pre-Oregon

I'll be putting up the last few entries about India in the next few days. Then I'll try to skim through the pictures and post a link to a collection of them with commentary.

I needed to post something current to bring up the India posts that I'm a wee bit late in finishing up and posting. 6 months have gone by since I updated it.

I go to Oregon in a few days, then stop by Chicago on my way back to California. Of course, that depends on how my Ducati 250 feels.

Here's Alan Cathcart on the Daytona winning Irving Vincent I watched him run round the track at Phillips Island last November. He only broke it a little, but I'm sure the belly pan would've fallen off anyway.

First a link to him going by. I didn't take this.

Had to close off comments again. Dang spammers. I need to update to a better version of Movable Type. I'll try that when I'm in Korea, I reckon.

India Part 2

Okay, back to India for the first time.

Yup, I done bought me another one way ticket to India. I leave San Francisco on July 14 at 1:30am and show up in New Delhi on July 15 at noon. That seizure that I had in April kind of screwed me because I had to postpone my trip until July. That means I won't be able to get to China to see the Olympics. That's okay, I probably wouldn't have won anyway. Hey-oooooooooo!

I read a trick on BBC about getting past jetlag. They said it's best to fast for about 16 hours and then eat when the locals eat. Your body runs with 2 internal clocks. There's the circadian one that wakes you when the sun comes up, and there's one that lets you know when to eat that overrides the circadian clock. At least that's what the researchers said. I'll try some melatonin too. The BBC also published a story on hamsters show that Viagra works, but I doubt I'll try that.

When I went to Australia a few years ago (round 1 of my trip), I was working 2 jobs, 7 days a week. Day, swing and 2 nights of graveyard shifts. My sleep pattern was so out of wack that I could sleep anytime with no notice, so there wasn't any jetlag.

I really need to find myself a temp job working with Indians so I can learn a little Hindi. Any suggestions? Of course, I also need to fix up and sell my NSU Sport Prinz, Norton Commando, a Honda CX-500 and my beat-up but reliable Toyota pick-up truck. I'll keep my Monkey Wards/Benelli 125cc cafe racer.

broke back dave

My back has hurt since the seizure so I mention that to my neurologist. I say I've been taking 800mg of Advil but it's still hard for me to sleep. There's nothing he can do since I'm trapped in the Kaiser Hospital system. No "take these pain pills or muscle relaxants". No, "let me send you straight to another doctor". It's, "Sorry, but you have to make an appointment with your assigned doctor". An assigned doctor I haven't seen before. Kaiser's red tape is as bad as the government and it's 2pm on Friday afternoon. And it's all with a $30 co-pay.

In order to make an appointment with Kaiser, I have to go through a complicated phone system. A "push 1" or "push 2" or "push 3" and "our options have recently changed" and I have to go through 7 different options to talk to someone to make an appointment. It's like this every time I call and since the seizure, I have to call a lot. When it goes fast I can talk to someone in 6 minutes. When it's slow it's 17-20 minutes.

After 18 minutes, I get through to a person, but my doctor can't see me. Kaiser says for me to call up at 6am on Saturday to make an appointment. There's a party at my house on Friday so I'm up until 2:30am. It's hard to sleep with a sore back so it's not hard to get up at 6am to call. They say they can't do anything for at least a week. I bitch and say my back has hurt for 10 days so they make an exception and point me towards another doctor.

This doc sends me down for x-rays and when he looks at them he says, "I think your back is broken. A stress fracture of your vertebra. I'm not sure so I need to have a radiologist look at these. We'll let you know. Take some Advil". I let him know the Advil hasn't been working so he says, "try Tylenol".

I look like someone who seeks drugs. I had that explained to me by a doctor years ago and by my wife* who's a nurse. Even without a sarcastic mustache. It's kind of funny because I don't even take aspirin when I have a headache. When I've had surgery, I stop taking Vicodin after a day or two. I don't smoke pot and in the last 10 years, I hardly have more than two beers. But it is only "kind of funny" because when I'm in pain, I don't get anything. I'll just have to start buying Vicodin off the street for times like this.

I wait all day Saturday and they don't call. I know they won't call on Sunday, so my lawyer** takes over and buys me hot packs, cold packs, Tylenol, aspirin, and Advil. She quizzes the pharmacist for advice but she chose well. Back at her house, I have a glass of wine with aspirin, Tylenol and Keppra (my anti-seizure drug). She puts Salonpas hot pack/pain relief bandages on my back so not only do I hobble like an old man, I smell like one too.

Everything put together helped. I still don't sleep well but it's better. Monday at 7:45am I call them back. They take a message and call back at 10am to say, "We'll let you know in the next 24 hours".

Thanks a lot, Kaiser you fucks. I'm starting to wonder if I'll have to cancel on the Bananas tour which would suck. The seizure already screwed my plans for India and if my back is broken, I have no idea when I can start traveling. Riding for months on an old motorcycle with a broken back somehow seems like a bad idea. I'll still go to India but sans motorcycle. I've already quit my job to do this. In California, having a seizure means a 6 month suspended license. That won't count in India but I won't ride until I'm used to the medication and feel it's safe for me. Having a broken back and no license will rank me quite high for whatever minimum wage job I can hobble to while I wait to heal enough to go to India. Maybe I can get a job in a liquor store so I can learn Hindi from my co-workers.

Kaiser calls back at 4:30pm which is a pleasant surprise because it is the same day. It's obvious, I lost all faith in them. I wish I was back at Sutter Hospital. They were always nice and it's within easy walking distance which is helpful. The radiologist said it isn't broken and they'll send me a report. Man, that's a relief. Still Tylenol and Advil don't help much but knowing my back isn't broken is great. It would've been a funny way of breaking my back with some seizure inducing sex, but life somehow seems better without a broken back.

So Wednesday I go on tour with the Bananas. I'll try to post random updates here to get back in the habit for India. I'll get back and stick the engine into my NSU and put the NSU and my Norton up on eBay. I'll show up in India end of July so in time for monsoon season. Showing up so late means I'll miss out on going to China for the Olympics.

I know it seems like all I do is bitch and moan but that's just the nature of blogs. I actually think a lot of this has been funny, even if not exactly enjoyable. Complaining about postponing a long trip to India is like a millionaire complaining about getting old hundred dollar bills.

*My wife is a nurse friend of mine who married me so I'd have health care. It worked out that Kaiser was the most convenient. She's got a real fiance but they said for me to finish my lap round the world before they get hitched.

**My friend Heidi is a lawyer. I like to call her "my lawyer" or "Heidi Birdman Attorney at Law". She's good people which seems weird for a lawyer.

My friend Craig went to India a couple weeks ago (as he says, India then Outdia). He sent me this brief video of his brief trip. I was planning on seeing his band "Conquest for Death" last year in North Africa but I had to postpone my Round Two. I hope to run into them in Iran later this year. Craig wrote a really neat book about visiting Antarctica. It's a 2-sided book with the other section by Dean Carrico about his semester abroad in the UK. I hadn't read any of Dean's stuff before but I was really surprised how good it is. My favorite part of that side is Dean stalking a girl and not quite figuring out that he's stalking her. Well worth the 10 bucks!

He's been most everywhere with his band "All You Can Eat" and "Your Mother" and when he went to the Air Guitar Championship in Finland as Hot Lixx Hulahan -- the 2006 US National Air Guitar Champion.

seizure-o-matic

Ah, the joy of having a seizure! I really hope no one who reads this will ever have a seizure. They're a pain in the ass. But as Old Man Foster said, better here than India where monkeys would bite off my balls.

Tuesday the 15th, and I've been busy getting ready for my trip. I have a couple carbs to rebuild for my Norton Commando so I can eBay that, and I had found a running NSU Prinz engine on eBay. It was in a 1959 Prinz that got totaled.

I was really excited that I found a running NSU engine. They're not that common. It's in Kentucky and I was thinking about driving out there to pick it up. 2,200 miles each way, but I'm in a hurry. I'm going on tour with the Bananas on April 30th and I leave for India May 21st. Just a couple days after we're back from tour. So it was worth it to me to drive out to pick it up. That way I could get my NSU on eBay.

It was my friend Sam's birthday. She came down for a few beers and spent the night. I woke up on the floor, which isn't that unusual of a place for me to sleep when I've been drinking. I thought "that was weird, I only had 3 or 4 beers but I guess I only had 2 packs of ramen yesterday" and got back into bed.

I was lying there and asked Sam what happened -- apparently it was mind blowing birthday sex! If it wasn't mind blowing for her, it was for me.

She wrote:

I won't forget it anytime soon. I hope it helps. I've tried to get a time frame for you.

We had finished having sex. You were on top of me lounging, it felt as if you fell asleep. The time was around 10:40am i glanced at the clock. You had your arms wrapped around me tight they tightened up as if you were grabbing me and pulled me off the bed on top of you. I thought you were kidding around until I looked down and saw your facial convulsions. I quickly jumped up to push away all the surrounding stuff and think of what to do next. Your entire body and head were convulsing rapidly. I remembered you saying to just make someone comfortable. So I pulled the blankets around you and on you. By the time I had made you "comfortable" your body had stopped seizing (about 2-3minutes had gone by). But your facial expression was still seized up and you were making gurgling sounds with your head turned sideways in a box. That lasted about another 2 minutes. Then you went into deep sleep snoring loudly.
I texted my mother at 10:44 am asking for advice as I sat and watched you sleep. You slept for 15 minutes then you awoke for a second your eyes were glazed over you mumbled at me then you went back to sleep. You slept until you awoke confused almost an hour later. I watched you the entire time. You didn't have anymore symptoms of convulsions while you were asleep. I did have to tell you a couple of times that you had a seizure. When you got up into bed I knew you were able to comprehend what I was telling you.

End of Sam's story.

Sadly, I wrenched my back and bit my tongue really hard. I'm sore all over and my tongue is swollen and sore. It's hard to eat, which I guess is good since I have a fat belly.

I called up to schedule an appointment with a neurologist and the hospital told me to go to the emergency room. I showed up and asked if I could eat and take some advil and was told to wait for the doctor. They said I'd see one very soon. I didn't see a doctor for 5 hours.

