I have a question for you, my handful of regular readers.
As many of you know, I write regularly as an automotive journalist for MotoringFile.com, BimmerFile.com, and ScooterFile.com. I also spent a year as BlueCat Motors’ official documentarian, writing a weekly story about what was going on at the shop and some of my own thoughts about riding old motorcycles. – Read More –
I’ve just learned that David Rackoff died today.. His decades long struggle with cancer finally got the better of him. I’m deeply saddened to hear of his passing. His was a dark, wonderful wit. When I think back to my first exposure to him — his Fraud essay entitled “In New England, everyone calls you Dave” — on This American Life, I realize just how much of my own thought journey I owe to Rackoff.
His essays inform my own introspection at adult life. “In New England…” introduced me to TAL, to David Sedaris, to Mike Birbiglia, to Sarah Vowel and a dozen others — all of which grew my love of non-fiction storytelling. He was one of the first gay men I recognized as a person rather than just an orientation. And while I haven’t read him in a while, I know the world is a lesser place now that there won’t be any new work of his in it. Thank you, David Rackoff.
Today I gave $35 to a Kickstarter.com project for the movie Girl Meets Bike. It’s the first time I’ve supported something through Kickstarter. As expected, it was really easy to get involved, but why this project? Girl Meets Bike hits home on a couple of fronts for me. – Read More –
June 9, 2012 — Sometimes a journey is the destination. Sometimes it’s the road. Other times it’s surprises along the way that happen when I intersect other journeys I didn’t even know I was taking. This time, it was all of the above. – Read More –
Back in March I paid a visit to a Chicago-area motorcycle institution. Each Sunday morning, bikers of all sorts descend on the Full Moon Diner for the weekly motorcycle gathering and ride. – Read More –
May 20, 2012 — My thumb hurt. Somewhere between a cramp and an ache, my right thumb felt like it didn’t want to be part of my hand anymore. It was tired of squeezing the throttle on my ’83 Honda GL1100. It’d been about 90 minutes since I set off from Evanston, IL to intercept my buddy Bree on his way back from Minneapolis. – Read More –
September 30, 2011 — In far western Wisconsin there is a stretch of road every motorcycle rider should experience at least once. It’s The Great River Road. It follows the east side of the Mississippi from just outside the Twin Cities all the way down to the Illinois border. Similar roads will take you all the way to Memphis in the south, and to the source of the Mississippi in northern Minnesota. But it’s this Wisconsin stretch that I love the most. Particularly the section between the Twin Cities and Alma, WI. – Read More –
May 5, 2012 — I don’t really pay much notice to Cinco de Mayo, St. Patrick’s Day, Columbus Day or other major drinking holidays, but this year I got to have a Cinco de Mayo adventure that thankfully didn’t have anything to do with being left for dead in Mexico. – Read More –