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MomJeans420 posted:the smidsy weave Ok so which bike are you going to get? Sagebrush posted:I think the pandemic has made people shittier drivers and more angry overall. I haven't noticed an epidemic of red-light runners here in California, but people are absolutely driving more aggressively, changing lanes less safely, and generally doing more unpredictable things. It used to be that in a half-hour drive on the highway I'd see one or two real stupid moves; now it's at least half a dozen every time. Lots of people driving into the city instead of taking the train. SF is so much more urban than the rest for CA, and people are just overwhelmed. Not making excuses for them, just affirming I see the exact same thing. Pretty sure there were more traffic deaths in 2020 than 2019 even though traffic was way down.
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Apr 26, 2021 19:22
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There is a lot of benefits to shift work, and nearly the best is commuting outside of normal hours, and not having to interact with the general public on the roads at all. It's also why dirt biking is great.
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Apr 26, 2021 19:26
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Toe Rag posted:Ok so which bike are you going to get? There are so many choices and I want like 10 wildly different bikes. I'll have to make a post in the tell me what bike to buy thread once I can type with two hands, typing like a boomer right now is slow as poo poo.
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Apr 26, 2021 19:31
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I reckon the media are complicit in this poo poo (like so many other things) because they always use the mealy mouthed passive voice that reinforces the idea that car crashes are random whoopsies that can't be avoided or prevented. It's always 'a car lost control on x street, leaving two people dead and one in critical condition' and you'd swear they were minding their own business when a bloodthirsty car jumped out of the bushes and crushed them. They literally never say 'a driver lost control' or 'a man drove his car the wrong way down an offramp' it's always the car doing it and the humans get damaged as a side effect. But when it's a person on a bike it is always, always, ALWAYS 'a motorcyclist was killed on x road when a truck lost control' it drives me mad.
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Apr 26, 2021 19:31
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if you want to murder someone in the USA the proper way is to do it with your car. just "accidentally" drive over them while they're crossing the street. it's just a tragic unavoidable thing; sometimes cars run over people and there's nothing that can be done. you probably won't even get jail time.
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Apr 26, 2021 19:37
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Or deliberately drive over them while they're at a protest. I think I heard that's legal now.
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Apr 26, 2021 20:22
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MomJeans420 posted:There are so many choices and I want like 10 wildly different bikes. I'll have to make a post in the tell me what bike to buy thread once I can type with two hands, typing like a boomer right now is slow as poo poo. After I totaled my bike on the highway I got all that stupid bullshit too, and people would ask my wife how she’d ever let me get on a motorcycle again. (Her response is: “he’s an adult, I don’t let him do anything.”) Partially out of spite I bought a Harley touring bike, a Ducati scrambler, and a Kawasaki dual sport within 18 months and I ride at least one of them almost every single day. But partially indecision. If you want wildly different bikes, get them. Ride all motorcycles. They’re all so different and fun in different ways. Renaissance Robot posted:Or deliberately drive over them while they're at a protest. I think I heard that's legal now. Depends on what you’re driving. 
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Apr 26, 2021 20:29
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MomJeans420 posted:Oddly enough multiple family members on my wife's side have had horrific mountain biking injuries yet there's no talk of "don't ride bicycles" Same deal. It’s frustrating for sure.
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Apr 26, 2021 20:33
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I ride less and less in town now, never at night, and try to do more dirt than anything else.
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Apr 26, 2021 21:29
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when i first got a motorcycle and posted about it on facebook, the first reply was my dad's cousin saying "i hope you are an organ donor." like, thanks for the vote of confidence i guess? dickhead.
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Apr 26, 2021 22:55
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Sagebrush posted:when i first got a motorcycle and posted about it on facebook, the first reply was my dad's cousin saying "i hope you are an organ donor." Yeah, I got that one too, a lot. It was super weird because I've been evangelizing organ donation for decades so it's not like anyone who said it didn't already know I was one. I think it's just become something people say. The most memorable reaction I got when I started riding was my friend's horrible sister who is a neurosurgeon who loving hates me. She just said "I have some information about helmets that you should read" and then emailed me a paper that amounted to "wear a full face helmet or you will be turbofucked". Getting news outlets and cops to switch from "a car lost control" to "a driver lost control because they were _____" would probably make for more effective road safety messaging than any amount of money spent on advertising.
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Apr 26, 2021 23:24
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I'm not sure how I settled on getting a motorcycle as my first vehicle (I went through the usual teenage automotive dreams; tuned import, American muscle, I briefly really wanted a dune buggy for some reason) but it took far too much convincing and if my Dad hadn't ridden them in the 70s it may have never happened. Took a couple of spills but my folks were still pretty supportive. Now that I'm back in the saddle after a ten-year hiatus, riding a bike that is irresponsibly powerful, I couldn't scare my Mom if I tried.Sagebrush posted:if you want to murder someone in the USA the proper way is to do it with your car. This is true here in Canada too, at least in Toronto we've had some drivers kill cyclists or pedestrians, getting off with a traffic citation if that. It's hosed. Renaissance Robot posted:Or deliberately drive over them while they're at a protest. I think I heard that's legal now. This is horrifying though. Legal in at least two states now, isn't it? In less awful thread content, I have to admit I didn't know what a dry clutch was until recently in one of the moto threads, and now that tambourine jingling is all I can hear every time some of the local Ducati guys stop at the light by my place.
