Feel Good Stuff – Page 17 – The ExhaustNotes Blog

Water Security

As mentioned in a previous ExhaustNotes story titled “Guilt Trip,” our water well at the ranch has become unreliable. In order to quickly bring some stability to the situation we decided to install a storage tank and re-shuffle the way water is delivered to our shack.

After pouring a slab to support the new, 3000-gallon water tank we had the local Tank Guy deliver Big ‘Mo to the ranch. Big ‘Mo cost $2800 delivered to our door and that’s a bit expensive but it seems like everything costs more since the Covid crisis eased up. Home Depot has a 2500-gallon tank that is slightly lighter construction for $2300 plus $80 delivery plus tax so the per gallon price is comparable. Buying local means the Tank Guy will spend his money locally. Anyway, I don’t like the way our local Home Depot stores their tank inventory. They put the tanks on their sides instead of the bottom. This makes it easier to move the tanks with a forklift but I suspect it does the tank no good having all the weight where it’s not designed to go.

The Tank Guy stores his tanks upright, just north of Tularosa in a big field across from the railroad overpass. Our tank showed up securely strapped to a trailer…on its side. But only for the time it took to arrive at the ranch. These tanks look huge but they are rotocast plastic and are not that heavy. The 3000-gallon tank weighs 500 pounds. It took the Tank Guy, the Tank Guy’s wife and me to slide the tank up a ramp I handily screwed together earlier for pouring the tank slab.

I installed two ball valves in the bottom of the tank, one ¾-inch for the output and one ½-inch to fill the tank. Tank filling can be done three ways: by water delivery truck, gravity fed from the upper level shed storage tank, or by pumping well water into the tank. A jumble of shut-off valves can be juggled to pressure feed the house from the well, from Big ‘Mo via a centrifugal pump or by gravity from the upper level storage. I’m into redundancy when it comes to water.

If you live in areas that freeze you’ll want to add a pipe heater and insulate any exposed pipe. The black tank helps keep the water from freezing and when the sun comes out we rarely get days under 40 degrees so water freezing in the tank has not been an issue so far.

I took this re-plumbing opportunity to eliminate the water softener and reduce the size of the very old well pump expansion tank. The water softener periodically runs a flush cycle and being on a fixed water supply we can’t waste water like that. The bladder inside the big expansion tank became porous over the years and water had migrated to the dry side causing rust. Plus it was too damn big. I’m thinking it will make a great stand alone fireplace or smoker.

From Big ‘Mo water is piped through a mesh screen filter, a one-way check valve and into a centrifugal pump that provides 40psi of pressure to a large 5-micron filter and on to the house plumbing. The pump has its own small expansion tank that seems to keep a fairly steady flow of water to the fixtures. You can see the flow increase a bit when the pump cycles but nothing a rough, tough, couple of pioneers like CT and I can’t handle.

Since we’ve moved from hot, humid Florida to a colder climate I’ve learned that PVC plumbing is not ideal in freezing conditions. Going forward I’m trying to use PEX plumbing in all my projects and I’ve been happy with the results so far. PEX uses a more flexible pipe that is crimped onto brass PEX fittings with brass/copper-ish crimp rings. You’ll need a special PEX crimp tool to compress the rings onto the PEX fittings. Once crimped, you can spin PEX pipe on its brass fitting (within reason) without causing a leak. I haven’t had one PEX-related leak yet, even when tight working conditions result in a less than optimal crimp. I wish I could say the same for the PEX-to-threaded-pipe connections. One thing to keep in mind is that PEX pipe is not UV resistant so cover any pipes that will see sunlight.

Like most plumbing systems PEX has to be cut and pipes replaced if you need to change anything. You’ll need a PEX removal tool if you want to reuse the brass PEX fittings and why wouldn’t you want to reuse them? The ability to reuse PEX fittings is a big deal. When is the last time you were able to reuse a glued PVC fitting or soldered copper fitting? The removal tool cuts the crimp ring without cutting into the PEX barb. Once the ring is out of the way you can crimp V-shaped depressions around the bit of PEX stuck on the barb. Crimping the Vee’s causes the PEX pipe circumference to expand and the pipe will slide right of the barb without causing undue stress.

It’s a bad feeling when your well runs dry. All of a sudden your shack becomes unlivable. But by building in a little extra infrastructure we have water security even if it means buying water from our local water delivery service. And I have plans on the table for catching much more rain during the next monsoon season that will nearly eliminate our reliance on bought water.

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The Ride

“I am slowly dying every day I am here”

It was April 2017 and that was the thought that kept going through my head. I was living in Seattle and it was one of the grayest winters in Pacific Northwest history. According to meteorological scientists, there had been only thirty hours of sunlight from October to May. I was working remotely; a strange, novel existence that in a young and lighter life was referred to as telecommuting. To work remotely is to live semidetached from the rest of society. At times, it feels as though you are physically invisible to the world; literally, a digital personality. Of course, this was before the global pandemic came in and made remote work the new normal for those of us fortunate enough to have a job. I had begun losing motivation in my work and in most other aspects of life and it wasn’t just the weather. Maybe it was the fact that I wore the same ratty Boston University hoodie every day that winter and ate Shin Ramen for two of my three meals a day. Maybe it was that the people I saw in the streets and places I frequented seemed to be as isolated and disconnected as I was feeling at the time.

