A couple of milestones reached

3000_iphone_2462In case you don’t know the story: I’ve been trying to get to the 3,000 mile mark on my mountain bike for the longest time.  Technically speaking, I’m several hundred miles past it…but due to various speedometer failures over the years I’ve never seen it indicated, and therefore I’ve never considered it “official”.  That is, until today.

With my various medical things going on lately, I really didn’t expect to be out on a bike this weekend.  I did ride, though, without anything unusual, and spent part of the trip pulling over at a park to play catch with my oldest little boy (I had mitts, a baseball, and water bottles in my backpack).   I didn’t do anything aggro, no wheelies or endos, and chose to take it easy. The last time I threw caution to the wind on a mountain bike while still recovering from surgery, I tore my kneecap in half and nicked an artery with one of the pieces.  Serious stuff I’d rather not repeat.

 

3000_iphone_2495I managed to get out on two of my motorcycles tonight, too, and while giving my youngest little boy a ride I noticed that I was about to reach the same milestone on that particular machine.  A few blocks from home the odometer ticked over to 3000.0, and we pulled over for a quick snapshot of photographic proof.  Awesome.

This “new normal” we’re going through right now seems a lot more normal now that I’ve been able to spend some time on two wheels.  Maybe there will be some camera time ahead, too!

Sign of the times

sb_sign_29154I got a chuckle out of this sign as I drove by on Airport Road tonight.  I’m as weary as the next guy of this non-Spring we’ve been having.  The bitter winter didn’t help much, either.  I know we NoDaks are resilient and have historically turned bitter cold into bragging rights, but everybody I know is fed up.  Hopefully Spring does come and stick around (although there’s a freeze warning for tonight).

sb_sign_29154This reminds me of a great sign I spotted a while back. A long while back, since the Donut Hole has been Bearscat for quite some time.  But it’s a Star Wars reference, which means it’s timeless.

Check out the Signs, Logos, and Typos category here on the ol’ Blog for some of my favorites.

One good crane deserves another

st_alexius_crane_29075Two days in a row I was treated to views of people lifting very, very heavy things with machines that look right out of my boyhood Matchbox collection.  This time around was actually a crane lifting a crane, as the sections of a big tower crane were assembled for some ongoing work at St. Alexius.

 

st_alexius_crane_29089By the time I’d taken the first picture in this post, they had already attached the main part of the crane to the tower.  That just left this 200-foot boom to attach.  It was assembled in pieces on a set of stands, which had to be detached, and then carefully lifted without getting snagged on the tree (right), hitting the stoplight (left), or getting hooked on the streetlight (center).

 

st_alexius_crane_29135That’s not distortion in my lens, apparently.  I could see the boom of the yellow crane bow visibly under the weight of its payload at that extension.  I pointed it out to one of the crew and he saw it too, so either we’re both nuts or it actually bowed a bit.

 

st_alexius_crane_29150This is an enormous undertaking, but I’m told that this tower crane will have plenty of work to keep it busy this summer.  In order to even erect this crane, footings had to be prepared for it to be mounted.  It’s self-supporting with no guy wires or anything, so its stability has to come from deep underground.

I actually have some more really neat crane footage that I shot years ago that I may have to re-share here.  I’ve got a lot of respect for these operators, mostly because I could never be patient enough to do their job.  It obviously takes a cool head and a lot of focus to be in control of these cranes, because one mistake could be very expensive and possibly fatal.

So there ya have it…after a long dry spell, I got the camera out of the bag two days in a row!  Not a bad way to round out the week.

An uplifting night, for me and the boat

riverboat_crane_28917

As part of another First Day of the Rest of My Life, it was a blessing to have a date night with my sweetie as our boys went out with their grandma.  After a satisfying Italian dinner we went for a little cruise and saw that the riverboat was about to be hoisted into the Big Muddy.

 

riverboat_crane_28950The gigantic crane from CJ (I like those initials, obviously) was already in place, and the conditions appeared to be perfect.  It suddenly occurred to me that, even though I’ve been unable to wield it in a while, I had my camera in the truck.  Since my wife is among the most gracious of women, she agreed that it’d be fun if we stopped to watch and take a few photos.

 

riverboat_crane_29063Nothing happens quickly with a crane; when heavy things start moving quickly, damage occurs.  After all, mass x velocity = FORCE.  That’s the last thing one needs when balancing a load high above the ground.  Slowly but surely the crew eased the big ol’ boat into the river and held it in place until the pilot could get all systems up and running and power it out into the channel.

You may notice a gap in the sequence of my photos.  That’s because, as a video guy, I felt the urge to actually shoot some video clips of the event.  A time lapse would have been nice, but the dock’s undulating movement from passing watercraft made that more hassle than I’d prefer.  So here are a few video clips I slapped together this morning:

You can view it in high definition on YouTube.  I also saw something else from the dock that was pretty cool, but I’ll be posting that later.

Almost had some sundogs

sunset_iphone_2358It would be an understatement to say that my life’s gone through an upheaval in the past six months, medically and otherwise.  That’s why you haven’t seen a lot of new photos lately.  I’ve simply been unable to get out with my camera, a situation that’s been just short of maddening.

