Jan 012010
 

This New Year just kind of rolled in quietly for me. My work schedule gets me up before 5 AM most days and it’s hard to break that ritual on my days off. I had New Years eve and today off this year but last night was sleeping on the couch by 9:30 pm. Amazingly I woke up at about a quarter to midnight and was able to wish my sweetie a Happy New Years and give him a kiss. It didn’t last long though. Listened to a bit of the requisite fireworks in the distance and watched the dropping of the ball in Time Square (the station said live but of course this was not the case). By 12:30 AM I was back in bed.

2009 was an interesting and historic year. Barack Hussein Obama II became the 44th president of the United States. Why, I don’t know and hopefully time and history will figure it out. He has been a total disappointment and I am sure a lot of the people that voted for him are asking themselves what they were thinking. His obsession with the nation crippling health insurance reform seems to have put the important issues like the economy, record high unemployment, the threat of terrorism and our current military activities on the side burner. The amount of money Mr. Obama has spent during his first year in office is uncompromisable. The $787,000,000,000 stimulus bill, which congress didn’t even read and most of which is still to be distributed has not been shown to do any good to our economy. Just lots of big business bail outs, many of which should have just been left to fail. I guess all that campaign money paid off.

We lost a lot of people this year. Some I will miss, some not so much. Walter Cronkite passed at 92, Karl Malden made it to 97. Paul Harvey left us at 90 and Ricardo Montalban at 88 years young. Farra Fawcett at 62 and Michael Jackson at 50 both died on the same day. No one really paid much attention to Farra’s death as Michael took the spotlight. Ed McMahon outlived Jonny Carson by a few years but he never showed up with my check from Publishers Clearing House. Patrick Swazy lost his battle with pancreatic cancer at age 57. Billy Mays died at 50, not from a bump on the head as a lot of people think, but from heart disease. And Ted Kennedy checked out at 77. Enough about him…..

Washington State suffered the loss of six police officers in only eight weeks. On November 1st, Officer Timothy Brenton with Seattle police was killed and his partner wounded as that sat in their patrol vehicles discussing a traffic stop. On November 29th, four Lakewood Police officers, Greg Richards, 42, Tina Griswold, 40, Ronald Owens, 37, and Mark Renninger, 39 were executed while sitting in a coffee shop working on their laptop computers. I was honored to attend the Memorial Service in Tacoma. On December 21st, two Pierce County deputies were shot while responding to a disturbance call. Deputy Kent Mundell died from his injuries on December 28th.

Some interesting sudden fame in 2009 included Susan Boyle’s beautiful singing voice. She amazed the world but the instant fame took it’s toll on her. Captain Chesley Sullenberger’s amazingly landed his jet in the water of the Hudson river saving all on board. Northwest flight 188 overshot Minneapolis airport while pilot Timothy Cheney and co-pilot Richard Cole claim they were discussing company schedules on their laptops and not asleep. And of course there is Bo the First Dog, a Portuguese water dog. I wonder if he could do a better job running the country than Obama.

As for my year, well it was not too bad. I traded in my old 5th wheel for a new Montana which was a very nice upgrade. We had a great boating year, we spending most of it at Detroit Lake and a great trip to Lake Billy Chinook. I purchased a new Dell Studio 16 XPS laptop (Christmas present to self) and i’m still working on getting it set up. My best friend got married in Bend, and I was honored to be his best man. And for the most part my health was good all year.

On the down side, I did lose a bit of my retirement savings due to the bad economy however by the end of the year most of it had rebounded. 2009 will not be the best year to look back on at my work. Our department had some public image problems and in the fall out we lost an officer, our Chief of Police and some officers were disciplined. We have finally hired a new Chief who will start soon so I hope things can get back to normal. On a good side note to all of this, our City Administrator was canned. It was about time for that as he handled this situation very badly.

All in all, 2009 has been an interesting year. A very tough one for the nation but I think there is hope on the horizon.

Nov 022006
 

I got back from my little adventure with my friends Elk Hunting last Friday. I had a great time and the weather for the most part was good. The temperature dropped below freezing most nights but the days were great except for Tuesday. That day it did quickly get cold and even snowed for a bit. I got there on Monday and drove over in a caravan with four other guys. We had three vehicles one with a camper and cargo trailer, one with a truck and trailer and my 5th towed by my trusty F-250. We got on the road at 6am which is what we had planned but then we had some electrical problems with the lights on one of the guys rigs. We finally located the culprit fuse and after fueling up, got on our way.

