Taking The Guesswork Out of Motorcycle Selection

The author and publisher of Twisted Roads — Jack Riepe — was injured in a domestic issue this past weekend, and unable to meet the Monday deadline for his blog. His significant other walked in on him while he was applying Teflon spray to a snow shovel. In response to her inquiry as to why he was doing that, Riepe said, “To make it easier for you to shovel out my truck, and the rest of the driveway.”

When he regained consciousness, emergency room doctors claimed they had never seen a snow shovel shoved that far up anyone’s ass. Twisted Roads resumes this week with Thursday’s blog posted a few hours earlier. We regret the delay. The winner of the Big Jim Cookie Drawing will be announced in a special addendum on Friday, February 4, 2011.

Moto -journalists and biker columnists the world over are often confronted with letters from readers claiming that some particular brand of motorcycle (many belonging to marques with distinguished reputations for, speed, comfort, and long-distance capability) are overrated and actually painful to ride. Some riders claim their machines have even humiliated them at crucial moments. The pain generally stems from an unusual seat configuration or a radical motorcycle design, while the humiliation is a byproduct of the machine’s inability to meet a rider’s expectations. (The mental anguish caused by a motorcycle’s inability to go from zero to 85 in 2.5 seconds, or its limited capacity to run for 85 miles without breaking down, or its reluctance to pass a Segway on a long hill is well documented, and can easily translate into a steady throbbing in one’s temples or a constant pounding in the balls.)

In reality, the problem is generally not with the bike but a poor match between the rider and the machine. One rider of my acquaintance (a man from New Jersey) is between 96 and 104-years-old and struggling with dementia. He just bought a Ducati 1198, and complained that the machine made him feel like a “monkey humping a watermelon.” His primary motivation in purchasing the motorcycle was largely one of image. He wanted a bike that looked good enough to get him laid at the nursing home, where some of the dollies will accept one last tickle — from a biker — on their way to the cemetery.

Another guy I know, an insurance actuary in his late forties (who has never been laid), and lived in a trailer with his free-ranging parakeets. He bought a Ural, thinking a motorcycle with a hack rig would be a great introduction to the cool life of a biker, while reducing the potential for stoplight and parking lot drops. His complaint was that the neighborhood kids threw rocks at him and the hot-looking divorcee in the trailer next door once dropped a bag of garbage in his sidecar.

These riders relentlessly blamed their machines for failing to meet their expectations; one for the design of the bike because it obviously challenged his physical limitations, and the other because the motorcycle did not appreciably alter his social status. Both of these gentleman are of limited means and did not have the option of simply trading in their motorcycles at a loss. Each called me looking for advice. After studying their circumstances, my recommendation was that they should switch bikes!

The aged Ducati rider found the Ural perfectly suited to his needs. He stopped falling off the bike and reported a 100 percent drop in sore throats as he no longer has to yell himself hoarse waiting for an attendant to pull the machine off him. His social life has improved as his “dates” no longer have to remember to hang on, a big deal for folks who struggle with recognizing their own names from one hour to the next. And the tub-like nature of the sidecar often catches their dentures when the rig hits a bump in the road.

The real turnabout came with the actuary, however. He has become the role model for the kids in the neighborhood, and ended up drilling the hot-looking divorcee within 24-hours of taking the Ducati’s keys. He told the insurance company to shove the actuary’s job and locked the parakeets in the trailer with an owl. He is now an agent for the hottest showgirls in Las Vegas and goes under the name of “Studley Steele.”

There is a lot to be said for finding a motorcycle that matches your physique, your psyche, your riding style, and your expectations. Yet most bike purchases — especially the first one, either as a new rider or as a re-entry rider — are an act of compromise, reached through an expensive half-assed trial and error process. Usually only one or two points of the key criteria are addressed.

Though this is the way motorcycles have been acquired for generations, a far more scientific approach now exists. Developed by Dr. Albert Hissingaz, director of research at the Wilmington Institute of Hollistic Dry Cleaning, the new process couples the power of a supercomputer with an in-depth questionnaire to determine the perfect bike for a specific individual.

“Never before have riders been able to harness the incredible power of a supercomputer to help riders choose a motorcycle so tightly dovetailed to their riding style, personal preferences, and mental image,” said Hissingaz. “The Advanced Motorcycle Selection Process (AMSP) starts with completing a comprehensive questionnaire that has been developed by human behaviorists trained in two-wheeled para-psychosis and sideshow hypnosis. This data is then run through a Cray 1200, which conducts more than 47,000 evaluations, covering a riders physical attributes, mental condition, and emotional awareness, before making a recommendation.”

Hissingaz explained that the AMSP project has been in development for over ten years, but was only recently completed when a federal agency tossed out a Cray 1200 in favor of an Apple MacBook Pro. “It was laying right there by the curb and we grabbed the damn thing before it started to rain,” he said. “From that moment on, we were able to crack the complex motorcycle-match code that lies hidden within every rider’s DNA.”

One last hurdle was presented by a team of psychologists who argued that a substantial degree of the motorcycle selection process depended on biker imprinting. Dr. C. Mentos Smith claimed that if a rider was introduced to the lifestyle by BMW riders, that individual would most likely adopt the attributes of a BMW rider. Yet if another rider were introduced to the road by Harley-Davidson devotees, then that person would most likely become a Harley rider. “It is like what happens when a human attempts to raise ducklings without the birds’ natural mother,” said Smith. “The baby ducks accept the presence of the human, and begin to follow that person around, even in the company of other adult ducks.”

