Slingshot

My buddy Troy, from Ride Stop n Go, invited me to join him on a little tear around town since the sun was shining and the weather was so fantastic and warm. And, to make it all the more interesting, Troy rounded up this crazy crazy rig on loan from our friends and fellow motorcycle enthusiasts over at Cycle Works Calgary.  Not only do the crew at cycle Works deal in KTM, Indian and Victory motorcycles but they have a great selection of Polaris ATV's and also the "Slingshot". Once you get you hands on a new ride, or specifically an ATV, we can get you covered!

This machine is like a rocket on roller skates and I felt like Batman as we went ripping around the city. Powered by a 2.4 litre DOHC engine with 5 speed transmission, this thing flies and we had a blast!!

I started as a passenger and 'tried to do some video', though not so successful considering the novelty of our first ride!!

My turn to play!!

Ready to rip!

New Rider Demographics

I've been reading some more articles about riding, and in this case, riders. And what I read is backed up a fair bit by what I noticed at the Motorcycle Shows in both Calgary and Edmonton, which we just wrapped up.

It seems the motorcycle industry has been doing very well in the past few years, based on the baby boomers and their disposable income to help purchase 'the toys'. With that demographic hitting mid stride and possible staying the same in sales, the motorcycle industry is placing an emphasis on expanding across all segments of the population. Within that segment is the growing demographic of women riders, traditionally smaller in the past but now estimated to account for 12% to 15% of all new buyers of motorcycles and mopeds and scooters.

Certainly, many motorcycle manufacturers recognize women's growing interest in motorcycles and are offering up ways to alter bikes to 'fit' women, such as lowering seats. More interestingly, our friends at Torch Motorcycles, are actually doing anatomical studies on women as they relate to the ergonomics of motorcycles, with design considerations for seats, clutch and brake levers and other such factors. Torch not only works within that sphere but encourages women to extend their interest in motorcycles from just riding to a more 'hands on' approach, with bike building and mechanics, apparel design and lots of other cool stuff. 

One of Torch's affiliates, Christine, is hand's on for sure!

Black Metal / Find The Panda!!

Saw this and thought it was funny! Time yourself and see how long it takes to find the panda. haha!

Vintage Tractors?

So, I got a notification at work from one of the companies we represent regarding vintage tractors. Hagerty Canada is a company that has specialty insurance for vintage automobiles and we are hoping they expand that to include vintage motorcycles as well, since we deal with quite a few of those bikes. Interestingly, they just opened up a program that covers vintage tractors, which prompted me to look into just what that means in the grand scheme of things.
Certainly, I've seen a few collectible type tractors at various fairs and in a parade here and there but never realized just how big of a thing they were, with lots of people restoring some of these old work horses and showing them off at Show 'n Shines just like they do with the collectible car and motorcycle crowd.
Here's a few photos of some tractors which I found particularly interesting, since some were on the farm when I was working on one as a young fella. Does that mean I am also going to be classified as Vintage soon, if not already? haha

I worked on an old tractor like this on the farm.,  a pre-50's era tractor that we called 'Old M', like in 'Aunty Em', though it was actually an 'M' series. It had that great big metal seat mounted on a piece of spring steel, for a smoother ride. 

There were plenty of AC's around that part of the country where I lived on the farm.

Thankfully, this was way before my time :)

Anything with steel wheels would have been a rough day of work

'Farm Red'

A silver one to match my hair!! haha

This Allis Chalmers looks like it's still a working rig.

Definitely at a Show 'n Shine in this photo

YOU are a prize winner!!

Imagine that you had won the following PRIZE in a contest: Each morning your bank would deposit $86,400 in your private account for your use. However, this prize has rules:

1. Everything that you didn't spend during each day would be taken away from you.

2. You may not simply transfer money into some other account.

3. You may only spend it.

4. Each morning upon awakening, the bank opens your account with another $86,400 for that day.

5. The bank can end the game without warning and at any time it can say “Game Over!", close the account and you will not receive a new one.

What would you personally do?

You would buy anything and everything you wanted right? Not only for yourself, but for all the people you love and care for. Even for people you don't know, because you couldn't possibly spend it all on yourself, right?

You would try to spend every penny, and use it all, because you knew it would be replenished in the morning, right?

Actually, you may be surprised to find out that this GAME is real! And, each one of us is already a winner of the PRIZE.

We just can't seem to see it, maybe because the PRIZE is actually TIME!!

1. Each morning we awaken to receive 86,400 seconds as a gift of life.

2. And, just like the rules say,  when we go to sleep at night, any remaining time is not credited to us.

3. What we haven't used up that day is forever lost.

4. Yesterday is forever gone.

5. Each morning the account is refilled, but the ‘bank’ can dissolve your ‘account’ at any time without warning and you won’t get a new one.

SO, what will YOU do with your 86,400 seconds?

Those seconds are worth so much more than the same amount in dollars. Think about it and remember to enjoy every second of your life, because time races by so much quicker than you think.

So take care of yourself, be happy, love deeply and enjoy life!

Here's wishing you a wonderful and beautiful day and……start spending!!!

New Baby!!

I'm soon to be a grandfather for the first time and I'm pretty excited about that, to say the least. One day, if it's okay with my family, I'll get to do a post or more about the newest member of the family, who is 'scheduled' to arrive in February.
In the meantime here's news of another expectancy, this one for some 'distant cousins' of ours. Kioja, a 14 year old female Lowland Gorilla at the Calgary Zoo is pregnant and will be giving birth sometime around March. This is Kioja's first pregnancy and the first at the zoo since 2008, so it's pretty exciting news. There will likely be a baby gorilla naming contest, so put on your thinking caps and come up with something interesting and relevant.

