Here’s a short-ish story about my old motard-modified Honda XR650L. I bought this bike new in 1994, intentionally planning to make it a motard. That year there was only one factory-made motard available, the very first generation KTM Duke. A friend of mine living in Minneapolis had purchased one and loved it, but within the first few hundred miles the needle fell off its speedo (all speedos were mechanical then) and was rattling around the bottom of the instrument, and there were no KTM dealers in Duluth, a far smaller town than Minneapolis. So I decided to try and make one out of the then first-year-released Honda XR650L. After working on it for two years (funding limits) I had the little wheels made by Buchannan’s Wheels, a big front brake, shortened forks, and a shorter shock. Plus, different taller-geared sprockets. Everything came together with stiffer pre-shaped foam inside the saddle and a few other changes and soon I was learning how to do nice stoppies in traffic and use its overall ‘entertainment’ potential.  It wasn’t fast, but was good enough for city use and commuting, and spectacular on bumpy surface streets, which we have a lot of here (Duluth Minnesota) due to the hard winter road damage. Now it’s twenty-nine years later and unbelievably the Honda company is still producing this same exact model with essentially zero updates or technical changes. In a few months, this bike will have been in production for thirty years. Which is completely unbelievable. In August of 2001, I decided to see if I could take a longer trip on it, packing very light, riding backroads, and camping. Almost nobody was taking long trips on smaller bikes then. My own travel and highway bike at that time was a BMW 1000cc boxer. I rode the little Honda 650L from here to LA and back. No problems. Wonderful trip. Got pulled over once for speeding in a canyon somewhere but only got a warning. Camping was primitive, due to packing very light. Did not carry even a stove. Didn’t miss it. The funniest thing about this bike was during the first year or two after I lowered it and put the little wheels on it, several of my local riding friends looked carefully at the results of my work and then very seriously asked me: “Why did you ruin a perfectly good dirt bike?” All I could do was shrug my shoulders and smile. Most riders at that time had no idea what a motard-style bike was. -- Mr. Subjective, October 2023 PS - Because my Honda 650L motard was specifically purchased to be modified and employed as a small-town daily utility-transportation ride and commuter, and not for speed or higher performance, it still has its stock, stupid and fairly quiet muffler. *shrug* Do you have a ‘Long Service Model’ story?  Send it to us here. We’d like to read it. This is one such story. PPS – This substack essay is about the disappearance of high-quality window ‘box fans’, because air conditioning became more affordable and universal. This essay actually relates fairly closely to maintaining and riding a long-service model motorcycle like my ancient Honda XR650L. When I started in college a long time ago, I bought myself a medium-quality window box fan, and just like the Honda I still have it. Despite its age and ordinariness, this fan is much better quality than the box fans sold today. Mine probably came from a Target or Walgreens store and was no more special in its day than the box fans those stores sell today. Assuming they still sell box fans. For many summers I had it placed in an open window in the guest bedroom of my apartment, running on a lamp timer set switch it on in the evening. It would run unattended all night exhausting warm air, and this system kept the place comfortable as the cool evening ‘in’ airflow entered via open windows on the north side of the living room and larger bedroom.  At some point, this fan’s electric motor failed so I took the grill off one side and removed the motor. Then I took the motor to the parts counter at a business called “Melke Electric” which is an industrial electrical contractor place. They either had or ordered (I don’t remember) a similar electric motor, which I used to replace the one that failed. That fan is still with me, though I don’t currently have a use for it. I was surprised to find this young kid’s substack essay lamenting the commercial obsolescence and disappearance of moderately high-quality box fans like mine. As an ‘old guy’ now, I am surrounded by old stuff accumulated with some effort during my lifetime. I have a quite nice box fan, now about fifty years old. Mostly metal, including the blades. A better electric motor than the one it came with. Probably the motor, frame, and blades all were made here. It’s almost embarrassing. Wait. Not almost. It is embarrassing. PPPS – Going from three simple stamped aluminum box fan blades to molded plastic or (even better) ultralight ultra-stiff compound-curved, pressure-molded carbon fiber fan blades, shaped to biomimic the evolved and highly specialized aerodynamic wings found in nature on ultra-quiet predator birds like owls, would greatly increase airflow efficiency and reduce the noisy propeller thrum of my old slide rule-engineered aluminum-bladed box fan. Today’s digitally-controlled higher quality electric motors are surely more efficient than the motor in my fan as well. A higher quality old-fashioned thing does not mean new versions of that thing must necessarily be of lower quality. Had air conditioning never been invented, many of the box fans being produced today would be of better quality.

