Father's Day (2007)


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Father's Day (2007)
"Couldn't you just get a Blonde, instead?"

Sunday 17th June 2007

Great Story, Great Gift.

I have had a few people complain that I haven't written anything in quite a while. Disappointingly, but understandably, not a lot of people have complained. I'm always looking for a good story. I'm still traveling a lot, but how many times can you write about your flight getting canceled? On a seemingly unrelated subject Cheryl and the kids were asking me, "What do you want for Father's Day?" I'd tell them, "A motorcycle." They'd laugh. The more I think about it the more I thought, "If I'm going to buy a new motorcycle, and I am going to, wouldn't it be a much better story if I got it for Father's day." The kids would be able to say, "We got our dad a motorcycle." Matthew should be really happy about it. He would be able to ride it with me, and when he becomes a dad he can turn to his kids and say, "We got my dad a motorcycle for Father's day. What are you getting me?"

History

I like to think of myself as a motorcyclist, which is kind of hard if you don't own a motorcycle. I have owned bikes. I started riding on my brother's bike in 1974. I bought my first bike 32 years ago, a beat up used 750 cc Yamaha. I had to sell it when we moved to Germany. I bought a Kawasaki when we moved back to the States. It was my only method of transportation, rain, shine and even during the infrequent ice storm I rode that bike to the Tactics Department. I remember dumping it on an ice covered intersection one cold Georgia morning. I was more embarrassed by the looks of the poor people in their cars wondering what the heck I was doing riding a bike in an ice storm then I was that I dumped the bike. I rode the bike, because it was Georgia so the ice wasn't going to last. The ride home would be in the fifties. I also rode it because we owned a car and a bike and Cheryl wasn't going to ride the bike to her classes or her job.
1986 USA Ride

I reenlisted and with the bonus I was able to sell the "Cow" with its leaky head gasket and buy a brand new Honda Silver Wing. It cost about the same as a car. I rode it out to Texas and back to Georgia four times while I was assigned temporary duty to introduce the Bradley Fighting Vehicle to its first Combat Battalion. I once came back home from Texas just long enough to drop off my laundry repack my gear and head out to New York. We lived in Columbus, Georgia which is just south of Atlanta, by the time I hit Atlanta it started to rain. and it continued to rain every minute of the 975 mile trip. It stopped just as I pulled up in front of my childhood home in Rochester, New York.

The Silver Wing was not a screamer. I couldn't crank it open and pull the front wheel up off the ground. Of course, I have never been able to do that with any of my bikes because I like being married and if I ever did yank the front tire off the ground, I'd be single and living alone with only half of my stuff.

When I got to New York I let my brother ride my bike. He never knew how much this meant. I don't let people ride my bike. My standard line when someone asks if they can ride it is, "You have a better chance of making love to my wife than you do of riding my bike. I cleaned that line up a little bit, but Cheryl will still not be please to see that line in print. She has given up trying to fix me, once a "Grunt" always a Grunt. She knows I'm untrainable or at least that I'm as trained as I'll ever be.

My brother came back from the ride and announced, "This bike is a pig." I was a bit surprised since it I knew it wasn't a rocket bike but then again it was basically an engine with a couple of tires bolted on, so I thought it was plenty fast. I shrugged it off to the stupidity of youth. I toured around Rochester for a long weekend then headed back to Texas with a quick stop at Fort Benning, Georgia. I got a few miles out of Rochester twisted the throttle and realized, "This bike is a pig." I had ridden in the rain for so long on the way up to Rochester that the air filter was soaked. Every time I cracked open the throttle I'd pull water out of the filter and into the carburetor. I pulled the filter, poured about a cup of water out of the housing and continued on to Buffalo to get a replacement filter.

