The Blizzard (Story)

First of all so that you don't think I'm trying to pull anything tricky,
I just want to mention that I'm cross-posting this story into the
rec.motorcycles.victory and the rec.motorcycles.harley newsgroups. RMV
needs some traffic, so please, if you feel like replying, feel free to
leave the cross-posting.

I posted a short reference to this event in RMH the day it occurred, so
I'll flesh it out here best as I can remember the events of that day.

Also, this has only been proof-read once, so please forgive my typos and
other errors.

Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and cold, I
went on the Jackson County ABATE Toy Run in Southern Oregon. We started
out at the old D&S Harley shop and the ride itself was pretty
uneventful. As usual, we were escorted through Phoenix and Medford by
the police, traffic was held up at lights so we could get through and we
wound up ending it behind the Naval Reserve Center at the Moose Lodge.
It was pretty cold, so most everybody had a shot or two in the bar,
and also some hot coffee and chili-dogs. I wasn't drinking at the time
though, just one of the occasional breaks from drinking I used to take
so that I could prove to myself that I could do without it (I no longer
drink except for two or three beers once in a while these days). After a
while, we tossed our toys into the pile there and the crowd started
thinning out.
It wasn't as easy for me to get on my way though, because my old '69
FLH was giving me fits. Her Interstate battery was on its last leg. I
could start Myrtle up (that was the name I gave my bike), but only after
furiously kick-starting for several minutes. She'd fart, belch and then
chokingly, sputter into full life.
As I put on my gear to leave while anticipating the sweat I was going
to produce in the next several minutes, my friends Joe and his wife,
Benita, and Mooch and his old lady (forget her name, Mooch is dead now
and his old lady was only one of many) started working on me to go with
them into Jacksonville.
I looked up at the sky and saw a nice sucker hole in the clouds that
stretched all the way through the valley to my home town. "I should go
home now, while I can," I told my friends.
"NAHH!!!! Yuhaingoddahayeronyerazz!" slurred Mooch. "Cummon, don't be
such a pussy!"
"It's going to rain in the next few minutes, and it'll be a freezing
rain too. I just want to get home while I can," I replied, "If I go now,
I can make it home before the shit comes down."
At that point, Joe chimed in to back up Mooch and so did the women.
Seeing that resistance was futile, I reluctantly gave in and agreed to
go with them, "But only for a little while. I don't like the look of
that sky at all."
And speaking of that sky, it was edging the valley with thick, black
clouds now.
The bike started up after only a few kicks, so I foolishly took that
as a good sign that everything would be all right and fell in behind the
pack as we all blasted out of the parking lot. Down the road we went, as
the rain started spattering on my glasses.
I had on my rain gear but after a few minutes, the rain was coming
down REAL hard. I started getting worried about the bike sucking some
water, it was coming down so hard. Not only that, but there was a little
sleet mixed in with the rain as we pulled up to park along the side
street bordering the Jacksonville Tavern.
We all loudly poured into the bar, I ordered coffee to warm my
freezing hands and the rest got a couple of large pitchers of beer with
four glasses. We all sat down and started shooting the shit.
As I sat there, I managed to look outside to see that the sleet had
now turned into snow, which was beginning to stick sort of. Joe saw me
looking outside and said, "Don't worry John. It's going to break in a
little while. We can just sit it out here and wait for it to end."
"I don't know Joe, it looks to me like it's getting worse. And just
in the time you've been talking to me, it's started sticking real good."
It had indeed.
"Hell, don't worry about it John. I used to live in Bellevue,
Washington and it snowed all the time. It's not that big a deal to ride
in the snow if you just use your head."
At that moment though, I was using my head to remember with a clear
mental image the condition of the Yul Brynner I had mounted on my rear rim.
"Think I'll go outside and see how deep it is, Joe," I said loudly so
that he could hear me over the braying and guffawing coming from Mooch
and the rest of the table as they laughed over one of Mooch's stories.
I went outside and was greeted by a winter wonderland. Horrified, I
walked over to my bike and, using my index finger as a gauge, discovered
that the snow was already three inches deep! Not only that, but it was
coming in sideways and in huge gobs of dry fluff.
Going back inside the bar, I quickly grabbed my leather coat off the
back of my chair and hurriedly put it on. I then put my beanie and army
helmet liner (the two fit each other like they're made for each other,
by the way) on and started fighting my way back into my Columbia rain gear.
"You idiots can do whatever you like, but I'm going to make a break
for it. That shit is over three inches deep on my seat and it's starting
to come down harder!"
Everybody in the bar heard me and suddenly realized that this was a
situation which could really suck for each and every one of them
personally. You could hear chairs scraping and a couple of glasses
hitting the floor as people crowded to the windows. My friends suddenly
became very sober and after one look outside, also started skinning up
in their gear.
By the time Joe and Benita (who he was packing that day - she
normally rides her own bike), and Mooch and Donna (that's right, that
was her name.. and Mooch was packing HER too) all got outside, I had
already been kicking Myrtle over for several minutes. She stuttered to
life as they were all trying to get on their bikes.
Nervously, and knowing that it would be slippery, I gently eased the
clutch out so that I could pull away from the curb I'd backed up against
