Tag: Trail Walking

Categories
Writing

End of Year Snow Melt

Lake Macbride on Dec. 26, 2025.

Ambient temperatures in the 40s have been melting snow and ice, leaving a dead landscape. No spring hope. No winter cover. Except for the lake, it’s just dead. It’s a good time to turn indoors to my writing.

I have three chapters remaining to draft in part two of my autobiography. In the story, I just concluded leaving paid work during the coronavirus pandemic. If the pandemic did one thing right, it made a clean break between the workplace and me, forcing me to live on a fixed income. The final chapters write quickly because they are so recent. Today I created three of them, and next I write about the coronavirus pandemic plus two other chapters with working titles of “Beginning of the end,” and “New beginnings.” It shouldn’t take long to finish the first draft. Then begins the process of going through the whole book for the first major rewrite. I expect there will be three or four of those before I’m ready to publish.

After the book is ready for publication, I don’t know. I’ve been focusing on this work so long, I hadn’t given much thought about what’s next. I want to revise the first book to clean up a few things identified by friends during the post-publication period. I also must see if there is continuity without repetition. Next year I should be able to declare everything finished.

The biggest predictable issue in our lives is Social Security doing nothing to avoid running out of money beginning as early as late 2032. Benefits will be cut automatically by 24 percent across the board if nothing is done to prevent going over this cliff. If anything, Republicans in charge of the federal government are going the wrong way. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and the Social Security Fairness Act, accelerated Social Security insolvency alongside well-known demographic challenges to its structure. An answer to the question “How do I make up for this loss in benefits?” needs finding. Counting on the Congress to do something is not an answer.

What that says is I have to return to paid work. I have no regrets about how my working life proceeded and ended.

Physiologically I am changing. I know this because I adopted a new morning exercise regimen and my conditioning schedule is outpacing the ability of my soft tissues to recover and adapt. After a good couple of weeks on the new regimen, my shoulders started to hurt. This is self-diagnosed as inflammation, not a chronic problem. I believe I’m right about that. I have to take it easy for a while to let my body catch up with my ambition. Apparently I am no longer young.

In the meanwhile, it’s nose to the grindstone with the book. If I can finish the first draft this year, that leaves me plenty of time to publish a final text in the first half of 2026. That would clear the deck for returning to the workforce, something I am loathe to do, yet may needs do.

Categories
Living in Society

Sunrise at Autumn’s End

Sunrise on the state park trail on Dec. 9, 2025.

Everyday I am out in the weather for at least part of the day. This December has been weird with heavy snowfalls coupled with spells of above freezing ambient temperatures. The talk on the trail is about how the trail surface varies with snowfall and temperature. We are all of retirement age so our concern is testing new muscles and stress on our ankles and joints. Thus far I have been able to navigate rough surfaces without mishap.

The outdoors temperature was 37 degrees Fahrenheit when I woke. By the time I was ready to walk on the trail it had dropped to below freezing. As I entered the state park, the wind picked up and snow began to fall. The trail surface had frozen unevenly around snowmobile, wildlife, and pedestrian tracks. I had to be careful to preserve my joints and ankles. I knew the weather forecast before I left home.

I’m not the only one who takes accurate weather forecasts for granted. My resource is the Weather Channel with its hourly forecasts and radar images. Mostly I seek short-term weather forecasts in order to do something like mow the lawn, take a walk, or work in the garden. Existing technology gives me accurate forecasts that facilitate what I want to do.

Hannah Ritchie is a Scottish data scientist, senior researcher at the University of Oxford, and deputy editor at Our World in Data, according to Wikipedia. Her work focuses on sustainability, in relation to climate change, energy, food and agriculture, biodiversity, air pollution, deforestation, and public health. She recently wrote the following about weather forecasting:

The potential for AI to improve weather forecasting and climate modelling (which also takes a long time and uses a lot of energy) has been known for several years now. AI models have been tested for one- and two-week forecasts with promising results. Scientists will often need to wait weeks for a complex, high-resolution climate model to run; AI might be able to do this hundreds, if not thousands, of times faster. (Email from Hannah Ritchie on Oct. 27, 2025).

