Bees At Night

Beekeeping is the kind of hobby where you never quite feel like you're the one in control.

Here are a few photos of the bees when the sun has gone down and they don't think I'm watching. The photos don't really do it justice. It's pretty amazing seeing them either all bunched up in a chain or shifting back and forth on the face of the hive doing some grooming and cleaning.

The heat and humidity is the reason they're doing all this stuff. There is not as much for them to do when the sun goes down (no foraging) and the inside of the hive gets a little too warm with thousands of them in there. So some of them sit out on the porch while a few others stand in the entrance fanning their wings to draw cool air in. Crazy!!!

Trail Runners Beware!!!: Dogs at Francis Beatty Park

So I just wanted to go for a nice trail run out at Francis Beatty Park this morning. The first half of the run was just fine until I came around a bend and stopped about 20 yds. short of two guys with dogs. Two of the dogs weren't on leashes. I asked if he was going to get them on leashes and he said, "They're fine." And then at that moment the dogs cut through the trees and came up to my legs growling. I slowed down to a walk and tried to give the dogs room because I don't really like dogs coming up to my legs snarling. I told the guy he better put them on leashes. The owner of the dogs, a great big guy came around the curve trying to call the dogs back. The dogs don't hear too well I guess because they won't really let me pass and continue growling. He calls again. Nothing. So I let the big guy know that I have pepper spray and would be more than happy to use it on them to help get them under control.

The man freaks out. On me. He's still trying to call the dogs off though and I think he's watched too many mafia movies. He says, "What the f**k, man. Why you gotta be such an a$$hole?"

"I'm the a$$hole?" I said. "You're the one with dogs off the leash about to bite me."

"You know what? Just get movin', you f**king a$$hole! What is it, a**hole day?!" he said.

So of course I said, "Well, it must be if you're out here!" I finally got past them and ran a few yards up the trail to where his buddy was waiting with his dog. A rotweiler. The man held the black dog's collar and waited patiently. The rot sat there like a little kitten. Well, I guess now I know where the other dogs got their aggressiveness. As I ran up the trail I could hear him mocking me in a high pitched voice. I love it.

What is it with me and running in Charlotte? When I've tried running on the roads I've almost been hit by cars (one guy kind of chased me down in his car {see earlier FB post}). I tried running out at McAlpine greenway, but now they're gonna pave it. I got into trail running to get away from all that only to get chased by dogs and roughed up by NY walkers.

I don't tolerate people who don't have control over their dogs. I've been bitten before. I don't like it. If you want to have your dog out on the trails keep a leash on them or get out there earlier. Or go to a dog park for goodness sake.

By the way. The two dogs are white-ish with a couple of brown spots and look a little like smaller huskies. And this isn't the first time they've come at me or others I know.

(the only dogs I do like are my parents' dog, Dexter's dogs and of course Molly Jones.)

The Bees were, well....busy today.

The weather's been warming up and today the bees were pretty active. Almost too active. I had noticed that the feeder was empty and when I replaced it full they just started going crazy. I just finished the box and frames for one more brood section so the bees have more room. I've heard that if they feel like they're running out of room they can swarm and I didn't want that to happen. So, when I saw so much activity outside of the hive this afternoon I assumed the worst only because I still have no idea what I'm doing and what to expect from these insects. Here's a little video. Enjoy.

BEES!!!!

So I've been thinking about it for a couple of years and now I've finally done it. I brought home a hive full of bees today.

I got in touch with a man out in Indian Trail and drove out to his house this afternoon. He and his wife have about a 6 acre spread of woods, meadows with goats, a big pond and I don't know how many bee hives.

I after loading a few full frames into my hive box and one bee sting on the back of my neck (I wasn't wearing a veil.) I drove back into Charlotte and starting getting the colony into it's spot.

These are pretty amazing creatures. As soon as I opened up the little hatch on the front a few streamed out. They hovered around the entrance for a few minutes and within 20 minutes were already buzzing around the front and backyard foraging for nectar. I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning and organizing my shed and checking on the entrance of the hive from time to time. And when the sun finally started going down and my backyard was getting dark, I could see the last few scout bees coming in for the final landing of the day. A little while later the hive was quiet. I guess I'll find out in the next couple of days if they all want to stay awhile.