Rah, bah, bah. Just the usual, "Hey you had a seizure" response. They put me back on Keppra which is the anti-seizure drug that I carted around Australia and New Zealand. I had weened off it about 18 months ago. My old neurologist said I could ween off it. Anti-seizure pills are taken in increments. You start off small and work your way up, and when you stop, you work your way down. It'll take a couple weeks to get back to my dose, and there's more tests. I'm going to have to postpone my trip to India for a month or two until I get this figured out.

I've got an EEG on the 29th but I'm hoping someone will cancel so I can get in sooner. I won't be able to drive or ride a motorcycle legally for about the next four months. That'll make it hard for me to get a job while I wait for India. The mass transit in Sacramento is horrible which'll make it hard to substitute teach.

I'll have to get a crappy job and shave off my sarcastic Salvador Dali mustache. Or maybe I can get a job at a thrift store where a mustache wouldn't be a bad thing.

Bleh.

Oh yeah, so I leave on April 30th to drive cross country with the band The Bananas. Here's the schedule. Please feel free to let me know if you'll be at any of the shows. My number for the next few months will be 916-307-3607.

May 2 Minneapolis, Minnesota
May 3 Minneapolis, Minnesota
May 4 Milwaukee, Wisconsin
May 5 Chicago, Illinois
May 6 Cleveland, Ohio
May 7 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
May 8 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
May 9 NY, New York
May 10 NY, New York
May 11 Washington DC
May 12 Richmond, Virginia
May 13 Asheville, North Carolina
May 14 Chattanooga, Tennessee

Sarcastic mustache meets nonsarcastic eeg

Round 2 Begins: India!

Remember this? I barely do. I'm getting ready to start Round 2 of my trip. This time it's India style.

My birthday cake that Keri made me (my friend Keri, not my sister Cary). Keri's 6-year-old daughter Lydia made me a really nice card that she taped 71 cents to for luck!

I like that it's been a year since I updated this so if you don't pay attention to the dates on the last one, it seems like it's only been since last month.

I was planning on leaving last year but life bit me in the ass again. It would've been nice being at the 50th Anniversary of the Motogiro d'Italia and at the 100th Isle of Man. But that wasn't going to happen. At least some good things happened.

My neurologist said he didn't think I'd have any more seizures, so I'm off the anti-seizure medication. If you're new here, I got my head busted wide open in a profitable mugging (they made $23 dollars!) and I ended up in a lovely vegetative state. Someone was smart enough to wave a beer under my nose and I came around.

I was going to ride across the US, fly me and my bike to the UK and it was East to California! Now, I'm going on tour with the Bananas, a punk rock band. The first show is May 2 in Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Chicago, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, NYC, Washington DC, Richmond, Asheville and ending up in Chattanooga, Tennessee on May 14. If you think you'll be at any of the shows, let me know. It's always nice meeting people.

I fly to Delhi, India on May 20. I've got a friend in Varanasi, India and I'll be there until my bike shows up at Port Haldi outside of Kolkata (Calcutta to us yanks).

My cell phone will still be 916-307-3607 until end of May. I doubt I can check it from India so May 20th or thereabouts should be the last day you can crank call me. I always always fall for "is your refrigerator running?" I won't have a phone in India because I like being unreachable. I'll check email when I can.

I hope to make it all over India, and visit the Royal Enfield Factory. China and Southeast Asia will be next.

I'm not sure if I can bring my bike into China. I'm hoping they'll open up more for the Olympics but if not, I'll store my bike somewhere and buy a bike there.

I've been busy getting all the shots and doing the random stuff you do when you're leaving the country. Part of that is doing the errands that I should've done the minute I got back. There's a book I borrowed from Nigel in New Zealand, and a few bottles of moonshine that goes to some Aussies, that I need to send out. Somehow with them sitting in my room, it seems like my trip hasn't ended. I reckon since I am leaving (this time for sure!), I no longer need them as reminders. I should have my NSU Sport Prinz and Norton Commando up on eBay by the end of the month. I love them both but I need the money to travel on.

Duc 250 bits and travel plans

A list of stuff going on with my motorcycle and possible travel plans. Some of this is just me re-editing emails I've sent to lists and friends. Do you care? I don't know who you are, so I don't know.

Basically, part of this is stuff going on, but a lot of it is me typing out loud to myself. Feel free to browse and give opinions. I can't expect anyone to read all that.

I'm getting ready for Round 2. Currently, I'm thinking of shipping my bike from Melbourne to the UK. I'll fly from New York to London and pick up my bike on May 4. I'd like to see the 100th Anniversary of the Isle of Man TT races, and more importantly, the Motogiro d’Italia. I'll ride across Europe and Asia. Then Malaysia to Darwin, Australia. Or maybe Russia to Alaska.

Nothing much really planned except visiting Gallipoli in Turkey. I'm keen on World War 1 and that's the site of a major battle, and it helped build Australia and New Zealand into what they are today. Sort of the American Revolution. I'd like to be there for Anzac Day (April 25), but I won't be able to make that unless I find $15,000 in the street within the next month or so.

The Motogiro coincides with the IoM TT, but my best friend Bill is planning on getting married around June 9. I'll have to fly back from Italy to San Francisco, hitch a ride back to Sacramento, for the wedding and then fly back. I don't have the money for that.

I don't have the money for Round 2 in the first place, but 2007 is the 50th anniversary of Leopoldo Tartarini and Giorgio Monetti's trip round the world on a couple of Ducati 175.

I've been having a lot of fun and I've met lots of great people, but those guys. Wow. September 1957 - September 1958. Even with Tartarini being a Ducati racer so they had some factory support, and that they're both engineer/mechanics, that was crazy. I can't miss the chance of meeting them both, so I'll have to have a child to sell to pay for a ticket. Any girls out there that wants to get pregnant in order to sell the kid so I can buy a plane ticket? Oh, and you should've been pregnant about 4 months ago.

Either way, I can't make the Motogiro with the IoM TT. There's the IoM Manx Grand Prix (vintage) from August 18 through the 31st though. And the idea of crossing Russia in the winter seems like a bad idea. I'm sure it'd be fine for me, but I think it might make my banjo go out of tune.

I think I will try to find a job (maybe teaching American) in Portugal or Cairo for the winter. And I want to visit Matmata, Tunisia where they filmed parts of Star Wars. The Mos Eisley Cantina in Tatooine is the hotel at Matmata, and we all know I'm a big enough geek to make my way to Tunisia to visit that.

Maybe I can ferry my bike from Sicily after the Motogiro to Tunisia. Then ride across Algiers and Morocco and then up to Spain after seeing the Rock of Gibraltar.

Back to the bike.

There's some stuff I need to do to make the bike more reliable (such as not letting me ride it). Ignition and the front brake are two main things on my mind.

I asked on a few lists, BevelTech, BevelHeads, and Giro d'California.

What would be the easiest way of putting a disc brake on a 250 narrowcase Ducati? Drums aren't bad, but wet drums ain't the best. I first kicked around the idea of the cable disc that the first Honda CB200s came out with. Looking that up on google (see CB200 site above), I found that Honda discontinued that option since they weren't reliable.

Ivan The Thelin, and a couple others, suggested just yanking off the forks and brakes from any small Japanese 1970s bike. It'd look correct and it'd work better. Maybe I will.

I might stick with the drums anyway because most of this bike should be Italian.

And I need reliable ignition. It's running points. There's electronic ignitions out there, but how reliable are they? This isn't a bike used for Sunday rides.

This is after I crossed this creek at Daintree in Australia on my way up to Cooktown. I screwed up bouncing off a big rock in this creek and killed the bike. But hey, it's just the second creek I've crossed on a motorcycle. Once I dried the points, the bike started right up. Lots of steep hills and wet drum brakes is fun! At least in the dirt.

Ivan also said:

http://www.powerdynamo.biz/eng/systems/7160/7160main.htm

"I installed an MZB ignition/lighting system on my Bultaco Metralla
and built an upgraded wiring harness from scratch. The MZB products
are agricultural, bulletproof, and simple. Mine has been reliable as an
ax. It can even apparently charge a small battery, but doesn't require
one. Under $300 and well worth it every time your bike fires on the
first kick and you see that headlight blazing out ahead of you on a
dark night...

The I talked to Bob Brown. He said the engine is fucked and it'd be cheaper and easier to find another engine to rebuild. Ducati narrowcase engines can be found in the US, but they're hard to find in Australia.

I whined a bit about how I paid nearly $10,000 Australian for this bike and specifically asked for hardened valve seats on a couple lists. Someone on BevelHeads responded with, "You ever hear the one about burning bridges Dave?"

I answered, "I'd think hosing a customer is burning bridges. I learned my lesson and there's other places for parts -- Cosmo Motors, DomiRacer and Ian Gowanloch are a few". BevelHeaven also have parts for sale. I expect the bike to break but I feel a bit ripped off on what I got sold.

I got a neat reply from another Dave who said,

"Not that you asked, but I have had my share of unplanned,
uncontrolled separation of parts inside engines, including narrow
case singles, superbikes, V8's making too much power, supercharged
MGB engines, and even old two-stroke Yamaha factory road racers.
I've come to appreciate the opportunity to examine these mechanical
catastrophes, and learn from the folly that created these disasters in
the first place.

"It all goes in the experience bank, and when the grey hair exceeds
the dark, it comes back as wisdom. (Gotta have some way to maintain
respect in your old age! Perpetuate the myth!"

If I switch bikes, it'll be something old and British. BSA M20, Matchless, Norton 16H, or Panther. My mechanical "skills" are more of the bailing wire type anyway. Which took me 14,845 miles on the Duc before detonation.

I like traveling and I like old. If this was the 1930s, I'd be complaining about new bikes and how they don't compare to the 1908 models. I know that most of the people who ride Ducatis grew up with these bikes, but some of us didn't and we just like old stuff.

I'll put on a Cheap Suit Serenaders 78 and sit on my porch with a banjo. I'm learning, just in a different way.

Then I started seriously thinking about doing this on a bicycle, since I don't have the money to buy another old bike. That would also be a dumb choice with me getting my brother in law to build me a 3 speed. A single speed would be fun, but it'd kill me. But what's the point of showing up to the Motogiro on a bicycle?

