Vroom! Vroom!
Sep. 28th, 2005 10:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7This morning I got up early and had Z drive the scooter down to the parking lot, so I could practice driving around it. (I followed in the car, which he in turn got into and drove to work, leaving me there.)
I drove around the parking lot for an hour. It's simple to drive Visvalda, really. You just have to move both hands at once-- release the clutch slowly but smoothly, while smoothly turning the accelerator with your other hand just a bit. I went around and around that parking lot, stopping and starting, stopping and starting, turning and stopping and starting and shifting and turning and stopping and starting and stopping and starting. I kept thinking "this is easy!" and then having trouble. I started seven times in a row without incident, and then the eighth time for no reason stalled, and then it took me six tries to start again. Why? I don't know. What was I doing differently? Nothing.
So it's simple, but not always doable.
Not really acceptable for driving around...
The problem is that, of course, with a second person on the bike, it's more than twice as hard to give enough gas to overcome inertia without over-revving it. I think it will be a long time before I am ready to drive with a passenger. I drove home entirely without incident, but that's because I treated the stop signs normally, and didn't quite stop rolling. (I put my foot down, but didn't stop and sit and then go, because nobody does that at stop signs.) I have now successfully started from a full stop dozens upon dozens of times without incident, but it bothers me that if I stall it can sometimes take me six or seven tries to get started again. That's no good. And that's not just me. On the way, while I was following Z, he stalled at the stop sign at the end of our street, and it took him five or six tries to get started. Only because there was no traffic was this all right; by the fifth time he had gone halfway into the intersection and yet couldn't keep it running long enough to get all the way across.
So the problem is that the scooter's an unreliable bitch on top of being hard to drive. She sometimes stalls for no reason while you're driving, which she has now done once to me and once to Z. And the much-vaunted electric start has a special feature: it only works when you don't need it. In the parking lot, I successfully used it about three times out of five; but never when I was stuck and kept stalling and kept stalling. No, it always failed in those situations, and i would have to kickstart it. I'm getting faster at the kick start, but sometimes it just won't catch and won't catch--- and that is guaranteed to be when you are trying to get through a busy intersection and there are people behind you and it's been three or four whole minutes now and you've stalled out seven times and just can't get the fucker to go. (And that's when you pop a wheelie by over-revving it because under-revving it has failed you seven times now, and you go spinning off and it's a disaster.)
The other thing that bugs the shit out of me is that the clutch slips. The vehicle will only roll in neutral (of course); I was trying to park it and was straddling it and pushing it by the handlebars, and the shifter handlebar twisted and put the thing into second gear, so that the headlight punched me in the stomach because the fucker immediately stopped rolling. I wasn't even touching the goddamn clutch. That should not happen. But it happens all the fucking time. And it's hard to get it back into neutral-- you have to turn the bike off, if it's on, and let the clutch in and out a bunch of times, and twist the handlebar as hard as you can with both hands. It's not only stupid, but also dangerous.
So much for this bitch being well-engineered.
So it was actually a whole ton of fun. Me and Visvalda have reached a sort of peace: I accept that she is an unreliable and temperamental bitch, and she in return sort of runs for me most of the time unless I really need her to. (Maybe I have to win her favor somehow? Maybe she'd stop dying in traffic if I fed her carrots and groomed her fetlocks? ... That never worked for my horse. Horses are ungrateful bitches. I bet you scooters are even worse. Still and all, maybe I should wash and wax her and polish her whitewalls, just in case.)
In other news, the grow lights are set up downstairs, and last night after dark I moved the seedlings from the back porch down there, and transplanted anything over three inches into a big pot. I have to admit that even though we're not growing pot I've gotten all my best gardening advice from the articles archived in Erowid.org's "Cannabis Vault"-- like, for example, transplant your seedlings to bigger pots an hour after dark, so that they'll have the night to get acclimated before having to endure the intense sunlight. DUH! Of course. I transplanted a bunch of my snap peas this summer at mid-day and the little fuckers wilted. Duh. Dusk is a good gardening time. Durrrrr. Even better when it's an artificially-controlled Dusk On A Timer and you can keep the pot out from directly under the lights for a day or so to give them more time.