when I parked. WHOOPS! The ass end started to slide out from under me
towards Joe and Benita!
Joe shouted "HOLY SHIT" as I outriggered with my legs and managed to
get the bike under control without running into him. I yelled out
"LATER!" as I creeped off in first gear, doing about five mph.
My way home was through hill and dale, and normally I would have
taken the road at the 60 to 65 mph I usually cruised at back then. In
that snow storm though, I knew that first gear was as far as I would be
getting and also realized that it would be foolish to go any faster than
10 mph. Gritting my teeth and hunkering down into the cold, on I went.
After a while, I decided that the best plan of action was to go in as
straight a line as possible, slowing down to a crawl in the corners.
This seemed to work and I didn't go down even once. It also might have
helped that my butt cheeks were so tightly clenched that my asshole was
cutting o-rings in my seat upholstery. Every muscle in my body was tight
as a steel cable and screamed in agony at me after only 15 minutes. And
I had another 14 miles to go at the very least!
My game plan soon became to make it as far as my old friend Tyroneous
Maximus' house. In fact, thinking about his warm place rapidly became
the only thing that kept me going, as the cars started backing up behind
me in that blizzard.
That's right, it was now officially what I would call a blizzard. I
had been stationed in Connecticut while in the service, and I knew full
well what one looked like. It was nearly a whiteout and showed no sign
of letting up.
Mile after tedious mile I went. After a while, it dawned on me that,
although they were being amazingly sympathetic and patient with me, the
cars wanted to get past so that they could minimize the risk of their
getting stuck. Probably not one of them had chains in their trunk
because this storm was a real out-of-the-blue wall of shnay.
Deciding that there was no time like the present, I reluctantly
pulled off into a turnout onto the six-inches-deep snow and waited for
the cars to get by. Unfortunately, at this point the stress had caused
the reptilian portion of my brain to kick in as some kind of survival
response, and the all-consuming rage which was keeping me alive directed
my frozen hand to flip everybody off as they went by. I'm sure the
people all looked at me and thought that I was some kind of crazy
asshole. And, of course, I was.
When this long string of cars got by, there were no others. It was
just me and Myrtle, who I had barely managed to keep running. Few other
people were stupid enough to be out in that storm if they could be
someplace safe and warm.
Did I forget to mention that Myrtle's S&S Super "B" could not be set
to idle? That's right! I had to keep the son of a bitch running by
manually controlling the throttle with my now-painfully cramped fingers
and wrist. I'd been doing it so long though, that it was old habit at
this point and I ignored the pain. Pain could be paid for later.
Now it was time to get back on the road and moving. I just KNEW that
I was going to fall over at least twice before this would be possible,
but I decide to give it a go in spite of this. Hell, I didn't have much
choice anyway!
I nervously and slowly let out the clutch as I just BARELY, almost
IMPERCEPTIBLY gave Myrtle a little gas. Old Yul in the back though, he
didn't want to bite that snow at all and the rear tire spun without
doing any good. I feathered it out a little more, and actually used my
legs and feet to kind of "stroke! stroke!" the bitch into moving forward
at a tiny rate. Then, after a while the ratio of slippage to forward
movement got smaller and smaller. Amazingly, I soon actually found
myself moving down the road as before. All this without having fallen
over yet, not even once!
Now it started getting really nasty. I had to keep using my gloved
left index finger to windshield wiper the snow off of my glasses. I'd
already been doing this, but now I was riding one-handed the whole way
and still going 10 mph in first too. The cold was starting to get to me
and for the first time, I realized that I could very easily die out
there in the country. They would find my frozen, blue corpse flipping
the world the bird several days later, a snarl on my lips and contempt
in my grayed-over eyes, I was sure.
Now the only thing that kept me going was the thought of Tyrone,
welcoming me into his house and shoving a cup of hot coffee into my
black-fingered, frost-bit hands. And after having now done 45 minutes in
this blizzard, I was running on auto-pilot pretty much. The thought of
Tyrone and his coffee became a kind of mantra. On and on I went at a
crawl, nervously making each corner while thoroughly convinced that this
would be the one where I went off the embankment and into the irrigation
ditch.
Nonetheless, the end came and I finally managed to make it to
Tyrone's! It had been a miserable, cold, son-of-a-bitch, but I now found
myself rolling down the snow-covered, gravel driveway and into his
snow-covered back yard past his snow covered fence and snow-covered
everything.
I parked the bike on the cement slab under the back porch awning and
locked her up. I now realized that death was biting me on the ass,
because I could barely move. It taken me almost 10 minutes to fumble the
padlock into the neck tabs, my hands were so frozen!
Up the back steps I tromped and when I got to the top, I pounded
loudly on the door while smiling a huge grin of anticipation.
No answer.
I beat on the door again and waited.
No answer.
Unbeknownst to me, Tyrone was, at that moment, WAY the fuck up in the
woods with his girlfriend and her kids, getting a Christmas tree. They'd
taken her four-wheel drive, 3/4-ton Dodge pickup and no chains. At the
top of Wagner Creek Road, WAY up in the mountains, they'd managed to get
caught in the storm like everybody else, gotten stuck and were not to
get home until late that evening after much effort on Tyrone's part to
get them dug out.
But back to my situation, I realized that the only solution was to
kick the back door in.
