Bugs!

Well, I guess there was always going to be a post on this subject :)

Ive gone a long way North. Im actually in the Yukon now. There is basically nothing but forests and wetlands up here. (More little lakes here than you can poke a stick at!)

The bugs have been increasing ever since I headed out of the city.

Long and the short of it is that there are about a million bugs all trying desperately to get into my little tent right now. I can actually here them banging into the tent as I type this on my new little computer. It sounds like gentle rain on the tent... Honestly! Its like this each night for about four hours before it gets cool and dark (10-11pm ish).

In the mornings, I get up and on my way before the bugs really wake up (by say 7am) and then Im on the road for the rest of the day so I only have to worry a bit about them when Im stopped and outside (gasing up the bike etc)
Its not too bad.... But it is quite impressive!

I wonder how bad they will get as I head even further North???

Field Repairs

Just got in to Whitehorse and my chain has run out of adjustment....

This is premature as far as Im concerned since it has only done about 15000Km.

There are two possible causes for this short life:

1) I got a crappy low quality chain (It was in Mexico - Baha California to be exact)

2) It has worn out due to lack of lubrication...

Initially, this seems unlikely since I adjust and lube it twice per day on the road!

But what I think has happened is that when I had the rear tyre fitted the other day (back in Vancouver), they cleaned my chain at the shop....and that I think is the problem...

I think they cleaned it with either a petrol bath or with lots of WD40 spray lube.

What either of these options does is penetrate into the chain spaces with a light lubricant/solvent that disolves the grease that is in there and then washes away the dirt.

Problem is that on an O-ring chain, there is an O-Ring betwrrn the chain side plates of adjacent links. The O-Ring keeps the dirt out and some grease/lube in (good for long chain life)...But the penetrating solvent gets inside the O-ring and disolves away the grease in there. So after the clean, the chain is relubed from the outside but it doesnt get inside the O-rings and essentially I am left with a chain that looks well lubed but is running dry....And so I have a worn out chain.

Clearly I need to specifically tell the shop not to clean my chain in future!!!

Anyway, I also needed to adjust the length of an add-on set of foot pegs (up front for a change of position for my feet on the long highway rides).

I found a welding shop and for $25 they cut, drilled and rewelded the foot peg bar. It was too long and would have damaged things if I dropped the bike at speed... not a good plan but these things sometimes happen.

And while the shop was doing that work, I tried out my new chain tool to remove a link from the chain ...so I can keep adjusting as needed before I replace the whole thing... in the not too distant future it seems.

Now this would normally be a very bad plan since once a chain is this worn, it just wears faster and faster and can eventually break...causing all sorts of damage.

But, I have several days of dirt road riding just ahead of me and Id much rather do that with a crappy old chain than a brand new one.

So, Im gonna risk it with the old chain and ride slow and gently. Then in about four or five more days Ill be done with the dirt and I can put on the new chain that I have with me :)))

Hope it all goes as planned!

Big Rigs

Like I said, there are plenty of Harleys on the roads up here.

And also some big touring bikes as well...

... And there are also a bunch of "Big Rig" riders.

The big-rigs are massive Japanese bikes with beautiful fairings and colour matched contoured carry cases.... And trailers!

There are a couple of pictures attached that show these bikes with camper trailers (yep, they pop up into camper vans!)

Now, I have to say that I really dont know what the attraction of this type of motor bike touring is (why not just get an open top jeep or the like?) But it matters not, they are out there enjoying them selves and they are not hurting any one...so, Go for it :)

Actually, the Harley riders and the big-rig riders seem to me to be more or less the same type of people... They are all retirees. The Harley riders are usualy just the men, while the big rig riders are usually a couple.

They all seem to fancy the same type of clothes though....

Yep, Lots a grey hair and black leather! (gotta get me some of those "Assles Chaps!")

I guess they all bought in on the same "American Dream" from television or somewhere.... I dont know where it comes from exactly, I dont have the same dream :))

Liard Hot Springs

I have been camping for the last three days on whatever patch of flat ground in a secluded spot that I can find. This is good and cheap but the weather has been really hot all over BC for the last couple of weeks and I have become very sweaty... This makes sleeping in a sleeping bag rather unpleasant!

But I just hadnt stopped at an official camp ground with showers to deal with the problem yet.... But it was gonna happen in the next day or so thats for sure!
But, as I was riding along, I saw a sign saying Liard Hot Springs. Now if Id actually planned my trip, Id have known they were there and could have planned a stop there. As it is, I usually cant be bothered with planning and I just `wing it`.

