You think your job sucks?
Wild storm hit the California Coast last night and took out the power to the vast Bikernet generators. We’ve been down all morning. I’ll jump right on the news, but here’s a couple of tidbits. Advanstar, the promoter behind the Indy dealer show tried to head off the Easyriders V-Twin dealer show in Cincy with a Las Vegas effort, January 23 to 25th. It fell on it’s face and was canceled, but they’re not giving up. Their new Vegas effort is scheduled for November 21. We’ll see what happens next.
I ran across an ad for a cool rigid roller kit for three grand from Tedd’s Cycle. It’s a single loop frame. E-mail teddcycle@aol.com for more info and put in a good word for Bikernet.
Dig this, I ran across a 4-speed hand starter that looks like a jockey shifter. It replace ’65-’86 soloenoids. Find out more at motorcyclesstorehouse.nl. Let’s hit the news:
DAYTONA BIKE WEEK UPDATE–As Daytona Bike Week quickly approaches, the list of complaints grows and grows. Yeah I know, the motels hit us hard at bike week, the rooms start at about a $150 a night, not cheap, but if you want to play you gotta pay! Just a suggestion you can save money by sharing a room and that will cut it in half. You can also save money on food. Food vendors line Main Street and Beach Street and all the streets off of Main. Two people can usually eat for $15–$20, not bad. You can splurge on the high dollar restaurants once or twice during the week. I don’t like spending my time in the restaurants though, there is too much to do and see. The food the vendors provide is top quality food, more than just burgers and hot dogs . The best food on Main Street is a vendor in the Full Moon saloon parking lot selling pork chops. They cost (I paid $17 for one last year), but they are huge, more than enough for two people. So maybe you can offset the cost of the rooms with some savings on the food.
Miami H-D shot from Rogue
The next thing everyone complains about are the COPs. They can be a pain in the ass, that is for sure. I’ve attended bike week since 1988 and got one ticket, speeding and it cost me $125. I was trying to out run a thunderstorm and got popped by the radar gun. I was polite and didn’t get an attitude and that was that. Did I like paying the fine? No!
The guy had me red handed and there was no sense in making things worse by mouthing off. So there’s my advice, present your paper work and take your medicine. It is better than spending Bike Week in jail and still having to pay for the motel room. It seems every year they have a point of emphasis, high handlebars, blue dot taillight lenses and no dark glasses at night (which is common sense), and the list goes on. It is part of bike week. Be cool while you are there and you won’t have problems with the man. If you choose to argue, don’t. You’re going to lose the argument and get a free stay at the gray-bar motel. Chalk it up to experience and let it go and enjoy the rest of your stay.
I don’t know why we ran these shots here.
Another complaint I always hear is how big the crowds are and that you can’t ride. Well what kind of Bike Week would it be if only say a thousand bikes and a thousand bikers showed up? Man that would be fun! To me one of the best things about Bike Week is seeing all the bikes and all the people. The part about you can’t ride is not true. You can head out of town to ride to places such as Orlando and St. Augustine to name a few. It really is about what you like to do and how bad you want to do it. Most who complain about the crowds and not being able to ride , belong to the “Pissing and Moaning Club About Everything.” Daytona really is about what you make it. It isn’t perfect, but what really is?
One of the great things about Daytona Bike week is that all of the industry’s vendors and all the top bike builders show up to show off their new products and their new creations. For me this is the best part of bike week, seeing things that you normally only read about. Even if you hit some bad weather while at bike week, the worst day there beats the best day at home, especially if you have been snowed in all winter.
Daytona has always been for me a ringing of the bell to signal the beginning of the riding season and that spring is near after a long winter. Yeah it costs you some bucks to go, but the memories I have from past bike weeks are priceless! On down the road in the later years of my life, I would rather have the memories that the money paid for! You can’t put a price tag on that.
Oh by the way “THE MEANEST” and I look forward to seeing your son and my cousin Jose in Daytona. I hope he sheds some light on his ideas for the 6th Annual Run For Breath “In Memory of Justin Pullin” awards he is going to do. I have heard he is going to try and rival Mr. Bandit’s creation this year? We will see!. I hope to see you all in Daytona, ride safe and enjoy the sun!
See you way down south!
–Mike (THE STEALTH)
VANSON LEATHERS DOES DAYTONA–Daytona Party Open House, When:
Thursday, March 4th 4pm-8pm
Friday, March 5th 4pm-8pm
Saturday, March 6th 9am-6pm
Sunday, March 7th 9am-5pm
Why
Preview new styles for 2004
Blowout sale on selected items
See the ALL NEW Super Motard Suit
Special sale on Race/Drag Suits
School Rental Suit Sale
Sandwich buffet on Sunday
SONS OF LIBERTY RIDERS E-NEWS– WV Legislative Update. Need some quick words to a few on the fence.Well, they did it again. Pulled our Helmet bill off the agenda again today.We believe this to be good news! It means the leadership doesn’t have thevotes to kill the bill outright. We have a count of 7 to 7 with the Chairbeing the tie breaker. He’s feeling pressure, and don’t want to go on recordas killing our bill. Looks like you have all weekend to try to get at leastone fence sitter over to our side. Senator Harrison said he won’t fight itbut didn’t think he would vote for it.
If we don’t get this voted out onMonday looks like it may be all over for this year. These guys are feelingheat, or they would have killed it outright. I believe they think it has agood chance on the floor. We need another push! These are the ones we needto hear from you. The rest are on our side.
Jeffery Kessler; kessler@mail.wvnet.edu (Committee Chair) Tie BreakerAgainst
Herb Snyder; hbsnyder@mail.wvnet.edu (Vice Chair) Against
Evan H. Jenkins; ejenkins@mail.wvnet.edu ?
