Happy Father's Day - Late

For all you Dads...

It's Official....

....Best Garage Ever. It's so nice I sweep pretty much every time I work on anything in there. As for the need to post a new pic, well that would be to show off the new Kawasaki flag I purchased on fleabay. I have a second one I'm gonna hang on the left side. It's red lettering on black background with similar Kaw theme.

And in an effort to make this a completely random post, I decided to post pics of a house that I passed on my way to work this morning. It's on a side street within walking distance of my house. So when I got home this evening just before dark, I went out on foot and took a few "recky" shots as Chuck would say. Not sure what this place might have been before it was residential. Cool as all get out though. I think I could see a big tree growing inside, although I'm pretty sure it's a residence.

Route 2. Hot Springs, Roan Mt, and the BRP

This is a route that utilizes the corridor of the western Piedmont with which I am actually quite familiar. I think Roan Mountain and Linville Falls are a couple of the most beautiful places in the region and I wanted to include those on a ride. This is the suggested 330 mile route.

From Maggie Valley, we get to 209 and head east to Hot Springs. That is a GREAT stretch of road. Lots of hairpins. Then we head on to Roan Mountain where we can get off the bikes and trek to the top of a "bald" to see the view. The short "hike" is optional. On to Banner Elk and Jonas Ridge and we take HWY181 towards Morganton. Everyone has said that 181 is a great road and I do remember running it often (many years ago) in a car. Turn and head back north up HWY181 and stop off at Linville Falls, which is another very nice scenic spot. Another stretch of the legs to see the beautiful waterfall. Short hike....very easy. Here's where it might get tricky. We can actually pick up the Blue Ridge Parkway right there at Linville Falls and it will meander (and I do mean meander) all the way back to Maggie Valley via Asheville. I think this could be a bit on the naive side because I think I remember someone telling me that the BRP moves along quite slowly. But if we got tired of it, we could hop on a main road and jettison back to Maggie in no time. However, I've been on parts of the BRP and it is quite beautiful and I think it would be fun to take in as much of it as we can.

Here's a pic of the route and a LINK to the Google page.

I40 is OPEN!!!!

I know this may not seem like a big deal, but it is. This means we will be able to take the interstate pretty much straight into Maggie Valley, NC. No dodgin' opossum at midnight on back country roads while trailering our precious cargo.

ALSO, another HUGE benefit is that I40 is a connecting route to a ton of good roads in the area. So while we won't be on it much, it connects a lot of awesome destinations that may have been difficult to access via gravel forest roads.

Downside? The potential for being on the receiving end of one of those rock slides that closed I40 to begin with.

Route 1. Highlands and Lake Toxaway.

Hey all. I started a thread on the OA and have been asking for route suggestions for the Maggie Valley Roadeo. Here's one that I've mapped out on the Google. I got this one from "Flying Dave" off the board.

From Maggie, pick up the BRP (Blue Ridge Parkway) to 23. Head down to Sylva. Take 107 out to Tuckaseegee. Pick up 281 to Lake Toxaway. 64 over to Highlands and up to Tilley Creek road back to Cullowhee. Ride back to Maggie.

This appears to be about a 155 mile route, so we could make it a part of longer ride or whatever. Here's the Google link if interested.
Also, if you want to see the thread on the OA, follow this link.
More routes to follow and feel free to add routes of your own.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly...

I just couldn't stand not knowing what kind of shape the bike was in so I went up to the storage yard to take a look. I think several factors played into my advantage that kept damage to a minimum. Wreck happened at low speeds and we actually ended up in the entrance to a parking lot which has some upward slope to it which took some vertical out of the drop.

Front rim seems to have taken the worst of it as it must have "dug in" on the incline. Bottom of fork leg is scuffed.



2 of the 3 places the front fairing is scuffed. Bottom of radiator shroud is scuffed. Custom blinker is scuffed.



3 of 3 places the front fairing is scuffed.



Can is scuffed.



Bar end and lever on right side.



Left rearset looks bent and heelplate was sheared off.