Looking back on those gray, empty, Seattle days I realize now that the need for freedom and openness was what finally forced me to make such a drastic change. I needed a hard reset of my current mindset and environment, one that would revolve around my passion for riding motorcycles. I wanted to take the check-mated chess game that had become my life and forearm-swipe the whole thing across the room, kind of like the Jack Nicholson diner scene in Five Easy Pieces.

So that is exactly what I decided to do.

New game

I decided I was going to put the Jet City in my rearview mirror and travel the country on my Ducati Monster M1100. This torquey little machine had a dry clutch with a stiff pull, which made a beautiful “clack clack clack” sound that reminded me of a WWII P-51 Mustang heading into a dog flight alone, against a squadron of Messerschmidts. I loved my Monster, and we had seven good years together feeling the wind in our hair and the angry vibes of the 1100 CC v-twin engine on two-lane roads all over this amazing country. I had even camped off this sleek little machine during a memorable ride down the coast to San Francisco. To me the Ducati Monster M1100 is everything that a motorcycle should be. Nothing extra, and nothing less. In fact, the only thing that bike wasn’t fit for was the journey I was about to take.

The Plan

The high-level plan was to head east on I-90, blaze through E-WA and Idaho in one go, not stopping until I hit the unadulterated freedom of open space called Montana. I would camp every chance I could in the open-air majesty of perhaps our greatest treasure; America’s National Forests. I planned to visit National Parks, and stop to see every UFO landing site and giant ball of string that caught my eye. Most importantly, I would make sure that my thirst for the road on a fossil fuel burning two-wheeler was quenched on a daily basis. I would live in Airbnb’s during the week, feeding my pencil thin bank account by logging in to my nine to five via laptop as an IT project manager. Although I did fine at my job, I had this unique perspective that work was a vehicle, a vehicle that when pointed in the right direction and driven with the right intent could be used to feed my hunger for riding, camping, and living life in a way that I would not regret when my last days arrived. Monday through Friday I would continue to persevere in my career. Weekends, however, would be all mine and I intended to max each one out with the whistle of speed in my ears and a thick coating of dead insects on my face-shield.

Seattle

The weather finally broke in May. I greeted the first rays of sun with squinted eyes, dangerously low vitamin D levels and steaming cup of Starbucks, which would be my last for a while. I loaded the Ducati with all my gear and took a step back to look things over. The packing list was dangerously minimal, yet the bike looked like something off of Sanford and Son. My gear was just too much for the journey I had planned on the Ducati.

I had to make a difficult decision, one that I had been stewing on for years, in fact. Some might call it an up-grade, some might call it the death of romance. Some might call it the end of the sexy and lyrical object worship and variable reliability that is the result of Italian design and engineering. That day… that fateful day, I traded my Ducati Monster in for a BMW GS1200.

Coming out of the closet as an adventure rider

I now had the perfect bike for the adventure and the lifestyle I was about to launch into. I had no idea it would lead to an all-consuming life obsession that would take me some 50,000 plus miles down every type of road imaginable on one excursion after another with no end in sight. When I departed Seattle on that first sunny day in May I remember thinking “I’ll just cruise out to Montana tomorrow and get to know my new machine.” My plan was light on detail and I told myself I’d deal with that, well, tomorrow. Besides, spring was in the air and I had never spent more than a few days in Montana, and that was years earlier. I had been headed in the opposite direction then, and running on Red Bull and fumes, hunched over the Ducati’s bars on a laser-focused run down the entire length of I-90 from Fenway Park in Boston all the way to Seattle’s Safeco Field.

That first day riding east was epic. As I left Seattle, I remembered the scene at the beginning of Easy Rider where Peter Fonda tossed his watch onto the desert sand as they kicked started their Vaughs and Hardy chops and blazed out eastward on their own adventure towards Mardi Gras. The day couldn’t have tasted better. The smell of Spring was thick in the cool morning air. The sky opened up as if to reassure me I had made the right choice and would be there to support and guide me in this liberating endeavor. The enormous evergreens of the coast became steadily shorter, fewer and far between until they disappeared and were replaced by tumbling sage and the open high desert of eastern Washington.

I don’t know how fast I was going but there was still a light mist coming off the Columbia as I cut through a vicious cross wind on the bridge at Vantage. The traffic thinned out with every mile as the quiet machine practically rode itself eastbound. Spokane, Coer’D’Alene, Post Falls, Idaho… Well hello Montana! I rolled into Whitefish and stopped for my first full meal since I had left out. It wasn’t anything spectacular; a small brewery on the outskirts of town. I could have eaten a gas-station bologna sandwich on stale bread and been just as happy. I had made that leap and had landed squarely outside the hamster wheel, looking in. It felt like coming home.