In 1986 Cheryl talked me into leaving the Army by saying, "You are going to get out of the Army when this tour is up." We moved to California where I decided to take a year off from school so I wouldn't have to pay out of state tuition. I was a Platoon Sargent in the National Guard so I really only had to work one weekend a month.. I decided that you are not a real motorcyclist unless you put one foot in the Pacific ocean and then ride across country and put the other foot in the Atlantic. I road to New York from California via the deep south. I was born in New York but I'm true Southerner. The Army can fix an accident of birth. If you are a foreigner they will let you become a citizen after you pull a tour. If you were unfortunate enough to be born a "Yankee" they will make you an honorary Southern. if you pull at least five years as a "Grunt" or if you become a Drill Sargent. You can't be an Army Drill Instructor unless you have a Southern accent. I'm pretty sure they will keep recycling you until you can at least say, "Son, Drop and do push ups until I'm tired" in a convincing southern drawl. You get to keep the honor for the rest of your life, but they can revoke it at anytime if you dishonor the South. Like if you refer to the "War for States rights" as the "Civil War." The same doesn't hold true for Texas, you can't be a Texan unless you were born in Texas. Kind of like how Schwarzenegger will never be President. Now that I think about it, the boys did make me an Honorary Southerner, I have the award on my wall to prove it, but I'm a Southerner only in the generic sense. They wouldn't let me tell some one I was from Kentucky, Georgia, or Alabama. I have lived most of my life in the South, or out West. I've lived in: Elizabethtown, Kentucky, Columbus Georgia, Plano, and Fort Worth Texas. I lived in Hobble Creek, Utah a couple of times. Hell, even when I lived in Germany I was in Bavaria, (Southern Germany) I also lived in Southern California but I have to count that time against my Northeastern total since California is not really the West and it is for damn sure not the South.. I don't care which side they were on in the War for States rights. Any way, I put a lot of miles on that Silver Wing. I made fun of a lot of guys who road a lot bigger bikes to the local watering hole. It wasn't fast, but it was fast enough. It wasn't pretty, but it was fun to ride.

I sold it when I started working for McDonnell Douglas and bought a BMW K75S. It cost a little more than a car, not luxury car expensive but more than a mini van. Cheryl asked me how I could spend that much money on a bike. I reasoned that it was a very good motorcycle and a lot of the guys at the office were buying Lexus sedans. The K75 was a mini rocket. It was small, fast, and great in K75s

LA traffic. I once got pulled over for splitting lanes on the 710 freeway. I was holding it back behind a couple of tractor trailers after a long day working at Douglas. If I had a bad day at work I did one of two things to release stress. I cracked open one of the many bottles of Whiskey I kept in my drawer and filled a coffee mug with Scotch. This also had a tendency to fill my office with the unmistakable smell of whiskey. I was the Manager of Voice and Data Systems and the smell of whiskey wafting from my office had a tendency to reduce the number and frequency of people that would come into my office to complain. Something really important had to crash before they would walk into my office. Of course you can only pull that gag so many times before they sign you up for Alcoholics Anonymous.

The other way I'd reduce stress was to blast between two tractor trailers doing 90 miles an hour, screaming the rebel yell at the top of my lungs. It does have a few negatives. If your wife sees you do it you have to sell your bike. If the trucks float a little too close together you die. Finally if a cop sees you do it, he has to pull you over. I blasted through a couple of trucks one day screaming as loud as a fire truck. I had the needle straining against the peg so if a cop did stop me and ask, "How fast do you think you were going?" I would have had to have answer, "I have no idea, officer I had the needled buried long before I really opened it up." I was screaming like a siren when I saw the blue lights come on. My first thought was, "Cool." The sound of my screaming along with the K75's engine straining in protest coupled with the Red, White and Blue lights bouncing off the side of the trailers really does bring the world into focus. The only other time I had that kind of focus, was when I was hanging out of the side of a Huey blasting dual sixty machine guns at the tree line. That moment comes in a close but definite second, to blowing between those trucks. The thought that this is "Cool" was quickly replaced by the thought, "Shit." I was traveling so fast and doing something so stupid that I knew I was going to spend some time in jail and my bike was going to be up for sale. Cheryl expects me to be stupid but she is not that fond of crazy.