There appears to be some truth in this matter.

A crack team of Twisted Roads editors secured a baby duck and sequestered it with a bunch of Harley riders. Within six months, the duck was drinking beer, smoking cigarettes, and riding a Sportster. The duck went on to get a fat boy, lead a gang, and kick the shit out of MV Agusta riders on general principle. I last saw it in a bar, walking a pit bull on a leash. The duck ran up an $80 bar tab. When the bartender tried to collect it, the duck said to him, “Put it on my bill, asshole.”

Taking imprinted motorcycle behavior into account, the psychologists developed a questionnaire that targets a rider’s psyche, bringing the id and the ego together in the showroom, sidestepping the trial and error method of find the perfect bike. Now, for the first time ever, Twisted Roads has arranged for the Wilmington Institute Of Holistic Dry Cleaning to present our readers with the questionnaire, and to evaluate each set of answers — absolutely free. Please read the questionnaire below, choose your answers carefully, submitting the results in the commentary section that follows. Submit only the letters that correspond to your answers. (For example, 1A, 2A, 3C, etc.) The recommended bike for you will appear in an answer from the author within 24-hours.

The Questionnaire:

1) When taking a morning ride, your destination is most likely:

a) Another continent

b) To the WaWa, Dunkin Donuts, Sheetz, or other gas station (within 11 miles) where you will have coffee, polish the chrome, and stand around looking tough, before repeating the process three more times that day.

c) Over the river and through the woods, to grandmother’s house

d) A quaint little coffee house that has fairly current European newspapers and organic raison cookies, about 40 miles from home.

2) When taking a long weekend run, the first thing you want on the back is:

a) Nothing that would impede my bike from a 46° degree lean, on a tight curve, at 84 miles per hour. (Besides, my girlfriend has her own bike.)

b) Tattooed pillion candy who can rest her hooters on my shoulders to keep my eyeballs from vibrating out of my head.

c) A cocker spaniel in a special kennel that has its own stereo and DVD player.

d) A “Kindle” loaded with the complete works of Willa Cather, A Cultural Guide To Amish Quilts, and “How To Say ‘Hello, It’s Great To Meet You’ in 75 Languages.”

3) When thirsty:

a) You sip lemon flavored water from a tube that leads to a container on the back, precluding you from having to stop more than once every 500 miles, or roughly the equivalent of a tank of gas.

b) You must have an ice cold beer in the skull of your vanquished enemies.

c) You look for an old fashioned ice cream soda, from one of those places next to an antique mall, where you can get your picture taken wearing period clothing.

d) Your preference is for unsweetened ice tea, in a place where no one will ask you questions about your ride, handy to a recycling receptacle for your cup.

4) When stopping for the day:

a) You are not particular, as long as the hotel has a decent restaurant featuring fresh dungeness crab, 7 IPAs on the bar list, 24-hour room service, and waitresses in the breakfast area competing for top prize in a lingerie modeling contest, in addition to free wireless connections that are three times faster than light.

b) You prefer the campground that is off the road, in an area avoided by the local police, where the only rules prohibit human sacrifice and taking a shit in the drinking water.

c) You really don’t care as you are towing a pop-up camper with a bidet, a billiard table, an observatory, and a foldout leather couch.

d) You look for a bed and breakfast with a nice room where you can fall asleep looking at your parked bike, and wake up pretty much the same way.

5) When gearing up for a ride, you:

a) Wear full ballistic gear capable of containing a shotgun blast through the crotch, or full racing leathers with a six-inch diameter leather porthole for uncoiling the apparatus when taking a piss.

b) Wear leather vest and an armor-plated cod-piece to protect the only irreplaceable part of your body.

c) Step into highly fashionable Bermuda shorts and a shirt with a pocket to hold your mentholated cigarettes.

d) Choose a complete ensemble from LL Bean, including a classic Allagash/Moose River motorcycling necktie, with matching handkerchief (with micro-stitching for removing bugs from your LL Bean sunglasses).

6) Upon reaching the Grand Canyon:

a) You have sex with your partner, standing up, still wearing your leathers or ballistic gear, because you plan to have sex again in the warm Pacific, 5 hours later.

b) You take a piss over the canyon’s rim while your buddies video the whole thing for YouTube.

c) You immediately look for 50 other bikes with pop-up campers so you can exchange pictures of your garden back home with other riders.

d) Your view of the canyon is marred by worry about that strange fucking noise you hear (like marbles in a can) whenever you give the bike the gas. (Ducati riders please choose alternate answer below.)

e) Your view of the canyon is undisturbed because you remembered to pack extra cylinder heads and a starter motor.

7) You are in trouble for taking a leak and leaving the toilet seat up:

a) You respond by taking a piss in the kitchen sink.

b) You respond by taking a piss in the kitchen sink, but first removing the dinner dishes.

c) This question does not apply to you because your bike has a urinal in the side bags.

d) You fall to your knees to beg forgiveness and agree to wear a toilet seat around your neck for a week, in addition to promising to sit whenever you piss for the rest of your life.

8) When pulled over by a cop who says, “I waited all morning for you,” your response is:

a) “I tried to get here as fast as I could.”

b) “I used to butt-fuck a guy about your size in prison.”

c) “Well officer, I didn’t want to be late for the weekly Rotary lunch.”

d) “Yes sir. I was speeding... And my inspection sticker is overdue too.”

