Anna and I have a wedding date! We will be getting married on April 21st, 2007 in St. Paul, Oregon (about 25 minutes from Portland), so please everyone send us your addresses so we can invite you!

speeedshift@hotmail.com

I have a headache today. Just though you'd like to know.

But despite this irritating fact, I have been fixing many small (and also irritating, like a headache) problems with my '72 Ford truck, and I am very pleased with the results. There are few things as satifying as taking a deteriorating mechanical object and shoring it up by unconventional and creative means. I can't wait to take this thing off road...

The sun is shining in Oregon for the first time in quite a while. It is pretty cold, but nice. I am working on the farm now---the winery let me go due to the slow winter season---but it's okay, my boss is a very good man. I have a winter and spring of good old-fashioned farm work ahead of me, and then...well who knows. I am searching diligently for a new job and may end up needing to move yet again...I will miss Oregon if that happens, but I have liked other places better, so it won't be too bad. Besides, there is always some spare enthusiasm for the next adventure. It seems I am always on the prowl for new ideas and opportunities, and what I am actually going to do for a real job!

What changes have come and gone in this last stretch of life, and what is yet to come? Are there words that can describe the thoughts that grow from hours of solitude?Around we go, blundering through the fog, striving and hoping and despairing, only to be checked by the tiniest of moments and realize we are back at the same spot, not really any different, just perhaps a bit rueful. The things we cared so much about last week are now but nice ideas, and the things we thought we forgot about that meant everything then, are once again so important. People, circumstances, sin and time drag us along, but when the night is quiet and no one is around, that same child that wondered at every blade of grass smiles at the adult it has tried to become. What a happy, embarrassing thing, this pause from the world; as we loosen our grasp, drop our load of duties for a time and admit we cannot do everything, we aren't always that strong, that life is just as beautiful whether you feel bad about yourself or not. Hope for the joy that is promised, both in the good things of this earth and those of the next, and the ability to laugh at oneself, to trust in God--- The faces you love the most become infinitely more lovely, the dreams that seem burdensome have lost their heaviness. And as spring approaches, all the world is free and there for the having, enjoying, and loving.

Alright, here are the links to my tee-shirt submissions:







If you get the chance, go and score the designs and comment. Thanks!

This lull in posting has got to stop! It has taken much longer than it should to recover from the brain-dead fatigue of harvest, but I am finally back up to speed (I think). Writing and drawing being creative again, which is really good.
Oregon wintertime is wet and chilly and rather dismal, but there are tons of good folks and fun things to do, so it's all okay. Pictures and adventures to come soon...

Hey all you blog readers, I have just entered some of my artwork on a website called Threadless.com. It is a t-shirt printing website, and the way it works is this: you enter a design and if it passes the initial screening it gets posted for rating. If it gets a good enough rating from website visitors it will be printed and the artist gets $1500. So you all should visit the site and give me some ratings! This is a just heads-up, but check back and I will post the direct links to my designs (they are still pending approval). Thanks, and check out all the other designs people have up on threadless while you are at it; there are a few strange ones, but tons of awesome ones.

Since I started this blog back in February 2004, I have:

-Been a Liberal Arts student
-Farm babysitter
-Cross-country traveler
-Vineyard caretaker
-Taught a go-cart building class
-Entry-level graphic designer
-Built a 450hp 1965 Mustang, restored a 1963 AMC Rambler and a 1973 Yamaha 360, revived a 1989 Yamaha 600 and 1972 Ford truck, assembled a 1969 Chevy Nova, hot-rodded a 1972 Volvo wagon, and acquired a 1929 Ford Model A 2-door sedan (Think I like cars a bit..?).
-Worked as an auto shop supervisor
-Traveled to Peru
-Been an entry-level wine-maker

And so many more things I can't even remember them...seems as if I have been looking for a niche, but been to restless and hungry for all that life has to offer to feel calm and settled anywhere. But the times they are a' changin', and I have AMH in my life now; everything else fades in glow of her soul...
(The guy sitting next to me in the coffee shop is from the local Quaker university, and he is currently telling his friend that there is "not a girl out there for him, there is a WIFE. This is a whole new typographical reference," he insists. Now he is trying to explain how Christ did not trust anyone, especially not his disciples. Poor boy. He's trying).

I usually prefer writing about life and thoughts and such, but this time I think some pictures will say more...these are some phone-taken shots from this harvest while at work at Owen Roe.

...Sunset over the farm...



The forklift for dumping fermenter bins...



"The Red Press". What we dump fermenters into when the wine is ready to be pressed from the grape skins. I spend most of every single work day on, in, or in front of this machine.



A busted forklift---I spent quite a while getting it to run again.



Mr. Quinns falls in a fermenter...



Our awesome pneumatic wine pump



...Leaking barrels...



Roomate: Charles "Indie Rock", "Hutch", "Way cool Amigo" Hutchins.



...Rockin' out at home...



Don't ask...

Waiting for the grape press to finish it's cycle...right now it contains perhaps the best Syrah that this winery produces, so I am being very careful with it. It is very cold again this morning. Today my roommates and I decided that it doesn't matter if it is expensive, we have to start running the heat in the house when we get home---it's just too miserable to be cold all evening. Been working on my car after work, and looking forward to more time to devote to all the things that need to be done...and learning how to relax again.

It is so cold! Even though the actual temperature has not been that low, somehow these last couple of days have been bone-chilling. But the rain has been light and seldom; once again the morning fog has burned off into pale sunlight. I love Autumn...

Friday the 13th...I am not superstitious in the least, but I do get a kick out of weird creepy things...and this would be a good day for a disappearance or ghost or something Halloweeny. But so far it is a normal day. It is chilly here, and the sun is shining. This morning I am running a huge stainless steel wine press, squeezing juice out of fermented grapes. Working the press is nice because you actually have a little down time here and there to think and try to collect your wits. Or blog, like right now.

Gotta get back to it...

Life has been very intersecting lately. Two weeks of over 80 hours of work (each), enthralling new purchases, friends who are oh so cute and probably getting hitched someday and very sore arm muscles from punching down fermenting grapes. The first week and half or so since my last blog post I was a truck driver, hurrying all over the Willamette Valley and all the way up to Yakima Washington, and for the last week-ish I have been learning how to run a wine press. Messy work and long hours, but not hard. Driving was very fatiguing but I had a lot of fun seeing vineyards and learning about the different fruit and locations. I spent so much time in that tired beat-up Isuzu that I gave her a name so we could commiserate together while waiting for the grapes to be loaded at yet another vineyard.





I saw some incredible scenery too. Oregon is an amazing state. And now it is cloudy and sprinkly and cool and even lovelier.





Seven AM is too early for intense physical labor, but my AMHfuture-C is adorable as ever...sigh...



And perhaps the most exciting thing of all is of a vehicular nature...(ahem) our new car: a 1972 Volvo 145-E wagon; lowered, custom wheels, manual transmission, hot-rodded engine. Could we possibly be hipper?