Whittling, Waiting and Fancy Feathers

Making some progress on the stitching horse... Ended up having to bring a couple parts over to the trailer to laminate up. When it's too chilly out in the garage for the glue, you got to find other options.

I've got the base most all together. I changed the design, as is my usual way, on the fly. I'd planned on just cutting shims to set the leg angle and then on a whim, chose to bevel cut into the side bars... I think it'll make a better tool.

I've got to finish laminating up, and then shaping the jaws, put on the lower leg braces. Then it's mount the jaws into the frame, cut the seat deck and the most tricky part of all; cut in and assemble the operating mechanism I've got imagined (that I've NEVER seen built into a stitching horse).

That goes through the leg on the left (as you face it) and will work that off side (right side as you're sitting on it) jaw. The longer one. I should get that done in the next few days... barring any diversions... which are ALSO my usual way.

I'll also need at some point... to come up with the seat cushion for my bony kiester... an eight or ten inch wide chunk of wood gets a guy a mite wiggly after perching on it for a couple hours of stitching and braiding...

This piece is a requisite in any complete leather shop. Gets used not only for stitching, but braiding and lacing are much simplified if you're not trying to hold the piece you're working on with your teeth and a third hand... that don't exist! Much easier to fabricate that third hand.

I still need that high dollar leather stitching machine, not to mention the fabrication of a clicker... but my hopes remain high that some long lost Irish Count relative I never knew about will die and leave me a modest fortune in the next six weeks or so...

The bike work has been suspended while I wait a slight bit for warmer weather... It's parts aren't so easily brought to the rig to work on. ;) So she just sits there in the back of the garage and waits her turn.

Today I'll crawl into Evin's basement... and check out that sagging floor... and hopefully go locate the support post and other necessities to get her bathroom floor doing a bit less of an imitation of the deck of the titanic...

Then... if the weather holds... might could even start digging a ditch or two... beats splitting the wind in the Arizona desert... don't it? ...

Um... not so much... ;)

The farm has seen some changes. They've torn out a lot of the old concrete irrigation ditches and put in a fancy new Pivot system and dug a big retention pond for it's supply water.

Preparations are in high gear for the spring planting... which makes finding supper a little bit of a problem for some of the locals...

Just a couple days ago he and his gals had a field of corn stubble to sift through for groceries... plowed and disced... now... there's not much left for a meal.

One Day at a Time
Brian

From One Circle Straight Into the Next...

 From Moab to Fort Collins... 410 miles of road...

At the end of that road was a sound and the sound was unmistakeable. When the Rig turned into the driveway... CLICK! echoed in the cab. The circle was closed.

*The Mountains south of Moab... at Ken's Lake*

On the east side of Fort Collins is a small farm of a good friend. On that farm is a windbreak... in the shelter of that wind break sits the worn and tired old Eagle...

*Sunrise on the Farm*

I-70 is a road... a good one it is not. From just east of Grand Junction to Denver... I'd mostly be embarrassed to admit that my company was the one who built/maintained it. I swear, the Alaskan Highway is a far better road. I-70 ain't half as good.

I think half anyway... I actually couldn't find a GOOD half...

The Eagle goes down that rutted, potholed piece of asphalt junk like a twenty thousand pound worm... wigglin' and weaven trying to decide which rut it is that it wants to run in... and unable to pick one.

But I'm here. And my work has begun.

To send that Yamaha Raider of mine to a new home, in the interest of generating the working capital I need for the next Circle... I've got a goodly amount of mostly cosmetic work to do on her to make her not only bring a better price... but also I believe... to just make sellin' her easier in the first place...

Though, that's a two edged sword... the better I shine her up... the harder it will be to let go of one of the few material things I truly value.

Ah well... they don't call 'em hard choices for nuthin' do they... and anything that was easy didn't give you much.

Spent a bit of time just figuring out what really needed to be done for sure and for certain... and then hunting down the best place to get the pieces and parts to do the work. While spending the fewest of my always scarce dollars.

  One benefit of staying here and watching out for my Friends property (she's on active duty in the U.S. Army) is that she's got a couple of garages here with concrete floors and a Roof!

*Raider waiting for her cosmetic attentions*

So... I'll have a spot out of the spring winds to do the work.

I found most all of the goods I'm going to need for this project... as well as bits of the next phase. The next phase being the resurrection of my full Custom Leather Shop...

Pretty much the first thing once the Bike has been taken care of... is to find a "Trailer Core" that will be converted into my shop.

Been scouting a bit online, to get acclimated, for a few weeks now... I'll be looking for an Old Wilderness, Prowler or similar pull type trailer (probably) that has solid walls and roof... but the inside is pretty much wore out...

I've seen quite a few of those online being sold for a thousand and maybe a bit more... Now that I'll be looking with the cash in my pocket (hopefully) they'll probably go and get scarce ;) but... that's the hard find I'll be doing.

With that trailer in hand... I'll go inside hollow out all the worn out furniture and then install the benches, lights, tools and equipment financed by the sale of the Raider... to put a shop together and get back to work.

So... this morning, as soon as all the coffee is gone... it's time to start pulling the to-be-refurbished parts off the Bike and get this show on the road.

... sounds like I'm committed now... don't it...

Wrenching and Shining
Brian

Rain... 36 hours and Counting...

Yeah the Sunny Arizona Desert... You just have to dehydrate it first.

Started raining the night before last... a small blue patch floated by a short while ago.... but then PFFFFT it was gone... and the rattle of rain above me has resumed... Looking off to the south and west shows nothing but more liquid sunshine.

