Throttle Blog

Lets forget about the debate of whether or not global warming is happening. Unless you want to debate why there are ice packs forming in the souther hemisphere, which begs the question, where’d they come up with the GLOBAL part of global warming.

Anyway, I support global warming, such as it is. I’ll give you a quick run-down of the pros and cons as I see them. (This is not a complete list)

Pros:
• More food production.
• Lower heating costs.
• Better standard of living.
• Lower deaths due to freezing.

Cons:
• A select group of eco-wackos think:
• The Earth has already reached optimum temperature.
• Humans are to blame.
• All human growth and advancement needs to stop now.
• We need to stop or reverse the naturally-occurring weather cycles of the planet
• The sun has no effect on global temperatures.
• The earth is warming AND cooling due to mankind.
• My Jeep has such bad emissions, it’s screwing up the climate on Mars and melting the polar ice there, too.

Anything that will simultaneously inflate man’s self-importance and expose the hypocrisy of wealthy liberals not only entertains me, but makes popcorn cook on it’s own while I watch.

Just an FYI, I reported over at Under My Helmet about an article I found today slamming ATV use for youths.

Read my rant and feel free to pass it on.

I wrote about deadbeat dads and their ATV license renewal at Under My Helmet yesterday, and in the post, I brought up cell phone records of deadbeats being made available. A reader mentioned that he felt it ok to have the records made available because deadbeats need to pay what they owe.

While I agree with him that they must pay, I disagree with the means. As off roaders, I’m sure we can all agree that we’ve had places to ride “chipped away” slowly over the last 2 decades.

So I have to ask, what’s next? In an effort to curb unlawful off-road activity, everyone in the United States with a registered ATV or off road vehicle will be subject to have their cell records looked at.

According to Two Heel Drive, it’s dangerous and unpleasant to try to hike on an ATV trail.

Gee, ya think?

Ok, sorry, maybe he didn’t deserve that. Or maybe he did.

As a long time hiker and nature lover myself who Tread’s Lightly, I must admit that by the same token it’s almost as hard to ride ATVs on hiking trails, because those pesky “I deserve to be here and you don’t” hypocritical screaming green weenies keep getting stuck in my suspension. My next purchase will have to be a cattle hippy guard to help keep some of that smelly crud from getting on my shiny new paint job.

I wonder if this guy is somehow related to the hippycrite who foolishly portrayed himself as superior to other off roaders because he drives a Volvo…

Show some respect for your neighbors and get a pipe on your ATV if you’re going to ride in your yards. Quit being annoying to your neighbors, they aren’t going to take it for much longer.

If you keep being rude, it will soon be outlawed to ride on your own property! Is that what you want?

That’s not just Kentucky either, folks. It’s happening all over. You really need to be considerate and think about what you’re doing or you won’t be allowed to do it any more.

Mother’s Day this year was spent in the mountains at Lake Morena. We planned on camping there and fishing, then trucking the quads and bikes over to 4 Corners (Corral Canyon OHV).

Seems I might be having some luck planning holidays away from (everyone’s) home. Even Aj had a blast. He gave up on his little elect quad and jumped on mine. As usual. (He turned 2 last month)

I’ve never ridden at Corral Canyon. It’s been closed for several years; since the big San Diego Fire Storm that literally burned almost 1/3 of all of San Diego County. We took a day trip without ATVs a few weeks ago to check it out to see if it would be kid friendly to ride.

We camped and fished. Oh, and drank. But we didn’t get to ride the quads out there. I did, however, get a chance to install my new Handy Throttle: Thumb Throttle Converter. (Converts a thumb throttle to a twist throttle). The install was brilliantly simple. (Read the review I wrote here).

My wife and I will be testing it out over Memorial Weekend. (She prefers twist throttle because she’s used to it)

Here I am, almost 14 days after the big “V” with an aching groin and a sore wrist, (from an ATV accident, silly), and we’re off to the mountains for some trail riding this weekend in Pine Valley. bouncy bouncy

The boys are still a bit a lot tender, they’ve itched for almost 7 days straight (yes, they shaved them), and it still feels like good ol Lefty is hanging down to my knees. Kind of like a bell.

I don’t know how much longer I can take the pressure. I wonder if my wonderful, beautiful wife hubba hubba will notice if I start playing the sympathy card…

Fellow blogger Gunnar Heinrich, over at http://4driversonly.com posted this video on April 26, 2007 of a Hummer getting un-stuck by a Toyota FJ somewhere in the dunes of the near east.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love seeing people get humbled every now and again, especially when they’re humbled by seeming underdogs. Heck, I get humbled all the time. But if you look closely at the video, you’ll probably notice 2 things… 1) the angle at which the TJ is facing vs the H2, and 2) the violence required to free the H2.

Item 1) shows that that TJ didn’t want to be in the same boat as the H2, because it would likely get stuck too. Chalk one up for driver awareness. Not so much for vehicle’s capability.

Item 2) shows the running start needed to dislodge the deeply buried H2. Given the fact that a process like that is almost always a last resort, especially at that angle, and could have been done by just about any 4×4 with a sturdy hitch point. Chalk up one for strong frames. Not so much for vehicle capability.

It sure is funny to look at, though isn’t it? Especially if you’ve seen the movie Cars, where they show a group of 4×4’s learning to 4×4, and the Hummer gets scared and complains that it’s never been off road. Funny as it was in the movie, it’s even funnier in the desert. They just don’t take them off road. I’ve seen only a few Hummers off road, but they were all very capable when I did see them.

I guess they’re just too damn expensive to take the chance on breaking it.

Cars, hummer, h2, stuck, jeep, fj, free

Where’s the outrage? Gas is going up to record prices. Again.

By summer we will be looking at $4.00/gallon or more. Prolly more for me here in San Diego, Ca. where I saw it yesterday for $3.54/gallon for regular. People were lined up to buy it, too. Even though there was another station not more than 2 blocks away that was selling it for $3.30/gallon.

Why aren’t we mad as hell yet? We know it’s coming, yet we do nothing. We don’t drive less, we don’t complain, we don’t shop around… we just shut up and keep pumping money into fat pockets of big oil companies that are making record profits while we face an economic catastrophe of Biblical proportion.

Shop around for your gas. Tune up your car and check the tire pressure. Or park it and start taking the bus or riding your motorcycle or bicycle or horse or whatever. Just start sending the message.

gas, price, gouge, oil, fuel, economy

All too often, people dis-associate off-road enthusiasts with nature in any and every way, as reported last week here. As you can see by my reply to this situation, I am quite sure I speak for most off-roaders when I say “We do care”.

Jeep cares too. They recently teamed up with the New York Wildlife Conservation Society to raise over 16 million dollars for the “Tigers Forever” initiative during their Camp Jeep event. This initiative makes money available to directly support a project who’s goal is to increase the number of tigers by 50% worldwide.

I’ve always been a fan of jeeps. Just about anyone who’s driven one is. This is just another reason to appreciate Jeep. Be sure to attend the next Camp Jeep in your area!