So, I stopped and got my swimming shorts out of the bottom of my luggage and trotted off into the woods.
Im usually not that impressed by hotsprings since in my previous experience, they are either festering mud holes in the bush, or way over commercialized with tiled spa like tubs and swimming pools that cost a lot.

However, this one was very nice indeed.
The BC parks service have done a very tastefull job. There is a four hundred metre board-walk into the forest through some wetland. Then at the actual pools, there are some environmentally friendly composting toilets, some change rooms, and wooden platforms and staris etc into the pools.

Its all very low key and clean and neat and accessible and free.

So, I had a dip in the very pleasantly hot water and got the grime and sweat off from the previous four days. Then I rinsed off the sulphur smell in a stream of refreshingly cold water.
Then I relaxed for a bit (very few bugs here...Not sure why), got dressed and carried on riding West.

Very pleasant experience in deed :)))

Safari

Its been a bit of a wildlife tour for the last day or so. Ive seen lots of different animals including:Coyote, Mule Deer, Cariboo, Bison (The warning signs call them Buffalo so I guess I should too), Big Horn Sheep, Black Bear, and a Porcupine too. All were quite benign which was nice, though I admit that I was worried about the porcupine attackinbg my motorbike over night.

That likely sounds strange to people who dont live in BC, but its a real issue.
The porcupines seem to really like salt and minerals and eat whatever they find that has this stuff. I guess its due to the roads here being salted in the winter or something actually in the rubber, but when parking vehicles in the remote back woods here in BC you have to wrap a fence of chicken wire around your car to stop the blighters chewing your tyre valves and door seals and electrical wiring etc... They really can be a problem.

Anyway, it turned out the little guy I encountered was more worried about me than I was about him and he didnt come back in the night :)

The only large critters that I have not yet seen are Moose and Grizzly bear...

I live in hope :)

The “Great Boreal Forest”

I believe thats what they call the combined northern forests of the Eurasian and North American continents that wrapped around the planet in the days before humans cut them all down.
Im currently riding through that region... And I have to say that there is not much of anything up here other than forest. Its mostly coniferous trees (lots a Pine and Fir) but in places there are also lots of broadleaved trees too (Birch, Aspen and Poplar).
The highway is a swathe of asphalt down the middle of a strip of bright green grass that cuts a swathe through an otherwise uninterrupted dark green forest.
Its not just the highway though, there are high tension power lines, microwave towers for the telephones, a buried gas line and the good old rail line as well. They all follow the same corridor through the mountainous sections (they spread out a bit on the plains).
Theres also a chain of airfields that correspond to town sites every few hundred kilometers. Its the old Alaska highway that I believe was put in during the second world war in order to “secure the territories”. And that meant getting air rail and road access to Alaska.
That road building effort was no doubt a major undertaking but the old highway was a rather “puny” little thing (though plenty effective!)
These days though, the highway has been hugely improved... Its a supper smooth well maintained highway. Im riding along and looking at the huge amounts of “cut and fill” that have been done to smooth it out and the size of the cleared strips of grass land on either side... It must cost a bomb to keep it this well maintained.
It has been given a MAJOR face lift/improvement.
About that forest though. Im pretty sure that most of the forest that Ive seen has been logged since the trees are not that big. Its true that the trees get smaller as you go north, but I think the bigger factor is that they grow much slower up here with the short growing season. I saw only one sign saying when the block was replanted but it was 20 years ago and the trees were still looking quite small and weedy. Looks like they grow 20-30cm per year here (not a lot)
Along with mining, its pretty much the only industry that I can see up here, but its still amazing to think that most of it has been logged at some time... Its just such a vast area of land.
People down south in the city area (Lower mainland) really do have little idea of how big their province is and how much forest there is or how few people.
On an interesting side note, The original old growth forest up here must have locked up an enormous amount of carbon (green house gasses) that has all been released back into the atmosphere in decades past. Id guess (certainly not a qualified guess though) that only about 25% of the mass of the old forest has been recaptured into wood. That means that there is still enormous potential of “Carbon Capture and Sequester” in the regeneration of these forests...which could be good news for the environment.... The down side is that it looks like we would have to wait about a century or two for it to happen,... And then of course WE WOULD HAVE TO STOP CUTTING IT DOWN!
Fat chance I guess, Oh well :)))

Three Bears.