Tyrone would understand that this had been an emergency.
I was about to die, surely he'd understand!
Doors are replaceable.
Yeah, I know the idea sucked, but what choice did I have?
Besides, I would pay for the damage!
Back up the steps I went to put my strategy into action. As I got to
the door though, there was a major change in my plans as Tyrone's 120
pound, purebred, unneutered, male German Shepherd "Brutus" made his
presence know.
Brutus did this by jumping up and crashing repeatedly against the
back door, barking loudly at me and spraying saliva all over the window.
I knew Brutus and we got along, but without his master there, he wasn't
going to let me in the house.
Period.
"Great," I though, "so this is how I'm going to die. Nice. Freezing
to death after all I went through. Time to come up with a plan B."
Just as I though this, a light bulb came on and I remembered that I'd
brought a metal thermos of coffee in the right saddlebag. Frantically
pulling the gloves off of my nearly frost-bitten fingers, I fumbled for
the keys in my pocket and fumble-fucked them into my saddlebag lock. The
thermos was still about half full, and the contents weren't quite hot,
but the coffee was definitely warm enough to do some good! I guzzled it
all down quickly and put the thermos back in the bag.
Revived for the time being, now it was time to think about how I was
going to get home. I knew that the bike was out of view and safe. Nobody
was going to mess with it in six inches of snow and at some point, my
friend would be home to deal with anybody who had the balls to try it.
Turning into the wind, I braced myself and leaned into the driving
snow to cross the road and stick out my thumb. I walked a ways down the
road so as to distance myself from my bike some.
If it hadn't been so cold and such a dangerous situation, I had to
admit that it was starkly beautiful. Everything was covered in a thick
blanket of uniform white and other than the hissing of the snow, there
was absolutely no sound at all. Even Brutus had gone back to his couch
and quieted down, satisfied that the threat to his territory had been
dealt with. The houses in the distance kind of reminded me of a Thomas
Kincaid painting with their warm glow.
Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a car almost noiselessly hissed by and
didn't stop.
That amazed me. How could anybody be that ruthless in this kind of
storm? Well, I wasn't thinking too straight at this point or I would
have understood I guess. Then another car went by and didn't stop. I
started to get a little concerned. Maybe nobody would stop for me and
I'd have to walk to the closest warm place, several miles away or even
ask for the mercy of some stranger's grudging hospitality?
By the time the third, widely-spaced car went by without stopping, I
was getting pissed. This was BULLSHIT, I thought. I knew that *I* would
stop if I saw some poor bastard standing in the snow and freezing to
death like I was doing.
I flipped off the fourth car as it too went by and yelled loudly
after it, "YOU ASSHOLE!", mimicking Dennis Hopper in Easyrider when they
got turned down by a motel manager.
However, after a long while, a fifth rig came down the road and
pulled off to get me. The driver threw the passenger door open and
hollered for me to "HURRY UP AND GET IN!" with a big smile on his face
at the spectacle I presented. Here I was, a 240 pound biker in leathers
and rain gear, helmet on head, standing in the middle of nowhere without
a bike. It must have been quite a sight.
I jumped up and into the seat, and shut the door. Immediately I found
myself in Death Valley. The young guy (who is named Tony and who turned
out to be a good friend of another friend of mine's son, Johnny) had the
heat going full blast. His rig was a mid-sized, four wheel drive Toyota
pickup and he had huge tires on it. Hell, he didn't even have to slow
down for the snow!
As I started peeling off a few layers so that I didn't suffer a heat
stroke, I thanked him profusely for stopping. He asked where I was going
and when I told him, it turned out that he was on the way to my home
town to pick up his girlfriend. Apparently, she worked at the newspaper
there and he would be driving right past the bottom of my street!
Away we went and quickly covered the few remaining miles before
reaching the final approach to my town, which is a hill. That hill was
now covered with, and totally blocked by, numerous cars and trucks at
various angles, all of them stuck after a failed attempt to climb the
hill. They were also all now immovable and there was no way past them.
"Jeez, this could really suck!" said Tony, "I'm not sure we'll be
able to get into town!"
"Not a problem," I said, "See that driveway looking thing right there
by the muffler shop?"
"Yep."
"That's actually a turnoff onto a road that bypasses all of this shit
and comes back into the highway right at the top of the hill! Go for it!"
Laughing at the idiots who were sitting on the hill with their
collective thumbs up their asses, we blasted off down the side-road. Of
course, several people saw what we were doing and followed us. That
didn't hurt anything though and in fact I'm glad that they figured out
what we were doing. Probably saved a lot of people a lot of time and
trouble.
Finally, just like I had said, we came out right at the top of the
log-jam of stuck cars. Tony grinned in appreciation and asked, "Now
where do you live again?"
I told him the street once more and said that he could just let me
off at the bottom; that I could easily walk the three or four blocks
uphill to where I lived.
"NO WAY!" said Tony, "I wouldn't have gotten through that mess back
there if you hadn't been along. I'll take you to your front door!"
And he did, right to it in fact! The snow was going good still as I
waved at my rescuer from the porch and he drove off. I fumbled out my
keys and went into the cold (but soon to be warm) house.
It occurred to me that a photograph was in order, and so I took one
of myself standing in the snow, stripped from the waist up down to my
t-shirt and grinning like a baboon.

