Nov 23 - a day like no other

No day is ever repeated, but some are similar ... not so this one ...

1) Ritchie finished the master bath floor. He finished up around 2pm and could do no more at that point because he couldn't walk on the tile. He'd intended to do the shower pan first but had not brought the material, so rather than have him leave I was quite happy to have him do the floor.

2) The drywall work took a step backward. Richie put his arm through the wall so I now have to do a real patch -- wood and a large piece of drywall. I picked up a 2x2 piece of drywall at Home Depot

3) It rained for the first time since we've been back, so I couldn't go bicycling (I now have to make a distinction with motorcycling). Forever more "cycling" will mean self propelled; "biking" will mean noisy in this blog. If I simply go "out for a ride" you'll have to guess !

4) Since I couldn't go out -- none of my sports are conducive to being out in the rain -- I decided to do some bicycle maintenance. I got my Hummer up on the stand and replaced the fork with the new Easton fork that I bought a couple of months ago. That eases my mind.

5) We went to the Harley dealer, paid our money, ordered some parts, bought some things ... since there is 20% off on anything purchased at the time we bought the bike. Sandy now has a helmet and there is a passenger pillion (seat), sissy bar (the back to the passenger seat), and associated mounting hardware on order. It's all in stock in the Daytona store so it doesn't take very long to get here. I'm not really in a hurry since I will need to get some miles on the bike by myself before carrying a passenger any appreciable distance.

6) We went to Home Depot, went back home, had lunch, saw Ritchie off.

7) The DMV received the transmitted results. Nice people -- Sandy called to find out the location and was told that they could look things up when we called, rather than coming in. I called at 3pm and the lady got back on the phone and said "guess what?" -- "what ?" -- "we have it" -- so we went in and collected the new license. It now says "Motorcycle Also". Florida has recently made changes to its drivers licenses -- no motorcycle only licenses, no non-resident licenses.

8) While on the way to the DMV my sales guy called (Dave, whose first name is also William) to see if we were coming back in today to pick up the bike -- yup, on our way -- great -- and he had the bike out front when we got there.

9) After a brief orientation ... I headed out and Sandy headed home via the post office. I did not head into the traffic on SR44 which was jammed, but turned right down the side street and wandered through said side streets to Canal then across the north causeway, along A1A and home. I did not want to do my first real driving in traffic, but by the end of the day, having put 30 miles on the bike, my reactions were starting to be automatic ... more ..

10) Sandy was home, with the M5 in the driveway. I pulled the bike into the garage and assessed the situation. I was not going to be able to park the bike where I thought that it might fit without a great deal of trouble. Ok, I'm not going to worry about that now ... only have an hour of light left and want to get a few more miles on the bike.

11) I left and headed down Saxon towards the park. Into the park and down to the end, cruising along the Eldora loop as I went. Driving in a straight line doesn't really practice much other than just getting used to the bike under my butt. It was sunset ... got home and it was almost dark.

12) Now ... what to do about this garage. I worked until after 7pm moving shelves, emptying shelves, etc. to get the bike into position on the passenger side of the car. I had hoped that I could move the bike in and out without moving the car but don't think that is possible. The handlebars have too wide a spread. I would have to do away with the shelves at the front of the car and move it further forward. My main goal was getting the car in the garage for the night. Why should the M5 suffer for the new arrival ? I did not want it to feel bad, displaced by the new kid on the block.

Part of the problem in the garage is that it also houses the washer and dryer and furnace and water heater and water filter and water softener and my work bench ... lots of stuff ... so we need access on a regular basis. I've also got 4 bicycles hanging from the ceiling ... and they hang too low for either the car or the H-bike. I might be able to do something about that -- hang from two wheels perhaps -- but don't think that the ceiling is even high enough for that to work. Besides, the area over the garage door is not useful for anything. Oh, don't I wish that I had the tall ceilings that I have in my barn up north or even access over the rafters without going into the attic, like the garage up north.

I'll do some more work out there this morning and see what can be managed. I also have to do that drywall work. I also have to take a bicycle ride. We also have to go boating. There's no end to what we need to do !!

The weather today looks like it might be like yesterday, with light rain. I really need to get out on the pedal bike but as I said to Sandy yesterday -- life is too short to go riding in the rain. If I have to, in a scheduled ride, I will. If I get caught out in it on a pleasure ride, ok, that's life. Normally, however, I won't head out in the rain. I won't do that with the Harley either. That bike is purely for pleasure ... no exercise value either ... so even less reason to head out in the rain.

Right now ... I'll go do some more garage assessment, see what can be managed in there. I'll also go over the bike with my manual in hand -- checking oil etc. -- familiarity lesson, if you will. It's too early for breakfast for me or Abby ... I'll give that another half hour.

Ritchie comes back today and should be grouting the shower first, then setting the shower pan, then grouting the floor. Tomorrow he should come back and lay the tiles in the shower floor. We'll see how all that works out. Hopefully there will be no more holes in the wall :).

Onward !