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(You can jump to the synopsis at the end if you want to skip all this :)
I went to a motorcycle meetup/ride today. Although the weather perfect, we only started with four bikes.
This is Leo's bike, Strawberry Bitch. He made it himself from a collection of scavenged parts. The frame was from something wrecked, the engine from a Harley. The tank was from something else. The seat is a plate of steel, no lie. It is completely illegal to drive this on the roads, which is why he brought it to the group ride: he's afraid he'll be easy pickin' if he rides by himself, but harder to stop in a group.
Leo also didn't have a toll tag, so we drove through toll booths, he'd ride right next to another bike. Hey, we pay the same as cars, so we ought to get four tires for the same price. Right? Kinda crazy though to pass through the plaza in a single lane driving handle bar to handle bar at 75mph.
Because I have a bright yellow jacket, I often will ride trail (last bike). That way the leader can look for me in my jacket and know the whole group is together. Leo was right in front of me, and it looked like he had a wounded left arm... holding it to his belly. I was concerned, but I figured he was a big boy and could tell me if something was wrong.
At the last toll booth, Leo zoomed ahead to pass through with the leader. Then he pulled back to the 3rd slot. A couple minutes later, he pulled off the road. I stuck up my arm to alert the lead that there was trouble and we were stopping. The second bike saw it, and pulled over a half mile ahead. The lead didn't see any of this and kept going.
Leo jumped off his bike like it was on fire. In fact, he told us earlier that this was a replacement engine, because the last one caught fire. Oops! But before I had time to be alarmed, he shouted "I have to go pee!" as he dashed under a bridge. That's what he had zoomed up to tell the lead, but the lead had just kept driving to the next gas station. Leo's need was more pressing than that, apparently.
When he came back, he told me that his gas tank was falling off. It's a two-part tank, one on either side of the frame. The bolt on the right side broke, and now it was falling off. That's what he was doing with his left arm... holding the tank on.
Leo decided to head home rather than continuing the ride. Probably a good idea.
As we started out to catch up with the gal on the #2 bike, she took off! We never did find her. When Leo split to go home, I pulled into a gas station to call the lead. As I was getting their number, they found me. No one had #2's number. After waiting ten minutes, we went on the ride. Of four bikes that started, only two finished.
Synopsis:
This is Leo's bike
Leo's gas tank almost fell off while we rode
Our group of riders went from four to two as a result.