Zach Hates You

:(

Dear last week, I hope you die in a fire.

Let us begin with the crash of my (once) lovely SV650.  My sad. beaten up moto.  Details?  Sure.

Setting: A wonderful sunny, albeit cold day on Queen Ann right outside my new to me apartment.  It’s the first day in forever that it hasn’t rained and I’m looking forward to hopping on the bike to have a ride while not getting soaking wet.  After taking off the motorcycle cover now that my bikes are sad outdoor motos, I stuff it under the cover of my little GS500’s cover, put the key in the SV and turn it on.  The bike roars to life and with it’s fuel injection is ready to go.  Looking forward to carving some asphalt, I put my still wet gloves on from the night before, then my helmet.  Giving a couple of unnecessary twists of the throttle, the shift peddle gets kicked out of neutral and off I go.

It’s one of the shortest rides I’ve ever been on.

Knowing that it’s cold out, I back off the throttle coming up on my first corner of my ride, a mere couple hundred feet away from where I started.  “I have cold tires, I need to take it easy,” goes through my head.  As I go around the turn, my back tire starts to low-side and I can’t help it.  The cold tires can’t stick to shit.  The back of the bike goes down.  Sliding on my ass I look up to see a large SUV coming right at me.   I’d say that has been one of my less enjoyed views that I have seen in my life.  Not long after that, impact.  My foot is wedged into the front of this SUV.  Did I mention that the SUV wasn’t parked, but coming at me?  Maybe I should have mentioned that.  Fortunately, he saw my wipe out and began to slow.  To his credit, no cellphone or TV, but actually paying attention to the task of driving.  Point for you, sir.

Here I am, mid-calf deep into a car, my bike on it’s side with it’s gas tank dented to all hell and plastics blown everywhere.  Me?  Alive with what I thought was a one way ticket to having my meals ingested through a straw for the next couple of months avoided.  Thinking that I still need to get out of the road, I tug on my foot to try and free it from the monsters grill with no success.  I’m stuck something fierce.  Oh, and in shock too.  That’s fun.  At this point, the SUV occupants get out of the car and are freaking the hell out.  It takes them a few moments to understand that I’m not dead, bleeding, or unconscious and help me get my foot out of their car.  I give myself a quick systems check, note that I’m not in need of any medical aid and talk to the guys after yelling a few choice expletives.

These guys are almost worst shape then I am mentally and they were in a big metal cage.  Talking to them a bit makes me realize that they are a bunch of pudgy frat boys.  Wonderful.  My sort of people.  I limp over to my SV and pick the damaged bike up off of it’s side.  Bluntly, my darling motorcycle is fucked the hell up.  The tank is beat to shit, the tail plastics have exploded into many different little pieces, my license plate lays nearby.  Not a pretty sight.  A bit of jiggling around and it starts.  Holy hell it starts!  That’s looking up.  I make a phone call to my friend while still in shock, but not freaking out too terrible (I hope) letting him know that my journey to meet him at the coffee shop has a bit of a detour.

An older couple walking by ask if everyone is ok.  They didn’t seem to care awfully much, but I’m sure they felt better that no one was bleeding on their nice afternoon walk.  A few more people my age do the same, but with a bit more feeling.  After learning everyone is OK, they point out on the side of the building we’re in front of  marks of previous marks from vehicles that have failed to make the turn.  He gives us his information and leaves into his apartment happy I’m sure that no one is dead in front of where he lives.

I see a familiar blue car come around the corner at us and lights go on.  Goody, the police.  Because I need a ticket on top of all this.  The cop takes his time getting out of the car, ensures that everyone is OK and that SFD doesn’t need to be called, then asks for everyone’s driving info.  Asking me for my plate number, he looks to the ground and noticed that it’s laying in front of him.  (Chuckling) “Never mind, I got it,” he says as he picked it up and hands it to me.  He then takes all our information and goes back to his car.  The officer doesn’t seem much for words as he honks on his horn and summons the driver to him.  After talking to him, he beckons me over with a wave of his hand.  Handing me a card with the incident number he tells me how he’s glad I’m alright.  Me too man.  Thanks for not giving me a ticket too!  That’s something I’m pretty happy about.  Bike starts, no ticket, and I’m still not dead.  wOOt.