Yo-Yo Adventures in Church

A kid was sitting in front of me in church this morning playing with a yo-yo. He didn't flip it out and "Walk the Dog" or anything, but I guess I was just amazed that kids played with yo-yo's at all anymore. Well, he was turning it in his hand when the thing slipped out, rolled across the aisle and ended up lodged under some old man's chair. The kid's little head snapped over to his right to see if his mom had seen anything. She was standing and singing along with the band. Good, he thought, she didn't see a thing.

He hesitated for a few moments, laying out his game plan. Do I just walk over there and ask the old man for my yo-yo back? The kid takes a church information card and slides it over with his foot across the aisle toward the stuck yo-yo. I think he was either creating a diversion or giving himself an excuse to go over there..."Excuse me sir, I seem to have dropped my card across the aisle and under your seat. And even though there are hundreds of other information cards scattered through the sanctuary I really want this one."

The kid, I think, realizes that his information card didn't slide far enough and the old man wouldn't buy the card routine anyway. So he sits back into his chair and thinks about his move one more time. I almost wanted to tap him on the shoulder and tell him that it was ok if he went over to get his yo-yo, that he wouldn't get in trouble. I almost volunteered to go get it myself. And then finally when the band was getting all wound up and the singing was at its peak, the kid crept over, crawled under the chair and grabbed the yo-yo. Whew. That was a close one. It was such a Tom Sawyer moment.

By the way, the kid sitting next to him (his brother?) just fiddled around on his mom's cell phone playing video games....Boring.

There's Coffee At The Summit

The alarm went off at ten-to-5 a.m. I got up and put my running clothes on in the dark. I hate getting up early to run especially during the last few months when it's been cold. There's nothing like stepping out the door into 19 degree air knowing you have 10 miles ahead of you. Yesterday morning wasn't that cold, thank goodness, but it was still early.

The thing that got me going this time was knowing that I had already committed and people might be waiting for me. I had been talking to my buddy Chad Randolph for weeks about heading up to Davidson to run with his group. Davidson is a small town about 25 miles north of Charlotte and one of the few places in NC that reminded me of being on the west coast again.

So, of course, I was running behind and had to speed to get up there. I didn't want to drive all the way just to get there and see the running group take off without me. I drove in the dark with no traffic. Man, Davidson is out there a ways.

I pulled up to the CVS right in downtown and saw the familiar sight of runners warming up. And there was Chad, tall as a tree, wearing shorts! Dang. I pulled up just in time to get introduced to everyone--Jeff, Todd, Jim; and then Chad hands me a headlamp. A headlamp? Where the heck were we going? I tried to be cool as I adjusted the strap like I'd worn headlamps to run all the time, but honestly I've never worn a headlamp. Back in California I almost never ran in the dark. I was a musician, so I usually got out the door in the late morning and didn't really get to running until the early afternoon.

Chad showed me how to switch the thing on and soon we were headed up the street. We cut into a greenway section, which I would have liked to see in the daylight. You could see the outline of the trees like giant matchsticks against the dark purple dawn. The guys mentioned that some kids had shoved a big log across the greenway path so that if you weren't watching carefully you could trip over it and wind up face down in the middle of the path. They joked about the delinquent youth of Davidson.

I've come to realize as I get older that everyone has their "thing". Which means that everyone has an interest that they geek out on. Some people are into Star Trek, some are into classic cars, some folks are music snobs (me), and some people are runners. We geek out on running. As we ran along the dark greenway path we talked about everything running.

I hung back with Jeff and Chad most of the time, both of whom run ultra-marathons (distances longer than 26.2 miles). Jeff is probably in his late 40's*and he and Chad talked about their ultra races. I think Jeff said that he'd run about 150 ultras! I peppered Jeff with questions about the races and the ultra-marathon "community", about his times and training. This guy is insane!