Step One: Create a terrific product which answers a question almost nobody is asking. Something entirely new which meets a need few people are interested in meeting...

It just hit me again last night and this morning, and it keeps coming back. Essays, news, emails. Story after story, year after year. Real-time life experiences. This so-called generational ‘divide’. The young digitally-fluent generations don’t understand how to navigate yesterday’s analog realms too well, while the older analog-fluent geezers struggle to handle today's computerized technologies. This is hardly news, and of course, there are a few polymathy exceptions. Those scattered extraordinary people living among us who are equally comfortable in both worlds. And like almost everything else, we all fall along this spectrum somewhere. I self-estimate I’m about 2/3rds analog-fluent and 1/3rd digital-fluent. A guess. This year I am sixty-six. When I was seventeen the digital stuff was room-sized IBM 360s and Fortran cards. Everything else was analog (in HS I was taught how to use a slide rule) but the future was clear. Analog was history. My best childhood friend Bill was a straight-A student and an Eagle Scout. We were almost perfect opposites. He was ‘born old’ and I’ve never quite grown up still. I was an undistinguished student who never made it past the scout rank of second class but sure loved going camping. His career involved computers and software and mine involved sewing motorcycle riding suits. We remain close friends to this day, but we’re far apart on the digital-analog fluency spectrum. The first explanation of the relationship between digital and analog that made sense to me was something I read in a self-published staple-bound book(let) attempting to teach improved off-road riding skills. I don’t remember its title but the year was 1971 and the key section was about something the author called the “Push-push-bang-bang-servo-technique.”  It was very simple. Imagine a grid with two indexes. Up the left side was increasing force. Across the bottom was moving forward time. Now draw a diagonal line starting at the lower left corner (where the two indexes meet) upward toward the upper right corner. This is a visual analog description of how a force increases at a steady rate across a period of time. Now zoom into the diagonal line. Zoom in really tight. Pixel tight. What you’ll see is that the diagonal line is actually a series of tiny steps. One up, one over, looking like a microscopic stairway. That is a digital description of something analog – the diagonal line. One up and one over, ones and zeros. This was a dirt bike guy explaining the neural feedback loops riders use to apply force to the handlebars and brakes. Press a little and in a microsecond decide if it is enough to cause the effect you want and if it isn’t press again a little harder and re-evaluate. Continuous unconscious infinitesimal one-up-one-over feedback loops that allow you to trail-brake, feather a clutch, or do a donut or wheelie. Beneath our conscious awareness, everything is digitally describable. Fifty years ago it was this guy writing a pamphlet about how to ride a dirt bike faster and smoother and today it’s Steven Wolfram’s magnum opus about how everything in the universe is digitally describable in fractal equations. Or this Quantum Gravity Research theory of everything (watch on YouTube). Here’s a short story involving analog fluency from November of last year. Five years ago I’d parked my old Honda XR650L without any special preparation and recently wanted to re-activate it. This involved all the usual resurrection restoratives (fresh engine oil, a gummed-up carb cleanout, front, and rear brake rebuilds, fresh gas, and a new battery) and after all this, ‘voila!’ it came back to life. Several knit-picks still needed attention, though, the first being a sticky-icky-gritty turn signal switch. This was disassembled, cleaned, re-lubricated, and reassembled just before parking the bike for the winter. All of the nano-details of that job were described in this blog at the time, the point being I did not need a service manual to take on the project. I just knew what to do. Walk over to the bike with a screwdriver and start taking pieces apart and cleaning them, then lubricate and reassemble. No big deal, but satisfying all the same. Getting this bike ready the following spring involved two more little analog jobs: I took the sticky throttle apart and cleaned, lubricated, and re-assembled it. Now it snaps back like the bike was brand new again. This bike