Then I got this list from Bob Brown at Melbourne Desmo Center about my motorcycle. If you want to see pictures of the damage that Tony Hannagan took, check this spot.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Bob Brown

Hi Bud,
What do you want to do with this motor of yours.
It needs as follows...........
2x valves
2x valve seats
2 x rockers
1x cam repair
1x oil pump
1x cylinder liner.........not available
1x big end
1x big end strip, clean & assembly
1x piston assembly
2x main bearings
all g/box bearings
1x chain
1x oil
1x gasket set
1x clutch plate assy
1 x grind crank end and make oil feed bush in outer cover
Hope like hell I havn,t forgotten anything.
Regards

ciao Roberto

---------- End of message ----------

Ouch, I say. Not that I couldn't tell it'd be bad from Tony's pictures. Before I had talked to Bob, I was thinking, "Hmmm... it can't be that bad to fix".

Garry, another Aussie I met and worked with at Ian and Georgia Gowanloch's Happy Farm said he talked to Ian. I sent the list to Ian asking how much it'd cost for him to build a Mototrans 250cc.

At the Happy Farm where The Wonder Pigs of Australia live, Ian had explained that Mototrans licensed Ducati but the later singles they built were built down from large twins. Ducati singles were built up from a 125cc engine. So the Mototrans was a lot tougher so more reliable.

And I thought more about getting a bicycle.

Georgia and Ian called me up right before Christmas. Ian said he has everything on Bob's list except the rocker arms. He said he'd rebuild the engine and install the hardened valve seats.

If you haven't been following my story, Ian Gowanloch established Gowanloch Ducati in 1977.

He's semi-retired from motorcycles (which basically means lots of long drives to Gowanloch Ducati in Sydney), and he's building a Ducati Museum and a winery in Adelong. Between Ian and Georgia, they're raising 2 kids, and many many animals. Happy Farm is also an animal rescue center. Trained pigs, cows, sheep, ducks, geese, kangaroos, wallabies, dogs, and wombats. I'm sure I left some out.

It'd help them if I could pay in several hundred thousand gallons of water, but that I can't arrange. Six years of a drought, but the raging Australian fires stayed away.

Use the force, Duke.

Day 15: Deliverance

This happened way back in 1990. Way back in the days of non-annoying swing, Frank Sinatra, Packards, and World War II. Another generation, another war.

On the last entry, about the California Melee X, I mentioned a road trip I did with a couple friends. Six weeks around the US in a zebra-striped 1974 VW Thing.

I sort of got weirdly philosophical while writing this intro, so just skip the boring stuff and go straight to Day 15: Deliverance.

Boring stuff:

I kept notes of the trip and wrote this up for a college class, so it reads kind of weird. It's posted somewhere on the interwebs but it's easier to use the inter-tubes and put it here.

I probably should find those notes and update this site occasionally with old road trip stuff. It'll be a few more months before I start Round 2 of my round the world trip.

I'm still good friends with Steve, and I still talk to Rory once in a while (Hi Rory!!). I also had most of my annoyance beaten out of me. Never when I had it coming, but they made up for that in Quality, not Quantity. The last one literally knocked the nouns out of me, so I'm usually quiet now. No more instant smart mouth, and I'm not mad at the world and it's injustices anymore. Well, some of that's still with me, but it's no longer gnawing at me.

Sorry I keep mentioning the beatings. It gets old, like Pete Dexter's Sacramento Bee columns where he always talked about getting beaten with baseball bats: So, today I got a ticket by the Rocklin Police Department because they're idiots. Which reminds me of the time when an entire Philly block tried to kill me with baseball bats. I understand a little better why he beat that incident into the ground. Beat into the ground like a pun so obvious it hurt to type.

I've always lived life always knowing somehow I was robbed and I wasn't going to live forever. I think when I die, the entire world dies with me. At least from my point of view, which, as I look at it, is the only point of view worth having. Think of it this way, when you die, I won't be here anymore.

It took more than one near death experience to change the point of view I have for living. I've done plenty of stuff where I've risked my life, but it's different when I'm making that decision. It was the second beating that really counted. And even that was slipping away until I had the first seizure. Like I've said before, it's having to take medication every 12 hours that is an ongoing reminder to get off my ass and see neat stuff.

I've seen and done a lot of weird stuff in life, but luckily, I have great credit. I think having a cushion of credit to fall back on is one of life's greatest things. A cold beer on a hot day. A curvy road with an old car or motorcycle. Or seeing a punk rock show while holding a 12-pack.

We put up signs that my friend Sid made that promotes solipsism. Which, at the time, I just thought the signs were funny so we put them up nationwide, but somehow I grew into it.

Solipsism in a nutshell, and I'm the nut, is that the universe exists only how I see it. Not the Matrix movie version of solipsism where basically the brain is in a vat where the world may or may not be true. Just the idea that the entire universe exists only how I see it.

There's lots of neat stuff for me to discover, and with as much time, and as little time, as I put towards finding the neat stuff, I will discover all there is to know. Because if I don't discover it, it doesn't exist.

In your point of view, do I exist? I'm just something you ran across while killing time at work and you've got a computer at your desk. I'm a pint of beer in your life. Or maybe we've met, so I'm several beers.

It's probably just my attempt at dealing with Catholic upbringing, and realizing that the Christian/Islamic/Muslim/Jewish God is just this millennium's Thor. Now you no longer care what I wrote, since I'm a godless heathen. Them's the breaks.

Okay, blah, blah. Here's the story I wrote 10 years ago.

Day 15: Deliverance

This is Day 15 of our trip, and we were in Southern Louisiana. Rory and I hated each other, Steve just tried to stay out of it.

It sounded good on paper. Rory Hearse and I would spend a month or so driving across the country in the Thing. I'd pick her up at her mother's in Salt Lake City, we'd hit Vegas -- maybe get hitched for the sake of being married -- then play the rest by ear until we hit Graceland. I asked my friend Steve if he wanted to go along for the ride, and he said sure, what the hell.

My grandfather took me aside before Steve and I left and said, "Don't forget to bring along a mess of henskins. You don't want to knock that girl up."

It took me a minute to figure out "henskins" meant rubbers. As my dad recently joked, "We're not hillbillies, we're Appalachian-Americans". Fat chance of using the henskins -- within days, Rory and I were at each others' throats.

Rory Hearse, punk as fuck in 1987

My car ran like hell, when it did run. The Germans almost took over the world twice this century, but they couldn't design a reliable car. I bet they lost the war when they switched from using BMW engines in their Panzers, and started running them with Volkswagens. And there we were, driving cross country in the civilian version of the German jeep. If it wasn't for Volkswagens, we'd all be speaking German.

We were sitting on the side of Interstate 10 about 45 miles from the next big town. The Thing ran only to strand us. It broke down before Nevada. Then as we left Salt Lake City it died again. It took two days, fifty bucks, and a new fuel pump later, to leave Salt Lake City. The top flew up on the freeway and almost killed us before we made the city limits. The next day in Nevada, it's spewing oil. We limp to Phoenix and pay to get it fixed. It breaks down in New Mexico and runs poorly throughout Texas. And there we were. Sitting on the side of the road in Louisiana.

Me. I don't know why I decided not to shave on this trip. I've always hated having a beard.

I pulled some stuff off the engine and peered into the carburetor. I swore at it. Made some personal remarks about its mother, then cursed Der Fatherland and the French for goading them into a war where they designed this car. The extent of my mechanical knowledge at the time. We sat and watched cops pull cars over on both sides of the interstate, but not ask if we need help. After nearly an hour and half, the car started. That was the only good thing. It'd break down, but restart after it decided it sat for a spell.

We got underway, fingers crossed, and hoped to make Lafayette before night. We limped about five miles, the car not willing to go 55 mph. I watched a cop car approach in the distance, and wondered aloud which sap he was going to nail. I should've known it would be us. His lights went on. I swore. We figured once we shut the car off, it wouldn't start again.

Johnny Reb, the southern law officer, got on his loudspeaker and said, "Driver, step out of the car." Rory thought it was weird that the cop had me get out, instead of him walking up to the car. I wasn't worried, when I picked up my speeding/reckless driving/unsafe lane change ticket, while playing Mario Andretti in Chicago, the cop made me go to him.

Officer Reb spoke to me through his mirrored sunglasses -- ever the Southern Lawman -- he'd received reports we were running people off the road. I laughed nervously and told him we were broken down on the side of the road. He nodded and told me to turn over the weapons and narcotics I had in the car. That caught me off guard. I said, "I'm may be dumb enough to drive through the South in a zebra-striped convertible with California plates, but I'm not dumb enough to have any illegal substances in the car."

He told me if I turned over my weapons and narcotics, the judge would go easier on us at sentencing time. I was given the choice of letting him search the car where it sat, or having it impounded where they'd give it a thorough going over with the dogs. I gave him permission and hoped Rory had smoked all her hash in Salt Lake City.

I was given the Miranda warning, and told to sign a paper saying I was freely giving permission for my car to be searched.

He started with my wallet, pulling out my California driver's license, my Illinois driver's license, and two fake California driver's licenses with the names "Bob Azlebub" and "Richard Trenton Chase." A play on Beelzebub, and a Vampire of Sacramento joke. Both had Dorothea Puente's Sacramento address. I knew it was a long shot that he'd catch on, but I was doomed if he did.

A second cop had pulled over and walked up as he asked, "Why the fake IDs, son? It's a federal offense to falsify government documents. I could take you in for this alone, but I'm just going to add it to the list of felonies we take you in for."

"They're so I can buy beer. I'm underage," I said.

He nodded and said, "I've got no problem with beer, just your narcotics and weapons. How old are you, boy?"

I stood there with two cops staring at me, while a third cop approached and talked to Steve and Rory. The were all wearing mirrored sunglasses, and two had mustaches. "I'm, I'm nineteen. No, I'm twenty. I'm twenty. I had a birthday two months ago. I'm twenty."

He said, "Why so scared, boy? Is it the drugs and weapons you have in your car?"

