...remember when...(stories with links and pictures)

It Only Takes a Spark
...the year was 1967 or 1968 and I was 8 or 9 years old.  At the district 37 desert races my job was to man the newspaper booth selling copies of "Desert Wrap Up" (not sure of its exact name), a newspaper written, illustrated and published by my dad, Winston Beaumont.  JN Roberts was the man to beat but my personal hero was a checkers MC racer named George Walker.  I remember the day was soggy, like the name of the dry lake where the race was going on.  I was all alone while the racing was underway, and really cold, but the steady drizzle had put a damper on the campfire.  It did not respond to the dead (though damp) creosote branches I tossed on, but in a moment of resourceful genius I spied the five gallon gas can nearby with pre-mix in it, and came up with the solution.  As I dribbled the gas onto the embers, "WHOOF!" the fire reignited in vengeance!   The one millisecond of self-congratulation changed to pure horror as the flames chased the gas up to the can and my hands!  It all happened so fast and I was only a boy, so I did the most logical thing at the time, which was to throw the can away.  Unfortunately I threw it in an arc right towards the car…oh yeah!   I managed to get the fire out and when the riders started coming back, all was back to normal.  But what really stands out in my memory of that day was that George Walker had crashed hard and when they brought him in, he looked ghastly!  A head cut had caused heavy bleeding, the rain had blended the blood with the mud, and the mixture was running down his entire body.  But those desert racers were made of stout stuff, because he came right out to the next race to give it his all again…(note: for a brief history of the Checkers MC and its riders, go to http://www.superhunky.com/articles/The%20Checkers.php


Greatest Dad on Earth
...I have the coolest Dad on the block…my dad used to do bike tests for Motorcycling Magazine.  He would have me and my two older brothers ride them and get pictures of us doing really cool jumps and turns.  Of course he would ride them himself to get the info he needed to do the write-up.   He also worked for Webco Inc., which sold accessories for dirt bikes, and managed to bring home all kinds of cool stuff for us to put in or on our bikes, in order to try them out so he could write about them in their big catalog.  You can see pictures of me and my siblings (two sisters too) with various products throughout those old catalogs.  There's my favorite (sic) one, when he had me bite down on a handlebar pad with my big bucked teeth while he snapped the picture...

More About Dad
...my dad was and is always tinkering with bike concoctions.  Like a bartender with his alcohol, Dad can mix up an exotic bike out of anything.  He'll think nothing of putting a Suzuki 400 engine into a Hodaka 100 frame, add leading-link front forks, a swingarm and rear wheel assembly from a Kawasaki 125, or even a rear wheel from a tractor.  I was constantly breaking frames, swingarms or whatever, and he was always there to weld it together, modify it or whatever.  I visited with him when I was down in California this spring and he showed me his latest project bike.  A Honda CX 500 frame (I think) with a Parilla 250 engine.  The parilla engine has been hanging around in the garage for years!  It reminds me of another one he made in the early 80's, a Honda XR 250 engine in a Suzuki 125 frame?  I forget the exact ingredients.  I rode it in a CRC enduro out by Victorville and was in contention, when it broke a swingarm and ended my day.  But it definitely did NOT have the tractor tire, because that was on the "Toad"…  
Here is a picture of me on the hybrid Honda, in the CRC enduro:



Here is a picture of a Hybrid Hodaka, with leading link front forks:



The Toad
...speaking of the Toad, that has to have been the MOST fun off-road
motorcycle in my life!  It had a Kawasaki 125 engine in a who-knows-what
frame, but the rear tire was a garden tractor wheel and tire, complete
with the "V" tread design.  The front end was probably stock Kawasaki,
with a 21" tire.   This gave it a kind of chopper appearance.  When I
was out walking in the desert I always knew my dad had been by that way,
and which direction he was headed, by that most unusual track.  But I
remember filling up so many weekends on that bike as a boy!  One weekend
we were camped out in Phelan (before there were houses there) in 1970, I think, and I was cruising around my little track on the toad when WHOA! a huge snake
lay across the trail!  I was really into snakes when I was a boy so
naturally I dismounted the bike and made an attempt at catching the beast.  
Now most gopher snakes are pretty passive and you can go right up and
pick them up, but this was no ordinary gopher snake.  It was a bull snake,
with similar markings to a gopher snake, but not the same.  Bull snakes are very aggressive, with hissing fits and strikes galore.  This one was at least
6 - 7 feet in length and had the largest diameter body I have ever seen in the
wild, of any snake.  I tried in vain to capture it but he was too strong for me
to pin down behind the neck, and too big around for me to even get my
hand!  While I was attempting to pick him up, he was slowly wrapping his body
around my legs...  
...alright I know what you are thinking, this is too much, huh?  It's the
truth though and it IS stranger than fiction!  I just heard on the news
the other day where a woman was strangled to death by her pet, a tiger python,
who she was trying to give medicine to.  Quote of the day, her boyfriend
said, "I don't think he liked his medicine."  Anyway I lived through that
one and learned a greater measure of respect for snakes (though this would
prove to not be my last nasty encounter with snakes!) after that day.  
Whenever we were out riding in the Phelan area after that encounter, you can believe me when I say I'd keep one eye open for that dude...

Kathy's First Time Out
...I have a 4-wheeler also.  It's an Artic Cat 700, and my wife rides an Arctic Cat 600.  But she won't get on a dirt bike.  That's because when we were dating in the late 70's (I think we were both 18) I took her out for her first adventure on a dirt bike.  I bought her a brand new helmet, loaned her my Suzuki 125 and we parked out north of El Mirage Dry Lake along HWY 395.  We brought her little brother Frank along for an escort, and because he wanted to ride bikes too.  Anyway after teaching her the basics with the throttle and clutch, and she could start out without stalling it, I took her out for a little ride of about 5 miles.  When we got she was stoked!  After letting Frank ride around a little bit I decided to gas up and take her on some of my favorite trails for the afternoon...BIG mistake!...She was doing okay for the most part, and the trails were pretty easy (I thought) for the most part.  We rode over the top of the shadow mountains and down a gentle canyon trail with a few whoops, well, okay, a lot of whoops, and much taller than I remembered them, by the way, when I glanced back just in time to see Kathy (riding in 3rd gear still) in mid-air on the way to a sideways face plant in the whoops... Oh, noooooo!  She came up spitting gravel and I feebly asked if she needed help picking the rocks out of her arm ...and that nice blue helmet was toast, by the way...after killing the 125's engine and spinning rear tire.  No she did NOT want to take the scenic route back to the truck.  Then, to make it a complete first-time-out experience, when we arrived back at the truck, we found Frank standing/sitting on top of the truck.  What's up, Frank?  Look over there he points.  We look over, and there're two Sidewinder rattlesnakes mating in the sand!  Neither Frank nor Kathy ever went out riding with me again...

Here's a picture of Mrs. Paul on her arctic cat:




What?! No Brakes?!
...I just remembered a good one!  These stories are real and truthful, and I don't have to exaggerate to make them interesting, either!   (I do improvise when I can't remember every little detail) This story needs a little background, so bear with me, okay?  I had this '65 Chevy pickup which had its fair share of "problems".  I was the trials chairman of our motorcycle club and it was my duty to find the place and run the event (with lots of help from other club members).  I picked Cactus Flats, up in the mountains near Big Bear above the Apple Valley/ Hesperia area, for our outing.  They have some great boulders there which make for fantastic trials traps!  Anyway I was planning it out and two boys (ages 14 & 15, whose mothers didn't know me very well) asked if they could come along. Okay, but I had two bikes of my own (one for trials, the other for fast stuff) plus all the trials stakes, flags, banners, camping gear, etc.  Where was I going to put their bikes?  
I called my dad because he had a home-made (everything my dad owns seems to be home-made) trailer, and he said I could use it for the weekend.  I should probably mention here that one of my truck's "problems" was that the emergency brake did not work, so I had disconnected it months before this.  Another one of my truck's problems was the shifting linkage on the transmission (automatic) would not work so I had the linkage permanently locked into "Drive" with a pair of vice-grips, also done months before.  If you moved the column shifter to "Park", the engine could start for you but it was in "Drive" all the time, so the truck would move as soon as it started.   And by the way, forget about "Reverse".  When I showed up at Dad's house to pick up the trailer I discovered he didn't have a safety chain for it.  This wouldn't do, I thought, and looked around for something... AHA! I had a huge chain that I kept on my friend's excavator! The only problem was its length, about 25'.  Not wanting to cut the chain, I wound it around the frame of the truck a few times and around the trailer tongue a few times, and back around the truck's frame again, until I used up all 25' of chain.  After this and a few other preparations we were off...and it was a fantastic weekend!  I finished in the top ten I think, and everyone else enjoyed the great mountain riding.  Oh did I mention, no I didn't, that to get up to Cactus Flats we had to drive out past Apple Valley towards Lucerne Valley, and then turn south and head into the mountains from the desert floor? The road from the desert floor (elev. 2,500 feet, I think) to Cactus Flats (elev. 6,000 feet, I think) makes that climb with many switchbacks and overlooks.  Sorry, I'll get you back on track here...We were the last to leave the trials camp on Sunday evening, just before dark.  I settled into the driver's seat with fatigue and satisfaction, and headed down the highway toward home...At the end of Cactus Flats where the road makes a sharp right turn and begins it's descent to the desert floor I gently eased on the brakes to slow us down, but there was no response!  I reflectively tried pumping them, but the breaks were gone, vanished.  I told the boys to hold on and thought about ditching it into the mountain side, but chickened out because we were already into the cliffs-on-one-side, mountain-on-the-other section of road.  Just for effect, and to let the boys know our predicament, I moved the shifter from park to low and back again, and pulled the emergency brake lever out. Their eyes widened but after that I was too busy watching the road to see what else they were doing.  Anyway I tried without success to ditch it into the mountain a couple times, but I was just too chicken.  We managed to slide through those switchbacks almost all the way down the mountain, sometimes with the trailer coming alongside in a sliding curve, sometimes whipping us side to side.  But we were going to make it!  Or so I thought.  We really were about to the bottom when I saw a big turn-out with some great big rocks on it's border coming up on the right.  I decided to hit one of those rocks with the truck in order to slow us down, and maybe get more control.  As we neared the rock it grew in size to somewhere between a Volkswagon Beetle to a Plymouth Fury.  I chickened out at the last moment and glanced sideways off it with the truck.  We bounced back onto the pavement, but not before the trailer had hit the rock and uncoupled from the truck's hitch. The trailer proceeded to plow its tongue into the pavement and with the help of the excavator chain, drug us to a stop...(whew!).  After inspecting the brakes I discovered the front left brake shoes had disintegrated and collapsed, letting all the fluid leak out.  So I tied off the brake line to that wheel and filled the brake reservoir with water so we had some pressure to the rest of the brakes, and continued home.  Unfortunately the impact with the rock had knocked out our wiring to the headlights, so we ended up driving the last 50 miles home with no lights and very limited brakes.  Those boys never asked to go riding again…