is 26 years old and its twist-grip assembly had never been cleaned. I also bled the rear brake (again) using one of the EZ Bleeders we sell which I had purchased many years ago. I think this was about the third or fourth time I’d used this simple tool. With these two jobs done the bike is now (a mere six years after being unceremoniously parked!!) fully ready to go back into daily service. Which is as exciting to me as if it were a brand-new just-purchased machine. This kind of little-kid excitement never gets old. - Mr. Subjective, 2019 PS - After finishing this story I liked how it came out well enough so I sent it to a couple of old friends (the key word here is: ‘old’) thinking they might also like it. Their replies: “Maybe five years ago I had to take the carb off my 650L in a hotel parking lot at night, in order to clean out the plugged idle jet. It was the evening before a big group ride, and I was pissed that I hadn’t taken care of this earlier. So I was working quietly and furiously with clenched teeth, just wanting to be done so I could relax with a beer and the rest of the guys. After a while, I looked up, and there, standing behind me in total silence were six or eight riders under 40 years old. I don’t think they’d ever seen the inside of a carburetor. It was like they were watching someone perform simultaneous open-heart and brain surgery in a parking lot. They actually applauded when the bike started, ran, and idled.” Mark L. Mark, a few years ago I had the same experience changing a tire’s tube on the side of a well-traveled road. Several people stopped to ask if I needed help, and after I said I didn't, some drove on but three younger ones stayed, simply to watch. And: “…My grandson, for example, commutes 12 months a year on a mountain bike or eBike (RadMini), he is into rock climbing, wall jumping, marathons, kickboxing, and all kinds of stuff I’ve never heard of and has lots of friends doing the same kinds of things. I’d put riding a bike 7 miles one way in a Minneapolis January over anything I’ve ever seen a hippobike rider do, adventure-wise. He sucks at maintenance, though. His eBike is in my garage waiting for a motor replacement. He beat it to death in 8 months. We did a full service on his mountain bike last weekend and it was pretty hammered, too. ;-)” Tom D.

A fair number of our customers agree about one looking like a dork/Road Grimed Astronaut if riding for transportation and utility, vs. when riding primarily for sport and recreation. These two different-but-related applications have at least this in common: they both involve a single-track motorized vehicle. In rich countries like America, transportation/utility/commuting riders generally do both kinds of riding, but most motorcyclists ride more exclusively for sport and recreation. This makes a lot of sense for a lengthy list of strong cultural and logistical reasons. Evaluating the risks of motorcycling-in-general through the lens of utility and transportation riding is difficult to sort out concisely, but still worthwhile. An important paradox is how we become better risk managers in all things, the more we do the thing. This means as we increase our overall motorcycling risk exposure by riding more, the better we become at managing and mitigating the various risks involved. But beyond that, the relative and comparative risk landscape for this type of riding has changed dramatically during the years I’ve been riding, worsening despite important improvements in protective gear and great motorcycle technology and performance advances. There are many components to this motorcycle-relative-to-automobile statistical worsening. Here are a few, not listed in any order of priority: Automobiles have become tremendously safer due to the development of required passive and active safety systems, beginning with easy-to-use seat belts during the 1970s. Roads have become far more crowded. Most rider accident scenarios that produce serious injuries and deaths involve another vehicle. More drivers (as a percentage of all drivers) are not driving as well as in the past because of underlying factors including increased risk-compensation behavior due to the above-mentioned passive safety systems becoming universal, of being better insulated from (and more oblivious to) their immediate surroundings (cars became better sealed climate-controlled ‘capsules’), of there being more compelling distractions inside the vehicle, and probably also because of an increased percentage of marginally skilled and poorly trained drivers becoming licensed and