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.
In 2021, no Nova Scotia but New England, sure!
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Motorcycle
- Hits: 1925
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.
After taking all the warm riding gear back off and hooking up the battery charger, we waited. After 30 minutes of charging it became clear that hours would be required to get the battery to a state able to start the bike. A growing desire, bordering on desperate determination, to get going lead to rolling another motorcycle out of the garage and deploying motorcycle sized jumper cables between the bikes. That did the trick! Bike started. After a few minutes of run time we had a battery able to re-start the bike. Knowing that hours of highway riding was ahead of us, which would provide plenty of charge time, I was confident that the battery would be able to start the bike after our next stop. Off we went only an hour delayed. The battery never did give us any trouble throughout the trip.
The Conservative Sensibility
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Reviews
- Hits: 436
Author: George F. Will
They say...
The Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist's "astonishing" and "enthralling" New York Times bestseller and Notable Book about how the Founders' belief in natural rights created a great American political tradition (Booklist) — "easily one of the best books on American Conservatism ever written" (Jonah Goldberg).
I say...
The Convenience of Narrow Bible Interpretation
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Life
- Hits: 724
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.
Baja Key Points & Paths
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Travel
- Hits: 96
I maintain a base set of waypoints and tracks for my GPS that are useful when travelling in Baja Mexico. Often I start with this base set then add the waypoints, tracks and routes specific to a trip to create the plan that I load into the GPS for a Baja trip.
With each trip, I seem to find both new items to add to the map and changes to existing spots. For example, recently I've noticed that a number of Pemex fuel stations have changed to Chevron. Previously the national brand (Pemex) was the only fuel but I guess private companies can now enter the market. I've been updating these as I come across them.
Here is a map with my current base set of points and paths. You might find it helpful on your next Baja trip.
Where have you ridden?
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- Written by John Button
- Category: Motorcycle
- Hits: 3981
After the topic of hobbies, travel or motorcycles is introduced into a conversation, and I explain my habit of riding to far off places, the next question I'm asked is, "Where have you ridden?"
The answer is a long list. Many roads, destinations and experiences. I believe a better answer is to show the places I've been.