Coop's Corner: September 2019

Sunday, September 29, 2019

Threatened Cold And Snow

No, not today but it does feel like it could do those things after what we've recently become accustomed to; we do know it's coming. That's what I honestly admitted to myself Wednesday afternoon. Partly sunny, clouds that looked very cold up there to the south though pleasantly warm down here on terra firma, the very dark grey clouds harbingers of things to come. So, for the 2nd time in a week on a weekday afternoon, I climbed on the Himmi and crossed the river.....to see what I could see.

My start from home....

This was what we saw Tuesday evening as the cold front blew in. A small tornado (sure it didn't feel small) in Lake City caused quite a bit of damage.

The next afternoon, looking South across the Mississippi from the park in Diamond Bluff.

But this was typical going North which is the direction I started....same day, same ride, same locale.

Probably best to approach one of the other neighbors....

One needs to be cautious when executing this maneuver; I can just barely count on one hand (and I'm a machinist maintaining 5 fingers) the number of my friends that have direct experience with the possibilities of failing at this.

Leaving the park in Diamond Bluff....

Work on our bridge continues....

A very nice 112 mile late September afternoon, once again, not a single road planned. The Himalayan was given its head.

Friday I finally got the tractor running again. Carburetor and distributor rebuilt, the old 9N runs and seems to be happy about it. No pie in this cake pan, a sad state of affairs but I'll bet you thought about it.

Yesterday morning, Saturday, I finally got back to Diamonds for some coffee, hadn't been there in awhile and I heard about it. Mike was there with his spiffy yellow Ducati 450 and my sibling was there on his Ultra. More machines rolled in later.

Another work week ahead, planning and packing for this coming weekend's Autumn Slimey Crud Run has already been underway.

Saturday, September 28, 2019

Playing Fort 2

Eric had it all set, a reserved campsite at Pineview, GPS Routes created, both inside the fort and out...we were ready. Eric rode down, Kevin and I drove w/trailers having left early to make our 7:30 meetup. As so often predicted this summer, the forecast wasn't all that great but I'll break the news here; we had almost no rain while riding. In fact the rain didn't start until we had the campfire going at a mature pace Saturday evening. All of us tired enough from a couple days of riding, it wasn't necessarily a hardship to be sent to our sleeping bags early.

The plan had been to spend a lot more miles on the fort itself and that's how we started out Friday morning. We later were made aware that a rule change had taken place last winter, a new definition of Recreational Use had been established and as a result, the roads that we were most interested in were no longer accessible to motorcycles, street legal or not. Eric did a magnificent job of adapting and almost as if it had been meant to be, we discovered some absolutely prime avenues to the east. Prime to the point that we did some of them multiple times, changing direction or even repeating those! They're out there to be discovered.

355 miles ridden for the weekend, Eric had more since he'd ridden his bike from home rather than haul it like Kevin and I did.

7:30 Friday morning...

We went out for a ride and then returned after the park office opened at 9. Registration complete, we moved the rigs and got camp cozy.

Ready for the all important coffee....thanks Eric!

Then we were out on the trails...

Here we stopped for a bit after a section of extra deep sand.

Later, root beer floats at Rudy's in Sparta....

Potter Road, Bear Road, Goodyear Road, McKenna Road....

Merlin Lambert County Park, Potter Flowage

In Warrens, we made a stop at Cranberry Discovery Center...

Cranberry Festival next weekend.....many, many people expected to enjoy the berries.

Dinner....Twice....at Club Oasis.

After our dinner and outside, this young family were exiting their car with the little guy absolutely ignoring his mother, eyes focused on our bikes across the parking lot. My brother offered a "sit" on his Kawasaki. Both the young man and his sister sat on a KLR and a KTM. Horn honking was both encouraged and practiced.

Eric left early Sunday morning for home, Kevin and I a bit later with a breakfast stop together in Sparta. Rain off and on all night and this was the radar image at 8:30 Sunday morning.

Here's a look at where, what and how we rode.

Monday, September 23, 2019

First Autumn Evening

I was out for one of my rare mid-week rides. Still composing last weekend's adventure and that will be ready soon; this evening's ride needed to be made public before our late summer weather gets away.

Monday, September 16, 2019

A Few Roads I Missed Saturday

Another lovely late summer day, almost too warm and sticky, almost as if summer is reluctant to leave. I can tell you the geese and swans have been discombobulated. They go north, then they swirl around, seemingly unsure of where to go. The next day they go the other direction....Mixed up Marvins.

Anyway, Sunday a very nice enough day to go for another ride. Our border state football warriors were battling, the bars were all full and the roads empty, making great conditions ideal. My new Himalayan battery was installed mid-week and it was the first chance to get it out for a ride.

151 miles with plenty of up and down.

I don't have the exact median/mean speed data but I can tell you that there were many spots of bodacious pea gravel on chip-sealed roads. The contractor with the roundest rocks must have won all of the bids. A person truly needed to have a care on the roads I explored Sunday.

Highlighted with a set of Motion Pictures....