having access to an automobile. In collisions, cars and light trucks have become riskier to riders because of the increased popularity of taller and more slab-sided vehicle shapes. Changes in road architecture and surrounding infrastructure has made driving safer while doing the opposite for motorcycle riders. Typically, making roads easier to drive causes drivers to pay less attention to their surroundings, and also adding roadside barriers to help cars and drivers during crash scenarios usually increases harm to riders during motorcycle crash scenarios. So compared to driving, riding is now relatively riskier than it was forty years ago. This may be one reason (of several) why the X, Millennial and Y generations have not been adopting riding in as large of numbers as Boomers did. Those younger generations may not have broken down riding’s increased risks as I have described above, but they know by both intuition and cultural meme it’s become riskier. This may be part of the reason they don’t want it as much as I did. They perfectly recognize and appreciate its pleasures, benefits, and coolness, but it is not enough.The importance of acquiring the fluency and risk-management experience that comes only with increased ride frequency cannot be overstated, but acquiring this risk-mitigator is a lot harder today than it was when Boomer-riders were starting to ride in large numbers fifty years ago.  Nevertheless, it still can be done. Here’s a concrete example: If someone pulls out from a side street directly in front of a rider, or turns left in front of an oncoming rider at precisely the exact-to-the-microsecond wrong moment, the bike and the car will collide. Same for a random deer suddenly leaping out of the forest at the exact-to-the-microsecond wrong time. No matter what gear the rider is or isn’t wearing, or the age and type of motorcycle they are riding, they are going to experience some level of impact. But — and this is ultra-important — there are risk-mitigating things riders can do which dramatically lower their statistical chances of experiencing one of these scenarios.For situations where approaching drivers may be violating a rider’s right-of-way at exactly the wrong time, riders can tactically reduce the risk of a collision when they: Ride the speed limit, not faster. Wear bright clothing and a bright helmet. Add and use auxiliary lighting. (I prefer a single asymmetrically* located additional light, believing this looks more visually anomalous, and thus more irritatingly noticeable. Research indicates any additional forward lighting is a bit more noticeable if it is yellow or amber colored. *Meaning positioned relative to the low headlight beam at about 10AM, 2PM, 4PM or 7-8PM, and not at 3PM, 6PM, or 9PM.) Wiggle the bike side-to-side slightly for a couple of seconds if it seems like an approaching driver may not be seeing the rider. Ride only sober, and always in a relaxed yet subliminally slightly paranoid frame of mind. Automatically and unconsciously position one’s bike in the lane(s) and relative to other traffic so as to be more easily noticed. Automatically pay acute micro-attention to other vehicles' micro-movements which may indicate they are about to violate one’s right of way. Ride an unfaired and un-windshielded bike to visually appear more irregular in silhouette and more human in profile. Never rely on “eye contact” with other drivers because they can be looking directly at you and still not see you. Whenever possible choose routes one is more familiar with. Commuting on familiar roads with familiar and more predictable types of surrounding traffic makes a difference. Also, whenever possible choose optimal times of day. 2 AM bar-close is a poor time to be riding, and ‘rush hour’ is similarly riskier than at other times. Choosing optimal weather is a factor. Snow, ice, rain, and fog are all riskier times to be riding. (Do as I say, not as I do…) Ride the same familiar bike for years and maintain it well. Regularly practice ‘emergency’ riding skills like aggressive swerving and braking. For the deer jumping out of the forest scenario, there are other things one can do to reduce this risk, but with both exactly-at-the-right-time-in-the-wrong-place situations, the higher risk of riding never goes to zero. It may be reducible by 99.87% (or whatever…), but it never goes to zero. I like to think about the senior commercial airline pilot ‘Sully‘ Sullenberger who famously landed his jet full of passengers on the Hudson River after losing both engines shortly after takeoff.  