Motorcycle Mania

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Motorcycle Mania

I used my ten-speed bike to become a curb painter for extra money, and designed a nifty coffee can transporter that just fit behind the seat of my ten speed. It held all of my painting and stenciling supplies. I think it only broke open once, and after gathering all the contents back up, I tried to look dignified and go on my way.

My step-brother Chris and I decided to go on an adventure on our ten-speed bikes, and being young and hungry, decided to ride up to the State Capitol, then out to a water-treatment plant below Big Cottonwood Canyon, to the house of some girls we had met that weekend, and then to my uncle's.

What was the reason for this 100 mile trip around Salt Lake City? We spent the majority of the day traveling to the Capitol for free hotdogs and drinks for some event I can't remember, and then to the water treatment plant for - you guessed it - free hotdogs and drinks. We would go just about anywhere for free food, even if it meant pedaling a hundred miles in a day.

The girls part shouldn't need to be explained, and it didn't hurt that they lived somewhere in the vicinity of my uncle. Only I couldn't find my uncle's house so I think we may have called home for instructions on that one.

The part I won't forget happened just after we left the newly dedicated water treatment plant full of hotdogs and drinks. It had rained lightly, and while it was still drizzling a bit, it was pleasant to ride in since this was the summer. Behind us we heard a mighty roaring, and then a skid and a string of profanities.

As we pedaled along the road and looked back, a motorcycle and its former rider came sliding past us going about 40 miles per hour. The guy was wearing his leathers, so he wasn't injured that we could see. But he was sliding on the slick road magnificently, right up alongside of his motorcycle which caught up with us, passed us and then came a stop about a hundred yards ahead of us. I'll spare you the details of the language that also slid past us; I'm guessing you can imagine what the guy was feeling at the time and fill in your own expletives.

We were almost to the guy - when he got up off the ground, wiped his hands over his leather suit a bit, and then jumped back on his bike and rode off. I'm thinking if that would have been me, I probably would have done the same thing if two teenagers on ten-speeds were approaching to help me.

It prepared me a bit for watching my daughter Aleesa do a face-plant on the asphalt of the hill above us. We were going somewhere important and had gone up the hill to tell Aleesa. If she wanted to go, she would have to ride her bike home, and she did want to go, so we followed her down the hill. She started to lose control of the bike and as it shook back and forth it finally violently slammed her face first onto the road. We were just behind her in the car, and we watched the whole thing happen in slow motion, helpless to do anything but rush to her as fast as we could.

Debbie held her on the way to the hospital where they scraped her face from the road rash, pebbles and dirt. It was a terrible thing to watch your own child go through. It seemed a thousand times more terrible than any injury I have ever endured myself.

My wife and I recently had a scare on the freeway, which is bordered right now on both sides by crash barriers while an expansion is completed. Some guy passed me going way to fast, dodging in and out of traffic. Speeding back in front of me, he slowed as the cars in front of him were going much slower. The car rocked a bit, like he was losing control. Then the car bounced into the right barrier and bounced up into the air. The undercarriage bounced off the cement divider, and the car continued in a perfect 360 degree circle, landing back on the tires and facing the right direction in the right lane -- still going pretty fast, just like a stunt from a movie. I was hanging back quite a ways, so when it looked like everything was okay, I changed lanes and we passed the rapidly slowing car. You could smell rubber, since I think one of the tires had blown. He pulled off the first chance, probably very happy to be alive.

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