The rest of this encounter has nothing noteworthy.  I talk to the guys, and give information as my friend who showed up earlier takes pictures of everything.  He grabs a bag from my house to fill it with the various assorted pieces of motorcycle that are no longer attached.  We say our good-byes to the dudes after exchanging information and I begin my power walk of shame to return my bike to where it started off a stone throw away.

I get phone calls and texts the rest of the day from the assorted folk of the UTMC wishing me well and happy to hear about my lack of death.  That helped to cheer me up a wee bit.  Thanks guys.

Sad, beaten motorbike.  It looks bad, but I have a feeling that it shouldn’t be too hard to get it road worthy once more.  Not as pretty, but I’m not too worried about that.

But that’s just the beginning of the shit storm.  I’m far from done getting screwed over by this foul week.

Moving on from a very loved bike, to my hated GS750.  The hand cramping bike that I’ve neglected since buying my SV.  Needing to rid the Hanta Haus of it after nearly a month of me moving out, the day after my wreck myself and a few others of the Cult gather to revive the bike.  Needing a new battery, spark plugs, and a tire to get back on it’s bead, myself and my friend in his truck venture towards a battery shop in the Rainier area.  Remembering that Twinline Motorcycles has moved, we look about for it before discovering that they’ve camouflage themselves well by renting out some space to some cages for parking.  It sounds quiet and all the doors are buttoned up, we approach the door with spirits low only to open the door easily and a bell sounding our arrival.  They are in fact open and happily shoot the shit, find everything that I need and only charge me the low sum of 30 bucks for a decent amount of effort and talking to the mechanic working on the beast back home a couple of times to assure the parts that I need.  With much thanks, we had to the battery store thankful about not needing to venture towards the money grubbing dealership all the way down in Renton.  We arrive to the battery shop and leave a short while later.  I lose $40 for a trade of a brand new battery filled with fresh acid poured out of a box that looks akin to the sort that the shitty wine comes in.  Yummy.

We return back from to the Haus victorious with our finds and get to putting them back into the bike where they belong.  Everything is ready to go, the key turns annnnnnd….

The bike fails to turn over.  Splendid.  Fastcat the mechanic gives it a puzzled look and goes back to tinkering.  A short while later, she sits back and unhappily says, “I have no idea why the fuck it wont start.”  Well…shit.  So a bit of stressing and talking about what the hell we are going to do with it and the plan is to go down to Oly where another of the Cult lives to stash it for later work on his garage.  My vote for setting the beast on fire was vetoed for some damn reason under the guise of a “learning experience.”  Let the flames take it I feel.  So I give Fastcat a bill, then myself and Calamari Kid make our way Southbound.

The day after the non-working GS, my bottem left molar looses a chunk of itself while I’m brushing my teeth.  This week, is offically the worst week I’ve had in my life.  Well, FUCK YOU LAST WEEK OF NOVEMBER.

Blug.  Currently, the fat boys have yet to contact me about the repair costs for the SUV and I’m waiting to be bent over leaving me with an empty bank account and scrambling for a job.  My poor SV is still not at riding status.  I’m on the search for a new gas tank and making a choice of making a bobber out of it or lopping the sharp parts off of the subframe and constructing some sort of luggage system.  Things are looking pretty good right now for that.  The GS750 is in pieces and still not functioning.  I’ve wrote it off as parts and scrap.  People are hopeful, but I am not.  As I’ve told others, it’s dead to me.  I think the bloody thing is cursed.  My tooth has yet to regrow and there was an appointment made today, for a month later.  I’ll have to deal with the pokey, temperature sensitive pain in my ass, broken tooth until then.

