The Wandering Minstrel

There’s a first time for everything. The Better Half and I were walking the dogs this afternoon when an airplane towing a glider flew directly overhead. We have seen sailplanes in the distance as they soar over the desert, but this is the first overflight of one under tow.

Clickable image by The Better Half

It’s been many years since I took my one and only lesson in a sailplane at El Mirage Field in the California High Desert. I remember the instructor pilot was Gus Briegleb, the flight school owner and a well-known pilot among soaring enthusiasts. When we released the tow cable, the thing I remember most about the experience was how quiet it was aloft without the engine and propeller noise. The flight was over in about 20 minutes but I am glad I took the lesson even though I had no inclination to continue getting a sailplane rating.

This is a double nostalgic photo (clickable - courtesy The Better Half) since we see a nice 1954 Chrysler New Yorker parked at Screamers Drive-in restaurant. Quite frequently, we see classic cars parked at this mid-century-style eatery on US 60 in our town. The restaurant is about a quarter mile from our house. One of these days, The Better Half and I will go there for burgers and fries and a malted milkshake with a side of nostalgia.

The Better Half and I were in a sporting goods store during our recent visit to California. They had this Smith and Wesson 4504 Air soft Gun on sale at half price. My old one stopped functioning last year so I bought this gun.

We brought the new air pistol home and fired it today. We both shot it into the berm behind the RV pull-thru. To our surprise, the .12 caliber plastic BB rounds seemed to hit where we aimed them (at 7 yards) right out of the package. We will be using it for keeping some of the undesirable critters off of the Better Half’s bird feeders. Pretty much the same application we had for the old air gun in California.

This classic, seen today on Interstate 10 near Blythe, CA, is a 1930-ish car, but I can’t identify it. The most interesting thing about this car is that it’s wearing a custom “bra” as it heads westbound. I can’t remember seeing a bra on any other old classics.

I took a couple of years of German language when I was in high school (that was a long time ago). I always was amused at how the Germans concatenated words into one long word to describe something. The German word for the automotive bra is “steinschlagschutzhülle. This is the concatenation of the words for “stone-hit-shield-cover.” During WW2, they called the P-38 Lightning “fork tail devil” or “gabelschwantzteufel.” Equally as hilarious.

I ran across this article on Fox Nation this morning:

The XM2010 sniper rifle is making a name for itself in Afghanistan. Officials won’t say how many are there or where they are. But at the time of the Sept. 20 contract, officials said the first 250 rifles would be ready by early December and sent directly to Afghanistan.

No matter how many are there, this is clear: The weapon’s performance has been strong enough to warrant full fielding.

Read more:

Just look at that beautiful piece of tactical hardware!

We see a lot of pro-second-amendment signs and bumper stickers in our new hometown. We were in the old historic part of town where a sign on a pickup truck had a sticker on the tailgate that inspired the animation seen here . . .

I found this weird image on the internet today while I was looking for something entirely unrelated. It’s an image from a Field and Stream on-line article about how to make candles from used shotgun shells.

When we head to California from the new home, we travel westbound on US 60 until getting on Interstate 10 a few miles east of Quartzsite, AZ. The scenery and the little towns are always interesting to us when we drive past them. Each time we take the trip, we seem to notice something new along the route each trip we make.

Take,for instance, the Outback Restaurant and Bar at the intersection of US 60 and Alamo Lake Road in Wenden, AZ, where we finally noticed their sign along the roadside on this trip. It says, “Hot Beer - Lousy Food - Bad Service - Welcome - Have a nice Day.” The Better Half took this (clickable) image of the building and the sign.

Here’s more about our “Outback:”

The Arizona Outback encompasses the vast Hwy 60 corridor that lies between the Harcuvar and Harquahala Mountain Ranges, traveling west from Wickenburg through McMullen Valley across to the Kofas, and on to Arizona’s original “port of entry”, Ehrenberg, AZ on the Colorado River. The area is rich in history, gold mines, agriculture, cowboys and cattle drives, old miners and new enterprises. Vast open lands, mild winters, and the irresistible desert vistas make the area a favorite spot for winter snowbirds and off-road enthusiasts.

Explore Arizona’s public lands, search for old gold mines, go rockhounding, bird watching, hiking in the mountain wilderness areas, horseback riding, off-road, run the quads through the desert trails, or have a jeep adventure. Visit the communities of the AzOutback and find special places, special people. Stay for awhile - the RV Parks in the Arizona Outback have the best tour guides in the west!

Visit these Arizona Outback Communities - Ehrenberg, Quartzsite, Bouse, Brenda, Hope, Salome, Wenden, Alamo Lake and Aguila.