XV920 "Short Bus": The Epitaph
Sorry folks, it's been a while. I went back to college, graduated, quit smoking, went back to college again, and a few seasons have come and gone since I logged in here.
So I should probably relate the story of why I don't have the Viragostrosity anymore. It's a long story*.
As you may recall, the Viragostrosity won BOTM, was a big hit on reddit, and got a few hundred thousand views on the image sharing site I'd hosted pics on. It was pretty cool - but there were a couple of things that still needed some work, and I have a GL1000 and a couple of enduros that were taking up a fair amount of my time, too. So I was riding the XV a day or two a week to work, kind of irritated that my math had been off and I was going to have to raise the pipes a little bit or build a new set entirely.
There's a gas station across from my office, and one morning on my way in to work, I stopped to top off the tank and grab a snack. And along with that normal stuff, another normal thing happened: When I got back outside to fire up my loud-ass motorcycle, the starter broke. Something sheared internally such that it would spin, but make no contact with the flywheel. Not even the Phil Waters signature "skeleton jerkin' off into a coffee can" noise - just a whirrrrr, and that was it. So I pushed it into a parking spot behind the building next door - I can see it from my office - and walked to work.
Then I joked with CharlieT that I should probably get it on a trailer before I took my family to visit the folks out West.
Then I stopped joking about it, and then I forgot to do it before we left. Then, after we got back, I forgot that it wasn't in the garage - I know that sounds really silly, but it was one of four motorcycles, and I hadn't been riding it that much anyway, and I was really starting to get into the swing of classes (which I would be doing at night after work for several months to wrap up a BS).
And I probably would have remembered it sooner or later if I hadn't gotten a letter from the State letting me know that it'd been towed away as abandoned.
Those of you who've watched this sordid saga from the get-go have seen me go back and forth on this bike: I never put much money into it, but it took me to the first Spring Thaw, and almost all the way home, and by the time it was done it was pretty rad looking. A couple of you donated parts - hell, Brad threw that whole front end in a box and foisted the responsibility on somebody else to get it to me when I missed Vintage Days. And at the end of the day, I built a pretty neat bike that only worked about once every five times, and when it came down to it, the thing was a fucking pain in the ass.
CharlieT has a guy apprenticing at Checkered Past - I haven't been able to come in as much this last several months, and he asked about the XV. So I called the tow yard and it turned out they'd scrapped it as they couldn't figure out what else to do with it. Kind of a sad ending for the thing, but you have to admit, it fits.
And I bet it made a terrible sound when they crushed it, like a skeleton jacking off into a coffee can.
See you in Kentucky.
* "My dad boned his mom."
"All right, it's a short story."