EDS Bike Show

Tuesday was the rescheduled EDS bike show. It probably worked out better as it got a bit more visibility, and allowed for some additional perks including a (brief) appearance by the Teutuls of OCC and American Chopper fame. There were a total off 69 bikes entered, of all shapes and sizes incliding a bicycle, a moped, several racing bikes including a drag bike, jap bikes, American V-twins, a trike and even a Honda Rune.

Unfortunately as previously there was rain scheduled and even more so this time, it actually came, in buckets! We had rainfall of up to 8 inches in the North Texas area, I think in Plano/Mckinney we had multiple inches as well. Of course as soon as the show ended the skys opened up, with severe weather. I got ready and left as soon as I could, but it was not soon enough and got thoroughly soaked on my way home. In fact my feet were wet before I even left the parking lot. I don't have a lot of experience in the rain, but that was probably as hard a rain as any I have driven in, even in a car.

Wildflower Ride

Well this weekend was the Wildflower Ride. I must say, if you were to be plopped down in Texas, at this time of the year, in this part of the country, you would never want to leave! What a great trip, beautiful sites, sounds and smells.

We took off Friday morning, all told I believe we had 62 bikes depart, I don't know what the final count was. It was a unique KSU, as we had a friendly police officer block traffic so all 5 pods could leave at the same time. With the additional 50 or so miles from Mckinney, we put on about 380 miles that day, with a couple of nice detours and the Willow City Loop. We rode some of the best rides in the Hill Country on Friday and this weekend, without a doubt.

Saturday was a bit more of the same, our group was the laid back group, a shorter ride perhaps but a lot of fun. We went and had BBQ at Coopers in Llano, which was phenomonal.

Friday night's meal was at the Auslander Restaurant in Fredericksburg and Saturday was BBQ (hams, hots, sausages) back at the hotel. Both nights were a lot of fun.

On Sunday Marv led us home, heading out in wet conditions. We had some unfortunate occurances however. After a relatively problem free weekend, we had two bikes go down. We passed Kim and Glen on the side of the road, thinking Kim may be having some discomfort as Glen waved everybody on, however she was (unknown at the time) nursing a broken hand and waiting for Luke to come and rescue Old Blue. In the end the news all around was a lot better than it could have been.

I have to double check my mileage but I think it was around 850 miles total.

NASCAR

Well, the weekend is over, everyone has recovered. NASCAR is over and on to the next track. What a blast! Dale and Peter left this am. They arrived Wednesday of last week and we went to the Texas Motor Speedway on Thursday. We rented an RV and stayed next to Darlene's boss' family. It was a lot of fun, and a lot of liquor! The weather was fairly typical of this time of year, with a cold front keeping temperatures down a bit.

We caught some Busch qualifying on Thursday, some NASCAR practice on Friday and then the weather got severe! Tornado warnings, everyone that was in the facility, including us, had to huddle in the bathrooms. A tornado touched down in Haltom City, which is about 15 miles south of the track. All other events for the evening, including NASCAR qualifying and the DALE movie were cancelled. The cold weather and mud unfortunately kept the wildlife at bay as well...

Saturday was the Busch race, it was a good race, good seats. Sat night Peter was a passenger in a race car and he was very excited.

Sunday we had Pit Pavilion passes, so we had some goodies and a pit pass. we were in the pits for almost 2 hours and I got tons of pictures. They closed the pits 1 hour before the start of the race, we went back to truck, got beer and got to race after the Nat anthem, but before the green flag! Talk about cutting it close.

The race was very exciting, Peter got ticked cause Jr, got taken out of the race by a wreck initiated by Tony Stewart.

Of course the truck was parked where we left it in the morning, which was great for the mornings events but not in relation to our seat. After a short delay where we knew we would not be able to move the truck, we walked the half mile to the RV. We ate, and eventually went back to get the truck. Oh, the weather on Sunday was fantastic. We overdressed of course as it warmed up more than expected.

all in all a very fun and exciting weekend.

New Home

Well, we got moved on the weekend. Easter Weekend. Actually ended up having lots of help, was a bit concerned as a lot of folks were unavailable. We had 2 large uhauls, did the first 2 loads in 2 hours, the next two took a bit longer, misc stuff, odd shaped, we didn't pack as well etc. Sunday went back and spent almost 5 hours fininsing up the remainder of stuff and cleaning old house.

Living out of boxes, working from home this week till Dale and Peter arrive then we'll be taking some vacation and heading to Nascar.

