How did I miss this when we were there? We’ll have to go back.

By the way, I'm having trouble with that stupid Bluetooth keyboard I bragged about on page two. I'll catch up eventually, but if anybody asks, you can tell them why I haven't updated nightly.

I'm not sure if I have told the story on-line, mainly because nobody asked. Besides, what makes you so sure it's a nickname?

Actually you are right. The Feeshko is not her real name. It evolved over many years from Alice, to Alicia, to Licia, to Leash, to Feesh, to Feeshko, and finally to The Feeshko. I had an employee who worked for me for three years before he ever knew her real name. Somebody called her Alice one day, and he said, "Alice? Who's Alice?"

Looking forward to a bunch more tours this year! By the way, have you ever told us where The Feeshko gets her nickname?

tour #23: tour with Diggity?

You're right about technology being a slippery slope, Bob. First I started carrying a Bluetooth Speaker, now it's a Bluetooth keyboard. What next . . . a Bluetooth derailleur?

There is some good news though. With the keyboard, I no longer have to carry a laptop. And with the speaker, I no longer have to carry a radio. I consider those tradeoffs to be a technological wash. Another bit of good news is that I'm still sticking to my paper maps, and I'll continue to do so until somebody pries them out of my cold, dead hands.

Come to think of it, I did learn of the Bluetooth keyboard from your journal. Thank you for that. And don't be so modest, messengers can be just as important as originators.

I don’t know Greg. Technology is a slippery slope. First it’s a Bluetooth keyboard, then a navigation app on you phone, then a Garmin. Where will it all end? Just kidding of course! Looking forward to this next adventure.

Hi Greg-

You may be recalling a conversation I had earlier this week with Suzanne Gibson, in the Comments section on the "Two (more) days, one (more) night" page of my "Dress Rehearsal Mini Tour" journal. We were talking about exactly that subject.

All credit for the idea of a Bluetooth keyboard, however, is more properly directed to Team Anderson. It was they who made the first mention of such things within the sphere of my awareness, making me a mere messenger and distributor rather than originator of Good Ideas.

Whatever the path you traveled to Awareness and EnLIGHTenment, I think you'll be as pleased as I was by the discovery.

Good luck to you on your Summer of Small Tours! I'm looking forward to hours and hours of entertaining reading as you report; you'll certainly get my vote when I'm selected for the Pulitzer Review and Award Committee.

Oh oh! Well, I'll deal with that problem when the time comes. In the meantime, I'll try to keep it charged as much as possible. Thanks for the heads up.

Great to hear from you Stu. I was worried that maybe our connection went bad after I got booted off CrazyGuy.

For sure, the Palouse is very special, especially to a person who doesn't live nearby. I remember one of my brothers-in-law, who lives in Spokane, saying "there's nothing down there but farmland." Well, maybe so, but it's not the same kind of flat, corn & soybeans farmland I'm used to.

I'm excited to read about your "different" tour of Pennsylvania. You KNOW I'll find it.

That's what I use, too. I find it has to be charged fairly frequently and when the battery is low it does strange things like repeating the last letter for several lines. like thissssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Greg,
Came on here to finally comment on your Palouse tour journal, which was as highly entertaining as all your journals are. Great photos, brought back memories of the four months I spent in 2014 living in Richland, WA. One weekend I did a loop out of Spokane that must have covered much of the same ground that you went through on your trip. Like you, I thought the Palouse scenery was something special and I can see why you thought it deserved it's own dedicated bike tour.

Happily, I see that you have several postings even more recent than that tour. Not surprisingly, our bike touring instincts are very similar, my equivalent to your Wisconsin trip is coming soon: I'm going to venture into my neighboring state of Pennsylvania and do a loop to Pittsburgh and back. And I'm gonna do it "differently", I'm not gonna use the C&O Canal Trail like most sane cyclists would (I'm kinda of bored of that Trail), I'm just gonna barrell across the state from Gettysburg on westward. To get back home, I'm gonna take the National Road, an old road that I've seen snaking back in forth alongside I-68 in Maryland on many of my auto trips out west.

Anyway, sorry I've taken so long to get back to you and look forward to catching up on your latest Cycleblaze entries.

Stu

Oh, that's sad that you no longer have your adventure map. I don't have a lot of things, but I still have my first map that I marked up. I spent a month traveling around the western US on Greyhound when I was 20, sleeping in parks and the bus stations. I bought a fold-out map to decide where I wanted to go, and after the trip, I marked all my routes with a highlighter. Then on all the different backpacking trips I did with my friends in college to WY, NV and UT, I marked those drives off. Then, I marked off the 6-month, 20,000 mile road trip Nigel and I did in 1999-2000. I can't remember if I put my US bike tours on it or not. But I still have that in my box of sentimental things.

Still working and it's absolutely nuts. End of financial year is always crazy in government, but even more so when your dept is being dissolved then and rolled into another one on 1 July. I'm also essentially doing logistics for two trips (the one to see my folks and all the stuff for the bike tour so I can take off straight away when I get back), plus getting everything together to go into storage. I finish work on the 23rd, carpets get cleaned 24th, move and clean house on 25th/26th, vacate inspection on the 27th, then fly to Sydney on the 28th, on to AKL, LAX and DEN on the 29th and then up to Fort Collins on the 3oth. I have one week in Colorado to isolate before I see my parents, and I think I will just be exhausted and liking that I have a week to relax first! I have much more energy than I used to, but I do still have limits!

I can be your offline memory unit. When you find a place and date fire them my way and I’ll keep a list for you.