Do you allow others to ride your machines?

[TOwenR]

Me? You can refer to me as "Dr. No".

I might let you drive my 2019 Chevy Silverado 4x4 providing you place forty thousand dollars in exchange for the keys along with the understanding that if so much as an unremovable fingerprint smudge is discovered on any of the entertainment system buttons, then you my friend have just bought yourself a nearly showroom truck.

As far as my bikes? While not priceless items so to speak, they hold a great deal of personal value. And I may be wrong, but a machine allowing time travel still isn't on the market.

Perhaps I just keep the wrong friends. Listen up, kids. You might possibly learn for yourself whether or not being a "righteous friend" is worth it.

My first bike was a '73 GT 550. Loved the thing. Bought it with low miles for barely a weeks paycheck back then, and all it needed was a clutch push rod and oil seal to bring it to a state of pure love. Rode it everywhere and kept it maintained, thanks in part to some occasional advice from a former Suzuki dealer who had a shop in a backwater swamp of a town called Colchester, CT.
So a chum of mine wound up getting a new ride. A 1983 Suzuki GS 750 E, one of those nice maroon colored TSCC Full Floater suspension deals.

I never asked to take it for a spin. But he did. We exchanged bikes one summer afternoon and I expected just a short jaunt down some country roads within a mile of his house. He was off before I barely turned the key. I do recall thinking "I've got to get one of these things." as I treated the GS with controlled respect. The advances in ten years of technology left me feeling as if my own bike was a dinosaur.

So I return back to his house. But where's Harry? "He's on my bike, Mrs. H. He should be back soon." I tell his mom.

30 minutes
45 minutes
1 hr later and more

Instead of waiting it out and to escape the rising tension expressed by his concerned parents, I decide to go take a look around town on the GS to see if I can locate Harold.

I go no further than a couple of hundred feet when I see the ignoramus walking my baby back home, with a look of pain that I think more due to having to struggle by pushing a 400 or so pound machine up a slight gradient on a humid day than whatever physical injury he might have suffered.


"What Happened?" I asked


"I'm Never riding this ***** bike again." he blubbers, while complaining about his bruised hip from the fall due to "crappy brakes" .


"You BET you're never riding this ***** bike again....DICKHEAD! "


Some exchange like that.


So is it worth it to be such a trustworthy pal ? Not in my opinion. Any time I swing by that oafs place while on my bike, I always hear "Let me take it for a spin.", to which I always refuse and bring up this nearly 40 year old history lesson, the memory and lesson of which has been forgotten and erased by whatever poison burned his chalkboard from nearly half a century of intoxicants too numerous and too ethically repulsive to list.

What really makes me laugh is when he gives me one of those "SO you're not going to let me ride your bike?" ultimatums.


Rarely am I more serious than when I fire immediately in return a dead on wide eyed salvo with " NO...I'm not going to let you ride my bike."
Along with sometimes epilogues additives such as "I'm only doing this to keep you from killing yourself, you know." Which I sometimes wonder.

Keep your ride for yourself.

[rodent]

My brother is the only other person that rides my bikes.

[TOwenR]

Yeah, I suppose I'd concede there too if my brother asked.

On my initial post, I didn't note the damage done to my bike from letting a friend take it for a spin: bent forks, dented tank, turn signals snapped off and hanging, destroyed throttle grip and brake lever. A little work and it was roadworthy again. And I must have put another 60K on in before offering it as a trade in on a ...oh, nevermind

I suppose I should be thankful that I got off that light. Around about that time, the bike wrecking lout's father destroyed a brand spanking new boat - a 24' Mako with large Evinrude outboard if memory serves me right. Something like 35K of dollars pissed away while taking it for a test drive from a boat dealer near Noank, CT. There are quite a few submerged destroyers of pleasure craft lurking there if you stray outside the channel of the mouth of the Mystic River in the Ram Island vicinity.

I understand the boat was a complete loss, though I never heard it directly from Mr. H himself, only through his son.

I don't think Mr. H wanted to talk about it very much....ever.



Furthermore, while on the nautical tangent, I've also had the same dunce ask me if he can take my boat out fishing at some of the reefs in the area. While I do believe that he is more experienced on the water than on land, my arguing point for NOT allowing this to happen is centered on the FACT that I cannot remember a boating season when he has not destroyed a propeller off of whatever craft some unfortunate and trusting owner gave him the keys to. {usually someone elderly person barely able to walk let alone stand on a bouncing watercraft}