Karma AIN'T always a bitch!

I'm sitting here on the couch writing this with every single muscle in my body wrenched and aching and I am thrilled about it!  Why would anyone be thrilled that every muscle in their body hurts you may ask?  The reason simply is because the muscles all hurt but the bones aren't all broken!  I still have both of my legs and I walked from my bed to my couch, slow as it was, I still walked there! 

Never again will I complain about my bad luck, nor will I ever ask about when will Karma rear it's head and make its presence known because last night, muscle memory, nearly 30 years of riding motorcycles and the skills that I've acquired from those years, Karma and what I would have to say was the HAND OF GOD all appeared in a split second!  I've been a lot of things and I've done a lot of things in this life of mine so far, but for the very first time, last night, I became the hood ornament of a Mercedes Benz, a very, very expensive Mercedes Benz!

Those of you who know me or follow my writing know that as much as I'm known for making people laugh, I'm known for being brutally honest.  When I tell you this story you are going to say, NO FUCKING WAY, and as I've relayed this story so far, I find myself saying NO FUCKING WAY, you must be mistaken, you must be exaggerating, you must be completely full of shit or you must just be plain and simple, out of your friggin mind Jack!  Had there not been 20 witnesses who re-played the events in their own minds and shared them with me, I myself would not believe the event that transpired last night.  The crazy part is that from no matter what angle it was witnessed, no matter what position they were in when they heard the crunching of bike and body parts or where they were in the pack, everyone has the same details.  I can say this though, you forget just how good it feels to be alive right up until that is nearly taken from you and then you cherish it!  So what happened?  Well I'll tell ya!

Even now, nearly 11 hours later as I type this, I find myself still shaking my head in total disbelief.  Just as it's been for the last few months, on the first Friday of each month, we meet up over at HD of Scottsdale and take a ride down to the Dirty Dogg Saloon in Scottsdale for what we call First Friday.  With each First Friday ride that passes, the number of riders and attendees grows as the heat decreases.  Last night was probably the most bikes that we left the store with, the most beautiful weather that we've had so far and a fantastic mix of riders, it was perfect, what could go wrong and this was only the start of the night.  Hell, we were only riding like 8 miles on a crystal clear night.  We left the dealership on the same route we take each and every single time and were just rolling down the road, side by side 20 or more of us.  We had a green light as we approached the intersection and when I say green, I mean a long green light, not a light that just changed to green.  We entered the intersection as the Mercedes rolled up to it only slowing enough to make the right turn without losing control but never did the driver even attempt to stop and being so very close to the car, never did he even turn his head to look to see if anyone was coming.  So we are rolling about 45 -50 mph, I just crossed the cross walk and I'm on the right hand edge of the road, riding the line of the shoulder and there is now a big ass Mercedes in front of me!  I MEAN RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME!

By the grace of God, the rider next to me saw what was happening and shot over to the left.  I held my line as long as I could so as not to take out the bike but out of the corner of my eye, I could see that she had shot left and so did I!  When I tell you that I used every single muscle in my body to move that Road Glide left, I mean EVERY SINGLE MUSCLE.  I swear even my sphincter hurt and I may have squeezed so hard that I actually busted out a hemorrhoid and my eye sockets hurt.  I laid the bike over as far as I could left and we were in the intersection at the same time.  I knew in an instant that if I hit the brakes there would be no way on earth to stop the bike and it would change the rule of objects in motion tend to stay in motion and set the bike in to a wobble and I would have hit the car dead on, so instead, I kicked it down a gear, dumped the clutch and opened the throttle wide!  I managed to get even with the left front corner of the bumper and quarter panel when I felt and heard the crunch.  As the bumper came to meet the bike at the rear floor board I raised my leg up and over the front of the car and got near sideways in front of the car and I could feel myself getting pushed and damn near out of control but I never came off of the throttle and I managed to stay somehow even I guess in speed and direction of the car.  At no time ever, as the bikes behind us would later express did this asshole EVER touch his brakes even as he was pushing me through the second cross walk.  Maybe it was the fact that I never came off of the throttle, maybe it was the fact that I had the bars cut hard left or maybe it was the hand of God himself who gave me that little extra push that I needed but the bike stood straight back up and I got in front of the car with the bike in a full on wobble.  I spun around expecting to see the right side bag just obliterated or missing all together but it was there.  I looked down and expected to see my leg either hanging off or missing all together but it too was there.  I looked in to my mirror to see all the bikes sliding around both sides of the car and I could hear someone screaming "WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU" at the driver. 