Michael Oliverio; oliverio@mail.wvnet.edu(Biggest Bill Opponent)
Larry L. Rowe; larrylrowe@larrylrowe.com Against
Frank Deem; fdeem@mail.wvnet.edu
Steve Harrison; stevehar@mail.wvnet.edu Against(Most likely to change)
Andy McKenzie; senatormckenzie@aol.com Against
Don “DUCK” Smith
ABATE of West Virginia
State Communications Coord.
www.wvabate.org
duck@solriders.com
Got Liberty?
www.solriders.net
Missouri needs our help
I got an e-mail from a buddy in Missouri…and he’s asking for our help. Onceagain, the enemies of bikers are using all kinds of statistics…includingthat people going to Sturgis and other places on vacation ride THROUGHMissouri WITH their helmets on. I would like to see everyone send e-mails tothe following legislators on the House Transportation Committee (who couldbe voting on the helmet revision in a few days) – explaining how they asfreedom loving bikers do not and will not travel through Missouri and spendout tons of vacation money until the helmet law is repealed.
REMEMBER…be cordial, be nice, get to the point and thank them forlistening. Missouri is NOT our state and we sure don’t want to piss them offand get on them mad at FORR. But we do want them to understand that they AREloosing tourism dollars by maintaining their archaic mandatory helmet law.
-Spotman
Rep. Gary Dusenberg, E-Mail: Gary.Dusenberg@house.mo.gov
Rep. Terry Young (female), E-Mail: Terry.Young@house.mo.gov
Rep. Charles Schlottach, E-Mail: Charlie.Schlottach@house.mo.gov
Rep. Ryan Glennon McKenna, E-Mail: Ryan.McKenna@house.mo.gov
Rep. Tom Green, E-Mail: Tom.Green@house.mo.gov
Rep. Larry Crawford, E-Mail: Larry.Crawford@house.mo.gov
Rep. Lanie Black (male), E-Mail: Lanie.Black@house.mo.gov
Michigan needs a few letters
John Silk asked me to get in touch with you about money spent on out ofstate rides. I asked fifty (50) riders to send me there receipts for a outof state week-end ride. They spent $12,938.50, which comes out to $258.75each. This may not be to scientific, but it does say that bikers do spendmoney and will spend it at the out of the way places that need the money themost. If you can get some of your people to write letters to our Governorand a few of our Senators maybe it will help get the last couple of yesvotes we need.
Their address’ are; Governor Jennifer Granholm, StateCapitol, P.O. Box 30013, Lansing MI 48909
The Senators are;
Sen. Hanson Clark Sen.Valde Garcia
Sen. Irma Clark-Coleman Sen. Jud Gilbert
Sen. Samuel “Buzz” Thomas Sen. Ken Sikkema
Sen. Ray Basham Sen. Bill Hardiman
Sen. Dennis Olshove Sen. Wayne Kuipers
Sen. Mike Switalski Sen. Jason Allen
Their address is; State Senator, State Capitol P.O. Box 30036 Lansing MI48909-7536
Thank you for your time, Be free, ride safe!
–Chuck Johnson
HERO AND DORK OF THE WEEK–Hero,Horry County ABATE for getting involved in the Jay Jarman trial and beingthere for the family.
Dorks,The 2 little weasels who killed Jay Jarman and the Judge who feltcommunity service was a strong enough penalty for killing a biker.
Send any nominations to tmor@nauticom.net and the Officers will pick fromthe cast of entrants and characters.
If you need more info on this or any other subject just go to the Sons ofLiberty Riders Info Zonehttp://solriders.com/ or http://solriders.net/index.php
BIKERNET RELATIONSHIP ADVICE– A couple drove down a country road for several miles, not saying a word. An earlier discussion had led to an argument and neither of them wantedto concede their position. As they passed a barnyard of mules, jackasses, and pigs, the husband asked sarcastically,
“Relatives of yours?”
“Yep,” the wife replied, “in-laws.”
–from Christ T.
IDIOTS– The following is a list of “idiots” as submitted by George Petricko
ONE: Recently, when I went to McDonald’s, I saw on the menu that you could have an order of 6, 9 or 12 Chicken McNuggets. I asked for a half dozen nuggets. “We don’t have half dozen nuggets,” said the teenager at the counter.
“You don’t?” I replied. “We only have six, nine, or twelve,” was the reply. “So I can’t order a half dozen nuggets, but I can order six?” “That’s right.” So I shook my head and ordered six McNuggets.
TWO: The paragraph above doesn’t amaze me because of what happened a couple of months ago. I was checking out at the local Foodland with just few items, and the lady behind me put her things on the belt close to mine, picked up one of those “dividers” that they keep by the cash register and placed it between our things so they wouldn’t get mixed.
After the girl had scanned all of my items, she picked up the “divider,” looking it all over for the bar code so she could scan it. Not finding the bar code, she said to me, “Do you know how much this is?”
I said to her “I’ve changed my mind, I don’t think I’ll buy that today.” She said “OK” and I paid her for the things and left. She had no clue to what had just happened.
THREE: A lady at work was seen putting a credit card into her floppy drive and pulling it out very quickly. When inquired as to what she was doing, she said she was shopping on the Internet and they kept asking for a credit card number, so she was using the ATM “thingy.”
FOUR: I recently saw a distraught young lady weeping beside her car.
“Do you need some help?” I asked.
She replied, “I knew I should have replaced the battery to this remote door unlocker. Now I can’t get into my car. Do you think they (pointing to a distant convenient store) would have a battery to fit this?”
“Hmmm, I dunno. Do you have an alarm too?” I asked.
“No, just this remote thingy,” she answered, handing it and the car keys to me. As I took the key and manually unlocked the door, I replied, “Why don’t you drive over there and check about the batteries. It’s a long walk.”
–from Chris T.
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