Recent polls of 11-year-old boys show: I’m cool

I look like a complete dork. When I’m riding my little motorbike, I mean. It’s not even a real moped, which are nerdy enough; it’s an old, black mountain bike onto which the previous owner slapped a 50cc motor manufactured in some Hangzhou sweat shop.

I traded an old laptop for it a year ago. Since then — even though I look like a dork when I do so — I drive it to work every day.

Part of the reason for this is that I hate driving cars. Or trucks. I hate being cooped up inside a vehicle; any vehicle.

On the other end of that spectrum is the fact I’m too chicken to ride a real motorcycle. They go too fast and there’s something in the water around here that makes deer suicidal. I do not want to provide some buck with his two-wheeled ticket to the afterlife.

The motorbike is a great middle ground solution. It goes fast enough to get me around town almost as quickly as my car, but if I smack into a deer I will (probably) get off with just a scrape or two and maybe get some venison steaks in the bargain.

Also, the motorbike is WAY fun to drive! It zips along at a comfortable 25 mph, burns through less than a gallon of gas PER MONTH, and if it breaks down or blows up, I can buy a new one for under $500.

Granted, the build quality of the thing is less than one might find on, say, a Rolls-Royce. Or a Yugo. It requires regular adjustment of the cabling system, the clutch, the carb … but it’s all minor stuff that takes just a few minutes once you know what you’re doing.

When I’m riding it I feel like Steve McQueen racing across the French countryside in an old WWII movie, the Nazis in hot pursuit.

Of course, I don’t LOOK like Steve McQueen. I look like a dork. Or thought I did, until the other day.

I was buzzing the periphery of the lake, up through the cemetery, down to the grocery store; just putzing around with no particular destination. When you’re getting 150 miles per gallon, you can afford to putz around.

Three young boys, who had been fishing in the lake, came running over when I sputtered to a halt beside my mailbox.

“Whoa,” said the oldest, maybe 11. “What is that?”

“Just a mountain bike with a motor on it,” I said.

“How fast does it go?”

“About 25, maybe 30.” It doesn’t really go 30, but I was trying to impress the kid. I have security issues.

“Awesome!” enthused one of the other kids.

“Yeah!” agreed another.

The boys unselfconsciously inspected the bike from stem to stern as I sorted my mail, ooh-ing and ah-ing the way a Cessna pilot might ooh and ah over a Bombardier Learjet 85.

“That is SO cool,” said the 11-year-old. “How old do you have to be to ride one?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. When you’re old enough to get a senior discount at McDonald’s, you no longer bother checking that sort of thing.

I rode away, wishing I was wearing a leather jacket with the collar turned up. I may look like a dork to the rest of the world, but to 11-year-old boys? I’m Steve McQueen, baby.

Mike Taylor’s book, “Looking at the Pint Half Full,” is available at Robbins Book List in Greenville and in eBook format from Amazon.

If I’m found by the side of the road dead, the first suspect should be my bike seat

I’ve sweat off half my body mass in the past week and have developed a tan to rival James Brown’s, but I’m loving every minute of it. In addition to playing with my new bike, I’m training for the second annual Geezer-thon Cross-State Bike Tour, coming up the first part of August.Last week I told you about my new Wonder-Bike, normally a crazy expensive road bicycle I purchased off Craigslist.com for $95 from a woman determined to give her ex-husband (the bike was his) an apoplectic fit. Since then, I’ve put nearly 300 miles on the thing, despite the fact temperatures have been in the high 90s nearly every day.

Last year, I pedaled from Port Huron to Stony Lake, near Lake Michigan. This year I’ve planned a slightly more modest route, from Grand Rapids to Traverse City and back, about 300 miles as the bike rolls.

I’m not sure how many days it will take me. Originally, I thought about doing four 75 mile days back-to-back. Then last Saturday I did a 70 mile ride and it nearly killed me. Seriously, it took me about 20 minutes to extricate myself from the car when I got back home. My knees were stiffer than the Tin Man’s prior to Dorothy’s application of oil. My butt felt like it’d gone 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali in his prime.

The problem is the seat that came with my new Wonder-Bike. Like the rest of the bike, it’s a miracle of modern technology and French engineering; part carbon fiber, part titanium alloy…if the Space Shuttle came with bicycle seats, they would look like this thing.

And because my Wonder-Bike was designed to be raced by guys like Lance Armstrong, the seat is about the size of a postage stamp. It weighs next to nothing. In fact, if detached from the bike, it must be tied to a string to prevent it floating away like a helium balloon.

Plus, it looks really cool! So cool, in fact, that I left it on there during my recent 70 mile ride. I could have achieved similar results by sitting on a rabid porcupine.