My first instinct out in front of him was to raise my hand up, shake my fist and hold my middle finger up in the air.  All the bikes ended up out in front of the car, each flipping him off and I remained out front, shaking so hard that I thought the front end of the bike was wasted.  It took a few minutes to realize that I had my arms locked at the elbows and it was me who was shaking the front end.  I passed all the bikes who had shot over to the shoulder to hop off and help at the accident scene and just rolled ahead shaking my head in disbelief.  No matter how hard I tried, I could not stop shaking my head.  The next time I looked in the mirror, the Mercedes was gone!  I don't know if he made a U turn, if he made the next left or what he did, but that motherfucker was GONE!  As I rode to the bar at speeds from 5 - 50 mph and no rhyme or reason as to what speed I was currently traveling at, each rider rode up next to me, shaking their heads and making hand gestures with their fingers an inch or so apart, like fuck man, that was so close!  We arrived at the bar and my head was still shaking back and forth in total shock.  I got off the bike fully expecting to have to bungee closed what was left of my saddle bag and found no damage.  How the hell can that be?  I heard the crunch, other folks heard the crunch, WE ALL HEARD THE CRUNCH!  Upon closer inspection, the only marks on the bag were from end to end, all the road grime and dirt had been removed!  I could not even find a scratch in the paint.  I found some black marks on the air cleaner and the rear floorboard had been pushed up straight but that was it, how could that be?  Each time that I went outside the bar to smoke, I would see people gathered around the right side of the bike looking for the damage that I must have missed but they too only found the same things I did, virtually nothing.....

YES, REALLY, THIS IS ALL THAT HAPPENED!  A streak of unknown black shit on the air cleaner cover and the dirt removed on the saddle bag!  Madness, just plain madness!


As we screwed around in the bar for the next few hours, person after person walked up and just laughed and said, "how's it feel to be alive?"  "God had your back man" and "get your ass to church and then race over to the casino, now!"  All I knew was that I was alive and it felt amazing!  Every sense in my body was at full attention and although my back felt a bit strange and I was walking funny, I felt pretty damn good.  Well pretty damn good until my mass endorphin rush began to subside and with each passing minute that it did, I got more and more sore and more and more stiff!  I guess that I never got my leg fully over the bumper as I thought I did because now it hurt like a som-bitch!  My back muscles were so wrenched that I could barely raise my arms and my right arm at the elbow clicked with each movement!  I could not stand for more than a few minutes at a time and when I sat, it felt like lightning bolts were shooting from my right leg to my neck.  The real kicker was that I just didn't care, I was alive and I was in-tact!  For what I had just gone through that in and of itself was a miracle and I'll be forever grateful that my good Karma finally showed the hell up and paid off its long over due balance! 

My trip to Cali for the weekend is off and I could care less because I am alive to do it any time that I want!  I won't ever complain, you will never hear it or read it from me again about my shitty luck or wondering when Karma will appear.  We always think of Karma in the aspect of paybacks, you know, Karma will catch up to his ass and then he'll get what he deserves.  We never think of our good Karma, what we put out in the world and it coming back to us, but I'm thinking of it now!  Like I always say, live each and every single day to the fullest as we never know if it will be our last!

Until we see each other on the road again,

Keep the wind in your face,
Tits in your back
and The Man Off Your ASS!

..... and don't become a hood ornament on a Mercedes

Your friend,
Jack Shit