Waldon Woods

Sometimes it feels like only yesterday I was a kid exploring the woods around our house.... easing through the ferns that grew to my shoulder...... avoiding stepping on dried leaves and dead-fall that would scare the wild life. Somewhere along the way and very early on, I discovered that I had a knack for learning the habits of every creature I came across. I became aware of how to track nearly anything that touched the ground and discovered that walking a certain way would leave almost no track. For animals or man. You have to look close and know what to look for to see what isn't obvious. A leaf flipped over to it's darker side while others are sun dried; pine straw bent a certain way or having a woven appearance from being stepped on while others lay flat; dew knocked off a leaf when all others show beads of humidity like silver pearls..... little things. It allowed me to get closer than I could have dreamt to so many of natures creatures.

But it was oh so many years ago.

A few things that have remained with me through the years is knowing when an animal will do certain things, where to look for them, and the rush from being able to be so close to them they never know you're there. Some patterns never change from generation to generation.

Since moving to our new house, I've once again been able to explore the woods as I did in my childhood. I still love being close to nature and can read the woods as I did so long ago. Something else that hasn't changed is that animals don't seem to mind me being in their domain. Some will even draw nearer to me just as they did some 30 years ago just to find out exactly what I am. I know other people that hunt religiously every season and can't get within a hundred yards of critters. That has never been an issue for me, and I enjoy the rush I get from being so close to them.

I took a few photos today of some of the creatures we have living around the house and doing so once again brought on that rush of excitement I got so many years ago.

This is the Guardian of the Dish. He/she is as big as my hand and I think is responsible for the demise of several small birds.
Speaking of small birds, this is our local nectar addict......but on the "gravity challenged" side of the scales. This mean little shit fights off all other hummingbirds and won't share. Definitely not gonna make it in this rapidly changing political environment. Damn, I love this bird.
I was looking outside as I opened a Stone Brewery IPA Ruination and discovered that Lunch and Dinner were outside enjoying the flora and fauna. So I eased out the front door to take a closer look and took my camera with me. Lunch is on the right, by the way.
Lunch is getting a bit of gray around her snout, so she is probably heading into her last winter this year. Can you hear me now?
Not only is Dinner more than curious, she's down right stupid. This last shot is within 12 feet of her destiny. The shot is blurry because I had just a tad bit of adrenalin flowing and couldn't hold the camera still that well.

I'm not planning to hunt any of the deer on our property because I like to have them around. I can't keep the deer captive to keep them safe from other hunters bordering the property though because that is the nature of things. I can, however, ensure that no-one sneaks onto our property to hunt. That's more fun anyway...........

Things are humming right along...

It's been nearly two weeks since being admitted to hospital to try and find out exactly what was going on and unfortunately all the tests came back inconclusive. That's a good thing of course, but I'd really like to know exactly what the hell happened that made me grow so ill because it wasn't exactly like being in perfect health one day and the next laying in a bed with tubes and needles all over the place. My better half was a little more than ticked that I didn't say something sooner because I began feeling less than normal several weeks earlier and figured it would pass. Well, it didn't. It built up until the headaches, fatigue, and body aches sent me over the edge. I found it very hard to concentrate on menial tasks, so that was the final signal to get some medical help. Anyway, I've been at home and slowly getting better albeit slowly. Still taking some nausea inducing meds, but it's always better safe than sorry if it is Lyme's Disease.

On a different note, we've started working on several aspects of the house again and have bought tile for the kitchen and hardwood flooring for the living room. We have a door being built to our specs and should set the design tone of the house both interior and exterior. Now if we didn't have to work, we might be able to get the house done in the next 5 years. Maybe.Once we called it a day and I'd experimented with different wall textures in the foyer (neither of which we liked much), I spied some very quick movement around the hummingbird feeder. Indeed, we have some visitors. Two different couples in fact. It was a good chance to take some photos, so I took a stool outside and perched patiently for 45 minutes in order to capture about 10 photos, four of which I'm posting here. (Note to anyone wanting to buy a Canon digital Rebel: you need much faster ISO speed than 1600 to capture wing movement, so save up an buy a higher level camera). I was tinkering with camer settings so these aren't as good as they should be.

This is the male from the first couple:
Below is the male's partner. He hovered about a foot from me and to the left as she fed. Territorial little jokers for sure.
This is the male from the second couple. Below is the second male's partner. He wasn't so territorial with me but buzzed around making sure the previous male wasn't trying to corner in on his action.

