Friday 12-15-17 Noon Update

Greetings and welcome!

We had another 1/4-1/2″ of fluffy snow last night. There is 1-1.5″ of new snow on the driveway since it was cleaned up after the storm

My hardcore snowmobiler buddy said that I was goofy telling you guys that there isn’t quite enough snow to ride. His thoughts were that it is enough as long as you avoid really rocky stretches like on the power lines north of Benson Lake Rd, and you understand that there will be bumps and rocks. It might not be perfect, but hey, you are riding.

I am kind of getting on board with that. A lot of people would ride less (including me). If I wasn’t preoccupied with resuscitating my old plow truck, I’d be giving the little sled its preseason love today, followed by a ride tomorrow.

This is where you get to make the call. Here are some pictures from around the yard today at 11:30am. As always click the picture for a bigger view.

I like that the sun is a week from the winter solstice, so it isn’t burning off the side roads between here and the trails.

The TV weather channel meteorologist has an interesting scenario for tonight and tomorrow. His presentation shows the jet stream going right over us tonight and Saturday, and as little disturbances and bits of energy go overhead we could see some light snow. His graphic has Lakewood getting 1.7″ by sunset Saturday.

The rest of the weekend weather looks cloudy with a high of 22 Saturday and 30 Sunday. Low temps are 5 tonight and 16 Saturday night. We are expecting mid-20s to low 30s for high temperatures next week, but I don’t see any disastrous warming trends yet.

I do not know if I will be working Saturdays at Rapids Resort this season. They have new owners and I have not talked to them about it yet. We have been friends for like 3 decades so I probably will be, but like I said, there has not been any discussion about it one way or the other. I hope to get down there later to look into it.

There is a little more to cover but nothing too important so I am going to get this posted for noon. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!

Addition- The past few years I have not been happy with what I have done here (Extreme understatement). I was working a lot of hours at Carquest, plus starting the flashlight business, plus running about 3 dozen web sites with a lot of help from Chris. In the few hours that I did have free I had to cut firewood, fix my cars, or whatever. That meant a lot less time here, and a lot less time in the saddle and on the trails.

This March I gave notice at Carquest and struck out on my own again. So.. what DO you do for a living Ray? Whatever pays that day..

This summer I returned to the whitewater photography and had a blast. I set a new personal record of an average of a picture every 1.15 seconds for almost 7 minutes straight. Beyond that I have fixed dashboard instrument clusters and done other electronic repairs, built decks, pounded wells, worked as a computer tech, and quite a few hours being an auto mechanic again. I still sell my flashlights, headlamps, and floodlights too. Some weeks I am digging in my change dish for gas money, the next week I will bring in a grand. It is anything but boring, but it is my boat to drive, and the results, good or bad, are a product of my own decisions.

The bottom line- I am always a busy guy, but being back on my own again gives me a little more freedom to spend time on this page. This just can’t be like it has been the past few years. Expect to see a little more of me this year, and hopefully we will all see a lot more trail time.

The other reason that you might care about this is that now that I do a fair bit of mechanical work I usually have a toolbox and my battery powered impact wrenches in the car, and will always help a fellow snowmobiler out with some tools and a flashlight.

Well I am off to tackle the plow truck so I can get my snowmobile into the shop. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!

RJB