Week One: 60 Miles. I know, I suck.

It’s been 7 days since I brought my 2002 VFR home. I’ve added a mere 60 miles to the odometer reading. I know, I’m a lightweight. I have a full time job, give me a break.
I’ve ridden it to work a few times the past week, and I indeed take the long way home. I’ve found the Interceptor to be a very amenable ride; the hydraulic clutch pull is perfect, the brakes are very strong, there’s practically zero vibration for a nice comfortable ride, and the riding position is very good. The engine temperature gets up to and past 200 degrees F, but the fan comes on and it doesn’t rise above 220 that I’ve seen.

I don’t know if I’m a huge fan of the Hot Grips that were added. I am thankful that I don’t plan on riding when it’s below 40 degrees so having heated hand grips isn’t really going to be a necessity. Therefore, I may just remove them and replace them with a regular set of grips.

The reflector that bit a car. First blood. Hopefully LAST.

Oh, and uh… I had a little boo boo in the parking lot on Friday. I don’t want to take up a full parking space in the company car lot, so I wedged my VFR between two parked cars in the corner of the lot. I saw that my back end was kinda blocking the silver Prius’ driver side door, so I backed out to park elsewhere… and didn’t exactly realize how wide my rear end was, what with the hard luggage. I kinda scraped up against the silver Prius’ rear quarter panel.The sharp edge of the reflector on the hard luggage bit into it…and left a mark…

Have I mentioned that one of the company VP’s owns said silver Prius?

So I immediately told her what I did. She seemed not too concerned about it and didn’t even inspect the scrape until after she left Friday evening. As of this very writing I don’t know if she and her husband have decided that the scrape mark will need to be professionally fixed. If so, of course, I’ll pay for it. But this may be the first time a motorcycle damaged a car while its engine wasn’t even on, as I was walking it backwards between two cars.

Next time? I’m taking a fucking whole space. I’m actually listening to AC/DC’s First Blood from Fly On The Wall as I write this.

What’s ironic is just the day before this, I was talking with a colleague and said that motorcycles in Washington state are not required to carry any sort of insurance. I’ve checked into motorcycle insurance and am on the fence about its necessity. If my Interceptor were stolen, I’d want protection, even with a $1,000 deductible. But collision insurance? That tacks on a significant amount of dough to a motorcycle policy. So I’ll think about it.