New house, new lifestyle, new hospital visit

I can certainly think of better means of catching up on what all has occured since my last rambling, but it appears I'll have some time to kill the next few days spent in hospital so here it goes....

The new house - During our annual trip to White Springs, Fla. to ride the IDIDARIDE, we had two offers on our house, which was outstanding considering the state the economy and housing market were in. We took the most solid offer and became homeless for a few months. Well, not exactly. We stayed at Twin Oaks south of Perry, Ga. in a tiny - and I do mean tiny - cabin. Single file walking in that shoe box. That lasted 2 months until we were able to finally buy the house our real estate agent had shown us previously, but didn't want to pay what was asked since the house was in bad shape. Well, as luck would have it the owner was in the process of filing for bankruptcy and her creditor, Wells Fargo Financial, was trying to "short sale" the home to save their bacon and the owners. The original price of $200k had been dropped to $139k, so we jumped on it first with a full price offer and got it. In the end it was worth the hassle we went through to get 2800 sq. ft. house on 29 acres, but I'm not so sure I'd do it again considering we could have bought other homes that required no work and were move-in ready. I look at this new home as an opportunity to put my skills to work making it ours, and in the design style I want.

The lifestyle change - The new house is some 35 miles or so from where we work and is quite a change since we both were only 10 minutes from our respective jobs in the old house in Warner Robins. We can no longer pop out for something missing from a recipe, or walk to Subway for a sammich. We can no longer come home and casually get ready to join our fellow cyclists on the usual road or mountain bike rides during the week. BUT... the roads we live off of are nice and hilly for road rides and did I mention the 29 acres of land we now own? Yeah, we bought it to have our own private mountain bike trail we can ride anytime, can build it my way (not that that is the right way), and I think once the house painting and repairing is done our friends can come out, ride until they get their fill, have a beer or twelve with some brats or steak, shower off, and even park it for the night if they want. Oh, and we now live only 10 minutes from Arrowhead (boom) trail. And the most important aspect of our new home: we don't have mean little shithead kids screaming at each other or being screamed at by their shithead parents. Enough soap box, I feel better. We also have a few deer that keep pretty close to the center of our property because of all the dogs running loose out that way. We plan to fence in the property to keep the deer safe (til deer season) and the dogs out. Speaking of deer....I hope everyone knows that deer carry these interesting little creatures called ticks around. Which leads me to my next point.

The new hospital visit - I'm sitting here in room 437 of Warner Robins' hospital with an IV of ceftriaxone (aka, Rocephin) dripping its way into my bloodstream. It must be what the medical people call a "big gun" because it is making me feel - not so good. And, it made the wifey tear up when the neurologist mentioned the need for it. The reason for all this fuss is that I may have Lyme encephalopathy, or what is commonly called lyme's disease. This lovely disease got its name by geography and happenstance: around 1975 mothers of a group of children who lived near each other in Lyme, Connecticut, made researchers aware that their children had all been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. This unusual grouping of illness that appeared "rheumatoid" eventually led researchers to the identification of the bacterial cause of the children's condition, what was then called "Lyme disease" in 1982. Ticks carry the bacterium and it gets transmitted to a host when bitten. Not all ticks carry it, just the trusted ones who make the grade.

The past few weeks I've been feeling less than normal, heavily fatigued is putting it mildly, along with several other symptons: loss of motor function (coordination and movement), tingling in my arms and hands, joint stiffness, body aches, mild to severe headaches, sweats/chills, memory loss, and some confusion. More confusion than I normally experience anyway. I never once had the bulls-eye rash everyone, including doctors, expects.

Anyway, I've had the luxury of having 12 viles of blood drawn today and a CT scan with contrast. Yes, more needles. I just had visits from the neurologists, Dr. Parihar, and my friend and doctor, Dr. Fabian Franco. Both said my bloodwork was suprisingly normal and the CT scan was normal. Did they think I wasn't human or something, or didn't have a brain since it showed up on the CT scan? It is great news, however, because it appears I may not have lyme enceph-something afterall. Relieved I am, but still not looking forward to tonight and the morrow. MRI tonight, with contrast, fracken needles again.....and the coup d'etat tomorrow --> a spinal tap, or the softer verbage: lumbar puncture. They want to be sure, and so do I, that I don't have Lyme encepha-something because what few folks know is that during later stages of the disease miningitis may develop, heart failure can occur, hearing loss, and several other nasty ways of slipping down the slope of a miserable death. I know I'm worth more dead than alive, but damn-it man, I don't want to slip the surly bounds of earth just yet!

