Rochester Lights

If it wasn't zero degrees and windy it would have been fun walking and looking at the lights that hang from the buildings in downtown Rochester.

Working in the Snow

Last week for work i went to Michigan's upper peninsula and Wisconsin to survey cell phone towers. It reached record low temps in some areas and lots of snow. I also saw 5 bald eagles over the entire trip. Here's the 48 sites that we surveyed. There were 8 of us that went on the trip.
Crossing in to the U.P.
A view of a cell phone tower from one of the cable wires
I realized after the first day that the boots i usually wear to walk on the roads weren't going to cut it, even with the hotel's "boot" dryer.
I ended up spending more then i planned on a pair of really nice winter boots that said they were good to -94 degrees. Fortunately it didn't get that cold, it only got down to -20 degrees, a record low in the town in Wisconsin. The boots turned out to be really warm and comfortable.
Dogs like following us through the snow and woods.
There were lots of iced over trees.
This was on some guys mailbox.
Wisconsin. They have cheese and food.
A custom one of a kind truck door.
And here's some other pictures from the trip.

2,600 miles on a Honda - part 5

After two nights of camping, i was ready for a night in a motel, hopefully with a little time to work on the bike. By the time i got to Garth Brooks' home town of Yukon, Oklahoma i had ridden around 1000 miles. A little later the highway turned into a turnpike so i decided to take route 66. 10 miles down that road i came up to this really strange looking building. It had an awning that kinda reminded me of the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars and had a giant metal pop bottle by the road.
The place is called Pops, it's a gas station with several hundred kinds of pop from all over the US. So i filled up with gas and had a Fritz's orange soda. It tasted a lot like Faygo, meaning it was great. In the parking lot there were dozens of motorcycles and after talking to some people, it turns out that on the weekends Pops is the the main hangout place in the area. They said on friday nights there usually isn't a place to park a bike it's so busy.

Then like always people ask me where i'm headed. After i tell them Michigan they ALWAYS say "WOW...you're a long way from home huh? Well good luck and stay safe" The first few days it didn't bother me but i've already ridden 1000 miles, how can i still be a long way from home?

Route 66 was great. Perfect speed with cool little towns every 20 miles or so. I stopped at a motel on the east side of Tulsa and started working on the bike. Changed spark plugs again, realigned the rear tire and tightened the chain. All set for another 1000 miles.

The next day i hit the 20,000 mile mark on the motorcycle. It seemed like a really big event at the time so i stopped and took a picture.
Then at the border into Arkansas i talked with a guy selling oranges and blankets with pictures of Elvis and wolves. I didn't buy any oranges but looking back wish i had got that Elvis blanket.

That night i camped at Bull Shoals State Park. It was on a river near the Bull Shoals Dam. I'm still amazed at the number of people that camp out that time of year. Although i was the only one in a tent, the rest of the people had RV's or campers. This time i used dead leaves as padding under the tent.

I also forgot to mention that back on day 3 in New Mexico i was talking to an indian guy at a gas station. He saw the bike and asked if i was doing some "long traveling" I said i was headed for Michigan. He said "oh ya you are doing some long traveling alright. Well i hope you make it. Be safe." I had never heard that phrase before but after thinking about it while riding a few hundred miles, i started to really like the term "long traveling."

Time for a New Coach????

I went to my first football game in Ann Arbor to see UofM vs Wisconsin. Of course UofM lost.

(click to see full size)

The stadium was huge and i was amazed at then amount of people in the streets and at the game.

The best part was that all of the fans were cheering whenever they showed the score of the MSU vs Purdue game because MSU was down by 14. The reason is was so good was that MSU came back in the 4th quarter to win.

Here's what 20,000 depressed wolverine fans look like.

2,600 miles on a Honda - part 1

Leaving Adam's house my odometer read 18,598.8 I was kinda nervous and thought "There's no way i'm going to be able to make it all the way back to Michigan." But less than 1 hour later i knew i made the right choice. I was driving to Globe, Arizona which is at an elevation of something like 4,000 feet above sea level. Half way there the view was amazing and i stopped to take pictures.