I pulled off to the side of the freeway and slowly got off the bike. The officer pulled up behind me on his bike. He lowered his kickstand and walked over to me. I made a big show of taking off my gloves and helmet to show how safety conscience I was. You don't have to wear any gear in California but I always did. He asked, "Didn't you see me right behind you?" I responded, "Obviously not, officer." He asked me what kind of bike I had and I told him it was a BMW K75S. He walked around looking it over. He then said, " You know why I'm taking my time?" I answered, "Sorry, Nope." He looked at me and smiled, " I need to let this traffic clear so no one sees me let you go without hauling you off to jail or at least giving you a ticket." I grinned at him and thought, "The Gods are smiling down on me today." We chatted about motorcycling and I would have let him ride the bike if he wanted to, I might have even let him do the other thing since I was pretty happy I wasn't going to jail and more importantly I wouldn't have to sell my motorcycle.

I did end up selling it after moving to Novell in 1992. My boss told me that it didn't look right for the System Engineering Manager to be riding to work on a café racer. That meant that the bike ended up sitting in my garage mostly un-ridden. I sold it a couple of months later. One day I had to charge the battery and I figured that if you have to plug your bike into the wall you shouldn't own a bike. That was 15 years ago. I've rented bikes a couple of times but I've always known that I would buy another one. I think my wife did too, but she hoped maybe I would out grow it. I have ratcheted it up the last few years. I would say, "It's a sign from God." every time I saw a motorcycle. I got the kids doing if for me only so they wouldn't have to hear me say it. Cheryl grew tired of hearing it. I rented a bike last year, you can read that story on this site. She hoped that by letting me rent a bike once or twice a year she might be able to hold me off from buying one until I finally gave up on the idea. Her thought was that at least then she would only have to worry about me a couple times a year.

Buy the bike

I was planning on renting a bike again this year when I thought of a new plan.. I had worn Cheryl down and she told me "Just buy the damn thing." around February.   She was tired of hearing "It's a sign from God." I was thinking maybe I could get a good used bike for five grand. I looked at a few used bikes but it is harder than you think to pick out a bike. I was thinking, "It sure would be nice if you could see into the future." I want to tour with it but I also want to get up on Sunday morning and whip down to the store and buy some muffins. Texas is great because you can ride a lot in the winter, but Texas is hotter than hell in the summer so pulling the bike out of the garage at noon with the mercury bubbling away at 115 degrees might not be as much fun as you would think. I thought it might be more fun to get up early blast along the twist and turns of a Fort Worth farm road for an hour before the asphalt melted, then park the bike at home until right around sunset. You don't need a touring bike for a muffin run. On the other hand, I thought a long weekend would give me enough time to barrel down the Blue Water Highway from Surfside to Galveston Texas or maybe even make it out to Route 67 with a night in Cripple Creek Colorado. That kind of riding means a bike with some guts and a windscreen. You can't enjoy 1500 miles of eating bugs.

I looked really hard at the Honda Gold Wing it has an engine just about the same size as my car. It is not a muffin bike. It is big enough to need a reverse gear. When I rented one last year more than a few of my friends gave me a lot of grief about riding it. They called it a Honda Accord. I knew Matthew would like it but I'm not sure how much he is going to ride with me and, if he does, for how long. Kids don't want to hang out with Dad, so I figured I'd buy the bike I liked. I have another friend that has a BMW R1200 LT. It is BMW's answer to the Gold Wing. It is smaller but not by much, it still has a reverse gear. It is also a little less like a car and it is a BMW which means that it in my humble opinion is a little better than the more popular and hence more common Honda. I looked at the Gold Wing on Saturday, there was a good looking used one for sale for $15,000 which is about five grand less than a new one. It was disappointing, I had finally worn Cheryl down so she would let me buy a bike. I was standing at the dealership looking at some very good looking motorcycles and it wasn't any fun at all.

