Three nights of New Years Eve; cold weather putting the brakes on working on the race car; still working on plans for Blue Knights International

Here we are 13 days into the new year and this is my first entry. It’s not that I don’t have anything to say, I just have to be careful of how I say it so I don’t get myself in trouble.

In some of the on-line Police publications, I see articles on law enforcement officers being reprimanded, suspended or even fired for making questionable posts on social sites such as Facebook and MySpace. Some of those postings are plain stupid and if the person stopped to think about what he/she was posting, maybe they would think better of it and not make the posting. A law enforcement officer could post a questionable picture or statement, and a defense attorney might find it and use it against the officer in court. If the item puts the officer or his/her department in a bad light, disciplinary action is very possible. For that reason, I try to shy away from making work related comments in my blog or on my Facebook page.

I must really be grabbing at straws if I’m reduced to talking about this stuff in my blog!! Enough said on that subject….

Our Christmas and New Years weekends were pretty uneventful. I was on days off the entire Christmas weekend, and Jan was off Christmas and the day after. We were fortunate that we were able to spend those two days with our families. We were even more blessed with decent weather. We had to work the three days of New Years’ Eve, and even though it was pretty cold, there was no white stuff and all in all it was a fairly quiet weekend. Our Police Department had a DWI arrest about 3:30 AM on New Years Day, and the Sheriff’s Department had two more right after that.

This last weekend brought a change in the weather and now we’re going into a “deep freeze” for a few days. I hope everybody uses good sense when they have to go outdoors or travel. We don’t see as many problems in the city, but the deputies and troopers seem to have to deal a lot with stranded motorists in cold, miserable weather. According to our local newspaper, city road crews will be out through Thursday trying to get the streets cleaned. At least we aren’t having weather patterns here like we did a year ago with a new snowstorm coming in every few days.

I had to get the snow blower out to clean the driveway yesterday. I found there was a bit of a gas leak from around the carburetor, but was able to get the snow moved. In looking for a gasket for the float bowl, the parts houses I went did not have anything. I found out that one of the local lumber yards carries parts for small engines, and as luck would have it, they had the right gasket. I should be set for the rest of the winter now.

I planned to work on the race car on my Friday-Saturday-Sunday off this last weekend. I got all my parts together so I can finish my brake lines to the rear brakes. When that’s done, I can start on making the rear deck. However, the weather started to turn a lot colder and I didn’t even attempt to start the wood burner as it looked like a fire would be futile. I’m on days off Wednesday and Thursday this week, and the last time I looked, Thursday may warm up close to 30. If there’s no wind, I should be able to heat the garage to a point where I can work out there.

I am pointing toward having the car on the track at McCool Junction on March 4th & 5th. There is a USMTS modified show that weekend and in the past the open stock cars have been the support class. It hasn’t been announced yet if that will be the case, but if it is, I hope to be able to race then. When I stand back and look at the car, it looks like there is a ton of stuff to do on it, but if I can keep the garage warm enough to work out there, there really isn’t that much to do. I plan to straighten and use the old doors. I need to straighten the left rear quarter panel. I’m afraid the front fenders can’t be re-used, so I will either have to use the new after market ones I have or find some used stock ones. I’m hoping to find some used fenders for a very reasonable price. The aftermarket ones look nice, but they are so thin they crinkle if you look hard at them.

I was able to pretty much finish my expense sheet for the racing operation for 2010 over the weekend. I have to have a copy of the bill on the engine that is at Hastings so I can itemize it on the expense sheet, and 1099 forms from Beatrice and Columbus and that task will be all done. I need to remember to keep myself caught up on this stuff so I don’t have to re-construct the entire year at the end of the year.

I’ve also spent a little more time planning our ride to Chesapeake, Virginia this summer. The Blue Knights International Convention is there the 3rd week of July. One way or another, we want to spend a couple of days in Nashville as Jan really wants to go to the Grand Ole Opry. I think a day or two in Memphis should also be in order. Right now, I kind of have a 3 day ride from here to Chesapeake planned. The return trip will be a bit more leisurely and routed through Nashville and Memphis. We’re just hoping the price of gas doesn’t go up too drastically that we can’t enjoy our time.

While we’re in the Chesapeake area there are a lot of things I want to see. I was stationed at Ft Lee for AIT in 1971 and made trips to Washington, D.C. and Williamsburg, Virginia. I hope to be able to go to both places while we are there. I also went to the Petersburg Battlefield just outside of Ft Lee and would like to go back there. There’s so much history in that area that it is impossible to see it all in an entire summer, let alone the few days we will be there.

We kind of kicked around the idea of maybe camping along the way to make the trip less expensive. However, I think I’d rather have a hot shower and a real bed after riding 450 miles each day. Irregardless of what our plans are, we will have to pack carefully and wisely in order to have everything we need for the entire trip,

I’ll have to have the Gold Wing checked over closely. We now have about 32,000 miles on it, and it should go to the dealer for a complete check-up according to the owners’ manual. The front tire has almost 20,000 miles on it, but still looks pretty good. The back tire has about 10,000 miles and still looks good. The original rear tire went about 22,000 miles and I expect this one to go that far, too. I will have to pack the wheel bearings on the trailer, but other than that, it should be ready to go.

Blue Knights just had their election for International President, Vice President, Secretary and Treasurer. I want to pass on my congratulations to all of the new officers. I know you will do the job to the best of your abilities.

I subscribe to “Google Alerts.” This gives me an alert to other blogs about specific subjects. I came across one today by a crime analyst in Texas. He writes about a guy who, when stopped by law enforcement, gave them his cousin’s name. Turns out the cousin had a warrant for his arrest, so the guy went to jail. Now he’s suing the Sheriff’s Department for false arrest. In Nebraska, a guy like this is “Job Security.” Here’s the link to the newspaper story, in case anybody wants to read about it: 
 
 http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/010811dnmetalias.a15fbd.html