mechanical one. So I tweak some here and there and put it together about the 4th time when I finally can report progress. It switched on and off during the test run, that means it is just hanging on the wires and I have a test instrument connected that will tell me when the contact is closed and when it is open by sound, and it keeps on working. So I install it again in this overfilled messy box full of wires and there too it worked!!! Lucky dog I am, 3 hours later and finally got it to working.
It is one o'clock and I also build-up an appetite... lets go and find some to eat. I feel like having burgers and fries and what is more convenient then go to Nations Giant Burgers on Center Street in El Cerrito. Hmm that burger and those fries are so good when I really want them, I also ordered a slice of banana-cream pie for later, say, with coffee at three!!!
I should get a new pair of these North Face pants, with removable legs and deep pockets, first for this weekend, and second I need a new pair. The one I'm wearing now turned into work-pants, that means they are on their way out. R E I has em and I have a good dividend from using the R E I credit card, some 280 dollars, I think it is before March 20th they give you another 20% off the first item. So what else I need from one of the greatest outdoor supply stores... ahh, maybe it is time for a new bike-helmet, I don't remember when I bought the last one, but most of the support straps, flimsy plastic pieces, have been broken for a while now. I think its time for a new one. Well here is the item I want 20% off. And off to R E I. I got the Giro "Hex" helmet that is regularly 84 bucks for 67.20 and the pair of pants I wanted for 65 bucks... ahh I mean all was for free and I still have money left for more goodies. I like to shop this way!!!
Just on the last few blocks before turning into Burnett street the clock showed 3 pm, soon its time for that home-brewed cup of coffee and that slice of banana-crem pie, then starting to get ready to go on my trip south...

Driving in my neighborhood...