yeah well me neither, but i did have this affair with an amazing motorcycle — a 2002 KTM DUKE II. she was totally insane. before everyone thought the DRZ 400 SM was so cool there was the KTM Duke. ruined only by it’s dumb streetbike front fender this bike was no single cylinder Ducati Monster, it was a true motard….in sheep’s clothing. it was clearly a bike before it’s time and considering the money i dumped into my old DRZ 400 i don’t know why i just didn’t buy this in the first place.

anyhow, 2002 and older models are prone to clutch bearing failure, a fact that i found out about a bit too late. so a few weeks ago things went from bad to worse, the bearing failed and the engine self destructed in a clackity and oily mess. in a way i think she was getting back at me for having thoughts about dumping her. as much as i loved her, with our impending RV trip i wanted to get something smaller and more dirt capable, so i was planning to sell her.

to deny me the break up i wanted, she dumped me instead. depressed and alone, i decided to sell her for cheap on craigslist instead of going trough the trouble of parting her out. i listed it for $2000 and had a flood of interest. in a matter of days some nice guys from scotts valley arrived with a truck, a ramp and $2000. they tried to get me down to $1800, and i can’t blame them, but i knew they were getting a deal and $200 isn’t chump change. i had said $2000 firm…i wasn’t joking. besides i knew they didn’t come without $2000 :).

so here’s to my old girl, it was fun, it was nasty, in a few years i might give one of your sisters a ring.

Of course, the trip wasn’t without incident. On the way back we were following Sean when all of the sudden the bike started to cut out like it was running out of gas, but it wasn’t. so i pulled over, checked the petcock, checked for any major warning signs like oil or gas puddles, etc. Then I went to get off the bike and realized my kickstand was missing!!! Sure enough it had fallen completely off, which explains why the bike wasn’t running since most bikes have a safety interlock that kills the engine when your kickstand is down. Once Sean circled back to find us i hopped on the back of his bike and we went to look for the kickstand. Thankfully we found it without much effort and with the help of Sean’s knife and my wire strippers (aka my teeth), I twisted together the interlock wires to bypass it, threw the kickstand in my suit and we were back on the road.

However the fun for the night wasn’t over. Before the movie we grabbed some burritos at chipotle to chomp on during the movie. When we came home we dropped off our gear and hopped in the car to go get Ingrid. When we came home we found Ginger in her crate, with my helmet stuck on her head. Apparently some burrito bits had fallen in my helmet during the movie, and my little Ginger was determined to find every last bit. Surprisingly she was really stuck in there, it took several minutes to get her blockhead out of there. Eventually she was freed, and both dog and helmet were unharmed.

I took a pic of Spies returning to the pits after a crash but since I’m not used to the camera on this phone it ended up as a pic of his foot. So instead here’s a blurry ass pic of someone in practice.