Since my butt looks more like Homer Simpson’s than Lance Armstrong’s, the cool seat and I are not precisely simpatico. The seat is small. My bootie is big. It’s as simple as that. One good bump in the road and I’m off to the proctologist’s office. I’ve heard the outpatient procedure for bicycle seat extraction is not pleasant.

So I broke down and bought a new seat. Like my own backside, it is somewhat wide and somewhat padded. It doesn’t look as cool as the old seat, but I can perch on it for hours without whimpering like a wet kitten.

And when I get to Traverse City sometime early next month, there’s a good chance I’ll still be able to walk.

Mike Taylor’s new book, Looking at the Pint Half Full, is available online at mtrealitycheck.com or in eBook format from Barnes & Noble, Borders and other major booksellers. Email Mike at mtaylore325@gmail.com.

For once, I got the deal of a lifetime and I’m not going to feel guilty about it

Yesterday, I bought the bicycle of my dreams. It’s a Motobecane, a carbon fiber/titanium/aluminum alloy beauty that retails for exactly twice what I make in a year. I’ve had dreams about a bike like this, the sort of dreams which, back in high school featured cheerleaders and Swedish flight attendants. I’ll admit it; I have, in my heart, lusted after this bike. I’ve put nearly 100 miles on it already, and I still can’t believe it’s mine.

How did a lowly doofus like me come into possession of this two-wheeled miracle of French engineering and cutting edge science, you may ask. Go ahead, ask. I’m dying to tell somebody.

I found it yesterday morning, around 6 a.m. As is all too usual, I was suffering from insomnia. To pass the time until the sun came up, I opened my laptop and began paging through the Craigslist classifieds. I like to peruse the high-end bikes listed there. I knew (or thought I knew) I’d never be able to afford one. I like to look at ‘em anyway, in much the same way guys who are never going to date Irina Shayk like the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue--it’s fun to dream.

I pulled up ads for Specialized, Trek and similar upscale two-wheelers, marveling at the four-figure price tags and wondering how anyone besides Lance Armstrong could justify paying $6,000 for a bicycle when my first Schwinn—purchased for five bucks at a garage sale back in 1965—served me just fine for nearly a decade. In 1976, I replaced the Schwinn with a used Fuji for the then unheard-of price of $300 and rode that for the next 30 years. So, yeah, six large seems kinda pricey to me.

But like I said, I like to look, to ogle, to…well…drool a little bit.

Then suddenly, there it was, right at the top of the listings; my dream Motobecane, one of the company’s top end models, priced at $95. Being a rational man and not given to flights of fancy, I assumed the price was a typo and the ad should have read $950, which still would have been a steal. Since the ad had posted just seconds earlier, I called the listed number, even though the sun had been up for only a few minutes. A woman answered.

“Hello,” I said. “Sorry about the early hour, but I’m calling about the bike you just listed? I was just double-checking the price. It says $95.”

“Yes, that’s right,” said the woman. “But if that’s too high, I might be willing to entertain an offer.”

Twenty minutes later I was driving up to a prearranged meeting place. She had the bike, a thing of exquisite beauty and in like-new condition; I had 95 bucks. We made the exchange. Once the bike had been transferred to my car rack, and locked securely in place (touch black! no trades back!) I couldn’t resist asking her the question.

“Why are you selling this bike so cheap?”

 “Am I?” she asked. “Is it worth more?” I told her it was. “Well, I guess I knew it was an expensive bike,” she said. “It belonged to my (expletive deleted) ex-husband. He left it at the house when he moved in with his girlfriend. He called yesterday and said to get what I could for it and send him the money. How much is it worth, exactly?”

I told her.

“Whooooo,” she whistled. “He is not going to be happy.”

She didn’t sound too concerned about Mr. Expletive Deleted’s happiness. As I drove off with my dream bike, I realized that I wasn’t either.

Mike Taylor’s new book, Looking at the Pint Half Full is available at mtrealitycheck.com or in eBook format at Barnes & Noble, Borders and most other online booksellers. Email Mike at mtaylor325@gmail.com.

My new lock will prevent crooks from stealing…my new lock

Somebody stole my bike lock; not the bike itself, just the lock.

I’m assuming the perp was a master thief of some kind, probably of the cat burglar variety, the sort that dons a black stocking cap and leather gloves before scaling the sides of an office building using only suction cups.

The lock was swiped while I sat nestled inside a nice little pub, celebrating the completion of my recent cross-state bicycle tour. The bike was locked securely (or so I thought) to the rack on the back of the Bonneville.

In deference to the good taste of the thief, I must admit the lock was probably worth more than the bike and car put together. The bike is an ancient Fuji I purchased for $25 several years ago at a Lion’s Club charity auction in Lakeview, then my hometown.

As to the Bonneville, the kindest thing one might say is that—despite all odds—it continues to run.

