Christmas china from True West - Merry Christmas to me!

It's been a few years since I added anything to my cowboy china collection so I claimed this Christmas platter as my Christmas present from Maria.

The Christmas series was never produced by Wallace China. The rest of the Wallace cowboy china line is now being faithfully reproduced by True West China. The owner of True West was visiting with the late artist Till's daughter when he was shown a series of Till's drawings for Christmas cards and got permission to use the images on a new Christmas series of china.

This platter arrived on Dec. 18 and I planned to use it for Christmas dinner, but I liked seeing it in the china cabinet so much, I couldn't bear to cover it up with food.

Confronting the reality of ending my motorcycling career

I fear that the Covid-19 pandemic has ended my motorcycling career that began in the 1970s.

My BMW K1200GT (on the left) sits idle in my shed connected to a battery trickle charger. It hasn't run in nearly a year and I fear the fuel stabilizer isn't sufficient to prevent starting problems. I just haven't had the heart to find out.

My BMW K75S has been sitting in the neighborhood Gold Wing repair shop since just after Labor Day, 2018, waiting for rear brake service. I haven't talked with the proprietor in more than a year and I learned the other day that his building is in foreclosure, so I probably ought to rescue the bike before it gets seized by the lender.

I rode a pathetic 10 miles last year - just down Ind. 75 to Western Boone Junior-Senior High School and back. Not long after, I began to notice I was having balance problems, which eroded my confidence and got me thinking about the slippery slope that goes with breaking a hip. That's what put my dad into a nursing home at the end of his life.

Plus, the pandemic took away the initiative to ride anywhere now that most destinations are problematic (first time I ever used that word in print). 

I joined some Indianapolis BMW Club friends for lunch last summer and another long-distance rider shared that his confidence isn't what it used to be and we agreed that it may be time to retire from riding.

I had a good run - about 400,000 miles on five BMWs and a couple of Kawasakis and rode all over the U.S. with multiple trips to California, the Pacific Northwest, Canada, and Florida to mention a few. I took lots of photos and kept logs of my trips, so I have plenty of memories to revisit in my advancing years.

So when spring arrives, I plan to sell the big blue bike and maybe keep the K75S for puttering around.

Visiting fox

My trailcam captured this fox strolling across our neighbor's driveway at 5:50 a.m. on Nov. 21.

We live on the edge of town, so it's no surprise that wildlife comes to visit occasionally.

We routinely had foxes and deer and coyotes in our yard when we lived in Arkansas.

My big German binoculars have been restored to their former clarity

My WWII E. Leitz 15x60 Campofortit arrived yesterday after being refurbished by Suddarth Optical Repair of Henryetta, Oklahoma and I am astonished at the improvement in clarity and sharpness! They're as optically impressive as the day they were made.

Cory Suddarth learned his craft while in the U.S. Navy and he and his son Eric have been repairing/refurbishing/rescuing binoculars for several years. Eric did the work on my binoculars which were brought back from WWII by my first father-in-law Philip Kroon.

Judging from the serial number, I think they were manufactured in the late 1930s. I am awaiting information from the Ernst Leitz Museum in Germany as to the precise date they were made. The eyepiece cover has a Wehrmacht waffenamt mark, identifying them as being used by the Gerrman military.

My research indicates they were the most powerful binoculars ever produced by Leitz and were in production from 1932 into the 1960s. One source asserts they were the third best binoculars in the world at the time of manufacture, but he didn't bother to identify the first and second-place binos.

In my experience, it takes very steady hands to use binoculars this powerful. Generally, I find 7x50 to be the most practical for hand-held use.

Happy 50th birthday, Steve!

 My son Steve, seen here with his mother Diane in April, 1971, is 50 years old today.

It seems impossible that both of my sons are in their 50s, but me being 75 seems odd too.

When dad was less than half my age

Going through an old scrapbook the other day, I found this photo of my dad in the 1940s - he would have been in his early 30s - on the Carroll County Courthouse square in Delphi.

Kind of startling to see him downtown without a coat and tie.

Using a bore sighter to adjust my Combat Commander's laser grips

When I bought a set of Crimson Trace Laser Grips for my Colt Combat Commander 1911 a few years ago, I adjusted the laser to align with the iron sights.

It seemed to work okay and I was able to put rounds on target as far as the 50-yard length of my neighborhood shooting range, even shooting from the hip.

Even so, when the Amazon Vine Program offered me a laser bore sighter, I jumped on it.

The device comes with two sets of three batteries. You unscrew the back of the .45 caliber-size bore sighter, insert three batteries and screw it back on. This turns on the laser. Insert it into the chamber of your gun and, voila, you can see precisely where the bullet would impact, distance and wind notwithstanding.

I found the Crimson Trace laser was off by about 3-4 inches at 20 feet - not terrible, but not perfect either.

Then came the hard part - finding the original Crimson Trace box containing the tiny Allen wrenches used to adjust the sight. I hunted high and low for about 20 minutes before I finally located it.

It was a simple matter of dialing in the Crimson Trace laser so it was in synch with the bore sighter's red dot.

Now I am reasonably confident that my laser grip is spot-on. Of course, the proof will be in the shooting, but I'm impressed that my original seat-of-the-pants setting was so close to perfect, considering that the iron sights are ever-so-slightly off.

Isle Royale sunrise

My sons, Sean and Steve, were up with the sun for our first day of hiking and camping at Isle Royale National Park in late June, 1976.

Godspeed, Bill Freeman

I was shocked and saddened when Dave Goyer (on the left) told me our high school band compadre Bill Freeman (center) died earlier this week.

Dave said Bill had been in hospice care with colon cancer. Bill was a year behind us in school, graduating in 1964.

