Pressing My Luck
Seemed like a good idea at the time. You know - going for an early ride this morning before the weather got much worse. There are few, very few things that will keep me off my bike, but ice is certainly the one thing, if not the only thing that I truly hate. I love the cold - I can dress for it. The wet, the mud, even the snow - I can deal with everything but ICE! Don't ask me how, but I managed to get all the way to the hill at Cold Water before my bike came out from under me. I really had to think it through, as I was committed to getting a ride in this morning, but the risk - scratch that, the danger is not worth the chance. One of my neighbors had this very thing happen to him a few years ago and it put him in the hospital for four days - dang near killed him at that. Last year I had my bike come out from under me after riding over Ben Lomond peak, down past Willard Basin. There is no more gut-less feeling than when your bike goes from under you. It is completely unpredictable, never the same and always bad. Just stopping for this pic below I was standing on an icy bridge deck. Bad idea..............
I've never been a big holiday fan. However, as a kid, I used to love going hunting on Thanksgiving morning. From my earliest memories, I remember some of the most unbearable conditions; snow, fog, ice, wind - it didn't matter I truly loved that experience. From probably four years old 'till....well when things changed. I couldn't carry a gun until I was twelve, but I didn't care. Truth is, most of those hunts were completely unsuccessful from the hunting perspective, but I remember so much about them all. One year it was so cold while duck hunting, I remember thinking if I shot my gun a few times, I could warm my hands on the barrel (stupid) - not that I would ever do it. The last year I can remember was perhaps the only successful hunt on Thanksgiving. Chasing Chukars in a foot of snow up where I would ultimately break my ankle last March. The irony......
Through some of those years, as I got a little older, there was this phenomenon called FM radio. In particular, there was this early local station that would play nothing but deep tracks and extended full versions. Virtually no commercials and absolutely no talk - none. It was XM/Sirius thirty years earlier, but better. I'd leave that playing all night, very low, with only the light of the tuner illuminating my bedroom. It was magic. While at work yesterday, I was going over a project with a tech. While going over the details of some calculations he used the phrase "FM", which I learned early on in my career, that's what techs often call engineering. Later in the day, I had business over in the other valley. Afterward, I took a couple of my boys over to the farm for a little target shooting. Cold and windy, it was reminiscent of those earlier days, when on a cold autumn night, I would listen for hours to the magic of FM. Those were great days and I miss the magic.
Watch out for the ice and Ride HARD!
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