All answers are strictly confidential, until the results are published in the "TW" comments section. If you are absolutely delighted with your motorcycle, recognizing its precise balance of power, speed, and comfort — plus it’s ability to get you laid about 99% of the time — please check the most appropriate answer below.

9) Optional -- I have no complaints because:

a) I ride a BMW K75, or other BMW, so no further explanation is necessary.

b) I ride a Harley Davidson, so fuck you and all your smart-assed facts.

c) My Goldwing feels really good on my hemorrhoids.

d) The Vespa is highly underestimated as the perfect metrosexual statement.

e) Someday my bike may be regarded as “iconic” too, but for now, I’ll settle for a copy of one of the above trendsetting four.

©Copyright Jack Riepe 2011

Really Stupid Things I Did On A Motorcycle... Part One

The bike in front of me dodged a wobbly manhole cover, swerved around an open car door, and narrowly missed knocking a boom-box off some guy’s shoulder — without a glimmer of the brake light, as the rider took all of this in stride. His instructions to me had been cryptically clear: “Stick with me Reep. I’m not waitin’ for your dead ass at traffic lights.” So I skirted the same manhole cover, caught the phrase, “fucking asshole,” from the asshole getting out of the open car door, and took the bird (perched on the upended hand of the guy with the boombox).

It was the sizzling summer of 1976, and we were on Tenth Avenue; two shooting stars rocketing through traffic on the West Side of Manhattan, the smallest borough in New York City.

Even then, riding in Manhattan was like taking a flying saucer through an asteroid belt. A lot of the manhole covers were loosely seated. If I said “fuck” every time some dope opened a car door in front of me, I’d have been diagnosed as having Tourettes. And pedestrians with pizzas, boom boxes, dogs on leashes, and the occasional shopping cart (filled with the remains of shattered lives) were always stepping out into traffic, willing to play the odds on getting across major avenues that were six lanes wide.

The guy in front was “Cretin,” a street brawler and respected member of Jersey City Café Society. He was known for winning arguments by snapping the antennas off parked cars, and using them to beat his opponents half to death. He was the “Doc Holiday” of his peer group, being able to quote Shakespeare fluently and to read and write Latin without hesitation. He had an incredible mind that battled emotional tides only he could see or hear. And he was infatuated with the romance of the gutter.

Cretin had the kind of code and reputation that made him welcome in some of the roughest gin mills in Jersey City (and there were more than a few). No one had a bad word to say about him, and many of the guys whose asses he had kicked admitted it with pride. He thought I was funny, and introduced me to some of the toughest guys I would ever meet, in a bar that could best be described as a “bucket of blood and teeth.”

Cretin was astride a 1974 Norton Commando painted “Gestapo” black. The machine generated two-thirds of the Harley Davidson thunder — with one-tenth of the heartbreak. Still, it staked out it’s curbside territory with a spot of oil, which Cretin referred to as its “signature.” When I once asked him why it leaked oil, his response was, “Because it’s perpetually on the rag... Like the last broad you tried to hump.”

He was not far from wrong. The metropolitan area was fighting off one of its annual summertime draughts, and I was in the throes of one of my most enduring dry spells. It had been so long since I had as much as copped a cheap feel that the color of my eyes had begun to fade. I poured out my troubles to Cretin, over 15 shots of Irish truth serum.

“There’s no trick to getting laid,” said Cretin. “Especially if you have a motorcycle... Unless you have a shit pot like yours. Then you have to get creative.”

He was perfectly serious.

I was riding a 1975 Kawasaki H2, the fastest and most primitive motorcycle of its time. One of the last of the two-stroke street screamers to be offered to an unsuspecting public, the “Widow-Maker” made a noise like a lawnmower with its balls in a bear trap. My bike was painted plum pudding purple, with a big, stupid Kawasaki decal on the gas tank. That decal looked dated from the day the bike rolled off the assembly line.

Above: The 1974 Norton Commando 850 Interstate... A classically beautiful British motorcycle. Photo from Wikipedia.

Above: The 1975 Kawasaki H2, the fastest and most primitive motorcycle of its day. Photo from the Internet.

Other than that, the bikes looked oddly similar. They shared a similar profile, with a straight seat and raked pipes. The Norton had two cylinders to the Kawasaki’s three, but both motors were utterly stark in design, with easy access to all the parts. Each had four gears and weighed about the same. Both had similar instrument clusters on chrome handlebars, behind big headlights in chrome housings, which in turn accommodated turn signals on chrome stalks. Up close, the Norton had a much better fit and finish, and the bigger engine. But the Kawasaki had 25 more horsepower and easily pulled ahead from a stop. The Kawasaki had a slightly longer wheelbase and a forward slant to its straight seat, which guaranteed the pillion candy would always slide into the rider on a good stop. It also started easier than the British bike. The Norton was tight in the turns, whereas the Kawasaki had the cornering capability of a baby grand piano, dropped from a twenty-story building.

Cretin thought I had two major disadvantages when it came to mating rituals. The first was in my objective and the second was in my approach.

“You go into a bar or a party looking for the romance of the century, with the most perfect woman you can find, so the two of you can move into a cottage by a pond, and have kids who can read and write from birth. Consequently, your dick looks like a bicycle handgrip from solitary consolation workouts,” said Cretin. “You need to meet women with the idea that you’re going to be shot at sunrise. That way, they’re all perfect.” He claimed each of his romances had fiery beginnings and bittersweet endings, about 5 hours later.

