But I signed up for the Motorcycle Training Course to take place in mid-December and I'm going to buy my friend's Ninja 250 this weekend.
Not that my mom could say much. My dad started riding motorcycles a few years ago. Granted he's 73 so you figure he's already got a long life should anyone plow into him... but you also gotta figure my reaction times are going to be quicker. I’ll also never forego gloves just because it’s warm out, or ride off for a gallon of milk in my house slippers. But I’m crazy like that.
It's just that I've spent enough time on the back. For days at a time across Thailand and Cambodia (through mud puddles up to the seat and monsoon rains and asleep), around the City, down to the races, whatever. I’ve only been thinking about doing this for 6 or 7 years, so it’s time to just go do it.
Maybe I should start doing more of the other things I want to be doing too. Hrm.
Posted by allison at November 21, 2005 02:52 PM"It's just that I've spent enough time on the back."
I read that as "I've spent enough time on my back", bwahahaha!
Posted by: Sonia at November 21, 2005 09:03 PMYah. I wish!
Har.
Posted by: allison at November 21, 2005 10:31 PMCool! A back injury got me back into cycling, as prolonged sitting in an auto/truck was too painful.
My new Kawasaki, and (in progress) trip: http://germz.org/klr650/
p.s. Does Kevin ride?
p.p.s I read "time on your back" too.
I've got a Honda V65 Sabre....badly in need of a new gauge cluster (unobtainable). And a 1967 Honda CB160....just needs a new set of tank badges (unobtainable for a tolerable price) to be all pretty again. Feel free to post any leads here on Al's Motorcycle Forum...
Rode from St. Louis to DC and back one summer. And then another summer from Seattle down the coast to Eureka, CA, turned inland and rode back up to Portland, OR (had the bike trailered, vacation was too short). I think I may have switched belief systems somewhere halfway down that Oregon coast.
Posted by: "other things"? at November 22, 2005 07:38 AMHmmm. Swinney reported that much of Oregon had been clear-cut, now. I saw much evidence of that same practice in Arkansas. And then there is the road-kill, and the death-racing truck and SUV traffic.
I have, to date, had my beliefs confirmed, rather than changed. It's not really what I wanted.
The country feels smaller, now. And the violence of the highway feels more real. It is true, it seems, that systems tend towards disorder: motorcycles lose their badges; human communities break apart.
When you find something beautiful, it is good to stop, and enjoy it as long as you can...
Posted by: Paul at November 22, 2005 10:46 PMUgh. That definitely bleakens....bleakifies....bleaks..... Okay, why is there no word that means to make bleak? My Old Oxford Dictionary says that once, long ago (but not really THAT long ago, as these things go), "bleak" and "bleaks" would have done the trick, verb-wise, at least in part of England. But that was when it still really meant "to bleach". And now they're flippin obsolete anyway.
Maybe I should start a movement, a grass-roots effort to establish "bleaken"'s rightful place in the lexicon. It could be the new "harshed" or "gnarly". I'm sure the Goth crowd would dig it.
Anyway, I was going to say something pithy about the chances of my socks ever being reunited in this entropic world, but forget it.
Posted by: allergic to poultry at November 23, 2005 08:01 AMdude
i want a motorcycle too. jenn is agin it too, but maybe i talk her into it. alsos, dad used to ride back in the day... like in the 40s or 50s or some craps. PS HI IM BACK