"I've seen Deliverance," I said without thinking. Oh shit, I thought. Nice going. Good job, pea brain.

The cop stared at me for a minute. Just stood there and stared. He looked as if he wouldn't piss himself if he was on fire. He was so cool. Finally he said in his Southern drawl, "That's Hollywood, boy. Let's get this started."

He had me stand in front of his car while they talked to Steve and Rory. He took their ID and stuck them into his shirt pocket.

As they searched out bags, a cop pulled out one of Rory's black bras and held it up laughing.

"This must be some kind of a joke," he said. "Ain't no one wears anything like this."

"Are you sure you don't have any weapons and narcotics," he asked Steve and Rory. They said no. He looked at Rory then back to Steve. "Are you sure you don't have any narcotics," he repeated.

"No sir," Steve said.

"What about marijuana," he asked.

"No sir," Steve repeated. "Positively no."

I imagined wrestling a gun away from one and shooting them all. Cop killer on the lam in Louisiana. I'd die resisting arrest while standing on a water tank yelling, "Top of the world, ma! Top of the world!" Plugged in the belly, I'd swan dive to the pavement.

They popped open the trunk, as I waited for them to find the Route 666 sign Steve and I tore down in New Mexico. Another felony of destroying government property, and I'd lose the cool sign we worked so hard to souvenir. They missed it. Too big I guess. It wasn't what they were looking for, so they didn't see it. They finished, and the first cop had me step to the rear of the patrol car as the other two drove off.

Route 666 sign. Underneath is a sign that my friend Sid made that promotes solipsism and sells indulgences.

"I pulled you over because you look funny. You fit our profile of ideal drug carriers," he said.

Oh yeah right, I thought. Ideal drug carriers. Three punk rockers in an obnoxious zebra-striped car with California plates and a Velvet Elvis duct taped to the driver's door. If I was running drugs I'd be wearing a suit, and sure as hell wouldn't have California plates on the car.

"Which license do you want," he continued. "The Illinois or the California? I'm mailing the fake ones to California where I suspect they'll follow through on the charges."

That didn't worry me. I doubted he'd actually bother with the paper work, and even if he did, I couldn't imagine the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department caring enough to find some punk kid who had a fake ID taken off him in another state two thousand miles away.

I took back my California license, and he told us to get out of his parish. Louisiana divides their state into parishes instead of counties. It's some throwback to the way churches divide counties, I think.

"There's a campground in the next parish," he said. "I suggest you stop there for the night and then continue on your way out of my state."

He drove off, and Steve and Rory realized he kept their licenses. The car started and we took the next exit to find a pay phone.

I called up the Lafayette Sheriff. They said it wasn't their jurisdiction, and they connected me to the local police department. They said it wasn't them who pulled us over. We didn't know who pulled us over. They gave me another number to call.

That number was two dollars and ten cents from the pay phone. We didn't have the change.

I called the operator, and asked for the Acadian Sheriff's Department. 9-1-1 answered. It wasn't an emergency, so I apologized and hung up. I called the operator again and explained it wasn't an emergency. She connected me to 9-1-1 again.

The 9-1-1 lady tried to help. She named the different law enforcement agencies that could've pulled us over. That didn't help, so she described the different uniforms to us until she narrowed it down to the Crowley Parish Sheriff's Department. Not her jurisdiction, but she gave us directions and wished us luck.

The department was 23 miles in the way we had just come from. We watched the odometer. About five miles on the freeway, the rest was off. It wasn't a big town and we drove around until we found the Sheriff's department. As we walked up, prisoners yelled out of the second floor windows. They described, in amazing detail, the sexual acts they wanted to perform on Rory.

The cop at the desk ignored us for a while as he filled out paper work. He finished and impatiently asked what we wanted. Steve and Rory explained what happened, and that they wanted their licenses back.

The cop looked at us like it was our fault, then had the dispatcher return the cop to the station. We sat in the lobby, and looked through the "Wanted" stacks. That got old the second time through. Rory pointed out the box of donuts in the break room, and we laughed.

Occasionally cops would walk through to laugh at us freaks in the lobby. Then back to the break room for another donut, and cheap jokes at our expense. It was a two-way street, officer.

Rory and I had originally planned to dye our hair green or blue for the trip, but ended up chickening out at the thought of driving through the Deep South calling more attention to ourselves. Good thing, I guess. In the '80s and early '90s having funny colored hair meant trouble even in a city, let alone the rural South. In the late '90s even grade school kids had colored hair and took all the fun out of it.

We sat around the lobby being bored, whispering jokes about inbred Southerners.

What do you call a virgin in the South? A girl who could outrun her father and brothers.

A Southern boy called off his wedding and his father asked him why. "Well pa, I found out she was a virgin," he said. His pa said, "Well that's good son. If she hain't good enough fer her fambly, she hain't good enough fer ours."

Finally the cop showed up with their licenses. He apologized, and offered me two dollars gas money. I shook my head, "No that's okay. We don't need it."

He held out the two dollars and told me to take it. I thought he'd shoot me for reaching for his gun, but I took it. He apologized again for causing us any inconvenience. Said it was a misunderstanding and all his fault. We left.

The prisoner's hooted at Rory as I struggled to get the car started. The engine finally kicked over and we drove to the campground the cop told us to go to. The gate was locked. It was after 10:00 p.m. We kept driving.

New Orleans should have been an easy five hour drive from where we crossed into Louisiana at the Texas border. It took us eleven hours to get there. It was hot and humid as we slept in the car.

I hated New Orleans. It was Old Sac only with full nudity girlie bars. Bars advertising "Wild French Lesbian Orgies Every 90 Minutes" with pictures of scab covered women piled on the floor were funny at first, but got old fast. Voodoo shops on every corner were worse, and the local punks we met were snobs. The best thing about New Orleans was a bumper sticker that read "Say NO to drugs. Get high on the Rosary."

We blew the state and found a freeway rest stop that had fire ants in Mississippi. Steve and I had more fun flipping burning Sterno onto the mound, playing Viet Nam War Atrocities, than we had all day in New Orleans. Ten minutes of being stung by fire ants in Mississippi was funner than two days in Louisiana.

Rory took the bus home from my sister's house in Athens, Georgia a week later. She woke up knowing she'd have to leave or kill me before my childish antics gave her an aneurysm.

Battle of the California Melee X: 1974 Fiat 124 Abarth vs 1963 NSU Sport Prinz

The California Melee is billed as, "The original low buck classic sports car rally". You gotta figure, that if it's "low buck", I should be involved. When my main point is, "No tow truck involved for us!" you can guess there was some car trouble.

The California Melee X happened September 9, 10, and 11th, 2006.

All the pictures are pop-up, so click on them, and they'll get a bit bigger if you're interested.

The California Melee is roughly around a 1,000 mile road rally. I figured I'd take my NSU Sport Prinz (1963, 2 cylinders, 583 cc) on it, but there was some problems.

NSU used to have World Speed Records for cars and motorcycles. In the 1950s, they sold more motorcycles than everyone else. Yes, more than Harley Davidson, BMW, Norton, Triumph, and even the mighty Nessetti. Now no one now remembers who they are.

The NSU Sport Prinz had a body designed by Bertone, who designed lots of neat coachwork for Alfa, Fiat, Ferrari, Jaguar, Lancia, Lamborghini and Citroen. We won't mention that Bertone also designed the horrible Fiat X1/9 (that sort of Porsche 914 Pontiac Fiero kind of wedge).

I gave up on the NSU Sport Prinz with the smoke and the gearbox problems, and went down to ride with David Fuller in his Fiat Abarth 124 (like this one: Fiat 124 Abarth site).

Americans pick on Fiat, but hey, Fiat's highest paid employee is Michael Schumacher. Doesn't that count for something?

The Abarth was having gearbox problems, causing it to smoke, which is completely different than the NSU smoke and gearbox problems. And this Abarth involved David and I in a lovely conversation with SFPD on a lonely Pacific Coast Highway during a 1am test drive. David put in a straight cut gearbox and straight cut differential right before the Melee and we were testing driving to get the problems out. Two cop cars sped by, and the cop that pulled us over took off, so we got away without a ticket and even slept a few hours before the Melee started.

The start of the Melee X. Lots of neat cars, with lots of great pictures. Check out these links if you're inclined. I'm not good with a camera, so I'll link to people who are.

Craig's pics

Max pics

Steph's pics A lot from the Giulietta

Margaret-Ann's pics

hardtuned.com

Besides my usual favorites of old Brit convertibles, there was also this Alfa Giulietta which was my favorite car.

1964 Falcon Sprint

Lancia

MGB-GT

An MGB GT was almost my first car, as a hand me down from a sister. It got sold so I ended up with another sister's 1974 VW Thing. It was zebra striped and I drove it across the country with Steve Mar and Rory Hearse (which is a story with lots of crazy shenanigans involving stuff like working at whore house, telling a Southern Sheriff that I was scared of him because I'd seen "Deliverance", and "acting" in a low budget horror movie called "Disgusteen" that Ben Weasel of Screeching Weasel made). I promised to never own another air-cooled VW again.

I might change my mind and get one of those weird Type 34 Karmann Ghias sometime. I picked up a new hole for my head (it was cheap!), so that makes it alright to change my mind.

Here's the view from the Abarth as we left. That's Walter's Opel GT in front of us. I drove it about 150 miles from Roseville to San Jose so that Walter could get it running for the trip. The clutch was going out so I did it without shifting as much as I could. It's a neat little car.

Walter was one of my teammates in the 24 Hours of LeMons race that happened the first weekend of October. I'll wait for all the fancy pants magazines to write about that before I get around to it.

The Abarth's straight-cut gearbox crapped out about 35 miles into the Melee, so we limped it back to David's place in SF.

That's one of the things that I love about old cars and motorcycles. They break, but they rarely strand you. We could've done the Melee in the Abarth at about 50 mph but what's the point in that when you're in an honest to god rally car? It's got toggle switches! A start button! A switch to reverse polarity! (That kept Gort and Klingons away from us).

Limping the Abarth

We hopped in my indestructible '86 Toyota truck and drove to Sacramento and picked up my NSU and drove it to Red Bluff for the first hotel night. We weren't the last ones to show, but close. We took a different (much straighter route since the tie-rods are iffy) following Highway 99.

