guzziguy

No problem Al. Just remind me as my memory has disappeared. BTW, wouldn't MOA be before CanJam?

There's one Scolari's in SB. Fortunately, it's the closest grocery store to my house. Guess what I'll be getting the next time I'm there.

My dad always told me "Don't have kids. And if you do have kids, don't have girls or boys, have elephants". My wife and I decided elephants would be a little unreasonable, so we have cats and birds instead. Back on subject, I went on my first dual sport motorcyle ride Sunday through Tuesday (yesterday). It was from Santa Barbara to the Lake Isabella area and back. Weather was supposed to be good, but we got into rain and freezing rain early in the ride at the 7K foot level. God was it cold. Fortunately it never rained/snowed hard at all so nobody got wet. After a couple of hours, we got to the dirt. I did well before throwing it down in some clay mud. No damage was done to me or the bike and we continued. The rest of the ride was on fairly easy dirt roads. In the high desert, we had to deal with extremely high, gusty crosswinds. I'd guess it would gust to at least 70 mph. For the first time in my life, I leaned a motorcycle left to turn right! We got to Kernville around 4 pm. It was getting dark and, because of the wind and cold, decided to motel it there rather than camp. That decision made me very happy. Monday dawned bright and clear. We could see that the snow level was fairly low the night before and I was even happier that we stayed in the motel. We ate a quick breakfast, packed up the bikes and headed out for the day's riding. They took me up higher and taught me how to crash in the snow. I did well at first, but the snow got deeper and after the first crash, things went downhill. I crashed/fell four times in the snow before we got back down to dry roads. Then, on the way to the campsite in Keyesville, I managed to crash again at about 25 mph. That really took it out on me. We set up camp and the other four guys did some more riding. I'd had enough for the day. Normally, I'm not big on camping but had a good time Monday night. It got pretty cold and I had to keep my head in the sleeping bag to keep warm. This was in addition to wearing long underwear, socks and a watch cap. There was lots of frost on the ground in the morning. That explains why I was cold. I was sore as hell and made it clear that I needed an easy day. We packed up, stopped for breakfast and went home. We mostly stuck to paved roads and the little dirt we did was very easy. Fortunately, there were no more incidents. Got home at 3 pm and just left everything on the bike. I was too tired to do anything. The tent didn't dry out before we left so I have to unpack it and dry it out today. I'm a very experience street rider, but a beginning dirt rider so I expected a good challenge for this ride. Boy did I underestimate it. I did have a good time and will continue to dual sport, but not until my muscles and jammed thumbs heal. The Suzuki DRZ-400 is a really good dual sport bike and it took a lickin' and kept on tickin'. Through all my crashes/falls nothing got broken. Here are some clickable pictures taken by one of the other riders.

I'll bet you do. You're just too polite to say them.

These will be TWAs. Texas Winter Amps.

Sounds good! I can hear the arteries clogging from here.

Thanks. As much as I like salt and other spices, pepper is my favorite. So while I was trying to be funny, I also meant it as a compliment.

I could never get into the US version. The original UK version is so much funnier.

It was so hot here last night that I had to open a couple of windows before going to bed. This was at midnight. The upcoming ride will be cooler as we'll be riding as high as 10K feet and camping at 6-7K feet. Frost (or worse) is a definite possibility.

After reading Tyrion's impressions, I'd say ask Justin when the PicoDac is due to come out and at what price (I daresay it will be considerably less than $1K) and wait for it if you like his answers.

I could have responded, but thought it only appropriate that a Brit should do it.

Mike is the Floridian salt of the earth. Vicki is more like the pepper.

Me too! The first time I read the title I thought "How hard can it be to shoot? It's not like it's moving or anything".

I thought Lucas made all of that kind of stuff for the UK.

Big Agnes Air Pad Smart Wool crew shirt Capilene bottoms LED head lamp Titanium spork Insect repellent Stuff sack Emergency blanket Getting ready to go on my first overnight dual sport ride starting Sunday morning.

Panasonic RP-HTX7. They cost <$50, sound pretty darn good and meet your other requirements.

How about a paper bag to put over your head.

OK. I admit it. I wanted to do this too. It never ceases to amaze me how much denial people can go into. This applies to all sorts of things and both sides of every issue.

I disagree with both of you. This administration has the lowest approval rating in history. It's certainly replaced the Carter administration as worst administration in my lifetime. Unless they can pull off a miracle (like an Israeli/Palestinian peace plan) in the remaining three months, I think historians will not be very good to this administration.

I see you haven't left the bar since then!

I agree that this is mostly political. That was why I mentioned McCain. He pretty much had to do the opposite to differentiate himself from his opponent.

He endorsed voting no on Prop 8. Voting no meant to leave it as it was, i.e. gays are allowed to marry. Not surprisingly, McCain endorsed voting yes.

Here's an excellent skit on the 00's: [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XptsrTxncPc]YouTube - ADG Security[/ame]

Do some research into who threw money into which sides in California Prop 8 and you may have to change your mind here.

I meant inland California. Go look at the county by county California vote and it will be clear. I'm not sure I understand this. Divorce is one of those things that has to be dealt with on a legal basis. So if government got out of marriage and just dealt with "civil unions", the legal part of a divorce would be covered by law. Why shouldn't a gay divorce be different than a non-gay divorce? Legally, divorce all about dividing assets, both current and future (alimony), and for deciding custody issues. To me, this applies to all unions (marriages if you prefer). So I don't see why and how it should be different for gay vs. non-gay unions.