Near as I can tell, somewhere around 4 inches has fell on the roof of the rig since it started... Slow and steady too. No flash floods here. Just soaking in. Too bad for me, I've become largely a fair weather rider... I gotta say, even a foul weather scooter pilot wouldn't have much fun in this slop.

Stepped off the stair last night to walk to the end of the rig and shut down the generator... (had to run it since Liquid sunshine doesn't work on these solar panels I bought) nearly lost a boot! This stuff might have been solid and hard when we pulled in... it ain't no more!

Gonna take a day for it to harden up once the storm passes... assuming there's nobody around building a special sort of boat!

The benefit of it all is that I'm slogging through the early process of getting the next couple of books goin' strong.

Which was a one step forward and two steps back sort of deal. Turns out the storyline I'd conjured up a few weeks back for Ol' Ben Jensen just couldn't catch fire. So... I was sitting here staring out the rain speckled window imagining how to light it up in a rain storm... and CLICK! that spinning kaleidoscope struck some gold. :)

So... scrap the old... line out the new... and off she goes!

With nearly another day of the sky falling... there's no shortage of time to rattle the words around and get some momentum built up under it.

I gotta get after it too... Jeb is itchin' and impatient to get more of his story told!

Ridin' (NOT!) Writin' and Waitin' on the Weather
Brian

From Death Valley to Sydney Montana

 Found our last FREE Montana boondock Yesterday Afternoon, just below the Dam at Fort Peck Reservoir... Robinson Point...

That's the largest earthen dam in the world stretching across the horizon behind the rig.

Since I'm writing this... this morning... it didn't break in the night... a worry... cuz you know... it DID break when they were BUILDING it ;)

Now... if you want to tempt fate a bit more... and want the availability of power... you move over to the Corp of Engineers camp directly below the dam...

 Yup...if there's one thing the Army knows how to do... it's properly arrange a campsite. It is likely the prettiest camp we've ever seen. "Looks like a park"... imagine that...

Just to the east of that camp is a pretty fine interpretive center... with displays of a lot of the local areas as well as the story of the building of the dam and reservoir...

There was a case that showed a lil' demonstration of why you DON'T bring in Non-Native species... The "locals" have no defenses against them... like those dang mussles that are spreading like a cancer...

Hmmm... guess they forgot that lesson when they planted a non-native wolf variety...

~~~

Well, last night the skies welcomed us to Fort Peck, and the Fort Peck Dam... and celebrated our last night of "Freedom" for a few weeks. ;)

We started this season's roll back about the late middle of March, running from Cottonwood into Death Valley...

Had our stumbles and breaks along the way...

... and seen some beautiful sights...

I've rode some roads not ridden before... and some I've covered many times...

Since we pulled out of our Cottonwood camp the Ol' Truck has moved some 7400 miles... maybe 1/3 or so with the fiver on... the rest snoopin' around... and then the Raider has made a few more...

Today... we'll pull on over the last few miles to Sydney Montana and sign our papers to work for the next few weeks.

So... not knowing how it's all gonna shake out... it might could be a lil' quiet around here for a bit... there's only so much a fella can say ~ I think ~ about stacking Beets!

Ready and not-totally-willing
Brian

Sunrises, Life and Sunsets

The days start off with the sunrises... end with the sunsets, and are filled with the Montana Sky and living life in between...

Sunrise over Hungry Horse... It's quiet sitting down on the shoreline as the sun cracks the sky of a new day. The ducks swim past, the air is still, sweet scented and calm...

*Hungry Horse Reservoir at Sunrise*

Then you work all day... at whatever you work at... Last week, I spent much of a day building a Stitching Frame for sewing together the signatures of journals and albums...

google has gone the way of microsoft...

Its size and economic power has led it to believe it can do whatever it wishes.

It sees no need to have any regard for its publishers, maintaining integrity, respect or consideration.

It has fully adopted the philosophy of; "It's not personal, it's business." Well... yeah, it IS personal.

That has made it an unpleasant, uncomfortable and risky outfit to have as a business partner...

So... the trail I'll be following is to wean myself from that association over the coming year. Restoring my custom leather shop will be a major focus for the coming months... It's going to be a difficult task, all things considered... but realizing shutting it down in the first place was a great mistake was the hardest part! ;)

Restoring that Shop, in combination with my writing, is where I'll be investing my energies... to provide my subsistence into the future...

Back in the present... At the end of the day, the Montana sun makes it's big show departing for the night...

*Sunset over Hungry Horse Dam*

The sun sometimes lights up the skeletons of the fire killed trees... it's almost as if the fires that consumed them are still raging...

Late in the day we headed for Glacier National Park... As we left we spied a pair of Osprey with their brood taking an evening meal in their nest on the bank of the reservoir...

Look six trees to the right of the nest... you'll see either Mom or Dad sitting about half way down the left side of the trunk... 'fore I zoomed in...

Up at Glacier... they've already shut down the majority of their camps. The season is rapidly slowing down...

But the show is just getting into high gear as fall comes on in the high country and starts it's run south...

Sunset over Lake McDonald in Glacier... to start off the Fall...

*End of day approaches at Lake McDonald*

The sun paints its fiery reminder in Glacier as well... that the ability of man to interfere is fleeting... the power of the land to take back what belongs to it... cannot be resisted.

It's a busy fall and winter I've got planned out... gonna be a task to keep it all focused! ;)

Remaining Yet Under the Wide Montana Sky
Brian