Chutes And Ladders

This indecision's bugging me

If you don't want me, set me free

Exactly who'm I'm supposed to be

Don't know which clothes even fit me?

So come on and let me know

Should I cool it or should I blow?

Should I stay or should I go now?

Should I stay or should I go now?

If I go there will be trouble

And if I stay it will be double

So you gotta let me know

Should I cool it or should I go?

To wrestle and battle with decisions small and large is the essence of the human condition.  Some find it easiest and most comfortable to work for someone else, be told what to do and therefore leave themselves enough energy to be able to make other decisions once they are told they can go home for the day.  I spent about 9 years just trying to figure out what I was going to do for a college major, trying this and that, going to school in several different states and lacking much direction.  The only thing I could really focus on was the location of the nearest place to catch a fish and hopping from bar jobs at night and sporting goods store jobs in the day to help me afford to get to the river.  I only recall odd snippets of my education for Trivial Pursuit and such.  Most of my good learning that shaped me came through trying to understand the "Third Eye" of the Tibetan monks, or the work-wisdom of Ben Franklin through Poor Richard's Almanac.  I didn't worry about what I was "supposed to do" in the eyes of the world, and had no inner turmoil due to this lack of "real direction" -that is until a few years into my first career-type job that took away everything I had in my heart for what I really knew I was "supposed to do" with my time I was given.

  The Hindu have a caste system that puts the people of society into different roles based on their previous success in another life.  I get that, but they might be missing the point of letting themselves get out of the current level in the life they are in and just improve on what they have going on today.  What I understand though is that we all have the ability to do or not do what we know insides ourselves to be the next step in our lives.  Some are called to wake up and go to a place where they make calls to sell something that someone else made and if anything goes wrong with the product someone else is handling the support for it so they can rest assured that they won't have to answer for the sale.  It is a comfortable way to spend their days on this earth, but that is not me.  I often wish it were me because life could have been so much easier.  I wouldn't have had to wrestle and battle inside myself to get out of the "caste system" that I was allotted.  My wife wouldn't have had to watch me spiral in and out of control while balancing the desires of my heart with our false desire for a plastic house in the suburbs of our home town.  She wouldn't have had to spend a few years telling our daughters to "be extra nice to daddy" and "he's not really angry at you".

We are all playing a game of "Chutes and Ladders" from the day we come out of the womb.  Whether we are born to a hunting tribe in French Guyana or the son of a cattle baron in Texas we all start out at the beginning and have nothing.  The difference is that some get to land on more ladders to skip some of the work of walking the board - i.e.- the son of the wealthy cattleman.  But I believe that for as many ladders as he gets to land on he probably has that many chutes he could choose to slide down as well.  The son of the hunter in Guyana with a bone in his nose, has less peer pressure to steal a car and wrap it around a tree after washing down a mix of pills with a martini at a night club.  The boards are similar and what we know as success at the end is respectively the same.  We just need to focus on our game and not someone else's lest we miss our ladder and end up slipping down a chute.

I need order before I can start.  I'll spend an hour cleaning my garage before I rip three boards lengthwise for 8 minutes and put sawdust everywhere.  It's a mental block I have.  There are just some things that need to be a certain way before I can begin.  There are certain things that need to be done in a certain order.  There is an order to the mundane trivial things in life that has to be followed.  Out of this curse is a blessing however.  I question the way other things are done and ask myself is that the best way, and I have no issues removing everyone else's preconceptions on the way things are supposed to be.

This way of thinking works great for design.  I built a deck a few years ago, and imagined the deck rail parallel to a small stream waterfeature that ran between two ponds.  My children were probably just walking about this time, but I designed a mixture of large structural deck railing going from side to side between the supports and strong enough so that the kids could climb up the rail and peer into the stream.  The norm on deck rails is vertical.  Many couldn't see my vision, but once it was complete there was no mistaking that my ability to see things in a bigger framework of life is better for everyone...
...most of the time.

When emptying the dishwasher, I could almost blow a gasket if someone doesn't start with the silverware in the open door, then slide the bottom rack out and empty those items, then slide out the top rack and put the stemware away.  If you start in any other order you get water on the dry dishes below.  And sometimes it is that gritty water that holds a bit of Cream-of-wheat still in the concave, upturned bottoms of your drinking glasses.  It just makes sense to do things a certain way.  Why is the rest of the world so oblivious to this?