The lock, on the other hand, was brand new, purchased just prior to my tour at an upscale bike shop in Ada Village. It was made of case-hardened steel, fused to a thick, barely-flexible cable of braided metal thicker than my index finger.

According to the girl at the bike shop, it was the best lock the store offers, guaranteed to resist all but the most diligent assault by a phalanx of bicycle burglars armed to the teeth with state-of-the-art bolt cutters, welding torches and battle axes.

Also a plus, it was one of those locks that let you set your own combination. This, I now suspect, was my downfall.

Apparently I’m not the first knucklehead to choose 1-2-3-4 as my “secret” unlock code.

At the time I set the thing, I said to myself, “What are the odds a crook is going to try that combination? Surely, no self-respecting thief would go for such an obvious code.”

Wrong. My guess now is that it’s the first combination the thief tried.

I didn’t even notice it was gone until I arrived home and made to unpack the bike from its rack. Even then I figured I had just forgotten to lock it up and that the lock was buried in one of the bike’s Pannier bags. It wasn’t until later that I recalled distinctly having locked the thing up before going in the pub.

And so I found myself back at the bike store yesterday, shelling out another $30 for a replacement lock, identical to the one that was stolen, with one notable exception: my combination is now far more difficult for a crook to cipher.

Surely nobody would ever try 4-3-2-1, right?

More Reality Check online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.mlive.com. Email Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.

I can’t afford to dress properly for modern biking

When I was 17, I rode my bicycle from Grand Rapids to Quebec. I no longer remember how far that ride was, but it was a long way. By the time I got to where the road signs were in French, I had calluses on my butt that rivaled any bicep Arnold Schwarzenegger, in his “Terminator” days, could have boasted.

I pedaled my Fuji the whole way wearing cutoff Levi’s and a pair of Red Ball Jets sneakers. If I stopped at a roadside café, I’d pull on a T-shirt. Other than that, I had no specialized equipment.

If I chafed, which I sometimes did, I stopped pedaling for a day or two and pitched camp in a pinewood or nearby corn field. It gave me a chance to read whatever Ray Bradbury had written recently and partake of the questionable nutritional value of Lipton’s Cup-a-Soup, the camper’s best friend (at least in the ‘70s).

I was thinking of those times earlier today, while riding my bike for the first time this year. The temperature finally climbed above the 45-degreee mark, melting most of the snow from the bike trails near my new home in Ada.

The first thing I noticed is: my new neighborhood is hilly. Riding around Ada, I felt like Hannibal trying to get his elephants over the Alps. Holy moley! What were they thinking when they built this town? No two homes should be located anywhere near the same sea level? It’s like San Francisco without the palm trees and silicone-enhanced actresses.

Anyway, it’s a lot of up-and-down for an old guy whose only exercise since last November has been drinking beer and eating pizza. But the hills I’ll get used to, or die trying—a distinct possibility. (That “elephants over the Alps” reference wasn’t entirely metaphorical.)

I only rode for about 15 miles, a short run by summertime standards, but enough to work up a sweat beneath my ski jacket this time of year. And while cruising the neighborhood I discovered something wonderful—and dangerous; there are two really good bike shops nearby. They’re the kind of places that offer bikes that require financing plans. Bikes made not from steel, but from carbon fiber. Bikes that weigh six ounces. Bikes that Lance Armstrong would prefer over Sheryl Crow.

And along with all those cool bikes, they have the cool bike accessories. Headlights, tail-lights, water bottles, water bottle holders, bags, baskets, bells, air pumps, and clothes, clothes, clothes, clothes, clothes!

Apparently, riding a bicycle around here without the proper attire is considered rather gauche. Before I go any further I’ll admit, I do have a pair of Spandex bicycle shorts and no, they do not do my backside any favors. The only purpose they serve, that I’m aware of, is to alert approaching motorists to my presence. (The shock value alone often causes drivers to swerve to the opposite side of the road.)

At any rate, the stores offer all kinds of clothing, including leg, arm and knee warmers. Most of these duds are skin tight, because cyclists are supposed to look like Lance Armstrong and date girls that look like Sheryl Crow.

Did I mention I rode to Quebec in cut-offs and sneakers? Quebec, man! I was built like Lance Armstrong back then, but nobody had invented Spandex. Now that they have, I (sadly) look more like Drew Carey than Armstrong. Spandex is no longer an option for me (except as a means of startling motorists).

I just Google-mapped Quebec; turns out the trip was just over 1,000 kilometers. I don’t know how many miles that is, but it looks like quite a few on the map. And I did it without Spandex, special shoes, a helmet or padded underwear.

I had a point to make earlier in this column, but I can’t remember what it was. I’m chafing that bad right now.

More Reality Check online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.mlive.com. Email Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.