The War of 1812 and a strange little boy

I walked up to the librarian with my phone, displaying a photo of Baxter, my very bad dog.

I wanted him to see who was responsible for chewing up my library copy of "Mad Boy," by Nick Arvin. My sincere hope is that, once I pay the replacement cost, my local library will indeed replace the copy Baxter destroyed, because it's a great read. 

Mad Boy follows the adventure of a 10-year-old boy named Henry Phipps as he roams around the battlefields during the War of 1812. The character is thought by some to be insane, but he's also pretty quick to anger. So you can take the title any way you want.

Along the way, Henry meets up with a young prostitute, a British soldier who has deserted his army, a childless couple who are travelling merchants with no wares and, by the way, he's hauling his dead mother around in a pickle barrel most of the time.

I don't want to give up the plot, but the story reminded me of some Spanish picaresque novels, with its array of characters that seem so true to life. 

It doesn't seem as though Nick Arvin has published many books, but I will certainly be on the lookout for his next book, and hope it's as enjoyable as Mad Boy.

Our Lady of the Ice, by Cassandra Rose Clarke

I realized that my header said this was a blog about motorcycles, books and writing, and all I've ever written about were the motorcycles.

So here is a new book I just finished, Our Lady of the Ice, by Cassandra Rose Clarke.

I must admit I wasn't sure where the story was going for the first 100 pages. It has a city on the Antarctic, a private investigator, a local gang lord, robots and androids. The timeline was all off, too. But then, I haven't read a lot of steampunk, or any, so maybe all of this is par for the course.

In any case, it turns out that I thoroughly enjoyed this unusual novel. It is the second book I've read by Cassandra Rose Clarke and one thing she has done in both books that I've read is to spend a lot of time on relationships between her characters. They really like each other, or they really hate each other, and in either instance Ms. Clarke provides the reasons for the hate or like. I think this has been my favorite part of both her novels that I've read.

That being said, she doesn't skimp on the plot, either. It's fun to follow, without being so convoluted that it makes no sense. All in all, this was a book I really liked and I expect I will read another book by this writer

Hwy 1 at night

The fog was white and damp, letting me see just enough to keep from driving off the road. I was on Highway 101 somewhere north of the Bay Area.

It was late, way past dark and I was riding north on the winding road with no idea how long I must go before I could rest. 

The cold cut through my leather jacket, chilling me through and making it harder and harder to turn my head for those checks to the side that are all the more critical when you're on two wheels. 

I tucked behind the small windscreen on my motorcycle to escape the cold wind, but tucking in made me go too fast, triggering an inconvenient reflex in my wrist.

Even a rundown motel is welcome
at the end of a long night ride.

There were no lights at all on the highway. The only way to know the curve of the road was by following the highway reflectors, gleaming bright amber when my headlamps hit on them.

The darkness, the fog - I had no idea what lay to the sides of the road - soft shoulders? Or steep, deadly cliffs and a black ocean below?
The gleaming pavement beneath my wheels, that was life. Whatever there was behind the veil of fog, that was pain, injury, even death.
I wasn't frightened. I wasn't nervous. But I was...concerned. That's the only way I can think of it.

I must have rode inland because the black void of night began to fill in with thick, knotted tree trunks that loomed closely from the edge of the road, crowding me with their massiveness. 

Now, instead of flying off into space, a mistake would send me crashing into a tree as wide as a small home. 

Out of the darkness neon lights appeared. A gas station beckoned.
I rolled up to the pump, stiff from the wet and the cold. My ears numb from the hours of road noise.
I stopped as much to warm up and feel my legs again as to fill up on gas. I checked my map, pulling it from my pack and spreading it on my tank.

I was close to a small town, but my travel times were all screwed up. Everything was taking me longer than normal. And yet - I had a kind of faith. I was cold. I was hungry. I was a long way from a bed. But if I had to, I knew I could ride all night. 

My bike would not let me down.

Back to work

Children grow up, parents pass on, jobs change -- but the guts of my torn apart motor from my 1980 Suzuki sit immobile in boxes, plastic baggies, and at least one egg carton. No surer sign of a procrastinator ever presented itself.

I had promised myself that I would rebuild my motor and repair the oil leak. I even told people that once I was done, I'd celebrate with a new tattoo. Well, my arm remains free of any motorcycle-themed tat.

Nearly two summers ago I managed to remove the motor, by myself, and tear it apart. I bought all the new gaskets and seals and rings and bolts I needed to put it all back together. Heck, I even cleaned and painted parts of the motor.

And then I stalled. But this summer, I said aloud in front of witnesses, would be the summer when I finally piece together this jigsaw of gears and shafts and metal casings.  Now if only there were some King's Horses and King's Men to help. Oh wait. They're useless, aren't they?

At the moment, I've managed to wriggle the cylinder body over the cylinders with the new rings installed. The rings were actually what stalled me almost two years ago, trying to get them to stay put and compressed with my fingers while slowly lowering the cylinder body over them. I broke one ring in my first attempt.

But new ones are in place and I'm hoping (and praying and lighting candles) that nothing shifted in the process.

Next step - re-installing the cam followers and valves in the cylinder head.

As I said to my friend who visited today, "It's OK, I'm not in a hurry."