Yeah, eat a dick last week of November.  I hate your face.

Me: on sexy black SV650 getting off of work at 4am.

You: sweet effin Charger with brush guard, light-bar, and a shotgun.

As I was getting off work and heading home, I saw you far down the street ahead of me.  I didn’t want to catch your eye and just wanted to make it home, but you stopped in the middle of the road and waited for me.  I knew our encounter was going to be special.

I tried to get into the turn lane to go across the overpass, you matched my speed in a playful, “I’m going to check out your butt,” way.   So I slowed to let you be in front of me (ladies first) and made it to the turn lane I needed.  While I was slowing down to come to a stop behind you, a quick lane change and we were right next to each other.  I couldn’t muster up the guts to give you even a meek wave as you glared at me.  You rolled down the window so we could finally speak!  Never will I forget our first conversation, “Don’t do anything ‘dumb’ on that thing.  I already got you for having your plate bent (I knew you were looking at my ass!).  That’s one thing, don’t give me another.”

Oooooooo!  Fiesty!  Not wanting our talk to end so soon, I made a daring suggestion, but was still a statement that was nothing but truth, “I’m just off from work ma’am and can’t wait to get into bed.”  Unfortunatly, you didn’t pick up on my hint and barked back at me, “I just got on shift, am on three hours of sleep, and don’t want to put up with any bullshit.”  A girl that’s straight to the point.  No beating around the bush.  Rawr!

As the light was changing, I knew our wonderful time together was over.  I wish it could have been longer.  With a sigh, my foot pushed the motorcycle into first gear.  But before we parted, I had to say one last thing, “Have a good night,” which you promptly ignored while slamming your gas pedal and shooting onto the freeway.

So you know, I followed your words of “not doing anything dumb.”  I wanted to make you proud of my riding skill and prove that I was not a dumb rider.  I expertly went well over the posted 30 and 35 mph speed limit by a good 40 mph and quite dexterously wove my motorcycle across two lanes of traffic while almost grinding my foot pegs into the street.  I do believe you have been impressed.  There’s even a S turn that I set my own personal record on last night.  There’s no way I could have done it without your little pep talk.

You fucking pig.

Location: 1st Ave and Edgar Martinez Dr

Today I was out zipping around Seattle with a friend in nice sunny weather having a great time.  When she asked if she could get dropped off around the Westlake Mall I asked her if she was serious.

Downtown Seattle.

430pm.

Really?

Getting there wasn’t that bad.  There was one Metro driver that wasn’t happy with the fact that while pulled over, I snuck the bike into the space next to him.  I don’t care how big you’re vehicial is.  I’ll win.  Not that the driver saw me glaring at him through my very dark tinted windscreen, he decided that it was better to just let me in front of him.  He chose wisely and gets to continue living. Good for him!

So dropping my little punk of a friend off at the mall.  No big deal.  Now it’s time for me to head back home.  Still south of Beltown’s now fucked up roads due to construction, I figured 2nd Ave wouldn’t be too much of a hassle.

Wrong.

It took me 30 mins to go 5 blocks.  That was doing all the illegal things I possible could do while on my bike aside from riding on the sidewalks.  Even with SPD directing traffic the whole place was madness.  All I could do was watch as my poor, hot motorcycle’s temp gauge continued to rise.  Normally it hovers at around 187.  While stuck in traffic it neared 210.  Poor, poor SV.  So not being able to take it anymore, I shot up to Capitol Hill thinking it was a better bet then trying to get to SoDo.  It wasn’t the best, but I’m sure it was better then anything else.  Guess what kiddies?  It’s PRIDE weekend! That’s great, I’m really happy that you’re happy about being gay.  Be as gay as you want.  I’m OK with it.  Really.

NOW POST SIGNS BEFORE YOU CLOSE DOWN MAIN FUCKING ROADS ON A FRIDAY AFTERNOON.

