Just When I Thought It Was Safe

Man, I hate it when I find a puddle under my bike in the morning.

Especially when it's an unexpected and, frankly, unwelcome puddle of oil about six inches wide.

I guess I was due for a run of poor mechanical luck. First a coolant leak on the Triumph (fixed), then a dead battery in the Vespa ET4 (fixed), and now an oil leak on the Triumph.

Argh.

Perhaps the Triumph is just too excited for Moto-mas.

Hose Clamp Update

I still don't like hose clamps.

However, I'm happy to report that tightening the clamp mentioned back here took care of the coolant leak. I love easy fixes.

Now I just have to get a new battery for the Vespa ET4. I was disappointed to find that my local purveyor of fine motorcycle batteries did not have a suitable battery in stock, so I'm going to have to go somewhat out of my way tonight to get one. Also, just to make sure everyone knows, the kickstarter on the ET4? Worse than useless. I was told it didn't work if the battery was dead, but I didn't realize it wouldn't work if the battery was just too low to crank the starter.

Disappointing. It's a good thing the little Vespa has so much going for it otherwise.

Far Better Than Ball Bearings

I love this concept, although the execution clearly needs some work. Presently, it seems the rockets are just as dangerous to the rider as to the intended target. Hmm, I've got a model rocket in the garage that just needs some motors...



(via Autoblog)

Sometimes, Science Is Good

Like when science is applied to the fine art of slicing pizza.

Man, I could go for a perfect slice right now.

A Quick Recharge

Sometimes, a fella needs to get the hell out of Dodge. And sometimes, the fella doesn't know it. Fortunately, the universe occasionally provides when we've been oblivious to our own needs.

Lady Luck and I had a fantastic opportunity to enjoy free lodging in Sedona this weekend.

Sedona is a strange place. The natural beauty is staggering. I have yet to see a photograph that does justice to the land. Every where you turn is another awe-inspiring view. Compared to Sedona, the Grand Canyon is let down.

But with all that natural beauty is a whole lot of "natural" capitalism. I have nothing against commerce, but Sedona the town is one hell of a tourist trap. If you want to buy expensive candles, magical healing supplies, or a spiritual experience, well, they can all be had at a special price just for you!

Sedona isn't about that stuff. It's not about the "spiritual" stuff either. I hate to break it to you, but Vortex Tours were invented by hippies to make a buck off tourists with sparkly eyes and bulging wallets. Those hippies were on to something, all the same. Hike a mile or two into the wilderness and you will start to feel energized and euphoric.

That's because exercise is good for you, and Sedona is a spectacular place to get that exercise. It's so great, you might not even notice the exercise part.

It's really easy to get wrapped up in the day to day grind work and other work. You might forget that you want to go outside and play. You need to get outside and play.

So? Go play.

Enjoying the Small Things

I don't like kids, as a group. I mean, there are specific children that I like, but I'm not one of those people that goes all crazy the second anyone under 16 appears. I like kids I don't know best when, like ferrets, they are over there, where I can study their habits without having to interact. Because those things have nasty, pointy little teeth.

But a major exception to my general not-kid-liking policy is when I'm on the bike. Kids, if you haven't noticed, like motorcycles. I can't count the number of huge smiles and waves I've gotten from kids when I'm on the bike.

I always wave back. It makes my day.

...I mean, we gotta warp 'em while they're still young. Otherwise they might grow up to drive an S.U.V.

The Real Thing

Riding in the cold is nothing new for me anymore, as I'm sure it's nothing new for most of you reading this. When I arrive at work, with bright red hands and cheeks, someone invariably comments on the weather, or asks how I can do it.

Well, how could I not do it? Look at the sunrise I got to enjoy this morning. You can't enjoy a sunrise like that from a car, or from behind a window. You've got to be out there, with your legs going numb, your nose running, and your hands stinging to really get it. Because when you're right there, in that moment, it's real. It's not a painting. It's not a photograph. It's not a vivid description you once read. It's not a video.

It's a fucking sunrise, it's real, and it's right over there. It feels as though, if you could only jump a little higher, you could touch it.

Why would I give that up? There's a huge difference between what's real and what's Memorex, and given the choice, I'll take the real experience.

Granted, not every single ride is an amazing spiritual experience. Sometimes I'm just getting a frozen pizza. Sometimes traffic is snarled and slow. Sometimes my ear has a fierce itch that won't go away, and I can't get to it because it's under my helmet.

But, most of the time, riding is pretty good. And it's always better than being in a steel box behind safety glass.

Weather in Phoenix!

Those of you living in places that actually have weather that differs from day to day may not have heard, but we've had an interesting bunch of weather here in the great state of Arizona. Up in Flagstaff, according to the official weather report, a metric buttload of snow fell. Here in sunny Phoenix, we got a lot of rain. And it wasn't sunny.

