Lil CLThe best motorcycle documentary ever made turns out to be a no-budget Youtube serial called Adventure Prone. It is made by a couple of kids who ride beater vintage Hondas, don’t wear gloves, and sport temporary neck tats. I’m hooked on these little 10 minute episodes!
It sucks to be Matt Bush. Last thursday, he took a Dodge Durango and smashed into a 72 year old man named Tony Tufano, who was riding a motorcycle. Matt Bush was drunk, and had a suspended license. He tried to flee the scene. That’s when he ran over Mr. Tufano’s head.
From the Tampa Bay Online: “Bush was charged with two counts of leaving the scene of a crash involving property damage, a second degree felony; two counts of DUI with property damage, a first degree misdemeanor; one count of failure to stop and remain at a crash involving an injury, a third degree felony; one count of driving with a suspended license, a third degree felony, and one count of DUI with serious bodily injury to another, a third degree felony.”
Getting a signing bonus of $3,150,000 to play professional baseball right when you get out of high school doesn’t necessarily turn you into a professional, apparently.
After a week of baby wrangling, work, and school, the Snow Peach decided that the two of us needed a romantic getaway at the Salish Lodge at Snoqualmie Falls. It was the first sunny weekend in months, so naturally I wanted us to take the moto, up scenic highway 202 through Fall City and the farmy Snoqualmie River valley. Our overnight stuff might have fit in my saddlebags, but when we tried to pile on a grocery bag full of Trader Joe’s cheeses and chocolates, a bottle of champagne, and the Snow Peach’s breast pump machinery, it became apparent that the motorcycle would have to stay at home. So, we loaded up the car and took off towards the sound of 268 feet of cascading river.
The Snow Peach, gearing up for a nap
Snow Peach, gearing up for a bath
World's most expensive seat cover.
Most guys are lucky if their mother-in-law will make them a sandwich; mine will drop what she’s doing at 10pm on a weeknight and whip out a custom motorcycle seat-cover pattern.
Recovering a motorcycle seat from a yard of material is not an easy task, and requires the experience of someone who knows how to use tin foil and fabric chalk. I do not. I was actually going to try and stretch my piece of marine/RV vinyl to fit over my seat and just staple it down, which would have looked like a big lumpy raisin when I was done. Luckily, Carolyn stepped in and saved the operation. By forming a three-piece pattern out of tin foil and bed sheet and then carefully cutting the pieces from my yard of vinyl, she made a perfect fitting seat cover for my VFR750. A layer of closed-cell foam was used to firm up the old saddle, and it’s now better than new.
World's greatest mother-in-law
Chalk outline
When do we ride??
Adjustable rake angle
Eddie has a new supermoto that is very pleasing to the eye. It is a Husqvarna SM 450RR, a limited production race bike. It cost $7,000 (used), which is exactly the same amount as a one-year supply of earth-friendly, biodegradable diapers. Guess I’ll just take the diapers.
There aren’t many opportunities to connect my geek-obsession with motorcycles to the law school curriculum. In fact, most of the time, motorcycling and the law just don’t really get along. During my Criminal Law class last semester, I realized that riding a motorcycle on one wheel down a public street would be seen as criminal negligence by a jury of my peers. It was a sobering moment.
After having such a difficult time trying to meaningfully daydream about bikes while in class, I was relieved to discover Hegel’s philosophical view about the justification of private property, because it seems to correspond so well with my visit today to see Tower’s latest cafe projects at Twinline. Basically, Hegel thought that a human being cannot live a full life, and cannot reach the best state of his or her true capability and agency, without deeply engaging with not only our human society and culture but with the very creation of our culture. Hegel’s “culture creation” involved an individual’s creative material interaction and work with physical objects, along with the individual’s knowledge that a particular creation be imprinted with his or her unique mark and personalized style. People must be made to feel secure in their control over the objects that they use or create, at least temporarily, in order to fully develop their true efficacy and agency. So, things need to be owned, because the control of ownership is conducive to the fulfillment of this basic human interest. In other words, one’s greatest self development might be attained by spending dozens of hours making a custom fabricated motorcycle tank.
Twinline has changed a bit in the last year, but the shop-heart is still beating strong, and the bikes are more dangerous and beautiful than ever. The parking lot was empty when I drove up and parked, but that wasn’t surprising on a February weekday in Seattle. After entering the grungy warehouse door, I found Brian and Keo tinkering in the main mechanic’s bay. I had a bag of taco-truck mulitas to share, and they put down their wrenches while I spread the greasy food out on one of the benches. We laughed and they told me about some project bikes, some drama, a death, and a birth. I worked here over a year ago and for only a few months, but today I found something therapeutic in the smell of the solvents, the sound of the distant hiss and puff of an air compressor. I let myself slowly look around the huge shop space.
