What's Been Happening 11/07/04

Today was especially a great weather day. This morning it was a nippy, eye watering, teeth chattering 50 degrees this gorgeous Sunday. As the day would soon wear on, it would reach a balmy 58 degrees with 100% sunshine. How sweet it is!!

As all the mid-westerns know, for every day like this, at this time of the year, we just cheated "old man winter" out of one extra day of nasty, snowy winter. Being of sound mind, and a mid-westerner all my life, I know, as everyone else does, we will pay for this great weather sometime in the next few months, one way or another. Mother nature has a way of getting even, one way or another.

The rough riders of chapter H met at Mickey D's this morning, for yet another great day of some great chit chatting and some excellent back road riding. The ones who chose to assemble were; whispering Joe Mendoza riding PRANCER, dancin Dick Sieple riding RED MAJESTIC, lucky Larry Greco riding BLACK BEAUTY, Christine Irwin riding PRINCESS SAFIRE, sir Malcolm Irwin riding Mr. LUCKY with daughter Kirsty, gentleman George Riebesehl riding SILVER STREAK, captain Kirk Huot riding RANGE RIDER, sergeant Russ Prichard riding RED DEVIL, doctor Cary Levin riding his 4 wheeler, trusty Bruce Hirsch riding his new HOT TOTTIE (electric car) and yours truly riding HUMPTY-DUMPTY.

Our place chosen for some fine dining cuisine was 'Parkway' restaurant in Sycamore, ILL. I assumed the lead and sergeant Russ did his usual fine job of sweeper. It is off we go, hi ho, hi ho and away we go. Naturally, only the lonely roads will do, for the route that I have selected was so lonely that there were cob webs all over them, and little or no road kill. So our ponies' hoofs would experience no slippage and maintain excellent traction. Due to the nippy weather, cold as it may seem, there were no bugs to adhere to our ponies' wind shields and fairings. Yippee--what a relief!! Our ponies were smiling from mirror to mirror. Furthermore, our ponies were elated with all the exercise that they were about to receive, we all were happy to oblige. Upon arrival we converged in the back corral to put our ponies to rest.

Alas, we hardy rough riders were seated and the shenanigans soon commenced. The coffee was poured, and the chit chatting was at its finest as our tummies were growling. We members of chapter H sure know how to socialize, and that we did. Soon the vittles were served and our empty tummies were satisfied. Needless to say, time's-a-waste'n, forward ho -- we must go. Unfortunately, only lucky Larry and yours truly had the opportunity to continue on this fine day for some excellent back road riding. As everyone who lives in the mid-west knows, these days are but a precious few. In this area, there is at best, 2 or 3 potential excellent weekends for the remainder of this season for motorcycling. So lets all take as much advantage of these precious few days remaining. Soon there after, we all must lay our ponies to rest in their respective corrals for the long, cold, snowy winter.

That having been said, lucky Larry and I took off, heading in a westerly direction. Seeking out only the lonely roads, I managed to only get lost 2 times. It is a good think that lucky Larry has his GPS unit working at all times, for he found direction and kept us on the straight and narrow. Our cut-off was on the far northeast side of a small town in Oregon, ILL. Then proceeded north, and jockeyed and tip-toed our way further northeast and eventually circumvented our way towards the town of Rockford, ILL. Then our direction in route took us southeast throughout many farm lands of the greater northwestern Illinois. We continued seeking those lonely old roads that required motorcycle tires rolling on them to make them smile. We rough riders aim to accommodate and please those poor ole farm roads. Eventually our direction took us east, way east and soon turned into a southeasterly direction, homeward bound.

Today, by far, considering this time of the year, was an excellent day to give our ponies much needed exercise. Larry and I were just to happy to accommodate BLACK BEAUTY and HUMPTY-DUMPTY. All in all, our travels were extremely delightful, while the good Lord and the weatherman sure did cooperate with us today. Larry and I managed to log in 150 very safe enjoyable miles.