motorcycles

[Poodle Head Mikey]

In the early 2000's I used to ride out to a breakfast-ride get-together thing on Sundays. I think it was in a SJ town called Marmora. I liked having breakfast but I am just not an organized-ride kind of guy so I would almost always take off on my own. One early morning I was pulling up and an old weathered looking guy on a full dress Harley was sitting there on his bike. I nodded, he nodded, I put the stand down and as I was taking off my gloves I said:

"This is as young as I'm ever gonna be - let's go eat."

"I'll be in - I'm waiting for my friend - he's old and slow these days - he's always late."

"Old? He's still riding, right? How old can he be?"

"Well; he's older than me."

"How old are you?

"84; I'll be 85 next month."

"What? How the hell old is your friend?"

"Oh he's 88 - his birthday was last month I think."

His friend showed up a few minutes later on another big Harley, that I am positive EYE could Not pick up, and I thought: Maybe there is hope left yet! <g> I often think about those guys even now. WTH? Over? <g> They didn't move real fast off the bikes but they handled those heavy monsters on the road like it was nothing. I sat with them a few times and learned that they had been riding together since the 1930's. <g>

PHM
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This will keep you young if you can keep it upright!!! Ive had too many to list, or too many to start scratching my brain anyway but currently I am riding

05 KTM 530
09 Kawi ZX6
95 Ducati 916
02 KX 250

[motojo646]

In the early 2000's I used to ride out to a breakfast-ride get-together thing on Sundays. I think it was in a SJ town called Marmora. I liked having breakfast but I am just not an organized-ride kind of guy so I would almost always take off on my own. One early morning I was pulling up and an old weathered looking guy on a full dress Harley was sitting there on his bike. I nodded, he nodded, I put the stand down and as I was taking off my gloves I said:

"This is as young as I'm ever gonna be - let's go eat."

"I'll be in - I'm waiting for my friend - he's old and slow these days - he's always late."

"Old? He's still riding, right? How old can he be?"

"Well; he's older than me."

"How old are you?

"84; I'll be 85 next month."

"What? How the hell old is your friend?"

"Oh he's 88 - his birthday was last month I think."

His friend showed up a few minutes later on another big Harley, that I am positive EYE could Not pick up, and I thought: Maybe there is hope left yet! <g> I often think about those guys even now. WTH? Over? <g> They didn't move real fast off the bikes but they handled those heavy monsters on the road like it was nothing. I sat with them a few times and learned that they had been riding together since the 1930's. <g>

PHM
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And my respect for PHM grows....

[Poodle Head Mikey]

I used to ride with some Harley guys out of Philadelphia. I would head out before dawn to get in a 100 miles or so before meeting them for breakfast. Because breakfast was at nine and took most of two hours - and before 1:00P we would be at the bar for a two+ hour lunch. <g> They were big washers & polishers and there had been a lot of snow over the winter. They had all stayed home but I had set up a big Kawasaki with a big wide windshield, substantial plexiglass wind guards for my legs, and I built some heated grip covers - who the hell knew you could just buy them??? The snowmobile guys use them. <g> I made mine from salvaged heater wire from a defective electric blanket. <g>

Anyway by spring; the big winter-KZ is filthy and salt caked - rode hard and put up wet, as they say. <g> When it's above 50º the Bonneville will start so I was riding that as the weather warmed up. So one spring day they call: "We're all going to (some Dam Run) It's in southeast PA/northern Maryland. Harlan Dam ? Marlon Dam? Comeon - it's the first Run of the year (or something like that)

It starts at some HD Dealer and goes south to this Dam and back. Then there is the typical HD party thing with a band and Hooters Girls and so forth. Sort of 'motorcycling for people who don't like to ride'. <g> I get there by meeting a guy in NJ for breakfast and then following him - so I really have no idea how I got there, where the friggin dam is, or how to get to it. So they set everybody off at several-minute intervals - I don't know why. I see a HD guy from Philly that I recognize take off so I ignore the signal man and take off after him - I figure at least I can follow him to the dam rather than be lost.

As we ride we start to bunch up a little and I end up riding in company with several of the Philly guys in a group. They hot rod back and forth a little bit - goofing around. And after a bit of that the guy I had followed out of the HD dealership Really takes off. So I crank it up and go with him. I'm not racing so no-disrespect; I stay a bike length behind to his left. He keeps cranking it up and up - so I maintain. That bike's speedo only goes to 80 mph so it's been pegged for a good while. My windshield is hammering and the homemade leg guards are vibrating and the airstream has my helmet doing that back & forth wobble - something like what happens behind a big truck. We are well over 100, he still accelerating, and I think: What the hell is it with this bastard? Why break My balls? So I grab some more throttle, scoot up alongside him, look over, and and shrug my shoulders: "WTF?" He is leaned well forward but his head snaps over when I come into his sight. He does a double-take and looks like he sees a ghost.