Well, I was out on a friend’s land last night, enjoying the vista of open prairie, and happened to notice that we almost had a couple of really nice sundogs from the developing sunset.  On the left of the sun you can see one forming, and even a hint of one on the right.  The conditions weren’t quite right for really well-developed refractions, but it was still a cool sight…especially since it’s been so long for me to even gaze at the sky.

In a way, today is one of those “first day of the rest of your life” kind of days.  I’m not out of the woods yet, but I’m also not facing some dire prognosis either.  I’ve got more medical stuff ahead of me, I’ve sold our house to adjust for now and downsized my life significantly, but I’ve got prayer and loving friends on my side.  So as one stage of my life sunsets, I look forward to what the Lord has in store for us as we claw our way back to a new “normal”.  I’m sure it will include a lot of new photos to share at some point.

Bismarck Tribune article shows racism, bigotry, hatred, hostility, and abusiveness

bistrib_20140504_1I love North Dakota history, and the truly fascinating stories of many North Dakotans remain untold or in danger of disappearing into total obscurity.  That’s why I’m such a big fan of columns by Curt Eriksmoen for the Bismarck Tribune.  But today’s column about Hilaire du Berrier treads on dangerous ground with its Hostile and Abusive™ content.


bistrib_20140504_2
As you can read in the text of the above graphic, Curt makes a couple of racist, bigoted, hateful, hostile, and abusive comments about the neighboring Native American people:

  • He calls them Sioux;
  • He accuses them of bravery;
  • He asserts that they accepted dangerous challenges.

What, you say?  Why the offense?  Exactly.  These are the very same things that have been targeted and banished by the NCAA with regard to the UND Fighting Sioux logo and nickname.

I haven’t been to a UND hockey game since the banishment of the logo and nickname, but before a video used to play prior to the games.  It described the brave heritage of the Sioux warriors and the admired characteristics that were inspiration for the UND Fighting Sioux moniker.  I can’t forget the quote by Archie Fool Bear of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe: “We went to a hockey game, and they talked about the courage and integrity of the Sioux people. We looked at each other like, ‘Wow, we don’t even honor our Sioux warriors or veterans like this on the reservation.’ ”

It’s unfortunate that I have to drag Curt Eriksmoen into this, but it shows the hypocrisy of the NCAA and opponents of the Fighting Sioux name.  One could say that he obviously didn’t mean anything offensive or controversial by his generalizations about the local Native American population, and I agree – but neither did the proponents of the UND Fighting Sioux.  For our beliefs we were branded as Racists™ and other typical epithets used by the “politically correct” enforcement goons.  Hopefully the same doesn’t happen to Curt or the Bismarck Tribune.

And I used to think I took too many of these

sunset_28907I used to chase sunsets on an almost daily basis, then post the results here.  Maybe that’ll resume someday, but for now I have plenty of irons in the fire.  I’ve gone through a number of major changes in various aspects of my life over the past several months, and my cameras have barely seen the light of day as a result.  It’s about time to change that as time allows.

Take, for instance, tonight.  I was actually able to witness a sunset.  It’s odd that I’ve had little opportunity to do that lately, but I’m glad things are starting to resemble normal in the middle of all this chaos.  I was able to grab a somewhat decent shot, and it felt GREAT.

Here’s looking forward to more normalcy…and sunsets.

It’s even the perfect color!

lambo_iphone_2124Anyone who knows me knows that I love that Kawasaki Green.  I’ve been a diehard Kawasaki fan for decades and have owned many green bikes over the years, including two of my bikes now.   I have lots of lime green possessions as well, many of which have little or nothing to do with motorcycles.

That’s one reason why I spotted this car from a LONG distance yesterday.  I’m sure many of you saw it making the rounds, or parked at Hu Hot, or wherever else it was cruising around.  Awesome. Lamborghinis have been among my favorite cars since junior high school (I’m sure most boys agree), but they’re a rarity around here.  Maybe the Bakken boom has something to do with their appearance.  Out of respect for the privacy of the owner, I obscured the license plate – but I will say that it was a North Dakota plate.

I heard an unconfirmed report of an orange one in town too, but I’m not sure if that one is very credible.  In any case, they sure do add to the scenery here in Bismarck-Mandan!

At this point, I guess they’re probably just doing it for my amusement

The City of Bismarck has put out a notice that load restrictions on the city’s roads started on March 15th.  It gives me the perfect opportunity for a little good-natured ribbing over the “Restrictions in Effect” signs traditionally seen around Bismarck this time of year. Restrictions of what nature, you ask? If your only source of information was these signs, I suppose it’s anyone’s guess.

I first saw these signs go up a few years ago (and every Spring since) and thought they were pretty funny. It’s because of the load restrictions I mentioned, but the signs omitted that detail. It’s only after someone figured out what was missing (maybe they read this blog) and wedged a little “Load” in there that the signs made sense:

This is how the corrected signs look. I am still occasionally surprised to find an unmodified one posted. As I drove down Centennial yesterday, I noticed that someone’s going to have to dig through a drawer for another “Load” sticker!