He’d probably done that exact same take-off scenario (without losing engine power) maybe 5,000 times (a guess) over a career-long time span. The risks involved were never zero, but close, and when that one-in-a-few-million event occurred, he did essentially all of the best possible things, which worked out pretty well for him and his passengers. He knew how to use his plane and knew that particular familiar location extremely well.Despite recent measurably increased risks of riding, the above list of tactical risk mitigators lowers the overall risk of transportation and utility motorcycling to an acceptable level for most riders in most riding locations. For me, this type of riding is always going to be worth it, at least knock-on-wood so far. It’s still the best part of my day. But should I ever be badly injured or become disabled because of being on my motorcycle in the wrong place at exactly the wrong time, all bets are off. As many novelists, screenwriters, poets, and others have built their compelling stories around, you can never perfectly project how you’ll actually feel about some kinds of things until you are experiencing them. That’s life. (Also a good Frank Sinatra song lyric.)Lastly, in addition to my ongoing usual daily commuting and utility riding, this new year I hope to again get back to a little more recreational riding. Especially exploring interesting roads, trails, and places involving motorcycle camping. It’s been a couple of years since I last did this type of riding because of my stupid fear of the stupid pandemic/plague. - Mr. Subjective, January 2023

The First Ride... Photo: Daimler Reitwagen. Wladyslaw, CC BY-SA 2.0 DE <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/de/deed.en>, via Wikimedia Commons. November of 1885, 17-year-old Paul Daimler went for a motorcycle ride on the first ICE engine motorcycle, the Daimler Reitwagen (built by his father, Gottlieb Daimler, and Wilhelm Maybach). The date he made this ride is up for debate with some reporting that it was on November 10th and others on November 18th. No matter the exact date, it is an important milestone in motorcycling history. When was your first ride? Check out our own "firsts" in these past blog posts: Balancing Act My first bicycle was a 20” Huffy. Deep candy red with white pinstripes on its triangle-shaped fenders. I remember it so perfectly because this was the bike I first learned how to balance without training wheels... Read more » I Forgot. My first bicycle was a 20” Huffy. Deep candy red with white pinstLast week was the first time I rode on the back of a motorcycle in more than ten years. It was the first time I rode with my husband, Aerostich’s “Mr. Subjective”, whose life revolves around the activity... Read more » First Ride: Easy, Fun, Cool! Despite our record-breaking El Niño winter warmth right now here it’s six-tenths of a degree below zero (ºf) and there’s a Zero electric motorcycle silently sitting outside in the driveway, asleep save for a small green ‘I’m charging now’ LED blinking at the base of the speedo... Read more » Your First Bike Trip The first few days of travel and dealing with the straps, soft duffels and bags will teach you if your setup is good for you. The idea is to have things secure, semi-easy to get to, and not too much of a problem to remove... Read more »

VerschlimmbessernGerman verb, loose translation: To make something worse by trying to improve it. Long a favorite word of mine, though I've never known exactly how to pronounce it or use it in any actual conversation. Two forms, verb and noun version, neither of which I know how to say or use. But in our modern world, as we get older we become aware of more and more examples of it from life and the things around us. I've thought quite a bit about this. It’s sure true for me when this involves stuff like blue jeans and hopefully also one piece riding suits. I’m fairly convinced that wherever and whenever new technology gives us something, it always takes away something else. (If this wasn’t true, most philosophers would be out of work. Wait. Most are out of work...uhh.) For example, fuel injected motorcycles start and drive better, and get better mileage. But they are not as easy to hands-on tune without specialized tools compared to a carbureted bike. And the engines they feed don’t quite kick and snort in an almost animalistic way sometimes, like a (forever slightly imperfectly) carbureted engine does. And injection costs more to produce and operate when everything involved from raw materials upward is considered. Carbs are simple, elemental, and