Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater
As we all know, the real reason anyone reads blogs or journals is to revel in others' misfortunes. Well, have I got an entry for you!
The night started well enough. I had brought up laundry to do at my house, as long as I still own the washer and dryer. I was going to meet my friend J. and try riding his new motorcycle, a KLR650. He arrived a minute or so after I did -- I was a bit late because I was frantically taking notes on what I wanted to film that evening, in case I got inspired to do some talkie shots for the next video.
I excused myself, and dashed into the house to drop off my laundry. I figured I might as well start it, so it'd be done earlier, and quickly got the laundry in the machine and set it going. I must have set it just on the "waiting" side of the dial -- it'll wait up to 6 hours before starting the cycle, and if the dial is on the "wait" side, it'll wait a couple minutes before starting. Whatever. I ran back up.
We rode down to his destination, me on his bike, he on mine. It was fun. The KLR is a pretty cool bike, although it's very very different from my current motorcycle. I could probably easily live with it for a trip to somewhere rugged like Alaska, though.
That done, I headed up to a gas station, to fill my bike's tank and gather some footage. Within 10 seconds of starting the tape rolling, my phone rang. I stopped the camera, and answered the phone. It was work, calling to tell me that a server was down, and could I please take a look at it? I explained that I was 30 minutes from a computer, and asked them to call a coworker. I hung up and continued filming.
The phone rang gain. Coworker said it's not a big deal, downgrade the urgency (as I had initially asked them to do), and I get to deal with it. Ok, sure. I hung up and finished up the fliming, packed up, and headed down to work. The last thing I wanted to do was go back into work -- I was planning an evening of doing laundry and working on the house. But into work I went.
The problem wasn't a difficult one to fix, but it's the kind of problem that indicates the machine needs to be replaced soon, so that resulted in a generalized sense of doom forming. I finished up, turned in the virtual paperwork, and headed out. I considered getting dinner near work, but decided it'd be better to get to the house and put some stuff in storage before the storage place closed. I could get dinner on the way back from that.
I headed up to the house. Packed up a few things, rolled up a rug. I loaded it into the van, damaging a finger on the shredder that was coming back to the apartment. Not too bloody, but surprisingly painful. I washed my hands and went down to change the laundry into the dryer.
Wait a minute, why is that light still on? Oh, crap. The laundry never started. The door was stuck open. Glance at watch: 8:40. I had to get moving, the storage place closes at 9. Laundry actually going this time, I headed upstairs, took a quick look around, and decided I was ready. I got in the minivan, and turned the key.
Click!
Blackness.
Ohhhhh-kay. It's done this once or twice before. Usually it comes back on the next key turn. There's some loose relay or something. I tried again, foot off the brake this time. Nope. Shift to neutral from park? No such luck, it's locked. This sure looked like a dead battery, so I grabbed the charger out of the garage, and set it to the "jump start" mode. Hooked it up, got back in the driver's seat. Turn key. Click! Hmm, those lights on the dash are really bright... I've never seen them so bright! Try again, turn key, k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k! That ain't right.
I spent the next 10 minutes trying different combinations of charger and starting, to no avail. I opened the relay/fuse panel and swapped around relays, trying to feel for which one was doing the cricket impression, but nothing made a difference. It was now 5 minutes to nine, and I clearly wasn't getting to the storage unit. The charger kept its "charged" light on no matter what I did, suggesting that the battery was actually in fine shape, but it definitely acted like a dead battery. I even got to experience the joy of a weakened alarm siren going off 3 feet from my head as I was working. And it won't. Listen. To. The. Off switch! I was returning with a very large wrench (to detach the battery terminal, I swear) when it finished its cycle of different obnoxious alarm sounds ("weeoooweeeooweeoo! beep! beep! beep! beeeeee boooo beeeee boooo! aank! aank! aank! booooeeeeee! boooooeeeee!"). I need to find that alarm control box and throw it in the garbage.
Enough. I left the battery charging, and headed to the pizza joint that's walking distance and open late. I needed food, the nine hours since lunch were taking their toll. I ordered a couple slices of pizza and a fountain drink. I grabbed the cup, and hit the ice dispenser, accidentally brushing one of the taps with my knuckle. My hand was covered in Diet Pepsi, while the cup filled with ice. Grand. I selected Sierra Mist, in the mood for something new and not based on the kola nut. Filled to about an inch from the top, not interested in sucking down an entire huge cup of sugarwater. I turned back toward my table, when I heard a spattering noise, and felt my hand dampening. The soda was volcanically overflowing the cup, drenching my hand and spilling all over the floor.
Ok, really. What did I do wrong? This is payback for... what, exactly?
The pizza lackey grabbed me a clean rag, and I cleaned myself up. Dinner was very subdued. Amazingly, I managed to eat the pizza without choking to death, or having it squirt an ecstatic gush of tomato sauce and grease all over me.
I walked back, speculatively sucking on my now-quiescent sugarwater. The van received another bout of sullen attention, but it still wasn't starting, just clicking relays at me like a gigantic angry insect. I left it charging.
Determined to get something positive out of the evening, I swapped the laundry (finished this time) into the dryer, and loaded my "to the apartment" stuff into the sidecar. Ah, the trusty rusty sidecar. I thought evil thoughts toward the 1995 Toyota van in my driveway that was doing considerably worse than the 1983 Honda with the unexpected, off-balance weight it'd been draging for its entire life. Simplicity has its virtues.
Fortunately, the trip to the apartment and back was entirely without incident. I didn't even get bitten by the shredder again.
Back at my house, I pulled my clean, dry laundry into its mesh bag, and gave a last check before leaving. The laundry safely loaded in my little rear-seat basket and bungie'd in, I rolled the bike out and got ready to leave. Then noticed, in the final being-pissed-upon moment, that it had just started raining. On the clean, dry laundry.
Hoo boy, did I ever get what I deserved. Or something.
Posted at 11:18 permanent link category: /misc
Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater