Coop's Corner: The TranZalp is back on top....

Sunday, March 11, 2012

The TranZalp is back on top....

TranZalp (my slightly altered '83 Honda VT500F Ascot) suffered electrical switch problems last August, long before the end of MY riding season, but marking the end of '11's season for the Honda. First it was the dim/highbeam switch that started shorting out, then things moved over to the right side and the starter button literally fell apart. Luckily, I made it home from the rally I was attending before it finally disintegrated.

With a used, online replacement for the left side, the horn/light switch was taken care of over the winter. Finding a used switch for the right side proved more difficult, so I bought a much easier to find Shadow part. Other than having to remove a small locating tab that serves to position and constrain rotation, it was an easy and fast replacement. The wiring connector plugs were identical, something my limited but successful study of the wiring diagrams promised. The new grip isn't OEM and doesn't look the same but functions just fine. So we're back in business.

With today's weather being every bit as nice if not nicer than yesterday's, it was impossible not to go for another nice loop on a nice March Sunday. Since I started riding too late in the day yesterday before closing, today I had just enough time to get down to Alma for lunch at Pier 4. Having just opened for the season, I was willing to break my normal pattern of breakfast for a great lunch visit instead.

I was almost the last customer before closing time.....

Once inside, I was saddened and very sorry to hear that Paul had suffered a serious health issue this past week. Marietta's lunch, The Special, was fantastic as always, but it sure would have been nice to see Paul's smiling face through the kitchen door. Rest well and heal quickly Paul! I'm counting on a #4 at my next visit.

For my friends from warmer climes, this is 65 degree ice fishing on some still present Mississippi River backwater ice, how thick I don't know; there were a dozen people fishing out there.

Having only recently learned about the Castlerock Museum, it was a point of discussion at one of our Coffee's. The museum has a great collection of armor, swords, etc., things of interest to at least a few of the guys that show up at Diamond's Coffee Shoppe. Though none of us had been there, Tom happened to know or at least, know of, the proprietor. A visit by the group is in our future plans.

Open Friday and Saturday.....

Out of Alma, up on the hill and then down through and out of various valleys. My hunch about the condition of Arneson Dugway was correct; winter still has a grip on this north facing road that drops steeply down into the valley beyond.

The Waumandee Valley in the distance.....

Yesterday's rides of 4, 35 and 80 miles were followed by today's ride of 125 miles. This is exactly the way 2012's rides should be trending.

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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)