I didn’t have a helmet on when a guy in a 79 impala pulled out in front of me while I was doing 65 on a country road. Lots of broken bones and a lot of skin scraped up. And a totaled motorcycle. I was very lucky; I could have been stuck in a wheel chair or dead. I think (I am reminded of it) the accident every single day, and it was a long time ago, 8/17/89 (4:20 pm) I always have Percocet & aspirin tablets in my pocket, All the time since the accident. Some days walking is somewhat painful (both knees were broke) and these really help.


Make sure you use a helmet, and take the course.

But you should understand there is a chance at some point you are going to go down, and it could be a hard drop.

If you are married, make sure your family is taken care of money wise and that you will be covered for doing risky things like riding a motorcycle. This should be worked out before the accident you may have, not after.

"...If you are married, make sure your family is taken care of money wise..."

Good point. My wife and I agree on just about everything, 'cept scooters. She loves them, I don't. We do not believe in life insurance. But she and her ex were scooter riders, with three young kids. So they took out lots of life insurance. With good reason. She also wore leathers, boots, and a top quality helmet on every ride. Lucky for me, they never had to use any of it...

The most mangled one was a helicopter pilots helmet. I didn't hear the story behind it but I was told by somebody who had that it was pretty gruesome.

Motorcycles are fun. That said, my only experience is a motorcycle safety class I took with my mom when she got a scooter. I took a spill at 20 MPH, I can't imagine (wrong I can imagine all too well) a spill at 60MPH. I personally would like a lot more time riding in secluded areas before going out anywhere I'm likely to meet traffic, or where anyone would pressure me (with their bumper) to ride faster then 30 MPH. Take the course. They provide motorcycles and helmets most places and require boots sturdy pants, gloves and eye protection. They start at the very basics, starting the motorcycle, shifting, braking and work up to how to negotiate curves, how to swerve and how to stop in a curve.

I plan on getting a bike when I get stateside and then riding it primarily on post (where all the speed limits are around 35 MPH) before I go anywhere on it. I think it would be a great way to reduce my gas consumption, and I think they're lots of fun. Much cooler then convertibles.

A friend lost it on a curve while riding a motorcycle. He went into a pulpwood plantation head-first at about 60mph. Knocked down almost a dozen trees. Busted him up pretty good too.

A redneck hunter and his two sons, out for deer don't ya know and attracted by the sound of a guy skydiving horizontally through a pulpwood plantation, found him. Drifting in and out of consciousness he saw the tobacco chewing rednecks leaning over him. He swears he heard the theme music from Deliverance.

Country boys treated him right. As one of them went to get the truck they lashed him to branches where he had fallen. They got him gently on top of the dog box and to the hospital quickly. Taking him in the truck saved my friend well over an hour because the site was on the other end of the county from the nearest ambulance. And in a remote spot down a lot of unmarked dirt roads.

The rescuers did a good job. Kept his head, neck and back straight by lashing them to two pieces of wood. ER doc said they did a good job and saved his life. He was bleeding internally and would have died in a short time without an operation.

His helmet was literally split in two. Without it there would have been no need for a rush to the hospital.

After three months he was back at work but took most of a year to resemble 'right'.

Lessons being that when things go wrong on a bike at speed they happen fast. Your the smallest and softest thing around. Helmets help a lot. If your lucky someone might find you and make sure the pieces all get to a hospital. So drive like your life depends on it.

Back when I was sixteen, bikes of any kind, vespa's for the MOD's and Kawaski's for the rocker's were the big scene. You had to be one or the other, or in my case neither.

That choice was based on the fashion at the time I disliked both but not the bikes. While I was still umming and errring, my circumstances changed. I lost three friends in three years to bike accidents, it's hard to have any trust in bikes after three funerals.

I'm wondering the same kinds of things, mainly due to gas prices. My big question, as someone who has ok hand-eye coordination and lousy use-the-force coordination is this:

Do they make them in automatic?

Yes, I'm serious. My biggest doubt is if I can manage the gears. I've driven stick in five cars, and had to buy three transmissions for people. The other two survived, but it doesn't fill me with confidence.

You can definitely get scooters in automatic, my mom's is an automatic. I don't know about motorcycles. I have my doubts, but I have no direct knowledge. But motorcycle transmissions are much simpler then cars, you don't have to figure out direction to shift, up shifting is pushing up with your foot down shifting is pushing down with the exception of first to neutral. First is below neutral. So it goes 1 N 2 3 4. But if you seriously have problems with it, get try a scooter with an automatic transmission.

Ironraven, go with a scooter, I believe they're just have a throttle, twist to go faster.

I've only one experience of these in Greece, it rained once, for about a minute, the first shower in months, I was in T-shirt and shorts the road was greasy, you get the picture. Luckily I could still walk back to the hotel. The scooter was toast. The bus coming the other way also doing it's impression of the "greased floor shuffle", made sure of the scooter.

So even when you do nothing wrong you can still get hurt.

I've a friend with an old British Leyland lorry, has no synchromech, if you don't change gear just right at the right revs, the stick snaps back and breaks your wrist. You learn really really quickly how to best change gear.

The lorry is still going, first and only gear box, close to 1M miles on the clock and still no one's managed to kill it yet. Up for a challenge ;-)

Back in the '70's Honda made an automatic. I think it was about 400cc so not a tiny bike. But it wasn't very popular.

If you have poor coordination I don't think a motorcycle is a good idea. The riding MUST be automatic because 99% of your brainpower needs to be on processing the threats around you. You're in combat. They ARE trying to kill you - whether they know it or not.