When I am a rich man, I’ll have a motorcycle armed to the teeth ready to blow away traffic enabling me to zip through the still burning carnage.  When that day comes, I’ll be a happy Zach.  Still full of hate, just more of a sadistic glee.

He's nowhere near as pretty as me

OK.  I get it.  I look like Jay Buhner.  You can stop now.  I hate baseball.  There are worse sports out there that I hate even more, but I don’t like sports in general.  Sure, I enjoy MMA, but my like of sports pretty much stops there.  OK, I’ll watch some ladies beach volleyball, but I mean come on, that’s for reasons other then the sport.

When I was growing up, I shaved my head.  We laughed about going to “Buhner Buzz Night” where fans that showed up willing to buzz their hair or already with a shaved down head would get in for free.  This was a time we’ll call “pre-beard Zach.”   While I was in the Army with a shaved head, there were a couple of people that commented on my likness to the man.  It didn’t happen too often and it’s not like the guy was Hitler so I didn’t think much of it.

Fast forward 7 years or so and I have a decently sized red beard and a mohawk, I work across the street from where the Mariners play, and Mr. Buhner is no longer on the field.  I heard one guy say I look like him.  Just one.  One fat man.  Sure, it’s happened every so often no big deal.

And then I shaved my head once more.

All week, “Hey look, it’s Jay Buhner!” “Do you know who you look like?” “Wow, you look like you could be Jay’s twin!”

Fuck you all very much.  I almost snapped yesterday.  I went from work near the stadium where a group of annoying drunks kept calling me “Jay” to the Irish bar I also work at to find them again.  I was nearing the point where I wanted to kick them out of my first bar for being fucksticks, but they left soon enough.  Then, there they are…still drinking at my other bar.  The sad part of this is I don’t think they realized that I was the same person that was shooting them death glares for an hour across the bar.  Fucking drunks.

So Mr Buhner, I have a favor to ask of you.  Please go back in time and please do one (or more) of these three things:

1.  Don’t shave your head.  I know that bald is beautiful , but maybe go with a crew cut or something.  No shaved head, no mohawks.

2.  “The Bone” minus the nicely trimmed beard will still be a badass.  I’ve heard that ladies like guys without beards.

3.  (This one would be the one I would pick)  Don’t be a famous baseball player that makes a  buncha money for playing a sport.  Granted, I know that baseball players do work a lot.  There are a shit ton of games in a season and about half of those are on the road.  Man, that sure must suck.  You know what would be easier?  Not doing it.  So instead of baseball, you could be an apartment manager or be a train engineer.  Then once I become famous from this marvelous blog, people would come up to you and say, “Hey, you know you who look like?”

To be honest, I don’t hate the guy.  There is no way that I hate a man who stars in very funny commercials and an amazing fact from teh wikis, “He was also known throughout baseball for his ability to vomit on command.”  That’s pretty damn impressive and I admit a bit of jealousy there.  Well played sir.  Well played.

I hate all the damn fans that walk up to me to tell me something that has come up for years.  You people and your stupid jerseys with someone else’s name on them.  Even worse are the jerseys that have “Fan” as a name.  You can’t even pick someone at random to put on your jersey to keep you from looking like a moron?  The people they put their own last names on their shirt are even worse.  You are a fat middle aged cubical jockey.  You will never play any sport professional.  Enjoy your $8 bottles of crap beer and your nasty garlic fries idiots.

Due to the fact that I ride my motorcycles more then I use my car, I’ve had to become picky with gas stations. The reason behind this is the gas pumps. In a car, you shove the nozzle into your tank and walk away. Bike have smaller tanks and that god damn “safety” device that only pumps gas if it is pressed down is a real bitch. If I’m stuck refilling at a station with one of these pain in my ass devices I can usally manage. This was not the case today refilling my GS750 (which I also hate). I actually gave up after filling up 2 gallons of gas. The pressure of the gas coming out made it impossible for me to fill my tank without getting gas everywhere. Total bullshit. So I hate you gas station. I hate that pump. It’s my gas and I’ll put it wherever I want.