Kioja

2016 Dakar

The 2016 Dakar rally is well under way, although Stage One was cancelled due to unsafe conditions created by torrential rain. The extreme wet weather doesn't just make it unsafe for the riders and drivers by creating adverse riding/driving conditions but also puts them at jeopardy should something go wrong. The support helicopters that are used for spotting and rescue were grounded and added to the problem.
Racers drove to the next destination on an an 'untimed road section', where they commenced Stage Two. Now they're competing in Stage Three so I'll post results later in the week as they update.

Australian Toby Price,  riding a KTM,, holds a slight 2 second lead in the overall standings

Mohamed Abu Issar found out why they canceled Stage One

Looks dry and dusty now, in the heavy Truck Div

A look at Team Peugeot's rig

Team Peugeot went with 4 cars and Frenchman, Sebastien Loeb leads the overall standings by over 2 minutes

There's some great photography at the rally

Another great shot

New Year's Campout

We decided to head up to the camp for New year's Eve and welcome 2016, along with Mother Nature and some peace and quiet. We saw the Aurora Borealis just after it got dark, and before the moon came up, which we thought was a good omen of the year to come!

The temperature went down to a chilly -15°C but the fire kept us warm and we had the heaters going in the old Airstream, so it was pretty toasty all around. It's amazing how well you sleep when you are outside in the cold air all day and half the night, then curl up under a couple of big down filled duvets at bedtime. Of course, I had to sleep with my toque on but that's quite okay!! haha!

Happy New Year!!!

Panorama of half of the camp as the sun sets

Champagne is chillin'

We're getting the fire built up, but Rex still needed to get in his chair and cover up! haha

There was a bit of snow but not too much considering it's January

We got heated up nicely with this blaze

You can't tell in the dark but our tree is 50' high

Weird and Wanted

I was researching some news about motorcycle imports being affected by the low Canadian dollar and saw a link to "The Mug Shot Gallery", the oddity of it intriguing me enough to check it out. It was a real, and up to date photo gallery, consisting of mug shots of various 'alleged' perpetrators and a few who had been found guilty.
Some of these folks looked relatively normal, but I have to say the majority looked like they may have been making many other poor life choices other than the ones that landed them in the gallery.
Later, I thought it might make a funny post, in that sad 'your own worst enemy' way, but when I searched it, got a link to totally different, but equally funny yet disturbing series of mug shots. In this case, I am not one to question someone's choice when doing body modifications but let's face it (no pun intended) , all of these tats are just badly done. I'd say these perpetrators made tattoo choices, as well as the location of their ink, that shows they're not quite right in the head. Ironically, in all cases their distinctive markings were critical in helping police capture them.
Here's a few samples that caught my eye...

Is that an SS tattoo on his right cheek?

Maybe this ink is a tribal thing

Another guy with devil 'horns', as well as some other bad ink

Do you think the scowl makes him even badder than the reversed MURDER on his forhead

Perhaps there's drugs involved in this person's life

Would a true tattoo artist actually do this kind of 'work' on a person?

Kind of like REDRUM, but this spells DOG when you look in the mirror!! Not really...haha!!

Quite likely accurate

The ink is one thing but the skull mods are another complete level of commitment to who knows what!

A candidate for the t.v. series "Bad Ink"

Do you think they have a 'Vegan' option in penitentiary?

Our Economic Future

Without a doubt, these are some tough times for many Albertans. The slump in the oil and gas sector has many people unemployed or underemployed, and things are a bit grim for many, even more so since it's Christmas.
BlueCircle's Gerry, Kelly and myself were invited to a town hall meeting with our mayor, Naheed Nenshi, to discuss the economic state of our city and what plans the City has for helping boost our economy.
Needless to say, we liked to hear that the City of Calgary along with Calgary Economic Development, have some plans in place to not only keep our economy headed in the right direction but to assist those businesses that may be having a difficult time while making the adjustments needed to deal with the associated challenges we are facing.
Although he jokingly referred to the town hall meeting as "the best catered funeral ever", Mayor Nenshi felt there were many positives with our economy, based on long term investments of a diverse nature. Twenty years ago, 50% of our city's GDP was made up fromt eh oil and gas industry, whereas today it only accounts for approximately 30%. Add to that the addition of 5000 new jobs in 2015, despite the massive layoffs in the oil and gas sector, and you can see why Nenshi feels we are quite resilient. He pointed out the cranes that can still be seen all over Calgary’s downtown and many developers are betting hundreds of millions of dollars on the city’s ability to bounce back.
“If people want to live here, economic activity follows, and making sure this place is attractive – in both senses of the words – is the core of this economic strategy.”

Kelly is ready to hear some good news

Yes, lots of media

The first venue sold out so they moved to a bigger room, which also sold out!

Mayor Nenshi is a great speaker

Carstar And The Heroes Calendar

Our good friends and affiliates at Carstar provide the kind of service we like, when you've been in an accident and are looking to get your vehicle properly repaired and back on the road in a timely manner. Every year our local Carstar reps, Matt and Dave, pop into the office and bring the BlueCrew one of their custom stuffy critters (the latest one was a lion) and our very own, custom calendar. For 2016, they chose to feature a Canadian hero for each month so I thought it would be nice to feature each one at the start of every month throughout the year.
For January, our calendar features someone whose legacy lives on in an annual ritual for many canadians, in teh form of a run. Terry Fox inspired many people to take up his cause when he began his cross Canada run 35 years ago with "the Marathon Of Hope". Terry was living with bone cancer and had already lost his leg to the disease. For many, Terry's iconic step and hop running technique is instantly recognized and firmly planted in their mind as a symbol of the man.
"Terry raised more than money on his run, he left a legacy. To date, over $650 million has been raised worldwide for cancer research in his name."