wow, those wind dancers sure are fine!
It be Lusty!

girls are fun.
I've had a bunch of "girls and motorcycles" events over the past few days, which is really nice. Last night was the August Wind Dancers meeting, which, despite the name, I really enjoy being a part of. It's the local Women on Wheels chapter, and the women in it are a bunch of fun. The big thing after this month's meeting was some hilarity surrounding a plastic fake oil puddle. Now, I realize that this anecdote makes me the biggest bike dork ever, but, seriously, it was really funny. A fake oil puddle. What fake puke or fake dog poop is for the 14-year-old boy, a fake oil puddle is for the Wind Dancers organization, let me tell you. We were all giggling like little girls, sticking the fake oil puddle under various peoples' bikes, to see their faces when they came out of the restaurant. Damn. I mean, this was really funny. I keep saying that because I realize full well that it isn't. But it was at the time. Really. Oh, nevermind.

During the meeting, we also talked a bit about next summer's Pacific Coast Rally, which is apparently an annual event that the Wind Dancers put together with the other California chapter (which, in turn, has the unfortunate name of "Sunblazers"). In a fit of enthusiasm, I volunteered to be on the planning committee for the Rally. It should be a bunch of fun -- the other women on the committee are bright and enthusiastic as well. I'll admit that one of the reasons that I wanted to volunteer (in addition to legitimately wanting to help and get to know people) is that I can probably manage to put together a T-shirt for the event that doesn't suck. The WoW logo is, well, a bit 1970s, and has the unfortunate tendency to lend itself to sucky T-shirts. So maybe I can help with that. That's my mission for the Rally.

We also talked a bit about a low-speed skills workshop that's coming up on Saturday morning. I'm definitely going to be going to it, since if there's anything I don't have, it's low-speed skills. This a demonstrable fact, as I can't seem to make right hand turns out of driveways anymore without dropping my bike. On the way out of the meeting last night, I did the same thing that I did at Danger last week; I came up to the road, looked over my left shoulder for oncoming traffic, and then forgot to stop looking over my left shoulder as I started accelerating into the right-hand turn. Plop. Some touch-up black nail polish on the handlebar and some new duct tape later, you can't really tell (well, unless you look at the underside of the right front turn signal, which is now missing about a third of its plastic), but it's still marginally frustrating. The guy who helped me pick the bike up told me reassuringly, "don't worry, I just got my bike license too!" and I didn't really feel like telling him that I've had my license for almost two years already. ;) I know, I know, statistically speaking, one is much more likely to get in an accident or mess up somehow after they've been riding for a while, because you're confident enough to push yourself, but not skilled enough yet to know what you're doing...but I'd be hard-pressed to call turning out of a driveway "pushing oneself." Oh well, blah blah. That's the whole point of this workshop on Saturday; I'll practice some low speed stuff with some other women, and hopefully not make too much of an ass of myself, and also hopefully pick up some tips. So that'll be A Good Thing.

newton's law of motorcycling?
However, for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction, and so even though I dropped the bike last night, I made a nice accomplishment (for me!) tonight -- I rode up to San Francisco, in rush hour, and navigated my way to a bar I'd never been to, in an area of town I'd never been to, on a hill. Why is this exciting?

• I hate driving to San Francisco. I don't like to lane-split unless the cars around me are totally stopped, so I tend not to lane-split on the freeway. Unfortunately, I'm the only motorcyclist who doesn't, I think, and so the cars don't know what to do. I had two different cars nearly rear-end me tonight because the car in front of me braked, and I think the cars behind me just assumed that I'd go up between the cars and so they could keep moving forward. Pigfuckers.
• I hate driving IN San Francisco. I have the worst sense of direction ever. Seriously. Kim lives about 6 blocks from me, and it took me nearly a year of living here before I could reliably get between our apartments without getting lost. Anyone who knows me will attest to the fact that I will go way out of my way to avoid driving anywhere other than Peter's house, my workplace, or my apartment. It's really incredibly stressful for me. Add city driving and city parking to this equation, and it's easy to see why I try to avoid driving to San Francisco at all costs. Parking is the worst, because let's say I've managed to actually find my destination -- now I have to go one step further and find somewhere to park, and then I need to find my way back to the original destination. It's absolutely horrible. I have anxiety attacks at the thought of having to park in San Francisco.
• And then there are hills. In case all the above points weren't enough to send me to therapy, San Francisco has, well, some variety of topography. Now, I'm trying to find my destination, and parking, and I have no idea where I am, and people are rear-ending me and changing lanes into me, and I'm at a 45-degree angle with land as I like to know it.

So, perhaps now you can see why tonight was an accomplishment. At one point on the way to the bar, I was going up a hill, on a curve, with the sun directly in my eyes, in rush hour, trying to find street numbers, right behind a Muni bus (Muni is the public transit system in San Francisco, and the buses are generally considered to be rolling death traps). And I didn't die. This was very exciting.

Anyway, I was up in the city to talk to Liz, the producer and writer of the biker gang movie that I'm going to be in. I got the script but haven't had time to look through it yet. I'm really excited - it sounds like most of the cast and crew are affiliated with the motorcycle community somehow, and we'll be doing some "getting to know you" rides and stuff. Very very cool stuff, and I'm really looking forward to meeting the other cast members. :)

OK, I've got more to talk about, but I'm really tired and think I'll go to bed instead. ;)