He backs out of the throttle and I drop back to pacing him 'one-step-back'. He never even glances over again - it's like I'm not even there. So we ease into the dam parking lot and just inside I see a little tree and head for some possible shade. I park and sit taking off my helmet and gloves. He rides 75 yards further away and parks and never even looks over. In a few minutes the other guys come in and I wave and they park next to me.

Where's Sparky? (he was an electrician in real life)

Over there - what's up with that?

(they are all laughing) Oh he's just embarrassed - he'll get over it.

About what?

You showing him up.

The hell I did! I didn't do or say a damned thing.

You know: all that work he had done to his bike?

What work? I didn't know anything about it.

All winter he was bragging about how fast his bike was going to be - he spent over ten grand on the engine alone.

How the hell would I know that? I don't come to winter meetings - you all never want to ride in the cold. And what does that have to do with me?

He's just embarrassed that he build that gleaming chromed-up race-bike, and bragged about it to everybody, and you show up on that old dirty RatBike with the cracked windshield and whatever the hell else you have bolted on there - was the hell is all that shet anyway - and not only keep up to him like it was nothing but then pull up to pass when he's topped out! How the hell fast were you guys Going anyway?

Damifino; my speedometer only goes to 80. <g>

How come?

I don't know, I didn't build the SOB - I just ride it. <g> And I wasn't trying to pass him - I just pulled up alongside to see what the hell was going on - why he was going so fast. All I was worried about was getting lost - that's the only reason I stayed with him - I didn't know how to get here.

Dude! That makes it even funnier! Let's go over and see what he has to say.

They broke his balls over that all summer. <g>

[2sac]

2 bikes for me. Then I discovered boats.
Suzuki Savage 650
Honda Shadow 1100

[Poodle Head Mikey]

Thanks for saying so but it's all seemed pretty ordinary so far - just living a life. <g> I have had the questions for a long time: Am I really different in some way? Do interesting and amusing things happen to me that do not happen to other people? Or do I just have a knack for talking about ordinary things in an interesting way? <g>

I used to have a helper (he is weirdly becoming a girl now) who worked with me for a while before insisting that I create it all somehow. His claim was that with me there was a constant steam of 'occurrences' that was like nothing before in his life. He was the guy I was with when I invented The Two Beer Test that I've mentioned in the past. <g> And maybe that was one of them that he used as examples.

PHM
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And my respect for PHM grows....

[2sac]

Thanks for saying so but it's all seemed pretty ordinary so far - just living a life. <g> I have had the questions for a long time: Am I really different in some way? Do interesting and amusing things happen to me that do not happen to other people? Or do I just have a knack for talking about ordinary things in an interesting way? <g>

I used to have a helper (he is weirdly becoming a girl now) who worked with me for a while before insisting that I create it all somehow. His claim was that with me there was a constant steam of 'occurrences' that was like nothing before in his life. He was the guy I was with when I invented The Two Beer Test that I've mentioned in the past. <g> And maybe that was one of them that he used as examples.

PHM
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You turned a man into a girl?

[R600a]

Thanks for saying so but it's all seemed pretty ordinary so far - just living a life. <g> I have had the questions for a long time: Am I really different in some way? Do interesting and amusing things happen to me that do not happen to other people? Or do I just have a knack for talking about ordinary things in an interesting way? <g>

I used to have a helper (he is weirdly becoming a girl now) who worked with me for a while before insisting that I create it all somehow. His claim was that with me there was a constant steam of 'occurrences' that was like nothing before in his life. He was the guy I was with when I invented The Two Beer Test that I've mentioned in the past. <g> And maybe that was one of them that he used as examples.

PHM
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You are an amazing story teller. I tell a story about something funny and people's eyes glaze over but you tell a story about something normal and it is riveting.

Sent from the Okie state usin Tapatalk
"Is this before or after you fired the parts cannon at it?" - senior tech

[Poodle Head Mikey]

I hope not! <g> I taught him to weld because he wanted to get a job repairing ships. He met a woman in Guam or Sicily - I think they met in Guam and then lived on the beach in Sicily for a while. Came back to US; New Mexico and brought her with him.