Naturally, I asked ChatGPT about this, “When scientists like Hannah Ritchie say weather forecasting can be much improved with artificial intelligence, what do they mean.” As is usual for artificial intelligence, the answer was very long. Here is the crux:

When scientists say weather forecasting can be dramatically improved with artificial intelligence, they usually mean something more specific than “AI makes everything better.” They’re referring to concrete technical bottlenecks in current forecasting and the ways AI can overcome them. Hannah Ritchie, and researchers at ECMWF, NOAA, Google DeepMind, NVIDIA, the UK Met Office, and others, are all pointing to similar developments. (ChatGPT query result, December 2025).

More specifically, in explanation, the machine listed multiple bullet points:

  • Weather prediction is limited by physics-based models.
  • AI models can “learn the atmosphere.”
  • AI lets scientists blend physics and data.
  • AI makes weather forecasting more democratic. By that, it means cheaper and more broadly available than on expensive, physics-based computers.
  • AI enables longer-range and global risk forecasting: seasonal climate forecasts, agricultural and drought planning, energy-grid load forecasting, and catastrophe-risk modeling.
  • But: Scientists emphasize that AI is not a replacement for physics.

The machine summarized: forecast faster, forecast at higher resolution, run at vastly lower cost, improve extreme weather warning lead times, complement physics with learned patterns, and democratize forecasting globally.

According to the machine, consumer-scaled artificial intelligence models might be available by 2032. In the meanwhile, I’m just glad I didn’t turn an ankle on the trail this morning.

Categories
Creative Life

November Sunrise Photos

Sunrise on the state park trail.

I walk for 30 minutes on the state park trail almost every day I’m home. The timing is about 20 minutes before sunrise so I can view the transition in the sky. I don’t think I will ever tire of seeing a sunrise.

Sunrise on the state park trail.
Sunrise on the state park trail.
Sunrise on the state park trail.
Sunrise on the state park trail.
Sunrise on the state park trail.
Sunrise on the state park trail.
Sunrise on the state park trail.
Categories
Creative Life

Friday Gallery

Some of this week’s photographs.

Walking west.
Wildflowers.
Around the bend.
Cherry Tomatoes.
Wildflowers
Earliblaze apples.
Into the clearing.
Categories
Creative Life

Studies in Light

The more I walk on the state park trail, I notice the way light filters through the foliage. The familiar reveals itself as varied in presentation. It takes an active mind to notice.

Here is a series of photos about light on the state park trail. Some are subtle. Some, less so. They are all valuable as part of my journey with photography.

Light on the state park trail.
Foggy October sunrise.
On the state park trail.
Emerging from the trail.
Light on a clump of trees.
Clearing ahead.
Sunlight crosses my path.
Light on tree trunks.
Cloudy day on the trail.
Sunrise reflection.
Categories
Living in Society

Trail Walking in 2025

Trail walking in a light rain.

Wednesday morning brought more rain. The good news is we need rain, and it is forecast to end by early morning. I hope to try out the new mower in the garden if it’s dry enough. I’m way behind in the garden now, so we’ll plant what we can.

I went trail walking in the early morning mist for my health. If I can get my heart beating fast enough, for long enough, it is adequate exercise for a person like me. I don’t tire of photographing what I see, so this familiar part of the trail stood out today.

Editor’s Note: Another short post so I can spend time elsewhere. Thanks for reading.

Categories
Living in Society

Medicaid and Trail Walking

Trail walking.

Saw this family on the trail Tuesday morning. Spring is definitely here!

Our family was discussing whether or not to stock up on things we commonly use like toilet paper, dried pasta, canned beans, rice, tomato sauce, water and coffee. I hear there may be shortages due to the president’s trade policies. The way we provision in normal times is to constantly have a buffer of pantry items on hand in case we can’t get to the store for a couple of weeks. We didn’t go crazy, yet we won’t run out of toilet tissue or pasta any time soon.

The Congress delayed markup of the reconciliation bill until next week. Bits and pieces are becoming known with the biggest question being what they will do with Medicaid. I wrote Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks Tuesday afternoon:

I urge you to avoid changing Medicaid using the reconciliation process. Everyone knows Medicaid reforms are needed. Any changes in Medicaid should be accomplished in regular order in a bipartisan manner. Thank you for reading my email.

