Stuck in the Middle With You

For some reason Gerry Rafferty's odd song Stuck in the Middle With You often plays in my head. For years I haven't been able to find the delete key or escape button that will make it go away.

Well I don't know why I came here tonight
I got the feeling that something ain't right
I'm so scared in case I fall off my chair
And I'm wondering how I'll get down the stairs
Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right
Here I am, stuck in the middle with you.

It comes to mind again because I feel like I'm stuck between the cold of last month and the cold of next month. Stuck in the middle, and it's a feeling that definitely ain't right - not when I'd much prefer to be outside soaking in the warm sun on a long and winding road.

I haven't been able to focus on spring and riding these past two months, but I definitely had motorcycling on my mind and at my fingertips.  I have just finished a book about some amazing motorcyclists from back in the day - back when girls were girls and men were men - and all that nonsense.  Except that the 'girls' in the book I've just finished would probably kick most guy's keisters all the way across the continent and back!
The book is about some amazing and very tough women who explored their world on ancient motorcycles way back in the 1910s - when you had to be tough and resourceful to be a rider. No pavement, no push button start, no computerized engine and fuel controls, no nothing, except a very rough ride down muddy trails.  But the women of whom I write had the right stuff - courage, brains, resourcefulness, spirit, and one more thing - man could they ride motorcycles!

The full name of the book is: Grace and Grit: Motorcycle Dispatches From Early Twentieth Century Women Adventurers (Grace & Grit for short)

You can check it out on its very own blog site:  http://graceandgritbymurphy.wordpress.com/

It will be on bookshelves across the nation in March. If you like American history, motorcycling, antique motorcycles, women motorcyclists, stories of daring, danger and conquest - you'll like this book.

I saw an ad for Samuel Adams Spring Beer on TV last evening. It brought a huge smile to my face because it must mean that spring is in the somewhat foreseeable future. Large commercial interests have full faith that spring will arrive eventually and are preparing for it. If it's good enough for Sam Adams it's good enough for me. I'm going to start thinking spring, planning rides, shopping for accessories and clothes at my local dealer, and take the cover off my bike and just sit on it for a few minutes. Hopefully my wife won't open the garage door at that moment and make me look foolish. I do that often enough as it is without even trying.
It's probably all that bad influence from the clowns to the left of me and jokers to the right.

Kindred Spirits

Motorcycle dealerships are unique. They are one of very few commercial places where people feel free to hang out and talk with the workers and other customers as if it were a club instead of a business outlet.  I've witnessed this phenomenon dozens of times and find it fascinating.
Nobody would go into a grocery store, department store, office supply store and so on just for the fun of it; simply for the opportunity to hang out and be around people with similar passions and interests. For one thing, they likely wouldn't be welcome.  If a person went into a Krogers and just hung around, talking with the help and other customers about the bananas or corn flakes, they would eventually be told to leave.
But folks are more than welcome to come into a motorcycle dealer's showroom and just hang around. They can look at the bikes, talk with the sales staff, sit in one of the chairs that are there for visitors, read the magazines and journals that are kept just for this reason, and talk with other customers and browsers - for a couple hours or more - without anyone telling them they have to leave. Obviously the repair shop is off limits because of safety and productivity issues, but the sales area is almost like the club grounds for members - a bottomless pot of coffee is as much a feature of motorcycle dealer showrooms as are the products they sell.
This is very cool. It's just one more example of the unique relationship that exists between riders and the places that sell bikes and accessories. It's a relationship and community, not just a business (though it is a business also, and one that must survive financially. Keep this in mind and support your local dealer or they won't be there when you need them. You can't meet your friends, look at the bikes, and get free coffee at an Internet site.)
I witnessed this relationship again this past weekend, this time at the Grand Rapids, MI BMW dealer. The number of customers who came in and spent a large part of the day there, just browsing, talking, enjoying a coffee and snack, and basking in the camaraderie and the impressive display of machines and gear was amazing.
Like the old Cheer's TV show, it's a place where everybody knows your name and you are always welcome; more of a family gathering than just another commercial retail outlet whose goals are to make a sale and move customers quickly and efficiently in and out of the doors.

Motorcycle Art (Who knew bikes made beautiful music and are so often the topic of fine literature)

It's the first day of November, the month that most motorcyclists dislike perhaps more than any other. It signals the end of another riding season for most of us in the northern hemisphere; at least those riders who live north of say the 35th degree of latitude. Depending on how far south of that imaginary line one lives, the riding season is a bit longer, though even the far south has days in the dreary winter months that aren't suitable for man nor beast - be that beast made of iron or flesh.