So I actually think it would be pretty funny if the FBI were watching me and flagged me as suspicious because I just bought a bunch of potting soil and some organic fertilizer and some grow lights and have been searching for marijuana growing advice and going through all these drug websites, and came and raided my house and all I had was lettuce, beans, peas, and a few flowers. I mean, it would still suck, because they'd probably break my door and tear my house apart, but it would, academically, be pretty funny.
I'm such a rebel.
I drove around the parking lot for an hour. It's simple to drive Visvalda, really. You just have to move both hands at once-- release the clutch slowly but smoothly, while smoothly turning the accelerator with your other hand just a bit. I went around and around that parking lot, stopping and starting, stopping and starting, turning and stopping and starting and shifting and turning and stopping and starting and stopping and starting. I kept thinking "this is easy!" and then having trouble. I started seven times in a row without incident, and then the eighth time for no reason stalled, and then it took me six tries to start again. Why? I don't know. What was I doing differently? Nothing.
So it's simple, but not always doable.
Not really acceptable for driving around...
The problem is that, of course, with a second person on the bike, it's more than twice as hard to give enough gas to overcome inertia without over-revving it. I think it will be a long time before I am ready to drive with a passenger. I drove home entirely without incident, but that's because I treated the stop signs normally, and didn't quite stop rolling. (I put my foot down, but didn't stop and sit and then go, because nobody does that at stop signs.) I have now successfully started from a full stop dozens upon dozens of times without incident, but it bothers me that if I stall it can sometimes take me six or seven tries to get started again. That's no good. And that's not just me. On the way, while I was following Z, he stalled at the stop sign at the end of our street, and it took him five or six tries to get started. Only because there was no traffic was this all right; by the fifth time he had gone halfway into the intersection and yet couldn't keep it running long enough to get all the way across.
So the problem is that the scooter's an unreliable bitch on top of being hard to drive. She sometimes stalls for no reason while you're driving, which she has now done once to me and once to Z. And the much-vaunted electric start has a special feature: it only works when you don't need it. In the parking lot, I successfully used it about three times out of five; but never when I was stuck and kept stalling and kept stalling. No, it always failed in those situations, and i would have to kickstart it. I'm getting faster at the kick start, but sometimes it just won't catch and won't catch--- and that is guaranteed to be when you are trying to get through a busy intersection and there are people behind you and it's been three or four whole minutes now and you've stalled out seven times and just can't get the fucker to go. (And that's when you pop a wheelie by over-revving it because under-revving it has failed you seven times now, and you go spinning off and it's a disaster.)
The other thing that bugs the shit out of me is that the clutch slips. The vehicle will only roll in neutral (of course); I was trying to park it and was straddling it and pushing it by the handlebars, and the shifter handlebar twisted and put the thing into second gear, so that the headlight punched me in the stomach because the fucker immediately stopped rolling. I wasn't even touching the goddamn clutch. That should not happen. But it happens all the fucking time. And it's hard to get it back into neutral-- you have to turn the bike off, if it's on, and let the clutch in and out a bunch of times, and twist the handlebar as hard as you can with both hands. It's not only stupid, but also dangerous.
So much for this bitch being well-engineered.
So it was actually a whole ton of fun. Me and Visvalda have reached a sort of peace: I accept that she is an unreliable and temperamental bitch, and she in return sort of runs for me most of the time unless I really need her to. (Maybe I have to win her favor somehow? Maybe she'd stop dying in traffic if I fed her carrots and groomed her fetlocks? ... That never worked for my horse. Horses are ungrateful bitches. I bet you scooters are even worse. Still and all, maybe I should wash and wax her and polish her whitewalls, just in case.)
In other news, the grow lights are set up downstairs, and last night after dark I moved the seedlings from the back porch down there, and transplanted anything over three inches into a big pot. I have to admit that even though we're not growing pot I've gotten all my best gardening advice from the articles archived in Erowid.org's "Cannabis Vault"-- like, for example, transplant your seedlings to bigger pots an hour after dark, so that they'll have the night to get acclimated before having to endure the intense sunlight. DUH! Of course. I transplanted a bunch of my snap peas this summer at mid-day and the little fuckers wilted. Duh. Dusk is a good gardening time. Durrrrr. Even better when it's an artificially-controlled Dusk On A Timer and you can keep the pot out from directly under the lights for a day or so to give them more time.
