Housekeeping

Dramatic skies on the way home from work in late December

Well, now that we've made it over the Holidays and we are into a new year, it's time to get back to some regular postings here at "Guitar Ted Productions". But first......a little updating to get caught up after all the special postings of December...

Speaking of special postings.... I did hit the record for posts in a year with 389! Again- nothing planned- It just sort of happens that way. Although I have admitted it kind of becomes a personal contest at times to see if I am going to measure up to previous years blog totals. But 389! Whew! I gotta figure this out better because I could have taken off the entire month of December and still had more than one post a day for a year! 

Riding has been minimal. I've been out here and there, but mostly within the city limits since the winds and air temperatures have been pretty rough for open country riding. Fat bike rides and the occasional 'urban unpaved adventures' have been all I've been doing. In fact, I haven't really ridden out in the country since getting "The Quest" out of my hair several weeks ago now. I guess you could say it is now my 'off season' and I don't see regular outings into the country happening for a while yet. All weather dependent. We'll see.....

Speaking of the weather, this weather we had coming into Christmas was junk for cycling. No snow for fat biking and way too cold and windy for anything else. That and having Christmas at the end of the week really threw me for a loop. I still am not sure what day it is.....well, actually.... I am sure it is my 21st wedding anniversary. I'd better remember that! Mrs. Guitar Ted would not be too happy if I had forgotten that today was "The Day" back then.

A December 2020 sunset somewhere in Bremer County, Iowa

I did get to spend some extra time with Mrs. Guitar Ted of late. Since work has been so slow, I realized that I could ride along with her when she had to go to work at an affiliate hospital in a small town about 44 miles away. I drove with her and dropped her off and then picked her back up again in the evening. The timing was such that we got to enjoy both a spectacular Sunrise and Sunset. Pretty cool! Our holidays were pretty low-key with basically just a special dinner on Christmas Day and a lot of time spent together as a family unit during this time. 

Then the snow really did come on Tuesday before New Year's Day. And again right afterward we got a bit more. So, now with all of the white stuff it is time to try- at least- to fat bike in this granular stuff. And with that, I'm pretty much caught up on my situation here. 

I've shifted to doing a lot of cleaning/organizing in the Lab. It's a mess after doing everything but cleaning and organizing all year. I've got some plans to take care of my wheels, spares, and somehow do a bit better job with my tools and equipment which over-ran the place after I brought everything home late in 2019 when I stopped working at the old shop. 

The Blackborow DS shows me again why it is the best tool for the job of breaking trail or use in deep snow.

I've also had an idea which relates to the original requests from some of you readers to make some sort of Trans Iowa book available. I have already done a series about my two loaded, self-supported, over the road tours in the 90's. This series is pretty refined and would make for a good 'practice run' on a Trans Iowa publication. So, I may gather that all together, do a few tweaks, and see about getting that published. 

Anyway, so that's all the things that have been either on my mind, or are related to what I have been up to lately besides just hanging out, social distancing, and trying to stay healthy. Hopefully you all are doing well out there and are getting back into a regular groove soon post-Holidays.