Montana is a rider’s paradise. With a rough plan of spending 2 weeks in Whitefish I would start by riding a road called Going to the Sun, which is a rare and beautiful collection of breathtaking views that you take in between sweeping switchback curves on good asphalt. The experience leaves you feeling unstoppable while the occasional grizzly bear sighting reassures you that your place in the food chain is not always at the top.

Going to the Sun was a life-changing road on a bike that would prove life-changing for me as well. The GS was silent compared to the Ducati. It had roll on power for the slow steady grades of the continental divide. I sat up high and took in the wildflowers of spring and the smells of Ponderosa and Lodgepole pine as I changed the GS’s road setting to sport mode, opened up the throttle and consumed mile after mile of sun-baked highway.

At some point in mid-June, I lit out of Whitefish on Forest Service roads, starting to get a feel for what the GS and I were capable of together. Hunter S. Thompson famously said, ‘The edge; the only ones who really know where it is, are the ones who have gone over.’ There were several times on that ride when I had to dust myself off and pick up all 650 pounds of fully loaded GS before pointing her east and rolling it on. A sort of cadence developed on those sandy mountain roads; drop the bike, swear a lot, cut the engine, swear some more, then pick her up, swear a bit more, onward and upward. It was all part of a steep learning curve that comes with all things worth doing, and I learned that lesson one dropped twenty thousand dollar German motorcycle at a time until the new car smell was all but washed off of her.

I was falling fast in love with my new bike and Montana too, and soon after Whitefish I made the decision to relocate to Missoula where I began taking weekend trips out to experience some of America’s most drooled over stretches of two-lane blacktop. One of those American roads I will never forget is the Beartooth Highway, which stretches between Red Lodge and the Northeast Entrance to Yellowstone. If we set foot on Mars in my lifetime, I may just volunteer to go. Until that happens I’ll have the Beartooth Highway; A pristine lunar landscape that is literally without end, show-casing snow-capped peaks that go on forever to your left, right and center. The road going up Beartooth Pass is a chain of perfect hair-pin switchbacks so parabolically consistent that after a few awkward peg-scrapers I was able to lean the big GS in with a confidence reminiscent of my old Ducati. I experienced seventy-odd miles of rider’s paradise on this first outing from my new Missoula basecamp and finished the day dropping into Yellowstone, which, when it’s not choked off with Winnebagos and European tourists in black socks, is truly one of the seven wonders I have personally experienced on two wheels. You can camp on a pristine prairie and share the view with the bison who will roam freely around you as you grill up a rib-eye from one of their close cousins and enjoy a well-earned adult beverage in a tall can. This riding experience was something patently American; the stuff of childhood cowboy dreams and one I will never forget.

I hit Montana running, never planning more than twp weeks in advance and I never really stopped. The ride has been something enviable to those that understand. I am currently writing this sitting in front of a warm fire on this chilly June day in Lake City Colorado with the GS unloaded and parked where I can keep an eye on her. I will spend a few more weeks tearing up the asphalt and dirt in this geographically diverse state before setting sites on my next challenge.

I try to avoid the news, but it’s easy to see the world is spinning faster than ever these days. People seem to be polarizing more and more to where common ground is hard to find. In this unstable operating environment, you need to find a constant; a baseline; a solid rock that you can stand on, mentally and spiritually. Call it a ground-wire. For me, that constant is riding a motorcycle and the life that comes with it. Using the power of the ride to find common ground with people is one of the most magical talents I have learned to develop

So, as I continue on my ride, I am reminded that balance on two wheels requires constant motion. And like my last listless, restless winter in Seattle, there can be great tension in standing still. I think of the balance sometimes when I am polishing off a tall can, watching the crackling campfire reflect off the GS’s exhaust system, always parked close where I can keep an eye on her – after all, we are alone in a wild place. Now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure that’s what keeps us together.

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New Mexico Museum of Space History

Alamogordo is a cool town, and on a recent visit there Joe Gresh, Susie,and I took in three of its attractions: The White Sands Missile Range, White Sands National Park, and the New Mexico Museum of Space History. This blog is on the New Mexico Museum of Space History, a five-story tall structure that is arranged in a spiral (kind of like the Guggenheim in New York City). Joe, as the Ambassador of Alamogordo, suggested riding the elevator to the top and then walking down the spiraling hallways to take it all in, which is what we did.

As museums go, this is a good one. There were a lot of cool things to see, including a mockup of the space shuttle control panel (that’s Joe piloting the Shuttle in the photo above). Some of the other cool things are shown in the photos below.

Sputnik, the Russian satellite that initiated the space race.

The Ham capsule. Ham was the first chimp launhed into space. He’s buried on the Museum grounds.

Paying homage to perhaps one of the greated sci-fi series ever, Star Trek.

There’s a small missile park outside the Museum building. The vehicle in the foreground is a rocket sled, used in early development efforts.

If you ever find yourself in Alamogordo, the New Mexico Museum of Space History is worth a visit.

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Baja in the Slow Lane

For a motorcyclist one of the easiest and most rewarding trips a rider can undertake is Baja, Mexico. It’s a 1-day drive to the Mexican border from most of the Southwestern United States. I have been fortunate enough to spend many months in Baja over the past four years, but always mixed the experience in with working, so I was never able to fully detach and enjoy it. For my fourth time riding Baja this had to change. I wanted to allow myself to embrace this epic part of Mexico at a slower pace and savor each day. It’s Baja. This is the time and place where you are meant to slow down and relax.

