Time To Re-Consider Riding

[CWO4GUNNER]

Praise God you survived, my brother in law had a similar experience and quit riding for his family. Amazing how we can change our prospective about our lives when we face mortality, which of course we will all inevitably face. Personally I tend to fallow the posted speed in the twisties more or less with the lurking anticipation of whats next around the next bend. Even so its a risk like anything else in living. Ill pray to God for your full recovery and any lessons needing to be learned.

[dhcolesj]

+1 on the anticipation.  That helped this morning.

I was coming through Leipers Fork, TN and it was very foggy, fortunately some slower cages were ahead of me.  Rounded one curve and a knucklehead forgot which side of the road to drive on. I guess he decided that he would take his half down the middle, and I could decide left or right.  

I got by fine, because I was on the outside of the curve, but he/she barely missed the cage behind me.

[BLK]

Red01

The Mini Cooper, the Toyota MR2 and Miata were my three options but the more I look into cages as an alternative the Miata really comes out tops for me. A friend of mine tried to convince me to get an old Porsche ( mid to late 70's maybe early 80's) but like they say: "a lot of people can afford to buy a Porsche but not everyone can afford to OWN a Porsche". I am barely the prior and certainly not the latter, so...

BUT, the bike is not out of the picture entirely just yet. Spent this past Sunday pulling broken bits off the old girl, of which there really weren't that many, and decided to take it for a little spin to check it's alignment and what not. Oh how the spirit stirred.

So now I am doubting my doubts about riding.

In the meantime I have decided to spend my time and a little bit of money getting the Bandit back into shape. Truth be told the bike is infinitely rideable as it is as there was no structural damage.

Headlight and brackets
Clutch Lever
Gauge Console

That really is all the NEEDS to be replace. I am going to touch up some of the scuffs and scrapes and maybe replace the fork springs and brake pads but other than that not much work to do. And when it's all done we'll see how I feel about saddling up again.

For what it's worth my few spins around the block brought nothing but joy with no traces of hesitancy or trepidation. Maybe I am just slow to learn.

blk

[smooth operator]

  Glad things are looking up, and your healing up.Sounds like you'll be keeping and riding the bike again.When you feel up to it, think about taking a street rider school at a track in your area. You don't have to have ambitions of racing to go to a track for a school. It will sharpen your skills, and show just what your motorcycle is capable of.
   My brother picked up a used Porche a couple years ago, he compairs it to riding his bike. Loves it.

[BLK]

Track and street classes will definitely be in my future when and if I decide to ride again.

As for the Porsche, well, yeah, it sure would be cool to own one and I haven't ruled that option out yet entirely either. Especially with the next round of mortgage resets ready to hit. Something tells me that the kind of guy that took out a high risk mortgage just might be the type of guy to buy a lot of expensive toys he really can't afford even when times are  good. The one Porsche afficiando that I know thinks that by the end of the year there will be plenty of guys just begging for you to buy their cars so I am motivated to wait and see and in the meantime fix the bike, take few courses and try to explain to my mother, that as a 37 year old man if i want to ride a motorcycle then I will ride a motorcycle. Moms will be moms i suppose no matter how old you are.

BLK