Today was not a good scooter day.

I’m still in Seattle (which is a good thing - with friends, that part is really great). But I went to a scooter shop for a rear tire change and rear brakes. They asked if I wanted an oil change and a few other things. I did for sure.

The total came to $350ish. Is that a lot? Yes it is. But is that normal for a modern Vespa? Yes, it sure is.

During the service, they informed me that the bolt holding the exhaust on was broken off in the case. The mechanic said it was either the last place that worked on it or I hit something. Either could be possible with the roads I’ve been taking. It’s hard to say. I certainly don’t want to accuse Scooter Lounge of anything like that.

Anyway, I have to bring it back in on Friday. They’re going to drill it out and re-tap it. I’m not thrilled that it will cost me $210 (though I’m betting closer to $250). But it needs to be done. If the exhaust comes loose, it won’t fall off, but it will melt my brake line.

The more I think about how all of this could be avoided by riding a vintage Vespa, the more I’m disliking the modern Vespa.

On the vintage, I could change the tire myself (split rims), forgo the oil change (it’s two-stroke), do the gear oil myself, the exhaust attaches in a way that makes some sort of sense and about a billion other things.

Sure, vintage does need a bit more attention, but I can do that myself and it doesn’t cost nearly as much.

Will I end up selling dear Ruby II at the end of my travels? It’s a good possibility. Especially since I’ll be putting a 200cc engine in Whitey. And for around-the-town, I hope to get a small frame Vespa. I’m really excited about both prospects.

I need a favor to be done for me. Could someone please record a couple of things on their VCR (or DVR, etc)?

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, PCN TV is running those geeky Gettysburg tours that I like. This year they are running two that I really want to see.

The first airs tonight, but I’m not sure when. Probably around 7pm. It runs for up to two or three hours (depending).

The second airs tomorrow night at 6pm and runs for the same amount of time.

Could someone please record them for me?

My mother was going to, but she can’t get her VCR to record the upper channels.
Please? Anyone?

Those who know me know that on July 1, 2 and 3, I’m usually in Gettysburg for really geeky battlefield tours.

Because of Scoot 66, I’ll be missing them this year. However, PCN TV is there and records them. They show older ones from past years throughout the day and then at 6pm on each day they show the ones that took place that day.

I’m particularly interested in one that will be on probably around 7 or 7:30pm on July 2nd (Wednesday). If someone could record that one (and any others) for me.

The ones they’re running this year are:

Tuesday, July 1
Gettysburg Battlewalks - Day 1
Union 1st Corps on Seminary Ridge (2008)
Brigadier General Doles’ Brigade (2008)

Wednesday, July 2
Gettysburg Battlewalks – Day 2
New 2008 Battlewalks begin at 6:00 p.m.
Major General Hancock’s Leadership (2008)
Brinkerhoff’s Ridge (2008)
Lt. General Longstreet: Culprit or Scapegoat (2008)

Thursday, July 3
Gettysburg Battlewalks – Day 3
New 2008 Battlewalks begin at 6:00 p.m.
Longstreet’s Flank Attack (2008)
Confederate Cannonade Examined (2008)
Pickett’s Charge, Confederate Perspective (2008)
Pickett’s Charge, Union Perspective (2008)
Big Round Top (2008)

Again, I’d really appreciate someone recording the Brinkerhoff’s Ridge one. That would make me happy. Also, Longstreet’s Flank Attack would be fun.

PCN is the Pennsylvania Cable Network. Usually they show tours of weird/normal Pennsylvania things, but over the Gburg anniversary, they show the battle walks. Anyone willing to help a geeky fellow out?

Thanks!

I don’t have a lot to say. I mean, I’m pretty busy, but it’s pretty busy hanging out. Not a lot of interesting things to write about.

Seattle is a bunch of fun and the weather’s been great.

Mostly, we go to parks or eat. Sometimes we eat vegan doughnuts. I had some this morning. Oh, it’s good stuff. Seattle is great for that.