The week prior to my departure a friend gifted me this giant stuffed sloth for my birthday. I promptly named him Slothykins, which seemed to fit since I already traveled with a little stuffed lamb named Lambykins. Two days prior to departing for Baja while packing my gear I noticed the sloth in the corner of the equipment room staring aimlessly at the wall.

At that moment an idea hit me. Now usually (always) my ideas are a bit… off and this one would prove no different. My thought was to use my Rok Straps to secure the giant sloth on the passenger seat of my BMW GS1200 and ride the 3,000-mile roundtrip from Sedona to Todos Santos. What better way to embrace the slow lane of Baja life then with Slothykins as my passenger!

As we slowly departed Sedona it wasn’t long before I noticed something moving around in my rearview mirror. I quickly pulled over and saw everything was secure and started off again. I was in 3^rd gear and again saw a flickering of movement. Well, it turns out it was Slothykins. If I went above 50mph his arm would begin flapping in the wind and it gave the perception he was waving at everyone. The whole scene was hilarious. Other vehicles along the road would slow down, scratch their heads or wave back to Slothykins as we happily motored along desert backroads on our way to Mexico.

One thing I didn’t factor into this whole scheme was the attention I would receive once crossing the border into Mexico. This usually is a nonevent; however, with Slothykins I was promptly ushered into the “This guy definitely requires a further search” lane, to include an over friendly German Shepard which did a thorough job of sniffing Slothykins and the rest of my gear. It took a few minutes of the dog jumping all over the BMW before the Mexican Immigration Agents cleared me to proceed. Welcome to Mexico, Slothykins!

After the border dogs provide you with their approval to enter Mexico your senses are instantly overwhelmed with the sights and smells of fresh food, while your mind awakens to the new obstacles in the road to include but not limited to horses, donkeys, cows, potholes, and large trucks along narrow roads with no shoulder. This sensory awakening can make you become pretty hungry. Finding some street tacos and a strawberry Fanta from one of the many vendors you pass by is a rather easy task in Mexico. While sitting on the sidewalk I begin enjoying one of the most delicious meals I’ve ever had. Meanwhile, I look over to see my motorcycle parked with Slothykins as a sentry keeping a watchful eye on the new surroundings. THIS is life at its finest in the slow lane of Baja, Mexico!

Baja is a thin peninsula with only four main highways, so when you meet fellow travelers along your journey it is more than likely you will bump into them again at some point. The people of Baja have very kind hearts, so running into them repeatedly is a great way to build relationships along this journey. It didn’t take long for me to inherit the nickname “The Sloth Guy.” Which I found comical since I am a rather fast rider (ask any Massachusetts State Trooper).

For the next two weeks with Slothykins as my tent mate and passenger we happily camped on some of the world’s most beautiful beaches while riding almost the entire length of Baja to a turnaround point on Playa Pescadero, which was just south of Todo Santos. I never tired of hearing “Hey Sloth Guy come over for a beer” or “Sloth Guy want to join us for dinner?” The hospitality is incredible in Baja, more so for motorcyclists, and as I learned, even more so for motorcyclists with a giant sloth as a passenger.

With the relaxing two weeks nearing an end there was an outstanding question that I had to answer. What should become of Slothykins? I couldn’t keep him as he was much too large, and I already had the immense responsibility of Lambykins, who is quite the handful. An idea hit me on the final night in Kiki’s Camp in San Felipe. Why not donate Slothykins to an orphanage. After some time on Google and Google Translate, I happened to find the manager of a local orphanage called Sonshine Hacienda who lived just a few blocks from where I was camping. I called him and he was an ex pat who had been living in Baja managing the orphanage for several years. I promptly drove over, met him, and donated Slothykins to his new home to where he would become a big hit and make many new friends. On the return ride to Arizona the bike felt a bit lighter without my buddy on the back waving happily at passersby. While crossing back into the United States I smiled to the border agent while reflecting on the ride, the people, and the beautiful experiences over the past two weeks of traveling through Baja, Mexico.

Here’s a link to the Sonshine Hacienda.

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Moundsville, West Virginia

John Denver got it right: Almost Heaven, West Virginia. Hold that thought. Let the music play in your mind as you read this blog.

I think I found the best place in America for motorcycling. I could be wrong, but if you like twisties, if you like impressive views, if you like points of interest, and if you like good food, West Virginia (and in particular, the roads around Moundsville) is where you want to be.

A view from the top of the mound. That bridge spans the Ohio River, and that’s Ohio on the other side.

Moundsville is named after the huge mound that dominates the town (it’s what you see in the photo at the top of this blog). It was only in the 1800s when the person who owned the land surmised that it was an ancient burial mound (there were several in the area). The Native Americans who lived and then disappeared in this region were named (by us, not by themselves) as the Adena people, and it is now known that the mounds predate Christ. There’s an interesting museum next to the mound, and it is an easy place to spend an hour or two. The mound and the museum are free, and if you’re feeling up to it, there’s a circular stone stairway that takes you to the top of the mound (I made the climb, so if I can do it you probably can, too).

