Organizing information is one of the hardest things to get correct. I have been researching different PKMs (Personal Knowledge Management Systems). One of the problems that I and I am sure many of you face is while reading books

I generally read non-fiction books that have lots of tidbits of information, and when I read them they make sense to me and I can also possibly remember it, but most times an hour after I put down the book I have already forgotten about things. This seems like a problem that can be solved by having an effective secondary management and retrieval system.

One of the methods of note-taking that is gaining some traction with me is the Zettlekasten System. The video here outlines a good way to use the system

www.youtube.com/watch

I hiked the Teneriffe Talus Loop today. I am constantly amazed by how many trails there are so close to residential areas in the state of Washington and how accessible they are.

Ollie obviously gave me company on this trail. He is a fantastic hiking buddy. The only wrinkle is that he takes his job a little too seriously and will growl at people on the trail. Just to put things in perspective he saved me from 1 chipmunk today.

I would rate this as a moderate trail. There are large parts of the trail that are flat, and even where there is an incline it is pretty gradual. There are sections of the trail that I would say are steep and got my heart rate up in the 160-180 range The trail is lovely, most of it is shaded, and some parts are definitely overgrown, but not in a way that it is impassable. We passed about 5 streams, some of them were dry and some still had running water. There are trees on both sides for most parts of the trail, so you don’t have a breathtaking view. The final viewpoint is nice, you can see the valley below and all the mountains. You pretty much are hiking through a forest the entire time.

Crowds: We got here at 8:30am on a Saturday and there were 10 cars in the parking lot but lots of places to park. When may have seen a total of 15 people in the entire duration we were there. I felt like we had the entire place to ourselves.

Dog Friendly: We did not see other dogs on the trail, it is a pretty good walk for the dog, enough to get him tired and sleepy for the rest of the day.

The trail took us roughly 3 hours to get done and was totally worth it. I am hoping we can come back soon.

PS: Here is the GPS Recording of the trail. Should give folks a good breakdown of how the hike went down.

Finally managed to make time for my photography hobby. This is a picture taken at discovery park in early spring. I love the raindrops sticking to the leaves.

Wake turbulence is a function of an aircraft producing lift, resulting in the formation of two counter-rotating vortices trailing behind the aircraft. Wake turbulence from the generating aircraft can affect encountering aircraft due to the strength, duration, and direction of the vortices.

Truly an amazing demonstration of the concept of wake turbulence. I wished such videos existed when I was growing up, would have helped me grasp physics concepts much faster :)

The ridiculousness of the furniture supply chain issue during COVID. I ordered a simple Bar Cart off Crate & Barrel in March of 2022. The updated estimate is the end of August 2022 and it has already been delayed thrice.

This is a perfect drink for warm summer evenings.

Ingredients

• 2 oz. Huckleberry Vodka
• 4 oz Lemonade
• Mint Leaves for garnish
• Blueberries

Preparation

1. Mix the Vodka and Lemonade with about 3 cubes of ice and shake for about 10 seconds
2. Whip the mint leaves on your hand to bring out the taste
3. Pour the drink in the glass, you can filter the ice out (optional)
4. Add the blueberries and mint leaf sprig

I had intently followed this plane and how it was manufactured in documentaries and I was amazed by how big it was and the fact that it could actually fly. To date, this is my favorite plane of all time. It feels very spacious on the inside, it is extremely quiet in the cabin and even turbulence that I have experienced felt like a small speed bump. I really hope that airlines can find a way to keep this engineering marvel for as long as possible.

1. It is Huge: The A380 has a maximum takeoff weight of almost 1.3 million pounds — as much as seven Boeing 737-800s or 30 percent more than the biggest 747 models. It’s the only airplane flying today with a full-length upper deck. It can carry up to 600 gallons of water, feeding the onboard showers as well as the standard bathrooms and galleys. Its maximum fuel capacity is over 85,000 gallons, or about the same as 5,300 Toyota Camrys.
2. It has 330 Miles of Wires. A380s are built in Toulouse, France, but their parts come from all over Europe (and beyond today’s commercial jets are truly globalized products). The wings and Rolls-Royce engines are made in the UK, the fuselage in Germany as well as France, and the horizontal tail plane in Spain — all of this comes together by ship and truck and is assembled within painstakingly designed and enforced tolerance parameters.
3. It can fly for a long time: You will have plenty of time to enjoy the bar on the fourth-longest nonstop flight in the world, Emirates’ Auckland-to-Dubai route, the longest A380 flight currently scheduled. It spends on average about 17 hours in the air.
4. Typical seating for three classes is 525, but in a one-class seating configuration, the A380 can hold as many as 853 passengers.
5. It’s called the A380 because the cross-section of the fuselage looks like the number “8”.
6. Only 20 runways in the world are now fully capable of handling A380 aircraft. Others are not long or wide enough or not technically equipped for A380.

