Straps

 Yesterday I was out trying to find a nice running route around my office because we have some nice wide trails all around but they are all like one mile long and so I have to do alot of field crossing or road running.  So back to the story, I was trekking a new route to run and was having a bad run in the first place and second I found all sorts of places with no trails then I came upon this buffalo.  Now I love buffalo and at the time I was ready for a walk break so I thought it was time to get a photo. 

 Here is an up close picture of the buffalo which I knew they had them on this property I just was so lost that I did not realize I was running along the HP office complex.  HP used to be EDS and they kept cows and buffalo on the parts of the campus that was open fields so that first they had a tax break, Second, who is going to jump a fence with buffalo on the other side?  This also points out the reason that I keep pushing all of you to get out even if you are in the middle of town there is still adventures and wildlife to see.

 When people go trunk camping or car camping as it may be called, which is where you load up the car, truck, or SUV and park it at an outdoor place and camp near by you need to get yourself some cheap ratchet straps.  These straps are essential to every day life and to camp with a bunch of gear and stuff.  What makes a ratchet strap awesome is their ability to mechanically get tighter than you are able to pull with your wimpy little diabetic arms.  The picture above is of the ten dollar set from harbor freight and I have a pair of them and they have saved my but at least ten times so far and I always keep them in the truck with me.

 Here is a picture I found off the inter-web of someone using ratchet straps to hold down some expensive 6x6 cedar logs which each one probably weights a solid 75 pounds each and from the look of it they are longer than his truck bed.  If he would have used some good on twine or even rope there is a good chance with a hard take off or stop these timbers can shift and fall off his bed causing injury to others and we never want that.  That is why you make sure your gear is secure before you drive off into the sunset because it is not your life that may be in danger but others. 

I wanted to show you a picture of something to the untrained diabetic eye might think is a ratchet strap but is not.  The picture above is of a simple strap which just holds the webbing taunt instead of like a ratchet strap pulling the webbing mechanically tight.  Look at the metal piece in this one and compare it to the orange straps.  The orange straps have a device that moves up and down so that it cranks the wheel tighter and your load is held down with mechanical force.  The black strap above simply hooks onto two points and you pull the webbing and the metal part just holds it in place with friction.  So once you have read this post and you make the decision to move up in the world from twine spend the extra three to five bucks to get a set of ratchet straps and not gear straps or cargo straps.  Make sure the package says ratchet on it and usually they have the handles exposed out of the package so you can play with the actual ratcheting part.  Once you have mastered the ratchet you will find awesome other uses for them such as airing up tubeless tires.  The thing about a tubeless tire such as one on a kids tricycle or a wheel barrel is that you have to uniformly squeeze the bulge part of the wheel so that the sides make a complete seal on the rim and a simple ratchet strap can be placed on the tire, strapped to where the sides make a solid seal, then you just get a small amount of air in the tire and take the ratchet off and you just saved yourself ten bucks from having to take it to a shop to do the exact same thing.