I mean shouldn't it be fun? Shouldn't you just be giggling uncontrollably, smiling like a kid at Christmas? I looked at some of the other bikes. I wandered the around shop aimlessly. I talked to the sales guys then finally snuck back to my car. I went online looked at all of the used bikes, read the reviews, and looked at the Honda and BMW sites. This wasn't fun either, it was like work. It was like I was pulling together a competitive analysis document. A bike shouldn't be work. It should be Christmas morning. I wanted to take Cheryl down to the Honda place but it was 4:30 in the afternoon on Saturday and the place closed at 5:00 pm. It wasn't open on Sunday or Monday so Christmas was canceled or at least postponed.

The BMW place was also closed on Sunday. You would think that people want to buy bikes on Sunday but I'm sure these guys understand the market dynamics better than I do. I did a lot more competitive analysis and since the Honda place was closed and the BMW place was open on Monday we ended up at the BMW place at 9:00 am. They didn't have a R 1200 LT. The sales manager made a call to one of the other dealers and told me if I was serious he could get me one.   He did have a R1200 GT which is one step down from the LT. It is a good looking bike but I'm not sure why I'd want to take a step down, since my wife had already approved the top of the line.

He also had a couple R 1200 RT bikes.

They are a little sportier. It has removable saddle bags and is a lot lighter than the LT or GT. It has the classic BMW dual opposed twin cylinder low-center-of-gravity Boxer engine rated at 110 horsepower. I have always thought that a Harley should have a big "V" twin air cooled engine and a BMW should have the Boxer engine. I take it out for a test drive and the giggling begins. I come back with a Christmas morning smile. I could definitely put my left foot in the Pacific, hop on this bike ride it across the country and put my right foot in the Atlantic then smile to myself about the return trip. I could blast this thing down I-35 splitting the lanes between two tractor-trailers while screaming the rebel yell. This was a bike for the ride to Cripple Creek or for muffins on a Sunday morning. I sold cars one summer so I know that I have just been "de-horsed." In the business we always wanted to de-horse the customer, get them out of their car and into the new car smell of the car we wanted to sell them. I pulled the smile off my face, complained about the seat height and told him I was going to research it a bit on the web. We came home and I researched how much the insurance was going to be for my new BMW R 1200 RT.

This bike cost less than a Honda Gold Wing or a R 1200 LT but it cost a lot more than any car I have ever bought., still not as much as a luxury car but it cost a lot more than both of our cars are now worth. Cheryl asked me again how I could spend that much money on a bike. I reasoned that this is the last motorcycle I'm ever going to buy and Cheryl will be able to sell it when I'm gone. I have friends that have really nice cars and I drive a four year old Honda Accord which pretty soon Matthew is going to be driving. We can't fit three cars in our garage, but we can fit two cars and a very nice motorcycle. Plus come on, it really is a sign from God if you can find a boxer engined 110 horsepower BMW that lets you pick up muffins from Cripple Creak Colorado.

I buy the insurance which doesn't put me in a great negotiation position. The insurance guy needs the VIN number so calls the shop. I'm sure the sales guy smiles when he gets that call, "Hi, This is Peter Johnson from Progressive Insurance can you give me the Vehicle Identification Number for the R 1200 RT that Mr. Hartman is going to buy today?" I have the insurance in hand and permission from Cheryl to buy the bike. That doesn't mean that she is happy about the idea. I ask her if she is ready to go and she says, "I'll never be ready but I guess I have to take you." We pull into the parking lot, she looks over at me and says, "Couldn't you just get a blond?" I give my wife of 30 years a puzzled look and ask, "What!" She says, "I know you are having a mid-life crisis here and I was just wondering couldn't you get a blond instead." I smile and say, "Not for twenty two thousand dollars I can't." A blond will cost me a lot more than this bike. She thinks about how much the bike is going to cost and says, "I'm not sure about that. Plus your not going to get killed riding a blond." Maybe she didn't say the last part but she thought it. Cheryl wasn't happy about the money but she is much more nervous about me getting crushed between a couple of tractor trailers.

