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.