Coffee
...coffee...I awoke this morning to the smell of it in the house and thought about our daughter Julia who, along with her husband Matt, is expecting a child in May.  Poor girl, she runs (or ran, because she just sold it) a coffee van around town, selling latte and other strange concoctions.  The problem is, she is in the stage of pregnancy called "morning sickness" and her particular assailant is, yes, coffee!  It also reminded me of an adventure on the desert I had with my dad when I was about 11 years young (older guys can say it that way)...but I need to give you some background first...see, Dad did not limit his hybrid talents to just motorcycles.  He started with cars.  And LOTS of cars.  He would take his acetylene torch to the bodies and frames, move support posts, create roll bars, install plexi-glass windows, shorten drivelines and perform other operations.  He seemed bent on creating the perfect dune-buggy for the desert.  One of the best ones, in my boy's mind, was a Plymouth Fury which he had shortened down to about the length of a Volkswagon beetle, maybe a couple feet longer than that.  The Fury came with an automatic transmission which was controlled by push buttons on the dashboard.  Reverse was gone, but otherwise the Fury was in pretty good condition...so anyway, we are camped up in Jawbone Canyon, north of Mojave, and Dad takes me for a ride into the canyons in the Fury dune-buggy one fine Saturday morning.  Now I had heard rumors (everyone hears rumors) about some monster canyon that, once entered, there is no way out.  Apparently (rumor has it) you drop down a series of rock ledges, innocuous at first, but ones that get progressively higher until you get to the end of the world...and it comes up so fast you...well, just rumors, okay?  And besides, if it is a rumor, at least SOMEONE made it out to tell about it, right?  Back to the story…after darting all about through the canyons and mountains above Jawbone, Dad decided it was time to get back to camp and food.  I hadn't bothered to eat breakfast this particular morning, excited as I was with the prospect of running around in the dune-buggy with Dad.  We had made our way up into the mountains, where the desert dropped away and sage brush was replaced by Pinon pines.  Even I knew that all we needed to do was head down hill.  Dad picked a nice looking canyon and off we went.  This canyon looked like any other gentle meandering canyon, and in fact almost resembled a valley, at first.  But soon the sides of the valley started growing higher and closer together.  Then we came to it, a rock ledge.  I wasn't sure if Dad had heard the rumors, especially when he blissfully launched the Fury over the ledge and down the canyon.  Well that wasn't so bad, I thought looking over my shoulder, just a little over 8 inches high.  I chided myself inwardly for being such a sissy.   But I was jolted back into my place as we dropped over another ledge, Dad laughing in his performance.  I was thrown around but then quickly looked back again to see that ledge was a little higher, over a foot tall!  I spun around and saw that the canyon walls narrowed even closer together and now you couldn't see around the bends.  We made it over another low ledge and came to yet another.  These were about 18" each and Dad paused.  Maybe he had heard the rumors after all!  Hope renewed, I asked him what he was going to do?  By this time the canyon was so tight we couldn't turn around and as you know, reverse hadn't been working in the Fury for some time, probably years for all I knew…Dad decides to proceed further down the canyon and we go quite a ways before another ledge, where we come to a stop.  Hmmm, we get out and look and Dad knows that if we go over this one there really is no turning back!  We go exploring at this point, me and Dad climbing down the ledge and walking a ways down the canyon.  It looks mellow enough and the walls of the canyon are getting shorter now, though still close together.  My dad turns and I follow him back to the Fury.  "Fasten you seat belt Paul" That's what I like about my dad, always thinking about my well-being.  Okay I gulp, excited but fearful all at the same time.  He's going to do it! Yep, we did it, Of course we fell more than rode over that ledge.  Hey that wasn't so bad, I thought, we could handle ledges twice that tall in the Fury!  We continued down the canyon like this until we came to IT. Yep, you guessed it, the END OF THE WORLD... This ledge was WAY taller than the previous ones, and nasty looking as well.  Rocks and overhangs, with the canyon walls hugging together as tight as they ever have, rocks even protruding from the sides.  If water were flowing here it would make a beautiful waterfall.  And the bottom was even rockier, as if water had come through here, many times, to churn the rocks into a table setting for giants.  In his matter-of-fact way Dad said we've got to turn around.  The problems, as you know, are manifold.  We: A. don't have reverse, B. the canyon is too narrow to turn around, and C. have no food.  I should also mention D. it's a hundred degrees in the shade, and there is no shade.  I am complaining as only 11 year olds know how to complain, about the food (or lack thereof) and the heat, so Dad offers me his...you probably see this coming, huh?...coffee thermos.  Now Dad had made this coffee the day before, so it was getting old.  And this coffee thermos of his has been around since his days in the Korean War, I just know it.  Although I had snuck a cigarette or two, and even a swig of beer once, I had never been tempted to partake of his thermos!  But partake I did, along with my dad.  Almost like a religious thing, as in taking our last communion together I may have been thinking.  Who knows what I was thinking but most likely I wasn't thinking at all.  I chugged that two-day-old coffee from that two-decade-old thermos and laid down under the dune-buggy to get out of the sun, while Dad set out to perform a miracle and get us out of this place.  My head started to spin, and then the ground did.  Something caught my eye and I glanced up to see three or four ravens circling us in the sky.  I had to squint and cover my eyes to see them...and then I lost it.  All that coffee came right back up and out.  Not to mention the inside lining of my stomach, since there was no food in there to begin with....so now you know, why to this day, I don't drink coffee, and why I can relate to my poor daughter Julia in her morning sickness...  

Demise of The Fury
...by the way, my dad got us out of there, he is a genius you know… (to turn a vehicle around in a tight spot, use your bumper jack in the following manner;  Step One: Jack car up until the rear wheels are 3 to 4 inches off the ground.  Step Two: Push the car over, so that it falls off the jack.  Step Three: Repeat Steps One and Two.).   Yes, we got out of there, and lived to ride another day, but the Fury dune-buggy did not fare as well.  She was involved in a wreck near Lake Isabella one weekend, and we had to leave her behind, until the following weekend when Dad went back for it.  But vandals had swarmed in where only fools would, and that was the beginning of the end for our Fury.  Actually, the beginning of the end for ALL of Dad's cars came when he would cast his eye over them, torch in one hand and cigarette in the other…

Dad and His Cars, Where Did They All Go?
...here's another car story to relate...I love it because of the little twist at the end...I don't know where Dad got all his cars but I do know what happened to most of them in the end. To begin with he would take his cars to the drag strip, and the typical evolution of every car Dad owned started with the loss of its doors and the trunk lid.  These always carried the most weight I think.  But like in the case of the Fury, he would leave the cool-looking rear fins, because the car would have to be street legal, in order to drive to work.  I do remember that for him to do 80 mph in the quarter mile was a big deal to my dad.  He would tinker with the engines here and there, but his was always a low-budget operation.  He did good at road racing however, I know because I've seen a picture of my older brother Steve (who was probably only 5?) sitting behind the wheel, and there were several trophies on the pavement in front of the roadster my dad had built...but I digress, sorry about your ADD...anyway, Dad would cut up his cars, and make lamps and other things out of the excess body material.  Exhaust pipes, swingarms,  handlebars, all sorts of things for our motorcycles.  Nowadays Dad would be applauded for his inherent green streak.  But in the very end he would dig trenches in the back yard, which we boys promptly covered with plywood to make tunnels, where he would deposit whatever parts he could not use anywhere else.  Like windshields, and bumpers, wheels, etc.  My Mom tells me there was even a whole car out there!   Then he would bury those parts.  It wasn't a very big back yard, and it only took about 15 years to fill it up, but fill it up he did…

...but here's the funny part...they sold that house in Rowland Heights to escape the smog and increasing population in 1970 and moved to Wrightwood.  I went back there when I was old enough to drive, to see the old neighborhood again, and stopped by our house on Madonna Street.  I snuck up to the fence and peered into the back yard, and would you believe it, there was a full-sized built-in swimming pool back there!  Can you imagine what the excavator operator was thinking as he dug that hole?  

