{"id":739,"date":"2010-01-07T09:49:23","date_gmt":"2010-01-06T23:49:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bikeme.tv\/?p=739"},"modified":"2013-09-23T18:10:44","modified_gmt":"2013-09-23T08:10:44","slug":"the-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/the-problem\/","title":{"rendered":"THE PROBLEM"},"content":{"rendered":"

Have some of you shaved apes been bleating about how slippery new tyres are? You have, haven\u2019t you?<\/p>\n

And some of you have even fallen off on those slippery new tyres, then further demeaned yourselves by having your letter commemorating the occasion published in a widely read magazine.<\/p>\n

And this is after the nice man in the bike shop told you to \u201ctake it easy\u201d until you\u2019ve done a few kays on your new tyres, wasn\u2019t it? If you appeared especially stupid, he may have even put a bright sticker on your tank telling you once again about your tyres, in case you weren\u2019t paying attention before. And this is not because he cares about you.<\/p>\n

Privately, he burns with hope that you\u2019ll skid into the back of a tank the second you\u2019re out of sight of his shop. But he tells you about your new tyres cos he doesn\u2019t want you, or your estate, to sue him.<\/p>\n

So what do you do after he\u2019s told you this and put a sticker on your tank? Do you \u201ctake it easy\u201d for a few kays as instructed?<\/p>\n

Of course you don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

You crash. Or you almost crash and scare yourself. Or you rub the sides of your tyres with sandpaper and clip off the pointy bits with nail clippers and write to magazines so\u2019s other people can delight in your life as an arsehat.<\/p>\n

At first, I thought youse were having a lend. Or that you snuck away from some idiotic internet forum where retarded beginners wonder about which glove to put on first, or if the rain\u2019s gonna hurt their bike.<\/p>\n

Then I realised you were actually serious \u2013 and I wondered yet again why so many of you suddenly decided you ought to ride bikes, when riding bikes is really not something people like you should be doing. And especially when those bikes are fitted with shiny new tyres.<\/p>\n

Motorcycling obviously scares and befuddles you \u2013 and if that is the case, you\u2019ll probably die or be maimed in the very near future. Which is entirely a matter for you, and a wondrous act of natural selection for the rest of us.<\/p>\n

If shiny new tyres are impacting negatively on your \u201cenjoyment\u201d (though that\u2019s perhaps the wrong word, so feel free to use \u201csufferance\u201d instead) of motorcycling, there\u2019s a fair chance other important stuff bothers you as well.<\/p>\n

\"Ready

Ready to get their hate on<\/p><\/div>\n

Not able to take any responsibility for yourself and your actions when dealing with virginal rubber, you nonetheless have strong views regarding passive safety equipment and how vital it is to every rider\u2019s safety. But because you\u2019re also a bovine idiot, you cannot grasp the distinction between \u201cfeeling safe\u201d and actually being safe.<\/p>\n

Cos you are not ever safe on a motorcycle.<\/p>\n

People like you are too befuddled and frightened to ever be \u201csafe\u201d on the damnable things. And your riding days are numbered as a result \u2013 but as we\u2019ve already established, this is not necessarily a bad thing for the rest of us.<\/p>\n

Quite frankly, unless riding bikes makes you burn with passion, sing with delight and laugh with madness, you have no business doing it. Unless lashing through corners thrums glee through your being, and life-affirming acceleration bathes you in glory, you should get while the getting is good. It just ain\u2019t for you.<\/p>\n

Look, I know you thought it was cool and your mates had bikes and there is, admittedly, a certain perverted thrill to pulling on the gear and making sure you \u201clook\u201d the business to people who don\u2019t know what the \u201cbusiness\u201d actually is (like your mum and the chick in the hatchback who will one day crush you like a bug beneath her alloys), but if you were really honest with yourself, you\u2019d be forced to admit the whole motorcycling caper is actually quite frightful.<\/p>\n

Especially when you get those slimy new hoops.<\/p>\n

Now don\u2019t get upset. I\u2019m one of those riders who don\u2019t wave at you in traffic. I have issues. I hate pushbike riders clogging up major roads, hairy women, bad beer and cats \u2013 and I wear an open-face helmet, so I don\u2019t know all that much about certain things. I also don\u2019t think that \u201cgoing for a ride on Sunday\u201d means tooling along the most heavily policed roads in creation, at or near the speed limit, to a coffee shop frequented by people like yourself, so we don\u2019t have a common philosophical ground to stand upon either.<\/p>\n

Getting upset with my views and writing outraged letters will not avail you. I still will not wave at you while I\u2019m paying attention to riding like it meant something, and you will still be wiped out cos you\u2019re frightened and befuddled.<\/p>\n

So don\u2019t waste what little time you have left on that spooky, new-tyred motorcycle being all pouty with me. I love motorcycles and the riding thereof \u2013 truly, madly, deeply and honestly. Motorcycling is demands that \u2013 you\u2019ve gotta love it beyond reason so that it finally makes utter sense.<\/p>\n

So I\u2019m not the problem.<\/p>\n

Slippery new tyres aren\u2019t the problem.<\/p>\n

Me not waving at you is not the problem.<\/p>\n

You are.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Have some of you shaved apes been bleating about how slippery new tyres are? You have, haven\u2019t you? And some of you have even fallen off on those slippery new tyres, then further demeaned yourselves by having your letter commemorating the occasion published in a widely read magazine. And this is after the nice man [&hellip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":740,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[220],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=739"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3025,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739\/revisions\/3025"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}