Bikeless World Wanderings

Well, this is it.  It’s now 7:45 on the morning of my last day here.  I have nothing left to do but hang around for a few hours, pack up my computer and head out.  The manager we are working for is taking everyone out to lunch but I think I’ll skip that… never mind, I just came back from a cigarette break and was advised by a friend/co-worker that I should probably show up at the lunch to be “politically correct”, especially if I want to be on the list to return the next time… I don’t really want to go since I have an 8-hour drive, towing the bike back south and wanted as early a start as possible but I suppose I should, since I want to come back whenever the opportunity arises.

Some friends threw a little impromptu going away party for me on Wednesday.  Not a big deal, just pizza and drinks at the Legion Post in Smyrna for a couple hours.  It made me think of all the nice folks I’ve met and how much I have enjoyed my time while here.  This has definitely been one of my better assignments.  Between the people at the Legion, others I’ve met at Doc’s Food and Spirits and my co-workers it has been a most interesting time…  As usual in this job though, just as you begin to develop some friendships, it’s time to move on and that is beginning to get old.  I really like my job, well most of the time anyway, but the constant travel is tiring… until I sit at home for a while then boredom sets in and I’m ready to go again.  It’s a vicious cycle but I guess I just have to maintain until I hit the lotto or something.

OK, I’m back for my last week here in Atlanta.  I really hate to leave this job.  Quite a switch from my last assignment, huh but I really like it here.  If I could afford the pay cut I’d move here and accept that position they have talked to me about but that ain’t gonna happen…

Friday morning I’ll be all packed up, truck loaded and bike loaded on the trailer before my last day on the job.  I should get home sometime around midnight so it will be a long day for me.  It will also be a short night since I have to get up early Saturday and get the bike ready and head out to the Leesburg Rally that morning.  Not sure exactly when we are leaving or where from but a bunch of friends are gathering somewhere for the ride over.  Hopefully I’ll get some details later…  I better…  If you leave me alone for the ride I’ll be really pissed, hint, hint… Somebody talk to me…

This last week should be slow since I really can’t pick up any new work that will take more than this week to complete but we’ll see how things develop.  I’ll be busy enough with everything I have to do to get on the road…so maybe I cen rest at work… yea right… like that would ever happen here in Dilbert land.

What a great start to an awesome new event.  Angel City appears to be raised up from the woods and farmland just west of Unadilla, GA, about 37 miles south of Macon.  

The very first Iron Angels Motorcycle Rally was an absolute blast.  Probably 10,000 people there tops which, compared to the half million or so in Daytona twice a year, made for an not-to-big but full crowd of lively, fun bikers just kicking back and having fun.  The music was great, there was plenty of food and drink and even plenty of port-a-johns.  There were lots of vendors but not to many.  

Everything wasn’t perfect but nothing was a major problem nor inconvenience and I’m sure future rally’s will have many improvements.  It won’t be long before this event catches national attention like Sturgis or Daytona.  It may take a while for attendance to pick up to their levels (at least I hope so) but I do see it happening over the coming years.  

The place is an awesome, old west styled town with lots of room to grow and plenty of space for camping, which even I’d like to do for an event like this (my personal preference is 4 star hotels but even I can make an occasional exception).

The music stage and area are set well away from the main streets area and was a perfect spot where bikes could ride up to the area in front of the stage and park “drive-in” style.  The bands rocked and rolled and rocked some more.

I got a late start on Saturday due to the rain hanging in a little longer than expected in Atlanta but was on the road early in the afternoon and stayed there until after midnight before heading back to Atlanta.

All things considered, I had a great time, met some really cool people and I’d do it again in a heartbeat.  Their next big party is scheduled for October and I hope I can go…

It was Friday and the office was nearly empty.  Everyone had gone already for an early start to the Easter weekend.  I was ready to go myself but had some loose ends I had to tie up at work so stuck it out until about noon.  I then headed back to the hotel, grabbed my stuff, loaded it on the bike and headed south…

Surprisingly it was not a bad ride, rather enjoyable actually.  It took 7 hours to get from the hotel to Deland.  I was able to easily maintain about 85 mph throughout most of the trip and never really ran into much congestion on the roadway.

When I got home I was pretty beat but Stacey and I had a good evening anyway just hanging out and doing a little prep for the Easter Party she was having on Sunday.  I got up Saturday morning and did a few quick jobs around the house then took off on the bike for a while.

