buckle-up

There is a lot of truth to the saying, “being in the right place at the right time” and you can tie yourself up in knots trying to figure out just how it all happens. But as I look back through the years at the people that have entered my life it’s all happened without any planning or scheming and yet, many of these accidental encounters have turned out to be life changing. Top of the list, naturally, was how Margo and I met – me from Sydney, Australia, and Margo from Warsaw, Poland. Even as our paths had crossed almost the day I stepped onto the campus of Tandem Computers, the journey wasn’t linear by any means. And then there was the chance encounter with John (JR) Robinson in the offices of Nixdorf Computers at a time when his company was just three people and the future looked anything but assured. It was JR who encouraged me to go to California to join Tandem Computers and work on a mutually beneficial program featuring his product. In the 1960s we called it “the flying fic...

On a long and lonesome highway, (west) of Omaha You can listen to the engine moanin' out its one note song ... This past month was very much about motion. And mobility! Or, sometimes, the distinct lack of motion, as on one occasion I walked into the garage only to find it empty, except for a couple of motorcycles. As I wrapped up last month’s post I ended with the observation on how, only a short time ago, we had more cars than garage spaces and that perhaps we had culled the herd just a little too thinly, even as the highway beckoned. But yes, we still had the motorcycles, right? Well, not exactly. Taking the big Honda VTX 1800 (that’s 110 cubic inches for the metric challenged) out on the road for just the second time this year I only made it down to the local gas station before it too came to an inglorious end. No manner of coaxing could get the big twin to fire up so it too was hauled away on a flatbed trailer. As coincidence would have it, the driver of the tow t...

For several years now Friday afternoons have seen Margo and me “laying down laps” at Denver’s most famous road course, High Plains Raceway (HPR). Located east of the city, just beyond the small village of Byers, it really is a surprise to all first-timers not expecting to find a track this good so far from anywhere else. However, as we are fond of saying in Australia, “it’s the goods!” Taken shortly after we arrived at HPR, the freshly polished bright red Vette looks ready to go and it would be only a few minutes before it drove through the gate leading to the track. Carved into the rolling pastoral fields that feature small ravines, there are more than enough elevation changes to ensure drivers are fully tested. The course has names for all the turns, and over the years we have come to understand the history – High Plains Drifter, Danny’s Lesson, To Hell on a Bobsled to name but a few. And of course, there’s the Prairie Corkscrew, that for those who have driven Laguna Seca and f...

It’s raining heavily and there are rivers flowing across the circuit, with several pools collecting in all the wrong places. We are looking out across Infineon Raceway, formerly Sears Point, and there’s a major pond, Sonoma Lake, across the approach to the back straight and everywhere there are chunks of turf littering the track, evidence of where participants have spun and left the track! Yes, the weather puts a whole different spin on track weekends! The forecast had been for a wet weekend at Infineon but all the same, looking at weather maps and watching brightly colored circles move across the charts didn’t fully prepare us for what we were now encountering. Driving cautiously that Friday afternoon, as we picked our way around the pools of standing water scattered around the paddock behind the grandstands, was depressing and yet, the sound of cars accelerating past the start-finish line reminded us that track weekends were held in all weather conditions. Adapting to what we fo...