No, Nothing too interestingt. Just that I saw three black bears crossing the road at various places today (one at a time). They were all suitably cautious of the road and vehicles too, which was good to see. Habituated bears are not so cautious and end up as dead bears.

Its been great riding... Really nice highways all the way. There are lots of motorbikes out touring too. I was a bit surprised to see that by far the most common type of bike I encounter is the Harley!
There were ten times as many of them as any other type. But that was South of Prince George. Ive Just got into Fort Nelson at the far North East corner of BC and there are far fewer riders and far less Harleys... The roads are still magnificent but I guess its a bit far for most people.
The bugs are thick up here and everyone drives 350 sized 4x4 pickups (usually with a big 4x4 ATV loaded in the back to boot :)

From here I head more or less NW into Yukon and then West to Alaska.

Riding is good :))

Toasted Again

Today was the first day of riding on my Alaska trip.
I put in about 650Km which is good enough for a day (planning for about 500Km per riding day).
I started off in the city at about 9am. I stopped for a fuel up and a coffee and a muffin for breakfast and then headed off through the city...
Traffic was not good but not too bad either,
After about 45min I was on the main highway out of town headed North. This is the SeaToSky hwy and has pretty much been completely rebuilt over the past couple of years in preparation for the Winter Olympics that will be held in Whistler this winter. The road is much improved and is a pleasure to ride. From Whistler I kept going north to Lilooet. Again, this road has been completely repaved over the past year and what was a gravel road in places and narrow and rough for the rest, is now a magnificent new road that winds up into the alpine and along a mountain valley, past lakes and through forests to Lilooet...a real gem of a road for motorbike riders.
But as you get near Lilooet, the country changes from green to brown and the air temperature zipped straight through the thirties and up into the low fourties.
It was not as hot as when I rode through Death Valley, but it wasnt far off!
As I got to the town of Lilooet, the skys became smokey and the air was full of heavy lift helicopters with water bags slung below them...There were at least five of the big machines and they were fighting a bunch of fires in the hills around town.
I headed on and the temperatures stayed high and the country stayed brown and the sky stayed smokey.
When I got to Kamloops the helicopters were replaced by big twin engined water bombers dumping their loads of bright red fire retardant on another set of local fires...
The Okangan valley is really burning up this year!
Sad to say but I think its gonna stay this way in the future. I think the idea of “protecting” the local forests with such expensive fire fighting methods is not going to last very long...
I think global warming is here to stay for the time being and its a lost cause to spend these many millions of dollars on fighting the fires... The pine bark beetles are killing a very high percentage of the trees and the dead timber is kindeling for the fires that are becoming so much more frequent with the hotter and drier conditions.... The writing is really on the wall!
I bet the official body that does the fire fighting with the aircraft says it saved $XXXXX worth of forest by spending $YYYYY (where Y is less than X). But I bet they just add it up for the year just passed and that in reality, each year they are saving the same bits of forest...
Cumulatively, Im sure its a loosing proposition!
Anyway, from Kamloops I head North on the Yellowhead Hwy and after less than an hour of riding, the vast vistas of burned out forrest (from last year I would guess) give way to greener views.
It takes till 5:30 before the temperature is back below 40degC again. I ride on and at about 7pm I stop in a small town for the night. I find a suitable place to set up a tent and then I go to the local pub for a couple of beers and to assess my first day of travel...
Air cushion seat is doing well.
Riding jacket and pants are doing pretty good but I need to make some adjustments.
Got my face sunburned through the helmet visor (should have been expecting that!)
Knees are sore (should have expected that too)
Hands are shakey and ears are ringing (as usual after a day on the bike)
Yep, a prtetty normal day on the bike :)

Hitting the Road Again

The proposed route...


The Southern section through BC.
North from Vancouver to Watson Lake


The Northern section through Yukon and Alaska.
West from Watson Lake through Whitehorse to Fairbanks then North to the coast at Prudeho Bay.

The route is about 5000Km each way and there are several route alternatives along the way.
Its mostly highway riding but there are also some long sections of gravel road in the northern areas.
I figure it is about 20 days of riding but it could be more. Ill choose some of the longer route options on the way North to get a more interesting ride. If there is time Ill do the other longer options on the way back South but if not then Ill take a direct line back.

