I passed an old pickup on a long uphill who had blown by me at over 90mph back on the flats- as I crested the hill my cruise control always takes a sec to realize we are going downhill and my speed floats up a bit- so I was now coasting at close to <.!.> when suddenly there were deer in the road just a few seconds ahead. I looked behind to see what I expected, the truck had crested the hill and thought we were racing (when actually my speed had been a constant speed set just below what MT State Patrol consider too fast- the hill had slowed the truck down to a labored 65 or so, but now he was wide open pointed downhill). I-15 is a wide two lane tarmac with a tall concrete barrier on the left that the deer couldn't cross. I was still in the left lane from passing the truck (and lining myself up to straighten out the upcoming corner) I sucked in as close to the inside rumble strip as I could, straightened her out and hit the breaks- the ABS kicked in and with no steering pull or even a shimmy from the car I was at a full stop quicker than I thought possible with a big eyed deer peeling out and falling down a few feet from my bumper. I had been sure I would eat at least one of the deer, and my bigger concern was the pickup coming up fast behind me- if he turned his wheel he would flip and sweep me and the deer from the road. The other few deer stopped short as I had suddenly materialized in the middle of them, and the truck blasted between them without having to blink. I sat idling on the highway, knowing there was no one else coming up from behind, while the deer finally got its skating hooves under itself and they all turned and bounced into the forest.
I may be done. Hard to say. Just because there are some areas that I'm unsure of doesn't mean that I should work them more.
Yes, she is still pretty damn fun to drive.
When last we talked cars, I had just changed her spark plugs and oil and was wondering how much real work she needed. I brought her in for a Spa-Day at my trusty local monkeywrencher and it turns out she just needed a little bit of this, that, and the other. She even passed safety with the old crappy tires I had put on for $10 apiece last fall, as her old set from 1986 during my Senior year had rotted off. Now she has nice new whitewalls, and feels like every gal does after a fancy pedicure- ready to burn off a toe!
I took her out for a spin to the Marina on the Great Salt Lake, driving into a 50mph headwind of an incoming storm. She did just fine, and begged to go faster than a piddling 80mph- she has always baited me like that.
Coming back through town she burbled and thundered along, and gave me that crazy massage she does when waiting at a light.
All that smoke in the pictures is bad gas going through a caramelized carburetor- fresh gas, clean jets, and a few more hours running should clear it out.
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This is an excerpt from a essay I created during my MFA to parody Conceptual Art, creating a premise wherein a post-Post Modern aesthetic is applied to creating round hay bales. This flowery little ditty was created at my father's kitchen table on a bright summer day in late July of 2001- it was written to be a bit over the top, as a journal entry of one of the characters who is smitten with a percieved romance of the Montana ranching lifestyle. It does, however, point toward my current work.
the form of the bale is an infinite spiral in a finite space. the bail encapsulates verdant spring in all her glory of alpine wildflower and rich meadow grass. the bale is a talisman of Persephone to keep the earth from despair when she is gone to Dis. in their Montana homeland they are life itself in the depth of northern winter. they are formed by one man and many machines, formed to care for his herd. they are a testament to a life lived in harmony with seasons, of a man who lives his bond to the earth. when he was young the work was done with horses and a family of eight. now, with the aid of machines, he runs the ranch alone. the individual working in isolation with machines in a landscape that wants to swallow up all signs of man.
the fields of baled hay hold a mathematical symmetry, a cosmological grouping, a sense of the underlying structure of the universe, man’s conception of the LOGOS in tangible form, man’s existential desire for form and meaning and harmony.
multiple objects made by machines, too large to be moved without machines, yet they blend into the vast landscape and offer no affront to nature. they are of a relationship of man and earth, of plant-life and season and faith in nature, of man understanding self and world and his own constant animal effort. they are a bridge, not only man and earth, not only of summer in winter, but of humanity through all seasons. they are a pure conception of time as spiral, space as curve, mass as direction, and the mysterious simultaneity of gravity and electricity which is best sensed when the self is in motion around the static bales so that the relativity of time, distance, and perception bespeak the physics and metaphysics of the particular. the deep aesthetic of science arises with this motion, twin to the deep aesthetic of art.
they are objects created to be unmade. in the depths of the northern winter they are unwound, rolled backwards to their spiral under a cold sun that dazes the night for a few short hours before the earth returns to darkness and the sky to stars and moonlight and silver tendrils of Aurora Borealis, spring is uncapsulated and devoured by the harsh winter gods, the Norse apocalypse of endless dark winter destroying all creation crushes inward with the cold, but faith of seasons is offered in the Greek trust of Dionysus’ annual resurrection, even after his death that heralds all tragedy.
I didn't work on this yesterday, or the day before really- as my sister flew in from Sacramento to pick up my Dad's truck. It is the lovely Ford F-250 V-10 that effortlessly hauled the old Mustang down from Montana. Now it is off to it's new life as a California truck- it snowed yesterday and the day before; the last snow the truck will ever see. A bit too much truck for hauling groceries though- it will resume it's life as a working truck on my sister's little sheep ranch.
OHHHH!! Oh my gosh!! Fantastic.. outrageous! read more
on Bonneville II: in-progress, detail