Guess I'll leave it at that for now. Getting really tired and I think the lab vampires are about to strike again.... Need a nap anyway since the old folks on this floor have a "gown streaking" planned for midnite they want me to lead. NAKED LAP!!!!!

And then, the fight began...

As I was about to mix a rum-n-coke, I was gently reminded by my better half that perhaps my love handles were becoming inverted winglets on the blimp of late...

"Maybe you don't need any more rum," she says.

"What do you mean?" I'm asking but wondering "am I drinking too much?"

"Rum has lots of calories and Coca Cola has even more" she says.

So I make a drink without any Coca Cola, and leave the conversation at an impasse. But, I figured why not add some pictures to express the humorous side of this.

(I "borrowed" photos from around the web for this, so THANKS to all whom contributed.)

"What do you mean gravity challenged?"

"Let me think 'bout this for a minute...... of times where I may have over indulged":

"uhmmm.........how did I get here again?"

Heineken's best swim wear for a kegger.....

"There it is again. I distinctly heard the word beer...."

"We're at a Chinese res-suarant. Whazzzza problem?"

"And da fruit azza bottom ish tastEEEEEEEEE TOO!!!!"

"I kin walsh jus fine ossiffer............."

"Those sonsabitches are gonna pay for this!!"

"They said open bar. Hiccup. I musta fell in or something.....................hiccup."

"I can neither confirm nor deny existence of said "tekillya" but the hat, if you must ask, protects me from invading worms of outer Mexico. That's my story, and I'm sicken to it."

"I have not yet begun to defile myself, thank you very much."

"Let's see now.........1.75 litres of rum minus 2 drinks minimum per day in a glass having a diameter of 3.5 inches and 4 inches tall.........pi times radius squared multiplied by 2-1/2 deviations for ice volume displacement times glass height..........allow for coefficient of linear expansion of Coca Cola times temperature shift for volume expansion and the delta of viscosity during consumption allowing for velocity outflow per Bernoulli's principle of non-laminar flow........would put the bottle on the middle shelf. And yet, it is somehow not there. Why is the rum always gone?"

But I always arise the next morning to ingest copious amounts of coffee, ...........which brings me around to the normality of my role as an instructor:

In all of this, I've come to the following conclusion:

So, whether or not I'm too fat, consume too much, or wind up sleeping in the strangest places............. just leave me the hell alone..............K?....................hiccup.........

"Hamp!"

A clearer view

Summer. The heat waves caressed the image as if it were a shimmering desert mirage. Wafting back and forth in clarity and near illusion like an object obscured by a solid sheet of water...........falling. There, but not precisely still. Wind blowing but not cooling. Refracting light through curved paths of confusion. Hot. Wicked heat. Beating down......and yet upward in collusion with wind to blind. Stifling. Can't breath. Sweat pours from brow to sting and blind.

"One minute left, now."

Without hesitation, I reached to adjust windage in truth observed. Ignore all else but what is seen.

"Breathe........slow breaths..........relax"

Calm the heart. BOOM-BOOM-BOOM. Calm the desire. BOOM-BOOM-BOOM. Calm the impulse. The sound of heart-beats like horse hooves clopping along cobblestones and swaying back felt in every pulse. Echoing throughout my body. BOOM............Boom..................boom

The strap was cinched tight. Connected from butt plate to fore-end. Wrapped so tightly around forearm and bicep that each heart pulse is felt and resounding like timpani emphasis for orchestra in chest and ear drums. Pulsing blood through artery and vein bouncing the cross-hairs up and down. Swinging wildly to and fro. Left hand numb from loss of circulation of sling pulled so tight. Tight. So tight. Bound by strap, jacket, and rifle. Right hand free to roam with fingers able to gently pull the stock back into my shoulder. Right index finger caressing a 2 ounce trigger.

"Send it."

Breathe.................exhaling........................CRACK!!!!!

Sharp recoil without reflex. Eyes back centered on target to watch the trail of sound waves, heat, and wind part.

"Hit! Send another." A familiar voice of assurance and trust but not congratulatory. A simple statement of achieving what is desired. Expected.

A smile crosses my face knowing that I'd struck true. Working the bolt without hesitation, another round was readied for the trip of more than half a mile. Heat. Sweat. Constriction. Wind blowing but no respiration granted. Squeeze the strap and lock into position. Bone structure support for a solid base. Breathe. Boom-Boom-Boom. Eye centered and target up. Boom-Boom-Boom. Exhale slowly. Time the bounce of the cross-hairs on target. Know when it settles. Know when to gently squeeze...