Elk Camp

Elk Country Looking  SE

We stopped in The Dalles for breakfast and got to camp a little before noon. The first thing we did after setting up our camps was to go get firewood. As I said in my last post I have never been hunting before and when I go camping a few logs last me all night for a campfire so my friends idea of a fire was a little foreign to me. We collected about six cords of wood and as you can see from the photo the fires we had were a bit large but were sure nice for the cold nights. The other thing I found about these large fires was after we built them about sunset, they burned all night with very little attention.

Nightly Campfire

The season opened on Wednesday and I went out with the hunters. Duston, one of the guys in our group shot an Elk the first hour of the hunt. He named him Larry for some reason unknown to me. During the next few days I went out hunting with them each morning and a couple of time in the afternoon. We saw a lot of elk but no one was able to get a good shot at a legal “spike”, so Larry was the only one taken by our group. Our youngest hunter “AJ” did get a shot off and it is believed he hit the elk. Unfortunately it ran off and didn’t leave a blood trail. We looked for it most of the day but never found him.

Larry

Big Daddy

I spent the afternoon on Thursday driving around on the forest service roads of the area. It is some very beautiful country and I may have to go up there camping again sometime. My only complaint is that the roads are very wash boarded and it really bounces you around. When I first got up to camp and checked my 5th I found a lot of things bounced all over inside and a several loose screws.

Hunters

We all sure ate good up there. All of us had generators and one of the guys brought up his Treager Grill and we cooked on it most nights. I have a Treager which is a wood pellet grilling system and it is the best outdoor cooking grill I have ever owned. I don’t much care for cooking on gas or charcoal grills anymore.

I drove back on Friday but most of the guys stayed until Monday as the season closed on Sunday. I’m told they saw many more elk but still didn’t get another spike.

Elk hunting area map

Oct 222006
 

The fifth wheel is all cleaned and loaded. I have lots of extra propane, water and gas on board and plenty of eats. I am heading out tomorrow morning about 6am to go Elk Hunting with a friend from work and a couple of retired guys I use to work with. I’m not actually going to do any hunting, that’s just not that interesting to me although I have been giving some thought to trying bow hunting. I am just going for the camping and will probably tag a long a couple of times when they go out and try to take some photos.

We are going to the area out of Pilot Rock which I hear is very beautiful this time of year with the colors changing. I am prepared for the bad weather with two sets of chains for the Ford F-250 and a set for the 5th too. I am hoping for nice weather and so far it looks good but one of the guys who has been going for several years said it can get nasty. He said one year they went to bed with a couple of inches of snow on the ground and woke with about a foot and a half. They got out but had to stay a couple of extra days.

Rocky is not going with me, this is kind of a boys time out thing. I will be staying until next Saturday and hope to have some good photos which I will post when I get back. See ya then….

Oct 072006
 

A beautiful lady lost her fight with cancer this week and now she is at peace. Barbara, the mother of my best friend from high school was also my surrogate mom. My partner Rocky also adopted her as his surrogate mom and her passing is especially difficult for him. She was very young at heart and touched everyone she knew in such a positive way.

Rest now lovely lady.

Barbara

Sep 112006
 

I just got back from a weekend trip to Las Vegas this afternoon with three friends from work. Well, one that still works with me and two that have been retired for a few years. We stayed at the Flamingo Hilton and had a great time. I lost a little money but managed to have enough to get home on….

We went to Bareback, a show at Harrahs and the guys (and gals) were hot. If you like County music I would recommend it. We also ate dinner on Saturday night at Steakhouse46 in the Flamingo. The food was very good but it was a bit pricey. We all had the Porterhouse steak. Mine was cooked okay but everyone elses was overdone. They sent them back and the second ones were perfect. The service was very good and that is much of what you are paying for.

I spent a lot of my time playing Texas Holdem at O’Sheas just next door to the Flamingo. It’s not a real fancy casino but I always find it a fun place to play. I got into a game and played both Saturday and Sunday until the table closed the next morning at 5am. It’s Monday evening now and I haven’t slept in about 36 hours. I should sleep good tonight.

Jul 302006
 

I had lunch with a friend last Friday who is one of the few people that read my blog. He mentioned that I had never delivered on part two of RV’n in LaPine. Well the temperature is much cooler so I can’t use the weather as an excuse so here it is.

* * * * * * *

Friday my partner went into Bend with a couple of the girls to do some shopping. He’s a power shopper and I bet he wore them out. I went for a motorcycle ride and also went to Bend. I got a killer deal on a shirt and hat at an outlet store. Main reason I went into Bend was to look at a RV park I had seen on Wednesday when I was in town with the *M’s*. Friday afternoon the *I’s* arrived with their son and daughter.