Dad's Trucks
...okay where do we go from here?  I was thinking about my dad's trailers, because they would fill a chapter by themselves, but I got to thinking about all the "trucks" he had over the years.  You see Dad never owned one "real" truck in all those years, but we had trucks to get to the desert nonetheless.  It's just they were cars made into trucks.  In fact, MY first truck was a car I inherited from my older brothers Steven and David.  My second truck was also a car which I made into a truck myself, with help from Dad, of course.  It was a '63 Mercury Meteor which I originally got from a junk yard because it had the same engine (292 V8) as my first "truck", which was the first ever (and only) '55 Ford Crown Victoria Ranchero.   That first one was so cool looking. Everything my older brother Steve did was cool, in my mind, and this is still true today! Anyway it is quite easy to make a truck out of a car.  You begin by removing the trunk lid, and set it aside for future creations.  You then cut the rear support posts and the very rear of the roof, where it comes down to the meet the trunk.  You simply mold the roof tin and attach it to the center support posts and floor, just behind the driver's seat section, creating the back "wall" of the "cab".   Supplement the roof tin, if there isn't enough, with material from the trunk lid or other cars' carcasses lying nearby.  Now cut a rear window into this wall and add plexi-glass to seal it.  Naturally the plexi-glass is optional and if you intend to build your truck into a camper, which my dad and brother eventually did, and you may want to leave this cavity open for access into the camper section later.  The final step is to install a plywood bed into the now gutted rear seat and trunk sections.   Now are you guys enjoying this as much as I am?  Because using these basic steps you can convert virtually any car into a motorcycle hauler!   The reason I built my second truck out of the Mercury is because I needed a work truck, and didn't want to ruin the "ranchero" by hauling construction materials around in it.  I loved the Mercury because it had four doors, and I left the rear doors attached, so I could have easier access to the bed from the sides.   It basically looked similar to my first truck, but I called it a Mercury "manchero".  

Dad's Trailers
...but let's talk about Dad's trailers for a minute.  These were classics in any language. There were five kids, my dad, our bikes and all the camping gear for a weekend in the desert (my mom rarely ever came out, but preferred to stay home and enjoy the quiet).  He started with one little camping trailer that he actually bought, and gutted it to create what we needed to haul everything to the desert.  It had walls and a roof on it once, if my memory does not fail me.  (It was the same trailer I took with me on that ill-fated trip to the Cactus Flats trials event many years later)   As we boys and girls grew up and flew the coop my dad was not in need of such a large trailer so he gradually made it smaller and more efficient over the years until finally even he could make it smaller no more, and resorted to making his own single-bike trailers out of whatever lay nearby.  I've got one of these things just outside my window in fact.  It was once an "A" frame from a swing set, that fact is obvious by its colors and shape.  My dad welded a motorcycle ramp onto the A frame and a trailer coupler to the peak.   Hold-down hooks were attached at strategic locations along the frame.   On the two extreme corners, where the A frame was widest, he welded a motorcycle axle to each, onto which he could slip a front wheel assembly.  I don't know which bikes were cannibalized for this setup so please don't ask.  He then put trials tires on them, because they track the best on the street.  Add to this a license plate bracket and light kit, and wallah!  A trailer is born  (don't forget the safety chain)…

The Shoe
...now the reason my dad had to built such lightweight trailers was because he was hauling them with his "shoe".  My wife chose the nickname for his car because that is exactly what it looked like.  In its stock condition it was a Honda Civic, I am pretty sure...My dad loves Honda cars!  He had one of the first to arrive in this country, a little yellow Coup, back in 1973, I think.  It had a Honda 750cc motorcycle engine in it.  He boasted it could get 54 miles per gallon.  After we moved to Wrightwood Dad's drive to work each day in Venice was 105 miles one way.  He also worked at Lockheed in Burbank, but even that was 80 miles, I think.  So he drove these Hondas to work and back every day, not to mention side trips to his mom's house in Ventura.  After about 250,000 miles, Dad would get another Honda car, and do something with the old one.  I don't know what he did with the others, but this particular Civic became the shoe...to make a shoe out of a Honda Civic (2 door model), you start by cutting the car off at the front door posts, the floor section in a straight line at the shifter, and in front of the seats, and again just behind the door stop, or jamb, just in front of the rear bench seat.  Remove the doors, and entire front seat section, floor, seats and all.  Set these aside for burial later.  All that should be remaining at this point are the front engine compartment, hood, windshield and dashboard, including, of course, the floor pedals, steering wheel and shifter.  Besides this, and lying off to the side, the rear seat section and trunk, including the rear wheels (attached).  Now bring this rear seat section, in its entirety, forward until it rests against the front section.  Weld these two pieces together.  Now you need to cut the sides of the seating section down and mold them so that when you enter and exit the car you do not rip your slacks.   Side windows are not necessary, so don't bother trying to build or install such.  The same goes for any type of operational "doors".  Just climb in and out.  That, my friends, is a shoe.  Maybe you saw my dad once, out in the desert, hauling his Husqvarna on its little swing set trailer behind the shoe.  If you have, send me a note.  I'd like to hear about it, and your thoughts!  Or if you can arrange a day of riding with JN Roberts for me, pm me with your info...

Mom and The Snakes
...I remember when my mom's car broke down, and the only option for her to get back and forth to work (office secretary) was the shoe.  Poor woman.  Dad felt sorry for her predicament and on the rear shoulder of the shoe, which had been dented by a roll-over incident with my dad at the wheel, he wrote "my husband did this!" just so people she passed on the street knew...and speaking of Mom, I am almost embarrassed to remember the things I did to her when I was a boy.  Almost.  I remember wedging myself against the hallway walls and climbing my way to the ceiling in order to drop on her when she would walk through…but then there were my sssnakes!  I can't write about my career as a boy without mentioning my sssnakes.  I had an unusual (obsessive) fascination with the beasts, at a very early age.  When other boys (and girls) were checking out adventure stories and science fiction tales from the library, I was bringing home books on sssnakes. By the age of 7 I was the nearest authority on every sssnake you could encounter... which ones were poisonous, and which ones were not (really, the only two types that mattered). By the age of 9 I was accustomed to picking up every non-poisonous sssnake (or lizard for that matter) I saw in the desert.  But as much as I liked them, my mom equally disssliked them!  Sssshe knew her bible (isn't there a verse that says, "live by the snake, die by the snake"?) and Mom laid down the law concerning sssnakes in our home (NEVER!).   She also had a law about sssnakes on our property (SAME!).  Okay, no problem.  Together with my next door neighbor Bob MacKenzie, we constructed the sssnake cage in his parents' garage.  I remember it was 4' by 8' in size and 2' high.  We put a screen top on it and made a hinged section that you could open and close to get in there to feed, pet and frolic with them.  We kept the whole thing a secret from both our moms, I think.  I filled that cage with as many as 26 sssnakes at one time!  And then one day, I broke the law.  Mom was still at work and the babysitter was preoccupied with something in the kitchen, so I brought one of my favorite sssnakes into the house, to play with it.  This was a really cool California King, the biggest one I had.  We were frolicking on the couch when King up and disappeared into it's (the couch) recesses.  I moved its cushions, checked underneath it, looked behind it in the drapes, but no King. Then my mom came home from work...oh, noooo!...I frantically looked one last time before she walked in the door, then composed myself for her entrance.  "What were you doing Paul?"  "Nothing."  "I'm going to take a nap so leave me alone."  "Okay."  (She removes her shoes and dress, and is now clad only in her bra and slip).  I cringe because she's laying down on the couch!  Don't hurt King was all I could think.  He's my favorite.  