Stacey’s girlfriend Sue showed up for the weekend and we partied on Saturday night, visiting a friend’s house and a couple bars in Deland.  The night got cut short due to Sue getting a nasty drunk on and turning into a real bitch on wheels and Stacey just kept adding fuel to the fire…  

Sunday was a lot of prep in the AM followed by about a dozen people showing up at the house throughout the afternoon.  Much to my disappointment, Marvin and Bonnie couldn’t make it but another couple that we don’t get to see nearly enough, Jerry and Pat, showed up later in the day and stayed after everyone else left.  We had a good time, Jerry and I were working on a bottle of Jaeger and at the same time, Stacey and I were working on a bottle of Patron and the whole while Pat was doing serious damage to a bottle of Bacardi… After her previous nights performance, Sue was sticking to beer.  We had a great time and hated to see the evening end so quickly

On Monday I got up, got dressed and repacked and headed back to Atlanta.  Upon my arrival I realized that I had really gotten quite a sunburn on my head, neck and arms.  Oh well, it will take a few days but shouldn’t bother me for to long.

Now I’m back at work and looking forward to the Iron Angles Rally south of Macon, GA next Saturday… then one more week here before heading home for the Rally in Leesburg, FL the following Saturday.  

Wonder where they will send me to next???

Saturday was a recovery day.  It had been a good Friday night and I was looking forward to the monthly Saturday breakfast feast at the Legion.  I didn’t make it…  I awoke about 11 am with a major hangover, took some Ibuprophen and headed back to bed.  Couldn’t sleep but laid there for about an hour or so until my headache disappeared.  It was a rainy day and I just felt lazy so I never even got dressed, just hung around watching TV, drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes all day.  At about 6:30 I decided to shower and get dressed and head out for some dinner and catch the final round of the Karaoke contest at the Legion that had been going on for weeks.  They routinely had some really good talent there.  Got out of the shower and something on the TV caught my eye so I sat on the bed for a minute and the next thing I new it was 10 PM and I had just had an unexpected 3 hour nap.  By the time I got dressed and going, I had missed the finals and arrived at the Post in time to hear the winners announced.  Of course, I was well rested and quite sober while everyone else had been there for a few hours and were in different stages of inebriation.  I hung out a while talking to some friends and firmed up plans for a Sunday ride with a stop at the Cigar Pub for a benefit for a lady who was paralyzed from the waist down from a stray gun shot.

Sunday started out great.  It was a beautiful day, sun shining brightly, blue skies with a few puffy white clouds, cool temperatures.  It was the perfect day for riding.  Pam, a friend from the Legion, had expressed an interest in riding with me Saturday night so I had arranged to pick her up at the Legion at 11 AM.  I had been out since about 9:30 just enjoying riding the area without all the traffic that is so typical here in the Atlanta suburbs and picked her up as scheduled.  I had directions to the benefit and wasn’t familiar with the road.  The trip there was quite nice down a couple beautiful curvy roads and then we came to an old covered bridge.  Thinking nothing of it I proceeded through the bridge only to abruptly find out that the planking was very uneven and I was unable to maintain balance and dumped the bike.  It seems my friends had forgotten to tell me about the specific path necessary to navigate the bridge on a bike.  We were going very slowly so no one was hurt (except my pride) and no damage at all to the bike but it was very dirty inside the bridge and we came out the other side looking quite a mess.  After a few minutes of attempting to brush off the dirt we mounted up and headed on our way.  

We arrived at the Cigar Pub and hooked up with the other Legion Riders there and had a good afternoon.  The band was quite good and Rena got their contact info to try and get them to play at the Legion on some weekend soon.  We stayed a bit longer than I wanted as I was really in the mood to ride, not party the day away drinking diet Coke (no alcohol when I ride), but when we got on the road, Dennis led us through some absolutely beautiful countryside on nearly empty roads for a couple hours.  We made it back to the Legion and went inside for a bit to get the finishing order from the NASCAR race to see if either of us had won the pool.  No such luck… Pam took off and I hung around for an hour or so before heading back to the hotel.  Considering my lazy day Saturday, I was surprised that I was so tired Sunday evening.  Fixed myself a cocktail, got cleaned up, turned on the TV and ended up asleep rather early.
Long weekend coming up.  I’ll be leaving work early on Friday to try and beat the traffic south of Atlanta, spend Friday night, Saturday and Sunday at home, then ride back to Atlanta on Monday afternoon to finish up my last 2 weeks here for this assignment.

Hope everyone has a great Easter weekend!!!

Last night I went to a Gretchen Wilson concert that I was invited to last week. Wasn’t really expecting much but the concert was a lot better than I thought it would be.

The opening act, Blaine Larsen's 30-minute set was somewhat unimpressive but did show signs that he may be able to develop some style with lots of work. Try some new clothes boy…

The second act was a BIG improvement. Van Zant (Southern-rocking brothers Johnny and Donnie Van Zant) was rocking the house down. They put on an awesome show, full of high-energy southern rock and roll and country. The Van Zant brothers have quite a background as one replaced the older brother as lead singer for Lynyrd Skynyrd after the tragic plane crash and the other is a part of 38 Special. Their set consisted mainly of material from 2005's Get Right With the Man, the duo's first country album. Every song sounded like an old favorite to be sure. How cool it was to hear Donnie crank out 38 Special's "Wild Eyed Southern Boys" and Johnny unleash Skynyrd's "Sweet Home Alabama." Apparently, after this concert tour they will both be going back to their respective bands. I’m really glad I got to see them… I remember thinking how was Gretchen Wilson going to match their performance???