Susie on the way to the top of the mound.

The Grave Creek Mound Archeological Complex Museum. It’s a very nice museum.

Across the street from the mound is another treasure, and that’s the West Virginia State Penintentiary. It was used for well over a hundred years, but it closed in 1996. The West Virginia Supreme Court closed the place because it was inhumane. The good news is that there’s a modestly priced, 90-minute, guided walking tour. It’s a must-do sort of thing (in my opinion) and we thorougly enjoyed it. This is a place with a horrifying history (it was consistently one of the most violent prisons in America), and our guide (Tina) made it come alive for us.

The West Virginia State Penitentiary. Take the tour; it’s well worth the price of admission.

Yep. Nine people. Another 85 went via the gallows. The West Virginia Penintentiary used to hold public executions and charge admission. One condemned guy in one of these public executions had the trap spring open before the executioner slipped the noose around his neck. He dropped 25 feet straight down, breaking numerous bones. Undeterred, the staff strapped him to a stretcher, hauled him back up the gallows steps, and hung him while he was still on the stretcher. “Don’t worry ab0ut the pain,” they are reported to have told him. “In five minutes, you won’t feel a thing.”

A typical cell. It’s 5 feet by 7 feet. It housed three inmates.

A cell in the isolation wing that housed a gang leader. He didn’t have to share his cell, but he spent 23 hours a day here.

One of the most intriguing aspects of our prison visit was the woman who works in the gift shop. She lived in the prison for many years. No, she wasn’t an inmate. She was the warden’s wife. We had a very nice (and interesting) conversation with her.

One last stop on this most interesting West Virginia day was the Palace of Gold. If you’re old enough to remember the Hare Krishna crowd (the folks who used to hawk their books in airports), this West Virginia enclave is Command Central for them. The 30-minute tour was inexpensive and there were lots of photo ops. It’s not for everyone, but I enjoyed it.

The entrance. It’s hard to imagine this being founded in the 1960s in West Virginia, but there it is.

One of the hallways in the Palace of Gold.

What I enjoyed even more were the roads to and from the Palace of Gold. Think magnificent twisties and stunning views, and you’ll have a feel for this part of West Virginia. It truly is a stunning area.

US Highway 250 in West Virginia is incredible.

Twisties, twisties, and more twisties. If you designed a road specifically for motorcycles, it would look like this.

The best kept secret in Moundsville has to be Bob’s on 3rd Street. It’s in downtown Moundsville and it’s not fancy, but wow, the food is both spectacular and reasonably priced. We tried several different dishes, but the signature dish (named, of course, “the Mound”) is my favorite. It’s a gigantic thick pancake topped with scrambled eggs, hash browns, bacon, cheese and then another thick pancake. Put a little butter on top, pour on a little maple syrup, don’t tell the American Heart Association about it, and you can thank me later. And you will thank me. The open faced turkey sandwich and the open faced roast beef sandwich are great, too. And the pies…all I can say is wow. We tried a slice of the coconut creme and the blackberry pies, and they were awesome.

“The Mound” at Bob’s on Third Street in Moundsville. It was awesome.

Coconut creme and blackberry pie. There are many more on the menu. Bob’s is Moundsville’s best-kept secret.

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Be a Professional Writer For ExhaustNotes!

Berk and I were discussing the challenges of taking on additional writers here at ExhaustNotes. We print new stories about every two days and while we appreciate our loyal readers it wouldn’t hurt to drag a bunch more subscribers into the fold. We’d like ExhaustNotes’ popularity to reflect the quality of the content and to increase ad revenue to match our prodigious output. Plus, younger, less jaded motorcyclists who actually like all the electronic junk manufacturers strap onto motorcycles would be kind of cool.

So we’ve decided to try a thing: Berk says the best way to increase Internet hits and ad revenue is to publish interesting stories from insightful and entertaining writers on a regular basis. To do that, ExhaustNotes will need more than just two guys typing in their spare time. We may need three. Or four. Or more.

I don’t know about you but I’m ready for some fresh new perspectives on motorcycling and with Berk pushing 72 and me pushing a crusty 65 we tend to give fresh new perspectives a bit of the old stinkeye. You’ll notice we type a lot of dream bike segments and none of them are modern bikes. Do not stand on our lawns.

Perspectives don’t have to be young to be fresh, just different. Let’s hear how you love the way your motorcycle makes all the power and braking decisions for the rider. Hey, you still get to steer… for now. Tell us about the biker lifestyle and how it differs from the cosplay actors at comic-com. Exactly how do you use a 200 horsepower, full-race motorcycle on the street and stay alive? Tell us in an interesting way and you’ll get paid for doing it!

How much will you make?

Glad you asked: ExhaustNotes uses a simple formula to calculate how much we earn. We take the total site income from advertisers and Google ads and subtract the expense of running the site. That gives us a pool of money to pay the writers. You won’t get paid by the word. For example, if revenue after expenses is $100 and we publish 100 stories then each story is worth $1. Now, say Berk writes 70 stories and I write 30 stories then Berk makes $70 and I make $30. This is the part where you new writers will come in: If we publish 5 stories from you then the split will reflect your contribution. Berk divvies the money up twice a year, assuming there’s revenue.