Joe later told me that he and Benita had fallen over a couple of
times on the way back home, but that neither they nor the bike had been
hurt. They'd ridden to his daughter Debbie's, then Debbie had driven
Benita home so she could make it in to work. Joe, however, went to over
to Mooch's where he drank a few more beers and tried to wait out the
storm. It finally broke enough for him that he was able to get back on
the road, which was pretty much free of snow on the well traveled parts
until he got within a few blocks of his house.

Mooch had made it home but had fallen over several times, he later
told me.

It was another week before the snow melted enough for me to be able
to retrieve my bike. Tyrone and I both swapped stories about what we'd
each gone through that day and thankfully, were both able to laugh about
it all. My entire body felt like I'd been beaten with a baseball bat for
about two weeks because of the physical effort it had taken to ride that
bike the distance in that snow with a bald, rear tire. I walked like
"there's Uncle Joe, he's-a-movin'-kinda-slow" the whole time.

--
John Corliss BS206

"John Corliss" <jcorliss@fake.invalid> wrote in message
news:13lbrfum35vsc7e@corp.supernews.com...
> First of all so that you don't think I'm trying to pull anything tricky, I
> just want to mention that I'm cross-posting this story into the
> rec.motorcycles.victory and the rec.motorcycles.harley newsgroups. RMV
> needs some traffic, so please, if you feel like replying, feel free to
> leave the cross-posting.
>
> I posted a short reference to this event in RMH the day it occurred, so
> I'll flesh it out here best as I can remember the events of that day.
>
> Also, this has only been proof-read once, so please forgive my typos and
> other errors.
>
> Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and cold, I went
> on the Jackson County ABATE Toy Run in Southern Oregon. We started out at
> the old D&S Harley shop and the ride itself was pretty uneventful. As
> usual, we were escorted through Phoenix and Medford by the police, traffic
> was held up at lights so we could get through and we wound up ending it
> behind the Naval Reserve Center at the Moose Lodge.
> It was pretty cold, so most everybody had a shot or two in the bar, and
> also some hot coffee and chili-dogs. I wasn't drinking at the time though,
> just one of the occasional breaks from drinking I used to take so that I
> could prove to myself that I could do without it (I no longer drink except
> for two or three beers once in a while these days). After a while, we
> tossed our toys into the pile there and the crowd started thinning out.
> It wasn't as easy for me to get on my way though, because my old '69 FLH
> was giving me fits. Her Interstate battery was on its last leg. I could
> start Myrtle up (that was the name I gave my bike), but only after
> furiously kick-starting for several minutes. She'd fart, belch and then
> chokingly, sputter into full life.
> As I put on my gear to leave while anticipating the sweat I was going to
> produce in the next several minutes, my friends Joe and his wife, Benita,
> and Mooch and his old lady (forget her name, Mooch is dead now and his old
> lady was only one of many) started working on me to go with them into
> Jacksonville.
> I looked up at the sky and saw a nice sucker hole in the clouds that
> stretched all the way through the valley to my home town. "I should go
> home now, while I can," I told my friends.
> "NAHH!!!! Yuhaingoddahayeronyerazz!" slurred Mooch. "Cummon, don't be
> such a pussy!"
> "It's going to rain in the next few minutes, and it'll be a freezing
> rain too. I just want to get home while I can," I replied, "If I go now, I
> can make it home before the shit comes down."
> At that point, Joe chimed in to back up Mooch and so did the women.
> Seeing that resistance was futile, I reluctantly gave in and agreed to go
> with them, "But only for a little while. I don't like the look of that sky
> at all."
> And speaking of that sky, it was edging the valley with thick, black
> clouds now.
> The bike started up after only a few kicks, so I foolishly took that as
> a good sign that everything would be all right and fell in behind the pack
> as we all blasted out of the parking lot. Down the road we went, as the
> rain started spattering on my glasses.
> I had on my rain gear but after a few minutes, the rain was coming down
> REAL hard. I started getting worried about the bike sucking some water, it
> was coming down so hard. Not only that, but there was a little sleet mixed
> in with the rain as we pulled up to park along the side street bordering
> the Jacksonville Tavern.
> We all loudly poured into the bar, I ordered coffee to warm my freezing
> hands and the rest got a couple of large pitchers of beer with four
> glasses. We all sat down and started shooting the shit.
> As I sat there, I managed to look outside to see that the sleet had now
> turned into snow, which was beginning to stick sort of. Joe saw me looking
> outside and said, "Don't worry John. It's going to break in a little
> while. We can just sit it out here and wait for it to end."
> "I don't know Joe, it looks to me like it's getting worse. And just in
> the time you've been talking to me, it's started sticking real good."
> It had indeed.
> "Hell, don't worry about it John. I used to live in Bellevue, Washington
> and it snowed all the time. It's not that big a deal to ride in the snow
> if you just use your head."
> At that moment though, I was using my head to remember with a clear
> mental image the condition of the Yul Brynner I had mounted on my rear
> rim.
> "Think I'll go outside and see how deep it is, Joe," I said loudly so
> that he could hear me over the braying and guffawing coming from Mooch and
> the rest of the table as they laughed over one of Mooch's stories.
> I went outside and was greeted by a winter wonderland. Horrified, I
> walked over to my bike and, using my index finger as a gauge, discovered
> that the snow was already three inches deep! Not only that, but it was
> coming in sideways and in huge gobs of dry fluff.
> Going back inside the bar, I quickly grabbed my leather coat off the
> back of my chair and hurriedly put it on. I then put my beanie and army
> helmet liner (the two fit each other like they're made for each other, by
> the way) on and started fighting my way back into my Columbia rain gear.
> "You idiots can do whatever you like, but I'm going to make a break for
> it. That shit is over three inches deep on my seat and it's starting to
> come down harder!"
> Everybody in the bar heard me and suddenly realized that this was a
> situation which could really suck for each and every one of them
> personally. You could hear chairs scraping and a couple of glasses hitting
> the floor as people crowded to the windows. My friends suddenly became
> very sober and after one look outside, also started skinning up in their
> gear.
> By the time Joe and Benita (who he was packing that day - she normally