We arrived and the NSU piss marked its territory. German car + Italian body = English habits.

It broke down on the way up. Here's a cruising speed that happened a lot: Zero miles an hour at the side of the road.

On Highway 99, we shot out a plug holder on the freeway. Not the plug itself, but the rubber spark holder wouldn't stay on. We kept it in place with some of the same bailing wire that helped my Ducati make it around Australia, and made it to an auto parts store where we replaced the wires with something Japanese.

"Hey, we smell like we're roasting coffee beans"

"Yeah, that's different than the burning 90 weight gear oil from the Abarth or the usual weird smoke from the NSU".

We burned through a mouse nest in the heater pipe. A mouse shouldn't build a home near the exhaust. Unless the mouse bailed without leaving a note, it lived and died in an NSU Sport Prinz. Not a bad way of dying. Except the "Death By Heat" part.

There's the mouse nest. We blocked the hole with a coffee cup from the Melee coffee sponsor to keep the exhaust fumes out of the car. I can't remember the coffee sponsor name or I'd link to it and shout to high heaven. Okay, it's Farley's Coffee. I just checked in the Hagerty bag of Melee schwag. Hagerty Insurance is also a melee sponsor, but they wouldn't insure my NSU.

My reliable car -- the 86 Toyota truck -- is considered too old to be a daily driver. That's the truck I've driven cross country a couple times, and used it to tow my NSU back from Oregon. Blah. Well, that, plus the confusion that my wife lives in SF, and I'm in Sacramento, and that she has another old car -- a 64 Barracuda. Then my license being suspended from a seizure from a year and a half ago. It was too much for Hagerty. I didn't even tell them that my marriage was so I get medical insurance, and that my wife's boyfriend was at the wedding.

The ol' Ball and Chain.

Although since the Melee, my wife sold her house in San Francisco, sold her Barracuda, and moved to LA to be with her boyfriend. She bought a new VW, so maybe now Hagerty would insure me.

The valve cover gasket gave up the ghost close to Red Bluff and we used a quart of Synth 20-50 in about 20 or 30 miles. In a 2 cylinder car that holds 2 quarts of oil, that's a lot. We didn't know it was the valve cover gasket at the time, just A LOT more smoke after the normal smoke had ended. We were close so we just drove instead of pulling over.

We had quite a crowd when we pulled into the lot attracted by the freaky tiny car and the smoke screen. We were both surprised that no one doused us with a fire extinguisher.

I thought I took a picture of the Mini Bar but I didn't. It's a bar put on top of a Morris Mini. Or Austin Mini. Not a Wolseley Hornet or a Riley Elf or even a BMW Mini.

The next morning we tried to fix the NSU with a thin layer of Permatex to continue on the rally. We let it sit about an hour and drove about 6 blocks, and pulled over to check. It was still leaking badly so we bought bulk cork and made a new gasket cleaning out the Permatex. I know the dangers of Permatex. It doesn't mix well with oil galleys sometimes. It was a nice thin layer of Permatex, so no problem with that fix. Except for that it didn't work.

With the new gasket we went about 2 miles and pulled over to check. It was still smoking and the amount that had leaked out from the first valve gasket "fix" should've burned off.

The cork gasket needed to be compressed more and that's when we added the 2 quarts at once. After that most of the valve cover leak was over with.

We tried to leave Red Bluff at 9:15am. We actually left Red Bluff, plus our new gasket we cut ourselves in a parking lot, plus several more quarts of oil around 1:30pm.

We started heading for Ft Brag for the 2nd hotel night but there was some more problems. The main was with the exhaust so we limped it home to Sacramento and stopped by my brother in laws house. Robert's the guy who lathed 6 new bushing for the gear box the night before the Melee started and got all the gears to work. (For the NSU 2 cylinder folks, he said the square bushing at the end of the pushrod looked good so he didn't replace it. Might be why 3rd and 4th are working great, but 1st and 2nd are sometimes hard to find).

The carb gaskets were rough as we found out when we pulled the carb off to see why it was leaking fuel when starting. The accelerator pump is also leaking. The carb needs to be rebuilt but with no time, we made, and put on, new gaskets.

The exhaust manifold was missing the bolts on the bottom (or they rattled off) and the engine rattle finished off one of the gaskets.

Exhaust gasket material is hard to find. When did that happen? We had to wait until Tognotti's, the Sacramento Speed Shop opened up. We showed up early because auto shops always open early. Except this one. They open at 10am. We sat in their parking lot forever waiting for them to open. Letting fresh coffee stew in our insides. It was a fairly uncomfortable wait, but it made for a rush job grabbing exhaust gasket material. A nearby Target bathroom had to pay the price.

We mostly took backroads through Davis and Woodland to catch up with the Melee on the last day. Monday is the "limp home" day and we hoped to hit Highway 1 for the final drive. We hoped on Highway 121 outisde of Davis, and pulled over at the dam at Lake Berryessa to check the oil. That was it for the NSU. Spark, fuel and air but no go. We replaced the plugs and no go. Tried to push start it. No go. It caught fire after one back-fire. It's always funny when your car catches on fire.

I had a '64 Ranchero that did that once to me in high school. A fuel hose popped off and started a fire under the truck while I sat at a light. People drove by pointing and laughing. This was the mid-1980s and people often pointed to laugh at punk rockers. Or pull over to start a fight.

But this time they weren't pointing at me specifically. It took a while for me to open the door and look under the truck to see what they were pointing at. Oh, just these flames on the road under the engine. I pushed the truck backwards with my foot and everything was fine.

At Lake Berryessa

Finally, after 90 minutes, we decided we'd roll down the hill from the dam to the nearby gas station and hope they'd have Starter Fluid. I popped the clutch at about 20 miles per hour, the NSU started, so we drove back to Sacramento without stopping.

NO TOW TRUCK INVOLVED!!!

This was an amazing 4 days.

Our guess is ring/valve leak + stock low compression (7.6:1) + air leak at accelerator pump lowered the compression to the point where we couldn't get it started. I'm not sure yet. I'm letting it sit for a bit.

The Melee wouldn't be as much fun in an old reliable car. I wouldn't learn anything that way. I think we did great by never having to have it towed. Plus, and this I love, it finally, broke in a way that wasn't something I could figure out and fix. This part is goofy and all, but when I get it started again, I'll have learned something new.

No inconvenience for me at all. I'm not sure about David. He would have won a prize at the end of Melee dinner, but he didn't show and you have to be present to win. He went home to visit his wife. She gets car sick, so she stays out of stuff like this. It's got to suck being married to a gearhead when you get carsick.

David sent me this in an email:

"As Professor Farnsworth would say, "good news, everyone!" I've figured out the cause of the vibration, at least I think I have. I've convinced myself I must be right... The gearbox should be okay; turns out I forgot a small metal spacer that slips on the end of the output shaft. It's sort of like a small thick donut about the diameter of a quarter. It acts as a bushing and goes inside the end of the drive shaft, right where the drive shaft and output shaft are joined at the big black rubber flex joint. The metal part is sometimes called a "centering ring," because that's exactly what it does: it acts as a bushing and centers the drive shaft yoke so that it's exactly inline with the output shaft. Without it, the flex joint, well, flexes too much and throws the whole thing out of line at higher speeds. That's why I could rev it up to redline in 1st and 2nd, pretty high in 3rd, and not very high in 4th. The driveshaft would only be spinning fast enough to distort the flex joint above a certain road speed.

"I was looking through my parts manual at the whole driveshaft and realized, hmm, that part is still sitting on my oily towel with the old transmission parts. Gee, do you suppose Fiat put it on for a reason? As soon as my new plastic shifter bearing arrives, I'll test it out. Hopefully it will all be sorted out in time for the Alameda car show next month. Maybe I can also fit the triangular windows by then, too."

I won my first trophy for even attempting it in an NSU 2 cylinder.

The "2006 California Melee Willy Makit Memorial Trophy".

We spent about $30 on fuel and about $30 on oil. 5 or 6 quarts, and Synthetic is almost $6/quart.

--Dave Smith and David Fuller (and Robert Ives -- NSU mechanic when
forced at gunpoint).

Hey, what is that?

- It's an NSU.

Who makes it?

- NSU.

Okay, who makes it?

- NSU.

becomes after a while:

Hey, what is that?

- An NSU

Who makes it?

- NSU. It's the name Ferrari used for their luxury models.

or:

- This 2-stroke (it's a 4-stroke, but it was smoking a lot, but not out of the pipes) 1963 car gets 132 miles per gallon. Oil companies bought up the company and shut it down. They're very rare, as I'm sure you know.

sometimes even the truth:

--NSU, or Neckarsulmer Strickmaschinenfabrik (I'm sure it was badly pronounced by the way) which is how you probably remember it, went under developing the Wankel rotary and were bought up by Audi VW in the late 1960s.

Hey ma, I'm in Hollywood

People have been asking, and I don't have a good reason, but yes, I was at The Oscars last Sunday.

Yet another long post, so skim it.

I should start up another blog instead of this one. This one is meant for motorcycle travel, but that hasn't been happening for a while. That might change. I'm getting a 650 twin with a sidecar, and I still have my Ducati 350 in my living room. It's slowly being cafed.

My sister Gina explained my life to a friend of hers who thought I must live an exciting life. Gina basically said, "He doesn't do much most of the time but when he's doing something, it's usually weird". If I were to start up a blog about my day it'd read:

Went to work and took CDs out of a box to put them in another box.
Came home and read (or watched a movie).

After about 100 posts like that, it'd read, "Punched out in a bar in Portsmouth, Ohio" or "Built a catapult and launched frozen chickens at the train". Or, in this case, "went to the Oscars".

Since that would be a boring blog, I haven't started another one.

I made plans to see "The Worlds Fastest Indian" at a special showing in San Luis Obispo last Saturday (March 4). I figured I'd find a girl to take. A 9:30 am motorcycle movie that's 4 and a half hours away! Isn't that every girl's plan? And since it isn't, I went to Monterey the night before, slept at my friend Skipper's place and took him.