Next weekend is the wildflower ride, I guess by the middle of
May we may be relatively unpacked!

Going through riding withdrawals though!

PTP Preride

This past Saturday we did the Pass The Pigs route to make sure and prepare for where the piglets will be setting up. The route is around 130 mile. Its basically from Corinth, to Celina, to Krum, to Lewisville, and pretty much all good FM roads.

Tomorrow is Friday and there is a bike show scheduled at EDS, hopefully the weather will cooperate. The bike show is part of the annual Byron Nelson festivities and this year, EDS had teamed with Orange County Choppers to build a theme bike, actually 3 of them. One goes to the winner of the tournament, one goes to the highest bidder at auction and the third as an EDS travelling icon for lack of better term.

Also have been progressing on the move, getting ready everything seems to be falling into place, although the pool is going to take some more work.

5 Down

Well, we are back, quite the ride. 450 miles on Saturday, we left the house at 6:15 am, and 528 miles back on Sunday. I guess that's pretty close to 1000 miles this weekend!

We got 5 Challenge points this weekend and they were in fact pretty challenging! Great weather Saturday, cloud cover and a bit windy Sunday but no rain and not cold. Although at this time of year the temp varies a bit, especially if you start when its still dark out. A couple of u-turns this weekend but not excessively so. Some great roads in East Texas.

Saturday in Nacogdoches there was a flower market or some such thing downtown right in front of the statue. We drove around a bit, then went for lunch. When we came back it had cleared out enough we were able to get all 11 bikes taken care of. We hit the harley dealer on the way out. They were having their chili cookoff so it was hoppin', lots of bikes around. Next stop the monument then on to Kemah.

Kemah was south east of Houston, and there must be only one way into the boardwalk. What a traffic nightmare. The last 5 miles of the trip probably took us 30-40 minutes. Lots of fun at the Aquarium Restaurant with the group.

Sunday morning off again at 7:30. This time we had 14 bikes. By the time we got to our 5 and final point of the trip, in Gruene, it was getting well into the day. Of course there was a festival going on in Gruene, so another exercise in creative photography was required. Holly, bless her heart, was able to coerce the sherrif that was directly traffic to accomodate us in from of the Dance Hall. It was around 3:00 in the afternoon, maybe a bit later and we still had many miles left to go. Five of us decided not to take the scenic route and to scoot up 35 instead....

What a nightmare, we probably lost about 90 minutes due to traffic. There was a major backlog south of Austin (surprise, surprise) then some more south of Waco, but the worst was about 10 miles south of the 35 split. That took forever to get through! Well we eventually got home about 8:30 pm.

Lone Star Challenge

This weekend a group will be riding to work on the Lone Star Challenge. We are planning to go, albeit on short notice.
I played around with Windows Live / Virtual Earth and have created a "collection" of the locations. So, I'm going to see if I can post the link here...

Lone Star Challenge - 2007

This weekend is the eastern leg and is supposedly 5 points, but not sure exactly which 5. Nacogdoches is one point for sure, 300 miles Saturday, 500 miles on Sunday. Light drinking Saturday night I guess!

Great Weekend

Well, the weather held up, and unfortunatley is still holding up, at least in this part of North Texas. Saturday was a great day, it actually got into the 80's and I don't think there was a cloud. Sunday was similiar, not quite as warm and it started to clould over a bit mid afternoon, but no rain.

Saturday we had 33 bikes on the lunch ride. Nice roads, funny how you head south to go north... We had a bit of a train delay in Justin, but were soon back on the road. We pretty much headed straight home after lunch do to house stuff, but ended up napping more than working!


Sunday Darlene was suffering from allergies from Saturday ride, so she did not go to the St Pattys day ride, but I did. Forgot to set clocks to DST so almost missed it! I ended up with a straight, I thought I may win the best hand but didn't want to stick around for the next 3 hours. I didn't get anything in the mail so I guess I didn't win.

The rain in around us but not quite hitting us. Hopefully today, its not far off and heading this way. Yesterday we were about 100 miles north of 4 inches. Lavon needs rain!

Wild Hogs!

If the weather holds up should be a great weekend. Tonight we are going to the movies! AE HOG is going to see Wild Hogs. So far we have over 70 folks going. Show is at 6, gonna have to boogie to get there on time.

Tomorrow is a lunch ride to Jacksboro. Hopefully on the way home we can work on some of our points, either ABCs or LOH Scavenger hunt.

Sunday is the Dallas HOG St Patrick's day ride. Unfortuately the weather is not looking too promising for Sunday.