> rides her own bike), and Mooch and Donna (that's right, that was her
> name.. and Mooch was packing HER too) all got outside, I had already been
> kicking Myrtle over for several minutes. She stuttered to life as they
> were all trying to get on their bikes.
> Nervously, and knowing that it would be slippery, I gently eased the
> clutch out so that I could pull away from the curb I'd backed up against
> when I parked. WHOOPS! The ass end started to slide out from under me
> towards Joe and Benita!
> Joe shouted "HOLY SHIT" as I outriggered with my legs and managed to get
> the bike under control without running into him. I yelled out "LATER!" as
> I creeped off in first gear, doing about five mph.
> My way home was through hill and dale, and normally I would have taken
> the road at the 60 to 65 mph I usually cruised at back then. In that snow
> storm though, I knew that first gear was as far as I would be getting and
> also realized that it would be foolish to go any faster than 10 mph.
> Gritting my teeth and hunkering down into the cold, on I went.
> After a while, I decided that the best plan of action was to go in as
> straight a line as possible, slowing down to a crawl in the corners. This
> seemed to work and I didn't go down even once. It also might have helped
> that my butt cheeks were so tightly clenched that my asshole was cutting
> o-rings in my seat upholstery. Every muscle in my body was tight as a
> steel cable and screamed in agony at me after only 15 minutes. And I had
> another 14 miles to go at the very least!
> My game plan soon became to make it as far as my old friend Tyroneous
> Maximus' house. In fact, thinking about his warm place rapidly became the
> only thing that kept me going, as the cars started backing up behind me in
> that blizzard.
> That's right, it was now officially what I would call a blizzard. I had
> been stationed in Connecticut while in the service, and I knew full well
> what one looked like. It was nearly a whiteout and showed no sign of
> letting up.
> Mile after tedious mile I went. After a while, it dawned on me that,
> although they were being amazingly sympathetic and patient with me, the
> cars wanted to get past so that they could minimize the risk of their
> getting stuck. Probably not one of them had chains in their trunk because
> this storm was a real out-of-the-blue wall of shnay.
> Deciding that there was no time like the present, I reluctantly pulled
> off into a turnout onto the six-inches-deep snow and waited for the cars
> to get by. Unfortunately, at this point the stress had caused the
> reptilian portion of my brain to kick in as some kind of survival
> response, and the all-consuming rage which was keeping me alive directed
> my frozen hand to flip everybody off as they went by. I'm sure the people
> all looked at me and thought that I was some kind of crazy asshole. And,
> of course, I was.
> When this long string of cars got by, there were no others. It was just
> me and Myrtle, who I had barely managed to keep running. Few other people
> were stupid enough to be out in that storm if they could be someplace safe
> and warm.
> Did I forget to mention that Myrtle's S&S Super "B" could not be set to
> idle? That's right! I had to keep the son of a bitch running by manually
> controlling the throttle with my now-painfully cramped fingers and wrist.
> I'd been doing it so long though, that it was old habit at this point and
> I ignored the pain. Pain could be paid for later.
> Now it was time to get back on the road and moving. I just KNEW that I
> was going to fall over at least twice before this would be possible, but I
> decide to give it a go in spite of this. Hell, I didn't have much choice
> anyway!
> I nervously and slowly let out the clutch as I just BARELY, almost
> IMPERCEPTIBLY gave Myrtle a little gas. Old Yul in the back though, he
> didn't want to bite that snow at all and the rear tire spun without doing
> any good. I feathered it out a little more, and actually used my legs and
> feet to kind of "stroke! stroke!" the bitch into moving forward at a tiny
> rate. Then, after a while the ratio of slippage to forward movement got
> smaller and smaller. Amazingly, I soon actually found myself moving down
> the road as before. All this without having fallen over yet, not even
> once!
> Now it started getting really nasty. I had to keep using my gloved left
> index finger to windshield wiper the snow off of my glasses. I'd already
> been doing this, but now I was riding one-handed the whole way and still
> going 10 mph in first too. The cold was starting to get to me and for the
> first time, I realized that I could very easily die out there in the
> country. They would find my frozen, blue corpse flipping the world the
> bird several days later, a snarl on my lips and contempt in my grayed-over
> eyes, I was sure.
> Now the only thing that kept me going was the thought of Tyrone,
> welcoming me into his house and shoving a cup of hot coffee into my
> black-fingered, frost-bit hands. And after having now done 45 minutes in
> this blizzard, I was running on auto-pilot pretty much. The thought of
> Tyrone and his coffee became a kind of mantra. On and on I went at a
> crawl, nervously making each corner while thoroughly convinced that this
> would be the one where I went off the embankment and into the irrigation
> ditch.
> Nonetheless, the end came and I finally managed to make it to Tyrone's!
> It had been a miserable, cold, son-of-a-bitch, but I now found myself
> rolling down the snow-covered, gravel driveway and into his snow-covered
> back yard past his snow covered fence and snow-covered everything.
> I parked the bike on the cement slab under the back porch awning and
> locked her up. I now realized that death was biting me on the ass, because
> I could barely move. It taken me almost 10 minutes to fumble the padlock
> into the neck tabs, my hands were so frozen!
> Up the back steps I tromped and when I got to the top, I pounded loudly
> on the door while smiling a huge grin of anticipation.
> No answer.
> I beat on the door again and waited.
> No answer.
> Unbeknownst to me, Tyrone was, at that moment, WAY the fuck up in the
> woods with his girlfriend and her kids, getting a Christmas tree. They'd
> taken her four-wheel drive, 3/4-ton Dodge pickup and no chains. At the top
> of Wagner Creek Road, WAY up in the mountains, they'd managed to get
> caught in the storm like everybody else, gotten stuck and were not to get
> home until late that evening after much effort on Tyrone's part to get
> them dug out.
> But back to my situation, I realized that the only solution was to kick
> the back door in.
> Tyrone would understand that this had been an emergency.
> I was about to die, surely he'd understand!
> Doors are replaceable.
> Yeah, I know the idea sucked, but what choice did I have?
> Besides, I would pay for the damage!
> Back up the steps I went to put my strategy into action. As I got to the
> door though, there was a major change in my plans as Tyrone's 120 pound,