In case you don't know, "The Worlds Fastest Indian" is a movie about the life of Burt Monroe. Burt Monro bought a 1920 Indian Scout and after 40 plus years he broke 200mph on it when he was 67 years old. The 200+ wasn't officially recorded at Bonneville but his highest recorded was 188mph. Equally crazy speeds on a Velocette single with a Vincent head: 141mph on a 500 single.

When I was in New Zealand, I went to a BEARs bike race and saw 2 replicas of his Indian at the race. I also went to his old house (torn down) in Invercargill and talked to the "new" tenants. They bought the lot from him, tore down his shed and threw away all the motorcycle parts that were left. I also went to the hardware store where his Indian and Velocette are kept.

An email post said that the SLO showing of the movie would have his Indian. I called bullshit on that to one of the promoters (along with several other emails he must've gotten from other people who knew better). It was Burt's windstreamer and the frame he left in the US. He took the engine back to NZ between trips to Bonneville and had another frame there. I didn't think Burt's friend in Invercargill would sell the bike to a US collector.

Marty Dickerson was at the showing. Marty Dickerson, is also a nut. He set speed records on his Vincent HRD Rapide during the 1950s at Bonneville. There was a character in the movie that was supposed to be him. That's got to be weird seeing someone who's supposed to be you in a movie. Marty, I use his first name as if I know him which I don't, showed slides and talked about knowing and helping Burt out at Bonneville.

He had a great slide of him impersonating a famous Rollie Free trick (Rollie also stole the idea). This is a photo of Rollie wearing swim trunks at Bonneville while breaking a speed record. He topped 150mph like this:

The picture Marty had was in the same pose, only Marty was wearing leathers. The wind shoved up the ass of his pants into a point. With a little duct tape holding his pants down he could've gone a little faster.

What does this have to do with the Oscars? Well, the girl I tried to talk into going to the movie with me is Jen. She's someone I lost contact with about 10 years ago and she found me on myspace a few weeks ago. Luckily, no one else uses the name "Dave Smith" so I'm easy to find.

I figured while I was in SLO, it's close to Hollywood where Jen lives. I figured I'd sleep on her couch and see the comic art exhibit that was playing in a couple of LA museums. One showed comics from 1900 to the early 1950s and the other one showed comics from 1950s to now.

Jen had an invite for the Oscars, and for no good reason, Jen invited me.

Jen has a $4.99 dress from a thrift store, and we stop by the same thrift store so I can buy a pair of $2.99 shoes. Most of my stuff is still in storage -- including my shoes. I meant to bring my motorcycle boots since they're black, but I left them at home.

We met with her workmates, who are suckers who think I'm 28 at the oldest and probably younger than that. I'll be 36 next week. Everything over 30 is the bonus level. Even if I die tomorrow, I cheated death for 6 years. My secret of eternal youth was staying intoxicated from 22 to 31, so you kids out there had better crack open some beers.

I've got no interest in film stars, except for isolated people like Terri Garr, Mr. T and ones like Timothy Carey who's dead, so I didn't expect to see him.

I don't even watch the Oscars on tv. I think most Hollywood movies suck. It wasn't as awe-inspiring as meeting Joey Ramone and having him say, "Pleased to meet you". Even though "Pleased to meet you" is more of a Replacements thing to say. I told that to Old Man Foster who said, "I don't care about meeting famous musicians. It's meeting comic book artists that makes me nervous".

So Jen and I drive up and the LAPD has all the streets blocked off. People took our pictures as we drove by. The don't know who's picture they're taking -- you're at the Oscars so you must be somebody. Must've been a disappointment.

We show up when William H Macy showed up. Only he was in a limo and we were in Jen's Suzuki car. They separate The Celebrities from the jerks when you walk in. There's a red rope on the red carpet for The Arrivals. Celebrities on the left, jerks on the right.

There's security about every 5 feet saying, "Keep moving jerks, you're creating a bottleneck". Everyone is walking as slow as possible so they can be in the background shots of celebrity photos.

You end up like this.

Then I thought about how dumb it was for me to be there, and I started laughing at myself. I laugh at myself most of the time.

It had never occured to me to see the Oscars. I just thought the whole thing was funny. Inside I bought a $10 whiskey sour that had no booze in it. I think it's made like that so Gary Busey doesn't get likkered up and start a fight. I have a dream that one day they'll make a buddy picture of Gary Busey and Nick Nolte where they fight over Margot Kidder.

Celebrities I saw:

William H Macy who kept following Jen and I around. We'd go upstairs and a few minutes later, he'd be upstairs. We'd go downstairs and 5 minutes later, there he is again. He was often with his wife Felicity or walking around with some kid. Jen said the kid was Terrence Howard's son. Before I could say "who?" she said, "he's the guy from 'Hustle and Flow' and 'Crash'".

"Crash" was pretty good. The only person in the movie who didn't do both good and bad things was the locksmith. You can always count on a locksmith to do only the right things.

"Hustle and Flow" is a Disney picture under the MTV banner. There's a hooker with a heart of gold. She sucks off guys for $10 and then her gold plated heart shows up when she sucks off a guy for a $250 microphone. That one was crossing the hooker line and she said "never again". I kept waiting for the punchline, and I kept laughing at the dialogue, but there's no punchline and it's not a comedy. Not an intentional comedy.

So who else did I see? I had to ask Jen who some of these people are and she's have to keep naming movies until there was one I'd seen. Tim Burton and his wife Helena Bonham Carter. Mickey Rooney. Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. Matt Dillon (who looked like a jerk). Joaquin Phoenix (who also looked like a jerk). Will Smith, who was on the jerk side of the line going out of his way to sign autographs. So in my completely uninformed mind, Will Smith is a nice guy.

The director of the penguin movie (kind of a boring movie, but the "making of" wasn't so bad, but I still switched the DVD to play the Bug Bunny cartoon. It's an early Chuck Jones cartoon before he got a chance to ruin the Warner Bros characters. I don't like how Jones made Bugs Bunny snotty, and Daffy Duck conniving. I liked 'em better when they were both nuts and Daffy was completely batshit insane. But Chuck Jones was pretty funny -- you should read his autobiography sometime). Paul Giamatti who played Harvey Pekar in "American Splendor" (another comic book movie that I really liked). Philip Seymour Hoffman who's great in Happiness. Heath Ledger. I haven't seen any movies that he's in. Salma Hayek. Damn, I don't know who else. Saw some people early on with some Oscars. I didn't recognize who they were (writers?) but that doesn't mean much.

Mostly I just saw some of the worst cleavage I'd ever seen. I was relating it to "a titty bar in Gary, Indiana" but since I haven't been to a titty bar in Gary, Indiana, I'm just talking out my ass.

If you Tivo the Oscars this week on E! you should look in the background during The Arrival part. You'll see me laughing at myself behind Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock.

I sat in my seat for about 20 minutes, but mostly Jen and I walked around. We ditched out early while the Oscars were still being handed out to get a pizza. Jen had "Crash" on DVD so that's when I saw it.

I'm going to put my $2.99 Oscar shoes, along with my Oscar program up on ebay. Hopefully I'll do that tomorrow. Maybe I can pay off the $30.00 in parking it cost for the comic art museum parking. I really wish I would've noticed the sign that said the parking garage was $3.30 for every 12 minutes.

Moonshine & Purple Ducatis

Old folks, moonshine, hillbillies, tombstones, cheap beer, punk rockers, purple Ducatis, monkeys but no danged banjos. Maybe I should talk about Perth instead.

I ditched out of my busy work schedule a few weeks ago after I got a 1972 Ducati 350cc single off of eBay. It was out in Wisconsin, so I figured I'd drive out there in my beat to hell '86 Toyota truck. The 22R motor is the slant six of 4 cylinders if you're wondering.

My "busy work schedule" is mostly me thinking, I should get off my lazy ass and find a couple of full-time jobs to work. Two days a week at a music warehouse and random construction work is nice. Maybe I could get a job at Folsom Prison. That'd fit nicely into my sarcastic job history. "Well, you see, after I was farming monkeys, I worked at Folsom Prison shooting men from Reno who were there for shooting men from Reno.

Which is to say, I was just trying to bid up the price of the Ducati since it was so cheap but ended getting it for $885. Probably because it's purple.

The purple won't last long. Especially because it's the colors off the Sacramento Kings basketball team. Oh, and the Monarchs, I think. I'm going to strip it apart, clean off the freshly painted purple, and ask my brother in law to paint it. I might as well bring it into the living room for that. My new roommates haven't seen any Italian motorcycles inside. Yet. Although if there's a bike in the living room, it'll be hard to complain about my roommate's cat puking on the floor.

I'm pretty sure my living room is meant for bikes. Right before I left for Australia there was a Ducati square Sebring and a Moto Guzzi 125cc single.

So, I drove out to Denver, picked up a narrowcase frame for Jim Franzen. Jim's site is mostly down right now but it should be up and running again soon.

I'll link to him since for some reason, my site ranks high on google. There's hardly any shit talking about Phil Hitchcock's Ducati work, but I still rank high on google. Once again, just like the Aussies know, buy parts from him, even though you have to return them half the time. Just don't let him work on anything.

Since I turned down the biker who offered to kick Phil's ass, I reckon karma will catch up with him. He'll probably have a heart attack and die quietly in his sleep when he's 96. That'll show him!

Here's some pictures of my bike at Bob Brown's shop. The crankshaft & piston had some problems. Tony Hanagan, another fine kook, took some pictures of the wreckage. I've gotten some crap about letting Bob Brown and Ian Gowanloch fix my bike for free when Phil Hitchcock should be footing the bill. I've offered Bob & Ian both money but they both said fuck off.

All I can do is plug their work, unless anyone has any suggestions. It'd be worth it to send an engine to Bob from the US for work. Better than the wait at Syd's Cycles and Syd didn't come up with the 4 valve head for the Ducati twin.

Bob Brown at Melbourne Desmo Centre. 9372 2113
62 Stubbs, Kensington, Melbourne

Ian Gowanloch's eBay and his old shop that he still works at (besides being a dad, farming, running a winery, and raising cattle).