Rode past "The Home Place" as I seem to do more and more these days. Flower Valley is what it was known by for many years; this cornfield and trees right-center were part of the 128 acres that mom grew up on.

Directly above my shadow is a huge Burr Oak tree that had a wooden swing suspended from an almost horizontal branch, allowing us to almost swing out over the road below. Many things have changed, the road was narrower, the slope was steeper, the driveway moved. All buildings gone except the house. The front porch and time spent there remembered very well.

What it looked like in the early 50's....

What it looked like to me, Rusty and my little brother about 61 years ago.

Others say....

"it was auspicious to approach any situation from a deferential, inquisitive place. Conceding that there is much to learn is the best blueprint for discovering something new." ----B. Fuller

The Man straightened stiffly above the block of salt fixed to the stake and looked at the young cattle ringed about him. The pasture was holding out well and the stock was looking good. This bunch would be ready to sell in another month, maybe sooner if the market was right.

A stir among the cattle down near the river brought him round to face the swinging bridge he'd built years before. Someone was coming toward him from the bridge. Someone in breeches, but it didn't look like a man, somehow. What was a woman doing in his pasture this time of night?

He bent over the salt again; maybe if he paid her no heed she'd go on past and let him mind his own business. He heard her footsteps come nearer and stop. "Good evening," she said.

Her voice was smooth with book learning but friendlier than most, and somehow almost shy. When he made no answer she went on, "I've been sitting on your swinging bridge....I thought I'd like to say thank-you...." Her voice stumbled a little, then she tried once more.

"You are Mr. ____". His name sounded strange in her voice, but she went on to tell her own.

"That's what they've called me the last sixty-eight years," he said, looking past her face to the hills fast darkening under a single star. "I reckon the woods are free for those that like to walk there."

The unfamiliar voice laughed a little. "That's what Emerson said: the grove belongs to the man who walks in it with an open heart....On that basis I guess I've owned part of your woods for a good many years.....". She made a final effort. "I've always wanted to thank you....."

Something deeply hidden stirred in him. "There's a stump up there, in the notch of the woods", he said slowly, "that before the timber grew so tall you could stand on it and see all over this country."

He kept still a minute, remembering, then, "I used to stand up there an' look at things, an' wonder how they come to be like they was, an' how the hills was created, an' all the things in Nature.... I told my wife I guessed all the religion I ever had I got standin' on that old stump, a-wonderin'..." He turned his face away from her.

She helped him out. "I know about that, a little. This afternoon I saw......." Her account of a thing she had really taken time to look at eased him, and he answered with telling of the badger den at the foot of the swinging bridge.

When she had gone, he turned to watch her. After a moment she stood clear and unmoving against the sky. You could hear the sounds of the river where she stood. She was one that could stand still long enough, he thought, really to hear what a body was saying, or a river.

Then she walked down the farther side of the slope and was gone. ------Margaret Snyder from A Chosen Valley

Fall was the end of harvest, end of the growing season, a burst of color and sun-warmth before killing frost turned the land gray and cold. Fall was a moody time, full of both life and death, a time when we were reminded of the power outside of us, reminded that the seasons happen to us. We do not invite the change to come.-------Ben Logan, from The Land Remembers

When you get those rare moments of clarity, those flashes when the universe makes sense, you try desperately to hold onto them. They are the lifeboats for the darker times, when the vastness of it all, the incomprehensible nature of life is completely elusive. So the question becomes or should have been all along, what would you do if you knew you only had one day, or one week, or one month to live. What lifeboat would you grab onto? What secret would you tell? What band would you see? What person would you declare your love to? What wish would you fulfill? What exotic locale would you fly to for coffee? What book would you write? ------- Ben Tyler

We were also cautioned about journeying far from home. As an example of the dangers, the town had a badly crippled lady named Lucy, who as a girl had traveled to New York City. As she traveled along a sidewalk, sightseeing, she was struck by the outstretched hand of a suicide who had leapt from high above. Her spine had been shattered and for the rest of her life, she was to walk bent forward at the waist, tapping the sidewalk with two black canes. Whenever the subject of travel to a big city was raised, someone would say, "Just remember what happened to Miss Tripp." ---- Ted Kooser, from Local Wonders

"Steamboats are like wedding cakes without the complications...." ----Mark Twain

"It's not about having lots of money, it's about having lots of options......." -----Chris Rock

As the very proud father of three former ponytail wearers, hopefully I can get away with this....."For the past few years it's been fashionable for young women to wear ball caps and to snap the strap on the back under their ponytails. I like the looks of that, their shiny ponytails jauntily swinging, but it's hard not to think of the rear ends of horses. There's a piece of harness called the crupper that goes just under a horse's tail to keep its nose down. If the horse lifts its head to look for a way out of whatever predicament it's in, the crupper tightens and hurts the horse. But it's foolish for parents to think that a ball cap might keep a young woman from running away. Anybody can see they're made for running." ------Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

"I tell the guy's girlfriend that the only difference between the book's main character Phaedrus and myself is that I am neither brilliant, tortured or insane, she looks at my bike and there is an uncomfortable silence." --------ahendepe (a.k.a. Vermin)