I rode a bit yesterday, hoping that the problems with the scooter would occur again, but they didn’t. Right now, the scooter is fine. It’s a good thing, but if something is going to go wrong, I want it to do it here so I can fix it.

Several people have suggested that I leave the scooter on the west coast, fly back to PA, spend the summer there and at the end of it, fly back out to the west coast for the Cannonball. It’s tempting and I’ve given it a lot of thought.

Though I’m not convinced that it’s the best choice, I’m going to be riding back. There’s also the option to ship it out to California before the Run and then fly out. That is pretty tempting, to be honest. We’ll see how it goes. There’s also the option of simply not doing the Cannonball. But that’s an option I don’t really want.

One of the reasons I was going to be home was to change out the engine on the Stella. I ordered a PX200 engine and I’m pretty excited about it. However, that doesn’t get here for another six weeks. That should be in mid-August. We’ll see how/when that happens.

So… hm… anyone have any questions about stuff?

Sorry there isn’t much to talk about. Hmhmhm.

As most of the regulars will know, there is a 3,400 mile, coast-to-coast endurance event for scooters that takes place every other year. It’s called the Scooter Cannonball Run (no affiliation with Burt Reynolds). 20 or so scooterists ride from the Pacific to Atlantic Oceans over the span of about 10 days. It’s a grueling event that puts you in the saddle for sometimes over 400 miles a day.

This year’s Cannonball starts on Sept 11 in San Francisco. It ends ten days later in Ocean City Maryland.

Some ride for fun or to see if they can do it. Some ride to race. And some ride for charity (with a bit of the other two thrown in). And that’s me.

After a lot of thought, I’ve decided to do it. I’ve also decided that I will be riding to raise money for Food For Life, a world-wide food relief organization.

Currently, I’m in Seattle, having ridden my Vespa GTS , zigzagging my way across the country for a distance of 7,500 miles.

After visiting Seattle and getting some work done on the scooter, I will be riding back to central Pennsylvania in the next couple of weeks. Then, in mid-August, I’ll be heading west towards San Francisco for the start of the Cannonball Run.

How you can help.
Like I said, I’m riding to raise money for Food for Life. I’ll have a donation page set up and you can donate a flat sum or donate based upon how many miles I do (for example, if you donate a buck for every 100 miles, at the end of the Run (which totals around 3,400 miles), you will have pledged to donate $34).

Whatever money that is donated goes to Food for Life. None of it goes to me. I’m keeping not a farthing. I’m only asking you to donate to Food for Life, I’m not asking you to fund my vacation.

All of this will be set up in the next month or so.

I have little doubt that I can complete the Run. The scooter is in great shape and so am I (relatively speaking). I’m used to long days in the saddle and riding a ton of miles a day. The only differences will be that I’ll be “racing” a bunch of other riders and I’ll be riding with a purpose other than “seeing what there is to see.”

I guess there’s not much to say. My big trip to Seattle was shortened to a three hour ride on the interstate.

Riding on the interstate isn’t fun. It’s not scary or anything like that, it’s just not fun.

Before I left Portland, I stopped in at Corazzo to say good-bye to those folks.

I felt really at home in Portland. A lot of that was because of the town, but a good chunk was because of Ashley. Hey, thanks! It’s great to have folks in places. I think this is the first town where I felt really at home. Woo!

The ride to Seattle was lame. There’s a ton of really great things to see along the way, if you leave the interstate. But I just didn’t feel much like traveling. I wanted to get to Seattle, but just didn’t want to travel there. Makes sense?

One big concern is the scooter. The spark plug boot came off at a gas station - that’s not good. And after that, it was idling weirdly. It would be fast for a second or two and then slow down. Over and over. Why would it do that? I’m not sure. But I turned it off and started it again and it was fine. I wonder if I need a new spark plug.

So that’s my big day.

I arrived in Seattle around 4pm and it was great to see Ryan, Jaime and Jeff again. I’ll be here for about a week. Hopefully that week will be action-packed!

Miles today: 248
Miles total: 7684

I was all set to meet up with Kelley Baker today, at 1:30. I even mapped out the route and nearly memorized it! Kelley toured through Lewisburg a couple of times over the years. When he was in town, he’d stop in the bookstore. So I figured I’d return the favor now that I was in his neck of the woods.

