Welcome to the Button Family Home in California
This site contains stories, photos, news, thoughts and other musings by, and about, the Button Family in California. This is a family web site intended for extended family members and close friends. All others are welcome ... but may be confused.
Riding the USA and Canadian Perimeter
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Motorcycle
- Hits: 91

Peggy's Cove NS
In August 2022, we completed a motorcycle ride around the perimeter of the USA and Canada. The trip included many roads, museums and destinations that have been on my “motorcycle must do” list for many years. In particular,
- I’ve always wanted to ride to Key West (so we did),
- Three states had been missing from my "ridden there" list—Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana (not any more),
- Debbie has never been to the Americade motorcycle rally (been there, done that),
- and I wanted to return to the Canadian Maritime since visiting on my Suzuki 750 in the mid-1980s (did, better than ever).
The trip statistics:
- 17,656 miles / 28,414 kilometers (16,982 route miles excluding local travel)
- 130 nights on the road, mostly in hotels
- 23 US States and 9 Canadian Provinces visited
La Paz in Baja Fall 2021
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Motorcycle
- Hits: 1254

Another moto trip to Baja. This time the focus was on La Paz, where we spent five days enjoying the city and exploring.
We traveled on the Kawasaki Versys 1000 LT as a last second selection. Our Triumph Tiger 800 XC was carefully prepared and packed in the week leading up to the trip only to find, much to our surprise, the counter-shaft sprocket nut gone when we climbed on to leave. No idea how this happened. But, no time to fix. About 30 minutes later we re-packed onto the Versys and were off. One of the benefits of multiple bikes in the garage!
The Convenience of Narrow Bible Interpretation
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Life
- Hits: 1818
Christians that justify their decisions or actions by using a single sentence, phrase, or word from the Bible are often guilty of ignoring the essence of the message via intentional ignorance or a desire for misdirection to justify their actions. A closely related approach is when the reader interprets the importance of a Bible passage grossly out of proportion to the overall message as a justification.
In 2021, no Nova Scotia but New England, sure!
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Motorcycle
- Hits: 3335

I was hoping that we would tour PEI and Nova Scotia by motorcycle in the summer of 2021 but COVID interfered. No entry was possible into Canada. So instead, we road to the New England states to visit family and stopped at many museums along the way.
Our initial target was Great Falls Montana to attend the BMW MOA Rally—an annual national event we've been to many times in the past. In the days leading up to the trip, we spent more than our typical time preparing and packing. There is a lot to consider when packing two people into the limited space on a motorcycle for a nearly two month long trip. When launch day finally arrived, we were up early in the cool morning twilight, quickly dressed for cool riding, rolled out the already loaded bike and hit the starter ... to hear a click and nothing more. Dead battery! Hard to understand why but there was no doubt. The battery had so little voltage that the lights would only illuminate dimly and the instruments computer(s) would not initialize.
Colors and Motorcycle Safety
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Motorcycle
- Hits: 741
I have often wondered if there was any fact-based evidence that light colors and/or high visibility clothing on motorcyclists had any impact on safety. Well now I found some evidence. A 2004 study1 (data collected between Feb 1993 and Feb 1996) conducted in Auckland New Zealand by researchers from the University of Auckland and funded by Health Research Council of New Zealand and the Accident Rehabilitation and Compensation Insurance Corporation produced some meaningful results.
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