At 3:04 p.m. the same day her office responded as follows:

Dear Mr. Deaton,
Thank you for contacting me to express your support for Medicaid. Views from fellow Iowans help inform and guide me in Congress, so I greatly appreciate your insight and opinion.

As a physician and former Director of the Iowa Department of Public Health, I understand the crucial role healthcare plays in our lives. I am committed to working with my colleagues in Congress to ensure that state Medicaid programs have the resources they need to help people in need while ensuring the long-term financial viability of this necessary healthcare program.

To that end, I have been working on legislation that will strengthen and streamline Medicaid, such as:

  • H.R. 1019, the Medicaid Program Improvement Act, which would improve the accuracy and reliability of address information for Medicaid beneficiaries, ensuring seamless access to healthcare services while reducing the chances of people being enrolled in multiple state Medicaid programs.
  • H.R. 1509, the Accelerating Kids’ Access to Care Act, which would streamline the process for out-of-state pediatric care providers to enroll in another state’s Medicaid program to reduce care delays, while also safeguarding important program integrity measures.

In Congress, I will continue fighting to ensure Iowans have quality access to healthcare. 

Thank you again for contacting me. If there is anything I can do to be of assistance, or if you would like to receive my e-newsletter, please visit MillerMeeks.house.gov. You can also follow me on Facebook at facebook.com/RepMMM and on Twitter @RepMMM. Again, I thank you for your opinion and look forward to serving you. Please do not hesitate to contact my office in the future.

She didn’t really address my concern, yet at least someone in their office noted my email. Not holding my breath about “regular order.” Guess we’ll just have to wait and see what kind of partisan cuts Republicans will make when the markup is finished.

I may need another walk along the state park trail.

Categories
Kitchen Garden

Sunday Afternoon Walk

Pac Choi.

Around 1 p.m. I finished in the garden and took a walk on the state park trail. The wind had picked up. While there was plenty of remaining work in the garden, onions were in and other plots tended, I was ready to break the tension from wondering how I would fit everything in the ground this year.

The trail held little traffic: a couple of joggers and a group of young adults out sight-seeing. Spring has arrived with greys and brown of winter yielding to green, yellow and purple. There has been human activity in the park, due mostly to cleanup of the 2020 derecho and the recent prairie burn. The margins between the trail and housing developments get thinner each year. The breeze helped me forget.

Mostly I felt the rush of air on my face as I walked my prescribed route. Strong wind is a blessing and a curse. Yesterday it was a stress-reliever.

Under the row cover everything looked good. I inspected and weeded, then picked some Pac Choi for a stir fry this week, and enough lettuce and spinach to make a small salad. Dinner was the salad with organic rotini and sauce leftover from Friday’s pizza-making. I’m ready for my spouse to return home.

As I read the news after dinner, a longing for better times arrived. When I graduated high school it felt like the strictures of society were loosening. There was hope for better days for our country and our lives in it. No more. Republicans never liked the changes of the 1960s and ’70s. Since Ronald Reagan was elected president they have been rolling back the liberties we gained. The repression pushes down on everything.

They say longing and loss brings people together yet I don’t know about that today. Yesterday I wrote a friend, “I think things changed dramatically during the pandemic. Not only did we break all our good habits, I don’t see enthusiasm for just about anything in real life. People simply want to get by in their own world and leave the politics and pandemic out of it.” What good is it to bring together yet another isolated small group when the tide of conservatism threatens everything we have come to know?

I used the garden hose for the first time this season. It is old. I need to get a new one. The mended joints came loose while it was in storage. They leaked as it filled with water pressure. The nozzle is kaput as well. This morning I’ll take wrenches and a screwdriver to repair the joints again. There are a couple of old nozzles in the garage to use if needed. I don’t like them as well yet one of them will serve. Despite the leaks, the garden got watered and will until I replace the hose. That is, if I do.

So it goes on a spring day in Big Grove Township.

Categories
Environment

Autumn is Here

Reflection under a foot bridge on the state park trail.

This Friday a lot is going on in real life so I’ll leave this photo taken yesterday.

Once the sun comes up, it’s gleaning the garden, mowing, and a big apple harvest. Kitchen work never ends this time of year. I cleaned four half-gallon jars for apple cider vinegar making and am ready to go.

We take moments of peaceful reflection where we find them.