Snakebite! (part one)
I thought I knew everything there was to know about sssnakes, but this proved NOT to be the case.  I was 14 at the time, and beyond my snake cage years, but still into picking them up whenever and wherever I encountered one.  And of course I knew all about rattlesnakes, which we frequently encountered in the desert and around the house.  We had Western Diamond Backs, Sidewinders, and Mojave Greens, predominantly.  I knew never to pick them up…but I was on a hike one fine Saturday in the fall, about two miles from our house in Wrightwood, when I stopped to rest in the shade of a Fremontia bush. I hadn't even noticed it laying there (like a miniature cinnamon bun) until I got up to leave.  Hmmm, this is an odd-looking snake, I thought.  Could it be a baby King  (all black, with no markings)?  Maybe this is an infant Racer?  Curious, I used a stick to unfurl its body, and discovered it was only about 6 inches long, a recent hatchling.  I studied it for a moment, checked to see if it had any rattles (no), and surmising it to be harmless I picked it up by the back of its head.   I must have awakened it when I did this, because he yawned.  When he did, I saw two perfect little fangs drop down and stick out.  NOT GOOD.  I learned later through studying my books, that "Blackie" was a Pacific Rattler.  I knew better than to play with snakes that possess fangs, so I gently tried to let Blackie go.  Easer said than done.  Blackie had curled his tiny tail around my wrist and it was apparent that just dropping him was out of the question.  He was in my right hand so I brought my left thumb and index finger around into position to replace my right thumb and index finder behind his head.  While making this move I must have loosened my grip because Blackie managed to squirm out a bit, just enough to turn his head and sink his two fangs deep into the index finger of my left hand.   I was gaining valuable first-hand knowledge of WHY you don't play with rattlesnakes (Mom would say, ANY sssnakes)!  Now for those who have never experienced a venomous snake bite, be encouraged.  If you do get bit, you won't feel a thing.  Fangs of the Rattlesnake are razor sharp and they dive into flesh like a rear tire sinking into a mud bog.  As soon as venom enters your body it numbs the infected area.  I watched, seemingly in slow motion, as Blackie began to "chew" into my finger, and his cheeks swelled and shrank as he pumped fresh never-before-used venom by the sac full.  This could NOT be happening to me I thought.  Yet I watched in horror as my finger began to puff up in direct response to Blackie's ministrations.  AAAAH!  Get this thing off me!  I finally reacted by grabbing the beast with my right hand and threw him into the brush somewhere.  That was it, the deed was done.  I tried to remember the things I learned in my books, and what I should do now.  I didn't have a knife with me to cut the bite area open, but tried to suck the venom out nonetheless, taking care not to let it get into my mouth or gums.  I squeezed my finger 'til I thought it would fall off.  I remained calm though.  Removing my left shoe and sock, I created a tourniquet to use at the base of the affected finger.  Replacing my shoe, I headed for home…

Snakebite! (part two)
…with venom coursing through my veins I hiked back to civilization.  The first house I came to belonged to the Barton family.  Their daughter Shelley, who is my age, answered the door.  I calmly asked her to call the fire department for an ambulance.  Why?  I showed her the finger that was bitten, now blue and swollen.  AAAH!  AAAH!  AAAH! (she continued on for several minutes, with no phone call).  The guy who lived across the street came running over to see what the commotion was about.  I didn't know him, but he must have been a dirt bike rider.  He grabbed me and we ran across the street to his truck.  Get in the back!  (Okay).  Lie down, keep the finger elevated!  (Okay).  He instructed his wife to call the fire department to get the ambulance ready for me.  Off we raced, breaking all the speed limits in those scant 2+ miles to town...I will never forget the bump on Sheep Creek Drive where it crosses Thrush Road...and the waiting ambulance.  How are you?  Aside from the whiplash, and this guy's poor truck, I'm okay. They glance at the truck, then my finger, and grab an ice pack (!)  This was 1973 after all, and paramedics weren't very well trained back then.  But the fun part was the ride to San Bernardino (45 miles) in an ambulance with the sirens screaming...

...when we arrived at the county hospital in San Bernardino, they rushed me into the emergency ward and assigned me a doctor.  I forget his name.  He was a very short (about 5') Korean man with thoughtful, but kind, eyes.   He didn't know what a rattlesnake was but he really wanted to help me.  By now the venom was visibly moving up my arm, signified by the blue streaks where my veins were, and the swelling of that whole appendage.  I know this is a long story, sorry.  To make it short I'll just say that by Wednesday night all hope for me was fading fast.  They had started out with Horse-made Anti-Venom Serum to fight the venom wreaking havoc on my body's systems, but found out (the hard way) I was allergic to it and nearly it killed me.  So they brought in special Goat Serum from UCLA medical center to inject into me.  My respiratory system was under acute attack from the venom, as was as my central nervous system.  To make matters worse a blood clot (Phlebitis) had formed in my left forearm and moved up the arm to my shoulder.  The doctor was concerned that if this clot moved to my heart, this would shut it down.  In addition to these woes my left index finger was by now totally grey, green and black, and the skin looked like it could fall off if I shook it. Unbeknownst to me at the time, the doctor spoke with my parents to let them know it didn't look good. All I knew was suddenly the local rabbi came in, then a priest, and finally a Baptist minister (sounds like a joke, huh?).  Evidently when I arrived, someone wrote "any" on the admittance form, under religion.  I just liked having the new company.  Meanwhile my mom went home to Wrightwood that night and gathered as many Christians together as she could, and they held a prayer vigil for me...thank God for praying moms!... …Thursday morning arrived to find me laying in my hospital bed, but totally and completely healed of the snake bite, and all of it's symptoms!  The only thing that remained, and remains to this day, are the two scars where the doctor lanced into the finger to get the venom out...  

Halloween Story
...Did you know rattlesnake tastes like...rattlesnake?  Some say chicken, but I like it better than chicken. After my run-in with "Blackie", I got into the habit of killing the beasts, and making trophies out of them...headbands, wristbands, and if it was big enough, even a belt...and of course eating them.  I read in a snake book that rattlesnakes usually stay within a mile or two of their den, and rarely travel at all.  Every year for five years, I would go back to that same spot where Blackie got me to search it and the surrounding area in the hopes I could actually find the vermin, and exact my revenge on him!  As each year went by I mentally calculated just how big he must be...but in time I forgot about Blackie.  Just out for a nice ride one day and not really looking for rattlesnakes, I happened across a big one lying across the trail.  I stoned it to death and had it strapped to my handlebar before it even sank in, that this was real close to where I had been bitten!  Could this be HIM?  Of course I would never know, but in my mind, I had just killed Blackie and my revenge was complete.  I was on my way home with him when suddenly and terrifyingly, the "dead" Blackie's head sprang around and started to strike at me from his strapped position on the handlebar!   AAAH!  Freaked out, I launched the bike, leaping off it backwards.   When the dust cleared I cautiously approached the bike to see about the snake, but it was gone…?  The bungee strap was still there, though loosely sagging now, but no snake...and do you know that to this day, the hair stands up on my neck whenever I ride that section of trail...  

Cats
...So much for the snakes.  Let's move on to cats.  I was a little older than a boy, actually a father, with two little girls of my own.  Their names are Julia and Diane, if you haven't already caught that from earlier posts.  Anyway we went through a lot of cats over the years, mostly due to the local coyote population.  So I tried to teach the girls not to get too attached, if you know what I mean.  To keep up with the coyotes, Kathy would go shopping with the girls and come home with kittens that were being given away in front of the store, or I'd find a cat in the trash bins, obviously a stray, and bring it home.  The numbers would fluctuate of course, but at one point we had about 15 cats I think.  It was one of these 15 cats, Strawberry Shortcake was her name, that this story is about. Strawberry was very adept at avoiding the coyotes, a real survivor.  If she were human she would ride dirt bikes, and race in the desert.  I remember we had one real bad week when we lost over half our cats.  Each morning was the same, I'd go outside to load my truck for work, and count the cats.  Oooh, another one gone, that will be hard on the girls I'd think.  Summer turned to fall and nights got chilly.  We lost some more.  Eventually it was down to just one, Strawberry Shortcake.  How does she do it?  Where does she hole up at night to keep safe from the coyotes?  I guess it wasn't too important, just so long as she survived.  I went outside one particularly cold morning and started Sherbert to warm up (Sherbert is what my girls called the '65 Chevy, after Rainbow Sherbert,  since I had added several other trucks' body pieces to it). "prattle prattle prattle" went the engine.  Hmm, this does NOT sound good I thought, and revved the engine to see if the sound continued; "PRATTLE PRATTLE PRATTLE" it went, louder now, then lessened as I removed my foot from the gas.  I revved it again and the noise sped up too.  Hmmm, well, I've got to get to work, let's see how it plays out as I drive it, so into gear and up the street I prattle.  About halfway up the block the prattling changed to a thump, thump, thump and a loud "THWACK!", and the engine died.  When I raised the hood I found out where Strawberry Shortcake liked to hide from the coyotes at night...

...Strawberry Shortcake survived the incident with Sherbert, but we renamed her after that to Strawberry Short tail.   A super-survivor, she was the George Walker of cats...  