A long drive to the middle of no-where

I stopped in Vernonia to grab the hunting regulations since I was in
an unfamiliar location on the border of the Scappoose Unit and Saddle
Mountain. At the Hardware/liquor strore/bait and tackle shop I
noticed coolant coming out like mad under my truck. The beginning of
a long day was ahead of me but I had elk on the brain.
I figured I should let the engine cool at the next gate I come to and
hunt for the day and deal with my truck later. I bought some coolant
and headed on out of town.
Engine temperature rose and I ended pulling off in a completely new
area that I hadn't planned on. Even through the steamy coolant smell
of my truck I could smell elk as soon as I stopped and stepped out the
door.
I had an amazing hunt stumbling upon two does right off the bat.
There was scattered fresh sign around each turn... bear, cougar, deer,
elk. I was "in it" all day. I found a great spot by being stranded
at this gate. I may have spent too long in one area and approached a
different area incorrectly but I know I can go back and do it right.
Earlier in the week I was reading a thread about "weird things in the
woods" on ifish.net. I remembered one guy posting that his friend
leaves golf balls up at intersections in the woods and trailheads.
Upon reading it I vaguely remember coming across them in years past.
Wouldn't you know it but I happened to come across one about two miles
into the back country. I had to take a picture of it. You can see
the ball in the lower left corner. It was a "2 SRIXON" whatever that
means. Label was facing up so I could read it without disturbing it.
At dark I headed to the truck. My long bow still felt light and my
legs felt strong. I hoofed it out in a hurry. It took me about 90
minutes to go 30 miles back to Vernonia. I could run the truck for a
while then had to shut it down. A guy named Allen came by and offered
to call my wife when he got into service. I had a new thermostat in
my truck, just no 3/8" extension to get the old thermostat out.
Neither did he.
When I rolled into the mini-mart where Allen told me to go, the girl
running the store was waiting for me. Allen had called ahead. When
she found out I just need a little tool, she made a call to Chief of
"Chief's Yota Builds" and he came over to the station and helped me
put my new thermostat on. He tells me he builds Toyotas and screaming
quads and such. This morning I looked for some sort of contact listing online for his business but I guess it operates a little more covertly.  He was a heck of a nice guy. The whole town seemed
to have pitched in to get me on my way. I guess it sometimes takes a
village to rescue the fatigued in fatigues.

FinChasers Half-Page

Timing is everything

Gerry in a nutshell

Here is some great video that may encapsulate the epitomy of "The Good" in a Clint Eastwood film. The guy that doesn't mention "These foals will probably fetch a few million bucks". Instead he says "Do you like horses? Would you like to pet these?".



And the horses roll like Sting in the 80's... "Don't stand, Don't stand so, Don't stand so close to me".

Portland rock at it's finest

Put it in any city and it would change musicians perspective on
what could be accomplished- the Rick Bain train swung through Portland as it does haphazardly around the NW.
-It is always showmanship in authentic form and generations of musical
influence amalgamated to the present day.  Whoever is playing with him is reliably some of the best musicians available in the city that night.

Bold statement, I realize. His songs makes me smile in wonder and awe. The world needs to
experience this. And it happens every time he plays.

Sex and legos.
Eliot

The rise of opportunity

Missed opportunities often come without warning. When I miss a trout
who gently sips at my fly it's often that my timing is off by just a
split second. What hurts the most is when I have been spending the
previous hours diligently figuring out the correct fly placement or
retrieve, or the right pattern or most likely changing all factors
over and over. Sometimes I feel like I add a negative energy to the
set up with my frustration in achieving success. Then an osprey
glides overhead and I get caught up in jealous wonder of her seemingly
effortless, gliding quest for the same trout. My mind wanders off my
game as I look for her snag nest in the treetops nearby and catch
sight of the glorious glacier capped mountain scape that I have
neglected to notice all day. It is then that a trout rises- when I
take my mind off my goal and the energy releases from my line and
allows a fish to come into the vicinity to swipe at it.