Picture Collage of Ollie. This is him at his most handsome and him when he melts my heart. In one of the pictures here he seems to be tracking a squirrel up a tree. Taken when we were visiting California

Ollie met a Newfoundland at one of the parks on Vashon Island. I have been fascinated with Newfies since the first time I ever saw them. They look like gentle beasts. Thought It would be funny to create a video of Ollies thoughts as he interacted with the Newfie.

So the day finally came when I had to fly the 737-9 Max from SFO to Seattle. There was obviously the irrational fear associated with flying a plane model that was single-handedly responsible for back-to-back aviation disasters.

The flight turned out to be quite smooth. I was actually surprised by how quiet the flight actually was. There was engine noise, but it was much lesser than on the older Airbus planes that Alaska Airlines uses. As for the irrational part, it turns out that the MAX family of planes are probably the most tested planes in the history of flight. My suggestion for anyone scared of taking this flight. Give it a chance. I am sure it will surprise you - in a good way.

The map outlines a road trip that we just concluded through 4 Western States. We started our trip in Washingon, then visited Oregon, Idaho and finally Montana

Idaho was really the state where we spent the bulk of our time. The state is just gorgeous in terms of natural beauty with the tall mountains and deep valleys with beautiful rivers flowing through them. I will be posting some more details in the days to come. When traveling through Idaho, it would be definitely worth your time to travel through the scenic byways. We did just that, and though it added a lot of time and distance, it was totally worth it.

This was one of the first cocktails I ever made. The Pisco sour is a wonderful cocktail hailing from South America. As with everything illustrious and desired, this Pisco-based cocktail has fairly foggy origins as several claims to have been its creator. The most accepted tale is that it began its existence in Lima’s popular, wood-paneled Morris Bar back in the early 20th century.

Ingredients

• 3 oz (2oz if you are going for more smoothness) Pisco
• 0.5 oz Lime Juice
• 0.5 oz Lemon Juice
• ¾ oz Simple Syrup
• 1 Fresh Egg White
• Pinch of Chaat Masala.
• 3-4 drops Angostura Bitters

Preparation

• Combine pisco, lime, simple syrup, and egg white in a cocktail shaker without ice and seal. Shake vigorously until egg white is foamy, about 10 seconds.
• Add ice to shaker and shake again very hard until well-chilled, about 10 seconds. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass; dash bitters atop the egg-white foam. There should be no ice in the drink

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The northern Sawtooth Range formed from the Eocene Sawtooth batholith, while south of Alturas Lake the mountains formed from the Cretaceous granodiorite of the Idaho Batholith. The Sawtooth Range has a history of alpine glaciation, but while no surface glaciers exist today, perennial snow fields and rock glaciers remain, usually on north or east-facing slopes. There have been 202 perennial snow fields mapped in the Sawtooth Range. The Sawtooth Range was last extensively glaciated in the Pleistocene, but glaciers probably existed during the Little Ice Age, which ended around 1850 AD. Evidence of past glaciation given remnants of the glaciers such as glacial lakes, moraines, horns, hanging valleys, cirques, and arêtes.

The lake is named for the brilliant sockeye salmon that once returned from the Pacific Ocean in such massive quantities that the lake shimmered red during the spawning season. Currently, only a small percentage of the wild sockeye succeed in making it through the several hydroelectric dams along their route back to the lake to spawn. Sockeye must not be targeted while fishing and must immediately be released if they are caught.

At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: “I have to go to work — as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for — the things I was brought into the world to do? Or is this what I was created for? To huddle under the blankets and stay warm

Marcus Aurelius in Meditations

Meet my little buddy Ollie. Ollie is a 3-year-old sheepadoodle (Old English Sheepdog & Poodle Mix) He is a fantastic travel partner and hiking buddy. Here he is in a park in Sun Valley.