Lemans Start
...How about some stories about racing?  We could fill up volumes, you and I, and everyone else reading.  But where do we start?   Well the start, of course!  I've had my share of good ones, including hole-shots, but those don't make good stories for others to read.  Let's talk about our worst starts.  I have several candidates for the worst so I might have to tell you about more than one.  I'll go back to the earliest years...I was racing in the mini class on a 1970 Yamaha 60cc mini-enduro.  This was when it was box stock and I was new to racing.  The bike had a headlight and a keyed ignition.   There I was in the desert, lined up with all the other minis and the powder puffs (girl riders).  It was a Lemans-style start, which means when the flag goes up it's a 100' dash to your bike, jump on it, start it and go...I watched the men do it and discerned a few tricks…like put it in gear, and leave the kick-start lever out.  The really fast ones could jump from behind, hit the kick-starter while pulling in the clutch, and have the bike moving before they even hit the seat.  I even practiced it a few times until I had it down.  Piece of cake, I thought...Then the flag went up!  In a flawless leap, grab and kick motion, I beat everyone else on the line!  Only one problem, the Yamaha didn't start!  I kicked again before I heard the first bike start.  I kept kicking while all the other riders around me started their bikes and tore off the line. Kick, kick, kick…wait!  Is the key on?  Oh!  Great!  (The bike fires on the first kick after I turn the key on).  I tear off the line too, pin it wide open, and the race is on.  I really get into a rhythm when suddenly the bike dies, about a mile out.  Kick, kick, kick, yep, key is on...wait, the gas?  Oh!  Great!...  

Here's a picture of me posing on the mini-enduro:


And a year or so later, when I was starting to outgrow it (Notice I had moved up from #3 mini to #2 mini):




Collateral Damage
...and for after the start we have those first turn (motocross) stories...It's always so easy when you get the hole-shot and are first through the first turn.  But what about the stuff that goes on behind you?   THAT'S where the real drama unfolds!  I remember one race, I was on the 60 in the mini class, and I didn't get the hole-shot.  In fact, I was mid-pack and struggling through the field.  It was the Edwards Air Force Base track (how many of you remember that?) with its really-cool-slightly-uphill-right-hand horseshoe turn.  The bulk of the pack was going inside, so I railed the outside berm to sweep around them.  Really cool!  I must have passed three or four guys in one move and was pinning it hard when suddenly "YERNNNK!" I stopped dead in my tracks.  What's up with this?!  I grabbed the clutch, kicked the bike to life, revved it up and let 'er go.  "YERNNNK!" it went again, and died once more.  I looked down at my rear wheel and there was a boot in there, caught in my spokes, and stuck against the swingarm! Attached to the boot was some kid who had left his own bike to hitch a ride with me.  It was obvious that he had tried to kick me over when I was going by him but got caught in the act.  Disgusted, I started kicking at his leg to try to dislodge him from my bike, 'cause the rest of the pack were getting away!  Rolling backwards, I got him undone, and resumed the race.  It wasn't until later that afternoon I found out the poor (sic) kid had broken his leg...  

Stuck Throttle
...and I remember another time (several years later) on the first turn at the Edwards track when I was racing my Cz in the 250 expert class...the Cz had only a 4-speed transmission, but a really tall 1st gear, which was perfect for hole-shots.  This was one of those hole-shots for me, and as I approached the first turn (on the inside this time) I rolled the throttle back and prepared to grab my brakes but the engine didn't shut down, just stayed wide open!  The first turn there had a very tall bank, nay, more like a wall, and not knowing what else to do (I was going way too fast to make the turn), I launched it off the berm/wall...I had never walked this section of the track before (since it wasn't the track), so I had no idea what was waiting for me on the other side...  It was the pits, literally.  I sailed right over one truck and crashed into the bed of another one, going over the bars, and the cab, and somersaulting onto the ground.  Wow.  Too bad it wasn't my own truck, or I would already have been loaded up...  

Bike Sale
...when we first got married, Kathy asked me if I'd consider selling any of my bikes? NEVER I said.  In fact, I'd sell my BED before I'd sell one of my bikes!  Well guess what?  A couple of years later, we needed a good bed, and she had her eye on a beautiful 4-poster.  How much?  $400.00!  So how much did I sell those Cz's for?  Yep, you guessed right (hangs head in shame)…

Flag Starts
...I remember when motocross races started with a flag...and a lot of false starts.  Most of them were rider errors, but a few were caused by those clever flag raisers.  They liked to play games with us.  They would hold the tip of the flag on the tip of their boot, "wiggle" it a little, and grin at us.  I rarely took the bait, because I learned to watch their elbow, not their foot.  Nonetheless when one of the other riders took the bait and pinned it, half of us would do the same.  Just human nature I suppose.   To penalize the false starters, they would have to return to the starting line, but face backwards.  This was good, at least for those of us who didn't run.  For those of us who did, it was not.  The guy holding the flag knew that most of us were on the verge of throwing up so he'd drag it out as long as possible, with wiggles, false jerks, etc, coaxing us to sin.  We didn't have cell phones back then but that didn't matter…he'd get us all hot and bothered, revving our little two strokes to the limit until we were all pinned wide open and burning out our little clutches, then he'd step backward, look over his shoulder, and pretend he just got a phone call or something...but I was wise to the game, and kept my bike pinned.  Some of the newer riders would pause, thinking he really did get a phone call, and be left in the dust as he whirled around and raised that flag...  


Gate Starts
...then they invented the gate.   The gates were easy to beat at first 'cause you could see the guy on the lever, and watch as he dropped it down.  But they caught on quick to their blunder and figured out how to hide it from us.  So now you've got a lot of crazed racers pinning their bikes, burning their clutches and staring at that stupid rail with their front tires rammed against it.   Not me.  I figured this one out too, or at least I thought I had it figured out...see, I'd pull my bike back about a foot, and when the gate started to drop, drop my clutch and launch it.  While the others were watching the gate drop so their tires could be free, I was already wheelieing over the last of the gate rail as it dropped into the ground...I would start to guess the timing of the gate dropper, based on not just ESP alone, but on previous experience.  I tried and succeeded a couple of times in getting the hole-shot handily using this method.  But they got wise to me and thought they'd play a little trick on the trickster. I was poised, watching the normal routine, and just when I thought they should drop the gate, I launched.  But they didn't drop it.  I hit the gate and endoed over it.  Serves him right, the other racers thought in unison...


Snow Riding
With the snow falling outside and all the talk about setting our bikes up for snow (ice studs, chains on the tires), I am reminded about my own history of snow riding.  Snow, mind you, not ice.  Ice riding is for the crazies, but snow riding is for the creatives.  Because with snow you can't just take off into it with the throttle pinned like you can on the ice, and get very far.  Usually the first thing that happens is the snow packs into your front fender until it can't pack any more, so you can't turn.  Then it starts to pack up against the pipe, which begins to melt the snow, causing steam.  As if squinting in the snow storm doesn't impede your vision enough, the rising steam from your exhaust pipe completes the effect.  On one ride in the snow (I think I was 14), I managed to get out about 1/2 mile from the house (all down hill), in 8 inches of fresh powder, when I lost the trail and ended up ramming into a tree…At least enough snow fell off the bike so I could get her turned around to head back...  

...I remember when I was 14, my life was centered in motorcycles~ the whole eat, sleep, breathe thing! Everything I did revolved around dirt bikes.  If I went out for football it was because I wanted to get psyched up for crashing through the trees or tackling boulder fields.  I ran cross-country in high school because it was good training for racing in the desert.  My school was in Victorville and running cross country in the 100 degree heat was the best thing I could do to train for dirt bike racing.  It did not matter that I set two school records in three years of running, but what mattered was that I would be in shape to race my bike on Sunday.  I took up weight lifting, and when the other guys were boasting how much they could lift, I was content to do wrist curls for twenty minutes in preparation for twisting my throttle for an hour or more on race day.  I wore ankle weights all day, everyday, for the week, trudging around campus just itching to replace them with my riding boots.  I either worked on or rode my bike every afternoon, as soon as I got home from school, until dark.  So what could a little snowstorm do to dampen my enthusiasm?...  

...but little did I realize that riding in the snow was preparing me for a desert race I will never forget!  The race course was laid out in the area surrounding Red Rock Canyon, just north and west of Mojave.  It rained for most of the day on Saturday but by Saturday afternoon the rain had turned to snow, and the snow fell nonstop all night.  It was the first race after Christmas, I think it was 1974, because for Christmas I had received a brand new '74 Suzuki TM 125.  This was my first time to race the 125 class!  I broke in the new engine on Saturday and got used to being on a bigger bike.  When Sunday came it arrived with about 4 inches of new snow covering the desert!  I was horrified when the talk around camp was of maybe canceling the race, but when the snow turned to rain and the temperature started to go up, they changed their minds and decided to let us race anyway. What I discovered after the flag went up and the race was underway, was how poorly the other riders handled the snow!  All that snow riding around Wrightwood came in useful on the trail that day.   Even though the 125's were the last to leave the starting line (as was the usual routine), I managed to toast my class and finish 6th overall!  That was my first race ever on the Suzuki, and the best finish I ever had with it, in the desert...  