So I actually think it would be pretty funny if the FBI were watching me and flagged me as suspicious because I just bought a bunch of potting soil and some organic fertilizer and some grow lights and have been searching for marijuana growing advice and going through all these drug websites, and came and raided my house and all I had was lettuce, beans, peas, and a few flowers. I mean, it would still suck, because they'd probably break my door and tear my house apart, but it would, academically, be pretty funny.
I'm such a rebel.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 02:46 pm (UTC)And I dig your scootername.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 02:57 pm (UTC)I should get me some of those old-fashioned Victory Garden signs, so that if the FBI do raid and destroy it all, it would be that much more poignant. It'd make a great headline. "FBI Raid Destroys Local Woman's Victory Garden; Peas, Beans Fall Victim To War On Drugs Paranoia." And then there's a picture of the pathetic torn-down signs, or whatever.
Only I really don't actually want that to happen, as you know they'd take my computer to look for kiddie porn too while they were at it, or somesuch nonsense.
Anyway. I am a subversive subvert, which is below even a pervert, hah!
And Visvalda has a Latvian name because Latvians are total tools and she so is one.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 02:47 pm (UTC)This amuses me immensely.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 02:53 pm (UTC)If you see a gigantic black dog about the size of a small horse, the man he's walking is Mr. James, the headmistress's husband... only i think that they've moved away now and someone else is in charge. Dangit, what was that dog's name? Something really cute. Wellington or somesuch, but that wasn't it. He was a puppy over the winter, and by spring he was the size of a Shetland.
It would be utterly absurd for me to miss the place, of course.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 05:09 pm (UTC)No dog spotted yet, BUT I WILL LOOK.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 05:26 pm (UTC)If you ever do feel the need to explore St. Leonards you could say I sent you to take pictures for me. I'd have to find out if there's anyone there who remembers me, though. Parts of it are open to the public, I'm sure, but I wouldn't know which ones. There's a bit in the library where there's a bedroom that Mary Queen of Scots supposedly slept in, but it was rather underwhelming if I recall.
St. Leonards is in a nice castley bit of the city, to be sure, and there are lots of dramatic ruins, and the school is picturesque but it is a miserable place I assure you.
Have you found St. Rule's Cave yet? Down on the Castle Sands if you go to the rightish when the tide's out there's a cave in the wall. Unless the buggars have bricked it up.
I think I sort of miss the glamor of all the misery, though. I think that's what it is. Certainly not nostalgia.
And the weather is frigid, isn't it? My friends all laughed when I came home and in late July in Upstate New York (avg. daytime temperature: 85 F; nighttime 70F) it took me the better part of the month to get out of the habit of bringing an overshirt everywhere in case the wind picked up. (And by then of course the weather had started to turn and I *did* need an overshirt again. Confusing!)
I think the dog's name was Wellesley, actually. I could be confused, however. There was definitely another dog named Prothero but he was elsewhere and also old and is most likely dead now. How depressing that is to realize...
Well, good luck to you in overcoming your flu/cold.
If I knew where my Spanish dictionary was, I'd mail it to you, but I a) can't find it offhand, and b) wonder how useful that would be, as it's of course an American dictionary and most of the Spanish is probably Latin American. Not that they're *that* different, but still, it's probably confusion you don't need.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 03:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-28 03:46 pm (UTC)We went for a bike ride last night and it was so much fun! I miss riding bikes. The scooter is nice and all in that it's actually useful for getting from Point A to Point B at a reasonable speed, but... only with difficulty. And I miss getting exercise...
Meh, the scooter's not really my scene, is all. But I think it would be stupid not to learn to drive it. It's fun, it's just not what I'd choose if I had some money to blow and an abiding hatred of the bus.
Though, mind you, when hearing about my difficulties with the scooter, do keep in mind that last summer I had just as much trouble learning to ride a bike. So I'm not exactly proficient at the two-wheeling concept. Bike riding was impossible and self-destructive until suddenly this summer it was easy and fun. So I'm hoping the same goes for the shiny red all-steel bitch in the driveway.