As you know, I was off Friday, and this was also the first weekend of not drinking. It seems that a bunch of people came out of the woodwork to get me to drink. Now, I haven't announced to anyone outside of this, that I have stopped drinking, I figure that it will come up eventually, and I'll tackle that conversation at that point. Even as I was writing Thursday nights post, I was getting a text from someone to go out drinking. I had a real good reason not to go. I was writing. Friday came around and I had met someone who lives the "bike life", and from what I can gather, what that means to them, is riding a lot (which is a good thing), and within those rides, going to biker bars (not such a good thing). She wanted me to meet up with her during the day, and each place was a bar. I mentioned that I don't drink when I'm on the bike, so I would have to pass for now. That was a good thing, because since I was sitting at home waiting for the weather to clear, to actually go riding, a package came for me.
I know that I mentioned that my latest Mya-Moe would be the last ukulele I bought for a while, but I couldn't pass this one up. It is called a Ohana O'Nina Supranisimo. I saw something similar to this when I was in Portland Oregon and I was captivated by it. I've wanted one ever since seeing it, and I finally found it. Here it is. I haven't named it yet, because nothing has come to me so far.
I know what you're thinking, "What is so special about that? It looks like a normal ukulele.". Well, the next picture will explain all. I took a shot of the Ohana with Claude the latest Mya-Moe. This will give you an idea of why it is so special.
There you have it. Claude is a tenor ukulele, which means he is a little bigger than your standard soprano ukulele. If I put my soprano up next to Claude in comparison, it would be about 4 inches shorter. The new Ohana, as you can is, is about a foot shorter than Claude. It is tiny, and playable. It only has 12 frets as opposed to the standard 17 frets on sopranos and tenors. It has a tiny sound to it as well. I played around with it quite a bit, and it is just fun. I can't wait to take it to class on Thursday just to mess with my teacher a bit. I think he will get a kick out of it.
The little Ohana came a day early, which worked out because of the crappy weather that we were having. Alas, the clouds parted and the sun kind of came out around noon. I hopped on Saki and headed to the bank and to just go for a ride in general. After the bank, I decided to stop by the tattoo shop and talk to my artist. Oh, I forgot to mention that I was wearing Fred. Yes, I'm sticking with Fred. I just sort of works. I pulled my bike up next to the front window on the sidewalk, and had no idea what the scene was that was going on behind me, as I was getting off the bike. Everyone in the shop was going crazy over Fred. When I turned around and saw, I just walked in without taking off my helmet. Everyone was laughing and smiling. My artist was the loudest saying how much he loved it. There was a small child in there with his mom, who was getting a tattoo, that was transfixed on my helmet. He was smiling and laughing like there was no tomorrow.
My artist wanted to see how Bowie was doing, so I lifted my shirt and showed him. He mentioned that it had a couple of places that needed a touch up, and asked when I wanted to do it. Luck has it, that next Saturday I had a scheduled appointment to get Saki it's 3000 mile maintenance. The bike shop isn't far from the tattoo shop, so After I drop Saki off, I'm just going to walk to the tattoo shop, and if my artist is free, he's going to do some touch ups on the Bowie tat. It's the definition of killing two birds with one stone. Either way, I just walk over to the shop to hang out for a while. It will take them a couple of hours to give Saki the once over. While I was talking to my artist, I got a text from the biker lady that I met. Let's call her Biker Babe for now. She was with friends at another bar, and wanted to know if I wanted to ride over to meet her. Once again, I had a good excuse not to meet up for drinks, because I was talking to my artist.
I hung out at the shop for about an hour and watched him give that mom with the baby a tattoo behind her ear. I needed to hit the road though, the skies were starting to could back up, and since I was wearing Fred, I wanted to try to avoid the rain. While I was just bouncing around the area, I got another text from Biker Babe. Her and her friends were on their way to yet another place, and wanted to know if I was interested. This one I didn't need an excuse, because I was running from the rain, so I couldn't go. I turned around and started running south, since it looked like the rain clouds were heading east to west. I thought I could skirt them and keep riding. I failed. I ran into some pretty heavy rain on the road, and got stuck in traffic, so I couldn't outrun it. Fred was getting drenched, and my visor was getting difficult to see out of. This is the picture I took when I got home.
If you look closely, you can see that my visor is spotted with rain. I had to hang Fred up to dry out, and because of the rain, Saki was filthy, but that would have to wait.
After getting back home from a rain soaked ride. I picked up watching the rest of A Series of Unfortunate Events. There were only 8 hour long episodes, and they were fantastic. I managed to watch them all on Friday. I was in for the rest of the day, and Biker Babe was at her last stop, and then going home. We never met up. Later in the evening I got a text from 3W. I was eating dinner at the time, so I couldn't go out. He texted later but I was deeply enthralled in another series on Netflix called Troll Hunters. It is an animated show created by Guillermo del Toro. It's really good. There are 26 episodes in the first part, and it was released on December 23rd. I'd seen trailers for it when I went to the movies, and finally sat down and started watching it. The sad thing about the series is, that it starred the voice talent of Anton Yelchin. He was one of the victims of 2016. You might remember that he died in a completely freak accident when his SUV ran down the driveway of his house and pinned him against his mailbox. The show sets up for another season, or part, which is the way they have it on the display, but they will undoubtedly have to find another person to take the voice of the lead character. If you're in the mood for some lighthearted fun with Guillermo del Toro's freaky creatures that come from his mind, give Troll Hunters a try. You might like it.
