Coop's Corner: Just Another Saturday??

Saturday, January 20, 2018

Just Another Saturday??

I think not.

Coffee with the folks at Diamond's to start things off at 7AM.

Coffee drinker Tom B is helping me determine if any of our old tools are worthy of being in someone's collection so what felt like 200# of them were sent his way for valuation.

From Mpls coffee it was off to breakfast with the Minnesota Guzzi folks....

After shipping a bunch of Ebay items while the P.O was still open and then home....I got out.....felt almost too good to describe!! With these balmy temps, she popped right off. After the wind chills we put up with for a week, this felt Spring mild. I dressed like I normally would/will for 60 degrees.

Frontenac Beach....and out on to thickly frozen Lake Pepin (Mississippi River).

Ice Fisher People aplenty....Wisconsin in the distance. I have no idea how thick the ice was here but I wasn't in the least bit worried. You can see the vehicles avoiding parking-lot-style spacing.

Looking down river...

There was an ultralight in the distance but somehow I completely missed it!!

Then it was up into the State Park with my Annual Permit and parking next to a blue Ford that I know.

Zoomed in tight, almost perfectly centered in this photo, just above the brush beyond me, an SUV parked next to their fish house. It must be a very good year for thick ice. I just don't remember there being this many houses, vehicles and people so far away from shore out where the main channel is.

(Has Prairie Island stopped sending warm cooling tower water downstream??)

I made a loop through the campground and then was on my way back home. That blue Ford previously mentioned was there because Lauren was up in the park for a hike and 'got' me as I was leaving the campground section.

I've been thinking about this off and on all week; this being the fact that age is a tide that we all must deal with. There are times we seem to rise with it, other phases of our moons when we may just slide back a bit. Some of us do it with more grace than others, but thankfully we all get our chance at it for shorter or longer periods of time. Personally, I'm quite content with where I've been and currently seem to be.

What got these thoughts going this past week was time spent watching Leo Kottke videos online. Mr. Kottke might very well have been the first live concert I attended and early on certainly had his name on the most vinyl albums in what later became a substantial collection of mine.

I accept and expect most of us to age and make way for those behind us. I do wish there was a way for me to keep Mr. Kottke, his fingers and hands young for a very long time.....the way I remember him even 20 years ago, let alone almost 50.

Four rows back, front and center.....

I wasn't the only one in the crowd with 45+ years of Kottke listening experience; we were by far a vast majority of much experience. He led off with Pamela Brown and ended with Ring Ring Telephone Ring. Leo was wearing nice socks tonight. They were short. They were French.

Definitely one of my favorites, Ring Ring Telephone Ring followed by Jack Fig....

Corrina, Corrina certainly in my top 5.....

If you haven't heard his Eight Miles High, give that a look.

I have been fortunate enough to have some dandy January Saturday's but this one has been a standout; hope yours was as well!

15 comments:

redlegsridesJanuary 21, 2018 at 7:49 AM
I bet it was fun riding on top of the frozen water....that's one thing I've not done yet on my rig.
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motormikeJanuary 21, 2018 at 7:53 AM
... Ya got brag'n rights.... Not many hacker's can say they've done a hard water ride.
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Speed BumpJanuary 21, 2018 at 8:29 AM
What a great Saturday journey....might give Mike ideas about going out for a winter ride...& I remember attending a Leo Kottke concert in my college days....he is one of the best! So enjoy your blog!
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TrobairitzJanuary 21, 2018 at 10:04 AM
Wow, you had quite a day. Breakfast meeting, riding out on the frozen water, and then a concert too. You always could pack a lot int the day.

The snow pictures made me slightly chilly although our last ride was in 44 degrees as well, but it looked warmer, lol.
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RichardMJanuary 21, 2018 at 6:46 PM
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RichardMJanuary 21, 2018 at 6:48 PM
Isn't the third wheel handy for days like this? No real worries about falling over even if it's just on the driveway. Studded tires really do make a difference when you just have 1WD and make a huge difference when braking on ice. Due to our temperatures bouncing up and down, we now have a nice layer of ice on most of our major roads. Add a little snow or frost and driving without studded tires becomes a bit more exciting. They even delayed school for a couple of hours due to school busses sliding (sideways) off of a crowned road. N.B. Delayed, not cancelled
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SonjaMJanuary 22, 2018 at 2:46 AM
As fascinating as I'd find driving on a frozen surface I wouldn't be able to stop thinking about the thickness, and what's below... The steed looks like it belongs on the ice, though.
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EricJanuary 25, 2018 at 8:09 PM
Glad you are content my friend. You have had many great adventures and many more to come!
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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)