Organizing Chaos and Pushing on a Rope

A week ago Thursday, after the big windstorm finished blowing through, I was up on a ridgeline in the
northern Black Hills checking on a radio repeater antenna. I was going along the trail when I saw, up
near the top of a yellow bark Ponderosa Pine, a ratter tattered fellow sitting on a branch. I shot a line
up to him and he climbed down. Gave him a cup of coffee and some my lunch and he told me he had
been walking along a road north of Spokane, when the Paluser (windstorm) ...

I just finished "The Big Burn" by Timothy Egan. If you have an interest in the battles between
the Robber Barons of the Gilded Age and the Teddy Roosevelt Progressives. The book tells how the
US Forest Service and the National Forests were established and about the 1910 Fire that saved
both of them. I now have a better understanding of how the Forest Service came by it's aversion to
wild fires.

What hit home hard for me was the descriptions (based ...

Well, the aspen and birch are starting to change colors at the higher elevations of the Black Hills, the understory at the lower elevations (poison ivy, wild grapes, gooseberry bushes) are at the peak of color this week. The nights are getting down into the mid 40's and the sun is setting earlier every day.

The wildlife feel the changes coming, the deer and elk are chowing down putting on that last bit of fat for the winter. The bighorn sheep are moving down the mountain sides ...

The ramp up is over and it is here!!!!! The 70th edition of the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally and Races!
One of those events of organized chaos that help clear the mind and repair the soul. The feeling of
daredevil freedom that comes from doing 85 mph down the road with the wind in your face, the roar
of the engine, the heat of the exhaust and then sharing a spot of shade with another like minded
individual just can't be beat. For that brief period you aren't anything but part ...

I finally got a vacation!
Day 1
1 Drive for 5 hours - see Moose at Burgess Junction, Wyoming
2. Drive for 3 hours - Found a Drive Through Bar in Frannie Wyoming
Send night in Laurel Montana - don't like being that near to oil refineries (We were going to camp but with the wife and I getting over pneumonia we decided to stay in motels)
Day 2
1. Drive for 4 hours visit Walmart in Butte Montana (Hey we had to have certain supplies)
2. Try to explain ...