I don’t currently own a street bike — I borrow them from sympathetic buddies once or twice a year — but I subscribe to Cycle World and try to keep up all-things motorcycle-related.
So when I’m perusing the mag and staring at the photos, my desire to own 3 or 4 different types of bikes lights up, with the mental image of how I would look riding them lurking in the background.
I’m often willing to put up with some pain in order to have an ego-orgasm and riding a motorcycle can sometimes qualify. For last year’s Real Joe Fry-Your-Ass Tour to Balltown, Iowa I rode my friend Larry’s BMW sportbike… a magnificent machine, but a nut-cruncher. And the previous year’s Freeze-Your-Ass Tour to Wisconsin I rented a Harley Sportster. For a great treatise on motorcycle ergonomics and the pain threshhold often required, see this article that appeared in the NY Times in October: Uneasy Rider: But to gird himself for the 350-mile ride home from a rally in New Hampshire last spring, Mr. Klerk said, ”I loaded up on Motrin.” He needed painkillers because the one design element missing from his motorcycle — and from thousands of new and pricey others — is ergonomics. ”My bike looks fantastic, which means it rides like hell,” said Mr. Klerk, a 43-year-old welder.