“Why five hours?” I asked.

“Because that’s when I usually wake up hung over, but with a strong sense of regret and a compelling desire to have breakfast alone, 150 miles away from where I’ve regained consciousness.”

“Don’t the women feel some regret that you leave?” I asked.

“How the fuck would I know,” he replied.

Cretin claimed my second problem had to do with my mouth. “You either sound like a college professor or the fucking game show host from hell,” he said. “Women like biker guys who mask themselves in mystery and who express themselves in grunts. Just stop talking, and learn to shrug with your eyes. I’m going to take you to a party over in the city tonight — and using my methods — you’re going to get laid.” His parting instructions were, “Stick with me Reep. I’m not waitin’ for your dead ass at traffic lights.”

Traffic through the Lincoln Tunnel was heavy but moving fairly quickly. I have always loved the sounds of motorcycles within the confines of the tunnel, even my own. The Lincoln tunnel has a spiraling turn at one end, and slight changes of curving elevation in the dingy tile-lined two-laned tube. (There are three tubes of traffic, with two in and two out, depending on the time of day. Sometimes the middle tube is divided and there is on-coming traffic for a mile, deep under the Hudson River.)

It was around 9 pm in the dead of summer and turning dark on Tenth Avenue, or as dark as it gets in a city of a billion lights. Working girls waved to us from street corners, and I swear one called out to Cretin — using his real first name. We got caught at a light and I was distracted by one of the hottest women I had ever seen. She was wearing the uniform of a hooker, a skin-tight black rayon dress that ended high up on her flawless thighs. The woman was black and in the shadows it was damn near impossible to see were the dress ended and she began. I remember her voice to this day:

“Wanna go out?” she asked, stepping off the curb and leaning over the bike.

She spoke in the slight melody of the south, with eyes that saw me, but which were focused elsewhere. Her voice was the flavor of honey, and lemon, and whiskey served hot. She was about my age, 22, and had a hauntingly beautiful face. The act of leaning over the bike revealed her flawless milk chocolaty breasts, capped by dark bitter-sweet nipples. I had never seen a black woman’s breasts before, and was totally captivated. Glancing straight ahead, the light had changed and the Norton was nowhere to be seen.

“My name is Jack,” I said, switching off the Kawasaki.

This information failed to impress her. She merely cocked her head and looked at me with an expression of drug-induced resignation. This woman was beautiful enough to be on the cover of any magazine.

“Do you wanna go out, Jack?” she asked again.

“What’s your name?” I asked. What I really wanted her to do was to climb on the back and ride off with me to a cottage on a lake, where we could get lost in endlessly naked discussions on romance poetry.

“Kara,” she said. “My name is Kara... Do you wanna go out?”

I was about to mention the cottage on the lake when the Norton pulled up alongside me.

“What the fuck did I tell you,” yelled a furious Cretin. Then he looked at Kara and said, “Get lost honey. He sucks cock just like you.”

She blinked, languidly, and realizing there was no business to be had, started to step away.

“Wait,” I said. “Take this,” and I handed her the only bill I had in my pocket, a ten-spot. She looked at the bill, looked at me and then stepped back into the shadows of Tenth Avenue.

“You just gave a hooker ten bucks because you got a look at her tits,” said Cretin. “What the fuck is the matter with you? Stop acting like Toulouse Lautrec and follow me.”

Cretin split lanes whenever he felt like it or when it seemed to buy us a few seconds. We were always at the head of traffic when the light turned green. Our destination was a monolithic apartment house on West End Avenue, on Manhattan’s Upper West side. This is a classic New York City residential neighborhood, between Broadway and the Hudson River. The street was tree-lined and wall-to-wall parked cars. Cretin found an open spot by a fire hydrant, and bounced over the curb, with his trademark disdain for civil authority.

We parked the bikes on the sidewalk within spitting distance of the lobby doors.

Cretin hit a doorbell in a brass panel that held fifty individual buttons, some with names and others that were just numbers. These stately structures were built for the well-heeled in an era (the mid-1920’s), when each apartment was supposed to be a real residence. The lobby was all marble and brass, with a now vacant counter once manned by a concierge. We were buzzed in anonymously and ascended to the eighth floor in a tarnished brass bird cage of an elevator.

Above: Historic structures on West End Avenue in New York City harken to a more gracious era. Photo from Wikipedia.

I got the last of my instructions on the way up. “Don’t fucking talk if you don’t have to. Let me do the talking. Just nod if you hear your name,” said Cretin.

“Who’s throwing this party,” I asked.

“No one you know, and no one who gives a shit that you’re here. By the way, I reserved the star chamber for us.”

“The star chamber?”

“Are you dense?” asked Cretin. “Just fucking nod.”

The apartment was the kind of place you see William Powell and Myrna Loy romping through in the old “Thin Man” movies. The ceilings were 10-feet tall and there had to be a least 12 rooms. The layout was like a rabbit warren, and included a living room, a library, a dining room, bedrooms, a butler’s pantry, a servant’s room, and a music room. The decor was a combination of late Greenwich Village “coffee house,” with a strong Kerouac influence, punctuated by furniture that had grown tired before it qualified as “antique.” There were candles — mostly of the melted-down variety — stuck in wine bottles all over the place. Strains of The Doors, Led Zeppelin, and Janice Joplin pounded an atmosphere already laden with the sweet smell of pot. Behind a sofa in one of the living rooms there was a mural that looked like the pattern for the original paisley shirt. It covered the whole wall. Cretin told me it was a quote from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

“Do you see it?” he asked.

