The memorial service will not likely be until September.

I know. It doesn't come as good news. Had it been received a day earlier we wouldn't have cancelled the vacation and we would have ridden to Newport News.
Here's the thing. I am a firm believer when one door closes another opportunity presents itself. Ultimately, Heather is fine with having cancelled her vacation and is genuinely happy and has moved on. So, how can I be unhappy. I can't. At least, not where she can see it.
I'm going to leave you with this, since this blog was supposed to be about a motorcycling trip and we're not trippin.
I spent a couple hours on Instructables.com sharing my backrest project. There are many other things I've shared too. So if this project appeals to you, or you know someone it does. Or your find a strange desire to begin a worm farm because of this misfire blog, it was worth my time to stop by and offer a window to my soul.
http://www.instructables.com/id/Motorcycle-Backrest

Remember that ptt I told you about? It's push to talk for short

This is huge deal if you're going to communicate bike to bike. It keys up the radio without having to press the button on the radio itself. 

This is Heather's bike placement. Mine isn't far off. A slight of hand will open a channel. Oh and Autocom, the maker of my communication system wants 72.00 per ptt switch and I built this myself with a previously used patient grounding pad wire. Don't worry they didn't need it anymore. I waited until they left. So I saved 144.00 for two bikes. At a dollar a piece per awesome that's 144 of them.

Honestly, my bike is an 8 legged sanctuary

That's the brakes. I mean, it is the brakes. The front brakes.

And now, for you worm bin and vermicompost enthusiasts, you guessed it, worm time.

Like "Hammer time", just spelled different.
I've been doing this for over 7 years, and there isn't anything bad about it. Especially, and there are number of other benefits, I've had reports from previous coworkers that a half gallon of wormanure, or castings, was 20.00.
No way man, not when I can feed them my waste food, or pictured below, reconstituting some dried food we made for the trail last year that went bad. They'll eat it, and almost anything, one of the many cool things they do.

 I'll over-do anything given the chance, so here's the evidence of that. A half bag of wheat flower and 4 pears I won't have anything to do with anymore.

 I mixed it all in together, blech.

Where my new bin has been waiting to be built. Just needed some food to put in, how I do, Le pear Garbanzo bean ala wheat flower slurry.

Last time I made the other two bins I didn't mix the paper well enough, Too many strips stuck together didn't help it break down at all.

 This time, I played in it like a kid (not hard to do) mixed much better, time to wet it down. Worms are made mostly of water, so a proper environment for them to live in is important. This doesn't have much to do with going on a motorcycle trip and I don't care. Freight Train wants to see this. These were however transported on a motorcycle, given to me by the Duchess of Oblack.

Dig a trough and add food on one side. If this heats up when it breaks down, it will kill them if they don't have somewhere to move away from the heat in the bin.

 Fed and covered.

 The transplant bin. Provided by the Duke of Walter.

Still waiting on the details before we ride to the Portsmouth, in the mean time..

I found a few things to do around the place. But first, the pictures I promised of the backrest installed and placed on our bikes. I rode about 3 miles today, long enough to know I need to raise my backrest about a half an inch and haven't yet decided how I want to do that. It will probably be wire brushing the 2nd paint job off, then cutting the hinge and welding in a metal spacer. I can also drill holes in the wood, the black vinyl is stretched over. Either way, it's going to take some time, but glad I noticed this could use getting adjusted before I went on a longer trip. Cool thing is, I know I guy how can do the work.

 A nice feature having used the bolt and hinges, is you can move the backrest forward for your passenger to get seated more easily.

 At first, it bent when I tested it out. I later used my cutting wheel to make the angled support at the bottom. By placing the base as far out as possible before I welded to the hinge, gave it the best chance to prevent it from flexing. Had they been an inch longer would have been better. It ended up being a great improvement.

 Thanks to the invention of a bungee cord, helped hold the backrest up, It is front weighted and falls forward every time we dismount.

 This picture shows the pattern of the hinge. The consideration for placing the holes lower, to raise my backrest, seems like the right thing to do at first. By placing the hinge point lower on the seat means the upper part of the backrest won't push on my back. This points to having to add metal to the hinge to make the height taller. Don't worry, I know a guy.

 Staple the front over the foam first.

Use spray adhesive on the material in the back and pre-fold the edge before you goop it on with shoe goo.

So a video of a Praying Mantis isn't the last thing I post on my blog for a while, an update

While we're waiting on details of the memorial service, Heather has cancelled her vacation.
I received an email to call a way back friend from last year, Barry.

Barry and his wife Tara are really cool and take in people to their home they don't know. I know this, having met them in Pennsylvania last year while on the Appalachian Trail. They are avid bicyclists and occasional ride ones you don't have to pedal, so they're easy to love.

We got to talk at length about our alternative plans and looking for that new direction when life circumstances show themselves. In the coming days, we'll ride to the Portsmouth, Ohio area and you are likely to see a few images and anecdotes. I also owe you a picture of a finished backrest. To date, I have not taken a picture of them since they were placed on the bike. I will also be looking in the radio pockets for arachnids. It's just a fancy name for spiders that I looked up.

What is green, has six legs, is an alternative to using poison for pest control, that you return to nature?