EllenGtrGrl
Active member
It's a gorgeous day here. Perfect for riding, but I'm not out and about on 2 wheels. My FTR 1200 is within 70 miles of requiring its 500 mile break-in maintenance, and the earliest I can get in is 2 weeks from now. So, I'm conserving the rides I have left (about 2, rides of about 30 plus miles each, using routes around where I live) so I can keep my battery charged until I have the break-in maintenance done. 
Still, that's not where the title of this thread comes from - it comes from a motorcycle incident I was almost involved in, that could have ended in tragedy.
Despite being a salaried employee (I'm a Quality Engineer for a local company), I went into work this morning for a few hours, to take a bite out of my workload (it was work, that cannot be done remotely at home). I also brought one of my electric guitars with me (my Fender Telecaster - I've been playing guitar for 41 years [including stints in rock bands, and a local church band]), so I could head directly from work, to my favorite guitar shop, to try out some guitar amps (I ended up buying one [a Blackstar Silverline 50] to replace my ratty old guitar amp). While heading back to my home turf from work in my car, before I got to the interchange, where I would leave northbound I-94, to head west on I-894, I decided to change lanes. I looked as I always do (I don't count on rear view mirrors alone, due there being blind spots in mirrors), and saw I was clear, so I decided to change lanes. I was half way through the lane change, when I started to hear what sounded like a howling 4-cylinder motorcycle engine, so I decided that it would be prudent to abort my lane change, and swerve back over into the original lane I was in. It's a good thing I did. I was not even completely done moving back into my original lane, when some squid, yahoo, Urban Freeway Warrior on his 600 or 1000 super sport, went screaming past me, swerving to make sure he missed my car (since I still hadn't completely cleared the lane yet) doing about 100 mph - in a 55 mph zone to boot! Several seconds later, 4 or 5 of his friends went howling past me going just as fast. All of these individuals , were swerving in and out of/cutting lanes (I saw them snaking through several lanes before I lost sight of them - one of the gaps between cars they moved through was at the most, a car length wide) playing high speed follow the leader. Oh yeah, and there was a 6th rider who must have gotten left behind for a bit - he was riding a 'Busa, doing at least 100 mph in the INSIDE SHOULDER of the freeway, trying to catch up with his friends! Traffic was heavy, and as I mentioned before, the speed limit was 55 mph, with the average motorist doing about 60 mph.
After these "riders" (and I use the term loosely) left the scene, my blood was just about boiling. If I hadn't moved back to my old lane, Squid #1, might have collided with me, and wound up dead. Riding behavior like I saw, is what adds to the negative perception that the average non-riding person has of motorcyclists! Grrrr!!! I'll admit, I've occasionally had a lead throttle hand on my bikes. During my morning commute at 6 am (when traffic is light), I typically do 80 mph, when the speed limit changes over to 70 mph. I will even admit, that once in a rare while, I've been over the ton, on empty back roads, but I've never made it a habit to do so. What I saw, and on a busy freeway with a 55 mph speed limit to boot, was just plain insanely dangerous. You want to make a habit of going that fast around here? go to the track days held at Road America, or Blackhawk Farms Raceway! Both tracks are within an hour and a half ride of the Milwaukee Metro Area. That worst part about it, is that these "urban racers" think nothing about doing what they did, and it confirms what I've always suspected, that whenever I hear a 4 cylinder motorcycle howling past my apartment building at 10,000 rpm on I-894, it's probably an urbo-Ricky Racer type going insanely fast. Oh yeah, and considering that I hear more than a few rescue squad sirens on the freeway, I wouldn't surprised if the rescue squads are responding to a freeway squid crash on occasion. It's kind of depressing in a way.
/rant off.
Still, that's not where the title of this thread comes from - it comes from a motorcycle incident I was almost involved in, that could have ended in tragedy.Despite being a salaried employee (I'm a Quality Engineer for a local company), I went into work this morning for a few hours, to take a bite out of my workload (it was work, that cannot be done remotely at home). I also brought one of my electric guitars with me (my Fender Telecaster - I've been playing guitar for 41 years [including stints in rock bands, and a local church band]), so I could head directly from work, to my favorite guitar shop, to try out some guitar amps (I ended up buying one [a Blackstar Silverline 50] to replace my ratty old guitar amp). While heading back to my home turf from work in my car, before I got to the interchange, where I would leave northbound I-94, to head west on I-894, I decided to change lanes. I looked as I always do (I don't count on rear view mirrors alone, due there being blind spots in mirrors), and saw I was clear, so I decided to change lanes. I was half way through the lane change, when I started to hear what sounded like a howling 4-cylinder motorcycle engine, so I decided that it would be prudent to abort my lane change, and swerve back over into the original lane I was in. It's a good thing I did. I was not even completely done moving back into my original lane, when some squid, yahoo, Urban Freeway Warrior on his 600 or 1000 super sport, went screaming past me, swerving to make sure he missed my car (since I still hadn't completely cleared the lane yet) doing about 100 mph - in a 55 mph zone to boot! Several seconds later, 4 or 5 of his friends went howling past me going just as fast. All of these individuals , were swerving in and out of/cutting lanes (I saw them snaking through several lanes before I lost sight of them - one of the gaps between cars they moved through was at the most, a car length wide) playing high speed follow the leader. Oh yeah, and there was a 6th rider who must have gotten left behind for a bit - he was riding a 'Busa, doing at least 100 mph in the INSIDE SHOULDER of the freeway, trying to catch up with his friends! Traffic was heavy, and as I mentioned before, the speed limit was 55 mph, with the average motorist doing about 60 mph.
After these "riders" (and I use the term loosely) left the scene, my blood was just about boiling. If I hadn't moved back to my old lane, Squid #1, might have collided with me, and wound up dead. Riding behavior like I saw, is what adds to the negative perception that the average non-riding person has of motorcyclists! Grrrr!!! I'll admit, I've occasionally had a lead throttle hand on my bikes. During my morning commute at 6 am (when traffic is light), I typically do 80 mph, when the speed limit changes over to 70 mph. I will even admit, that once in a rare while, I've been over the ton, on empty back roads, but I've never made it a habit to do so. What I saw, and on a busy freeway with a 55 mph speed limit to boot, was just plain insanely dangerous. You want to make a habit of going that fast around here? go to the track days held at Road America, or Blackhawk Farms Raceway! Both tracks are within an hour and a half ride of the Milwaukee Metro Area. That worst part about it, is that these "urban racers" think nothing about doing what they did, and it confirms what I've always suspected, that whenever I hear a 4 cylinder motorcycle howling past my apartment building at 10,000 rpm on I-894, it's probably an urbo-Ricky Racer type going insanely fast. Oh yeah, and considering that I hear more than a few rescue squad sirens on the freeway, I wouldn't surprised if the rescue squads are responding to a freeway squid crash on occasion. It's kind of depressing in a way.
/rant off.
