if you remember to turn them on.
3:17am... Wake up. FUCK!!! I set the damn alarm, looked at it about a dozen times to make sure, but never turned the fucking thing on. DAMNIT! Thank heavens I loaded everything the night before.
I jumped up, took a quick wizz, emptied the catbox, brushed my teeth, scratched The Bear's head and took off out the door. Estimated time - 3:40am.
Blasting down the highway trying to make time... about a half hour into it... FUCK! Forgot my rainsuit (if only my crystal ball had been worth a shit... read on). Turn around, go back home, grab rain suit, hit the road... again. Approximate time - 4:45am.
At this point I was haulin'... really makin' time. Figured out that my truck has a governor just over 95mph. Also figured out that I should have spent more time playing with the GPS I bought for this trip so I'd actually know how to use it well. I did manage to get Drewpy's grandparents place plugged into the thing and added Trip's place as a point of interest/waypoint along my route.
Nothing really interesting to report for the first part of the drive. Gas stations, McDonald's breakfast... then Georgia. Jesus. Georgia.
First thing's first, everyone in Georgia drives like maniacs. Fast. Damn fast. Cops outside of Atlanta were sparse, but cared. Cops within Atlanta were plentiful, but could give two shits and a fuck about how fast you were going.
One cop I saw slightly over the border in GA was sneaky as hell. I saw old dude coming towards me, and everyone slowed down. He turned around and began to head northbound. After a few miles I noticed him still behind me (probably 1/4 mile or so), but he wasn't after anyone... or so it seemed. People started blasting ass again and sure enough he comes from out of nowhere blowing by me at probably 110mph. A couple miles ahead he's got the guy who was in front of me earlier pulled over. My guess is he clocked us as he passed, but wanted to see if he could clock someone going even faster so he waited to decide who to pull over. Sneaky bastard.
Another interesting part about GA was a stretch of I75 near Macon that had these cool signs, "Share the Road Watch for Motorcycles". We need more of those around.
Remember how I talked about Atlanta cops not giving a fuck? Well, I made it into ATL around 10am. Rollin' in a 55 at like 85, I might as well have been going backwards with the way people were passing me. It was unreal. People were passing, cutting everyone off, and just randomly acting like retards... all the while cops were out AND clocking people. I am pretty sure that you have to break the sound barrier to get a speeding ticket in Atlanta. I am DAMN glad I didn't ride my bike through there.
One thing I noted when crossing the border into Tennessee is that it strangely smelled like pot there... not very good pot, but it was obvious that there was somethin' planted nearby.
Anyway, I got to Trip's place without incident, and got the bike unloaded into a gas station parking lot. The place had a near perfect hill/cliff thing out back that is great for loading/unloading bikes. It would have been nice to have a helper, but my fat ass was able to pull that bitch off without dropping the bike... not to say it wasn't close a couple times.
I stripped in the parking lot and changed into my leathers... all the while talknig to some redneck chick who was outside smoking a cigarette. I think she liked fat guys named Zach, but her single tooth kinda freaked me out... plus she was like 60. And, for the first time, I loaded up the bike with all my shit. Damn I had a lot of shit. Too much shit it seemed. Standing outside a gas station in 80+ degree weather trying to screw around with saddle bags I've never used, a sleeping bag that was ginormous, and all sorts of other random shit was not fun. And of course, I fucked it up and had to redo it like 3 times.
I finally got everything set up and drove my truck down to Trip's garage, making a quick pit stop to pick up Chewy from the leasing office of his apartment complex. They looked at me like I was a maniac (fat guy, full leathers, wanting a plastic doll... go figure). The chick was hot, so I took a picture of her with Chewy, dropped off my truck, and walked back to the gas station to officially head out. Damn that walk was LONG and HOT. Of course Trip has to live in the section of apartments furthest from the gas station. Pain in the ass... Pretty much the story of the trip.
Securing Chewy to the bars on my rig, I hop on, and we're off to the races. Going up the road and fumbling with my GPS through my tankbag was dumb. I fucked it up, couldn't read it anyway, and ended up spending way more time than I needed to in Knoxville. About three hours to be specific. Between unloading the truck, changing, loading/unloading/reloading the bike 27 times, walking to hell and back to pick up a plastic doll, and dicking around getting lost with my GPS... I was just happy to find my way out of that damn place.
Being on the road and on two wheels felt GREAT. The adventure had finally started. It's off to Drewpy's grandparents place in Kettering, OH.
Nothing especially eventful on the way up, bike ran great, I felt good, met a couple decent folks... nothing too exciting. I did hit some misty rain-like shit about 100 miles south of Lexington KY and pulled over to put on my rain suit. Rain suit over leathers was a MOTHERFUCKER lemme tell ya. Big pain in the ass. It did give me the chance to BS with some Harley guys and a small town KY guy.
Turns out the Harley guys were heading to Deal's Gap for the weekend and we exchanged road trip plans, talked bikes breifly... then they left. The local KY guy was fascinated by my bike being belt driven. He said, "I didn't know they made them like that" and left me with, "now you fellers be careful, now"... Well it was only me, but maybe given my girth he though I was smuggling some other guys under my rain suit... who knows.
I give Drewpy a quick call cause my GPS had gone dead and got some quick directions to the gas station near his grandparents house. On the road... again.
Finally rolled into Kettering just after 8pm. I stopped at the gas station and called Drewpy. Ring Ring Ring Ring Ring Voicemail.
Again. Again. So I texted him... multiple times. FINALLY after nearly 45 minutes he calls back. 'Sorry, I was out running errands, but I'm not too far away'. Whatever jerk, come meet me here.
While waiting I talked to some super drunk guy who drove up and wanted to know what color my bike was painted. 'Yeah pal, it's grey and black' I want to hurt someone.
Then some lady pulls up and says on her way inside, "I told my kids you were Evel Kneivel so do something for them." I did nothing, but if it would have been more easily accessible, I probably would have whipped out my dork and beat her about the head with it. 'Is that Evel enough for you slut?!'
So... around 9:15pm, Drewpy pulls up... recognize that time. It's only an hour or so AFTER I got into town. AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH! Who cares! It was just good to finally know somewhat of what was going on and good to see an old buddy. In his defense, it was DP's birthday and he was trying to celebrate with multiple sides of the family, say goodbye, AND meet up with my happy ass.
We get to the house and I meet Drewpy's grandparents. Gramps is one cool mofo and Grandma couldn't be any nicer. We BS'ed for a moment until I noticed my saddlebag was rubbing on the tire. 'Well we can't have that' was the general thought amongst the Peacocks, but I'll be honest... I didn't really care.
Off to Home Depot we go to pick up some steel bar stock and some random shit from Wal*Mart. We pitted at DP's mom's place to say goodbye and headed back to the elder Peacocks who were waiting to fabricate something. Some measuring, fiddling, cutting, grinding, riviting, and no cursing (obviously I didn't help) later... and now I had a sweet bracket to keep my saddlebags in check. Them boys sure are handy.
Birthday cake break! Turns out it was Nighthawk's birthday too (or close enough to celebrate). We eat some KFC, sing the song, eat some cash money ice cream cake... and go back to loading the bikes. Of course Gramps and NH are finished already, while DP and I still fuck around with our stuff.
It's getting really late. I finished up with my bike last.... got showered and layed down in bed. Fell asleep probably around 5am or so... up for more than 24 hours... Leaving at 6am to ride like 650 miles. Joy.