Winter Riding

 The weather has changed drastically since November when I was out riding around in a T shirt . It snowed lightly the other night. It's been cold and damp.There were a couple days when I could get out and ride so I did.Been bringing my bikes in for inspection all month.I have 6 on the road right now and so far 5 are all inspected for 2025.The last one will be my 1965 Yamaha 250cc YDS3 .It's legal until the end of December so I can still use it if I want but I'm going to try to get a sticker on it this week .You just never know what this weather is going to do so I'm not putting it off.

Last week I did the 1969 Yamaha DS6C . It needed a new rear tire first so I went into my inventory and pulled out a new tire and tube. Got that job finished and took her in.After getting a sticker I took her out riding all over the place.I love riding in cool weather on my 2 strokes .They just love this cool dense air .It was about 40  degrees F out and after an hour or so my hands got kinda cold. Now I'm looking at heated motorcycle gloves with  rechargeable batteries. They aren't cheap but if I can get more winter riding time in the cost is worth it.I'm running out of time now.My life is getting shorter and shorter all the time . At 75 I have to get as much time to do what I love as I can. Shit, I've been riding this one motorcycle for 53 years !

So,today is a crappy day here in NY and looks like tomorrow is going to be one too.Guess I'll go down in the basement and work on the motorcycle parts inventory.Last winter I got about 75% of that job finished so this winter it should be pretty easy. It's so much easier for me now when I need to find a part.I just go in the book,find what number box it's in and go right for it. Everything is it numerical order in boxes that are uniform in size neatly packed on shelves organized by model.I've wanted to do this for years and finally in retirement I found the time.

 Now that it's all written in a book with the contents of each numbered box listed and they are all in order in dedicated spaces with the numbers on the shelf and the boxes I can find a part in minutes with out tearing the whole basement apart and wasting hours of time.With a bit of luck I'll be finished doing this job in early January so I can start building another bike out in the garage and find parts easily and in very little time. Today's work is to box up these signals and then some other parts for Yamaha R5 motorcycles.

Now if I can only find some people to buy parts from me .This is the real reason for doing this inventory job but it seems that interest in old bikes and old cars has peaked and is now in decline.I sure hope all this stuff doesn't end up in a dumpster when I'm dead and gone .Well, at least I'm having fun and enjoying the memories as I handle all this treasure.