Year: 2016

  • Here's Johnny.

    December 12th, 2016. Last year, we were blessed with winter staying almost entirely within bounds; a late December to February even, most severe in late January. This year the lake-effect weather system, resulting low temperatures (10F!!!) and snow started early. I also got the seasonal man-cold a couple of weeks ago. Any medical professional recognises…

  • Dan Gold's Honda CB650 Custom Artwork

    Motorcycle Live 2016, Birmingham NEC, England. London-based tattoo and multi-disciplinary artist Dan Gold went to the Motorcycle Live show at Birmingham’s NEC to work on a CB650 (Honda’s middleweight naked), painting the plastics and fuel tank Working through design ideas before the show. Photo credit: dangoldtattooclub The fuel tank design takes shape. Photo credit: dangoldtattooclub…

  • Zack Courts Monstering Monaco

    Memories of a similar bike in a different place. I was rather taken with this. Motorcyclist Magazine’s senior editor Zack Courts rides a 2017 Monster 1200 S around Monaco. I got a chance to ride the 2016 model in Summer, albeit around semi-rural Pittsburgh suburbs. I wrote about my Ducati adventure here.

  • Ohiopyle in Autumn

    Ohiopyle in Autumn

    Ohiopyle is about forty miles from me, as the crow files. It’s a phenominal motorbike ride, which is interesting because in the year I’ve been riding, I’ve never bothered to do it, due to the constraints of time and the fact I can get lost in my own apartment. Despite the relatively short distance, I…

  • As If Right On Cue…

    The weather has started it’s Autumnal swings. 36°F this morning. 36 is an interesting temperature for this rider, as last year I realised that is about the lowest I can tolerate without heated gloves. I don’t get numbness, just very sharp pain that I’m guessing precedes the numbness. First frost of the year. Of course,…

  • …And Winter Is Coming.

    Predictably on the tails of my last entry, and because I am British, I’m going to moan about Winter. I live in Western Pennsylvania, and while it’s hardly Minnesota, it’s a somewhat harsher experience than my British homeland. The average January high for Pittsburgh is 37°F(US Climate Data, 2016); that is the average low temperature…

  • Autumn Is Here.

    The weather’s still pretty damn good. Just a few weeks back I was out riding thinking I didn’t have much Summer left. A short fifty-miler today before the weekly commute grind. Washed the bike observing the usual Sisyphean practice. It’s due to rain tomorrow.

  • A Close Call

    There’s a lesson in everything. This could have gone very badly, luckily nobody was hurt and nothing was damaged. What could I have done differently? Fumbling the horn didn’t help. I cancelled the shit out of that turn signal, though… The police vehicle was being erratic long before the incident. I could have hung much…

  • Cheating on my girl with a pair of Italian supermodels

    In this part of the world, test riding bikes isn’t easy. The bar to a ‘M’ endorsement is low, and there are no restrictions. A novice rider can get their learner’s permit and hop on a 180hp, 1000cc bike the same day. Yes, they’ll probably hurt themselves. There’s a good example of this from Laurie…

  • 10,000 miles.

    Last month, I hit the milestone. I’d been managing around one-thousand miles a month since I got the bike; Winter had caused this to slip in January, when I had lost most of that month to bad weather. I knew I’d get back on target when summer came around; and so it came to pass.…