I like that last part so much I'm going to repeat it: it wasn't sunny yesterday.

Naturally, I was the only two-wheeled vehicle on the road in the morning. People in Phoenix are a little strange - everyone is afraid of a little rain.

I mean, I understand that every time we get weather, the entire city falls apart and we have to make it all out of papier mache and sand again, but really a little rain won't hurt you.

Everyone thinks I'm nuts for riding in the rain. Really, I can count on one hand the number of times I've been caught in a downpour while riding, and I've ridden every day (mostly) for almost four years. It does not rain here. Or I'm a sun god. But I think it's just that it doesn't rain here. Because of this, I've worn rain gear much more often than I've needed rain gear.

Yesterday, it really seemed like I was going to need rain gear on my way home, so I wore it. I got hit by a few drops of rain on my way to the parking garage. Other than that, the rain gear just protected my clothes from the spray from cars in front of me. Actually, I was glad I had my rain gear on for that reason.

But I didn't get rained on. I was disappointed, frankly. Flagstaff got dumped on. I heard rain all day at the office. But when it's my turn? Nothing.

It's kind of a bummer.

Confounded Hose Clamps

Hose clamps are one of those inventions that make everything better and worse.

In the photo to the left, that's coolant, not Pepto-Bismol (at least, so I hope) leaking out and down the radiator.

I thought the bike had been running a little warm lately. Yesterday I discovered a little pink puddle under the Triumph, had a small heart attack (what the hell liquid is PINK?), located the problem and calmed down a bit.

It seems the problem was just a loose hose clamp. I tightened it up, and we'll see if that was the extent of the problem after I get some more coolant in there.

Hose clamps seem to cause a great number of vehicular difficulties for me. Maybe it's just the daily temperature extremes here in the desert, but those suckers work loose like no one's business. On the VX800, tightening the hose clamp keeping the fuel line on was a weekly maintenance item. I have to tighten a couple hose clamps on the Mustang every oil change to prevent losing all our power steering fluid (and steering). And now this thing.

On the one hand, I like leaks caused by hose clamps because they're very easy to fix. At least, compared to a bad gasket. On the other hand, can't someone find a way to keep hose clamps tight? I mean, I tightened that sucker once, it ought to stay tight.

Maybe I ask too much.

The Time I Crashed My Uncle's Motorcycle

My family moved to Germany for a couple years when I was sixteen. Our house in a horrid suburb of Minneapolis sold well before we were actually ready to move. My dad was already overseas, working, getting living arrangements in place and waiting for our stuff to arrive so my mom, brother, dog and I could fly over.

Since our house was sold, on closing day we relocated to a hotel for a couple days. I was surprised at how torn up I was about leaving town; seriously, I hated that stupid town. In hindsight, of course I was sad, I was leaving behind a bunch of friends. Having moved a great many times now, I've learned that I always make a bunch of new friends right before moving. So I was finally starting to feel accepted, there were some girls I liked, and I'd managed to get into a band (Dead Reckoning, we were called). I had to leave all of that behind. At the time, though, I couldn't figure out what I was so worked up about. After all, I'd been wishing we'd move out of that town since we'd moved back from Sweden two years prior.

Anyway, we moved out to my extended family's Zombie Apocalypse Survival Compound in Wisconsin for a couple months before heading to Deutschland. If you think I'm kidding, I'm not. Not much, anyway. My grandparents' house was, for all intents and purposes, a bomb shelter.

Which was pretty awesome and really explains a lot about me.

So, anyway, out in rural Wisconsin, my family's compound had about 12 acres of land on which to goof around, and I had very little to do except for mowing the lawn (a two day task). But in the pole barn was a glorious thing.

A motorcycle.

It was a 1960-something, blue and chrome Yamaha something or other, with outrageously loud exhaust and a knobby back tire (the front tire was original, I think). It had a two-stroke inline twin motor (pretty small) with a kickstarter.

I was an avid bicyclist, so the transition to a motorcycle wasn't very difficult. Plus, I had learned to drive on a stick-shift Ford Escort, so working the clutch held no mysteries for me.

I rode the hell out of that bike. If I wasn't mowing the lawn (a two-day task, remember) or digging through the wonderland of weird old stuff in the pole barn, I was riding that motorcycle. I got pretty good at maneuvering it, although I didn't know about counter-steering, so a lot of my turns were much wider than they could have been. I wasn't afraid to lean though - I scraped the pegs on the ground a lot.

In addition to not knowing about counter-steering, I also didn't know about not braking while turning. Which I think, although I'm not 100% certain, was the cause of my crash.

One day when the whole family was out, I was - of course - riding the motorcycle. As I rode past my cousins at about 25 mph, all of a sudden the Yamaha was just... gone. I think I had started to turn left, and I now believe I high-sided it. Happily, I was off-road on long, soft, cushy grass.

So, there I was, going 25 mph with no motorcycle under me. I had exactly enough time to realize I had crashed before I hit the ground, so the experience wasn't scary so much as very very surprising. I landed some distance from the bike, and immediately popped up again - chock full of adrenaline - and ran back to the bike to shut it off. The back wheel was still spinning. That was when I learned that a crash sounds like WHHHRRRRRRRRR-lub-lub-lub-lub-lub-lub.

My cousins, all of whom witnessed my Evel Kneivel moment, all together yelled something along the lines of "Are you OK?" One of them informed me I had flown off the bike. I didn't believe her, because the whole thing had happened so quickly, even though it had been a long walk back to the bike. My brother Noodles came running up to me, extremely upset, and sternly told me I needed to be more careful. He was 7.

I yanked the bike back up off the ground by the handlebars. The weight of the bike amazed me. It didn't seem that heavy usually! As I pushed the bike back to the pole barn, I noticed the handlebars were a little out of whack.

After all that, I inspected myself. I had scrapes running up the undersides of both forearms (I've still got a scar on one side), and my hands were tore up (no gloves), but I thought I was otherwise OK. The next day I would discover I had rubbed my legs raw under my jeans in a couple places, and I had quite a few sore muscles, but for the time being I was still buzzing from adrenaline and a new panic: what if I wasn't allowed to ride it anymore?

The threat of not being able to ride FAR outweighed my concerns about my injuries. I needed a plausible story. Fortunately, my mom hadn't been around to see the crash. She was out grocery shopping, I think.

So I went into the hillside bunker and asked my grandma if she had any big band aids because, you see, I'd tipped over the motorcycle while going five miles per hour. So, no need to panic, but maybe we should cover these huge, bleeding scrapes on my arms before I wreck the carpet.

Young people are stupid. Case in point - I thought that was a pretty slick lie. As if my cousins weren't bouncing up and down with anticipation to tell everyone I'd just wiped out and had a perfect three-point landing on re-entry.

Anyway, my grandma dug out some gauze and we wrapped up my arms. After a while, my mom came back and I told her, my arms now cleaned, wrapped and only a little gory looking, that I'd tipped over going five miles an hour. To her credit, she let me think she bought the lie, and just told me to let her know if anything started to really hurt.

I didn't ride the next day, because I was one sore, scraped up proto-biker, but the day after that I did. The handlebars were all out of whack, but everything else on the bike seemed fine. The next weekend, my uncle (who had experienced his own spectacular wipeout when he was my age on the same bike) straightened the bars and checked the bike over for any other damage. Then he basically told me not to kill myself and get back to it.

My uncle is awesome.

Looking back on that experience, two things amaze me. One is how stupid I was - I wasn't wearing a helmet (started wearing it the next time I rode, though), and the only reason I wore jeans was because the motor kicked off a lot of heat. The other thing is how lucky I was - I wasn't wearing a helmet, and the only damage I experienced was a bunch of scrapes.

I learned quite a bit from that experience. First, you won't expect it when you crash. Second, proper clothing can save a lot of pain and explaining. Third, "is the bike OK?" will probably be the first question any biker asks after wrecking. We can't help it.

And the last thing I learned was that nothing is as scary as the thought of not being able to ride. Rubber side down, folks.

Chilly Ride

I woke up this morning with a strong desire to stay in bed. This is not unusual. For 9 months out of the year, I just want to stay in bed because getting up sucks. But today, the reason I wanted to stay in bed was that bed was warm and cozy.

I'm sure those of you that live in colder climates know exactly what I mean.

Since I was cold before I'd even left the house, I thought I'd check the temperature before I left. A balmy 41 degrees. No problem.

The other night I had to use a bunch of gift cards or lose the value, so I went to Bass Pro Shops to get a MagLite and other completely unnecessary items. While we were there, Lady Luck spotted fleece jackets for $10. I usually don't really go for fleece, but since they came in black and olive drab, I thought they might work.

Oh, do they work. I usually wear a hoodie under my leather jacket instead of using the liner because the jackets liner is, well, perhaps not intended for high winds. These fleece jackets are way better.

The collar zips all the way up to my chin, which means I can get away with not wearing a scarf (for now. Check back in February.), and the jacket itself ridiculously cozy.

Now I just need to find some warm pants...

And, we're back

Phew, that was one slam-bang adrenaline rush of a month...

My brain is a little fried, but I think I'll get back into the swing of regular life pretty quickly.

I don't have much to say about motorcycles or pizza today, so if you've been waiting until it was done to read this year's novel, go check it out.

Update: ARGH. I was more fried than I thought. The link above goes to the 2007 novel. So, if you want to read the one I just finished you should surf over here instead. Sorry about that.