Seeking, seizing the Kingdom

My wife got her motorcycle permit a week and a half ago. She came home so excited to learn, so we headed out to the empty church parking lot near our house.

I was running through the basics, and we had her going nicely in first gear. The time came for her to stop, and so she squeezed the clutch, then squeezed the break. The engine started revving and the bike continued to move forward, she squeezed harder trying to stop, which only made the engine rev more and more movement, this time enough to drop her off the side of the bike is it kept going. Crash, bang, went the bike, my wife on the hard ground, a bit dazed from the fall.

Why do these things always happen in slow motion?

I ran to see if she was alright, her jeans were torn open at the knee, and she was bleeding, but she was alright. I picked up the bike, the headlight was broken, and the gearshift pedal (the part you put your foot on) was bent. I bent it back, and it broke off.

Somehow, I knew something like this was going to happen. That’s an odd feeling.

I was able to ride the bike back home (without the pedal mind you, don’t ask, don’t tell) to get the car and pick her up. Joy did a great job bandaging herself up… good thing she’s a nurse.

After analyzing the gruesome details again and again, here’s what I, as the teacher, forgot to point out fully:

1. Keep your wrist low, so when you go to break, you roll the throttle closed before squeezing the brake. Joy had grabbed the throttle high, so when she went to brake, the throttle was rolling on with her thumb.
2. Squeeze the clutch all the way. Joy had squeezed it, but not enough to fully disengage it. This caused the bike to move forward when the engine was revving.

I called the dealer the next day to find out how much the parts would cost… I couldn’t believe it, $240! I wasn’t willing to pay that, so I started looking for salvage yards. I found Sport Wheel (terrible website, btw) in Jordan, MN, about an hour away. Through a series of e-mails and phone conversations, I found they had the parts I needed, I just had to come get them. Today was the day. $50 and a couple hours brought the bike back from its hiatus. After I got the bike working again, Joy and I went to Coon Rapids to see Evan Almighty with CP and Becky. It was a great movie.

I know you’re dying to know, so I’ll tell you… Joy made some cut-offs out of those jeans.

I came across this page about the Honda nighthawk and enjoyed the “top 10″ at the bottom of the page. Maybe you’ll enjoy it too. The nighthawk is officially Joy’s bike, we found that it does fit her if she wears her boots. This means I will soon start looking for a touring bike, much like the Nighthawk 1000 with the touring kit that the page mentions.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 8th, 2007 at 12:43 am and is filed under Motorcycle, Movies, Wife. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.