Rear brake lever mangles and possibly the rearset bent.



The savior!



All in all I feel I got pretty lucky considering I was physically struck by the truck. Hopefully I can get the rear sets sorted before the rally and I'll deal with the other items afterwords.

Man Down, Man Down!

Got sideswiped by a pickup turning left off of a light. I was behind him as the light turned green and pulled into the right lane as soon as we cleared the intersection I pulled into the right lane. He decided he needed Taco Bueno and cut on me hard. Honestly, it happened so fast I didn't have a chance. I didn't even get a chance to check the bke but obviously it's not going on the trip. Doctor coming in, will update later.

Edited Account:

Got taken out today by a pickup truck at 11th and Delaware on the way home from work on my motorcycle. The truck in front of me, and myself, had just turned left onto 11th Street off of a redlight on Delaware coming south out of the TU campus. As soon as we cleared the intersection I moved into the right lane as I typically don't like to be behind pickups for sight-line issues. As I pulled next to him, my guess is that he decided to cut into one of the fast-food restaurants on the south side of the road as he cut hard from the left lane and tried to dart in the parking lot on the right, taking me out in the process. I had absolutely no time to react and was down before I could even begin to think about taking evasive maneuvers. By the time I got up and sorted myself out, someone had already called the ambulance and although I really didn't want to go to the hospital, Cindy insisted so I took a ride to the ER. By the time I was strapped into the ambulance, and the initial shock of the accident was wearing off, my shoulder was really starting to hurt and I my thoughts were that I might have broken/fractured my collar bone. X-Rays in the ER turned up negative so after 3.5 hrs in the ER I was released.

I never really got a chance to survey the bike at the scene as it was down on its right side and too close to the truck to pick up. I have no idea how bad the damage is but my guess is rashed right fairing, bent/broken right peg and bars and trashed exhaust can. Hopefully it is still rideable and I am going to try and retrieve it from the wrecker yard today. All in all I feel I came out of the incident in pretty good shape and hope to take a lesson from all of this. I want to be more upset with myself for not being able to avoid the situation but in running through the scenario over and over in my head, it was completely out of my control. The guy couldn't have done a better job of timing the sideswipe even if he was doing it intentionally. In any case, I'll keep you guys posted and thanks to everyone for the calls and well-wishes.

New Bars

Finally got around to installing my "new" bars on the Fizzy and am looking forward to seeing how they ride tomorrow. On Friday, I messed around with quite a few different mounting positions as I had some lower bar mounts and 3 different sets of bars laying around. It quickly became obvious that I didn't really want to go lower so after thinking on it for a couple of days, I mounted the flat drag bars after cutting 1/2" off of each end. Sitting on the bike it seems much more comfortable now with the bars at a more natural position. See comparison below.

For you dog lovers...

This is what I envision going through Milo and Bodie's heads when Dick or Brett comes over...

Bulldogged Akra

Well, I have to say this was a mod that went exceptionally well considering how little info I had on what was involved. I knew I wanted approximately 4 inches taken out of the can but that was about it. The process was fairly straight-forward with disassembly requiring no more than drilling the rivets out. Cutting the carbon fiber was so much easier than I thought it was going to be and was accomplished with a hacksaw with a new blade. While I had the can off, I hit the pipe with my buffing wheel and voila, I solved my pipe color issue as well! I took the rear pegs off and used a ZRX MikiMoto pipe hanger and it worked out just right. The aftermarket pipe hangers for the Fizzy come perpendicular off of the frame and don't really look good where the MikiMoto has a nice rear sweep that works well with the lines of the bike. The only minor drawbacks to the entire mod are the strap marks on the carbon fiber wrap from the stock mounting location. Hopefully the sun will take care of that over time. Thanks to Deek for pitching in and helping!

Going Green

They say some guys have a motorcycle as an accessory in their life.

You know you've got it bad when you furnish your home using the bike as a "central theme."

A Perfect Tuesday

What a beautiful day to grill a steak!