On the surface this seems self-defeating, since you’ll be making the same amount per story as me and Berk then we must be losing money. Maybe not. The idea is to increase revenue, build the reader base and create a bigger pie. If it works we’ll all get filthy rich and go live with the prostitutes. Okay, maybe I can’t go live with the prostitutes but one of you guys might be able to.

We understand the unfairness of a 3000-word story earning the same as a 700-word story but life is full of unfair situations. Writing for ExhaustNotes is just one more. Try to picture this whole ExhaustNotes website thing as a grand experiment that we are opening up to a wider pool of participants. Who knows what will happen?

If you’ve already been a guest columnist for ExhaustNotes you won’t get any money from your past stories. That ship has sailed. This new deal is going forward from today. Mike Huber’s Romanian travel story is the very first one of our new system.

A few other things you should know: Berk is going to be the editor-in-chief and his word is final, meaning submitting is not the same as getting published. Punctuation and grammar matter. If Berk has to re-write your story to make it intelligible he probably won’t use it. ExhaustNotes only pays if we publish your story and we pay poorly at that. You retain all rights to your work and can do whatever you want with it. Remember: You are not going to make a ton of money doing this. If you feel our accounting methods are not strenuous enough don’t submit a story.

Having the proper mindset is critical. Berk and I write ExhaustNotes for the fun of it. If you factor in our time, we lose money doing it and I see no good reason why you shouldn’t lose money writing for us, too. Any beer money that happens to come our way is gravy that we use to buy mini bikes and reloading components. Topics are mostly motorcycle related with guns and construction materials thrown in, but any topic that is interesting will be considered. Everyone has to start somewhere; I started my writing career with a simple letter to the editor of The Key West Citizen. Let’s see what starts your writing career.

If you have a story you’d like to propose on motorcycles, guns, Baja, reloading, great rides, great roads, or any other topic you think would be of interest to our readers, email us with your story idea at info@exhaustnotes.us.

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A Sneak Preview…

Wowee, do we ever have some good stuff coming up right here on the ExNotes blog. Guns, motorcycles, adventure touring in Transylvania, and the results of a content safari through Arizona all the way to Albuquerque. Here’s an inkling of just a few of the topics coming your way.

What’s the real difference between a $1500 Colt Python and a $650 Ruger Blackhawk? Watch for our side-by-side, target-by-target comparo. It’s coming up.

Into resurrections? Hey, how about CSC’s replica of the original Mustang motorcycle! You read our recent story about the Al Simmons Mustang motorcycle collection and the origins of the Mustang. CSC’s Steve Seidner went a step further, and we’ll tell you all about it.

Ever have your well dry? I mean literally, not figuratively. Uncle Joe Gresh has, and he’ll tell you all about it. Gresh is a guy who makes MacGuyver look like an amateur. You’ll love this story.

We’re going to bring in a new writer or two (or maybe more). We have a blog loaded and ready to publish from good buddy Airborne Mike on a motorcycle ride through (get this!) Transylvania! I kid you not. Transylvania and the Transfagarasan Highway!

On that topic of new writers…Joe Gresh will tell you all about what you need to do to be considered for the ExNotes editorial staff. Watch for a blog on this topic in the near future.

The Pima Air Museum in Tucson is another treasure. Wow, that was a fun visit. There’s so much there we couldn’t take it all in during a single visit, and it’s a place that screams for more than a single blog. I need to return. The photo ops were incredible.

More good Joe Gresh stuff straight from Tinfiny Ranch, including the Gresh moto stable and the world famous Gresh project bank. Motorcycles, the MGB-GT, and more!

How about the Franklin Automobile Museum in Tucson, Arizona? Never heard of it? We hadn’t, either, but (trust me on this) it’s Tucson’s best kept secret!

White Sands Missile Range? Yep, that, too. Everything from a Nazi V-2 to current US weaponry, and we’ll have the story right here.

How about White Sands National Park? Think Sahara Desert, and you’ll have a good idea about what these rolling snow white gypsum hills look like. It was awesome!

The New Mexico Museum of Space History, with a guided tour by none other than Joe Gresh? That was a really fun visit with lots of cool exhibits. It’s coming your way.

How about sacred Native American ruins in New Mexico? We saw several and they were impressive, including the Kuaua Native American site along the Rio Grande River.

Albuquerque is quite a town, and Old Town Albuquerque is quite the place. We had a lot of fun wandering around and taking photos. It’s in the mix for a future blog.

And the Albuquerque 50th Anniversary Balloon Fiesta…wow, was that ever spectacular. The excitement and wonder of that event is one of the most impressive things I’ve ever experienced.

Stay tuned, folks. It’s quite an adventure, and it’s onging!