The aim is to be back in Vancouver again by the 27th of August... I have other commitments after that :)))


The past two weeks here in Vancouver have been a combination of hectic and lazy, but for the most part, its been really expensive. Ive been running around trying to get things organized for my next ride. That has meant lots of spending...

Ive got a new GPS (I didnt use one last time but I figured Id get one for this trip)
Ive got a new portable computer for the trip. (Likewise - new for this trip - really small one :)) )
Ive got a new set of riding clothes (Jacket and Pants - Three layers and grey rather than black)
Ive got new riding boots (waterproof this time)
Ive got new riding gloves (the old ones were just plain worn out)
Ive got new tyres on the bike.
Ive got a new tank bag (bit bigger and more compartments)
Ive got a new seat pad (air cushioning to pad my bony but!)
Ive got a new reusable air filter on the bike (better than having to carry a spare disposable one)
Ive got a new fuel filter on the bike. (The old one was basically blocked after 60,000Km)
Ive got a bunch of new bits and pieces for camping. (USA and Canada is mostly camping for me)
Ive got a new set of tools for the bike (good set this time instead of the factory junk)
Ive got a new set of maps for the trip (North - BC, Yukon, NWT, and Alaska).

It seemed like I couldnt go out of the house for a week there without spending $500!
But I should be set now and Im hoping that expenses are about $50 per day from here on.

So, tomorrow morning I hit the highway!
Who knows when Ill find a public internet connection (they are hard to find in the developed world these days!).

Ill post when I can.

Test Ride

I went for a test ride today on the BMW F800GS.
I have been more or less "coveting" this bike since I came back from my long ride to Ecuador and back.











It is only just recently available in North America (I couldnt get a test ride six months ago when I was here) and it looks to be the perfect type of bike for long overland touring like I have been doing.
Its got a twin cylinder 800cc engine. Its got good ground clearance and is styled like an over-sized trail bike. It has long travel suspension and a 21" diameter front tyre. It is reasonably light and narrow at the waist and has an excellent power to weight ratio.
As I said it looks excellent on paper... And if its as good as I hope it is then Im prepared to pay the money to buy it!

So, I made an appointment and today I got to take one for a ride for an hour or so.

Result is that Im not as enamoured with it as I had hoped!

Details:
First off, its a brand new bike and its a BMW with a price tag of $15000. Thats a lot! But its not quite as much as I thought considering that I just checked what it would cost to get a brand new bike the same as my current one (Suzuki DL650) and it turns out that that would cost me $10000... Wow, thats a lot too!

The initial look and feel of the bike is outstanding. The sound and feel of the motor when its running is reallllllly nice - classic BMW sound :)
So off for a ride I go...
And after an hour or so Im back...

0) Gee, brand new bikes are a pleasure to ride. This one is an absolute gem on the pavement and I had a great time on it. VERY smooth and so much power! The good stuff is all good. :)))
But there are issues and here is what I thought about the negatives...

1) Well, my biggest issue with the bike turns out to be the gears!
Specifically its the first gear...Its way too "tall". With the warmed up engine at idle (no throttle at all), and the bike in first gear, its strolling along at a cool 15kmh. Thats WAY too fast! Its fine for riding on pavement, but when you want to do low speed maneuvering in rough trail conditions its impossibly fast... My current bike moves at about 8kmh (half the speed) and its still too fast when things get tricky. You really want 5kmh. When its this low then you dont need to ride the clutch and brakes at the same time and its all SO much simpler. And there is basically nothing I can do to correct this issue. I could change the drive sprockets and I could get it to be about 10% slower but it just aint enough. I really need the bike to have a different set of gear ratios in the transmission... The current design is VERY much for highway riders.

2) The second issue is closely linked to the first one...There is basically no Torque in the motor at very low revs. This is probably because the motor is a parallel-twin rather than a V-twin but it matters not why, it matters only that it really is gutless at idle revs. This is no doubt why the engine idle is higher than I would otherwise expect - compensating for low torque. And this just compounds the 1st gear problem when riding really slowly in technical terrain. I tried a little of this type of riding and the damn thing is constantly stalling out on me (no Im not a complete Bozo with either the clutch or the throttle!).

3) The third issue is the throttle/power response. In general the power delivery is EXTREMELY smooth and EXTREMELY prompt. There is virtually no lag at all between turning the throttle and power change at the wheel... Its Magnificent! And there is so much power available... It really is a thing of beauty :)
BUT, there is so much power that when you just crack the throttle off of idle by the tiniest bit, you get a very sudden lurch forward in the bike if its in gear. There is absolutely no problem with this for street riding... I didnt notice it a bit. But, this effect just compounds the problems of low speed technical off-road riding that I have already mentioned - It just makes it even harder to get the smooth power control that you NEED to have.