Also have some work to do around the house and to start getting things ready. One month to go till close!

What to do...

We had our chapter meeting on Saturday. Lots of stuff going on. Plenty of scheduled rides and lots of activities in addition to those rides. Some of the events include club events, like the Lone Star Challenge and the LOH scavenger hunt. Additionally there are other chapter "tours" like "around the world in Texas", etc. Also would like to do the ABC's of Touring the HD HOG event. The problem is that a lot of these types of activities require short stops for pictures, which pretty much contradict the other riding activity, especially when travelling in a group. So I think the plan will be to partipate in those either on returns from destinations, especially if day trips or on weekends when we don't have a specific destination.

Got my 10K service done on Saturday as well. Switched to Synthetic oil. Have a new rear tire, so I should be good to go for a while now.

On Saturday night we went to the Rendevouz Reunion which is kind of the kick off for this years rendevouz ride, to the Black Hills. Hopefully we will be able to take that ride.

Milestone

Well this weekend my odometer clicked over 10,000 miles. Less than one year from purchase date, actually by that anniversary we will have had several other short trips as well as the wildflower ride. So it is quite likely I will have another 1K on by that time. Time for the big one, the 10K checkup. I'll get them to out Syn3 in it since that is all they carry at the dealership and also get them to give it a very thorough check. That is the last of my prepaid service so may as well get anything I can out of the way.

Saturday was the regional chili cookoff hosted by Texas HD in Bedford. What a day! The wind was unreal. Sustained winds in 30-40 mph, with gusts up go 60. I rode into the wind getting there, good thing since when I left to go home we were in the midst of a major dust storm. Probably the worst I'd seen here yet. Visibility was less than 3/4 miles. My bike and clothes got filthy riding home. Interesting experience in such strong winds, but not as bad as I expected.

Sunday was a lunch ride, short ride to Sanger. But afterwards we went for a bit of an tour. Went with Larry and Holly and a couple of others. They were booking it. Why? There was no need to get anywhere as fast as we could. Anyway we ended up breaking off from them and took a more liesurely pace, took 902 accross to 75. Good little road through a couple of small towns. It was fun. We ended up putting about 180 miles on Sunday, that was when I clicked over.

Spring Has Sprung!

Wow, what a gorgeous week! Another day forecast in upper 70's. Yesterday was the dinner ride, since the weather was so nice, we rode. Its the first dinner ride we have ridden our bikes in several weeks. Maybe even since November or December. We've taken our cars since then and each ride there has been few bikes, probably no more than 5 or 6 on average. Well you could tell it was the first nice day in a long time yesterday. We had 50 bikes on the ride and a total of 78(?) people I think at the restaurant. That's probably as big a dinner ride as I've been on.

Lots of new faces and some that we haven't seen in a while so that was all good, other than the fact that we probably overwhelmed the restaurant!

Also, Lindsey E was in town, so he joined us over at the restuarant. He had fun, not sure it was what he was expecting or prepared for... So I buy him 50-50 tickets, and he wins a prize! He'll be back in town next week and will likely come out to house to see the boys.

Almost forgot. Its getting into riding season again. We have t-storms forecast for weekend but if weather holds, the regional chili cookoff in Bedford, and a lunch ride on Sunday. woo-hoo!

Change in the Weather

Finally! Beautiful day, forecast to be a beautiful week. Even yesterday was nice and warm although very windy. Rode to work today. Temps got up to at least 78F, that's the temp now at 4:00. Forecast for 70's tomorrow and Thursday as well. Continued warm but thunderstorms at end of week. Will need to ride some more this week!

Waiting on my CB set, checked with Ryan has not come in yet, I thought it would be in by today.

Offer in on house, looking like a done deal.... fingers and toes crossed.

New Owners

Not much riding this past weekend, too much house stuff going on, with our house showing and looking for a new one. But I did go to the dealership Saturday morning and participate in the New Owners orientation. I took some pics have one to submit for the newsletter of the group.

It had warmed up a bit over the weekend and this week should be nice. The ride Saturday was quite windy. I took 720 to try to avoid some of the wind, but its hard to do. Although I am sure on 380 the wind would have been very severe in some stretches.

I wanted to ride today but have to go to Ft Worth for a meeting. Hopefully most of the remainder of the week I'll ride to work.

Events are starting to crop up on weekends, nothing significant for a while just some short day trips and things. Next weekend is the "regional" chili cook off so I may go down an cheer on the teams.

No rides...