Taking my first cue of the evening, I responded by nodding.

“What a piece of worke is man,” said Cretin.

“Ain’t it the truth,” I muttered, scanning the people at this bash.

“That’s the quote, you asshole.”

I gave Cretin a sneer rather than admit I never read Hamlet... But now that he had given me the answer, I could see the message rather clearly. The painting was far from the equal of “Guernica,” but it was clever in many respects. He shoved a glass of whiskey in my hand and told me to sit tight while he “worked” the room.

Above: "Guernica," by Pablo Picasso. Low resolution reference from Wikipedia.

The original, which I saw at the Museum of Modern Art, is the size of a billboard.

There were about 90 people attending this event, representing a diverse cross-section of the cultural strata de jour. There were artists, poets, dancers, musicians, communists, socialists, and even one anarchist — or so they said. It was easy to pick out the dancers. The modern ballet set featured women with incredible physiques. Even the more delicate ones were exquisite beauties with muscles like gymnasts. In one room, the occupants were sitting around a circle, while some guy read “an original piece” to the accompaniment of a sitar. In another, men and women (many of whom needed a shower) were crooning the lament of the proletariat. (Do you know how to tell a communist woman from a socialist babe? The communist women have fuller mustaches while socialist honeys often braid their underarm hair — author’s note.) A third room offered a mix of college girls and guys out for a good time. These were the general admission eloi. It was here that joints were orbiting in concentric circles, that the music was the loudest, and that I thought I stood the best chance of knocking off a piece.

But I was with Cretin... And he left nothing to chance.

Cretin was a man of many talents, and on this occasion he had brought with him some pharmaceuticals that were in short supply. Consequently, he was greeted like the Sun King in a world of darkness. And it was perhaps owing to this aspect of his talents that he shortly reappeared with two ladies in tow. He had designs on the blond, who had big hair, a big smile, and big tits. He thought I would hit it off with the other one, who was as flat as a board, slender as a willow wand, and with long hair down to her waist. (He got the size right. I do have a thing for women with long hair and flat chests.) Both of these ladies claimed they had an interest in motorcycles.

Above: The northern terminus of West End Avenue in New York City, where it meets 107th Street. Photo from Wikipedia

Cretin produced a bottle of wine, a couple of glasses, and a joint as thick as my thumb. He led us off to a room deep within the bowels of this apartment, in which foreplay was wearing the guise of a discussion on art. We followed him into a large walk-in closet, about the size of a bathroom. He hit a switch and a hidden black light brought constellations of glow-in-the dark stars, planets, and moons into view on the ceiling. The floor was littered with cushions of every shape and size.

“Welcome to the star chamber,” said Cretin, lighting up the bone.

The pot was alleged to come from Hawaii, where it was grown without seeds, under little magnifying glasses to enhance the power of the sun, and crumbled between the thighs of Polynesian princesses (who only had sex with each other). This potent weed had knockout potential of a locomotive.

Cretin introduced himself as a designer of leather jackets. I was astounded at the breadth and depth of this incredible falsehood. He made up shit about how he traveled all over the country (on the Norton, no less) in search of the most perfect hides. Then he spun some other fantasy of how he was designing a leather jacket just for women.

“Leather jackets are made for men,” said Cretin. “A woman’s leather jacket is just a man’s in a smaller size. I’m working on a design that will follow the subtle contours of a woman’s body, accenting each gentle curve, making her feel as if she is being caressed by a second skin.” Naturally, he was running his hands all over the blond as this world-circling line of bullshit unspooled. “Can I make a leather jacket for you, Baby?” I heard him whisper. “You could be the model for my whole new line.”

And new “line” was the right way to describe it.

Cretin introduced me as a “ghost writer.”

“You write scary stories?” The brunette asked.

“Nawwww,” said Cretin with a smile that had an eerie glow to it in the black light. “He writes books and stories for famous people... He gets the money... They get to put their name on it. But he’s not allowed to talk about it.

“You know famous people?” the brunette asked, her lips against my ear.

“I really can’t talk about it... It’s a condition of my contract.”

“Who do you know?” she pressed.

“I’ve been meeting with Steve McQueen every other week for two months now,” I said, unbuttoning her blouse with the precision of an assembly line welding robot. (I felt this whopper of mine easily put me in Cretin's class.)

“Could I meet him too?” she asked in a breathless whisper.

“The very next time I see him.”

That’s when she put her hand in my jeans.

I couldn’t believe how well the night was going. Using the Cretin method of romance, I was actually getting some. (The sense of conquest lost some of its shine during a lull in the action, however, when the brunette, whose name was Chelsea, whispered to her friend the blond, “He knows a guy in the rock group Queen.”) Yet pride goeth before a fall, and the meter was running. It was after 2 am and we were all still in the closet, which had begun to take on the characteristics of a marijuana smoke house. As congenial as Chelsea was, I couldn’t get Kara out of my mind. I wanted to know Kara’s story, her circumstances, and her plight. I wanted to release her from whatever sexual bondage she had to endure, and give her the chance to suffer through another one, less odious perhaps, with me.

