Bikes, Bears, Birthdays and Smartasses

This post was originally written on 7-3-2012.  I'm still getting through old posts:

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Today is the big 40.  This is the card my daughter gave me.  Apparently (Obviously?), she picked it out herself.

In my wife’s defense, she didn’t see the inside until they got it home. I like it when the universe lines up the right way and appropriate things like this happen against all odds :-)

Regarding the bike trip:

Read an excellent blog entry on bike camping:

http://wetleather.com/reference/camping.html

I need to add the following items to the equipment list.

• Camp stove.
• Propane can or unleaded gas.  This could also act as desperate last bit of fuel.
• Small two person dome tent.  The lighter the better.
• Good nylon sleeping bag.
• Instant coffee
• Non dairy creamer
• Splenda
• Siphen pump

This is the part that I like. Creating equipment lists and planning.

I think that as I get some of this stuff together, I’m going to try a solo bike camping trip up to a campground that I have never been to before.  I can leave from work on Friday and get home on Saturday late morning.  This would be good practice for the following:

• Packing the bike
• Testing equipment
• Rough bike camping in an unknown place
• Getting through a night of sleep.

One of the ideas that I keep coming back to:  Should I carry a pistol with me for protection?  I can legally have the gun on my bike and in my tent (extension of the home).    I need to think more about this because guns complicate things.  Usually I just have mace and/or stun gun in the vehicle. It may be better to just rely on these legal, non-lethal means of protection.  Guns are messy, loud and very final.  Still there is nothing you can carry on your body that provides the kind of ultimate protection that 16 9mm rounds can provide…and I would be afraid to Taze a bear (even though the video of such would probably be very entertaining in a Faces of Death kind of way). 

UPDATE: Read a great story about a hunting expedition:

Group sitting around the fire.  Hunter takes out his .357 and starts cleaning it.

-Guide:  Why’d you bring a handgun?

-Hunter:  In case we run into a grizzly.

-Guide:  Be sure to file down the front site.

-Hunter:  Why?  So I can pull it quicker?

-Guide:  No, It’ll hurt less when the bear shoves it up your ass.

Doesn’t recognize your right to ‘Bear’ arms.

Apparently it’s much better to use a can of Bear pepper spray/mace.  I stand corrected, humbled and definitely unarmed.  The gun stays at home.  (I’m not really afraid of bears and the gun is just too damn much responsibility)