An outsider would only observe a person lying prone in sun-beaten August heat with rifle while wrapped in a long sleeve jacket with only a wide brim jungle hat of sorts to shade the sun from his eyes. Perfectly still. Seconds..............minutes drag by and no movement. And, wonder why.

I see only a set of cross hairs bouncing wildly with each heart-beat creating the asymmetric sign of infinity.....but always coming back to rest on center target. The frequency is predictable now. It doesn't matter what the season. Only the wind and light matter today.

My friend was sitting on a folding stool above and behind me peering through a 45 power spotting scope at a target a thousand yards away. Below him on the ground wrapped in a jacket made of many layers of cordura and leather that neither breathed nor gave "cooling" quarter to anyone crazy enough to embrace it, I lay dehydrating. Jacket, sling, rifle, Gehman glove, booney hat, and determination. Windage and elevation were all that mattered.

"Send it."

Breathe...............exhale........................CRACK!!!!!

"Hit!"

A familiar voice of knowledge. A friendly voice of comfort, confidence, and camaraderie. I roll slightly to my left to look back at my friend.................and he is not there.

I awoke to realize my friend had come to visit me one last time on the grounds that we had first met, and last parted in life - the grounds of a competitive rifle range. Maybe not the place most would picture meeting past friends, but to us it was near to heaven.

Life is a bit empty without my friend, and not a day goes by without remembering some of his jokes and funny viewpoints of life. Dan always did have a way of making you look at life through different eyes, and a lesson was to be learned or shared every time. It was always a clearer view......

K.I.S.S.

Keep It Simple Stupid...

Aaaahh.......the New Year's Resolution time is upon us. The time when we swear on whatever is most holy that we will follow through this year on a new resolution. "gonna lose 20 lbs....." "gonna quit smoking...", "gonna eat healthier...", "gonna stop surfing porn sites at work..."

What ever your worry-stone becomes for the new year, it should be assimilated so easily that it doesn't create added stress to everyday life. Why rob Peter to pay Paul? Why should it be a great sacrifice that is consuming every waking moment? I've tried doing calorie counting this past year and gained back 12 pounds over 6 months. WTF? I got good at identifying every food's required energy expenditure to maintain my weight and it served no good results. I gained the weight mostly from not exercising as much while still consuming the same calories. It was mostly a stress filled year of laziness. That may be an oxymoron.

I'm planning to keep it simple this year and go back to what worked for me 3 years ago when I dropped over 40 pounds in 9 months and got much stronger and faster on the bike. And, I did it in a healthy way rather than like most people do --> stop eating altogether. All that does is put your body in fat-packing mode.

It's just 4 simple things this year:

1st- Spread out my eating.
Rather than packing a full belly at prescribed times during the day, I'm going into "snack mode" to ramp up the metabolism. This doesn't mean Little Debbie's, crackers, and cokes from the junk vendor, but rather eating small meals 5-8 times a day to keep the growler from getting angry. Eating a small portion of baked chicken breast, fruit, unsalted mixed nuts, yogurt, etc. throughout the day instead of big meals.

2nd - Just ride.
I've got cold weather gear, rain gear for sprinkles, enough ways to carry water during hot days that 5 other riders needn't carry bottles, so why shouldn't I be riding? It doesn't have to be an epic ride, nor a ride for the sole purpose of seeing black spots of oxygen deprivation while trying to time the explosion of muscle and ligament fibers with complete exhaustion. Although I do enjoy those rides......

3rd - Enjoy the scenery.
It may be cliche to state the obvious fact that we only pass this way once, but I've missed a lot of my surroundings in each of my hobbies these last few years because I was focusing solely on whatever the goal was at that time. So, I plan to look around a bit in the coming months to see what I'm missing. I can honestly say that the only time I actually enjoyed flying this past year was on two occasions because I got to see what was around me rather than worrying about the next challenge. On road rides, I've only focused on the wheel in front of me or the 30 yards directly ahead on the open road. Just concentrating on breathing, eating enough, and drinking enough while keeping up and not getting dropped. I use to enjoy talking to whoever was on the rides, but I don't believe I got to know anyone this last year on the bike. And that's a shame. I enjoyed what little moutain biking I've done this past year, but we've got to start visiting other trails as I've become really tired of Thomson.

4th - "Just smile and wave boys.....smile and wave."
I guess the penguins from Madagascar said it best. There's no sense in stressing over the things you cannot change and no sense in creating stress for others.