Cretin was right about one thing. I couldn’t be happy without the cottage on the pond. Chelsea had gone out to “freshen up,” and to see if there were any “Queen” albums. She came back humming “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and offered to perform a trombone solo for me, which I regard as the highest form of musical appreciation a woman can share with a man, two hours after meeting him for the first time. And then I made the mistake of saying, “If only these stars were real... If only we were outside... In the country, with the cool night breezes blowing over us.”

“That’s what I want too,” said Chelsea.

“And then breakfast,” said the blond, whose name was Michelle.

“Fucking Riepe,” said Cretin. “All you had to do was shut the fuck up. Why is that so fucking hard for you?”

We were down at the street about fifteen minutes later. My pal jammed a bundle into his soft leather side bag, and the ladies climbed on behind us. We were headed east, across town, moving with purpose, but without the shenanigans that would attract the attention of errant cops. Cretin hit Central Park West, and turned as if he was headed for a transverse (one of the thoroughfares that cuts thorough the park to 5th Avenue). Yet he shot up the handicapped lip cut into the curb instead. He switched off his headlight and rode along the sidewalk to one of the Macadam pathways into the park. I could only see the Norton when it passed under one of the occasional street lights, or if Cretin hit his brakes. My Kawasaki, also running dark, was a second or two behind his Norton.

Above: Central Park, 863 acres in the heart of New York City. Follow the upper diagonal line of bordering buildings to its lowest point. You'll notice a light brown apartment building. To its immediate right is a much lower, darker structure, with copper or bronze roof fittings (greenish blue) and almost Tudor-stule markings. This is the "Dakota," where John Lennon was shot. Photo from the Internet.

The brake light came on and stayed there. The Norton made a slow turn to the left and vanished into the trees. So did I. We were in a clearing about 20 feet square, surrounded by trees and shrubs. It was as if we were in the country. To those who have never been to New York City, Central Park was the first landscaped public park in the United States. It spans 883 acres, has two lakes, and more than 40 antique iron bridges spanning culverts and trails. In 1976, the park had a bad reputation after dark, and we pretty much had the place to ourselves. It is patrolled by mounted cops on horseback. The bundle that Cretin had shoved into his side bag was a tablecloth and two bottles of wine. In a gesture that I will never forget, he spread out the tablecloth for me and Chelsea to lay on. Then he handed me a bottle of wine.

“What about you?” I hissed.

He pulled off his heavy leather jacket, spread it out in the shadows, and pulled Michelle into the darkness after him.

I was new to this business of getting my horn honked in a communal situation, but it wasn’t bad. I could Cretin muttering, zippers getting unzipped, and a woman giggling. I heard Michelle ask, “Does it have a name?”

Cretin responded, “I call it Pillion.”

"That's a funny name," she said.

I busted out laughing. When Cretin asked a woman to ride “Pillion,” he was being brutally honest.

Manhattan is hotter than hell in July. The heat that bakes the concrete canyons during the day lingers far into the night... Even if you are in the only green spot for miles. I dozed off in the middle of the trombone solo. I was tired and half in the bag. First light was around 5am, and the din of a waking city, even on a Sunday, can be hell on a hangover. In the brutal light of day, it was clear I had the prettier of the two women. Both ladies were on the edge of the clearing, squatting to take a piss. I was critiquing their two naked asses in my mind, as they were before me side-by-side, when I felt Cretin’s eyes upon me. He was laughing without making a sound.

Then as clearly as if we were at the race track, we heard the clip-clop, clip-clop of horses on the path, barely 30 feet away. A mounted patrol was passing. “That’s the firing squad I was telling you about,” said Cretin. He gathered up the tablecloth and two empty bottles, and slipped off to reconnoiter. We’d broken about 50 laws the night before and clearly the best way to handle the situation was to break one or two more in a desperate bid to get off scott free.

“The loop drive through the park is about 200 feet on the left. That’s our best shot. There are people on the path now... Bikers... Joggers... And dogs,” said Cretin. “It’s too dangerous to get out of here the way we got in. We’d have to duck-walk the bikes out and we’ll run into a cop or some asshole on a bicycle for sure.”

Two hundred feet doesn’t sound like much, but it’s a lot to cover in bushes, over tree roots, and through leaves and loose gravel, especially with a woman on the back. Yet it was no trouble in the end and we were out of Central park just a few minutes later. Michelle lived off Ninth Avenue, down by the tunnel. The plan was to drop the ladies at her place, so they could get cleaned up before we stopped for breakfast, at a diner across the river in New Jersey. Her building was a dumpy four-floor walk-up in a neighborhood that looked like home to giant roaches. Cretin insisted we stay with the bikes on the street. Chelsea kissed my neck and followed Michele inside. They weren’t gone three minutes when Cretin kicked the Norton into life.

“C’mon,” he said.

“We’re leaving now?” I asked.

“Hey, we got them home safe and sound. It’s time to go while everybody’s smiling.”

There was virtually no traffic in the tunnel and we roared through it like projectiles being shot out of a cannon. On the New Jersey side, the tunnel ends in a massive helix, a spiral to the left, that climbs to the top of the Palisades, giving the rider a breathtaking farewell view of Manhattan. We were going to hit it at about 70 mph, like fighter jets in formation.

Just outside the tunnel, hundreds of bright orange traffic cones had been set up in complex lines. Cretin extended his right leg and knocked over about 50. “I can top that,” I thought. My intention was to extend my right leg, and capture one of those cones on my boot. They are made of soft rubber and weigh about 5 or 6 pounds. I hit the one I was aiming for at about 40 miles per hour. The sudden pain in my ankle was excruciating. I didn’t break it. But I limped for a week.

