Yep, well you’re absolutely right. I don’t know my ass from a hole in the ground as usual, can’t control my women and the in the last port, I chased a slinky, silk, slit up the side Hua Fu dress for Sin Wu. It’s against the Code of the West to buy clothing for women. Jewelry is cool, a handbag a wallet or a car, but no clothes. You can’t win. If it’s too tight you’ve embarrassed her. If it’s too big, you’ve called her fat.
So how the hell would I know about the industry, get the cool insider info or be able to bring you the deal of the century? How the hell would I know, let’s see:
EASYRIDERS COLUMBUS SHOW TOPS OLD NUMBERS–That’s right the national show in February in Columbus pulled 18,000 onlookers. According to the editor, Dave Nichols, “I think attendance was up because of better radio coverage toget people to the show, and the fact that the weather was great (no snow). Also, bike events have been doing very well since 9-11.”
BIG DADDY RAT, BIKER LEGEND TAKEN OUT–I mentioned that he was attacked by several woman, but that wasn’t the case, although, he wished it was. He’s been fighting stomach cancer for sometime. He was the master of the Big Daddy Rat images of the ’60s. He developed his mammoth bike shows in Daytona and Sturgis then worked with the man behind the Essen, Germany shows, to deliver his winners to Europe each year and share them with the 350,000 spectators who came to the motherland shows. Unbelievable.
Big Daddy, or Karl Smith, was a helluva guy and one of the major forces behind Bike Week in the early days. Good brother and a wild character, as nuts as his Rat logo. I’ll miss him.
Bikernet Caribbean Report—Hey ! Just got back from the Daytona mayhem, shit, it sucks more everyyear. It was fun to meet with old friends and talk a bit, the Sheriff fromSweden was there shooting for ScanBike, we always meet him, no matter whatand it’s always good to see him (plus and avid reader of Bikernet). BillyLane was there with his new hub less bike and a couple missing fingers, badaccident, he got them caught in his primary belt, it hurts just thinkingabout it, but like he said, “What I did with ten, can do with eight ” wayto go Bro.
We did not see Jesse, but he was there, his stuff was selling like hotcakes, and I mean one of every five had some garment that had Jesse’s logo,good for him. Also he brought a Funny car, a cool ass Hot Rod and his pickup truck to the booth, obvious that his area was the hot place to be.
Wemet Crazy Horse which is a fellow contributor to Bikernet and The Horse, shewas having a great time and went to every party and then some, we took apicture together so maybe sometime it will show up in here.
Also we sat down and talked to the guys at Killer Choppers(killerchoppers.com). They had some really cool frames and parts forchoppers. These 3 amigos got a good thing going on, check their web siteout, and all the frames are done customer order and at a very reasonableprice. Check ’em out
One gripe I have, and yes I’m gonna bitch, Daytona is getting way too bigfor it’s britches, the A1A traffic was 7 miles long, even the residentialstreets that we use as shortcuts were crowded. It took some people a solidthree hour drive from Orlando just to get to the Speedway, also we noticedthe amount of crotch rockets, I would dare say half, which adds to theabsurd amount of people there. Also the “Rubs” with their new bikes crackin’those drag pipes at all hours and all places. We even saw a few guyschanging pipes on the parking lot to go and make noise down the street. Dudes, if you don’t make that much noise back home, Why Daytona? Needlessto say they were getting busted for noise, but most of the time we saw thecops picking the wrong guy. We avoided Main Street like it was a bad caseof herpes. We almost punched out a “newbie” that tried to sit on my bikefor a photo, Hey stupid ! Other people bikes are sacred!We saw some crazy shit that did not happen before, people were pushing andshoving while walking down the street, and even fights breaking out. I tellya’ these new riders have to learn the rules and pay their dues beforesomeone smashes their faces in.
It’s like you have to watch your back from an over excited, drunk, yuppie,one thing that we have never done, even with the baddest of the 1% ers.On the other hand, we lost Big Daddy Rat, which is sad for the whole bikerlifestyle, and the Rat’s Hole show had many cool bikes from all over theworld, although, people will have to build a special bike for these shows tobe able to compete, and spend over 50 g’s on it. We are suckers for oldschool stuff and choppers, there were a couple there, but obviouslyignored. Also I saw the nicest Twin Cam I?ve seen yet, it was a fat boy withflat black paint, apes, white wall tires and red rims. Dude if you readthis, that was a cool ass bike, too bad I did not have my camera.
We got a new Buell Blast, it’s not the fastest most powerful bike , buthell it was a trip. We zipped around town cutting lanes and had a greattime. The little bike is quick and easy to handle, we were almost stealthamongst all those posers, shit we managed to come back with no tickets! BTW this bike is a gift for Yoly, but we had to test it, right ?
All in all Daytona is the mother of all rallies, people from all over theworld show up there for ten full days of bike action, fun and games.There’s still so much stuff to do that no one can see everything, or canget there without frying a piston, too bad it’s starting to suck thanks tothose who don’t know the unwritten rules of this lifestyle. Tell ya thetruth, there’s not enough money in this world to pay those cops, sometimesit turned into pure chaos. (Hope they read this and don’t bust us anymore)
So there it is, trial and tribulations in Daytona, I know I?m forgetting acouple things, but hell, we got next week!Hey I say it as I see it !!!
Later……..
Jose,
Bikernet Caribbeanagent
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