Chad, 42 (I think), runs almost exclusively in Vibram Five Fingers and is the one who got me excited about them so, of course, we geeked out on that too. Todd was maybe in his early 40's, too and Jim was about my age. They stayed up toward the front and then cut off a little early.

Chad and Jeff and I crossed a road and headed up an incline near a field just as the sky began to glow at the horizon, mixing dark with light. Our breath in the cold trailed behind us like smoke coming out of a locomotive. We dropped back into downtown Davidson to complete six miles and cooled down to where we had started. Next stop--Summit Coffee house.

This is probably one of the best parts of the run. Strong coffee in a cool coffee house. Summit definitely made me feel like I was touring again, up in the Northwest, sampling all the amazing coffee joints. It's a small, narrow place with wood paneled walls and warm light and great coffee. I liked it because it was funky. It was no Starbucks or Caribou. It's the kind of place where none of the chairs really match and the guy working behind the counter has dread-locks.

From the street we could see Todd and Jim waiting for us. Our group sat around the table with our coffee (thanks Jeff. It's on me next time) and talked about the next run. I said that I would definitely come to run with the group again. Jim asked me if I lived in Davidson and Chad told him, "No, this guy drove all the way up from South Charlotte!"

"What?" said Jim. "You came all the way up from Charlotte for this run?"

That's right. I lived in San Diego county for the last 10 years, dealing with traffic, long commutes, time on the road for hours touring and so a 45 minute drive to Davidson with no traffic was a breeze. If I hadn't driven up there I wouldn't have had such a great run with a great group. I'll definitely do it again. Anyone want to join me? We can carpool.

*So, I had originally tried to guess Jeff's age and got it wrong. Big time. Sorry Jeff. Like I said, it was dark. Hope you'll let me keep running with y'all again.

Monday night Bobcats

Last night my wife and I went out with one of her colleagues and husband to a Bobcats game. For anyone who doesn't know; the Charlotte Bobcats is an NBA team now entirely owned by a guy named Michael Jordan. Charlotte used to have the Hornets until the team was moved to New Orleans, I believe.

We started the evening out at a cool little tavern called "Tavern on the Tracks". And one of the best things about the place is that it is SMOKE FREE! We can finally go out to some of these places and not taste cigarette ashes in our food and come home without having to leave our clothes hanging up in another room.

After dinner we headed over to Time Warner Cable Arena, nestled right downtown/uptown. If you haven't been to a game there, I would suggest checking it out. It's a great facility. The interior of the building has many modern touches with other unique characteristics like a huge mosaic representing some of the region's basketball history that almost covers one entire wall near the entrance.

Our friends hadn't mentioned anything about our seats when we got inside. We got into an elevator (which has a human operator--classy.) and went up a couple of flights. I knew we were getting something cool when we stepped out of the elevator and the floors were carpeted. Turning a corner, we finally came to a closed door and I realized we were getting treated to box seats. Never had box seats before. Pretty cool.

We eased into soft faux leather seats and watched the game below. My wife and I have been to 3 events at TWC Arena: 2 Bobcats games and 1 concert. There's not really a bad seat in the place. For a major sports arena the place is actually pretty cozy. The state-of-the-art scoreboard features replay videos and special short films and even holds a model of the city skyline that wraps around the whole thing.

One thing about these games that I find crazy is the amount of audio and visual stimulus that goes on during the night. It's a testament to how short our attention spans are, I guess. You can't just sit back and enjoy the game for what it is. Almost every moment is filled with the announcer hollering, songs being played, the organ pumping or recordings of huge beats to get people to chant "defense". Every time-out features another booty dance by the "Lady Cats" or the firing off of T-shirts into the crowd.* There were a couple of times when it got quiet for about ten seconds, when the Bobcats were behind, and as if the system had sensed a change in the arena noise, a recording kicked in that said,"Everybody clap your hands!" So of course we all felt compelled to like little robots.

The Bobcats lost to the Dallas Mavericks unfortunately, but the game was still a blast to watch and we had a great night out. Not bad for a Monday.

*I'm constantly being amazed by human ingenuity; the fact that someone, somewhere invented a special hand-held "cannon" to fire rolled up T-shirts into the stands of sporting events.