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I grew up in the 60's and 70's when "those guys" would joke about "getting high" in hushed tones that teachers, principals, coaches and even us straight-arrow kids couldn't hear. Funny thing was that everybody knew and nobody did anything about it.
Lucky for my parents, I was not one of those guys but, truthfully, I was hooked on things that were probably more dangerous than smoking pot. Allow me to explain. While I may have appeared squeaky clean to a lot of people...I did sing in the church choir you know....once I got two wheels under me I turned into quite the hellion. Apparently, motorcycles were my form of rebellion and every kid had a rebellious streak in the 60's and 70's.
Watford City had one stoplight in those days so one of my first goals in motorcycling was to ride the entire length of Main Street, 6 blocks, on my Suzuki's hind wheel without running a red light. Heaven forbid if I ran through a red light on my hind wheel...there were limits to my rampant lawlessness. It only took a couple of tries to get the light's timing right and my life of crime was underway.
As the undisputed wheelie king of Watford City, I set out to ride to Arnegard from Watford on the rear wheel of my Honda XL250. Surely that must be some sort of record. It is seven miles to Arnegard and I made short work of that goal as well. A few cars passed me along the way with the old ladies shaking their heads at such an open display of anarchism. Perhaps one of them was old lady Drovdal who had given me a ride home the year before when I wrecked my Suzuki in the ditch while I was racing her as she drove down the highway.
Speaking of wrecks, another useful skill I mastered was riding a motorcycle without touching the handlebars. I had reached the conclusion that riding with my hands on the bars was dangerous since every time I had wrecked a motorcycle was when I had both hands on the bars. Logically, then, it was time to try something else. Of course, it is not good enough to ride hands-free for a few seconds at a time so I devised a plan to see just how far I could go without touching the bars. One mile? Nope. Ten? No. 100? Ah, now that would be impressive and perhaps another record setting performance. Call The Guiness Book of World Records again! Logical feats such as a No-Touch 100 do require some forethought and planning so I gave the endeavor about 30 seconds of serious consideration as I was riding to Fargo one day to attend a meeting. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? It is nearly 100 miles from Bismarck to Jamestown on Interstate 94 with only a few gentle curves and no road construction. Perfect conditions for the NT100!
As I departed Bismarck, I set the Wing's cruise control at the normally safe speed of 73 miles per hour. It is so liberating to have both hands free to pick your nose at will when going down the road at over 100 feet per second. Lane changes and curves were accomplished by leaning my body and sometimes putting a hand out into the wind to create extra drag on one side or the other. Meet another motorcycle? Wave back with both hands! I reached Jamestown without incident but I could have kept going touchless for much longer. Like most stupid things, it was a very easy feat to accomplish. Look ma, no hands or brains!
Warped minds are seldom content to do much of anything in normal fashion so I have also formulated other diabolical schemes. These ideas may even be legal! How about riding a motorcycle 1000 miles without putting a foot on the ground? I'll call that ride the Depends 1000. Another one is to ride 1000 miles in one day while never exceeding 50 miles per hour. Oh wait, that is too simple; all I have to do is ride from Four Bears to New Town about 100 times! Stay tuned, friends, you never know what groundbreaking motorcycling events are coming up next!
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