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Apr 26, 2021 23:32
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Elector_Nerdlingen posted:The most memorable reaction I got when I started riding was my friend's horrible sister who is a neurosurgeon who loving hates me. She just said "I have some information about helmets that you should read" and then emailed me a paper that amounted to "wear a full face helmet or you will be turbofucked". That's actually surprisingly kind and useful, especially from a doctor. She's not wrong either. I have several medical professionals in my family and a couple of them did the "oh my god, every motorcyclist I've seen has been in the most horrible crash, I can't believe you'd do that" and it's like uhhhh okay but you are an ER trauma nurse. Do you think your sample of motorcyclists is representative of the whole population? My grandma told me "well, you know, any time anyone asked The Doctor [my great-grandfather, her father-in-law] about motorcycles, he'd always say that he'd never let anyone in his family get one, because he'd had to put too many young kids back together." And it's like yep I don't doubt it one bit. He was the only surgeon in his little midwestern town and he practiced at a time when the state of the art in protective gear was a leather football helmet and you were a pussy if you wore one. Again, the things he saw are not exactly representative of the average conscientious motorcyclist in the 21st century.
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Apr 27, 2021 00:05
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My mom’s brother was killed by a driver on his motorcycle as it turns out only a few miles from where I now live, which is about 1,200 miles from where I grew up (and over 2,500 from where she did). She was not pleased.
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Apr 27, 2021 00:15
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Concern about death doesn't stop me from riding but I don't really ride in Manhattan/NYC anymore. It's just not fun at all so the risk now that I don't live in the city is for no pay off at all. And the number of fatal accidents is and always has been pretty high.
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Apr 27, 2021 00:37
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Toe Rag posted:My mom’s brother was killed by a driver on his motorcycle as it turns out only a few miles from where I now live, which is about 1,200 miles from where I grew up (and over 2,500 from where she did). She was not pleased. They always ask why you're willing to risk your life for a bit of fun, but they hate it when you ask why they're willing to risk doing manslaughter just to go shopping.
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Apr 27, 2021 01:28
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There comes a time in the life of every great manufacturer when all the trails have been blazed, all the championships won, and one seeks a different kind of challenge. Inevitably, eyes turn to the seemingly lowest hanging fruit in the world: Harley. One examines the Harley, snorts and declares 'What a crude piece of poo poo! We can do that, how hard can it be??' And it always results in something like this:  An appalling vehicle in every respect with no redeeming features whatsoever. Come at the king, you best not miss.
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Apr 27, 2021 05:09
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looks slow
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Apr 27, 2021 05:19
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I'm not really inclined to share that I just bought a motorcycle except with goons and a couple people who I know also ride because I don't want the lectures. As a contrast i've been road cycling (MTB too, including competing at a high level) for over a decade and very seldom do people bring up the safety thing when they find out I'm a cyclist.
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Apr 27, 2021 08:05
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they want to cry at you about how they saw a bicyclist roll a stop sign and how horrible that is as if they don't roll every stop sign in their car
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Apr 27, 2021 16:06
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The funny thing is it's safer going the speed of traffic on a motorcycle versus going half the speed of cars on my bicycle but still sharing a lane with them.
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Apr 27, 2021 16:18
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Greg12 posted:they want to cry at you about how they saw a bicyclist roll a stop sign and how horrible that is In 2019 someone in my town blew a red light and killed a guy on a motorcycle. When the article was posted on my town facebook page, people came to the defense of the driver saying that blowing a red light was an honest mistake and that could happen to anyone (she's well known in the community). People are loving terrible.
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Apr 27, 2021 16:31
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Overheard non-motorcycle coworker asking known-motorcycle coworker about the hard to see turn signals on some sort of sport bike he was behind. The answer boiled down to "There's not really any laws about brightness of lights" and then somehow ended with "A motorcycle can get out of a situation easily anyway"
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Apr 27, 2021 18:34
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Strife posted:In 2019 someone in my town blew a red light and killed a guy on a motorcycle. When the article was posted on my town facebook page, people came to the defense of the driver saying that blowing a red light was an honest mistake and that could happen to anyone (she's well known in the community). People are loving terrible. My friend's dad has had his licence suspended three times for driving through red lights. Last time I was round there he was bitching about the latest time and I said "Have you tried just stopping for them?" and got "as if you've never done it" snapped back at me. Turns out he literally thinks everyone does it all the time and he's just unlucky and gets caught.
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Apr 28, 2021 01:15
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A thief thinks everyone steals.
