Thursday, January 12, 2006

55 degrees in January

Everyone that knows me, knows that I don’t commute to work. On occasion I might ride the bike to work but that’s only when I need to do something with the bike before or after work, or the ride to work day thing. People at work have never even seen the Ducati, and I bought it last September.

But this morning I geared up and took off on the ST3 to work. It was so warm already, I didn’t even have to turn on my electric vest, the sun was shining brightly.

At some point I had to remind myself where I was going since it was very tempting to just keep riding north until hitting the Wisconsin border and spending the day exploring the many twisty roads. Maybe that’s why I don’t ride to work, its too tempting to play hooky. But I did have to go to work today, a meeting at 2:30 and a project deadline kept me in line. No way could I get out of working today.

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No I didn’t ride to work in heels. But I did bring my purse for the first time ever on the bike. I could never fit it in the tank bag before, but it fits nicely in the hard side cases.

People at work think that I’m as nutty as a fruit cake already. They think it’s nuts to ride a motorcycle at all. So I expect crazy comments and I usually get them. But can you believe that today I got the “isn’t it too cold to ride” comment? I mean, it’s going to be 55 degrees today, it was at least 45 this morning when I left home. I just kept answering “I ride in 30 degree weather, this feels like summer to me.

But think about the people that work in my building, 200 of them and only 2 people ride, me and this guy in accounting who has two metric cruisers. I was the only one to ride to work today, he sometimes rides to work during the summer.

So of course since no one has seen Ducati, at some point mid-morning, after everyone had plenty of coffee, I lead a group of excited guys out to the parking lot for a show and tell. And if they were nice, I’d let them sit on the bike. Two of the guys that I work with passed their MSF class last summer but neither has pulled the trigger and bought a bike yet. Something about responsibilities, wives, girlfriends, kids, blah, blah, blah, you know those excuses. For people that have an M class license but no bike, this kind of a thing is pure torture, I’m sure. But sometimes that’s what they need to make their minds up and get that bike that they really want.

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Bob, a coworker of mine, sat on it and couldn’t believe how light the ST3 was, I know he wants one, well at this point he just wants a bike, any bike. I think this summer he will get something, I’m pointing him in the way of the sport-tourers, since he doesn’t like cruisers that much.

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Time to get out there and have a long lunch and ride :)\

I got home from work at 7PM, didn’t need to fire up any electric heating implements on the bike, it was still in the low 50's. As a matter of a fact, it was so nice when I got home, I put the ST3 in the garage and took the 954RR for a spin. I finally got home at 8:15PM, still didn’t require running any headed gear or grips…awesome…. Tomorrow they are calling for snow. That’s Chicago for you.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

ok... everyone knows that girl on bike is pretty sexy, but woman with high heels on sport touring bike - va va vooooooooom, classy.

So did it take you 15 mins to get ready for a 5 min ride? hahaha Work is also just 5 miles for me, but when the salt is gone and I've moved my bikes back from Rick's garage, I'll be riding to work as well, just in the beginning, to quench that itch. My commute time is bound to double, but who cares....