Some George Strait was playing quietly on the speakers. A shy high school student from Bremerton was polishing aluminum engine case covers in the back. At least sixty motorcycles were lined up in rows against the far wall. A custom chopper, a vintage two-stroke racer, a KZ1000 battle bike, a Royal Enfield with an icon of a Hindu god on the headlight bucket, and dozens more, waiting for service. And, of course, Tower’s custom creations, all full of personal agency.
Keo's personal XS650
I’ve had a fear of ticks with lyme disease ever since mountain-bike goddess Julie Furtado’s dreams of an Olympic gold medal were crushed by a lyme-tick. It was later determined that Furtado actually had lupus, not lyme disease, but this fact does nothing to allay my fear of the crab-like parasitic monsters that thrive here in the Berkeley Hills. 
My ride into Sibley the other day began with another disease-carrying tick warning sign at the trail head. I’ve gotten used to seeing this little sign, and in spite of my fears, I’d soon forgotten the little buggers within a half mile of spiriting down the dirt track.
Ticktrack
The only single-track in Sibley are the little goat trails that skirt the cliffs and peter out into nowhere, and it was on one of these goat trails that I picked up my first tick. Since I had been obsessively checking my legs every thirty seconds, I saw the thing right away, and flicked him off. I had a chance to look at the insect, and I noted that it did not have the little red horse-shoe shape that apparently indicates the disease carrier. I looked around and realized that the trail I was on was a tick hot-zone; tall grass everywhere, with scrubby oak trees over the trail. Trying to remain calm, I carefully turned my bike around and tried to get back to the main trail and out of the tall grass. Within seconds, I noticed another tick on my lower leg. As I reached to flick it off, the beast seemed to realize what was happening, and started madly scrambling through my leg hair, looking for a place to bite and set up camp. I looked more closely at him, and thought I saw the infamous red horse-shoe on his tiny, repulsive body. It was a disease carrier, and it wanted my blood.
The adrenaline hit me like a shot of cocaine to the testicles. I began swatting at the tick with both hands as though I were trying to put out a fire, shouting and swearing. Riding as fast as I could back to the main trail, I started to imagine how many millions of blood-starved ticks were teeming in the grass just out of sight. It was like a nightmare.
As I reached the top of a grassy hillside, out of breath and still panic-stricken, I nearly ran over a young couple on a blanket. They were lying in the grass, completely ignorant of the hordes of ticks who were no doubt coming for them. I thought it was only appropriate to warn them of the danger. Trying to settle myself down, I screamed:
“THE TICKS- THEY ARE EVERYWHERE-THOUSANDS-I’VE JUST BEEN ATTACKED TWICE-GET OUT-GET AWAY FROM HERE.”
“oh, really? thaaanks,” said the girl, barely moving. Her boyfriend said nothing. I couldn’t believe it, and turned to ride away. Before I was out of earshot I heard the boyfriend making some grotesque sort of insect noises, and turned to see him pounce on the girl on the blanket. He was pinching her everywhere while making his tick-sounds, and the girl was giggling hysterically. Apparently a fun-loving tick-attack was a hilarious joke to these people.
cliffs vs. ticks
Wonderful, I thought. I’m like the out-of-towner, afraid of bears in Central Park. Laugh while you can, you crazy, care-free East Bay day hikers. I seriously doubt that Julie Furtado would think it was funny.
One of Rustin's five Hondas
Rustin sent me these photos of a wheel chock and repair stand that he whipped out in his garage. Note to self: learn how to weld!
Morning rush-hour
My brother Jordan commutes to work on a Huffy beach cruiser. He brings a small truckload of gardening tools with him, artfully strapped to his bike with bungee cords. I rode along with him the other day as an assistant to see his professional skills in action, and also to help prepare a secret garden plot that he had discovered in North Berkeley.
green machine
The assistant's vehicle
When we arrived at the “squatter’s garden”, I unloaded the tools that I had brought in my large yellow bag and checked out our little plot. Jordan figured that it had not been planted in at least three years, and it was full of overgrown weeds and random trash. Since a gas-powered rototiller doesn’t transport well on a beach cruiser (or a Mexican track bike), we would be breaking up the soil by hand, with shovels. It was time for me to find out that gardening is no picnic.
the squatter's garden before...
...and after
Adding soil
Making rows
Evening commute
view from Grizzly Peak Boulevard
View Larger Map
Skyline Boulevard is a winding, two-lane road that heads south from Grizzly Peak, and passes along some impressive regional parks, such as the Sibley Volcanic Regional Preserve, Redwood Park, and Anthony Chabot Park. All were very neat, all were very crowded on this memorial day weekend.
Grass Valley Road
Redwood Regional Park
Cathedral Building, downtown Oakland
