The latest Motorcycle Classics issue has a great story in it on Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, the National Park that’s tucked in along the Mexican border, south of Ajo and Why in southern Arizona. It was a fun visit for us, but wow, was it ever hot and desolate out there! The two closest towns, Ajo and Why, are remote. As in extremely remote.
Arizona has towns with unusual names. Ajo means garlic in Spanish (I didn’t see a single garlic when I was there). Why is name that makes you wonder, well, why anyone would put a town in that location (it’s not much more than two or three buildings out in the middle of nowhere). The good folks in Arizona wanted to simply call the place Y, as it was built at a fork in the road (you know, like the letter Y). But Arizona requires their towns to have at least three letters in their names (don’t ask me Why).
So, another day, another Destinations piece in Motorcycle Classics, one of the world’s great magazines. Other motorcycle magazines are dropping like flies, but MC keeps on keeping on with the best stories and photography in print. I’ve been writing for Motorcycle Classics for over 10 years now, to the tune of something like 64 articles. You can get to all of them online, or you can order your very own copy of Destinations, the book with all of the travel pieces I’ve done for MC (we have both black and white and color options). They make great gifts. You should buy several..buy two or more and shipping is free!
And speaking of stats, we’ve been publishing ExhaustNotes for a little over a year now. In that time, we’ve posted 512 blog posts, and we’ve had 2100 comments. We love your comments, so please, keep them coming. Do you have anything special you want us to write about? Hey, let us know. Post a comment!
Regarding blog topics, one of the things we’ve tried to do is steer clear of politics. Joe went there a little bit with the title of his recent blog (something about never getting a free gun when Obama was president). The problem with discussing anything related to politics is nobody listens to understand; they only listen to respond. That’s true no matter which side of the divide you live on (in my opinion, which of course is always the right one on all political issues). Do you want us to go there? There’s just so much to write about, but the deal is that no matter what position we take, we’ll infuriate half our readers. But wow, the topics are so tempting, and they’ll excite so much discussion. Get this: Illinois just imposed a tax on trade ins (they tax you on the car you’re buying, and they tax you on the car you’re trading in). I could have fun writing about that. But, it’s politics. And it’s Illinois (you know, Chicago, the place where stringent gun control laws are working so well). Should we go there?
Ah, let’s see, what else is going on?
Well, lots. I received my .257 Weatherby Ruger No. 1 back from the repair center with a new stock, and we’ll be posting photos of it along with a range report in the near future. I’ve got some good inputs on good loads from my good buddy Mississippi Dave, and we’ll put them to the test.
And things are going great guns with Gear’d (how’s that for alliteration?).
I’m wearing my Gear’d watch as I write this, and the more I wear it, the more I like it. I’ve been checking its accuracy, and it is spot on. I’ll have an update on my Gear’d in the near future, and so will good buddy Joe Gresh. Joe’s watch is on its way to him, and he’s got a torture test in mind similar to the one I posted recently. Joe tells me it has something to do with concrete.
You know, we’ve done a lot of product reviews here on ExNotes, and as promised, we’re adding a Product Reviews page on the site to provide an index to all of them. Stay tuned, and we’ll post a link in the next few days. I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned this, but we recently updated our Tales of the Gun page. Take a look. It’s better organized, and we’re all caught up with adding each of the gun blogs to this page.
And that’s a wrap for today, folks. As always, there’s lots more coming your way right here on the ExNotes blog. Keep your comments coming; we love hearing from you.
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No reason to avoid politics on a blog centered around motorcycles, guns and food. It might be useful to attend to your smile when the comments started arriving.
Joe, never worry about your political beliefs. Remember that we should never be worried about being politically correct, just correct and respectful (which you always are).
So I should go into my thoughts about Congress, the Deep State, the news media, etc?
Sure. Part of your blog is supposed to be opinions, right? Despite what some say, people do change their political views. How many people aren’t more conservative when they are older compared to when they are younger?
Who knows, maybe something someone reads on this blog will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back that causes them stop and actually do a little research to learn that their ideas about gun control, global warming, etc. are just based on political propaganda and not based on facts?
All good points, Fred. Yabba dabba doo!
My guess: the political leanings of the readers are probably a bit more in one direction than another…
Hard to say, Greg. Regardless of the tilt, no one is going to change their mind.
It’s ok to crack a joke or two but the thing with political chat is it’s a waste of time. No one will change their opinions no matter how logical or true your argument. All you can hope to achieve is to piss off a bunch of readers and lose them.
Having said all that if you cannot resist reciting your tribe’s canon feel free. It’s America!
Cool article and great pics. Just one question – Where do Garlics come from? Are they native Americans or immigrants from somewhere say Italy or Sicily or something? Seriously – Enjoy the articles immensely. Will have to visit Organ Pipes.
Steve:
No idea where the garlic comes from. Most of the garlic sold in the US today comes from China, I’m told (and the packaging says so on all I’ve bought recently). We travel through Gilroy regularly, the garlic capital of the US, but I guess they are a small part of the overall garlic scene today.