I emailed a friend in Milwaukee who posts under Rumblelizard and asked if I could crash on her couch. She says sure, but she's got a big house and I could sleep in the guest room. I forget that outside of California houses are affordable.

She paid $94,000 for a 2 story, finished basement, house with a garage and a backyard in Milwaukee. In Sacramento, that'd be $450,000. At least when I compared it to the house next to my sister. I don't know if the Sacramento house has a basement though.

Rumblelizard went with me to pick up the bike. TJ, the guy who sold it, has a friggin ton of nifty Brit Bikes. Which only reminds me that I need to get one with a sidecar. Or find a lightweight sidecar for the Duc 350 and deal with it. If you've read the stuff I've written, I'm not in any speed race and a small bike with a sidecar would be fine by me. Like I've said a brazilian times, I'm an idiot. If you don't get the "brazilian" joke, look up Bush and brazilian.

After Milwaukee, I made my way to Chicago to check on Misha's monkeys. All are doing fine, if you're wondering.

Which of course, led me to Southern Ohio and Kentucky to check on Pop and his girlfriend. Pop is my grandfather who's turning 90 on November 5. He's been shacked up with Ruth -- a much younger lady (she's 87!). Pop is a cradle robber.

Pop has some sort of black spot a growin' in his lungs. The doc started to explain the lengthy methods on how to check it, and Pop basically said, "I'm almost 90, the hell with it". Where does my orneryness come from?

Pop got the local mortuary guy to take us out past Flat Hollow (pronounced "holler") Kentucky and out to Cousin Ernie's farm. I asked my dad who we were related to out there and he said "everybody". I thought he was kidding, but nope, all hillbillies are related. Everyone we'd see, Pop would say, "Oh, so you're Jed Damron. Your dad is Fred ain't he?" Jed would say, "My dad is Richard, Fred's my grandfather" and Pop says something like, "Fred's married to my 2nd cousin Billy".

That worked with 90% of the people we'd meet. Pop is talkative and he'd figure out how related everyone is.

Cousin Ernie doesn't talk much, and most of what he says is "yup" and "nope" with a nice Kentucky drawl. Ernie has the family graveyard because out there, you plant your relatives on your land.

Pop wants to get planted between his parents and his sister. We're supposed to wait for him to croak, then mix his ashes with my Granny's ashes and stuff 'em in a hole in the ground.

Pop had the mortuary guy stick Pop & Joy's gravestone in the yard.

I wish I had a videocamera with me but some Kiwi swiped my cameras 4 hours before I left Auckland for Tokyo. I asked Pop how come he didn't dig his own hole and Ernie said we could just shove him in. Hopefully, when I get around to digging my own grave, I can make fun of death like Pop.

I figured I'd find some moonshine, but no luck. If anyone is reading this from the Portsmouth area and knows where I can find some moonshine, let me know. I have some of the store bought Georgia Moon Corn Whiskey (tm) that's going out to some Aussies and Kiwis who really helped me out on my trip.

Better plug them too:

Bob & Jenn Dumma. Hopefully they'll share it with Romeo (who has a green frame Ducati he bought new). Nothing like corn likker to wash back good Scotch with. They'll also get some US Coca Cola so Brock, their son, can add it to his Coke collection.

Ian & Col McPhee (since Perth Tony doesn't drink, I'll send something else along for him & his kids), Ian & Georgia Gowanloch, Bob Brown, Mark Plummer and the kiwis Brendan Kelly & Dave Lockhead are also getting some. Hopefully Bob will poison Tony Hanagan with it. I probably shouldn't torture friendly people with corn whiskey.

I should send them Pabst Blue Ribbon which is going to Pat Hawke. Pat, his wife and his kids were friendly and put me up. They mostly put up with me but Pat thought I was picking on him and wrote some kooky comment about it. So, I'll send him Pabst. America's finest canoe beer.

Canoe beer, you ask? Why is American beer like having sex in a canoe? It's fucking close to water.

And finally, speaking of Drunken Monkeys, here's a link that Doug sent me.

I'm off to Kentucky later today, and next weekend up to Oregon. I need to pick up the NSU Sport Prinz I bought and possibly deliver a Fuji Scooter. Oh, and Doug has set aside a BSA basketcase for Skip. Hey Doug, did I tell you Skip said he'd make a site for you?

I tried several times to volunteer for New Orleans but the local Red Cross didn't (doesn't?) have their shit together. Frustrating.

I did read that a lot of the Horrors of the Superdome (see my last entry), were overinflated. People always need to give a story even when they don't know nuthin'.

And for the guy who thought I was personally calling him an asshole with the fascist asshole rant. I didn't write the rant. "Fascist" seems like a high school term. I probably would've written "doody head" instead.

New Orleans

This is largely swiped from Rumblelizard's blog. It's long but well worth a read.

Based on comments that weren't posted, these are all documented with reports on BBC, clips from Fox News (Geraldo crying), the FAQ on Red Cross about how they're not allowed in, The US Army Times, The Washington Post, the AP and other reputable new sites (not saying the Fox is all that reputable).

Southeast America is a friggin mess. The stories are out there, but
they're hard to find.

Photo taken by Lisa Jenkins that I found. It's posted by CraftJunkie on her site. Right where she says Tetnus shots are currently $280 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

HOLY FUCKING SHIT.

First off, apparently, THE RED CROSS HAS BEEN FORBIDDEN TO ENTER NEW ORLEANS AND IS STILL NOT ABLE TO ENTER NEW ORLEANS. Click the link and it takes you to the Red Cross FAQ where they explain how the Homeland Security Department still won't allow them in. Bringing food and water will only encourage people to stay when they aren't allowed to leave.

From Steve Rose, a diarist on The Daily Kos:

...[A]fter reading dKos and the other blogs all week and seeing over and over again comments that that FEMA and the NG were no where to be seen from the people on the ground in NO, I was wondering where the Red Cross was in all this. They were never mentioned. It was like they didn't exist. And, after yesterday's drama at the convention center, the Brown and Chertoff lies, the Red Cross was still MIA. Then, earlier today, I saw a note that the Red Cross was not allowed to enter NO. Hmm, that's doesn't make sense. This simmered for a couple hours.

So I called the Red Cross and asked them if its true....

And, to my surprise, the nice lady answering the phone said it was true and they told/asked/ordered not to enter NO. [snip] Homeland Security (her term, not mine) told the Red Cross DO NOT enter New Orleans and says this still now.

And why, you may ask? Not Security. Not worker safety. Not lack of access. It was because people would be drawn to the Red Cross food and they wouldn't want to go to be evacuated.

So I asked: "The people starving and dying at the convention center yesterday couldn't get Red Cross food and water because they would be drawn to the food at the convention center, where they were, and not want to be evacuated from the convention center where no evacuations were going on or planned and all the while they are dying?" (Actually, it was a couple questions.) She went back into her spiel about all of the other good work they were doing. When I asked again, she said yes, that was true. She seem relieved to admit it.

[snip]

So, the question for Bushies, why was the Red Cross banned from NO when they knew people were starving? Could it be they were saving the convention center rescue until Bush's visit today? It certainly seems like it. Doesn't it?

Red Cross National Affairs number (202-303-5551)

So then another Daily Kos diarist called the Department of Homeland Security to see if they would confirm the Red Cross story, and well, here's what happened:

I just called the Dept. of Homeland security (202-282-8000) and asked them the following question:

"Is it true what the American Red Cross has reported that they have not been allowed into the city of New Orleans by the DHS since Hurricane Katrina because their 'presence would keep people from evacuating'"?

First, they put me on hold. Then I heard 2 beeps and the click that I assume means they were recording me. Then they asked me my name. (I told them, but now I sort of regret it...) Then they transferred me to Chris at the "Law Enforcement Fusion Desk". I read my question again.

Note: This isn't a verbatim transcript -- I'm paraphrasing. I wasn't smart enough to record the call. But I just called them and this is what happened to the best of my recollection.

He said he hadn't heard this, so I pointed him to the Red Cross FAQ page link that was posted on this diary. I directed his attention to the second bullet.

He said something to the effect that their policy is trying to help get people out and that this is why they don't want more people coming in.

I said I understood that, but that it didn't make sense to let people starve or die of thirst in the meantime.

He responded that this wasn't happening. That as soon as they pick somebody up, they take them out of there.

I argued with him and told him this wasn't true, that it had been on CNN that people had been being picked up and put down at the convention center where there was no food or water.

He said that all he could tell me was that they were picking people up and taking them out of there.... that their policy was to help the people.

Then I asked who at the DHS was responsible for the policy that kept the Red Cross out.

He said that would have to be Michael Chertoff.

I asked him for his own name and position again and then asked if I could make this public that the DHS was confirming what was on the Red Cross website.

Silence.

After a few seconds I asked if he was there and he said "yeah," and then nothing else.

So I asked my question again and he said "No".

Silence.

I asked why he had said no to me, and rather than answer me, he asked me what I wanted to do with the information.

I said I wanted to email it to my friends and put it on a blog. I think I heard him scoff at this, but I'm not sure.

I asked him again why I couldn't disseminate it and he said he didn't know who I was. Then he asked me directly who I was and why I wanted to know.

I told him that I was a citizen and I wanted to know because I actually gave a fuck about the people of New Orleans. (I was pissed by now because he was patronizing me and he had already lied to me.)

He said they did too.

I said something like "so you won't confirm what the American Red Cross is reporting then?", to which he said something like "no". (It was short.)

I asked why not and he asked me why I wanted to post it.

At this point I lost my temper and went on a little tirade. I said (something like) "because it's a stupid fucking policy! And people have died because of it. And if Michael Chertoff is responsible, people should be made aware of that. And if you and he think it's a good policy, you should be willing to stand by it and take responsibility for it!" (There was more swearing in there too, but I can't remember exactly what now. I was very pissed. At this point in the conversation, my wife, who was in the room, about fell out of her chair and started motioning to me to shut up.)

After a few seconds of silence, I asked again, so you can't confirm this?

And he said "no".

So I asked who at DHS could.

