Blog entry: The 2007 Riders Choice Awards for the best
in the motorcycle industry

 

 

Mar 6th

You know it is Spring when you are on the Bay Bridge at 5:45 in the morning and you are fumbling for the heater vest's rheostat, trying to turn the heat off. You know it is Spring when, while standing outside the dojo waiting for the teacher of the 6:30 a.m. class to arrive, you try to fluff your hair instead of immediately pulling a wool cap over your head. You know it is Spring when you get distracted from your normal traffic vigilence by the pink ornamental plum tree blossoms that seem to have burst through the grey bark overnight. You know it is Spring when you lose count of the number of riders who wave to you on your commute - two weeks ago I could count the cold-weather riding freaks on one heated-grip loving hand.

* * *

So, today was a the first day of a Spring madness experiment. Imitation is supposed to be the most sincere form of flattery. In January of this year, we learned about a young lady nicknamed Skinny, who rides a pink KTM wearing a pink tutu with a teddy bear strapped to her back. What a great way to make people see you and maybe pay attention before they pass and drift over into your lane. The bear is a brilliant touch and got me thinking, Sure, the pink tutu on the pink bike is the real eye-catcher, but would a grey bear on the back of a blue and grey GS catch your eye? I had to find out.

There are four stuffed animals sitting forlornly on top of the bookcase in the den, a skunk hand puppet (okay, only the head is stuffed), a snow leopard, a pig named UNIX (he was a cycle hog in the old days), and a sad-faced silver grey bear. I have had them for years. I have thought many times about giving them away, but I can't.

This morning Mr. Bear wore el-cheapo goggles borrowed from Peter and a makeshift harness that allowed me to strap him (the bear) to my back so that he appears to be sitting on the pillion seat - facing the cars in back. Yes, he needs a proper riding outfit, give me time.

When I dismount the bike, the bear is still strapped to my back. I'm not really expecting anyone to come up to me and say, "Excuse me, but do you know that there's a bear on your back?" but I am hoping that people who see me filling up at the gas station will smile, or people who pass me on the highway (it does happen) will shake their head in disbelief (what do you expect from someone on her way to / from Berzerkeley?) but not drift into my lane. What would you do if you passed me and saw this little guy?


If any of you decide to raid your/your kid's stash of stuffed animals to join me in this experiment, amuse yourself and humanize the morning commute - send pictures - I'll create an electronic picture board. Please be kind to whatever stuffed animal you choose to have ride with you - secure them in as dignified and humane a manner as possible - little kids will be watching!

 
Mar 10th

On the way home from watching the Daytona 200 race at Dennis' house, the merge onto highway 238 gave me a sense of what a red blood corpuscle feels like trying to get through a clogged artery. Mr. Bear paid his share of the bridge toll by enabling a low-anxiety merge. In my rear view mirror I could see that the fellow who gave me room in front of him was talking to his kid about the stuffed bear, maybe commenting that the bear was violating the all-the-gear-all-the-time rule.

Merging from 238 to 880 was yet another traffic snarl; you would have thought it was a weekday at rush hour, not a Saturday early afternoon. I lane-shared for about a mile until I got past the accident. Not everyone notices the bear, but the people who do give me a little more room, so I would say that this experiment in helping car drivers see me is a success. And at gas stations it is fun to see the quizzical looks on people's faces.

 
March 15

The MBI have concluded their 2nd annual Riders Choice Awards! Thousands of readers in about 88 countries worldwide nominated and voted for their favorite motorcycle products. We want this awards program to give a voice to the everyday rider worldwide.

The MBI hosts and moderates the awards, but you, our readers, are the ones who first selected which products were to be nominated, and then voted on which product was to be selected "the best".

There were 15 categories (there were 16, but we dropped one - Ugliest Motorcycle in 2006 - since there was only one nomination), ranging from positive to negative awards. See the MBI website announcement for the full text of the awards, including the "thumbs down" awards.

The Riders Choice Star awards winners are:

In the Best Blog category, this blog came in 4th place. Here are the podium finishers:
1st place: Steve Williams, Scooter in the Sticks
2nd place: Mike Werner, Bikes in the Fast Lane
3rd place: Wendy Moon, Moonrider’s Motorcycling World

If you are a 40+ rider, please check out the survey on Wendy's site.

If you know of any news sources that would be interested in a press release for these awards, please contact the Media Relations team at MBIweb.

Thank you all for participating!

 
March 31

The last entry for this month comes to you courtesy of Urban Moto, a San Francisco publication. With permission from the Urban Moto's editor, I'm providing a link to the entirety of Dr. Dean Freedlander's article, "The Ride of Valkyries". Dr. Freedlander, a psycho-pharmacologist in practice at Chabad Psychiatric Clinic in San Francisco, writes the Motor Psyche column. This month he took on the topic of the female rider in society.

I offer these three quotes for your consideration.

"The concept of a powerful female has both captivated and frightened every culture since the beginning of time. Nothing threatens men, and women to a lesser extent, so much as a change in sexual role and identity."

Dr. Freelander observes, "Like their male counterparts, female riders seek out a high degree of external stimulation, and the freedom of the open road. Men are more often thrill-seeking to avoid emergence of unconscious feelings. Women riders are more aware of their high degree of emotional intensity. The women (whom he interviewed, or whose biographies he read) seemed conscious of any pain they were evading, and conscious of their identify in transformation. The more powerless they felt as children, the more empowered they feel on the road."

"Why then are threats to the sexual order so frightening? Because identity is precious and too often fragile. In a hierarchy of fears, being nothing ranks higher than death. Some persons lack a core sense of self, and cling to threads of assigned external trappings to know their role in life. If such a person observes another to cross boundaries by changing trappings, then that observer fears a loss of identity by losing his or her trappings."

I must respectfully disagree with Dr. Freedlander, many people are more terrified of speaking in public than they are afraid of dying. But I am picking nits. If you are wondering if I felt powerless as a child, I felt constrained to conform, but no, I did not feel powerless.

So, what do you all think? Do these paragraphs resonate with you? What about the full article? How would a social scientist go about comparing the levels of empowerment felt by women riders relative to quality of their childhoods? Anyone looking for a cool Ph.D. dissertation topic?

 
Go to April 2007 entries