Theme troubles…..

How I absolutely HATE Internet Explorer!

Just found a great site to check your site out with – http://browsershots.org/.  The site will do screenshots of various browsers running on various operating systems.  Simply…a great utility.

Sooooo…I figured that my site would be fine, however I discovered in the different versions of IE there are problems <sigh>.

Anyways…had been planning on working on a new theme for the non-riding season but it looks like I need to push the schedule up!

So if the blog content resides WAY DOWN on the page, my apologies for not having my CSS set for every version of IE. 

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July 31, 2007 · Filed Under Website

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Another Sad Fatality This Weekend

Heather Williams was the young woman who was killed on Saturday evening at mile 111 Seward Hwy. She was 29 years old, with three children and her husband, Mike, is a member of the Alaska National Guard deployed in Iraq.

The bike she was riding was a borrowed 650 V Star.

Heather had very little motorcycle experience and no license, she had not yet been through any training. Apparently she crossed the yellow line between McHugh Creek and Beluga Point. She hit the pickup on the passenger side, an indicator of how far she was out of her lane. She was not passing a vehicle nor was alcohol a factor as first rumored.

The Alaska National Guard, along with the Red Cross, is working to transport her husband out of Iraq immediately. Our prayers go out to Mike and the rest of her family as they struggle to deal with this tragedy.

Please, please, please, PLEASE be careful on the roads out there. If you’re a new rider, please take care on the Seward going south. It’s a safety corridor to Girdwood because of how dangerous (curves, congestion, accidents) it is!

Hell, old or new…be aware! The time to be aware is not when you hear about a wreck, or when you roll by wrecked bikes and a person under blankets, or when you’re holding someone’s head level till the ambulance arrives, or picking up a bike off the rider.

The time to think about awareness isn’t while you’re turning around on a deserted highway trying to think about what you’re going to do about the fact that you’re friend and his bike are down and you’re hours from the nearest town and you’re not sure if any cell phones will work, or having to cut the chin strap of someone’s helmet as you stress and sweat taking off the helmet because you can’t be sure if they’re breathing and you need to give CPR.

The time to think about awareness is now, not when you’re leaving the emergency room after visiting someone and then meeting and escorting another injured rider back into the ER from the entrance where he is being dropped off.

Always remember to think safety when you throw a leg over your bike, not when you’re sitting next to a friend post-op after their shoulder is replaced.

Motorcycles are cool…they’re BAD ASS. They’re gas savers. They’re also extremely dangerous! There is nothing wrong with not doing something because you’re uncomfortable.

I’d rather live and be called a wimpy rider than to be remembered as a “rough-n-tumble bad ass” at my wake.

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July 24, 2007 · Filed Under Biker, General

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What a weekend!

A sunny MDA Live Ride!  Who would have thunk it…..

Saturday, was absolutely wonderful….almost cloudless.  Blue skies everywhere.

Registration here at Anchorage City Church and Denali HD went smoothly.

We had XRock 96.3 and Kool 97.3 at ACC with XRock doing the live remote to the Soldotna Sports Complex.

We have a "honor guard" group that ride with the sidecars (last year the "VIP" group left the sidecars with the MDA Kids behind!) all the way to Soldotna.

We have 14 groups of 8 depart after the honor guard. 

Judge Roy, Sirock, Minx and I were the last out since we were in charge of getting the groups together and on the road.

Road to Girdwood was uneventful.  After Turnagai Pass, is where things started to get interesting….

You can brief riders and ride leader till they are blue in the face…but <sigh>. 

Nothing like new riders.  We had LOTS of new riders and lots of people who obviously do not ride in groups.  We had a group that would not move to the right when we came up on them to pass.  Then one of the riders would leave the group and ride the right lane!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

So we ended up having to literally move into the group in a leapfrog to get past them.

However right after that is when we came up on the group that encountered the bear cub.  Long story short, a group had a bear cub run out in front of them.  Half the group were able to avoid the cub, but three could not.  Read the story here.

So…taking it slow after that we made it into Cooper Landing.  Had we not decided to take a break we would have been ahead of the first group <grin>!

We decided that since we had so much time, we'd hit a favorite stop for the three of us in Soldotna….Lucky Raven Tobacco!  Cigars and ciggs at GREAT PRICES!  I love stopping in as they have my favorite Brazilians and Dominicans at 40+% off!

So, after a good cigar purchase…off to the Sports Complex.

Thanks to the bridge being finished the ride to Kalifornsky Beach road is a easy ride.

At the complex everything is going great….games inside, LOTS OF FOOD (so much so that I'm full without going for seconds), live music that doesn't outright suck!

Except for the lack of a bike wash…it's a damn site better than last year!

The parade of heroes was also great!  We has twice as many as last year able to ride inside the complex.  As before I give my slot to someone else as to me it's about the kids…not riding around inside the complex.

We wait to find out who wins…it's not me again, so off we go to Homer.

You read that right…off to Homer!  There was Hagen Daas for desert, so we're so full we decide NOT to stop at the DQ!!!!

We arrive in Homer OK…except for the usual weekend tourist idiot traffic…the ride is great.  The roads are still…well…the roads to Homer (tar snakes, frost heaves, broken pavement).

Party at the driftwood, continuing to Duggan's Pub across the street for more partying and dancing till the wee hours.  I hear there are pictures and if I can get them I'll post them with accompanying blackmail instructions <EVIL grin>.

We get rain starting @5am.  We depart a wet, rainy Homer @10.

Breakfast at Anchor Point, gas and then the road home.

I want to mention that it's at Anchor Point that we get the word about Heather Williams…. 

When we get just past Cooper Landing we end up in stalled traffic.  By the time we get to the Seward/Sterling Junction, we see traffic backed up on the Seward as far as the eye can see.

First thought is another accident, but as we pass the trooper managing the junction we learn from him that it's road maintenance!  A rainy Sunday is a hell of a time to regrade the construction zones.

We end up at Summit Lake lodge @6:30 so we sit down for dinner. 

We then roll to Girdwood and home, arriving home @9pm.

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July 24, 2007 · Filed Under Road Reports

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