Here we are playing a gig at the Purdue University Club 25 Fraternity in the winter of 1962-63. Trumpet players will recognize the spots on our pants as drainage from spit valves.

A serious closet light

 Our house was built in 1903 and has only four tiny bedroom closets. It was an era when people kept their clothes in free-standing wardrobes.

Naturally, none of the closets have lights, so we've had to improvise. Today, I installed a motion-activated light in our office closet, powered by 4 D-cell batteries. It really lights up the space.

Fifty-five years ago today.

 Fifty-five years ago today, I raised my right hand and proclaimed:

"I, John Marshall Flora, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.”

The scene was the Armed Forces Induction Center on West Washington Street in downtown Indianapolis.

And thus began my 41-day career in the U.S. Air Force.

I consider myself still bound by that oath.

I was given an early discharge because a lost records physical - my physical records from the Induction Center went astray - indicated I had enough allergies to plants and animals that I would be a bad investment for the Air Force.

I was glad to be sent home, but let the record show I volunteered at a time when the Vietnam War was heating up.

1967 flashback

 Back in 1967 when I was trying to explore the hippie counterculture, I had a pair of prism glasses that approximated what an insect sees with its compound eyes. They were fun for brief periods and I even tried driving my 1965 VW beetle with them for a few seconds.

Somehow, they got lost and I found myself thinking about them last week. I did a search on Amazon for "prism glasses" and "kaleidoscope glasses" and found several examples. I settled on these and they were delivered yesterday.

Here's what things look like through them:

Pretty trippy, eh?

I can see for miles. And years.

 Among the treasures my first father-in-law brought home from WWII was a pair of Leitz 15x60 Campofortit binoculars - the biggest, most powerful that E. Leitz of Wetzlar ever made.

I inherited them and they spent the last few decades packed away in closets and boxes. I considered them too valuable and too powerful for day-to-day use and the optics, which were state-of-the-art at the time of their manufacture, have become hazy.

I had the good fortune to discover Suddarth Optical Repair in Henryetta, Okla. a couple of years ago and am in awe of the ability of Cory Suddarth and his son Eric to restore and refurbish old and abused binoculars at what I consider a very reasonable price.

I decided to have my binos restored and, happily, Maria agreed so I packed them carefully, insured them heavily and sent them off to Suddarths' shop.

I'm eager to see how they stack up against my Steiner 7x50 Navigator Pro binos once they're cleaned and restored.

Jack turned 9 on Sept. 1

 This is the image that made us fall in love with Jack nine years ago.

He was born in Carthage, Mo. and Maria found him on the breeder's website. His temporary name was Luke, but he looked more like a Jack to us.

He has been an exceptionally loving boy and a joy to have in our family.

Here's a more recent photo:

Lynda and me

 My Delphi High School classmate and double cousin (both sides of my family tree) Lynda McCain Brooks turned 75 last week, so I drove up to Delphi and took her to lunch.

We had burgers at the famous Sandwich Shop, toured the equally famous Delphi Opera House and cruised all over town revisiting our youth. We've known each other since the third grade.

Lynda became a widow four months ago and seems to be coping alright, but I think I should spend more time with her. Maria agrees.

Subaru!

 Our 2002 Subaru Forester reached the end of its useful life this summer. With more than 260,000 mils on the odometer, I can't blame it for developing a terminally expensive transmission problem.

Happily this came at a time when we were in a position to consider a new-to-us car and since Maria dearly loves Foresters, we went searching for a good used Forester.

We found it at Dreyer & Reinbold Subaru in Greenwood - a 2017 mode with only 15,000 miles on it.

We donated the old Forester to charity and dearly love our new ride.

Steiner binoculars at last!

 I've lusted after Steiner binoculars for years, but always considered them out of my financial league.

Then my wife turned me onto the Amazon Warehouse offerings and I found a pair of Navigator Pro 7x50 binos, "renewed", at a considerable saving. I pulled the trigger and Amazon delivered them Sunday afternoon. They looked, felt and smelled (the rubber armor smells a little like a new tire) like brand new - no hint of previous use or even unpacking.

I've been collecting/accumulating binoculars and monoculars and spotting scopes for year and these binos are easily optically superior to anything else I've ever used. They're a little on the heavy side for everyday use, but the clarity, coupled with the fact that the 7x50 format is the ideal combination of light gathering objective lens and magnification that enables prolonged use without vibration makes them better than anything else I've used.

My only regret is that our house is surrounded by trees. I haven't lived anywhere with a decent view since I sold my lakefront condo in Indianapolis 20 years ago.

Anyhow, I love these things and look forward to traveling with them.

Upping my Ebay game

Getting serious about selling odds and ends on Ebay with my new light tent.

It was a bitch to assemble because the Tinker Toy-style connectors were crazy tight on the structural rods, to the point where I had to pound them to get the fabric over the frame.

And the LEDs are certainly bright enough but they have a bluish cast that has to be corrected in Photoshop.

That said, it makes for impressive product photos.

87 years ago this month

That's my mom center top. I suppose the placement indicates she was class president. I'd forgotten that, if I ever knew it.

Out of the past

It's been 2½ years since we moved back to Indiana from Arkansas, but we still have a lot of stuff still in moving boxes.

I've been unpacking a few at a time as I figure out where to put the contents and discovered my 3rd generation iPod Touch. It has 60 GB of memory and held my entire music collection when I set it aside in favor of my first iPhone - the iPhone 5 - which had a similar capacity. It's been idle since March, 2013. Happily, I still have a pre-Lightning charging cable, so I plugged it in and recharged the battery with little expectations that it still worked.

Damned if it didn't come to life after more than seven years in drawers and boxes!

I've tried a couple of times to resuscitate my first iPod, a 5th generation iPod Classic that Maria and my sons gave me for my birthday in July, 2006, but it doesn't seem to want to wake up.