Happy New Year!

Although my Christmas list contained several items, I really only wanted two. I wanted one of the Sims3 expansion packs and a new set of ears. I bought a bunch of ears a while ago and stuck them all to the inside of my entertainment cabinet and I have gone through the entire set.

And Santa brought me both!

Christmas Eve found me on the way to my brother's house in the next town over. My extended family was meeting there, and the Rebel makes it easier on parking space.

I was rewarded on the way over with cold but decent weather and seeing three motorcyclists out for a ride.

There is a buzz going on one of the email lists that I subscribe to. The list is about Rebel Riders, and the buzz is about the demise of the Rebel.

Someone pointed out that the new Rebel is not on Honda's webpage and it was suggested that Honda is discontinuing the Rebel.

Well, the discussion is still ongoing, but the general consensus is that it is simply an off year and rumors of the Rebel's demise are greatly exaggerated.

One of the most vivid images from the discussion included a remark about part number gaps through the years and that sometimes motorcycles arrive at the dealer with "some assembly required."

Perhaps that is why my Rebel is so small. We forgot a piece somewhere!

Ta!

Balisada

Deceptive Weather

All I saw this morning when I looked out the door was a bunch of blue in between white clouds. I shut the door and later grabbed my jacket and helmet and left the house to go to church.

When I got to my motorcycle, I was greeted with ice on the seat.

Yes, ice. Well, frost actually.

I promptly started to break it off when I noticed the neighbors car also had ice/frost on the windshield.

Ok, God. I get the message. Auntie Balisada will not ride a motorcycle in this really cold and wet weather.

Pity, it looked like a nice day for a ride.

On the plus side, I did ride yesterday to the next town over. I honked at some sheet who were hugging the fence and was rewarded by a mass exodus of sheep from the fence area. I really should stop doing that. Someday a sheep might hurt themselves and I would be responsible.

Ta!

Balisada

Easy Solutions

I took some time off of trying to fix my motorcycle, opting instead to look at it through the window. It's broken and damaged state driving home my inadequacies as a mechanic. Despite my gloom, I was rewarded by a thought that turned out to be the solution.

I had known that after adjusting the chain the brakes need to be adjusted. The two systems are interconnected in a way that I am simply not aware of unless I do a complete teardown of a motorcycle (which actually sounds like a good idea).

So I went outside and adjusted my rear brake and rewarded with a working motorcycle!

Yay me!

The chain still needs to be adjusted, but it is a working motorcycle, and the chain is not as loose as it once was.

So I have once again been riding everywhere on it, but with the weather getting colder, I have to be careful.

I had already added the inner liner to my jacket a few weeks ago, and just last week dug out the really good gloves for the really cold weather.

Despite my precautions, I was surprised to discover that I was freezing on the way home from Media Team practice one evening last week.

Several days later I was surprised to find that the vent liners in my arms were open.

Ok.

That would explain why I was sooo cold.

I have a tendency to unzip the vents in my arms when I first put in the liner in my jacket. This is because the warmth of the liner is not needed all the time, but when it is needed, I can't stop and put in the liner. So the vents in the arms unzipped and the cold and warmth balance out, except that I had forgotten they were unzipped.

Ok.  Got to work that.

Still looking for the camera cable, so no pictures yet.

Ta!

Balisada

Oh Its Easy!

I am sitting here in church listening to the rain on the church wall. I drove today because I didn't want the hassle of getting wet while at church. The nice thing about riding a motorcycle to church is that everyone remembers you, especially when it rains. Today, everyone wants to make sure that I didn't ride my motorcycle in the rain this morning.

I have only been commuting to work this past summer due to stress at work and these past few weeks have only been riding to church (except for today) because LBCC and I have parted ways.

Let me say that I am very glad to have parted ways and the upper administration at LBCC are a bunch of useless self-entitled boobs.

I am thinking however, that I may take a class or two at LBCC regarding small engines.

Yes, Auntie Balisada wants to know more about her motorcycle.

Let me tell you about how I screwed up chapter one.

I needed to adjust my chain and had read Chapter One in the maintenance manual.

You know "Chapter One"? The chapter that has all the frequent and periodic maintenance tasks that should be performed on a motorcycle?

You know the chapter that everyone should be able to perform?

Yeah, I screwed that one up.

I needed to adjust my chain and somehow, even though I followed the directions, the rear tire was to tight to move and the chain still to loose.

Yeah, there is a reason that Auntie Balisada takes her motorcycle to the dealership to work on, and this would be it.

I would pose the quandary to a motorcycle group online that I have been following almost since I got my motorcycle in 2005, but they are in the process of imploding.