This story is a page from the chapter of my youth, titled, “Really Stupid Things I Did On A Motorcycle.” I’m glad I did these things when I was a kid. Because I haven’t got the balls to try any of it now.

Epilogue:

Two weeks later I rode back to the corner on 10th Avenue — alone. I had flowers bungeed to the back seat and $100 in my pocket. My intention was to find Kara, and take her out to eat, even if I had to buy her time. It was a hot, cloudy day when I left, and raining when I got there. There were two other hookers on the corner, both of who looked tougher than Cretin. I rode around for a while and ended up giving the flowers to an old woman walking on the street. Years later I mentioned this to Cretin, who laughed and slapped me on the back.

"Reep," he said. "You are the piece of work Shakespeare was writing about. Her pimp would have sliced you up, taken your wallet, and stolen your bike. But that wouldn't have stopped Toulouse-Lautrek either."

Cretin was dead ten years later. He died slowly in a hospital, like Doc Holiday. Not the recipient of a gunshot nor knife wound, but a victim of the gutter nevertheless. The last time I saw him, he was with a woman like Kara... And glad for the company. In the end, he was a lot like Toulouse-Lautrek and Doc Holiday.

Above: The Medical Inspection At The Rue De Moulins Brothel — 1894, by Toulouse-Lautrek.

Low resolution image from Wikipedia.

It's funny how some things stick with you. I think of Cretin a lot, and I miss him. But I only think of Kara when I come across the artwork of Toulouse Lautrek, or find myself on 10th Avenue.

©Copyright Jack Riepe 2011

The True Meaning Of Valentine's Day...

There are times when the price of legitimate crops can be worth more than the most potent marijuana. Right now, greenhouses around the world are scrambling to ship millions of cartons of roses (of every variety) in preparation for the annual Saint Valentine’s Day Wallet Massacre. Anytime in January, a gentleman eager to prove his love for a woman (or anxious to bribe his way out of some indiscretion) can buy a dozen roses for $22 - $28, in almost any upscale US supermarket. Yet just two weeks prior to the date on which the average man is compelled to publicly demonstrate his love for the woman in his life, the rose will disappear from public sale, only to re-emerge in all shades of its red glory for $60 to $170 per dozen on or about February 14th.

Likewise, specialty confectionary shops will begin displaying huge velvet heart-shaped boxes, filled with chocolate delights, ranging in cost from $30 to $250, depending upon the perceived exotic nature of the candy within and the brand name without. Yet the madness extends to a much broader range of the economy. Restaurants, especially those with a romantic ambiance, have already begun taking reservations for their better tables, and many will offer a “Valentine’s Day” menu priced to feel like a large zucchini being shoved up the ass of the unsuspecting male. Woe to the man new to a romance who shows up with the $20 (pre-wrapped daisies) and the $30 box of drugstore candy, thinking that pizza at the bowling alley is going to get the job done.

Buddy, you aren’t going to get laid anytime soon.

St. Valentine, a Christian priest in Rome, was martyred in 269 AD and buried in the Via Flamina. This worthy cleric would undoubtedly be appalled to learn that his name now graces a day set aside for romantic blackmail. The typical Valentine’s Day tribute to beauty, love, and intimate companionship (this last one means “the occasional blow job”) translates into roses, the heart-shaped box (containing Godiva chocolate, or a silk Teddy, or a diamond necklace — not one advertised on TV for $99), and dinner out. The total tab for this can easily run between $400 and $700 bucks. By coincidence, this is in the same price range as two tires mounted on the bike, or the MotoLight set you thought would look cool on your ride (and you’d be right), or the heated Gerbings gear you’ve been thinking about for the past year.

For those of my gentle Twisted Roads readers lucky enough tho have this extra cash in their pockets (during this time of extreme economic recovery), the decision to divert limited finances to what amounts to a “one-way Christmas” may be a challenging one. (While many women feel compelled to give the man in their life some token of their love on this particular day, the word “token” seems to sum it up.) Valentine’s Day has come to mean “a dramatic, costly public showing of affection” for a particular woman, in tribute for her romantic attention, which may not materialize on that day! Whoever thought of this holiday scam should have been martyred.

But, clever men can easily navigate through this. Instead of spending $140 on roses that will be dead and in the trash a week later, why not head out to a place like Waterloo Gardens and buy a bonsai tree ($75 to $100). Then get a $1.50 card at any drugstore, and cut out the little red Valentine’s Day heart from it. Neatly put her initials and yours on the heart. Then tape it to the tree, symbolizing the traditional carved heart in a tree that guys used to do instead of graffiti. When presenting this gift to the lady, say something like, “These trees typically live for 100 years. That wouldn’t be enough time for me to prove how much I love you.” Then stand back. You will have scored 100 bonus “BJ” points. (Do not attempt to carve the heart and initials directly into the little tree. It should also be noted that some bonsai trees can cost thousands of dollars, so order one early.) If the woman responds with, “You gave me a fucking tree for Valentine’s Day...,” get rid of her. She’ll be a huge pain in the ass as time goes on. You can get a great bonsai tree at Waterloo Gardens, In Exton, Pa. The owner and manager there is Bobby LeBoutlier. Call him at 484-614-5174 and tell him you ride a bike and read Twisted Roads. He’ll take care of you. (He rides a BMW, with me.) And if the tree doesn’t do it for you, he’s got other ideas. Waterloo Gardens has an exquisite gift center as well.

