Coop's Corner: December 2019

Saturday, December 28, 2019

Royal Enfield Himalayan - Snowy Mtns Wyoming - July 2019

Here's Week #2 of my July/August 2019 trip west. The first week was covered a few blog Posts ago, detailing my time in the Black Hills here.

The video

Earlier Posts from the trip I made while actually out West, posted from coffee shops and libraries....

People and Food

Weather

It was a very enjoyable 2 weeks; my Base Camp style of National Forest Campground camping worked well was both affordable and convenient. Luxurious accommodations in the minivan, a tarp, a large camp stove, a cooler, the laptop....plenty of amenities present to return to each evening.

I'd wrap things up by saying that my favorite part about Week 1 in the Black Hills was the riding. The best part about Week 2 in the Snowy Mountain Range was simply being there; I rode less, stopped and walked more with emphasis on simply enjoying breathing the thinner high mountain air and wide open spaces.

Speaking of thinner air, it dawned on me only later that my first week spent in the Black Hill elevations must have prepared me for being even higher the following week. We live at 650 ft. above sea level, the Black Hills exposed me to 5000 - 7000 ft and the Wyoming elevations were 9000 - almost 11,000 ft. I never experienced shortage of breath or even noticed the higher altitudes.

This coming season's trips are still being thought about; real planning has not yet started but there are some stronger possibilities being focused upon. More when I know.

Monday, December 23, 2019

Musical Holiday Weekend

It started Thursday evening with my attendance at Home For The Holidays. Hanna announced a week earlier that she'd have no trouble obtaining some Comp tickets so that if Peg and I or any of our friends might be interested, tickets would be available.

Four of our friends were and had attended earlier on Thursday at the 11:00 performance. After work that day, I soloed at the 7:30 show and very much enjoyed it. Stories, music, jokes and themes very much at home in the Midwest.

The VocalEssence Singers of this Age in the lobby before the concert

Midwest Animal Rescue was there as well....

Gingerbread homes were being fabricated in the lobby....

And then just before the show....

Friday started early with more Christmas preparation, some (more) last minute shopping but then in the afternoon, Hanna came, dropping off her Birman so that we could catsit while Hanna is in New York over the Holidays.

Saturday morning, another coffee sipping session at Diamonds in Minneapolis for me and a decent-sized crew. Amazingly warm weather that has lasted and continues to last.....melting in the low 40's. I saw 39 degrees at the Official Solstice Time of 10:15PM while we were on our way home from Lauren's concert in LaCrosse at the Viterbo Symphony Hall. Holiday Romance, waltzes, ballet dancers, a sing-a-long...we did it all after enjoying dinner together before the concert.

Before heading to LaCrosse for the afternoon concert, a different though just as lovely type of music in the warm afternoon sunshine that I've previously mentioned....Once again, the rig "popped right off", amazing really. I push it out of the garage, hit the button, a rotation and a half.....bum bum bum bum.....

When I was up on top in the State Park, a pedestrian tourist seemed not only willing, but determined to take my photo.

Sunday just before noon, we met Hanna in Minneapolis at the Hi-Lo Diner. One of not that many left, an original from the NJ maker of Fodero Dining Cars. It served meals in PA and OH before finding its way to Minneapolis. I meant to take a photo outside and forgot, but I did manage a photo of the important part....I'll definitely go back....maybe there will be a time when it's NOT so busy??

Amazingly, that same tourist that I'd seen documenting my presence up in the State Park was at Sunday's concert in Orchestra Hall.

Once again, she managed to get a snap of me (across the hall)....it was almost sold out by the time we got our tickets.

The movie, my favorite Holiday movie, was seen in quite literally a new light. There was music in the original score that Capra left out (chopped out according to the composer) in the finished film, more lush and complete than what we're accustomed to. Also, Ms. Hicks, the conductor, gave a presentation before the concert, explaining much about the necessary and expensive technology involved with combining live music with the video/spoken audio in the film. According to what she explained, the European's are far ahead of us in this style of film presentation.

And finally, the living, breathing and lone Rogue in the gallery.....

We're ready....hope that you are!! The tarts are being filled as I type.

Monday, December 9, 2019

Royal Enfield Himalayan - Black Hills - July 2019

Well it's done.

Saturday, December 7, 2019

Needed More Pie - 2019

Mike's been after me....."How's the Pie Chart coming?...."

Here it is but first, it needed some beefing up so this afternoon I took the rig out to enjoy what seems to be the last, best, possible riding for 2019. Predicted temperatures and pending doom-ful snow is on the way so I figured I better get out while I still could!

It seems both scooters were slighted this year....didn't mean for that to happen. I was getting a bit cautious about the belt/rollers in the Helix through the summer so that's the reason it was absolutely last in the Mileage Ridden category. Luckily it didn't suffer this year as part of Mileage Rescued which is the indignity suffered by 2019's high mileage winner, the Himalayan. Between chain issues (yes Tom, there were 2 individuals) and deep water challenges, bikes hauled to their origins, tales between legs were at an all time high. Sad because total 2019 mileage was down, though I'm not disappointed in the least; it was a great year for riding and I'm confident that what I lost in quantity I truly did compensate for in High Quality.

Naturally I'll shoot for more of both next year.

My Black Hills Post is just about ready and will be published soon!

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)