Suzuki 125 Chopper
Of all the bikes I've owned, that 125 received the most modification work at the hands of my dad.  He lengthened the swingarm and modified the frame in order to lay the shocks down (before there were RMs, there was my bike), bored, ported and polished the top end, and installed various add-ons from Webco (cylinder head, plastics, shocks, grips, handlebars, etc.), not to mention experimenting with a host of home-made exhaust pipes. For the desert, I put a 15 tooth sprocket on the front, which gave me a top speed of about 90 mph.  For motocross, I put a 13 tooth sprocket on.  For trials, I used the 12 tooth sprocket.  I forget what the rear sprocket sizes were, or even if I changed them at all. (Yep, we used the same bike for everything in those days).  He eventually tried mounting a Suzuki 400 engine in it (didn't work)!   All of those mods took their toll on the reliability of the bike in races.  I was really cooking in one race, going flat out across the desert, when suddenly the swingarm snapped right up by the pivot, swung down into the ground, stopped the bike dead in its tracks, and launched me over the bars onto my butt. Another time, I was in a motocross race, went over a jump, and when I landed the frame snapped off right at the steering head and dropped the engine onto the ground!  The first Suzuki TM125 chopper…

Yikes!  1
...I remember one race years ago, I was running my 125, and chasing down as many 250's and open bikes as I could across the desert.  The dust was terrible so for most of the race I was not on the trail, but off to one side or the other, lest I rear end someone accidentally.  The adrenaline was flowing and I was really taking too many chances, racing blind like that.  It was in a section of open desert with not too many rocks or washes to deal with, so I was somewhat sane (or so I thought), where I was hitting bush mounds and jumping off them.  Really getting into it, I started looking for the bushes just to get more air.  On one really good jump I was getting great air when something just to my left and down by my footpeg caught my eye.  It was an orange-colored helmet and when I peered into the dust to get a better view, I saw two wide eyes looking back at me through a pair of goggles...  


Yikes!  2
This reminds me of another guy, his name is Mike Eason, who has a great story to tell, but I can tell you my less-than-exciting-as-his version of it.  We were dicing it out in front of the pack through the desert (I on my CZ250, he on his HONDA Elsinor 250).  Sometimes he had the trail and I was off in the bushes, then I'd be on the trail and he was eating the flora.  He had just passed me on my right when suddenly all I could see was him kind of suspended in mid-air in a running pose, then he hit the ground on his feet and sort of half ran, half tumbled along at about 45 miles an hour through the desert, sans bike, until he took a mouthful of Mojave sand. I was hitting my brakes during all this and was going to stop (honest!) but didn't, mainly because he jumped up and looked around for his bike!  I pinned it then and never looked back after that...  I found out later that his front brake cable got snagged by a bush and it locked up his front wheel, subsequently pitching him off the bike over the handlebars...  

Powell Mini-Bike
When I was really young, I remember having to share a Powell 5hp mini-bike with my two brothers.  That little beast really got a work out on some days!  Somewhere along the way, it caught on fire and burnt the engine to a crisp.  That didn't stop me, however.  I would "ride" it, engine-less, all over the place!  

Fossil Hill
I journeyed back to the old stomping grounds a while back, when I was somewhat grown- up.  I remembered there was a dirt patch near our home that we called "fossil hill" (for obvious reasons).  It was on that little hill that most of my mini-bike memories were made.  Besides sharing the mini-bike with my two older brothers it seems like half the kids on the block also got in their riding time on it.  And there were a couple other kids who owned mini-bikes (remember the "Taco" minibike?) as well, or even (dare I say?) motorcycles.  When it wasn't my turn to ride one of these, I was exploring.  And catching snakes, lizards and what-nots to add to my collection in MacKenzie's garage.  One particularly nasty lizard is called the alligator lizard which not only looks like an alligator, but when you try to catch it, opens its mouth wide and backs into a corner.  I discovered in time that the alligator lizard's teeth are like a shallow comb and don't really hurt that much, so to capture the beast, I would reach my index finger in and "WHOMP!" let him bite it.  One trait of the alligator lizard is that when he bites you, he does not let go, and I would use this against him. The other alternative to the whomp-and-latch method was the grab-'em-on-the-go method, but this usually ended up with Alli ditching his tail in your grasp, and he getting away.  This is their main defense against cats, and works quite well against them.  Anyway I went back there to my old home, and that old fossil hill, located just west of Nogales street, and right next to the (!) (A FREEWAY?!).  There was no freeway there, the last time I looked!  Now there is.  It's called the Pomona Freeway (60).  And what about fossil hill? Gone.  Yep, gone.  Oh, it's still a mound now, but only a fraction of it's old stature (either they scraped it down, or I'm remembering it as an 8 year old!).  And what do you think they put on that mound?...A miniature golf course!...Well, at least it's still used for family fun, of sorts, but give me a dirt covered patch of ground, a hill, and a mini-bike, over a miniature golf course any day!

It was on Fossil Hill that my brother Steve and his friend Tim were riding the Powell when it caught on fire, and started the fields there on fire as well!  They pushed the minibike home as fast as they could to the sounds of fire trucks' sirens in the distance...

David Serves up Justice
...Mom is an amazing woman!  She met my dad while he was serving in the Navy through a friend of hers, and they fell in love via letter writing.  Today it would be like meeting on the web.    Anyway, Mom had five kids in the space of 7 years.  I was number 4, and when my little sister Cathy came along, the front of the birth announcement card said "...one DAMP thing after another..."  David, who is number 3, is only a year older than me, but I swear he was born an adult!  He and his friends were so cool in my mind and I wanted to fit in with them in the worst way.  I remember when he and his friends (9th graders) bought me on slave day, in junior high.  I wanted to be accepted, so I went along with their pranks.  You know the ones, like Indian burns on my wrists, Monkey Bumps on my forearms, even Melvins in my pants.  The trauma has blacked out much of what went on that day, but I do vaguely remember them pulling a dress over my head at one point...now David has always been the mild mannered, serious-minded type, and I had never seen him get rowdy or careless up to that point in our lives together.  Maybe he was feeling a little embarrassed for me, or maybe he was protecting his "property", but I remember in gym class there was a bully taunting me and slapping me around a bit. He was a 9th grader, like my brother, and among the kings of the campus.  I was just the peon 8th grader and what could I do?  Without a word David came up to the bully, slammed his ears a couple times to shut him up, and then left, still without a word.  After that day, and for the rest of the school year, nobody picked on me again...  

Riding Backwards and Joshua Trees
...I remember a guy in our club, his name is Keith Pippin, or something like that.  He owned a Yamaha DT 175.   One day he was all geared up and ready to go, jumped on his bike, kicked it to life, dropped it in gear, released the clutch and....Whoooooooooops!  It took off backwards!  Ran right into a Joshua tree and crashed it…Keith had a hard dirt bike riding career.  I also remember once he was in a race, and got too close to another Joshua tree, but with his head!  You were talking about how to remove a fellow rider's helmet, after they've been injured?  What do you do when the helmet has a spike from a Joshua tree going THROUGH it, and into the dude's head?!  He never lived that one down, either...but at least he didn't die!  Keith was a really fast rider, but it seems like he was always having some bizarre thing happen to him, and eventually he just gave it up altogether...  


On Picking up Chicks  
...Do any of you remember your first crush?  Mine was in the 6th grade and her name was Pam Troeger.  At the completion of 6th grade we went to Camp Colby in the Angeles National Forest to celebrate the graduation of elementary school and kick off our first summer as full-fledged junior high schoolers!  I had this huge crush (as did every other boy in the 5th and 6th grades) on Pam, who had long blonde hair and beautiful eyes.  (It didn't hurt that she was also  well developed for our age).  But I was too shy to ever do anything courageous about this or any other crush I had on the girls.  So instead of using the bold calculated moves of a James Bond type guy, I'd resort to sly little manipulations and inuendos, you know the ones.  Like get your friend to tell her friend that you might "like" her.  Or leave annonymous notes (never signed, of course!) to her where she might discover them, wherein you pour out your hearts longing for her.  And other moves....  But lo and behold that wonderful, glorious summer camp week, Pam Troeger took notice of me!  But she also took notice of Tom "Suave", or whatever his last name is.  So along with heart palpitations I got heart burn thinking about ways to one-up Tom Suave in front of the others.  So I pick a fight with Chad Runters, one of my friends (was up to the day of the fight) who was of similar (try super small) build as myself.  I should probably be brutally honest here and admit that Pam Troeger was at that time about 12" taller than myself, as was everyone else in 6th grade, except for Chad.  I heckled Chad incessantly for two days before he agreed to fight, and when the moment of truth came, I crumpled like a sack of potatoes under his first punch!  The crumpling move didn't work well and he kept up his attack, until I was cringing there on the ground, hands and arms covering my head, crying and begging him to stop.  I was the cowardliest of cowards at that moment, ashamed of myself and feeling like things couldn't possibly get any worse...but wait!  Over there, in the crowd, was that PAM looking at me?!  This had to be the lowest of low points for me and I knew at that moment my life (as i knew it) would never be the same.  I wished I were a little snake that could crawl into the nearest hole in the ground...  

