Good Morning!!!! 55F @ 6:30AM. Sunny. High 64F. Winds NE at 10 to 15 mph.
Got a bit of a late start yesterday and didn't make it to the motorcycle shop that was to do the brake work until well after they opened. Everyone was already quite busy on all manner of projects; it is, after all, a full service shop for the older bikes. But I was soon introduced to Bart, their machinist, who would be turning the brake drums. He'd modified an old brake lathe to do the job, and soon had the first one turned. The other one wouldn't fit on his tooling, but after a consultation with the owner and a judicious application of heat, it went on and was also trued. But it took an arbor press to get it apart. Then it was off to a toolroom lathe to turn the shoes to the correct size for the refaced drums, but one pair of shoes was mis-matched so I got to see how new linings were riveted into place. At the next lift over, another mechanic was removing the exhaust system from an older airhead BMW, using lots of heat and penetrating oil because it was painted steel and badly rusted. The aluminum collars that threaded into the aluminum heads were galled in place, so instead of forcing it and stripping the threaded stubs on the head, he stopped and cut the collars off. When the tooling problem came up, the owner stopped, got out his inside micrometers, and used them to figure out what was wrong. Some hammering was done, but very little, and it became pretty clear that these guys knew what they were doing and they were doing a lot of it. Regardless, all the fooling around resulted in us missing lunch, and also in an outrageous bill, but I guess that's the price of work done well.
By that time it was 3:30 and the SF Bay Area freeways were beginning to clog up. The iPhone said there'd be problems until I got farther east, so instead of spending another night in the area I decided to head out. Immediately the iPhone (using the Google Maps app) headed me in what I thought was the wrong direction, then onto a non-moving freeway. But then it guided me to the next exit and surface streets that were moving, then back onto another slowly moving freeway. That went on for a few miles, then an exit to another surface street that was jammed and stopped. An immediate right turn onto what looked like a country road led to a portable illuminated sign that said something like "NO THRU TRAFFIC. RETURN TO FREEWAY". The phone said go, I thought WTF, and the next turn put us into a residential neighborhood. Caught up to a few cars at a "T" intersection, and the first two were making U-turns. ??? When I got closer I found a stop sign, with another sign below it with arrows pointing left and right under the red crossed circle, and "2 PM - 7 PM" under that. It was 4:30PM. The car in front of me made a left anyway, only to be flagged over by a motorcop parked on the other side of the intersection. I couldn't go left past the cop, I couldn't go right, so I made an awkward three point U-turn and got the heck out of there. The phone caught right up and guided me back to that same intersection, this time coming in from what would have been the right side, and I sailed right by the cop who had a very unfriendly look on his face. It was then that I realized that Google Maps was using the network to figure out where traffic had slowed and/or stopped, and was doing it's best (or worst, depending on your experience) to re-route around the obstructions. I figured out it the ensuing excitement wasn't worth the two or three minutes such maneuvers saved, and stuck to my normal route north. It was easily the worst rush hour traffic I'd ever been in. Classic slow-n-go with people jumping all over the gas pedal and jamming on the brakes. Two compacts sat in the central median with their hoods and rear ends rumpled and glass all over the ground, and shortly after a full blown fire truck with sirens and flashing lights was trying to get past everyone. We all parted like the Red Sea in front of Moses, at least as best we could, to let him by. Right about then it got dark, but that didn't help things any at all. It took two hours to cover what is usually a forty-five minute drive, all of it white knuckle, head-on-a-swivel, nerve wracking torment. About half way through this I was distracted by the dome light coming on everytime I hit the brakes; the passenger side door was ajar. Waited for the next moment of jammed traffic and took care of it, but it was a poor time to be dealing with yet another distraction. Finally made it home at 8:30PM, tired, hungry, and to no heat or wood in the house. Filled up the wood dolly and brought it in, microwaved some left overs, and settled down to a beer and the TV news. Man-o-man, am I glad I don't live in that rat race anymore. It gets worse everytime I visit, but it is a recurring reminder of why I left. There's no place like home...
I did get a note from the ebay fellow with the transmission part, asking if I could show him his other ads for similar parts. Eveidently someone else was placing the ads for him, and wasn't doing a very good job of it. I sent him a half dozen links, two of which were using the same inventory number for two obviously different parts. Last night I got a reply from him saying he'd found the right part and would send it out today, along with a pre-paid shipping label to return the wrong part.
Today I'll get the truck unloaded and figure out somewhere to store the new 11' 6" van awning, then see what kind of progress I can make on the old bike. Should be nice weather for it.
Happy Hump Day, Gang!