Above: A typical Bonsai Tree for under $100. This is a Juniper and one of the most common types. It looks so cool. Photo from the Internet.

I am ordering charming tea roses (live miniature roses on the vine), which cost a fraction of cut flowers, and which can be wrapped into beautiful expression with a small sculpture. If I wanted to spend a little more, these same flowers can be put in a small terrarium, shaped like an oversize wine glass. Bobby can set you up with something like this too.

There is another shop down in Exton, Pa. conveniently located next to the beer distributor on US-30 (Business), near the intersection of Rt. 100 and US-30. “Perennial Pleasures” is a specialty store offering the most unique upscale “artistic-type” gifts, ranging from wall hangings to statuary, plus vases, artificial flower settings, and really unusual items. Prices run from $50 to the sky is the limit. They carry the full line of “Sid Dickens” tiles, which are highly collectible. My hot squeeze, Leslie, collects these and has 25 of them hanging in the kitchen. They are perfect Valentines Day gifts (for the kind of woman who could spend hours in a museum), with current tiles selling for about $80. (But be advised, if you buy one, and she really likes it, this will become a routine purchase at Christmas and on her birthday too. Then again that makes life easy.)

You can get an unusual card at this place (with a blank interior), and write something like: “This tile was inspired by passion and fired under tremendous heat... Two things I feel whenever I’m around you.” To contact a romantic gift specialist at Perennial Pleasures, call 610-594-6696, and ask for “Martha.” Tell her “Fat Jack” from Twisted Roads set you. Do not give a gift of this nature to anyone who wanted the $99 simulated glass jewel diamond heart and dinner at the chicken place by the gas station.

Candy is a tired subject at Valentine’s Day. The huge heart looks good, to a guy. While everybody loves chocolate, most women feel they are too fat to eat it with reckless abandon, or they feel the price of staying thin is too high to add a pound of condensed fat to their ass. So the big chocolate heart (that you intended for her) gets passed around at the office and worker drones, who you either don’t know or don’t like, are the ones eating your gift. Fuck ‘em. One of the best ways to say I love you on Valentine’s Day, or any other day, is a box of Big Jim’s Chocolate Chip Cookies.


Above: Big Jim's Chocolate Chip Cookies taste like sex in a box. Photo from Big Jim.

Now I can just see the look on your face as you read the above lines, thinking, “that bastard Riepe sold out and wants me to blow my chances for romance on Valentine’s Day giving my girl chocolate chip cookies.” Maybe I did. So what?

But the thrust is that Big Jim’s Chocolate Chip cookies taste like sex in a box. Each cookie pushes the envelope for flavor, texture, density, and composition. Heavier, thicker, and more proportionally perfect than any other cookie I have ever tasted, Big Jim’s recipe was originally buried with the Pharaoh Imen Hotep III. It stayed a secret until grave robbers allegedly passed it onto St. Valentine, a priest in ancient Rome, who was allegedly martyred for not giving the recipe up to Roman Emperor Caligula, who was trying to impress a woman on February 14th.

Why are these cookies better than candy?

A) It is easier to justify a cookie than a piece of chocolate.

B) There are no fucking caramels hidden among the good pieces.

C) They are cheaper than chocolate truffles made in France.

D) They are so good, your girlfriend, wife, or significant other won’t want to share them with the flesh-eating zombies at work.

E) She’ll want to eat them in bed, with you, and that kind of suggestion can easily be expounded upon.

You can order Big Jim’s Chocolate Chip Cookies right here... Or you can click on the ad at right of this story. Cookies are available in five extraordinary varieties.

Now, if you had $300 to blow for the month of February, you could get the tree or the tile, and the cookies for about $125. That would leave you with $175 to spend on heated gear or a tire. Not bad, eh? You can thank me by leaving a comment. Twisted roads is going to award a box of Big Jim’s cookies to a reader, selected at random, from comments left at this column. (Click on comments below to leave yours.) A winner will be announced on February 3, 2011. (US readers only.)

Women reading this blog in search of the perfect “token” gift to give a guy on Valentine’s Day couldn’t do better than to order a copy of the acclaimed book, Politically Correct Cigar Smoking For Social Terrorists. This book is 30 chapters of character-building short stories — dealing with cigars, the male psyche, world peace, sexual gratification, nature, human nature, and subhuman nature (politics). It has been rumored that briefly reading this book for an hour a day gives the average man a raging two-hour erection. (These results are rumors and may not be typical.)

Above: My book — the guide to the male psyche for women. Photo by Leslie Marsh.

You may order an autographed copy by sending me a note to: jack.riepe@gmail.com. Please put “Book Order” in the subject column. Each copy is $25, plus $5 S&H. Please include your name and address, and telephone number. If the book is to be a gift for your boyfriend, husband, significant other, or illicit lover, please include the full spelling that person’s name, and a line or two about them, so I can craft a personal inscription. Mailed books are accompanied by an invoice.

Women may think they have the last laugh on Valentine’s Day... But the equivalent of a male Valentine’s Day is on March 14th. This is the official holiday of Twisted Roads and ladies, you don’t really have to buy anything.

©Copyright Jack Riepe 2010

New Twisted Roads Blog Posts Every Monday and Thursday...

This Thursday: The Perfect Party Bike, Or A TromBone Solo In Manhattan