2002-06-25 - 1:30 p.m.
So they tell me that they are hoping to ship the heads to my SHO off to me on Friday. That SUCKS! Granted, I am thrilled that I may actually get my car back on the road, but I was hoping to have it done well before the July 4th weekend. Now it looks as if it will be done by July 4th. I am not taking a car tat has just had major work like that done to it on a many many hour road trip. Knowing my luck�well lets just leave it at that.
So I think that I am effectively changing my job description here at work. I am now going to be spending 20% of my time teaching, and the other 80% developing presentations, and new programs. I like this. Basically it means that most of my day I can stay plugged into my music, ignore my co-workers, and do my thing. Not a bad gig really. Granted I still let my insane boss edit everything that I do. It is a necessary evil really, cause if she feels that she has some control over the product�well she leaves me the fuck alone. So presentation is done and now in the edit stage, so I can begin to move to project 2.
On another good note, I have convinced work that I need more training. Hehehe�looks like I will be getting a MS certification of some sort, and learning HTML. I can dig on that. See if I can get work to pay for my training, and pay me for going to school�well after all is said and done, I will be happy to go find something else that pays much better. Hmm�what a mercenary.
So I have been talking to Mr. Thornbury about the possibility of acquiring his old bike. That would be pretty durn cool. I haven�t had a bike since�hmm�since 1994. At that time my bike was my only form of transportation. Ugh�cold, wet, and bike don�t mix very well�but I guess I got used to it. At least no one ever asked me to drive somewhere. So why don�t I have that bike any more? Well that is quite a story. Back in �92 I purchased a VF700F Interceptor.
I loved that bike. Granted it was a pig compared to bikes today, but I have to tell ya, if I found one for sale again�well I would snatch it right up. It was quite a comfortable ride. I rode that bike every day to and from campus, to and from work. Wind, rain, and yes even snow did not stop me (well if the snow was more than an inch or so I walked�and if there was ANY threat of ice I stayed home�come on I�m not that crazy!). That bike and I went everywhere. That was until that fateful day when yes�I had my accident. See there are two types of riders. Those who have had their accident, and those who will (sorry K, I hope you miss yours!). Mine happened to occur while I was on the way to work. I was doing the speed limit, I was not following too close, but it HAD just started raining. There I was cursing the weather when all of a sudden the car in front of me slammed on their brakes. Now when I say slammed I mean it. See, the girl who was driving had missed her turn, and figured that if she STOPPED she could get back to it. According to her she never saw me. Well, I responded quickly by getting on the brakes and looking for an out. My rear wheel locked almost instantly (disc brakes and wet road) and the bike began to fish a bit�no biggie really I used to do that on purpose. What sucked was I had no out. In the oncoming lane was the BT (Mucking Huge Bus), and I knew I wouldn�t be able to squeeze through there, now with the rear fishing, and to the right of her was a fucking person standing off the sidewalk in the gutter! Of all the luck. So I got down harder on the front end, and that was that. Front tire locked. Now I was fucked. I knew I wouldn�t stop in time, and in fact I wasn�t sure if I would be able to control the bike much longer. So instead of risking a high side (this is where the rider goes over the front of the bike, and often the bike follows, flipping right on top of the rider) I decided to put the bike down, and hope to get away from it. As the bike fished out to the left, I let the bike continue in that direction, and as gently as I could (at 40 mph) I laid her down on the pavement. The bike went down fairly soft, but I did not. In fact if it were not for my full-face helmet I would have been in a world of hurt, cause as I hit the ground I slapped my face off the street. I got all but my foot out from under the Interceptor and watched as I was drug by my bike towards the catalyst for this disaster. I saw brake lights, yellow car, and most of all, the license plate. It read Chiquita. At the time I thought �DAMNIT! My baby is going to get Fucked by a Mother Fucking Banana!� Then we hit. The bike went up under the rear of the car. Upon impact the faring tore off, I heard the crunch of plastic and metal, and then the sound of me hitting the bike. Furious I hopped up unaware of the pain in my ankle, and promptly looked at the damage. My bike�well she was bleeding. There was coolant everywhere. Parts of her had been tore off and lay there discarded like you see at the junk yard. Her car�not a fucking scratch. As I reached down to begin pulling the bike out from under her car, I heard a voice. It was the girl. She was horrified. I heard her babble something like �oh my God, I am so sorry I didn�t see you there, See I missed my turn and I stopped thinking I could get to it. I never saw you�I am so sorry, do you need any help? I am so sorry, it wasn�t till after I stopped that I realized that this wasn't even my turn�� I didn�t hear anything after that. As I drug My bike from under her car, I turned to her, ready to do something unspeakable to her. Yes folks, I had lost my temper and this babbling oblivious bitich was about to receive that full brunt of my anger. To tell ya the truth, if it weren�t for the fellah right behind me (who thank God, didn�t run me over) getting out of his car, and telling this girl �look your car is fine. If I were you I would leave before this guy fuckin kills you for being a stupid bitich�. See the ironic thing was a week earlier the same thing had happened to this fellah. The girl turned white as a ghost, as I was beginning to remove my helmet to start pounding the shit out of her car with it, when she left. Then the fellah there helped me get my bike back up on its wheels, gather up the pieces that had broken off, and asked if I was ok. I nodded an affirmative, thanked him for his help, and then began pushing my mangled baby home. It was several miles away. By the time I got home, and got the bike under a tarp, I could hardly walk. Turns out that I really bruised the crap out of my ankle, and may have even had a minor fracture in it. I also had a sore neck and body from slapping the pavement as hard as it did. Several days later, I was well, sore, but mostly unharmed. I was lucky. My bike was not. I could go into the list of damage to it but I don�t want to bore you with the details. Needless to say, I put her back together, but she never did run right after that. I soon blew a head gasket, and after fixing that, 2nd gear went out. It quickly became repair after repair. I finally decided that it was done. My bike would never fully recover from this accident. At least not at my level of skill at bike repair. So I did what I had to. I sold her. Two days later I bought my first CJ-7.
Gotta tell ya. I still ride now and then. I miss it. But I have never gotten around to getting another bike. Guess life got a bit complicated. I now had a Jeep that took all of my spare cash. And when I finally did have the money to spend on a bike�well lets just say I didn�t ever get the opportunity to get one. Do I miss riding�yeah�and now if I had a bike, I know that I would never again have to ride it in bad weather. And that in its self makes it so very tempting to climb back on a horse of my own again.
So today I learned that the Ruttle�s are again proud parents! Congrats guys!
So�what have you learned?
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