...but the strangest thing happened after the fight with Chad...my life didn't end.  In fact for some unknown reason my status only GREW amongst my classmates and even PAM took a closer look at me.  WOW.  For the last couple days at camp I reveled in my newfound popularity (imaginary for the most part) with Pam and the others.  Tom Suave tried to exploit my fight (less) skills but that backfired on him when Pam snubbed him because of it!  With Tom out of the way, I moved in... Pam's parents were providing a vehicle to escort some of the class home that Saturday, and I connived my way into getting a ride in their car!  I actually got a seat next to Pam, who was seated next to Tom Suave.  I was posted next to the window, because I don't do well in back seats you know...just imagine, seated in the back seat of a car with Pam Troeger!  Of course nothing would have happened between us on the ride home, being the 6th grade and all, except for...that's right, I don't do well with riding in the back seat (it became clear to me one Thanksgiving night as we traveled back from our cousins house in Santa Ana to our house in Rowland Heights.  The route took us (no 60 freeway in those days) up to Diamond Bar via some winding road).  We were almost half way through the winding road section (back to the story about summer camp now) and I was regretting eating those peach-halves-in-syrup so enthusiastically at breakfast.  In fact those peach-halves-in-syrup seemed to have a mind of their own and were telling me in no uncertain terms they wanted out of the arrangement!  I was going to say something to Pam's dad about pulling over but never got that far.  I didn't even have time to put down the window!  And as much as I liked Pam, I liked my own lap and clothes better.  There was no where else to turn...

More Chick Stories  
...It's funny but I still don't mind eating peach-halves-in-syrup.  Unlike coffee, which honestly I can not bring myself to consume even after all the years since my ride with Dad in the dune buggy.   Anyway, remembering the story about summer camp reminds me of another time involving Chad and...now forgive me as I introduce another classmate of mine, who must go by a different name, to protect me from some kind of lawsuit here...Janet Snotgrasp.  Janet is gross.  Maybe today she is an actress or model, even a former contestant for Miss USA, but in the 9th grade she was really gross!  She had this habit of picking her rather large (and reamed out) nose in public, on the bus.  This caused her nose to become really red.  Maybe I should name her Janet "Rudolf" Snotgrasp, but you get the picture.  As the bus travelled its route the seats filled up from one person to a seat to sometimes three persons to a seat, but Janet almost always got a seat to herself.   By now I had patched things up with Chad and we were basic friends who hung around together and shared the same friends.  Anyway our bus ride from the mountains to Hesperia Junior High in the desert was really long, plus stops to pick up 30+ kids along the way.  I never knew if this was the day I'd lose my breakfast, because I was that close to getting bus sick almost every day.  Especially on the colder days when all the windows were up and when other kids would break open something forbidden (bus rules were rarely enforced by our driver, Johnnie Lyons) to snack on.  This was one of those days and I realize now that other kids on that bus were feeling the same as I. All it would've taken was a sideways glance over to Janet "touching up" her nose.  Maybe that was why Chad, who was seated three or four rows back from Janet, decided to put his window down.  I don't know why he did it.  Maybe he was showing off his macho-ness, how he could brave the cold or something.  Anyway his was the only window on the bus that was down.  I was grateful for the fresh air and other than Chad's open window it seemed like this would be just another ordinary bus ride to school until...Janet got sick.  But she couldn't get sick in some discreet way like a normal kid.  Why couldn't she just use her purse?  Maybe she craved the attention, I don't know.  Anyway up comes Janet's breakfast, and in a quick-thinking motion, down comes Janet's window.  She turns to vomit out of the window and gets most of it out there.   Q: Do you know what happens to vomit that leaves a bus going 55 mph into a 30 mph headwind?   A: It returns onto the side of the bus, in a widening spread, along all the windows directly behind the window it left, until if finds an opening into which it can re-enter the bus.  And that's exactly what happened that day...  

All I Want for Christmas are My Two Front...
...I awoke this morning to a memory of a race I entered back in '88 astride my rip-snorting Suzuki RM400.  I had just bored and ported the cylinder because in the previous race I had seized the engine big-time.  While I was at it I changed my exhaust and rejetted it to perfection, all in the hopes of competing against Jerry Purkett and his Kawasaki KX500.  Jerry wanted to have the fastest bike in the club and he had it most of the time.  He tricked it out with all kinds of innovative applications.  But having the fastest bike in the club (though it helps) does not guarantee being the fastest RACER in the club!  Although Jerry could beat anyone in a drag race he was also a pretty crazy rider and had more than his fair share of crashes, which kept him from owning many a trophy.  Although I had pretty good riding skills I never really had a decent competition-worthy bike until I bought that 400...when I raced the 250 expert class on the cz I had an older bike with limited suspension but a bullet-proof motor, and the beating I took trying to outlast the other guys to the finish line got old...and entered the open class.  Not only were the bikes faster but the riders were too!  I had my work cut out for me and the Suzuki was just the ticket I needed.  The first time I raced it the throttle stuck wide-open about halfway through the race (start of the 2nd 45 mile loop in a desert grand-prix) and I raced it to the finish in that condition.  That probably deserves a story of its own.  Anyway that took a toll on the engine and in my 2nd race on the 400 I seized it.  So this is the 3rd race on it, and I had just gotten the engine broke in.  Jerry got me to drag race him and I beat him, so I was really stoked.  The course was an outdoor track (moto-cross) set up in the desert around some mine diggings north of El Mirage Dry Lake, at the base of the Shadow Mountains.  It was a long course (for moto-cross), about 2 miles in length, with some gnarly drop-offs, twisting sandwashes, a tight whooped-out section and one decent straightaway in the back section.  Oh, and did I mention the hill?  In practice I discovered a 2nd route over the hill because at the top of the hill there was a tight left hand, right hand zig-zag that took you down the face of the other side, then a sharp 90 degree right hand drop-off into a tight sandwash at the base of the hill.  The zig-zag kept you from going over a cliff/waterfall.  My route was a straight line off the top of the hill, over the rock cliff/waterfall and into the same sandwash, all without making a single turn of the handlebars.  The trick was to hit the crest of the hill with just enough speed to sail over the cliff and land at the bottom of the hill without getting too much air, so the whole jump, though long, is done only a foot or two off the ground.  I nailed it perfectly a few times in practice, as did Jerry and another racer, Dan on his KTM.  Scott Harmon on his YAMAHA YZ400 (I think) tried it a couple times, but didn't like it.  I planned to use this scary route during the race, especially if I found myself behind Scott and needing a place to pass.  We were to have three 20-minute motos that day...  

...at the start of the first moto I had my bike lined up in the perfect slot on the left (inside) and staring at that first turn, a huge left-handed horseshoe about 300 feet away, maybe further.  There was a gentle rise with a mellow jump leading up to the first turn, but nothing too outrageous.  This would be the perfect proving ground for the SUZUKI's pulling power.  When the flag went up I was the guy out front with the hole shot, all the way to the first turn!  But what happened next proved to be the pivot point of my entire racing career...Right behind me there was a monster pile up that stopped the race cold.  I swept around the horseshoe and completed the following two turns before I noticed the yellow flag was out and nobody was racing with me.  I had to turn around and go back to the line for a re-start!  Being the last one back to the line I was forced to line up on the extreme right side and the outside line in the event I can't get the hole shot.  I also showed up just as they were to raise the flag and was hurrying to get lined up when it went up, catching me off guard.  But still I managed a very decent pull up the hill and found myself about 6th and on the outside.  I railed the outside berm and passed two guys to get into 4th place, with just Dan, Jerry and Scott in front of me.  On the second turn, a wide right-hand gentle sweeper with no berm but a hard surface with gravel, I power-slid all the way through on the inside and dispatched Dan and his KTM.  I set my sights on Jerry and caught up to him by the 4th or 5th corner, which was a 90 degree right hander on top of a mound of mine diggings.  I stuffed it on the inside, forcing Jerry to the outside and off balance.  I blasted out of the turn, upshifted to third and roared away from Jerry and the big KAWASAKI in search of Scott's rear fender.  I caught Scott just as we got to the top of the drop-off into the mine hole, which had a sloping ramp out onto the open desert with a sweeping left hander.  I couldn't get by Scott on the drop-off or in the mine (too rocky) and he is really good at sweeping left handers onto the open desert so I bided my time.  I chased him over a couple rises and across two sandwash ditches to the base of the hill.  This was it!  I had to make my pass at the top of the hill, it was the only place on the whole track where I might have a chance.  We both hit the bottom of the hill flat out in 5th, my front wheel inches behind Scott's rear fender and slightly off to the ride side.  I knew he'd take the zig-zag at the top of the hill, but I didn't count on his roost as he slid sideways to take it.  The rocks started pelting me in the handlebars, then my stomach and chest, and finally my face.  I had on a chest protector, leathers, gloves, and a full face helmet with goggles, but the rocks in the face thing threw me off for a second.  I ducked my head to the right and looked away just as I came to the crest of the hill and Scott was diving off the left side in the zig-zag.  At the last moment I was aware of being just a little to the right of where I had practiced my jump and going a little too fast as well.  A small rock ledge said hi to me as I hit the top of the hill.  The last thing I remember was the front end climbing to the moon and I was frantically climbing up the handlebars to bring it down...  