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Apr 28, 2021 02:04
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Ten years ago this was the article that got me to quit using "rape" as slang for getting beaten in a video game http://dbzer0.com/blog/feminists-dont-think-all-men-are-rapists-rapists-do/
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Apr 28, 2021 02:15
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Yeah that's an easy one to avoid, especially as pwned is right there.
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Apr 28, 2021 05:37
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My younger brother died in a motorcycle accident down in Florida like 4 years ago. Really hosed my mom up and I sold my bike shortly afterwards. Just bought another one, i was pretty nervous to tell her, thought she would be upset. Was surprisingly cool about it, just said to be careful 
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Apr 30, 2021 11:20
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What bike did you buy?
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Apr 30, 2021 12:39
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Steakandchips posted:What bike did you buy? A z400
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Apr 30, 2021 13:36
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Nice. How are you finding it? I'm thinking I may get one for a trackday bike.
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Apr 30, 2021 13:40
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Steakandchips posted:Nice. How are you finding it? I'm thinking I may get one for a trackday bike. I like it a lot. It weighs practically nothing, and the motor is just the right size where I can be wring the poo poo out of it and for the most part not get myself in trouble physically or criminally.
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Apr 30, 2021 14:56
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I've always been pretty bullish about motorcycles and mortality, having nearly 15 years of no real incidents on the street other than the usual bullshit, but no injuries. The first time I ever went on a ride with my wife where she was on her own bike it all hit me at once how, suddenly I couldn't control her safety on a motorcycle, all the risks motorcycling represents. She's since cooled off on street riding and mostly just wants to ride dirt and I'm not encouraging anything else because admittedly I'm much more comfortable with that. You get older and you have more in your life you want to protect, your wants and priorities change. We both understand that I'll always need to ride motorcycles, but I'm happy to do the majority of it on closed circuits and dirt roads to minimize life threatening risk these days. At least until the next time tastes change.
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Apr 30, 2021 18:10
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I'm completely fine with the mortality risk of riding for me. I've ridden road bikes for 32 years. But my wife doesn't ride and I no longer ever ride with my wife as a passenger. I don't want to leave my kids orphans if anything happens to me on the bike.
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Apr 30, 2021 18:30
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Yuns posted:I'm completely fine with the mortality risk of riding for me. I've ridden road bikes for 32 years. But my wife doesn't ride and I no longer ever ride with my wife as a passenger. I don't want to leave my kids orphans if anything happens to me on the bike. Come ride dirt. Fun for the whole family and you just break stuff, you dont (usually) die. Pretty sure you even live close-ish.
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Apr 30, 2021 22:17
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builds character posted:Come ride dirt. Fun for the whole family and you just break stuff, you dont (usually) die. Lol be like my dad: “don’t do anything stupid and ruin our day” proceeds to wheelie and loop out his XR500 and have to have his son drive his rear end to some rural hospital at 14yo since his pinky was hanging by a bit of flesh and his knee was all hosed up  dirt riding rules
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Apr 30, 2021 23:55
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right arm posted:Lol be like my dad: “don’t do anything stupid and ruin our day” First, your dad owns. Second, exactly! You might get hurt, but you’re less likely to die.
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May 1, 2021 01:54
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builds character posted:First, your dad owns. Lol he does rule. he one upped me and bought a R1200GSA a week after I got my SAR. brother copied me and bought the second SAR the same dealer had tho motorcycle families rule. I’ve got a photo my dad took of me (on my CRF250R) jumping over my mom (on my horribly slow CRF230F) on a double up on a track back in longview WA wouldn’t trade those memories for anything 
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May 1, 2021 02:21
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When I moved up north I was close to my parents again. My dad has made casual mention once or twice of possibly getting a motorcycle, since I have one and I'm here and he could ride with me. I did not respond with a lot of enthusiasm, because, well, it's loving dangerous! I love my dad and he's a good guy, a serious pilot and he's not totally unfamiliar with being on two wheels. But I don't want him half-assing his way into motorcycling (especially as an older man) just so we can go cruise on a Sunday now and then. If he brings it up again I may try to talk about what kind of riding he might want to do, and talk about the training and the gear and the risks. It feels a bit like if I said it'd be fun to get my pilot's license so I could go fly formation with him around the local farms, but without any of the costs and training that goes into a pilot's license vs a bike license. The barriers to entry are so low - and he's never expressed an interest in motorcycling otherwise - it makes me cautious. And then part of me feels bad for discouraging him. Then a week later he's talking about replacing his Bonanza with a twin, and I relax, because his other pastimes are so expensive and time consuming he doesn't have much time to ride in the first place. e: An addendum: I don't think I'll ever have kids, but if I did it would be really hard for me to keep riding while I was raising them to adulthood. FBS fucked around with this message at 05:06 on May 1, 2021 |
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May 1, 2021 03:33
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Meanwhile I'm heading towards becoming a motorcycle instructor. Shadowing in-person classes this weekend directly after my second vaccination shot. Told the company owner ahead of this and he gave me the option of shadowing next weekend as well if I feel like poo poo. I'll just have to remember how clutches work again since I haven't had to use them in a couple years.
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May 1, 2021 04:49
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