He told me to call back and talk to the public affairs office on the same number (202-282-8000, although they transferred me to him, so I don't know if that's really his number), but that they wouldn't be back until Tuesday. [NOTE FROM RUMBLELIZARD: THEY ARE TAKING VACATION?!?! NOW?!!? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?!?!]

I am so pissed right now. If Chertoff really did order this, his head should be served up (Cajun style) on a platter to the mayor of New Orleans.

P.S. When I hung up the phone, the first thing my wife said to me was, "Great. Now you'll be drafted for sure!"

People, this is beyond the wildest fucking fever dreams of the most insane lunatic.

But wait! There's more!

Check out the video (scroll down to the heading "Horror Show") of Fox news reporters Shepard Smith and Geraldo Rivera on the scene in NO, literally crying with rage. And when Sean Hannity tried to spin his usual shit and say, "Let's get this in [the proper partisan] perspective," Shepard Smith shouts, "This is perspective! This is all the perspective you'll ever need!"

Holy fuck. This is an apocalypse.

You know what else people are reporting now? FEMA was keeping volunteer rescue workers out of NO until Bush's Parade of Pity could arrive. To make it look better. For the cameras.

The worst natural disaster in the history of this nation, thousands dead; staggering, hideous, criminal mismanagement; hundreds more dying every day, babies and old folks dying; anarchy in the streets; shootings, rapes, robberies, dehydration and starvation....and for George W. Bush, it's a fucking photo op.

This is info from me, Dave.

The BBC reports the US Army shot a man to death who was trying to report a rape in the Superdome. The lady was also stabbed, and I think that's the case where other people in the Superdome beat the rapist to death.

The US Army Times is also calling the people trapped in NO "insurgents". Insurgents? Christ. That's almost as bad as the pictures that show black people "looting" while white people are "finding".

They're also guarding the bridge that leads out of the Superdome that goes to a nearby city with electricity. Armed guards won't allow people to cross the bridge to safety. That one made Geraldo Rivera cry on Fox news.

Bush and Cheney stayed on vacation and Condi Rice WENT on vacation afterwards.

Northern Command who actually moves the military in the US was ready and waiting but they have to wait for the order from the president. Who happened to be on vacation.

Quote from Admiral Timothy J. Keating. He is commander of U.S. Northern Command:

As soon as the hurricane cleared -- and, by the way, we were preparing deployment orders as we saw Katrina strengthen on the late Saturday, Sunday, June 28, August time frame as she began to approach Louisiana, Mississippi. We alerted various forces to be prepared to move as soon as the situation on the ground stabilized and as soon as the Department of Homeland Security, through FEMA, determined what particular assets we would need.

Keating quote is from CNN.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Illinois) said he'd like to New Orleans bulldozed instead of rebuilt. Ex-Pres Clinton responded if they been in the same place when the remarks were made, "I'm afraid I would have assaulted him."

Associated Press reports that at least five people shot dead by police as they walked across a New Orleans bridge yesterday were contractors working for the US Defence department.

A spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers said the victims were contractors on their way to repair a canal. The contractors were on their way across the bridge to launch barges into Lake Pontchartrain, in an operation to fix the 17th Street Canal, according to the spokesman.

I'm also seeing reports that say the contractors weren't killed, but criminals shooting at the contractors were killed.

The gunmen were firing at 14 contractors who were traveling across the Danziger Bridge under police escort, said John Hall, a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers.

And more info pointed out by the Aussies: The Navy announced yesterday that Vice President Cheney's former company, Halliburton, which has handled much of the repair work as well as support services for the U.S. military in Iraq, was hired to restore power and rebuild three naval facilities in Mississippi that were wrecked by Katrina.

And here's a bit that showed up on Beveltechs, a mostly Australian Ducati list I'm on:

Don't Argue the Obvious

It's taken me a long time to figure out what fascists instinctively know: Don't argue, just attack. Don't debate, just slander and insult your opponents, flatter those who agree with you, and posture as moral or powerful.

But just as fascists instinctively know how to be assholes, many people instinctively know how to be kind and reasonable. So when you're arguing the obvious, appeal to people's empathetic instinct.

For instance, conservative intellectuals will pull out all sorts of crazy arguments as to why rich people are inherently good and poor people deserve to starve, but you don't even have to argue against them.

This is how you respond:
I don't have to argue with you. All good people instinctively know that it is wrong to be rich while other people starve. If you're arguing against that, it's because you're an asshole. There is something wrong with you. It doesn't matter what fancy words you use to support your position, because if you were a decent person you wouldn't even need to argue.

Now the problem is, in most arenas it's not acceptable to call someone an asshole. And that's a problem, because it makes assholes a protected species. It gives them an advantage. Calling an asshole an asshole is not a crime -- being an asshole is the crime.

American Red Cross donation page.

Just stalling...

Okay, real posts will be happening soon.

I've got a post about going to Buena Vista, Colorado, for the Horizons Unlimited meet. It's overlander motorcyclists. And I'll post some more stuff about last Christmas in Perth. But that'll be in a few days.

Just a bit of a delay. I almost bit the end of my tongue off a couple days ago when I had a seizure.
It's pretty good having a swollen, black & blue, tongue and the steady diet of soup should help me lose some of my blubber. So yeah, while I'm feeling a bit under the weather, I'll get my computer and DSL hooked up, so I can start up with Perth.

We've found four or five bottles of pee in the cabinets that the subrenters left behind. They trashed the apartment, too. It's always a good time. I'll be heading to Belize and Mexico in October, so new travel stories should be popping up. Plus, there's an abandoned railroad project I'm looking into so I might travel up the tracks.

Seizure later,

--Dave

New Number: 916/447-4168

Fell off the Earth...

but I'm back.

Sorry, once in a while, I fall off the Earth.

This one was good because Chris, the guy I subrented my apartment to, said, "I like this place, so I'm not moving" and took my name off the lease. No big deal, but he had a guy with a neckbeard move in who said, "I'll be out in October, so cool your jets -- you can move in then". Which would've been okay, but he wears Richard Simmons shorts (non-sarcastically) and he's apparently not-gay.

I like Chris, and was amused at his weasel behavior, so no hard feelings. They blew me off ("Hello, I'd like my apartment back!") until I said I'd take them to court. It's a pretty good apartment and it's been in the "Smith" name for 10 years. In the Great California Legal Process, Chris and Neckbeard would have to pay my court fees for the honor of losing the case (the rent has always been paid out of my account). I was only going to stiff Neckbeard with that because of his Amish Beard what-all. I'll celebrate getting my apartment back by having a party which you're all invited to. Hopefully, Chris will show up to play banjo. It'll be in about a month. So, I'll say mid-July and I'll post about it later.

Beginning of July, I go camping in Poinsetta, my favorite ghost town in Nevada, and hopefully, I'll ride out to Colorado for a Horizons Unlimited meeting. HU is an overland motorcycle site that's amazingly helpful. I might tag along on the dirtroad route from California to Colorado on my street SR500 because I'm an idiot who had to ride a street bike on dirt in Australia. I blew it by not getting off my ass to make it to mid-America for the motorcycle meeting, and I still need to go to Oregon for a coupla-three weeks working for Doug and his friends. Maybe if I'd done that, I could've bought an old Brit dirt-bike from Doug and ridden that to Colorado.

So I didn't have enough money to buy a pre-1971 bike, which means no Moto Melee for me this year. All I've got is a '79 Yamaha SR500 that needs work, and that there '65 Ducati which is hiding from me in Australia.

Speaking of the Ducati, it's being beaten to death by Bob Brown: Super Genius. He said he'd throw it in the bay, but Bob has a cruel sense of humor and I'm scared he's going to make it run again. So what's next?

I need to ride it to Italy. I want to show up to the Ducati factory and complain that my tank is chipped. I don't think I'll have money to continue rtw until 2006 or mid-2007 (12-18 months) and I need to make it to Isle of Man. I might meet up Doug Lee and Matt Bishop from the South Island, New Zealand to ride up from Argentina heading north to Alaska. They have real bikes, Honda XR400s, so they'd get bored with my slow wandering, but I might show up for part of that.

I went deer hunting with Doug and Matt, but a meth addict in Auckland stole my camera with the pictures from that. I'm also hoping to sell enough plasma to afford riding with Ted Simon in Turkey. Not likely, and if not, hopefully I'll find an old Brit Bike with a sidecar and tag along with Samueljohn for a bit. Of course, I've got the SR500 for that.

So a long way of saying, I'm broke and I don't know what's next. No matter. I've got rent money, I paid a zillion dollars in overdue taxes, and I'll wander around this summer. Tim White gave me a great job where I can leave for random amounts of time. If only it was possible to easily put a sidecar on an oil-in-frame SR500. The ride on the sidecar at Peter Jackson's hanger really makes me want one. Thanks again, Mike Tripae for that ride!

I'll really try to start up with my Perth Adventures on my next post.

Sacramento: City of a Beer!

It's like a dream. It doesn't feel like I've left, only I'm not late for one of the jobs I had: Programmer and Monkey's Butler (feeding monkeys and hosing monkey shit at UC Davis).

Cursed, like I often have been, Marletta picked me up at the San Francisco airport (SFO). She bought a car from Dawna, an ex-girlfriend of mine (1966 Dodge Dart GT), which smoked and died on the freeway. It took hours to drive 100 miles back from SFO. It's still running (hard to kill a slant six) but barely. That car has been haunting me for years.

I'm in debt and homeless, but years of playing in a punk rock band has taught me only one thing -- find a girlfriend and move in. So I'm staying at Marletta's place and trying to figure out what to do.

I can try to see if Doug in Oregon is still willing to hire me. Or I can live at Marletta's place. Or I could find another apartment. If I move to Oregon, should Marletta come with me? If so, how long before Marletta kills me? It's a confusing world.

I don't want to be a programmer any more, so I've been kicking around the idea of going back to the Monkey Job. Or I might get a job with autistic kids. Or I could sell plasma and recycle cans.

Anyhoo, I'm at Charlene's place now begging for alcohol and using her computer while she's not looking.

Call up Marletta's phone and say "You suck, Dave Smith!" 916/470-5506.
More stuff is coming soon. I'll finally catch up. I know I quit posting just outside of Perth and I'll start from there. Just 6 months late.