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The Buck Stopped Here

Some time ago I wrote about ordering a custom Buck folding knife. I’m not a knife guy (many of my friends are). The hook for me was an ad that floated into my inbox. I have a regular Buck 110 (an anniversary edition I bought on sale; it’s the other knife you see in the photo above), but I am the guy that marketing types dream about: Offer a custom feature or two, hit me with an email, and I’m in.

As promised, the lead time was a few weeks. When it arrived, all was not well. All priced out, I was into the custom Buck (complete with elk horn grips) for a little under $200. I liked the look of the elk horn grips, but on my knife the interface between the elk horn natural bark and the bolsters was not good. Some of the undulations in the horn butted up against the bolsters and it looked cheap. I realize the grips are a natural material, but I still didn’t like the fit.

I wrote to Buck, expecting to hear the above as an explanation (i.e., that the grips are natural material), but that wasn’t the case at all. Buck responded the next day. Send the knife back, they said, and we’ll make it right. I did, I had a new knife in about two weeks, and it was perfect. Buck selected a set of grips that had no bark interfacing with the bolsters, and the intersection was line-to-line everywhere on the knife. It is a thing of great beauty.

My custom Buck features included a mirror-polished blade, nickel (instead of brass) bolsters, and the elk horn grips I mentioned. And that blade…wow, it is razor sharp. The first time I closed it, when the blade completed its arc into the handle the tip caught my finger. It was so sharp I didn’t even realize it had cut me. The cut was so clean it healed in only a few days.

There’s more good news to the story. When you get a custom knife like this from Buck, you also get an official-looking certificate of authenticity, a knife case, and a holster. Somehow when I returned the knife for the new grips, I accidentally put all that stuff into the trash (which I only realized after Buck returned my knife). I called Buck and told them what I had done. I wanted the complete Buck custom knife experience, I told the nice lady on the phone, and she told me “no problem.” She shipped another set and it arrived a couple of days later, all at no charge.

All the above notwithstanding, like I said above, I’m not really a knife guy. Even though I have the two Bucks shown in the photos above, I don’t carry either one of them. I have a cheap Chinese copy (and its little brother) I bought at Lowe’s that is the same size and looks almost exactly like the standard Buck 110 folder. Sacrilege, I know.

The Sheffield name is laser engraved on the Chinese copies, but trust me, they are not from England. I think I paid $20 for both of them in a bubble-wrap package a few years ago. Once in a great while I’ll put the smaller one it in my pocket and carry it (even though the package included leather holsters for both), but I can’t remember a single time when I needed it and it was in my pocket. The big one? Its primary duty is opening letters.

If you’re thinking of getting a Buck knife, Amazon is a good place to go. If you’re thinking of an inexpensive Chinese copy, check out Lowe’s.

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The RV and Motor Home Hall of Fame

I used to work in the recreational vehicle industry. I ran a plant for Johnnie Crean at Alfa Leisure a couple of decades ago making See Ya motor homes (I’ve written about that before), and I consulted with Thor Industries on their travel trailers and Zieman on their trailers. It’s a fun business, although it was quite a bit different than the mostly aerospace work I had done up to that time. In the aerospace business, tolerances are thousandths of an inch, and if something is nonconforming (even if off by only a thousandth), it is rejected. In the RV business, tolerances are huge (usually denoted in fractions like ±1/8 or ±1/4 inch), and if the tolerances aren’t met, corrective action involves finding a bigger hammer.

You see a lot of elk statues in Elkhart. The RV and Motor Home Museum and Hall of Fame has one.

I loved making RVs and I loved working for Johnnie Crean. The guy is the most creative person I’ve ever known, and his ability to find simple solutions to complicated problems always impressed me. Johnnie came from RV royalty: His father was John Crean, the self-made billionaire who founded Fleetwood. I met Johnnie’s father a couple of times. He was a cool and unassuming guy. When Johnnie finished college, he went to work for his dad at Fleetwood and realized after a couple of weeks he could start his own RV company, and that’s what he did. I worked for Johnnie at Alfa Leisure and I ran the motor home plant.

Anyway, I’m getting off topic, which is the RV and Motor Home Museum and Hall of Fame in Elkhart, Indiana. It was a fun visit and not surprisingly, John Crean’s name appeared more than a few times. Check out the little travel trailer in the photo below.

A 1950 Fleetwood travel trailer. This one has quite a pedigree.

The RV/MH Hall of Fame also included the very first Bounder, another John Crean design that set a new standard in the RV business.

John Crean drew the Bounder logo on a napkin in a Denny’s restaurant. It’s a cool story. It’s one of the concepts that made him a billionaire.

The main exhibit hall in the RV/MH Hall of Fame displays iconic recreational vehicles and early campers along a walkway painted to look like a two-lane road.

Mae West, the famous actress, was an RVer. Her RV was interesting.

This concept of movie stars having an RV is interesting. When I ran the Alfa Leisure plant, we also manufactured 5th-wheel trailers (they connect to a pintle inside a pickup bed instead of a trailer hitch). Alfa Leisure was the preferred 5th wheel in Hollywood, and big name movie stars’ contracts stipulated Alfa Leisure RVs.

The Museum also displayed several examples of early travel trailers and motorhomes.