Around one o’clock, I hopped on the scooter, started it up, got to the end of the parking lot and it died. I tried to start it again, but nothing. The starter motor just turned over and over. I figured that I was going to run the battery down, so I pushed it back to where it was in front of Ashley’s front door and figured I’d have to get a tow.

I was lamenting not having a vintage Vespa. I could probably fix that. If a two-stroke scooter won’t start, you can usually get it running without too much hassle (then keeping it running becomes the task). But I had a modern, four stroke and had no idea what to do.

So I figured, “check the sparkplug.” And I did. And that was the problem.

Somehow or another, the sparkplug wire came detached from the boot. I looked at it and the wire seems to attach to the boot via a threaded screw, almost like a wood screw. This seems like a dumb set up to me.

So I screwed it back in, still unsure how it worked its way out (maybe when I ran over that tarp?). It started right up and I rode to meet Kelley.

We hung out at a coffee and tea cafe and talked for something like three hours. It was pretty cool to see him again. We caught up on our lives and swapped travel stories - he has more than I do.

That evening, Ashley and I planned to go to something called “Last Thursday,” it’s basically an art walk mixed with street fair. Anyone is allowed to sell whatever on the street and many of the shops have artists in them, showing their work.

While much of the atmosphere was “whoooaaaaaaa look at ME, I’m SO weird, MAN!!!!” There was more than enough sincerity there to make it very worth while.

Most of the art wasn’t to my liking, but almost all of it was cheap - the best kind! Most of it was very DIY and again, I dig that.

There was one piece (pictured on the left) that I really dug. But the artist wanted $175 for it. This wasn’t really the place to be selling the over-priced stuff. And I didn’t really have the $175 to throw at it. But I really really dug it. If it were $100, I would have bought it.

I also rediscovered sidewalk chalk while being here.

The first night I was here, one of the cafes wrote “The Waffle Window is Open!” on the sidewalk, with arrows directing all where to find it. My first thought was “what if there really isn’t a waffle window and it’s just arrows leading people to no where?” That would be a very fun thing.

Sidewalk chalk is also good for leaving little messages to the world around you. Tonight we saw, “Nothing says arrest me like a 2am cartwheel.”

Words to live by, folks. Careful out there!

There were other chunks of art that I wanted and I really wish I would have known about this, because I would have sent my books out here and tried to sell a few. I also have another idea that I’m keeping to myself.

I tried to encourage Ashley to sell her paintings and jewelery here, because she’s really good and for some reason never tries to get her work out there. Hopefully next Last Thursday, she will.

We got home late and basically crashed out. Tomorrow, I leave for Seattle. But I’m sad to be leaving Portland. I really feel at home in this town. Like a lot.

Mile today: 7
Miles total: 7436

ps - While I didn’t pick anything up at Last Thursday, I did become the new owner of Boy with Duck. I found another one and it’s mine! I feel very lucky.

You know what I did today? Not much at all. Some folks would take the time to explore Portland. See what’s here. Me, I just needed a day where I didn’t do anything.

Tomorrow I’ll explore some. But today, I just did laundry and ate some strawberries.

I emailed some scooter shops and worked out more logistics for the Cannonball. I went from being really hyped up about it to nearly not doing it. I’m still planning on it though, no worries.

When Ashley and Kevin got home, we grabbed some pizza - a few pizza shops in Portland have vegan cheese. West Coast pizza never ever even comes close to east coast pizza, but it wasn’t bad.

And then we hit Powell’s Bookstore. It’s the largest independent bookstore in the universe. It takes up a whole freaking city block! It’s amazing. I could have bought a million things, but bought three small comics.

And then we came back home.

That’s it, really. Easy day.

I’ve been thinking more and more about Cannonball Run and if I wanted to do it for charity.

Turns out that I do, but I’m not sure how to go about that. I’ve picked the charity I’d like to support. It’s a food-relief one. I’ve contacted them and hope to hear back soon.