She looked weirdly Native American / Asian, had solid breast implants, and a pretty killer body. Not the best looking woman - looked like some hard miles or something. But there was Something about her perked up my ears - but I could never put my finger on just what it was. Sort of put me in mind of a badly aging hooker or something. They broke up and he went back to custom wood work. I hadn't seen or heard from him for a few years and one day his brother texted me a picture. Not a bad looking girl in a glanced-at text pic but later when I looked again she looked oddly familiar. After some pondering it hit me: holy shet! That's him; dressed up as a girl.

That made me curious as hell, so I called his cell, and then stopped over his house for some beers. Turned out that it wasn't just dressing in dresses and girl-shoes. <g> Weirdly; I am not judgmental and it mostly just made me curious about why the hell anyone would do it??? But the next time I saw him after that, at a local college bar, or maybe at Lowes, he corrected me when I used his boy-name: "It's _______ - call me ________" and, as openminded as I am, it caught in my throat: I still can't bring myself to call him some new made-up girl-name. It still does. I find that odd about myself. He's still my long time friend - even with all the whacky modifications - but I just cannot use the new name. I avoid him now for that reason. Which makes me somewhat embarrassed about myself - he's still my friend. But . . . I just cannot do it! <g>

But thinking back to the puzzle-pieces left from the Girl From Guam time - more and more I suspect that She was a conversion - and That's what bothered me / piqued my spider-sense about her. <g> And also that maybe she / that was the genesis of it all.

So anyway, no; I don't think I can take (or want <g>) any credit for his (apparently still ongoing) conversion.

PHM
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You turned a man into a girl?

[Poodle Head Mikey]

I have heard that there is nothing – absolutely nothing – even half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.

PHM
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2 bikes for me. Then I discovered boats.
Suzuki Savage 650
Honda Shadow 1100

[Snapperhead]

Had a few Dirt Bikes , 125's , couple 250's , 80's 100 's

KZ1000 was given to me and I rode it for few months , but pulling the front wheel on that was risky as hell because it would SLAM back down

Got me a 2000 Katana 750

I was too crazy on that bike , any time I saw open gap after getting in front of traffic I would drop it 2 gears and twist the throttle until she wouldnt go anymore

After too many close moments like ... OH SHIT THEY JUST PULLED OUT ... forcing me to take the shoulder .... as well as out runnin a few Cops .... I decided I better sell it

Now we all stick to the dirt

[ehsx]

I was too crazy on that bike , any time I saw open gap after getting in front of traffic I would drop it 2 gears and twist the throttle until she wouldnt go anymore

After too many close moments like ... OH SHIT THEY JUST PULLED OUT ... forcing me to take the shoulder .... as well as out runnin a few Cops .... I decided I better sell it

Now we all stick to the dirt

I have a strong respect for Newton’s law.

[Poodle Head Mikey]

Me too. That's why I always keep moving and never look back. <g>


PHM
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I have a strong respect for Newton’s law.

[hvacker]

The biggest threat I've found for riding bikes is cell phones. They are distracted enough to make a person quit riding.

That and riding in a hail storm. I was going to a funeral of a friend who died on his bike. Then the hail started. Marble size.
I figured he might be looking down getting a good laugh.

[ehsx]

Looked up stats on bike accidents.
4x more likely to be involved in an accident than a 4 wheel vehicle
24x more likely to be a fatality than if in a four wheel vehicle
~ 1/2 involve vehicles making left turns in front of bikes
> 30% involve alcohol
~ 20% just ran off the road usually in curves

Had one accident in '72 where a 18 wheel tanker made a right turn from the left lane and I hit him in the fuel tank and the bike was run over, minor injuries without hospital treatment.
Last year went too fast in a tight double 90. Laid it down in a ditch, pulled a oil cooler line off. Nearby farmers pulled me out with a 4-wheeler, came home with a qt of peach and a qt of blackberry shine. Only a scratch on my face from a bush.

Lighting can make a big difference. Went to led which are brighter and color temp far more visible. Brake light flashes, large lenses.

[VTP99]

Last month I was getting home from work about 10:00 pm.
Sittin' in my van I heard that notorious metal crunch sound.
About a minute later I heard what sounded like a gun shot so I walked down to the corner.
The bike is on the left and rider on the right in the middle of the road.
Unfortunately he died on impact. 3 teenaged girls in a Subaru the driver pulled out in front of him. She told me she never saw him.