Annual Bike Ride

This weekend was my annual motorcyle ride with my buddies from PA. This year, due to a series of follies and uncooperative weather systems we logged a total of 35 miles.

The original plan was that my buddies, DEA, the Golden Jew, and Nine Fingers, would ride to DC Thursday night. Friday morning we would ride to Smith Mountain Lake, camp at the lake, then buzz up the Blue Ride Parkway and Skyline Drive towards Front Royal. We would camp there Saturday night then Sunday morning they would haul ass back to Philly and I would head back to DC. The best laid plans of mice and men...

Thursday morning DEA called and said that a case he was working on was coming to a head and he wouldn't be able to get out of work until late Friday night. The new plan was that Friday afernoon I would ride up to Philly then we would ride two hours up to Golden Jew's lake front cabin in central PA on Saturday and spend the night.

Friday at noon I packed a bag, strapped it to the back of the Harley and hit the road. It was hot out when I left, maybe 98 degrees, and humid as hell. Due to the heat I opted to take the shortest available route, all interstates, so that I was fresh for Saturday. I flew up the B-W Parkway to I-95 and settled into an 85mph groove, which is a comfortable cruising speed for that bike.

While I was in the left lane of I-95 approaching the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel I spotted what looked like a three inch square, six foot long section of cardboard sliding on the pavement towards me from the far right lane like a javeline. I had in earplugs to muffle the dull rumble of the engine and was singing some James Brown song loudly to myself. While singing I did a series of quick mental geometry and physics calculations and determined that object was on a perfect course to slide directly under my front tire. I took inventory of my surroundings: Jersey barrier to my left, pick up truck two car lengths behind me, gas tanker truck at my four o'clock two lanes to my right, and sedan slightly behind me in the lane directly to my right. Not too many places I could go. Afraid of slamming on the brakes and getting run down by the pickup I decided it was best to run over the cardboard. I kept my course and speed and braced for the bump. When the cardboard was fifty feet away I realized it was moving too fast to be cardboard, though, and my brain flipped through a mental Rolodex of possible materials it could be. I decided the cardboard was really a wood 2x4. I reassessed my possible actions and decided it was less dangerous to go over it than make some maveric manuever and risk dumping the bike. Nanoseconds later I heard a metallic "Clink-ching-ching-ching-clink-ching-clink" noise and by brain reassesed. "That's not wood, that's metal" I looked more closely and saw it was a three-inch round, six foot long, metal pipe. I said "Can't go over that" out loud to myself and slammed on the brakes.

In comically slow motion the pipe slid in front of my front tire, across my path, and slammed into the Jerser barrier to my left. The pipe hit the barrier a little ahead of me, bounced into the air and ricocheted off. At first I thought "Hmmm, where is that going to go?" A few more calculations and I said "That's going into my left ear...GOTTA GO, MAN!" and nailed the accelerator. I didn't look back, but the pipe probably careened about a foot behind me. I think I heard the truck to my rear hit the brakes but didn't look back to see the impact.

A minute later the adrenaline saturated my system and I nearly had a heart attack.

After the tunnel I relaxed and my heart rate went back to normal. I don't have many close calls like that, but when I do I take them in stride, they are just part of the "sport" of riding.

Traffic was heavy at this point and I slowed down to about 50mph. There was an older couple on a big Harley cruiser next to me for about 15 miles. They were a hard looking couple wearing only tank tops, jeans and skid lids (thin helmets with no protective qualities, worn only to skirt state helmet laws), a stark contrast to my leather jacket, jeans, boots, gloves, and full-face helmet. As we crossed a bridge I noticed the woman tap the guy's shoulder then point to the sky a few miles ahead. A thin ribbon of black clouds were forming to the Northeast of us and I said a silent prayer to no god in particular that the storm would hold off until I passed to the clear blue skies further North.

I wasn't so lucky. A few minutes later I felt the first sting of a fat rain drop hit my cheek through my open face shield. Then another, and another, until finally it was a flull blown deluge. I dropped my shield and raced ahead to make an overpass about a mile ahead, but when I got there I realized the shoulder was very narrow and it would be too dangerous to stop for shelter. I pressed on another 2 miles to the next exit and took refuge at a Pilot gas station under the pump canopy. When I stopped I was soaked from head to toe. Water had poured down my back, dripped down my legs filling my boots, and my leather jacket had sucked up a few gallons of water and easily weighed 25 pounds. I considered changing into my one spare pair of jeans but realized I had a long, wet day of riding ahead of me and it would be nice to have a dry pair of pants to change into whe I arrived at DEA's house. Plus, I wasn't wearing underwear and didn't want to strip naked in the truck stop parking lot. Nor did I want to change in the restrooms, which were sure to be a petri-dish of communucable diseases.

The next three hours on the highway I dried out and got resoaked four times. The bursts of rain were all short but torrential, and followed by intense and very hot sun. Each time I dried out I thought I was clear only to have another ominous cloud move in and open up above me. It was the most demoralizing ride of my life. I felt like I was on a conveyor belt in a car wash.

When I finally got to DEA's house I poured myself a huge Scotch on the rocks, took a warm shower, changed into my slightly soggy "dry" pair of jeans and plopped down onto his couch. DEA looked my me and said something to the affect of "I'd ask you how your ride was but I can see you're not ready to talk about it." We ate some dinner, had a couple of beers then hit the hay.

At 6am Saturday morning I woke to the sound of heavy rain pummeling the sky light of my room. I poked my fingers through the shades of the window next to the bed hoping to see signs that the rain was just a shower. However, the sky was black in all directions and I knew there would be no riding that day.

After a hearty breakfast DEA and I packed up a small arsenal of pistols and machine guns and headed to his range to blast holes in some paper. The rest of the afternoon was spent watching Chevy Chase flicks and drinking beer. We ate a quick dinner then half heartedly headed to a bar downtown so that we could say we went out at some point over the weekend.

DEA took me to this cool bar, but apperently it was "Douche Bag" night and anyone in a Tap Out t-shirt drank for free. We found a seat at a table and were planning where we would go next when some ass-clown at the table behind us, for no apparent reason, turned around and threw DEA into a rear choke hold. DEA's eyes went wide and I giggled in anticipation. DEA had a gun on his hip, an ankle rig around his boot, and a series of knives scattered elsehwere on his person. If he didn't crush this poor fools eye socket with a goverment-taught move I was certain the butt of a pistol would be depoyed to the bridge of his nose. Much to my disappointment DEA slowly turned into the guy with his left elbow and gave him a deliberate thump to the neck and said "What the fuck are you doing?" The kid, realizing he was about to be placed into a very uncomfortable position, let go and said, "Uh, sorry, I thought you just knocked my hat off my head." DEA, obviously surpressing every fast-twitch muscle reaction in his body, didn't say a word and sat back in his seat. I was now laughing uncontrollably and trying not to piss my pants. DEA said "When were you going to jump in on that?" but I was trying to catch my breath and couldn't muster an answer. We left the bar and went home before anymore nonsense could befall us.

Sunday morning it was finally nice enough to get out on the roads a little. DEA, Golden Jew and I took some twisty back roads to a place called The Classic outside Philly for breakfast. The ride was about 15 miles each way and constituted the bulk of our group riding this weekend. After breakfast I packed up my stuff and headed back to DC.