Tales from a crumpled water bottle.

Overthinking should play no role on a motorcycle trip, especially when you're past the point of no easy return.  In motion it's all split second decisions, reflex, flex & relax.  From hair dryer wind in tinderbox country to walls of  bone-chilling ocean humidity.  Sometimes ending up 30 miles in the wrong direction with dark nearing.  Side road improv campsites.  Lane split and fruitstand refreshments.

Find a rhythm and get lost in a place beyond familiarity..  you'll realize it isn't so bad.  The mind can all too often default to negativity, everything else has gone to shit, but really, maybe your head is in the wrong place.  It's easy to dig yourself a hole, each misfortune, bout with the bottle, workplace ruts.  Every destructive thought adding more fuel to the perpetual cycle.      

Life is an unfinished project; did you have other plans?

Enjoy these Taylor shots from a couple years back, Portland-Oakland-...

Modoc forest.  I remember eating saltines at some point.  This was a long day after a heavy party.  With darkness nearing we pulled off into a very silty road.  Tents popped up and passed out.

What's the Patrick's Point.  Luxurious mossy forest floors.  Skunks.  Waist height fire ring.

 Somewhere, Southern Oregon coast, most likely 40 something degrees.  Wincing into the wind.

Oh, Yea, That

It's a November Monday, generally hermit season.  Good time to get some extra hours at work, in the garage, or finish off a bottle of Tennessee whiskey.  Really though, maybe all of that.  

It seems, besides-the-obvious that things have been beginning to fray around here..  I'm not sure what the pursuit is about sometimes, these old machines or cave-people weekends out there.  The mindset is right though, escape while you can.  But with age everything gets thrown in the rock tumbler and all the old hard edges chip off revealing some sort of smoothed edges, a palatable version.

There is nothing appealing to me about a large city in 2021.  So many of us wait contemplating what to do next...

In an attempt to revive this old fashioned fervor;  I've begun to crack into years of neglected film.  Hopefully sparking something, somewhere, even if it's an "oh, yea, that".

 

HITW-10

Hope everyone is having a good Sunday night.  Fall is rolling in and so is this year's Haggard In The Woods.  The tenth installment in this journey.  9-10am meetup at Slim's in St. Johns..

 

Get your oldies here

 

Rather Knot

    Choppers, Customs, so called freedom machines, 0-400 mile a year rattle-trap piles, stand in the garage and tinker anchors, a monument to drink beside... The list goes on, and I go on.  Of course the generalizations are exclusionary, sometimes these little monuments run the run, do the thing, go.  But mostly I see a culture (if you could call it that) of jump to conclusion caricatures.  Bearded wipe me down Mann pants, speculative carb talk, hoard pile, pile-ons.  Erector set visionaries.   

    These days I'd rather tie the 15 foot boat up to a pylon and shut it down.  A slow current, full cooler and a place far away.  On the right day, in the right place it can be other-worldly, on a good lake crappie.  Instant trip to somewhere beyond the city.  There's an modern addiction to checking in:  The emphasis should be checking out, reset.  

    When the tie up spot gets old, collect the loose items and fire up old Mark 58.   Four cylinders at 44 cu.in. of restless wind-me-up,  or could be foul me out (depending on the day & temperament).  Thick sloshing hi-octane 2-stroke mix, pressure pumped into ancient Tilloston butterfly carbs.  At trolling speed you get anxious, can almost see the plugs turning wet and black.  Push the lever forward toward peak RPM and you reach a harmonious drone too loud to talk over.  A great thing these days.

     Beyond romanticized water outings I've been finishing up a lightweight minimal bike.  1973 Cycleology Single loop frame, with a full Basiley built 1973 shovel-coner.  Odd items like a 4qt. fiberglass oil tank, 11" 4-pot disc brake, SU carb.  Various one-off machined bits from Jim, Casey and Kelly.  Ceramic coated exhaust, too many paint layers on the frame (ready to chip!)  

    Maybe I'll get out and put 4 to 67 miles on it this year, really scrape those side danglers..!

Few highly fluorescent shots for now from Taylor...

.,  

    

Coots and select offspring

Haggard in the what... Sea level rising

-Haggard in the Woods Bay IX

-Anti-social reunion.  

-August 14-16.

-Meet at Portway Tavern 9-10am.

-Map:  Ride-Map Long way