Now its true that all three of these issues can be compensated for with the deft use of skilled hands... but it really is a huge effort and need not be that way. The simple fact is that the bike has been completely set up for highway riders. It has the look of an adventure tourer, and if you stick to pavement and good gravel roads, itll do great... but not for technical off-road!
I cant say I actually blame BMW for these choices though, since the type of riding that I do must account for way less than 1% off the market...There is just no money in it for them to cater to my types of desires... Mind you, when I ride my Suzuki, it behaves far better than the BMW for these kinds of issues; And it is very definitely a street bike, so I dont see why BMW couldnt do it too :)

4) And the last significant point is the vibration. The parallel twin format of the engine can cause quite a bit of vibration. Apparently they have a balancing weight design that deals with this.
BUT, not quite perfectly! Its EXTREMELY smooth from zero up to about 110kmh but above that (110 - 140kmh) there is an increasing "buzz" that would be quite noticeable for highway riding. Now this one is not too much of a problem for me since the truth is that I spent most of my time riding at between 80kmh and 110kmh, but for those people who just want to ride pavement Id think it would be a much more significant issue. :)

5) The only other big issue was the weight! The bike is supposedly quite light for its size, with the fuel tank in a very low position to help keep the CG low. It works well in that the bike feels very agile and responsive when you are maneuvering it at low speed and riding at highway speed too.
But, I found a patch of grass and gently laid the bike down on its side to see what parts of the bike touch the ground (for crash bar requirements). And then I picked the bike up (barely) but it took way more effort than I figured it would. I only just managed to lift it... and that was without crash bars and luggage added...so Its considerably heavier than hoped. Power to weight is great, but weight is high for ridding in sand or mud where you just cant help but lay it down every few minutes! But then again, its an 800cc bike and thats big in anyones language.

There were some other far more minor issues that I had.
The starter button is in a bad spot... Its really awkard to start the motor while trying to use the front brake (fairly normal hill start procedure!) And I dont know why they feel that the handgrip heater control needs to be super accessible... these two controls should be swapped!
The seat is pretty uncomfortable and with my long legs, there are some ridges in the plastic panels that line up with my knees and make it uncomfortable to "grip the bike" with my legs.
There is a lot of heat that is directed off the motor and onto the riders legs by the fan and ducting in the panels. This is great for riding in cold conditions but I suspect its a real uncomfortable feature when riding in desert conditions!

All in all, it was a bit disapointing...

I think Ill wait a year or two till I can get one second hand; or preferably till BMW releases an "Adventurer" version of the bike with different gear ratios and bigger fuel tanks and maybe a gentler power entry mapping in the bike ignition control computer. :))

My old Suzuki will have to do for the time being...That means lots of prep work to get it ready for the next long ride :)))

Lotusland Again

Well, Ive been back in Vancouver for a few days now.
Recent observations...
1) They are not using "thermal imaging" equipment at the Guatemala airport to check for people flying with fevers...for the Swine flu... I was a bit worried that they might be (as they have been doing in some places) and that I would still have a fever when I checked in. But the flu that I was suffering from had moved on to other areas by the time I got to the air port so no problem :)
I am actually fully recovered now too.

2) People in Seattle are definitely fatter than people in Vancouver. I spent a couple of days in the US before I came back to Canada and I think I saw a reasonable cross-section of people while I was there and here too since I returned... No question; There is more weight south of the boarder!

3) Its hot here! Yep, its hotter here than it was back at the lake in San Pedro... Which I was not expecting!... I guess its not that surprising really since Lake Attitlan is at 1500m ASL: And that should mean its about 10-15 degC cooler than at sea level... And that seems about right : High thirties there on the coast and low thirties here in Van :)

4) Hot showers with good water pressure are indeed one of lifes pleasures!
Ive basically not had a good shower for all the time I was in Guatemala: Low pressure water and crappy electric water heaters in the showers (suicide showers). But now Im back in the developed world, Im making the most of it :)


Im really busy running around and saying Hi to all my friends here. Im also running around trying to get my motorbike ready so I can ride off north to Alaska before the end of the month.
And thats about it for the moment.

