Looking Back at 2019 in Photos

Didn't do any Dual Sport Motorcycle adventures this past year, maybe turning 70 is starting to catch up with me...in fact other than a 4 day mini vacation with the wife, and my 3 weeks in Florida, I didn't get out of state much...yea, the annual Mushroom Hunt, with no Schrooms to show for 3 days in central lower Michigan, with Rick and Clint happened, a quick trip to Wisconsin in early November, but that was it...

However I did get some photography work in...although once again, not many early morning wake up calls out on Grand Lake....maybe age or just tired of the same old thing, photography wise....kind of like the local motorcycle rides...Perhaps I will be more active in 2020...

Or maybe age is starting to be a factor, along with the Agent Orange related health issues...but Hell, I feel younger than my soon to be 71 years, so let's look back at 2019 over the next few days and wait and see about 2020...

Here we go....the first of six installments...

January and February 2019...

As usual, I spent New Year's Day "Bowling" with football games, beers, and too much food, at Rick Pearson's place in NE Indiana...Rick and I have been great friends since High School when we worked together at Marsh Supermarket in Celina, during my Senior and his Junior years...we also were "Best Man" in each other's weddings many years ago...Here Rick is with the "Spread" last New Year{2019}, and me{left} and Rick on my and Patricia's Wedding Day in December 1976 in Wisconsin.

The weather turned brutally cold in January which limited my trips to the lake for photo shooting, but I did get some shots in...however the biggest news as the first month of 2019 was winding down was that I finally pulled the trigger on getting a new Jeep, well "new" but new enough...a 2009 Wrangler "X",,,nothing fancy but good A/C, good tires, a great Radio, and 6 speed overdrive manual tranny....picked in up a day before the coldest day of the year down some 60 south in Eaton, Ohio.

The weather moderated somewhat in February and gave me a chance to get out to Grand Lake in the Jeep...the Wrangler, with less than 65 thousand miles on it, gave me no problems until October when I headed it to South Florida....then I discovered it had some costly issues.

 

 Even with the purchase of the Wrangler, I kept the Nitro to use for work and hauling snowblowers and mowers around for the remainder of the winter and coming warm weather...the 2008 Nitro now has over 164,000 on it, but the only issues are the shot Air Conditioner and the Radio...but with XM on my phone, I can plug that in and problem solved...since I took it over from Patricia it, despite some repairs and one wreck on an icy New Year's Day a few years back, has been a good, solid, vehicle and plan on driving it until it dies or becomes to expensive to keep.  The TW sat alone with the cats in the garage for the duration...2019 would not see much riding, maybe 2020 will see me out more, but turning 71 in March...Who Knows?

Also in February I headed down to the Hope Hotel at Wright~Patt AFB to finalize our Vietnam "Sky Cop" Reunion plans...it continues to get bigger every year....not sure how long I want or will continue to run that show, with great help from Mike, Mike, Wayne, and Jack....but we will see, 2020 is set for sure.   Up Next:  March and April as the weather begins to thaw out and I begin to get out...