> purebred, unneutered, male German Shepherd "Brutus" made his presence
> know.
> Brutus did this by jumping up and crashing repeatedly against the back
> door, barking loudly at me and spraying saliva all over the window. I knew
> Brutus and we got along, but without his master there, he wasn't going to
> let me in the house.
> Period.
> "Great," I though, "so this is how I'm going to die. Nice. Freezing to
> death after all I went through. Time to come up with a plan B."
> Just as I though this, a light bulb came on and I remembered that I'd
> brought a metal thermos of coffee in the right saddlebag. Frantically
> pulling the gloves off of my nearly frost-bitten fingers, I fumbled for
> the keys in my pocket and fumble-fucked them into my saddlebag lock. The
> thermos was still about half full, and the contents weren't quite hot, but
> the coffee was definitely warm enough to do some good! I guzzled it all
> down quickly and put the thermos back in the bag.
> Revived for the time being, now it was time to think about how I was
> going to get home. I knew that the bike was out of view and safe. Nobody
> was going to mess with it in six inches of snow and at some point, my
> friend would be home to deal with anybody who had the balls to try it.
> Turning into the wind, I braced myself and leaned into the driving snow
> to cross the road and stick out my thumb. I walked a ways down the road so
> as to distance myself from my bike some.
> If it hadn't been so cold and such a dangerous situation, I had to admit
> that it was starkly beautiful. Everything was covered in a thick blanket
> of uniform white and other than the hissing of the snow, there was
> absolutely no sound at all. Even Brutus had gone back to his couch and
> quieted down, satisfied that the threat to his territory had been dealt
> with. The houses in the distance kind of reminded me of a Thomas Kincaid
> painting with their warm glow.
> Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a car almost noiselessly hissed by and
> didn't stop.
> That amazed me. How could anybody be that ruthless in this kind of
> storm? Well, I wasn't thinking too straight at this point or I would have
> understood I guess. Then another car went by and didn't stop. I started to
> get a little concerned. Maybe nobody would stop for me and I'd have to
> walk to the closest warm place, several miles away or even ask for the
> mercy of some stranger's grudging hospitality?
> By the time the third, widely-spaced car went by without stopping, I was
> getting pissed. This was BULLSHIT, I thought. I knew that *I* would stop
> if I saw some poor bastard standing in the snow and freezing to death like
> I was doing.
> I flipped off the fourth car as it too went by and yelled loudly after
> it, "YOU ASSHOLE!", mimicking Dennis Hopper in Easyrider when they got
> turned down by a motel manager.
> However, after a long while, a fifth rig came down the road and pulled
> off to get me. The driver threw the passenger door open and hollered for
> me to "HURRY UP AND GET IN!" with a big smile on his face at the spectacle
> I presented. Here I was, a 240 pound biker in leathers and rain gear,
> helmet on head, standing in the middle of nowhere without a bike. It must
> have been quite a sight.
> I jumped up and into the seat, and shut the door. Immediately I found
> myself in Death Valley. The young guy (who is named Tony and who turned
> out to be a good friend of another friend of mine's son, Johnny) had the
> heat going full blast. His rig was a mid-sized, four wheel drive Toyota
> pickup and he had huge tires on it. Hell, he didn't even have to slow down
> for the snow!
> As I started peeling off a few layers so that I didn't suffer a heat
> stroke, I thanked him profusely for stopping. He asked where I was going
> and when I told him, it turned out that he was on the way to my home town
> to pick up his girlfriend. Apparently, she worked at the newspaper there
> and he would be driving right past the bottom of my street!
> Away we went and quickly covered the few remaining miles before reaching
> the final approach to my town, which is a hill. That hill was now covered
> with, and totally blocked by, numerous cars and trucks at various angles,
> all of them stuck after a failed attempt to climb the hill. They were also
> all now immovable and there was no way past them.
> "Jeez, this could really suck!" said Tony, "I'm not sure we'll be able
> to get into town!"
> "Not a problem," I said, "See that driveway looking thing right there by
> the muffler shop?"
> "Yep."
> "That's actually a turnoff onto a road that bypasses all of this shit
> and comes back into the highway right at the top of the hill! Go for it!"
> Laughing at the idiots who were sitting on the hill with their
> collective thumbs up their asses, we blasted off down the side-road. Of
> course, several people saw what we were doing and followed us. That didn't
> hurt anything though and in fact I'm glad that they figured out what we
> were doing. Probably saved a lot of people a lot of time and trouble.
> Finally, just like I had said, we came out right at the top of the
> log-jam of stuck cars. Tony grinned in appreciation and asked, "Now where
> do you live again?"
> I told him the street once more and said that he could just let me off
> at the bottom; that I could easily walk the three or four blocks uphill to
> where I lived.
> "NO WAY!" said Tony, "I wouldn't have gotten through that mess back
> there if you hadn't been along. I'll take you to your front door!"
> And he did, right to it in fact! The snow was going good still as I
> waved at my rescuer from the porch and he drove off. I fumbled out my keys
> and went into the cold (but soon to be warm) house.
> It occurred to me that a photograph was in order, and so I took one of
> myself standing in the snow, stripped from the waist up down to my t-shirt
> and grinning like a baboon.
>
> Joe later told me that he and Benita had fallen over a couple of times
> on the way back home, but that neither they nor the bike had been hurt.
> They'd ridden to his daughter Debbie's, then Debbie had driven Benita home
> so she could make it in to work. Joe, however, went to over to Mooch's
> where he drank a few more beers and tried to wait out the storm. It
> finally broke enough for him that he was able to get back on the road,
> which was pretty much free of snow on the well traveled parts until he got
> within a few blocks of his house.
>
> Mooch had made it home but had fallen over several times, he later told
> me.
>
> It was another week before the snow melted enough for me to be able to
> retrieve my bike. Tyrone and I both swapped stories about what we'd each
> gone through that day and thankfully, were both able to laugh about it
> all. My entire body felt like I'd been beaten with a baseball bat for
> about two weeks because of the physical effort it had taken to ride that
> bike the distance in that snow with a bald, rear tire. I walked like
> "there's Uncle Joe, he's-a-movin'-kinda-slow" the whole time.
>
> --
> John Corliss BS206