Friday night we had a get together here at our camp which was very interesting. We got a little loud but only got one warning from the park Ranger. The bastards burned up half of my wood which was suppose to last for two weeks. Everyone got rather intoxicated and this lead to a lot of drama.
Continue reading »

Jul 162006
 

I wanted to post this a few days ago but wasn’t able to get connected to the camp hosts Wi-Fi setup. We just got home so I thought I would get this up. More to come..

RV in Site 21

I didn’t think I was going to be able to post before we got back from camping here in LaPine but one of the hosts has satellite internet on Wi-Fi and said I could use it. We came over on the 4th with three other families from work. For the purposes of this blog I will call them the M’s the C’s and the K’s. Their names have been changed to protect the guilty. C’s father also came over and on Friday the I’s came over. All of these families have kids so in total we had 20 people here: eleven adults and nine children. That’s quite a crew.

By now they have all returned to civility and we are here with just the other quite campers and the Chipmunks, but during the time they were here life was very interesting if not somewhat dramatic. Getting a bunch of cops and a fireman together, especially away from the work environment can be very interesting. Both jobs can be quite stressful as you can imagine and when we get in an environment where we can let loose sometimes things get a little weird.

I have know and worked with most of these people for almost twenty years so we are very comfortable together. I don’t know the guy from the fire department very well as I just met him recently. His future wife work for us and was just recently hired so that’s how they became part of the crew.

All of us from the PD had to work on the 4th and so after our shift we drove over together. We didn’t get in until late in the evening so night one was fairly quiet. It was a good drive over with very little traffic. After everyone got set up we all gathered (except the kids) at our place. We had eight people in our RV which is the largest group we have had here yet. Plenty of room though. I think everyone is envious of us as our rig is by far the nicest and most spacious. Sorry, just a little bragging rights here….

The next day was kind of a supply day. I went into Bend with the M’s to shop for food and other supplies and after we got back to camp I went into Sunriver with the officer C to get my bicycle tire repaired and so he could do some shopping. Later that night after dinner (I made a crab salad) we had a fire as well as the K’s. Everyone just kind of floated back and forth between the two camps.

Thursday the everyone kind of split up to do their own things. The C’s and K’s took off on their ATV’s and motorcycle to do some riding. My partner, *C* his dad went into Bend where C’s dad traded in his old boat and bought a new one. I’m not sure what everyone else did but I suspect they went into Bend I went for a little ride on my Honda Shadow. Earlier I repositioned the 5th wheel with the help of C’s wife so I could get the awning extended. There was a tree in the way so I had to angle the RV.

We all had reservations to eat dinner at this place out in the middle of nowhere called the Cowboy Dinner Tree. It is about fifty miles southeast of here near Silver Lake. Our reservations were for 5pm but *C* and his dad didn’t get back from Bend until almost 4pm. We quickly loaded up into three vehicles and after driving just a little over the posted speed limit, arrived at exactly 5pm.

The Cowboy Dinner Tree

The dinner there was great and the atmosphere very interesting. Dinner consisted of either a whole chicken or a steak which was more like a roast. First they served a salad with choice of ranch or honey mustard dressing. Then these wonderful hot rolls baked in a pie tin. Next they brought out two kinds of what they call soup but was more of a stew. One is a beef stew and the other they call cowboy bean. I had the beef stew but other people said the bean was very good. Finally they brought out the steaks and chicken with a baked potato. By then you are already quit full but I managed to eat a few bites of my steak (the remainder was consumed over the next couple of days). The drive back was much more relaxed and at a reasonable speed.

No camp fire or get togethers after dinner tonight and everyone just kind of went back to their camps and to bed early. We stayed up and watch TV until about midnight. I think everyone was kind of burned out after the drive and large dinner.

** Next the night of drama **

Jun 102006
 
For sure one of Portland’s Finest

Every year I try to get into Portland for the Grand Floral Parade at the Rose Festival. I don’t go so much to watching the parade. I go to see old friends that in many cases I haven’t seen since the last parade and hopefully meet a few new. I also go to watch all the interesting people a large festival like this attracts. I always take my camera and love to catch people being themselves.


Two good friends. I don’t think they have missed a parade in 20 years.

I don’t think I saw a third of the parade this last Saturday. I usually try to head out of town before the end. I hate all the traffic, it’s always an incredible mess with over a hundred thousand people all trying to get home at once. This year was very festive though, and the weather was great with no rain and a little cloud cover. Often it rains but Oregonians are use to that

2006 Rose Queen Camille Clark

I didn’t see as many friends as I usually do. I guess they just needed a break this year. Next year is the 100th anniversary of the Rose Festival. You can bet I will be there.