Part Way to a Bindings Fix

There is a NCT hike tomorrow. There are 10" of snow on the ground here, and possibly more on the trail. If no one has hiked the trail this week, it will be tough going. If only one or two people have tried to hike, it will be a mess with "post holes."

In any case, my snowshoe bindings have not fixed themselves. Haha. As you can see, these straps- the ones that fasten around the instep of your boot are in imminent danger of turning into four pieces instead of two. I really don't want that to happen on the trail. So I got serious about some other solution today.

I rummaged around in my webbing scrap box and found two pieces of lightweight webbing with clips that I cut off something else that was dead (I think something of Om's). For a temporary fix to make sure this kind of clip buckle will work (some are too hard to undo when they are cold), I fastened the straps on with safety pins. That will be fine for at least tomorrow.

Here are the boots clipped in to the shoes. You can't see the new straps at all because they are black. That white toe strap is from the military bindings. I can use the other toe strap from that set. But the long strap that goes around the back of the boot is way too long and can't be altered without sewing (see link below for more info than you want about those bindings). And, sigh, I currently have no working sewing machine. (Which is increasingly becoming another a real problem). The reddish-brown is the remaining pieces of the neoprene bindings. The blue is a jerry-rigged velcro fix on the boots because the plastic buckles disintegrated and the boots are still fine (I just love expensive gear with one low-quality piece that sabotages the whole thing, don't you?).

And here is a closeup of the "new" black strap with buckle. If these work well, I'll rummage in my webbing box some more to find long strips for the heel strap. I'm pretty sure I have enough, but I think it's wide.

So I look like a toggled up mess, which it is. But I don't care as long as it doesn't break on the trail.

In other news, I did get my act together. I edited a lot in the morning. Did shopping and errands all afternoon. Ugh, but I did get gas for $2.66/gal! Soothed my stress from the hatred of shopping by pigging out on carbs.

No extra walking, though. Now, I just have to get myself to the hike on time!

See Military Service Bindings

The Trees I Wanted

These are the trees I tried to picture the other day, but managed to leave the SD card out of the camera.

First up, we have my clump of white pines that I planted about 30 years ago. For a while, they looked like the letter B lying on its back. You can see its evolution at It's b-b-b-Back

This is pretty interesting to me. The jack pine that caught fire from sparks thrown from a train in 2017 has finally fallen down. The fire didn't immediately kill it, but I guess it never really recovered either.

You can now see the "mystery tree" clearly through the open space. This turned out to be almost certainly some kind of hybrid cherry that went wild. It always has a beautiful shape.

There is no longer even the faintest sign of the walnut trees I planted in about 1974. I think the tallest one got to about 15 inches. All gone now.

The sky gave me a nice pastel purple show through the aspens at dusk.

I seem to be in a low motivational phase. I managed to do some editing and a load of laundry. I snowshoed out back. It wasn't quite unbroken, except my tracks had blown in along quite a few sections. I was thinking about going farther, but didn't. My victory of the day was that I did not stop to catch my breath even once. I just kept walking.

Tomorrow, I have to get myself in gear. There are things I must do before Saturday!

Miles hiked in 2025: 463.1

See Not the Trees I Wanted

Christmas Flamingo

If you've been hanging around here long enough, you know that I have a running joke with flamingoes. No two that I've posted are alike! I'm up to somewhere around 40 posts, and have more pictures I've never gotten around to sharing. Link at the end to the list.

Anyway... one of the funny sweaters/sweatshirts yesterday had a Christmas flamingo!

Not a lot happened today. I did not get to sleep until 4 am. I did do a podcast interview about one of my books (link when it is published), and got out to do a half-mile on snowshowes. Since we got another 10 inches on Monday night, it was all in unbroken snow.

Miles hikes in 2025: 462.6

See Bell Choir Shenanigans See All Flamingo Posts

Bell Choir Shenanigans

Our assignment this week was to show up at bell choir practice in an "ugly sweater" for Christmas. Some people had the goods. I borrowed a sweatshirt of Omer's that I don't think is ugly, but it's festive.

Then we settled in for a long practice. Our first concert is Saturday, and I wouldn't say we are ready, but... o well.

Penny made us all ornaments from old sheet music and some bling. Every one is different. I really like ours.

I managed to get in 1.2 miles on snowshoes, but don't get too excited. I was going to try for a half mile, but when I got to the School Forest trail system, I learned that they had already taken the fat-bike groomer through. So what's the ettiquette on that? I know you shouldn't walk in it- that can create post holes. But I had on the wooden shoes which do not even have cleats. I tooks some steps on the groomed trail and looked back. It sure didn't seem like I was impacting the grooming. The deer, however, had done a number in a lot of places.

I stayed on the groomed trail and that's why I was able to go so far.

When I got home, I looked up what the "rules" are. Unclear. Some sites say snowshoes are OK, some say no. It seems to me that the shoes with cleats that leave divots would be more of a problem than my flat wooden ones.

Of course, you should never walk or snowshoe on groomed ski trails, or let pets walk in any of them either.

Then I went and spent a little over an hour with Betty. We are having such fun getting caught up!

Miles hiked in 2025: 462.1

Ludington School Forest, various trails. 1.2 miles

See 2023 Bell Choir Fun

Not the Tree(s) I Wanted

No, I'm not unhappy with the Christmas tree. Not at all. It now has lights.

I am unhappy that I forgot to put the SD card in the camera when I went out snowshoeing. I took several pictures to share of trees that would at least be updates on previous posts, but I can't guarantee how interesting they would be.

So, the good news is that I went out snowshoeing again. For sure I did a half mile today. I'll add the mile from the two days to my walking total. I may want to snowshoe a slightly more significant distance on Saturday, so I think I need to get out a little bit before then!

Worked some on the usual issues, and had a Zoom meeting.

Miles hiked in 2025: 460.9

See Putting the Tree Up