I’m going to be asking for donations for the charity (and the charity only - no money for me, ok?). Folks can donate by-the-mile (or rather, by the 100 mile segment) or can give whatever they can. The money, again, won’t be touched by me.

My folks suggested that I park the scooter out on the west coast, fly back to the east - then back west for the Run. It’s definitely something to think about.

But I doubt that I’ll do that. I want to ride. And if I get back to PA, what will I ride? I have the Stella, but that’s my next project and not street legal anymore.

Anyway, I’m 95% sure that I’m doing the Run. And I’m 75% sure that I’m riding to PA and then back to the west coast.

I’ll have to secure service work somewhere in the upper mid-west, in PA, somewhere in the middle of the country and then somewhere on the west coast (San Jose?).

This is going to be a lot of work, but I’m really really excited about it.

Maybe I’ll head up to New England for a week while I’m in PA.

Now, about “66″.

Several blogs have mentioned me of late and that’s just dandy and a little weird. I want to clear a few things up.

1) I know Route 66 doesn’t go through Idaho. The Route 66 portion of Scoot 66 was over a long time ago.

2) Someone mentioned that this is basically an extended vacation and not a real big deal. I agree. It’s not a big deal and really is an extended vacation. Why should you care? You really shouldn’t. Why do folks care? I’m not exactly sure, but I’m glad they do.

3) The point isn’t to make it across the states and back in 66 days. I’m not behind schedule. I’m exactly where I want to be. It’s Day 55 today and I won’t be home till Day 70 something. At that point, Scoot 66 will be over. In mid-August Scoot 66 II: Electric Boogaloo will start.¹ That will take about a month and will include the Cannonball Run.

Schedule?

My schedule is pretty foggy right now, but to the best of my knowledge, I should be back in PA in Mid (Carson) July. I’ll be leaving for the Cannonball in Mid-August. I’d like to take a week to go up to New England, but I’m not sure about that one. I’ll return from the Cannonball on Sept 22nd-ish. After that. Oh I’m gettin’ plans!

All in all, I’ll probably have a 20,000 mile summer.

Now that that’s cleared up, go and do something fun, ok?

1. That’s not really the name that I’m calling it - I probably won’t call it anything. Just Scoot 66 or something boring like that. [↩]

And what a welcome it was! We had a full day.

Except it didn’t start so early. Which is good. Gave me some time to get situated. I love getting situated. Maybe I’m a nester.

Our plans today were to hit an island where we could pick strawberries and visit Corazzo, the makers of my jacket.

While getting things ready to leave, I noted that Portland had one very big mark against it - no vegan doughnuts. Ashley then suggested Voodoo Doughnuts might have vegan ones. We looked it up and lo! They do!

Let’s do that first!

We drove down (she drove) and parked in Chinatown. We had trouble working the little electronic parking meter thing, but figured it out somehow. Each have slightly different instructions. This one had one set of instructions and then they decided to change them after installing the machines. So now there are amended instructions. Nothing made sense.

But Chinatown seemed nice. We parked right next to an all-vegetarian Chinese place. There are so many places to eat here, I bet.

We walked around downtown a bit. I had my first Portland celebrity siting! While walking down some street, I saw the girl who works for Herbivore Clothing and Magazine. It’s the gal in the top, left picture (and throughout the page). She passed and I thought, “I know her! But how?” I figured it was scooter-related. But no. It was vegan-related. Woo!

I want this shirt, by the way. I might stop by the Herbivore Store today and get it.

We found our way to Voodoo Doughnuts, our first stop! The place was eclectic inside. And the vegan doughnuts were in a little basket.

I picked out a glazed and chocolate frosted. Just like I used to get at Dunkin Donuts before I went vegetarian 15 or 16 years ago.¹

The counter gal bagged them up and I couldn’t wait to get outside to inhale them.

They use a banana-based eggless recipe. Sometimes that can go horribly wrong, making your whatevers taste only like super-sweet bananas.

So with a tinge of apprehension - this was an extremely important moment in my life - I bit into the chocolate frosted one.

