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.

Youth and motorcycles

I just felt like posting this photo of me, some of my family and friends - and my 1982 GS650. I'm the one holding the Corona.

This bike went with  me to college, carried me on more than one weekend trip from the California Bay Area to SoCal for a quick visit with my girlfriend and got plenty of compliments back in the day.

I still remember blazing through freeway traffic in Orange County, flying between the cars and the trucks, weaving in and around, barely checking my mirrors because I was confident nothing worth looking at was behind me. Once, squeezing through, I clipped my helmet on the mirror of a delivery van, probably cracking the glass, at least, it felt like it!

When my daughter was born, the bike was put away. I stuck it in a dark corner of my garage, even deflating the tires so I could stuff it below some cabinets. There was no time for pleasure riding and I just didn't think a  new dad should keep taking the kind of risks I took riding a motorcycle in LA traffic.

Eventually, I my Suzuki for a fraction of its worth.

It was many years before I re-discovered my love of street bikes and motorcycling in general and now I can't imagine putting the kickstand down for good.

I'm not splitting lanes these days. I've nothing to prove any more. There are no more drag races when the light turns green.

But, still, I'll probably ride to my last days.

Lots of love for my bike on the road

My friends and I had camped overnight in a small town near the border with Canada called Oroville. The next morning, after breakfast in a nice little diner, we were filling up the tanks on our bikes when a kid comes walking out of the station with his dad. He points to my bike and says, "Wow. I've never seen a motorcycle that looks like that before!"

Well, it's true. Out on the highway, there aren't many of the older bikes. But I only have one motorcycle and I like to ride so old or not, where I go, it goes. And damn if that bike didn't run like a dream the whole 700 miles, just humming along. 

Here's my bike with friends. 

On several stops, other riders just had to stop and talk to me about the bike. I'm not sure why that is. It's not a real pretty bike. I mean, I love it, but alot of that is because there's a lot of my sweat in that bike of mine. I know nearly every inch of it and sometimes doodle my bike from memory when I'm in boring meetings at work. 

For some, the bike reminded them of bikes they rode years ago. And it made them smile.

I think a couple of guys I talked to were just happy to see the old bike still hanging with its beefier, crisper, and technologically superior comrades. 

A few of them had technical questions 'cause at least two had old bikes of their own. 

My bike has never garnered that much attention before on any of my previous rides and these reactions were a really cool surprise. 

It was a great ride. And I have a pretty great bike. 

Molson, Wash. - a ghost town near the Canadian border. 

New pipes

Just wanted to show off my new exhaust pipes on this old dinosaur bike.

The big black dog has a modest bit of bling now.

Installing this new 4-in-1 exhaust pipe was surprisingly easy, although it took me a couple of weeks and some fiddling with the carbs before the bike was running right. Now, I'm pretty happy with how it's running.

If I had a second bike that I could ride, I'd tear this bike apart and really perfect it, but it's my main ride, my commuter, my weekend toy - it's my only bike, basically.
One day he'll have a friend in the garage, and then I can give him the TLC he's earned from all his loyal service to me.

GXR dreams

I saw this in a used motorcycle shop and couldn't resist hopping on.

I swear, hopping on bikes is like a hobby. I hope I'm still riding motorcycles when even electric motorcycles are old.

Favorite moment

I was riding along Highway 97 amid the rolling brown hills of Eastern Washington, the air hot and dry.

High on a ridge off to my left I could see a massive brown horse with a black mane. He didn't move, just stood there as I roared past along the blacktop below.

I watched him as long as I dared, savoring the moment even as he grew distant and small, and I had to put my eyes back on the road.