Gretchen Wilson was quite a surprise. She placed herself squarely on that fence dividing both rock and country. She played some of her own music that came off quite well but when she did her renditions of Heart's "Barracuda" and a Stevie Nicks classic as well, she literally brought the house down… She was awesome!!! Funny though, when she came back out on stage for her finale’ she did her signature “Red Neck Woman” and it seemed rather anti-climatic.

It was a good night but today I am paying the price. I should know better than to party mid-week when I have to get up so early for work… Oh well… Honestly, it was worth it.

OK, I concede, I give up, I quit…  Yesterday afternoon I went to Circuit City and had them remove the satellite radio and reinstall my original radio back into the truck.  It’s a sad day for me to give that up but I have no real choice since reception was a major issue for me.  Wish I knew what was causing the problems…

What a great weekend. Stacey and I met on Friday evening in Savannah, GA to celebrate a second anniversary of sorts, the fact that we have survived 2 years together. For those who aren’t familiar with Savannah, it’s a beautiful, romantic, historic party town. They certainly know how to do things right there. The tour busses look like old trolley cars and there are horse drawn carriages everywhere. The entire town is built on a plan drawn up in the early 1700’s and that plan is still used today. It’s a series of squares, initially 24, I believe. The historic district is full of small parks and really old houses (for the US anyway). Huge, beautiful, ancient trees are everywhere with Spanish moss hanging from all the branches. The riverfront area and an area know as the Marketplace is where the partying goes on. Wonderful restaurants, great bars, all kinds of live music, rock, blues, jazz, etc. makes for lots to do there. There are stores everywhere for those who like to shop. For those into history, architecture, ghost tours, etc there is a myriad of ways to tour. We saw tour busses and horse drawn carriages, both large and small, pedal cabs, three weeled two person scooters, a large Hearst with the top removed and seating raised so that people were sitting with their heads ouside and even saw a segway tour group.

We stayed at the Hampton Inn & Suites, which I highly recommend to anyone. Friday night, after settling into the hotel we took off on foot and explored the riverfront area, window-shopping while heading to Bernie’s Raw Bar and Seafood Restaurant. Turned out to be a great little place with good food and a big karaoke party going on with a group of service men, their dates and family… Karaoke isn’t our thing so we went down the street to another place with a live band. They were a really good cover band so we stayed there a while. Later we ended up in a local’s bar and eventually made it back to the room…

Saturday morning we went shopping. Stacey wanted something from Savannah for the house and was on a mission to find it. After walking a long busy street we flagged down a pedal cab, a bicycle rickshaw type transport and had her take us back to River Street. We went through a bunch of shops and Stacey couldn’t decide on what she wanted but had her eye on a print we saw at one shop. We decided to find the local American Legion Post that was across town, called the pedal cab girl to pick us up and she rode us there. Unfortunately, the Legion wasn’t open until 4:00 PM and it was not yet 2:00 so we got back on the bike and had Lori take us somewhere for a cold beer and some lunch close to where she had picked us up. We went to an English Pub, sat out front and had Scotch Eggs and baked Brie. From there we wandered back toward the hotel, did some more shopping along the way and then settled into a Sports Bar for a couple more cold beer’s. While there I called that shop that we had been in earlier and bought a beautiful framed, probably overpriced, print for the bedroom that Stacey had expressed an interest in. Stacey was happy and I was sure I would be rewarded later for my wonderful generosity…

We wandered back to the hotel to rest up a bit for the evening that I had planned for us. Stacey didn’t know what plans I had made and I wasn’t talking. We walked a couple blocks from the hotel and met up with a private carriage for an evening tour of the district with a bottle of wine. After the carriage ride we were dropped off at Alligator Soul for dinner. The food was good, actually excellent, but the service was really shoddy. We didn’t let that deter us or spoil our night. We went bar hopping after dinner and started at Savannah Blues, a great little bar with good music and stayed there for a set. Went to another place called Mercury Lounge that had an even better blues band than the first place. We wandered with some people we met to another bar that ended up being the local’s bar we were in the evening before but there was no music so we ended up back at the Mercury Lounge until the band quit playing…

Saturday we went down the street to a Mexican Restaurant for lunch then over to Loco’s Sports Bar to watch some of the race before heading back to Deland and Atlanta…

We had a wonderful weekend and really seemed to put some problems that had been lingering in our relationship behind us, at least for the time being, hopefully forever.