The bike is sparkling clean, fully fueled and waiting for me at the front door of Fort Worth's BMW Motorcycle dealership. I don't have a helmet so I'll need that and I'll need a light weight jacket with armor around the shoulders, spine, and elbows.

I want Matthew and Cheryl to ride with me so I'll need at least two of everything. I want to pick out a blue jacket that matches the bike but the sales guy says, "I like yellow, it's really visible." He shows me a yellow jacket, "Insane Asylum Yellow." It is too tight and definitely makes me look like I am having a mid-life crises. I take it off and Matthew trys it on. It looks a lot better on a 15 year kid than it does stretched across the belly of a 50 year balding overweight guy. I look longingly at the blue jacket but figure I have pushed my wife pretty far today so if she wants me to wear an insane asylum yellow jacket I should get one. I ask the guy if he has another one in a larger size. It is still a little tight around the middle but it's important to fight only the battles that count. We pick out a helmet that will fit both Matthew and Cheryl and then finish up the paperwork. I put Matthew on the back of the bike and we ride home. The weather is very overcast and there are already a few rain drops on the windshield. Cheryl asks me what will happen if it rains and I tell her, "We'll get wet." I drop the bike into gear and off we go.

Pretty Women, high wind and lots of rain

I split lanes, pull up on the driver side window to ask Cheryl if she wants to stop at our favorite Pizza place but it is closed on Mondays. Matthew and I decide to head off on our own. We beat our way through traffic not really heading to any place in particular or even in a general direction. We tour around for awhile and then I remember that I have been wanting to try a new restaurant called "Bone Daddy's." I assume it is a rib joint. Matthew and I both like ribs so I figure it is a pretty safe bet.

The parking lot is crazy busy for a Monday which is a good sign. We are on a bike so we pull into a parking spot that is a little too small for the typical Texas truck. The insane asylum jackets go into the saddle bags and both of our helmets fit in the oversized trunk. We walk in to "Bone Daddy's." It is not really a rib joint it is more like a "Hooters." except maybe not quite as classy. The waitresses are in really short shorts and extremely tight tops. You would think that a 15 year old boy would like a place like that, but both of us were a little uncomfortable. It really isn't our kind of place. Matthew counseled me by asking, "What did you expect? The place is called "Bone Daddy's!" I got it after we sat down, but honestly I thought it was a rib joint. I looked around and assumed a lot of other people thought the same thing. There were a lot of kids and families in the place. I suppose just like us, it was there very first time and I'm pretty sure their last. The food was a little more expensive, I guess because if you hire only really pretty girls and dress them in sexy outfits you get to charge a little more.

We got back on the bike and headed over toward downtown Grapevine which is a big motorcycle hang out. It was Monday and we were heading toward a very large and very black storm front so we were the only bike in Grapevine. I looked at the storm and decided to head for the barn. The wind picked up and we christened the bike with 60 mph winds and torrential rains. The wind moved us from one side of our lane to the other but it was an amazingly tight ride given the deep pools of water and the horizontal rain.. I had my cell phone in the front pocket of my insane asylum yellow jacket which was clinging to my now soaked shirt. Cheryl called us but I didn't hear it ring or feel it vibrate. That is not surprising since the wind was howling and we were being pelted with marble sized rain drops. She was calling to warn us that the emergency weather radio had gone off forcasting very strong winds and maybe hail. The rain slowed to a downpour as I made the turn into the driveway.

Cheryl had already cleaned out a nice dry spot in the garage for the motorcycle. You have to love that woman. Thirty years stuck with a guy who she knows isn't going to get better and most likely is only going to get a lot worse. What does she do? She offers me a blonde and when that doesn't work she cleans out the garage for a motorcycle she definitely doesn't want me to have. I kiss her and thank her for my "Father's Day" gift saying, "I guess you can expect a pretty good Mother's Day gift." She says. "We are not going to spend that kind of money for my gift!

You really have to love that woman.

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