I got really excited while riding on one of the mountain roads, i rode through a tunnel in the side of the mountain. It was the best bike ride of my life, until two days later.

I rode to Globe to visit my friend Laura who just got a job out there as a counselor for kids on the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation. The next day i helped chaperon for the all day field trip to the zoo, back in Phoenix. The zoo was actually really cool, they had pretty much everything except elephants.

The next day i was back on the bike riding to the Salt River Canyon. I didn't really notice it on the map but Laura said i would probably enjoy it. She was right. On the motorcycle it was great, with road switch-backs going right down the mountain.
That same day i made it to the Petrified Forest. I just assumed this would be old logs, that you weren't suppose to touch, lying on the ground. It was a lot better then that.



I was planning on camping somewhere near the park but it was too cold and no campsites were around. So i rode east on I-40 into New Mexico.

Here's some other pictures from the first few days:

Michigan to Arizona - part 1

Well i just got home from my 2 week trip to across the United States. The main part of the trip was me riding my 1972 Honda CB500 from Phoenix to Michigan. But before i get to that , the week before i left with my friend John, we went up to Bad Axe and spent some time with his relatives on their farm. I got to help milk cows and plow a field. They actually let me drive that thing for almost half the day, by myself. I think i plowed around 60 acres.




Now on to the trip. Basically it was three days of driving:
Michigan to Nashville
Nashville to Texas
Texas to Phoenix

Before getting to Nashville though we went to the Louisville Slugger factory and got bats made with our names on them. But Nashville was really great. John and i went to the Country Music Hall of Fame, saw some of the Montreal Canadians players walking from the hotel to the ice arena, went to a concert at the Grand Ole Opry and hung out downtown afterwords.

Carrie Underwood was just one of the people singing that night

Main street in downtown Nashville, there was live country music in just about every bar

Oh ya and we played putt-putt and rode go-carts every chance we could

Windmill

Several months ago i built a windmill out of a car alternator. My dream was to be able to collect so much electricity that the electric company would be sending ME a check every month.

My dreams were crushed.

A simple way of explaining it was that the wind would spin the alternator, charging up the car batteries, which would go to the DC to AC converter, which would plug into the house. Apparently plugging car batteries directly into an outlet in your house is not good... who knew?

So the windmill had been sitting in my basement in a pile labeled "crushed dreams" Other things were there like a hang-glider made out of a bed sheet and the human powered hydrofoil. I still haven't given up on the hydrofoil...it's too amazingly awesome:

human powered hydrofoil dream machine

Here's all the pieces before i put it up in the back yard.

Here it is all put together in the basement.

Garden - October

Well everything has been picked from the garden except gourds and tomatoes which are still going great. I grew 2 pumpkins that were about softball size and lots of carrots.

Also the bamboo is taking over, by next year my yard will look like a Vietnamese jungle

More Baseball...Less Haircuts

While cleaning out some boxes from the basement i found some old pictures of when i was little.

There is a theme to all of these pictures:
# 1 is that i loved baseball.
# 2 is that i hated getting haircuts...i still do.

So this is me playing t-ball at Bulman Elementary.
I mean come on, what's not to love about this? I'm happy, i got my mitt, i'm on my electric police trike and i'm wearing the shortest short shorts you've ever seen. Just lovin' life.

This year i was apparently really fired up for Halloween. Things to notice: the awesome green carpet, the actual karate kid headband and the MSU football in the background. There's no doubt that i scored some serious candy that night.

Baseball again at Bulman. And ya that's my dad running along side me. He always used to help coach in baseball and hockey. I'm pretty sure those were my gray Kangaroo velcro shoes with the zipper pocket on the side.
Blank stare...name tag...yep my first day of school. You can tell how happy i was to go and to have my picture taken.
More t-ball in the backyard. I like the look of the huge patch on the one knee.
And here you go people, my 3rd birthday. Han Solo, Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, R2D2 and yes even Lando Calrissian. Apparently i was too busy playing with my Star Wars toys to go get a haircut, but look how happy i was.