"No kidding!" was his reply.

Fortunately, I have this baby to ride!

Some MC jonesing

This has nothing to do with my old 80's bike, which, sadly, remains in parts in my garage waiting until the weather warms up and it's not quite so miserable out.
So instead, here are some photos from a motorcycle show I attended in Seattle with a couple of buddies.

Iron Man themed motorcycle 

I loved this Harley Davidson (something you won't often hear me say) 'cause it combined two of my favorite things on Earth - motorcycles and comics! It's an Iron Man-themed motorcycle, with a matching helmet.

 Over in the vintage motorcycle area, there was this bike, the Brough Superior. I snapped a pic because it was the motorcycle favored by T.E. Lawrence, and I guess I just always thought it was kind of cool that he was this famous, historic figure who loved motorcycling, just like me. I always have an easy time making a connection with guys who ride so, I know it's ridiculous, but I could imagine having a beer with T. E. Lawrence and talking motorcycles. I would have told him to take it easy on those narrow country roads and maybe he'd have lived longer than 46 years. It's the same thing my friends tell me about the way I ride! Guess I should take my own advice then.

Well, and just so my post includes at least one 80s motorcycle, here's a 1980 Suzuki GS1100, that was on display in the vintage bike area. Kinda funky and not sure I'd ride it, but looks like it took a lot of work to get it looking this clean.

My third year to the show. I'm sure I'll go again. 

Cold days, colder nights

It was dark by the time I left work last night. And cold, near freezing.
But I was well bundled.

I had a scarf 'round my neck and tucked down my jacket, wore a lined cowl under my helmet, wore my thickest gloves, and did I mention the heated jacket I wore beneath my leather motorcycle jacket?
Instead of jeans, I wore waterproof, windproof overpants lined inside with warm quilt material. My boots were thick soled Doc Martins.
I likely looked like a black Michelin man.

The young woman was also bundled. She wore a tan, thigh length wool coat, a colorful scarf wrapped round her neck, stylish calf-high boots.

As I rode out of the parking lot, there she was. I should have stopped for her, but I was so covered in gear it felt like a strain. So she had to stop to let me ride out of the driveway.

At that hour, we were the only two people in that whole area.

I felt bad for a moment that I hadn't stopped to let her pass.

Miles later I wondered, what the hell was she doing there anyway?

Riding and writing again

Been a long while since I've written here. Not that it matters since, obviously, I'm writing for myself.
A lot has happened since my last post. My beloved 80s bike is in my garage in parts. An oil leak this past spring prompted me, perhaps unwisely, to pull the entire engine and tear it apart.

I worked at the project diligently - nights and weekends - for about three months. Then, the lack of any motorcycle really began to eat at me. I began haunting the Craigslist postings for motorcycles.

My budget was a single paycheck - with maybe a bit more. But at the time, it took me about one whole paycheck to cover the mortgage. I figured, everything else I could juggle. Hence, my single paycheck budget for a new bike.  Here's what I came up with after a couple of weeks of hunting:

It's a 2002 1200S Suzuki Bandit. It looks good in this photo, I think, but if you look closely you can see the chain is bad. I knew that when I bought it. The tires were also shot. The guy selling it to me suggested I could ride it through the summer but, in my head, I thought he was crazy. They were nearly bald.
I have since replaced the sprockets and chain, the tires, the front brakes, the spark plugs and the windshield.

I've also ridden the bike nearly every day since I bought it, so, nearly every day for the past five months.

My longest ride so far on the Bandit has been from Tacoma to Los Angeles - and I took I-5 nearly the whole way. You know, lots of people will tell you that I-5 is a dull highway, but I don't think that's true at all.

Sure, I know Washington too well to get excited about it, but even there, the ride begins through the lovely Nisqually delta. You ride over the slow Nisqually River and can smell the briny air from the delta as you ride through.

You pass the state Capitol and then hit a fast 70 mph stretch that takes you all the way to the Oregon border. And then you're crossing the wide, dark Columbia River on a bridge that makes you jump from this lane to that as you negotiate your way across the river and through Portland.

The freeway does a slow climb after that, or at least it feels like it, and you ride along grassy foothills and along sheer cuts through mountainous land, with black, wet rock rising along the road.

I don't remember what Northern California looks like on I-5 because by the time I got there on this last ride it was pretty dark and I spent the night with family north of the Bay Area.

My next stretch was I-5 between the Bay Area and LA and, boy, what a ride! Flying along at 90 mph and no worries about getting pulled over because everyone is flying! It was like the autobahn. I have never ridden so fast for so long before and it was both fun and exhausting.

On the way home, I took a different route and wound up on Highway 101. Here's my bike along the highway just south of Crescent City.

It's December now. Cold and often wet and sometimes windy. I'm trying to ride in to work regularly, but tomorrow we may get snow so I will likely take my boring car.

I hate days when I can't ride my bike. And I don't mind when colleagues who stop by my office and see my helmet on my book shelves look at me like I'm bonkers.

Usually saying, "Did you ride in this weather!?"

They just don't understand. I don't, actually, either. I just know that when I ride to work, the day is always better, even if the brief time on my bike is cold, or wet or, frankly, even a little miserable.

I keep waiting for that to change for me. It hasn't yet.