SeaCat
Hey, my Halo is smoking
- Joined
- Sep 23, 2003
- Posts
- 15,378
The wife and I decided to take the bike out riding today. We had a bit of shopping to do and we both wanted/needed to get some riding time in. (I've only put a bit over 800 miles on the bike since January.)
Because it was hot out and expected to get hotter I decided to take the windshield off the bike. It took me all of a minute and I stashed the windshield in the storage area.
We climb aboard and off we go. Because of the layout of the roads the ride to the store is fairly slow with way too many lights and turns. It takes us a while to get there but we had fun.
We did our shopping and loaded our purchases into the cargo box before getting ready to head for home.
For the ride home we decided to take a bit of a detour. It would add about five miles to our ride but it would have far fewer lights and a slightly higher speed. We climbed aboard and headed for the back road we wanted. When we hit it I cranked up the bike to 45 MPH and got ready to cruise. We came around a corner and found ourselves stuck. Ahead of us was a lumbering dump truck while on our left was a solid line of cars. As we slowly sped up I started hearing little ticks and was wondering what they were. Then it hit me, quite literaly.
At first it was a minor tap in my shoulder. Then I felt another in my chest. I was wondering about this when something hit my hand with damned near crushing force. Man that hurt. I still didn't understand what was going on but I knew something wasn't right. Then I felt an impact on my left cheek just below my shades. Looking up I saw something, a shadow of something maybe, coming off the truck and I knew what was going on.
I told my wife to duck down behind me even as I swiped at my visor and knocked it down to cover my face. I was just in time. Even as I grabbed the brakes and started downshifting to slow that damned truck hit a bump and a cloud of gravel came out the back. It was like being shot at without being able to shoot back. The only good things about this was I was already slowing down and the gravel that came out of the truck was light weight. It hurt but it didn't do all that much damage. (I have a welt on my right hand where the rock hit my ring finger and I have a nicely shaped small hole in my face. Other than that I have some small point bruises and a chip or three out of my tank.)
Now comes the funniest part. When we get home I finally listen to the wife and contact my insurance company about inuring the bike. I go through tier online questionair and get my quite. $650.44 a year. That's more than I pay for my car and I'm still paying the car off.
I call the insurance company and ask them why so high a quote. We go through all of the questions again and then the lady on the other end starts tap tapping on her computer. The answer comes back and I have to laugh. It seems my bike, as old as it is, is still considered to be a high risk bike. Much higher than even some of the sport bikes out there. When I explain the age of the bike and my riding experience she tells me that doesn't matter. It's the bike. I politiely declined their insurance.
Cat
Because it was hot out and expected to get hotter I decided to take the windshield off the bike. It took me all of a minute and I stashed the windshield in the storage area.
We climb aboard and off we go. Because of the layout of the roads the ride to the store is fairly slow with way too many lights and turns. It takes us a while to get there but we had fun.
We did our shopping and loaded our purchases into the cargo box before getting ready to head for home.
For the ride home we decided to take a bit of a detour. It would add about five miles to our ride but it would have far fewer lights and a slightly higher speed. We climbed aboard and headed for the back road we wanted. When we hit it I cranked up the bike to 45 MPH and got ready to cruise. We came around a corner and found ourselves stuck. Ahead of us was a lumbering dump truck while on our left was a solid line of cars. As we slowly sped up I started hearing little ticks and was wondering what they were. Then it hit me, quite literaly.
At first it was a minor tap in my shoulder. Then I felt another in my chest. I was wondering about this when something hit my hand with damned near crushing force. Man that hurt. I still didn't understand what was going on but I knew something wasn't right. Then I felt an impact on my left cheek just below my shades. Looking up I saw something, a shadow of something maybe, coming off the truck and I knew what was going on.
I told my wife to duck down behind me even as I swiped at my visor and knocked it down to cover my face. I was just in time. Even as I grabbed the brakes and started downshifting to slow that damned truck hit a bump and a cloud of gravel came out the back. It was like being shot at without being able to shoot back. The only good things about this was I was already slowing down and the gravel that came out of the truck was light weight. It hurt but it didn't do all that much damage. (I have a welt on my right hand where the rock hit my ring finger and I have a nicely shaped small hole in my face. Other than that I have some small point bruises and a chip or three out of my tank.)
Now comes the funniest part. When we get home I finally listen to the wife and contact my insurance company about inuring the bike. I go through tier online questionair and get my quite. $650.44 a year. That's more than I pay for my car and I'm still paying the car off.
I call the insurance company and ask them why so high a quote. We go through all of the questions again and then the lady on the other end starts tap tapping on her computer. The answer comes back and I have to laugh. It seems my bike, as old as it is, is still considered to be a high risk bike. Much higher than even some of the sport bikes out there. When I explain the age of the bike and my riding experience she tells me that doesn't matter. It's the bike. I politiely declined their insurance.
Cat