General Motors dabbled in the motor home business briefly. It looks interesting, but GM’s interest in RV’s was fleeting.

In the early days, motor homes did not include bathrooms, showers, or other amenities. Today, high end motor homes include all of those things and more. Some sell for more than a million dollars.

Walmart used to allow RVs to park in their lots for free (maybe they still do). We joked about folks who would spend a million bucks on an RV and then spend a half day looking for a Walmart where they could park overnight for free.

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Indiana’s Auburn, Cord, and Duesenberg Museum

The Auburn, Cord, and Duesenberg Museum is somewhat misleadingly named. Yes, they have a stunning and visually arresting collection of Auburns, Cords, and Duesenbergs (one of the best I’ve ever seen), but the collection of more than 120 vintage automobiles includes more than just these three marques. There’s even a vintage BSA motorcycle (I’ll get to that in a bit).

The Museum is housed in what used to be the Auburn factory. It’s in Auburn, Indiana, where they used to make Auburn automobiles. Auburn is north of Indianapolis (the quick way in is on Interstate 69); we stopped there on our way to Goshen to visit the Janus factory. Janus was fun and I grabbed a ton of awesome photos there, too. Grab the September/October issue of Motorcycle Classics magazine and you’ll see it. But that’s not what this blog is about. Let’s get back to Auburn and the Museum.

The Museum is magnificent and the automobiles are stunning. The Duesenbergs are beyond stunning but don’t take my word for it. You might consider seeing this magnificent collection yourself. I took enough photos to fill a book and I had a hard time picking just a few to show here. I probably went a little overboard, but the cars are so nice it was hard not to.

Here’s a 1931 Duesenberg Model J. The body was built by the Murphy company of Pasadena, who made more Duesenberg bodies than any other company. The car has a straight 8 engine.

This is a V-16 Cadillac, another truly magnificent automobile.

Next up is a supercharged 1935 Auburn. It is an 851 Speedster, with a Lycoming straight 8 engine. It cost $2,245 when it was new (less than a used Sportster, if you’re using that as a benchmark). The lines on this car are beautiful, and the colors work, too.

This next car is a 1929 Ruxton, a car I had never heard of before visting the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum. It’s a front-wheel-drive car, a competitor to the Cord in its day. According to what I found online, the Ruxton was lower, lighter, and handled better than the Cord. The looks and the colors work for me.

Check out the Ruxton’s headlights. These are Woodlite headlights, which are very art deco. They look like helmets.

Here are two 1937 Cord 812 automobiles: A convertible and a coupe. The colors and the style are impressive. When I was a kid, I built a Monogram plastic model of a Cord that I think was based on the convertible I saw in Indiana.

Here’s a 1948 Lincoln Continental Coupe with a V-12 engine. 1948 was the last year any US automobile manufacturer made a V-12. This one had 305 cubic inches and it produced 130 horsepower. The car you see here cost $4,145 in 1948.

This 1933 250cc single-cylinder BSA is the lone motorcycle in the Cord Auburn Duesenberg Museum. This one was E.L. Cord’s personal motorcycle, which he kept on his yacht and at his Nevada ranch.

Another magnificent Duesenberg. This one is a 1931 Beverly sedan, with a 420 cubic inch, straight 8, 265-horsepower engine It went for $16,500 when it was new.

This is an XK 120 Jaguar. I think this is one of the most beautiful cars ever made. It’s my dream car, in exactly these colors.

Here’s a first-year-of-production, 1953 Corvette. Chevy introduced the Corvette in the middle of the 1953 model year, so there were only a few made. The 1954 Corvette was essentially the same car.

Chevy was going to discontinue the Corvette due to its low sales, but the dealers convinced them otherwise. The dealers didn’t sell a lot of Corvettes, but they sold a lot of other Chevys to people who visited the showrooms to see the Corvette.

Another view of the first year Corvette. Note the mesh headlight protectors.

Ford’s answer to the Corvette…the two-seat Thunderbird. The little T-Bird never matched the Corvette’s performance. After three years of production (1955 to 1957), Ford redesigned the Thunderbird as a larger four-seater.

The Thunderbird soldiered on as a four-seater for years, then it was discontinued, then it briefly emerged again as a two-seater in 2002 (that’s the car you see below). The new Thunderbird only lasted through 2005, and like the classic ’55/’56/’57 two-seat T-Birds, Ford dropped this one, too. My buddy Paul drives one that looks exactly like this.

Auburn is a cool little town. Its population is about 14,000 and the town is about 145 miles north of Indianapolis (it’s a straight shot up on Interstate 69). The town is rooted in automotive history, and other history as well. In 1933, John Dillinger and his gang raided the local police station and they stole several firearms and ammunition. But it’s the automobiles and their history that make this town a worthy destination. Auburn, Indiana, loves its automobiles and automotive history. We saw several vintage cars being used as daily drivers. The murals were cool, too.

You can easily spend three or four hours in the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum, and spending the entire day there wouldn’t be out of the question. One of Auburn’s best kept dining secrets is Sandra D’s, a reasonably-priced Italian restaurant with an exquisite menu. Try the eggplant parmesan; you won’t be disappointed.

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