Craig's List

I'm blogging from my "mobile office" (the shuttle van), so I won't go on too long. Yesterday was quite productive for me. I was packing up a bunch of my stuff, schlepping tubs and boxes up from the basement, and I decided I was going to try and git rid of some stuff.
-Electronic dartboard. Posted free on CL. Had five takers in as many minutes. Manny came over and picked it up within half an hour. I put a smile on a stranger's face.
-30 to 40 articles of clothing. Shirts and blazers I never wear anymore. Posted as free. Takers within minutes. Gone within 2 hours. No questions asked. As anonymous as a gloryhole. Is "gloryhole" one word or two?
-New Columbia Messenger Bag. $15. Gone before the Bristol race was over.
-Books. Over a hundred and thirty of them; that's a lot of WEIGHT when moving. Set aside 20 or so for a friend. Sold the rest to a kid who looked to be in his mid twenties for the sum of $25. I was as glad to get rid of them as he was to take possession of them. He was eager to get his hands on the Nietzsche and Camus. After he got there, I threw in a couple of Kurt Vonnegut books just because the kid seemed so nice and said he liked Vonnegut.
Feels great making my pile of shit that much smaller.

Reynolds Weld Lab Custom Recumbent

I could go on and on about this picture, but I don't think I need to. Picture says it all. This is probably around seven years ago.

An O-Maj (Homage) to my friend Steve

I talk about Steve a lot, so I figured I would profile him here as an honorary member of the Hoolie Crew. As such, he will be afforded full member status with benefits. If he visits your town of residence, you will provide him food, lodging, a daily stipend and whatever else he requests. This is the code we live by.

I met Steve a few years ago when I decided I would one day work for his company. Long story short…..that ended disastrously, but we became good friends and remain so to this day. Up until a couple of weeks ago, he lived within walking distance of my house. I had even worked my way up to the “drop in” (the unannounced visit). We have a standing Saturday play date, which most often consists of first-person-shooter campaigns on the Xbox 360.

Things of note:
1. “Corobra”, the moniker? That was Steve’s doing. He came up with the name.
2. We’ve been to junk yards, flea markets, and dirt track races together.
3. Holds his own at Scrabble.
4. Recently finished a 500 page tome on the life of JP Morgan.
5. Named his cat “Outback Steak House”. Outback for short.
6. He has prepared some of the BEST meals that I have ever eaten. A dang good cook.
7. Funny as hell. Too many one liners to mention.
8. We eat a hell of a lot of pancakes together. Mostly at IHOP.
9. Taught me how to make gravy for biscuits and chai tea from scratch.

An Almost Haiku:
Pistols and pancakes,
Hash browns and hand grenades,
Waffles and rifles,
Eggs and boast.

Street Fightin' Whore

What I mean is I'm quite a fan of street fighters. Here's some pics of a couple I've seen over the last few years. The one with the "shark" painted tank is okay. Notice that the guy has a flip cell phone jammed in the cheek of the helmet. Odd.
The silver Suzy on the other hand is just dead sexy. I love almost everything about that bike, the radiator, the coolant tank on the right side, the water pump on the left side, the wrist band wrapped around the brake fluid reservoir, the orange wheels, the shark fin tail section...even the hideous stock light.
Does anyone know what kind of bike that is?

Battlefield: Bad Company 2

Looking to get back into multiplayer online gaming, I've purchased Battlefield: Bad Company 2 at the suggestion of one of the draftsmen in the office. I have never really played war-sims so it has been a struggle getting up to speed. It is so unlike the FEAR2 clips I posted previously as you truly have to be concerned with taking fire from the enemy which really slows down the pace of the game. In any case, I have been having fun with it and am getting close to being familiar enough with the game to jump into online play. To me, The graphics are just stunning and I can't imagine where we will be in 5 more years with almost cinematic quality gameplay.

Randomness for Douglas

Reminds me of your "eye-picture" in Mountain View.

Yummy!

Between omelettes, barbecue and fresh-made salsa, I might have the goods to open up a restaurant, LOL!

TRON: Legacy

Be sure to watch in Hi-Def!