I mighta read your original refference to that adventure way back when.
Thankfully I never faught the snow, but I know what its liek to ride in the
cold. If you hadn't had good gear you might not have made it.


--
PROFILE LINK http://tinyurl.com/2rsp3v
VROC #21909
Current Rides (Yuma, Az)
2005 VN1600B2 Kawasaki Vulcan Mean Streak
2001 VLX600 Honda Shadow (for sale)
2003 FLTR Harley Road Glide (wife's bike)
1981 CM200T Honda Twin (project)
--
Bob La Londe
Fishing Arizona & The Colorado River
Fishing Forums & Contests
http://www.YumaBassMan.com



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Bob La Londe wrote:
> John Corliss wrote:
>>
>> First of all so that you don't think I'm trying to pull anything tricky, I
>> just want to mention that I'm cross-posting this story into the
>> rec.motorcycles.victory and the rec.motorcycles.harley newsgroups. RMV
>> needs some traffic, so please, if you feel like replying, feel free to
>> leave the cross-posting.
>>
>> I posted a short reference to this event in RMH the day it occurred, so
>> I'll flesh it out here best as I can remember the events of that day.
>>
>> Also, this has only been proof-read once, so please forgive my typos and
>> other errors.
>>
>> Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and cold, I went
>> on the Jackson County ABATE Toy Run in Southern Oregon. We started out at
>> the old D&S Harley shop and the ride itself was pretty uneventful. As
>> usual, we were escorted through Phoenix and Medford by the police, traffic
>> was held up at lights so we could get through and we wound up ending it
>> behind the Naval Reserve Center at the Moose Lodge.
>> (big snip)
>
> I mighta read your original refference to that adventure way back when.
> Thankfully I never faught the snow, but I know what its liek to ride in the
> cold. If you hadn't had good gear you might not have made it.

Heh. On the other hand, if I hadn't been such a cheap prick and had
replaced the rear tire when I was supposed to, riding the bike to
Tyrone's place wouldn't have taken as much effort.