No rides this weekend, too much to do. House is ready to go, now comes the fun part. We did meet up with some of the group on Sunday for an outing. Wine tasting then on to Mexican. Dinner ride this week, is Mexican. Hmmm, there is a trend here.... I'm not a big fan of Mexican, but this is Texas so I guess that is the popular fare. But also for reasonable prices Mexican is usually a good choice.

Weather this week doesn't look too condusive to riding either. Its raining today, supposed to be quite cold the next two days, below freezing at night, although forecast for Friday is looking pretty good! Maybe a ride to work.

Missed hockey last night as our thing went on too late for me to make it. No hockey this week, I think I need to do some other exercise activity...

LOH Granbury

Well this past weekend was "Girls Camping Weekend". The LOH went to Granbury TX, not too far a ride but just enough. The weather was fairly frigid on Saturday when they left, below freezing, but fortunately was warming up. On the board a lot of them were getting electric gear if they did not already have. I think a total of 9 girls rode bike and the remainder went down in cars. Interesting ride or so I've heard...

The girls had fun and all made it back safe.

I went for a short ride over to the dealership Saturday then a liesurely ride back home.

Working on prepping the house...

Oops almost forgot, it was Super Bowl Sunday as well, I watched the game, in bits and pieces, missed most of the commercials.

This week in Hockey...

Well, its one of those weeks. Three games back to back to back, Tuesday, Wednesday and tonight.

Tuesday was a great game, we ended up winning 7-6 in OT. After being on the ice the first shift when they scored 2 goals in the first 50 seconds (YIKES!) we managed to get back in the game and I actually scored the game winning goal from a slapshot in overtime! Whoo Hoo!!!

Last night was a D game, we won 5-2, I scored the first goal off a deflection in front of the net. That game was surprising rough against a chippy team, HFL.

Tonight however I don't know that we will fare as well. We are down 7-8 regulars, including our goalie. We have a couple of subs, but the team we are playing has some goal scorers. Several of us have played all three games as well. We will see.

A very Chili Weekend!

Saturday was the annual Chili cookoff at the dealership. While I didn't cook, I did taste and sample. There were 6 (I think) different chili's all of them were quite good, some better than others. My personal favorite was Renegade Roadkill Chili. Real meat as opposed to hamburg, but the overall taste and consistency was quite good as well. The festivities were fun and the presentation of the chilis was guite good and fun as well. But you know I think the leadup was a big part of it. There was a huge posting on the message board with lots of banter back and forth. Additionally there was lots of "private" banter in email and phone calls apparently between some of the contestants.

The ride home was an interesting one. There was a bit of rain overnight and when we left to go to the dealership it was quite nice. Of course while we were there, a cold front blew in. Reports of rain/hail were coming in. We booked it as soon as the festivities and awards were over. About halfway home on 380 rode right into the rain. It was windy, a good crosswind, cold, very wet and a bit of hail/sleet. We made it home ok, but it was a slow go. Ryan said it hailed about 5 minutes before we pulled into the house.

Sunday Darlene went to her Rider's Edge Advanced class at TMS. She left about 6:45 am, it was about 27F when she left. By 10 it was still only about 30. I think it warmed up to about 44. She did well, got her certification and made it home by 4. Long cold day, with lots of hard riding. She's pretty sore today.

This ain't my first rodeo...

Yesterday we were treated to the Fort Worth Stock Show Rodeo, courtesy of Robert (Cowboy) and his wife. We went with Larry and Holly as well. It was the afternoon show and was a lot of fun. This is one of the big rodeos. The seats we had were box seats, right beside the bucking chutes. I took a ton of pictures, several of which turned out pretty well I think. It was indoors so I shot at ISO 1600, unfortunately even at that speed the shutter speed was relatively low, hand hold in most cases, but there was a lot of motion on the arena floor. I'll post some pics after I process them a bit.

We were right against the arena, and although we kept relatively dirt free, one bucking bull did know Darlene's beer all over her as it smashed into the wall directly in front of us!

Winter Storm!

Well as typical, our latest winter storm was a bit of a bust. Actually thankfully we are in DFW, not Austin, who seems to have made out much worse. Austin never gets this kind of weather and they are not faring well. All in all we had a lot of rain, and by the time if froze, a lot had dried up. On Monday, MLK day so kids were home as were several businesses, it was a bit hazordous in the morning, but by mid day it was sunny, albeit still cold, and windy so the roads pretty well cleared. I worked from home and in the morning when I had a chance I went out and took a couple of pictures.