But on this first day of the dark month it is beautiful and I took advantage of it. With temps in the mid-50s and blue skies, I took what will be one of my last rides for the season. I hope to get one or two more in before winter settles in for good, but today was one of those gifts that must be taken advantage of. Though the trees were mostly bare there was still much beauty to be seen; a flock of wild turkeys enjoying a feast of spilled soybeans in a harvested field, deer in the back corner of a picked corn field, even a turkey vulture circling in the blue skies, extending his stay just one more day before moving south. (The thermal updrafts that these birds love to soar on are mighty rare this time of year). The deer cooperated in my adventure by staying away from the road and not causing me undue concerns.
As I cruised the back roads I was once again reminded how much I love the sound of motorcycles. It's a very basic thing for me - I think that the four-stroke internal combustion engine, properly muffled, (not too much, not too little) makes some of the prettiest music you'll hear anywhere. The sound of those power pulses string out behind as we ride, rising and falling with slight twists of the wrist. It's a beautiful sound that I enjoy listening to for hours. Motorcycle music is one of the many varied reasons I love to ride. Depending on the location the sound takes on different harmonics - next to a woods or rock wall it reverberates with a harmony unlike any other. On an open road the pitch changes to a muted trail of stacatto beats and I often wish I was somehow following behind me so I could hear the sound from my pipes more fully. Want to increase the cadence and volume - twist the right wrist just a bit to increase rpms and get more of those bass notes flowing. Want a little less forte and more pianissimo in your music? Roll off the throttle and listen as the harmony and dynamics change to a gentler more subtle music.
Of course a group of bikes is needed to really make beautiful music. A half-dozen bikes on the open road can produce a harmony of sound unlike any other.

Not all bikes make beautiful music. I had several two-strokes in my earlier riding years and I never did grow to like the harsh metallic ring-a-ding-ding of two stroke engines. And I don't care for the harsh ear splitting sound of un-muffled bikes at all. Those explosive sound waves emanating from within the engine need to be molded and tempered just the right way to get that wonderful and powerful visceral sound that can be both heard and felt. Proper tuning is necessary, just like good music made by any other musical instrument.
In my mind, the V-Twin engine makes the best music of all. To each his or her own - I like the firing interval of the twin and its unique low rpm power pulses and sound, other love the high speed turbine-like whine of a four cylinder engine at high rpms.

And motorcycle art goes beyond music. Look in any motorcycle accessories catalog and you'll notice dozens of books about the topic of motorcycling. They range from technical and mechanical treatises to adventure stories based on bikes, and pretty much everything in between. It's a genre in and of itself.
I've read quite a number of books over the years that were in some way about motorcycling. The very first was way back in 1974, and of course it was the venerable Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I've read it a couple of times since and I think I'm beginning to understand it just a little. (If you really want to be intellectually puzzled, try reading some of the other books that Pirsig wrote!)
This past year I have made it a point to read several books about the sport of motorcycling. They included: The Old Man and the Harley; The Vincent in the Barn; Live to Ride; the Long Way Down and Long Way Round books; The Perfect Vehicle (What is it about Motorcycles);  Motorcycle Girls 1900 - 1950; and an unusual one that I highly recommend for anyone interested in the overlap of major historic world events and motorcycling - Captain W.H.L. Watson's Adventures of a Motorcycle Despatch Rider. It's the true story of a young Englishman who joined the English Army's Signal Corps as a motorcycle dispatch rider in 1914 / 1915, when massive armies were moving across France and Belgium. His descriptions of the conditions and circumstances of the first year of The Great War, and of riding a motorcycle through the maelstrom of war, mud, snow and confusion, is fascinating. Just reading firsthand accounts of the descriptions of horse-drawn artillery and mounted cavalry battles, and the unimaginable (in this age of satellites and instant communications) often total lack of communications between units and the lack of knowledge of what was taking place just 2 or 3 miles away, is hard to comprehend today. And that was just one century ago!
Watson wrote his book shortly after his experiences and it's thus long since out of print - but it can be downloaded for free from Amazon on a Kindle or Kindle-equipped smart phone.
I've recently ordered Motorcycling Grandma, the story of Hazel Kolb and her marvelous journeys around America, from a book reseller, through Amazon. I'm looking forward to this next read.

Don't be too hasty about winterizing your bike and ending another season of fun. But when it is time to call it quits for the season, remember that there are dozens of enjoyable and interesting books out there that can make the dark cold winter more bearable. There are also many books and videos that will make a rider a better and safer rider - I can't think of a better way to spend an evening than watching one of these videos rather than the usual junk that's on TV.

 I added Sta-Bil before today's ride and topped off the tank with high-octane after the ride. I expect to have to do these and other winterizing steps again, as I fully intend to ride a few more times this year. Usually by mid-November I'm forced to call it quits. I don't ride in the winter except on the unusual warm day when the ice on the road has completely disappeared. I have nothing to prove and won't take unnecessary chances on ice and snow-covered roads. Too many people die trying to prove how macho they are. I'm past that point, fortunately. (And I survived that period in my life! Yahoo!)
So I'll soon hook up the electric life line to the bike's battery, clean it completely and wax all painted and chrome surfaces, and cover it for another long night's sleep.