--
John Corliss BS206

> Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and cold,


Damn Corliss, did ya get a little wind in your face this week too? <g>

Hoppy
BS7 AH85 SENS SLOB16

Hoppy wrote:
>> Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and cold,
>
> Damn Corliss, did ya get a little wind in your face this week too? <g>

Fuck that! I'm a creature of comfort anymore. Anything below 60 degrees
and the bike stays parked. 80)>

--
John "I own the t-shirt but not the bike" Corliss BS206

John Corliss wrote:
> Hoppy wrote:
>>> Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and cold,
>>
>> Damn Corliss, did ya get a little wind in your face this week too?
>> <g>
>
> Fuck that! I'm a creature of comfort anymore. Anything below 60
> degrees and the bike stays parked. 80)>

I rode to work this morning at 34 degrees because the weatherman said it
was going to be in the upper 50's by 4 pm .
It was 38 degrees and felt like 30 at 4 . I rode home anyway . Grinnin'
all the way .
--

Snag aka OSG #1
'90 Ultra , "Strider"
The road goes on forever ...
none to one to reply

Snag wrote:
> John Corliss wrote:
>> Hoppy wrote:
>>>> Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and cold,
>>> Damn Corliss, did ya get a little wind in your face this week too?
>>> <g>
>> Fuck that! I'm a creature of comfort anymore. Anything below 60
>> degrees and the bike stays parked. 80)>
>
> I rode to work this morning at 34 degrees because the weatherman said it
> was going to be in the upper 50's by 4 pm .
> It was 38 degrees and felt like 30 at 4 . I rode home anyway . Grinnin'
> all the way .

You bad.

Don't know if I posted about my 200 mile ride in the cold in back
October. I'd gone to my destination without adequate cold weather gear
because I didn't expect to need it. Then a cold snap moved in while I
was there, and I had to ride back home in it. My friggin' fingers
actually started to turn black from the second knuckle to the tip by the
time I'd covered only 45 miles. This is no shit. First near frostbite
experience I've ever had. Scared the hell out of me because pain hadn't
alerted me to the fact that this was occurring.

There's a lot to be said for heated gloves. Gonna be getting myself a
pair at some point. Also, another good item to carry is an insulated
face mask like this one:

http://tinyurl.com/yvr8yh

The fact that there isn't a hole for your nostrils is a good idea. You
can still breath, but it prevents cold air from going into your sinuses
and that's a major factor in your body losing heat. I've heard that as
much as 60% of your body heat lose occurs from your head.

--
John Corliss BS206

John Corliss wrote:
> Snag wrote:
>> John Corliss wrote:
>>> Hoppy wrote:
>>>>> Back on December of 1998, and despite it being overcast and
>>>>> cold,
>>>> Damn Corliss, did ya get a little wind in your face this week too?
>>>> <g>
>>> Fuck that! I'm a creature of comfort anymore. Anything below 60
>>> degrees and the bike stays parked. 80)>
>>
>> I rode to work this morning at 34 degrees because the weatherman
>> said it was going to be in the upper 50's by 4 pm .
>> It was 38 degrees and felt like 30 at 4 . I rode home anyway .
>> Grinnin' all the way .
>
> You bad.
>
Nah , not really , it was only about six miles , and on city streets
mostly . Now a few years ago , when I rode thru snow and sleet to get
together with some friends up in Mountain View ... and on a Sportster , not
a bagger ...
--

Snag aka OSG #1
'90 Ultra , "Strider"
The road goes on forever ...
none to one to reply

Warren Weber wrote:
> John Corliss wrote:
>> First of all so that you don't think I'm trying to pull anything tricky, I
>> just want to mention that I'm cross-posting this story into the
>> rec.motorcycles.victory and the rec.motorcycles.harley newsgroups. RMV
>> needs some traffic, so please, if you feel like replying, feel free to
>> leave the cross-posting.
>>
> SNIP
>
> John.. You are a good writer. Ever consider it as a job? W W

Thanks, Warren, that's very kind of you. However, I just re-read the
story and can see where there are several changes I would make to it.

Story writing is a lot of work. It's okay to do, as long as a guy has
something worthwhile to write about. I've been up against "the wall"
almost every time I've tried to come up with an idea for fiction, but
writing about my life is easy because I've been through so much
unbelievable bullshit.

80)>

--
John Corliss BS206

On Sat, 08 Dec 2007 16:10:37 -0800, John Corliss
<jcorliss@fake.invalid> after bumping into a tree and falling down,
mumbled:

>Warren Weber wrote:
>> John Corliss wrote:
>>> First of all so that you don't think I'm trying to pull anything tricky, I
>>> just want to mention that I'm cross-posting this story into the
>>> rec.motorcycles.victory and the rec.motorcycles.harley newsgroups. RMV
>>> needs some traffic, so please, if you feel like replying, feel free to
>>> leave the cross-posting.
>>>
>> SNIP
>>
>> John.. You are a good writer. Ever consider it as a job? W W
>
>Thanks, Warren, that's very kind of you. However, I just re-read the
>story and can see where there are several changes I would make to it.
>
>Story writing is a lot of work. It's okay to do, as long as a guy has
>something worthwhile to write about. I've been up against "the wall"
>almost every time I've tried to come up with an idea for fiction, but
>writing about my life is easy because I've been through so much
>unbelievable bullshit.
>
>80)>

well there ya go... fictionalize life... especially the unbelievable
parts ...and you'll do just fine.

Dr. Quin BS#268
E85 FXSB Lowrider - 224K, still going strong and still for sale
05 V-Star Custom (650) - 18k, good as new and still for sale too
07 FLTR Armed and Dangerous - 32k miles {we've just begun}

we are not evil
(just don't piss us off)
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