Updated title due to comments...
This was the view from our building on Friday morning. Another beautiful Fall sunrise with nice sunshine on the changing leaves. The photo is an iPhone HDR photo but the colors and brightness seemed just as bright. The weather through the weekend has been equally nice. There was an Airhead tech day scheduled for Sunday afternoon but other issues had me running around (not on the sidecar rig). Maybe I can catch up a bit this week.
On one of the Saturday errands, they had a bunch of old comics taped to their glass counter and this is an old favorite. It seems to accurately portray my impression of Fall in Fairbanks. This year, not quite this bad but sometimes it seems close. I wasn't able to find a source of the comic so you may have to settle for an pbone picture.
This morning, one of the facilities guys mentioned that the rig is really visible in the dark and the asymmetric arrangement of lights did make him wonder what it was coming down the road. The LED lights and the car battery have been good upgrades to the rig. I still haven't changed the front tire but the weather and roads haven't been an issue. They are predicting a dusting of snow tomorrow.
On Friday, UPS made a late evening delivery that gave me something to play with over the weekend. My old iPhone4 was getting slow as iOS and the apps get more and more resource hungry. I ordered an iPhone 5S complete with TouchID, 64-bit A7 processor but in a "normal" color and not the snazzy gold color that seems to be really popular. That is, if you consider "Space Grey" a normal color. At 112g, it's 20% lighter than the old phone. The TouchID is an incredibly convenient feature as I have always used complex passwords on the phone. Press the home button to turn on the phone, release pressure but leave your finger there for a second and you're in. No passcode or password to enter. The jury is still out on how secure it is but casual testing with others have demonstrated that it's probably secure enough. After I think 5 failed fingerprint authentications, you then need to authenticate with your password before the touch sensor will work again.
Gazelle.com was willing to give me ¾ of the cost of the new phone for my old iPhone so it seemed like a reasonable thing to do for now. Gazelle buys old electronics with the value based on the condition. Since my old iPhone has lived inside of a sealed case for the last three years, it's pretty much in pristine condition. So I got sucked into another two years of AT&T.
Gazelle.com was willing to give me ¾ of the cost of the new phone for my old iPhone so it seemed like a reasonable thing to do for now. Gazelle buys old electronics with the value based on the condition. Since my old iPhone has lived inside of a sealed case for the last three years, it's pretty much in pristine condition. So I got sucked into another two years of AT&T.
Funny comment re "Suckered" into AT&T. I felt the same way when I got my wireless. Hope they aren't listening... :^D
ReplyDeleteWhat a very northern word- "Foomp". I think only those of us with snow can fully appreciate the nuance of that! I was talking with a Filipino woman this morning. She saw snow for the first time in Green Bay a couple years ago, but she says "Now I'm used to it".
Sunrise for you is what time?
Sunrise is now at 7:58 and sunset at 7:20. So the days are still long enough.
DeleteI was looking into StraightTalk as a wireless provider but they now use the T-Mobile network which isn't in Alaska. They used to use AT&T and it was a relative bargain.
Foomp! The strip made me laugh. Only people who experienced the North American change of season from fall to winter know what this is about. Alberta was exactly like that!
ReplyDeleteI think the worst Fall (and Spring) was in 1992 when it was still snowing at the end of May and we got dumped on in mid-September while the leaves were still green. Shortest Summer that I remember...
DeleteFOOMP!! I have experienced that a few times living up in Prince George, Fall one day and winter the next. Foomp is usually the sound my body makes as I hit the ground because I wasn't wearing snowboots - oh the vanity of it.
ReplyDeleteGreat pics by the way. The phone is pretty snazzy looking. I actually prefer my phones a little more sedate in colour and they are usually bundled away in an otterbox case because of me tossing it into my tank bag. Let me know what you think of the battery, I have a 4S and my hub has a 5 and he was complaining of the poor battery life of it. I still have a couple of years left on my contract and am in no rush to get another.
I have actually been thinking of the Galaxy line of phones and giving them a whirl. The one thing I really don't like about Apple is the limited storage and no expandable memory. Something to think about, but I suspect when the time comes to upgrade I will drink the apple koolaid again.
Even with the new battery in my iPhone4, the battery would just last through the day. With the new 5S, at the end of the day I still have around 50%. Same, usage and apps on both phones. They changed something. I think the real battery hog were the movement apps that I use. The new one has a separate low-power processor for motion.
DeleteI thought about going to an Android phone but I would have to look for and buy my apps and music all over again. Too much trouble and extra cost.
Richard:
ReplyDeleteMakes you feel good to know that all of your lights are making you more visible. You need it as you go for months in darkness.
I was also thinking of a new iPhone but I still have a few more months before my 3 year contract is up and I have to pay a penalty if I renew now. Plus I don't need it until my next trip.
I know nothing about Foomp and glad of it
bob
Riding the Wet Coast
It's finally dark enough in the morning to see the beam pattern on the road. The fog lights are aimed kind of low and the headlight is kind of high but that's easy to fix. I was really interested in the fingerprint reader as it was always a pain to type in the password.
DeleteI was just commenting to someone the other day how I always expect there to be a graceful transition between seasons, but in reality, it always seems to be the case that the change is near instantaneous. So it's winter until one day it's spring until one day its summer until one day it's fall until etc.
ReplyDeleteVery well put. Around here, Winter seems to hang in well past when most folks are tired of it. Initially, there is a novelty to Winter in Alaska but it gets old.
DeleteFoomp, I like that! Just need 5 more days then winter is welcome to foomp it's way into Colorado.
ReplyDeleteThe asymmetric bright lights are key, the unusual attracts the eye of the unwary cager....until they become used to you, then it's back to invisible.
Hmmm, 5 more days. Does that mean you can start to telecommute? The assumption is always invisible. I've heard that people cut in front of emergency vehicles and claim that they never saw the lights or heard the siren.
DeleteI hope to catch good Fall Colors on Friday after I return from this business trip. Then it can snow anytime.
DeleteThe first thing I thought of when I saw the title was snow sliding off a roof. I chuckled when I saw the cartoon involved snow.
ReplyDeletei changed the title of the post since the first couple of comments referenced "foomp". Today, there is a light snow but it doesn't look like it's sticking yet. And the temperature is right at freezing.
DeleteI like some of those older cartoons.