Saturday was a new day, and it was a clear day. Saki and I were going to ride. First though, I got a text from Biker Babe. They were riding out, and heading to a place for lunch and drinks. I just wanted to ride. I turned down her offer again, and headed out. I found a new spot for pictures, and took a couple of Saki in all its filth. You can't see it in the pictures, but I know it's there. The back seat was splattered with mud as well as the entire underneath of the frame. The pictures came out pretty good though.
The pictures look very similar, but they are at slightly different angles, and I wish I could have kept those freaking signs out of the shot, but I managed to get one in each of them. From there, I went to my favorite watering hole. "Wait, you sad that you didn't drink this weekend." I did say that, and I meant it. I went to my favorite watering hole, and drank raspberry tea with my meal. They know that when I'm on the bike, I don't drink, which is why I brought Fred in with me. One again, a couple of kids were at the bar with their dad, and they loved Fred. They all smiled, which made me smile. Boom mission accomplished. While I was eating lunch, I got a call from an old friend. He was inviting me to lunch. I had to decline since I was eating lunch. I'm sure there would have been booze involved, so I dodged another bullet.
I headed home after that, and I was thinking that I was in for the day, but a thought came to me. I wanted to do a night ride. Of course, I had to wait until nightfall for that to occur, so in the meantime, I watched more Troll Hunters. I once again got another text from Biker Babe, telling me where she was so that we could meet up, but I had my plans and I was sticking to them. I told her what I was doing, but they were already at the next place and getting ready to head to another one.
Night was finally cast across the land, and I wheeled Saki out of the garage for our dance in the dark. I had a specific plan, and I was going to see it through. I ride at night on practically a daily basis when I go to work in the morning, but I have never rode at night with the specific goal of just riding. I picked the right time to do it. It was early enough in the evening that people weren't out. They were either already at a place or getting ready to go to a place. It left the roads pretty empty and where I was going was going to be light traffic anyway. I had two roads in mind. River Road and South Tropical Trail. They aren't fast roads, they are just cruising roads. There aren't a lot of street lights on them, so I had to go with the high beams quite often, but it was so peaceful and calm. It took me to another world. A worlds where it was just Saki and me. We rode in the cool breeze along the river's edge, and looked into it vast darkness. The waters were still, so the nighttime sky reflected off it. It was beautiful. I stopped about halfway along River Road and got a couple of pictures in different locations. One of them didn't come out to well, since my front reflector caught then flash from my phone, so I'm keeping that one out, but the other two are pretty good. I'm going to show you the second stop first. It is the clearest of the pictures and taken with only light from a street lamp near by.
It came out pretty good, and the sign has some symbolism of which way to I go, only the road knows. This was in a little area off the side of the road. It was like a one car parking area for that little bench there. Saki is in all it's glory, stalking through the night, but the next picture might show that even more so. This is the picture that in my little blog post on Moto Amino, I said summed up the night. Calm and Peaceful.
Although calm and peaceful, Saki looks a little ominous, and definitely looks to be living up to it's name of Ninja. Hiding in the night like a dark angel. I got quite a few compliment on this particular photo on Moto Amino. I like it more and more as I look at it. I only used the natural ambient light that was around, and as you can see, there wasn't much of it. That is how Saki and I rode last night, in darkness with only the wind rushing by us, and the river languidly drifting next to us, to keep us company. When I got home, I felt more relaxed and happy than I had felt in a very long time. It was truly exhilarating. Oh, also exhilarating was when I blew the doors off a Corvette on the way home form the ride. he came speeding up behind me, and passed me at the last minute. I wasn't in any hurry. He got stopped at a light, i was going to teach him a little lesson. I was still slowly approaching the light when it turned green. I was in an open lane, and he was at the front of his. I let him get rolling since I was already on the move, but still a cars length behind him, and then I hit it. I wheelied (I don't do that often) past him, and left him in the rearview in a split second. When he finally caught up to me, became I had to stop at a light because I was turning, he yelled out the window, "YEAH!" He knew I got him, and he appreciated what Saki could do. I couldn't help but laugh.
Sunday morning arrived, and I need more time with Saki Notice I still haven't talked about cleaning the much off Saki yet. There is good reason for that. That hasn't happened yet. We went south today, and went to Sebastian. It was a nice day for it, but I forgot to take the quilted lining out of my jacket, so it was hot. I hit a beach access just after the bridge that crosses the inlet, and stopped to use the bathroom and just relax a little. I got one last shot of Saki with all my gear sitting on top of it.
It was a good end to a fun weekend. I put in several hundreds of miles, and when we finally got back to the house, I let Saki cool off for a bit, and then went out, put Saki up on the stand, and wiped all that dirt and grime off of it. I think I even heard Saki sigh from feeling relief that all that dirt was gone. I did ride by a little ice cream shop that had a sign out front that read "Blackberry and Green Apple". I need to go there when they are open, because I need green apple ice cream in my life. Looks like another adventure for Saki and I to go on.
I never met up with Biker Babe, but I'm sure I will at some point. I don't know if I'm the right person for her, and I don't know if she is the right person for her, but maybe I can get a riding buddy out of the whole deal. If all she likes to do, si ride to bars, I'm not down with that, even if I am drinking, but if she is up for going places and seeing things, then maybe there is a chance. We'll just have to wait and see. Regardless of that, I had a great weekend, and I spent it with Saki. I don't know if I need anything more. I probably do, but I'll take what I got for now. Peace in and goodnight.
Fred was the right choice because it was your first choice. Loved the pictures So glad you had a great weekend.
ReplyDeleteYeah, Fred is just the right fit.
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