Hm. Good… not bad… some banana… but mostly… AMAZING! I’m eating a VEGAN DOUGHNUT! I basically freaked out inside. And maybe a little on the outside.

Maybe.

So good.

The glazed was equally amazing. I basically want to live there. It’s a shame that all their doughnuts aren’t vegan, but hey, at least there’s a nice selection of vegan ones.

But now was time for Strawberry pickin’ on some island that I redubbed Strawberry Island. We got a little lost, but eventually found our way there.

We grabbed two empty U-Pick boxes and went to pickin’. At first, it was difficult to find anything. But after we figured out a system and found a good place for good berries, we were in!

Oregon strawberries are different than Pennsylvania or California strawberries. First, these were no-spray. No icky chemicals to “wash off”. And they are red the whole way through. Yeah, they’re smaller, but they’re sweeter and basically nature’s perfect food.

The picking place also had a ton of other fruit and vegetables in a little store/barn thing over yonder. It was run by a guy who was amazingly enthusiastic about his produce, which is all grown on-site. He was thrilled with is dill, and ecstatic over his cucumbers! And don’t even get him started on his watermelons!

Our next stop was Corazzo, so we picked up some sweet corn and headed over. Corazzo is a scooter apparel company who makes riding gear (mostly). Chad and… .. I forget his name - I’m SO bad with names, I apologize², who co-run the place, hung out and talked while their lil puppy played with what must have been the most awesome red plastic lid EVER!

These guys are great and I can’t say enough nice things about them. Especially because: “Corazzo is proud to manufacture our garments and accessories in North America (Canada, California and Oregon), sourcing our raw materials from companies that manufacture in the US, wherever possible.” They asked if I needed anything and really, I didn’t, but maybe a pair of gloves (do you have ANY idea how hard it is to find vegan riding gloves?) and new armor for my jacket. Chad offered a bag, but I declined. It was a nice bag too. This company is run by scooterists for scooterists. And it’s very for scooterists.

It takes quite a lot for a company to impress me. But since this company has great stuff, great practices and is amazingly giving, I have to approve of their existence.

Now, if only their winter gloves were vegan so I could stop using ski gloves! And if they made pants!

My riding pants are black and weirdly, nothing goes with them. Even my black jacket clashes. I don’t quite understand how nothing can go with black. I think it’s the shape. Who knows. I’ll be getting a new jacket soonishly and definitely Corazzo’s lap apron. I bet my dad would dig this. He’s riding a Bajaj Chetak now. Ha! Scootering is addictive!

I’ll also be picking this amazing little number up before winter hits.

Chad also told us of a scooter meet-up at a bar called Plan B. It was at nine. So Ashley and I drove to her place, made some food and I “fixed” her router that was being super-cranky.

Suddenly it was around nine, so we headed to Plan B. Plan B is a bar that has a great VEGetariAN dishes. In Portland, in order to serve liquor, you must also serve hot food.

We got there, finding the place by looking for a bunch of scooters out front. No problem. There were about 20 there and I saw a mod walking up the street on crutches, still sporting the jacket, tie and hat. This must be the place.

Everyone was out back, on a patio (really an old parking lot with picnic tables - this place was pretty punk rock). Chad motioned us over, introduced us and we ended up talking with him, a gal, another guy and the mod fellow (remember, really amazingly bad with names, sorry!). I ordered some vegan chili, Corazzo paid for it… THANKS! I feel weird when people do this, but who is going to argue with vegan chili?

The DJ spun the soundtrack to my high school years. Metallica, Dead Kennedys, various other stuff that brought me back to a time in Todd Fogel’s basement where I had my first couple bands and countless nights of being young. Thanks, Mr. DJ!

Around 11:30, things wound down and we were beat (and the last ones there).

It was late, so to bed it was!

G’night, folks!

Here are my pics.

1. I went veg when I was 17, in a couple of years I’ll be able to say that I’ve been veg for most of my life - pretty neat! [↩]
2. Seriously, I’m horrible with names. I had to struggled to remember “Chad.” It wasn’t easy and Ashley had to help [↩]