The group leader is retiring and has required that the replacement continue to put on meets yearly. The problem with that is that the people who meet are on the east coast and the one or two replacements are kind of out West and Tennessee is too far for them to ride for a meet. It is my hope that the leader will stop being a jerk and realize that the purpose of the group is a "meetings of the minds" kind of thing, and not just real life meetups. The purpose statement of the group does not say anything about real life meetups.

So now it is Monday morning and I have spent off and on all Sunday looking for the cord for my camera so I could upload some pictures and I can't find it. Aren't I having a great week?


Ta!
Balisada

Motorcycle Parking

The college that I work at has two distinct areas for motorcycles to park in. They are free to park in spaces (which annoys a lot a car drivers, I found out), but they also have two specific areas to park in.
I normally park in the northern motorcycle parking because there is a fence around it, blocking cars, and because it's farther inside the college, and it's closer.

The southern motorcycle parking is really just a bunch of parking spaces that have been redesignated for motorcycles.

The last time we had it painted, the guy must have used water colors because the paint really didn't last long, and complaints started coming in about cars once again parking in motorcycle parking.

A few weeks ago, while on my way to work, I made my daily stop for coffee at Safeway. Along the way, I noticed that the call center had made a slight change to two spaces.

They had placed two concrete parking bumpers at the end of the spaces, preventing cars from using the spaces. Upon closer inspection, I found that the two spaces had yellow concrete parking bumpers on the perimeter, making a parking area just for motorcycles.

Cool.

After that I was telling folks at work about it, and since it was found that the parking bumpers were affordable, the college will be putting in the bumpers in the southern motorcycle area.

Cool.

I think that both motorcyclists and motorists will be better off if there is a more visible designator for the area.

A sign and bad parking lot painting just wasn't cutting it.

Ta!


Balisada


P.S.

I didn't have a picture of the motorcycle parking at the call center and each post needs a picture so I included a picture that I took last week.

We had several middle school choirs on campus for a competition, making for quite a lot of little faces on a campus that normally had ages 18+.

I snapped this picture of pizza boxes that one school had stacked neatly by the trash.

That is a lot of pizza boxes.

Ta!

Rainy Musings

So I got my motorcycle back a week or two ago from the shop.

I had put it on a trailer and took it home, but apparently, along the way, I must have run over something, because the tire went flat in my driveway.

So last Thursday found me on my motorcycle even though the weather was less than stellar.

Since we were between terms, I had taken advantage of the practically empty parking lots and parked in a space close to my office.

As I left for the day, it was raining lightly and I wondered how lonely my motorcycle had been all by itself. The less than stellar weather meant that there would probably be no other motorcyclists on the road but me.

Apparently, my Rebel found a friend anyways:






Ta!

Balisada

Justifying My Insanity

Several months ago (October I believe), I started this but as is often the case, I didn't publish it.



Irondad has written a thoughtful post about why we motorcyclists ride motorcycles, especially in dreary weather conditions.

What is it about riding?

I found that interesting, because I was wondering the same thing last week.

I can honestly say that I will miss my motorcycle more than ever on the days that I am forced to leave it behind due to weather.

Yes, I do ride quite a lot in the winter. Since it's just cold and wet but not icy, I feel justified in what others would consider to be an act of insanity.

But that got me to thinking, how do I justify my insanity?

My response?

Balisada said...

I don't justify my insanity.

I embrace it.

I proudly put tiger ears and a tail on my helmet and 24 packs of toilet paper on the Rebel, knowing full well that I will probably end up on YouTube as fodder for jokes.

I will ride in the pouring rain with just a RevIt Jacket, blue jeans, and tiger-eared-adorned-helmet, fully aware that my feet are swimming in their own pool of water and I literally leave a trail of water dripping off my soaked jeans when I walk inside. I know that drivers shake their heads when they see me riding in the rain and wonder what would compel someone to ride a motorcycle in such miserable weather.

Why?

Because no where does it say that life was intended to be taken seriously.

Because if someone were to offer to give me my dream vehicle, I would honestly get to say:

"Sorry, I already bought it. I rode it to work today."


Ta!
Balisada

10:51 AM

So I am embracing my insanity.

Proudly, in fact.


Ta!

Balisada

Early Classes

So I am going about my day today. It's winter, so I am riding when I can, but the weather makes it interesting.

Imagine my surprise when an email arrives in my inbox regarding the TEAM Oregon motorcycle classes and their schedule for the next couple of months.

LBCC hosts motorcycle classes for TEAM Oregon. It's a hoot. I love watching the classes on the weekend. They go in circles in the parking lot, and it always brings me back to my own training on this same training range actually.

Anyway, classes are starting up at the end of the month.

Wow.

It seems like just last month the last class of the season was held.

Oh wait, it was just last month that the last class was held!

That makes for a long training year and is a lot of brand-spankin-new motorcyclists!


Ta!

Balisada