Removing layers of a hardened heart, again

Dad,
So this is a great example of how email works well for engaging
another person. I can choose my words carefully and try to sum up a
whole lot as poignantly as possible.
Lisa and I had a great dinner party last night. 8 adults and their 7
kids -singing into our karaoke machine and parents dancing like idiots
with our kids and having some laughs over wine and cocktails on our
deck. These are friendships that are going on toward 20 years now-
great friends that still get my very best efforts for filling their
stomachs on a random Thursday night. I grilled two whole chickens on
my "beer can" roaster rack and slow cooked pork ribs in a huge dutch
oven all day and finished them on the grill. Every time I make either
of these two dishes people leave realizing they have never had much
better. The bummer is that I bet you didn't know that my grilling and
cooking talent is exceptional.
There are quite a few things you don't know about me. Did you know
that in high school football, there was not one person on the team
that wanted to go head to head against me? I'm just a small guy
really, but they said it "stung" when I hit them them. All I know is
that it was the only place to legally put every ounce of my body and
being into an act of such destruction toward another human. I
remember getting called out by a coach during my junior year and the
first week of pads with my new team when I transferred high schools -
after the third divorce. The coach stopped the play and asked in a
booming yell "WHO HIT Byrne!!???!??" I didn't answer. "WHO HIT
BYRNE???!" I thought I was going to get in trouble for sending the
starting senior running onto his back about five yards behind the line of scrimmage. It was also
the day after my mom and I had a heated argument that ended with me
staying at a friends house. Leaving wasn't something I had ever done
before -not like this. But I put all the aggression regarding my
family situation into that hit, and most of the other hits that were
notable in my career. I can't imagine having a son and not wanting to
somehow get a tape of him playing football or watch him get awarded
Valentine's Prince or the myriad of other things that are good. I
can't imagine not being there for him when he needs a friend- when
things aren't "good". I can't imagine talking to him in his growing
up years and not trying to find some excuse to see him, even if it's
just a VHS tape from a random Friday night game. I have spent the
majority of my life without any real family that is staying or
lasting. I have no brothers, no real cousins and that is what it is.
So when I see some time in my schedule and stupidly offer to spend it
with a dad who I have softened my heart toward in my later years and
get rejected... well it makes me want to put some football pads on.
My friendships are lasting because I care about others. But I have
learned to be okay with letting friendships go if they are unhealthy.
Why I still reach out to you is a question I need to keep wrestling
with.
I need to get better at being able to just let you go too, in a way I
guess- let you live in your world of not knowing how cool your son
really is, and somehow not take it personally. I have a few friends
who had dads die early in their childhood. I wonder if that is easier
to live with than the rejection time after time. I had thought I had
forgiven you for being disinterested in my life when I was younger. I
thought you had finally "learned" but most of that hurt came back with
my phone call to you this week. I am selfish for writing this to you,
because I am doing it for my own health. I just had to tell someone
how it felt... and how it feels all over again.
Dad, I wish you the best- if I don't then it would mean I am not
taking the necessary steps forward for myself.

Ribs DeBoer

Get boneless country style ribs... but any cut will do I just hate
wasting space by adding the bone in there.

You Need:
Pork Country Style ribs boneless. (I like to cook about 8-12 lbs)
Liquid Smoke
Lawry's Seasoning Salt
2 litre of some cola full sugar... but you only use about 2-3 cans worth
BBQ sauce

A dutch oven and a grill and regular oven.

Directions:
Use a big dutch oven or other big pot. Mine has a custom rack in the
bottom that lifts the meat off of the liquid that sits about an inch
high.

Put the rack in the bottom of the pot. Fill pot with 1/2" of water
or so (halfway to the meat).

sprinkle the meat while in the plastic on the top side with lawry's
seasoned salt.

lay that seasoned side down in one layer and pour a sugarry cola on
like coke or Dr.Pepper basting the meat. How much cola?...
Well...Watch your liquid level in the bottom and plan out the same
amount of cola going in for the next two or three layers of meat.
(You don't want the liquid touching the underside of the lower layer
of ribs when finished.)

So you've poured some cola now sprinkle with lawry's again the top side.

add another layer of seasoned-side-down meat.

pour some more cola on, basting this next layer.

sprinkle some lawry's on the top side of the new meat layer.

add another layer of seasoned side-down meat, sprinkle lawry's and
cola-ize if you have room...

then pour two or three "cap-fulls" of Liquid Smoke kinda down a gap
in the meat and a few drops on the meat on the top.

bake in oven at about 300 degrees for 2-4 hours or 250 for 3-5 hours.

Then pull the meat out carefully since it will want to fall apart and
place the pieces on something so that you can start slathering your
favorite BBQ sauce on them. grill them for a bit to carmelize the
sauce and fill your gut until you can barely move from the table

Oil cooler adapted to a 1982 CB650

I found a guy in Oz who machines an adapter plate in between the oil filter cover and the crankcase. We will run lines going in and out of the adapter plate up to an oil cooler from a later model bike like a CB900 or a nighthawk from the mid-80's.

He needed a picture of the area just to machine it perfectly so I posted some here for him.

I'll have to remove the horn I bet, hopefully I can keep my chains that work as my bar stop so that the clubmans don't hit the tank.