...the flagman (John Peterson) who was stationed at the top of the hill told me what he saw later when I returned from the hospital and was recuperating at home.  It all happened so fast he said, Scott and I racing up the hill with Jerry and Dan right behind us.  Evidently the four of us had broken away from the rest of the pack in a race of our own.  John said I launched off the hill like a rocket, and came down almost vertically, with the front wheel still straight up in the air.  I was about halfway down the face of the cliff when my rear wheel hit the ground.  I must have had my foot on the brake, because when my bike landed I was immediately launched over the front end in a classic endo.  My head hit the ground face first and the rest of my body and bike pile-drove me into the earth.  John didn't even have time to react before Jerry came flying over me, his rear tire making a tread mark on my helmet.  Dan's KTM made the tire marks on my bike.  After that John got his yellow flag out and waved the rest of the riders off...  

...the first thing I remembered hearing was Sandra (Jerry's wife) asking if anyone knew where Paul's teeth were?  Oh, no, I thought, this can't be good!  My helmet was off, but I was still wearing my chest protector and everything else.   Lying on a slope left me disoriented but gradually the other riders' faces began to appear over me, all looking pretty concerned.  They had cancelled the racing when I wrecked, and pretty much the whole club was out on the hill looking after me.  And for my teeth.  Little did they know, the doctors would find two of them later, crammed up into my sinus cavity.  They gently placed me into my dad's van (yes, a real van!) and he drove me to St Mary's Hospital in Apple Valley.  Other than my face I felt fine over the rest of my body.  When we were done with the CAT scan, the doctor gave me the facts:  Both jawbones are broken, cheekbones smashed and looking like shattered glass, a fracture in my skull about an inch-and-a-half long splitting my left eye socket vertically, no left eye (didn't matter since it wasn't there to begin with, also another story), a smashed nose (which was made up of plastic anyway, again from another story), the two upper front teeth lodged in my sinus cavity, and four other teeth gone.  The thing is I didn't have insurance and they didn't want to keep me in the hospital.  Besides, doc said he couldn't begin to work on me until the massive swelling (can anyone say "caulliflower man"? Well, Kathy called me "elephant man") went down.  So they sent me home with some pain killers and an appointment for the following week...  

...once home I was confined to a seperate bedroom to heal.  Kathy warned our daughters (who were very concerned of course) that I wasn't very "pretty" and they could keep their eyes closed while visiting with me.  I was limited to eating through a straw or being spoon-fed by Kathy, which meant the straw.  I tried to spoon some yogurt into my mouth cavity but it didn't quite work.  But here is the amazing part of this story: I had uttered a small prayer to God when I came to at the accident site, a simple request to not feel any pain.  And that was so, from the time I wrecked until the following week, I was pain free, and never needed to take even one pain killer.  In addition not having pain, I was once again blessed with a supernatural healing (like the rattlesnake bite healing) from God that week.  Its hard for some of you to believe, but I am not making this up.  In one week, my face bones were miraculously healed.  I still had to keep my appointment with the doctor, because those two front teeth were still lodged in my sinus, but otherwise I was pretty much as good as new.  When I arrived at the doctor's office for my surgery, he had with him a specialist from Loma Linda University Medical Center.  This man greeted me into the operating room that was graced with my X-RAY  pictures from the previous week.  Taken back by my seemingly normal appearance, he studied the pictures, then proceeded to poke and pull on my face, asking me if this hurt or that hurt.  Nope, no pain.  Jawbone was solid, nose was well-formed, eye was still missing but I told you about that, and cheekbones were sound.  He asked me if I was who I was, and if those were my pictures along the wall.  Yep, and yep.  He was pretty skeptical (I would be too!) and had another picture taken of my face.  The two front teeth were still in there, but no other evidence remained of the previous weeks damage!  I give God all the credit...

...by the way, I was telling my story to a man who I built a house for shortly after that, and he being a medical professional of very skeptical faith, I gave to him the copies I had of the X-RAYS from both the day of the accident and the following week.  He asked if he could have them to show to people in his office, and I let them go.  He had been born to a missionary couple working in South America and had some Christian upbringing and background, but my healing made a true believer out of him...  
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NW Montana
Where the pavement ends and the fun begins  
2005 KTM300exc

those r cool stories Paul.  

ya nobody jack his thread this time!!! stay on topic
DavidS  
i take a lot of pride in what i am

___________________
ride: 02yz426
local: north east Oregon

terrain type woods with lots of roots & rocks

I love your stories Paul...they are so similar of desert racers...it seems like we all grow up with those crazy things that happen out there that just don't seem to happen anywhere else....keep telling them, I love reading  
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"Only the desert has a fascination to ride alone in the sun in the forever unpossessed country away from man. That is a great temptation."
--D.H. Lawrence

thanks guys, I know there are readers out there who read these stories and think, "hey that happened to me too!", or maybe you have a story of your own?  This thread is dedicated to your stories.  Feel free to add your own.  I've changed the thread so that I'll be adding my own stories onto the first post, so they will be uninterrupted by others.  I want to thank the DR website forums for making this possible.  These stories from dirtbikes and other stuff make up my knee-jerk memoirs...enjoy!  
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NW Montana
Where the pavement ends and the fun begins  
2005 KTM300exc

That's the bloody longest post EVER in the history of Dirt Rider!  Congrats! lol

Great story(s)!  
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The King Of Crumpets - Crumpet Boy!

- 1991 RM125

Sully showed me a really cool story site, there's some great reading here:

http://thebannerisup.district37ama.org/stories.shtml  
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NW Montana
Where the pavement ends and the fun begins  
2005 KTM300exc

There's great info on there about desert riding...even some stuff on the husky monument  
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"Only the desert has a fascination to ride alone in the sun in the forever unpossessed country away from man. That is a great temptation."
--D.H. Lawrence

Thanks for sharing the stories PaulB.  
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I love this dirt stuff.

Great stories Paul! I've only read half of them so far, but I'll get to the rest. You tell a story well.  
___________________
Southern California

* 2007 YZ450F *

:
Great stories Paul! I've only read half of them so far, but I'll get to the rest



I haven't even gotten that far!   I got sidetracked by the great pics.  Thanks for sharing!  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hudson Valley NY
KTM XC-W 250

"If you don't have a dream, how can it come true?"

thanks, enjoy!  
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NW Montana
Where the pavement ends and the fun begins  
2005 KTM300exc

The Travelling Triple Whopper
This is not one of my own stories, but related to me by one of my riding buddies, Rob from Oklahoma (but Montana now).  Rob used to make a road trip to Colorado each year with some buddies to ride their dirtbikes in the rocky mountains.  He stopped in New Mexico to pick up his brother Stu.  They stopped at Del Norte, Colorado to camp and ride for a couple days.  They moved on to Ouray to meet up with some more buddies for more camping and riding, but stopped on the way in Montrose, Colorado to grab something to eat.  Having eyes bigger than their stomachs they each ordered two (2) double Whoppers from the Burger King there in Montrose.  One of the burgers came as a triple instead of a double, and they didn't have room for it.  So into the doggy bag it goes, since Stu has a german shephard at home named Ozzie who might enjoy it.  However when they got to Ouray they duct-taped it to friend Freds number plate.  Being a good natured man, Fred snuck it back into Stus airbox while no one was looking.  It was two weeks later when Stu finally opened up his airbox to clean his air filter and discovered the triple Whopper there.  Being a serious minded man, Stu packaged it up and mailed it to his brother Rob in Oklahoma, with instructions to give it back to Fred, in whatever manner Rob deemed appropriate.  Fred caught him in the act and told Rob to take it back to Stu when he goes to visit him in a month.  So Rob takes it to New Mexico, about two months after the original purchase date.  He laid it on the trailer and while he was preoccupied Ozzie came by and gobbled it down...  
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NW Montana
Where the pavement ends and the fun begins  
2005 KTM300exc

bp  
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NW Montana
Where the pavement ends and the fun begins  
2005 KTM300exc

If you're bored or want some good reading, here is a story about riding in Africa....the main story website is here , you might want to bookmark it to go back to later for more reading  
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NW Montana
Where the pavement ends and the fun begins  
2005 KTM300exc