Tuesday, July 06, 2004

I hope everyone had a fun and safe 4th of July! It seems that someone in the family has gone motorcycle crazy and it's not me this time. As many of you know, I've had a love affair with motorcycles that goes back as far as I can remember. At first, I went through several minibikes before graduating to motorcycles so I've had a motorbike of some sort for more than 35 years. Terri enjoys riding on the BMW as a passenger, and even though she got her motorcycle license nearly 18 years ago, she never did ride our various bikes much, probably because they were all too tall and/or too heavy for her. In June she took a refresher class from a professional motorcycle racer at the local track and the next day bought the bike that she had trained on, a little Honda Rebel. I figured she'd want to upgrade eventually, maybe after a season of riding, but who would have thought it would take her less than 30 days!? So now she's the proud owner of a new Ducati Monster which is a real thrill to ride. We got her all the safety gear, but I still worry and for the first time I realize why parents are so terrified of motorcycles. I never gave it much thought when I was the one doing the riding. I guess it's payback time for all the worry I caused my parents with my 'dangerous' hobbies like guns, motorcycles, and airplanes.



For the 4th of July Terri and I had an invitation to participate in a professional show that was held in Laramie, WY. We got to watch the show from behind the control console. You can click on the image to see a bigger picture of what the mortars looked like. We were less than 100 feet from the mortars as the shells were going off. We could physically feel the concussion of each shot and we were directly under the canopy of the exploding fireworks. The guy who ran the show ran it like a finale from the beginning to the end. It was 17 minutes 22 seconds long, set to music, and during that time he fired off nearly 2000 shells from mortars ranging in size from 4" to 12" in diameter. It was the most impressive 4th of July show I've ever witnessed from any distance.

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