Nutshell:

Kick ass. Final scores: Fish 1, me 0. Email 2000, me 0. Jeep 1, me 1. Liver 0, me 2.

( The full report )

So, work is *forcing* me to take a week off in late August. Why? Because I have stockpiled, once again, a disgusting amount of PTO. No, that's not Palestinian Terrorist Ordinance, that's Paid Time Off.

The first Friday of that week is a fetish ball Andrea and I will be attending to see one of er friends band play.

The first Saturday of that glorious week is the annual AZVJC Crown King runs(they split it up into 5 groups). Crown King is an old town, mostly a tourist attraction now. The trail passes the ruins of Oro Belle, which is pretty cool, and also passes some old cabins and stuff. Hopefully this trip will go better than the last one!

So, I am thinking I might do that run then camp out that night, possibly near a lake on Senator Highway so I can fish while I am getting drunk. Because, don'tcha know, nothing goes with booze better than knives, hooks, and motor vehicles. I am likewise thinking of recruiting some pals to do it, namely stypica, joeldavid_m, Ben Rine, and possibly some other dudes. It'll be like a bachelor party only instead of strippers we will have fish guts.

stypica, Ben Rine and I all went offroading yesterday. We went to FR4, the Coke Ovens, and Box Canyon. ( Trip pics )

	Scenery This trip was extra beautiful this time around, because of the recent rain.
	Gila The Gila river as it snakes around the valley. It's like two rivers- a small blue one flowing down the middle of a gigantic green one.
	Off down the hillside
	Mountains I love the amazing rock formations in Arizona. This picture does not do justice to the scale involved.
	Jeepin' Ben Rine's Scrambler heading down the trail. This photo really shows the dual personality of this trail, with two different kinds of mountain and cottonwoods growing 20 feet downhill from saguaros.
	Broken ground This was much less nervous terrain with tires I knew were sturdy enough for it.
	Did I clear it? Ironically he cleared this steep shelf even though he dinged a jerry-can mount on a lesser obstacle 20 feet before it.
	Ben hits the shelf I think he's having fun!
	Ben hits the This was a steep chute with holes all the way down it. The holes start off mediocre but soon become large... Dirt like this is fun because you can hit it hard and have very little fear of leaving spider gears scattering the ground ;)
	Pooped out
	He later went back up it, a feat I attempted but did not manage.
	Point of no return Once you start down, the only way out is through. This is a nervous bit, given that if you start to fishtail the only way to regain control is a quick hit on the gas.
	Heading in to Box Canyon I love this canyon.
	Heading in to Box Canyon 2 Ben got a lot of pics because this was his first serious wheelin' outing.
	Articulation This stuff rode much smoother without my front swaybar
	Articulation 2 Holy crap, my Heep is starting to look like a real rig ;) I still rub a little bit on full stuff, but some cutting on the rear and $5 bumpstops (used hockey puck + JB weld) on the front oughtta clear that up.
	He got few pictures just because he was not directly in front of me ;)

Looks like stypica got some of his pics up!

My ghetto antenna
My ghetto tire
My ass, preparing to fix tire issue #1

In other news, now the fucking Jeep won't start. think its the fuel pump, but I will be checking it out in a minute and probably calling a tow truck. When it rains it pours.

...the grave!


...and one of the big ledges I went over:

For lunch I went and saw a burly bald guy and got him to put some big meats in my ass.

For those of you that are disturbed right now, "meats" is slang for tires and the big bald guy works at Discount Tire. Anyway, I got 2 of my eventual 5 BFGoodrich 31" All-Terrains T/As. I shredded my two Passenger class tires on the trail yesterday.

( Trip Report, pics ahead! )

Today's Dilbert is AMAZINGLY relevant.

In other news, I went on a 3 hour offroad run to Crown King with AZVJC yesterday. Sadly, it was the ( 3 hour run of the USS Minnow )