What a Year!

2018 was quite a year.

I must apologize that it has been 6-months since my last blog post, but it seems I don't have a lot of time for puttering on the computer much anymore.

I must make more of an effort in 2019 to read more blog posts (I feel so out of the loop) and post more blog posts.

Since my last post at the beginning of June we closed on our house in Monmouth, then sold our house in Corvallis.  For a whopping two weeks we were land barons, according to our realtor, because we owned two houses. Of course that came with two mortgages for those two weeks. Troubadour also started his full-time job with Team Oregon.

I have now been with the Department of Justice 8-months and I still enjoy what I do, so that is a good thing.

I had one great ride in August before our move.  Troubadour and I were privileged to host BeemerGirl and Oilburner for a weekend of back-road riding, merriment, tater-tot consumption, and Crown Royal Apple Whiskey sipping.

That Sunday morning after eating pumpkin scones, we spent an hour or more linking our Sena intercoms before heading off for a figure-eight ride of the hills to the south west of Corvallis.   Here are a few pictures from our ride that day.

(Linking the Senas - Photo by BeemerGirl)

(Stopped at Alsea Falls - photo by BeemerGirl)

(Parking Lot of Alsea Falls - Photo by BeemerGirl)

(Stopped to check BeemerGirl's tire pressure)

(The view when we were stopped in the above photo)

Sadly work, house projects, household chores, and grocery shopping, etc has kept me off the bike since then.  Where I used to have Friday afternoons off for grocery shopping and house cleaning, now I do not, so it falls to the weekend.  Hard to pack a weeks worth of groceries in the trunk monkey of the bike.

We have had one set of visitors at our new house too.  RichardM and Bridget stopped by when they were on their travels.  Not only did they see the new digs, we had a lovely diner at Marco Polo in Salem.  Always a pleasure when they come to town.

It seems that we are hardly ever home on the weekends and now we are in winter. The low temperatures can be a little frosty.  I could have commuted by bike in the summer, but something about sitting in stop and go traffic in our state capital for 20 minutes just trying to get out of town was not appealing.  I have a different parking space now that takes me on a different route than it did this summer so maybe next year?

Most of my commute has been in the Fiat, which we've had for 4 years last month.  While it was great for that 3-mile commute in Corvallis and in town grocery getting, we've found it is not the best for commuting in the dark torrential rains or icy mornings.  The all-wheel drive of a Subaru is more suited for my needs now.  On bad mornings I have been appropriating Troubadour's daily driver - the trusty Subaru Forester. That just made me realize how unsuited the Fiat was.

Long story short...... my our new 2019 Subaru Crosstrek arrives Thursday January 3rd.  We should be able to pick it up on Saturday.  Bye-Bye little Fiat, we've had a great run.  I chose a Cool Khaki Grey color, which I think looks blue most of the time.  It is a hard to find color so we had to wait a few weeks for one with the options we wanted.  Here is a picture of what it will look like.

(2019 Subaru Crosstrek in Cool Grey Khaki - Photo by MotorTrend.com)

So far no huge plans in 2019.  We had thoughts of attending the motorcycle show in Vancouver in January, but PolarBear let his passport lapse so we may forego that since we can't go with friends.  We haven't made hotel reservations so my guess is we are a little late.  In the alternative we might be remodeling the kitchen here in our new place.  We enjoyed the Ikea cabinets we installed in the Corvallis house and can do that here too.  For a larger kitchen this one sure isn't as functional and doesn't have as much storage as we were used to.

We also are in the planning stage for a camping trip to Washington in May to visit with Troubadour's brother and his family.  May will be two years since we've seen them and the neice and nephew are growing fast.

Of course we'll ride when we can.  We are hoping that since we sacrificed 2018 to the new job and moving Gods that we will be rewarded by the riding Gods in 2019.

A very Happy New Year to everyone.  I shall try and catch up with your blogs soon.

- Au Revoir

 Just living is not enough, one must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower." Hans Christian Andersen

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