And More On the Same...

... Sorry about the delay but Ive been sick for the last couple of days (hopefully not N1H1)
Ill continue with this when I can...


Couple of significant clarifications and explanations I need to make

1) So I seem to think its better to trade "verbal avoidance" for "physical avoidance". That doesnt seem any better solution!
Well, yes, to me it is a better solution...
What Im saying is that Id rather avoid being around a person at all than be around a person and "fake" being nice to them.
Putting it as simply as I can... If there is someone who I have some significant issue with then I should try to forgive them and get over it. If however the issue is "too big" for me to "let go of" then, if I have to stay in their presence, I will have to constantly struggle with the issue and the person internally. The "offending" person may very well have no clue at all that I have a problem with their behaviors and will likely carry on blissfully unaware that I dont like it. Even if they do know I disapprove of them in some form, they likely just wont care and will likewise carry on happily "doing their thing". So by staying in their presence and "faking" normal nice social behavior, I am in fact giving myself a large amount of continual stress and they are unaffected...So they stay happy and I am making myself unhappy.
This is completely pointless!

One thing I am ABSOLUTELY sure of is that my happiness is completely my own responsibility and choice at ALL times.

So, it doesnt matter if I believe I am right and they are wrong. It doesnt matter if they should leave and I should stay.... All that matters is that if I am unable to truly be happy when I am around this person, then I should choose to not be around them!
Thats all there is to it!

How does this effect my choices in real life?
Well, life is full of conflicts for all of us. It simply is not possible for me to physically avoid everyone whose behavior is not to my liking. The work environment is a classic situation where I have to put up with things I dont like (and believe me Ive done it for long enough to know). Its not practical to "walk away" from every situation that is not to my liking...I cant run from everything.... But if I simply cant manage to forgive, then yes, walking away (including from a job) is still an option well worth taking if I want to be happy.

SO, Based on the above rational; If I want to be happy, then I better learn to forgive!... And I think we could probably all be happier if we tried to do the same :))


2) At what point do I feel it is appropriate to "intervene" when I see something going on that I disapprove of?
Well, Thats by no means a simple question of course.
I guess that for the most part we should leave other people alone and allow them to do their thing... Even if we dont approve. Thats more or less what I said in the first post... If theres no life or limb involved and the people are consenting adults then its their own business....
That said, I also believe that we all have a huge responsibility to take action on others behalf even when it does not effect us! Those two ideas seem to be, and in many cases are, in direct conflict!

Ive thought about it quite a bit and I actually think there are other times (beyond when life and limb are obviously threatned) that we should be prepared to take action (in some form).
One quote (actually paraphrased) that has always stuck in my mind that makes me pretty sure about the above comment is the words of Pastor Martin Niemoller from after the Holocost:

"In Germany, they came first for the Communists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist;
And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist;
And then they came for the Jews, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew;
And then... they came for me... And by that time there was no one left to speak up!"

But the rules for "taking action" are far from clear and I need to do more thinking on the subject.
At the moment I think that I should probably be prepared to at least "say something" if I feel there is force or threat or coersion involved (since I think these are basically bad regardless of the application)... But it still definitely needs more thinking!


3) If I do choose to intervene or express my disapproval, then what manner of intervention is acceptable?
Again...One of the more challenging of lifes questions for us (well, for me at least).
Well Im pretty sure that gentle/compasionate intervention is the obvious best choice in pretty much all cases... Simple verbal interaction can difuse most situations if handled skilfully.
But I think any intervention that is motivated by anger or similar negative emotions is pretty sure to be a bad idea!

But unfortunately, Im also pretty sure that its not too hard to "set up" a situation where I would take violent action (note here that I have as yet absolutely never been involved in a physical "fight" in my entire life). You just need to do something nasty to a loved one of mine or an inocent child (or any number of other sensitive choices) and I think those animal instincts that we all have would kick in and Id "let loose"!

So, What are my rules for intervention?
"Do it as gently as possible!" ... but that does not nesecarily rule out physical and possibly violent intervention!
So that leaves me with the very real possibility of making mistakes of the worst possible kind...But thats nothing new since I have always been this way...On the bright side I have successfully avoided violence for over 40 years so far... Hopefully I can continue in the same manner :))

But again, this needs lots more thinking about...
Im sure Ill get back to these subjects in future posts but its not going to be concluded in this post. :)))

... Back to more mundane topics for the time being.