ttocsland
November 9th, 2005
Current Mood: busy
Current Music:Black Coffee in Bed – Squeeze
Wasn’t that a G’n’R’ song? Well, here are some truths about November rain in LA.
It’s cold. Really. Like chilly.
It makes the roads slippery.
As a motobiker, I want to say that it also makes me realize just how many manhole covers there are in the road. Not just the circular ones the Wallace Boys once upon a time tried to roll down Genessee street. No – there’s also square ones, with a nice filligre relief in them – doesn’t add one iota of grip or traction, but it shines nicely in the rain.
Also noted – motobikes don’t come with windshield wipers; no windshields, natch’.
Helmets don’t have wipers either.
This combines to cause sadness.
Other things – my legs do pretty well in the rain – got my pants soaked, but the legs were like “ok, that’s nothing. We shower regularly – it did make me ponder why I don’t have better weather gear than what I grabbed. Let’s see – it last rained (not counting ‘fall’ season three weeks ago) in… carry the 2, root of 4 – April. That’s more than a semi-year ago. And let’s see – last time I rode in the rain would be… um… 4 years ago? Ok… so that’s why my weather gear sucks.
For the record – rain pants are needed. Got a rain coat with my jacket, and it worked well. Gloves – need to grab some of the yellow dishy jobs soon, or splurge and get some gore-tex leather ones. Boots with goretex and a decent tread, cause the roads look scary in the rain.
I’ll let you in on a secret, though. I had a blast. As always, you can only get so wet; then it’s nothing. I didn’t get that drenched, but man was it cool to be so ultra-focused on the road – watching people, predicting their bad moves, staying upright, watching the road the sky the side streets – all nicely heightened – no beautiful sunset to distract myself with. So yeah, probably should have spent the bicycle money on decent bad-weather gear, but it’s not like I’m back in DC on my Hawk. Shouldn’t see freezing rain for a few more months. Right?
:+s+: