6/27/2011

Well, I bought something at the swap meet. It wasn't what I went looking for, but I think I'm going to be just as happy, if not happier, with this. Here’s the poop. Saturday morning, John calls to say they are on their way to the shop, the time is about 0645 h. I head that way. We work on Barbecue Bob for a while until Dave has to go home to meet with the carpet people or something. John and I head for the swap meet. We stop for lunch at Mercado Juarez “on the way” but have to detour to his house to deliver some parts to some dude who showed up early for his appointment with John. At the swap meet, we take off to the far end so we can work our way back, as we are wont to do. We don't see any vans in the usually “cars for sale” heavy far-end of the meet area. We walk the rows. About two or three rows in, I see a bitchin’ olive drab and black motorcycle with a price tag of... wait for it... hang on... here it comes... $575.00! Normally when I'm at a swap meet, broke-assed and just dreaming, I'd have passed by saying, “Man, that’s cool.” but remember, I've got thirty one, one hundred dollar bills burnin’ a hole in my back pocket at this point. I take a closer look. It is a 1972 Honda XL-250 customized to look, to me, like a WWII army bike. John asks the guy if I can sit on it. He, John, is concerned that it might be too small and look funny under a MOG (Man of Girth). He approves of how I look on it and we stand back to examine it some more. Sanity prevails and I walk away. We had just started the meet, there were lots of rows to go, and I was shopping for a van we know we’d both seen there in the past. A few rows later, someone else had two XL-250s for twice as much but half as nice. That put the bee in my bonnet... but I was still looking for a van. Another few rows later and the dude with the OD green bike came riding by. It smoked a little but I ain’t skeert. It sounded good and looked cool as shit. By the time we go to the end of the meet, and hadn't seen any vans, I asked John if he’d mind walking back to look at the bike again. We finally found it and the dude started putting the hard sell on me. Well, to make a short story long, I offered him $500.00 and he agreed. I handed over the money and took it for a test ride. I won't go into how it has been almost twenty years since I'd ridden a motorcycle. The thing rode well, had way more power than I thought a 250 otter have, and... well, it is cool as shit! While we were making out the paperwork, John took it for a spin. He approved and agreed about the power. I took off to show it to George and Marty, who have a spot under the tree at every meet, while John walked back to Fifi. When we had the bike loaded, John asked how I was going to unload it by myself. I sheepishly suggested he might ride along and I'd bring him home but he counter-suggested “hiding” the bike in his “Car Hole” for a while. I thought that sounded like a good idea since the Freebird’s thing is next weekend and I'd rather risk riding from John's to it than all the way across town. I took it around the block in his neighborhood and actually got up into third gear. I like it. John said the perma-grin when I got off told the story. I think we have a keeper. From John's, I went up to Grapevine and paid Gregg the last of the money I owed him for Lil' Wiggly and the super hot rod engine. My brother, Ted, was in town and asked if he could stay the night so I rushed home to meet him. We had dinner at Flying Fish, a little hole-in-the-wall place across from Railhead Barbecue on Montgomery. I had frog legs. They were quite tasty. Kind of like a fishy chicken. We watched part of “Demolition Man” before I gave up and went to bed. Sunday morning... well, I'll tell y'all about Sunday tomorrow.