difficult to improve in certain ways, just like a hand-spun wool sweater or flint-knapped knives. Some of those flint blades can actually be measurably sharper than today's very best and sharpest surgical scalpels. It’s very hard to think of an example of a technology that does not take away just about as much as it gives. What makes an 'improvement' seem to be so involves our priorities as the consumers of whatever the technology in question is. We value easier starting, smoother running and more fuel-efficient engines a whole lot more than what is provided by carburetors. The consumer economy loves a product that sells at a premium, wears out quickly or is susceptible to regular improvement, and offers with each improvement some marginal gain in usefulness. Novelist Johnathan Franzen, Atlantic Monthly, April 1996 With blue jeans, it’s not so easy or clear cut. Does the decorative stitching applied increase the aesthetic appeal of a pair of designer jeans improve the level of attention paid to the shapes and contours of our bottoms, and in ways that benefit us? I think the answer involves our individually unique desires and objectives about how we want to present ourselves a certain way to those around us. In other words, fashion. AKA: Coolness. Style. Personally, I’ve generally presented myself to those around me more-or-less as a ‘purist’, ‘classicist’ and ‘truth seeker’, so I enjoy wearing plain original Levi’s 501s. But others have very legitimate and different goals when it comes to their jeans, so for them decorative stitching is an improvement which provides more than it takes away. Art (in this example, decorative stitching) can enhance and improve things in the service of utility when the way such things are defined is opened wide enough. Thus we have all the annually “improved” and redesigned versions of textile armored rider’s gear. You don’t see this when it involves classic black leather ‘biker’ jackets or basic denim jeans, and there is a reason. The market doesn’t want them new or improved. But there’s always a strong audience for people who enjoy chasing the latest-greatest whatever, whether it involves breakfast cereals, number 2 pencils, laundry soaps, computers or motorcycles and riders’ gear. In our view, armored textile ‘high tech’ riding gear isn’t like computers and motorcycles.  It’s a bit closer to a good nutritious breakfast cereal or a well-made pencil. When we started making armored textile gear it was a new kind of gear for serious daily commuters and long-distance traveling riders. It still is. -- Mr. Subjective Illustration from the 1986 Aerostich catalog. The Aerostich Roadcrafter was an all-new type of rider's gear introduced in 1983 - the world's first lightweight armored all-weather coverall intended to be worn over street clothing. The Roadcrafter, R-3, Darien and AD1 are embodiments of an original recipe which virtually all of today's "high tech" gear was derived from. There were no existing reference points when these garments were created, which is one reason why they are light and simple compared to the universe of derived copies. More About Our Originals » Dictionary stuff, found on the internet:Components – schlimm (fatal) + verbessern (improve) Verb that describes the attempt to improve or repair something and only making it worse in the process. Think of repairing bicycles and nuclear submarines with Scotch® tape. Whether "Trust me, I'm an engineer" or "There, I fixed it", these memes can all be summarized with this beautiful German verb. And it doesn’t just refer to honorable, but futile, DIY endeavors. Fractured phonetic pronunciation: 'Fair-shlim-bes-sen' or 'Ver-slim-bes-son' Fractured English usage of the verb form: "He is going to fair-shlim-beson that bike's rear suspension if he tries to do much more to it than has already been done." Fractured English usage of the noun form: "My new one-piece rider’s suit (or a Darien 'adventure suit' purchased from any manufacturer other than Aerostich) is a ver-lim-bes-son’d R-3 Stich’ (or Darien suit). Why did I buy it?"

Two high-mile riders meet: Brook Dain (left) and Paul Pelland at the Aerostich store and factory in June 2022. Brook Dain and Paul Pelland. Click to view full size image. What do these guys have in common? Both Brook and Paul ride a lot more than the average rider (basically every day), and they use Aerostich gear.  One chooses a Vespa scooter and the other a Yamaha Super Tenere, yet it’s no coincidence both depend on Aerostich gear for its long-term value as functional equipment.  When they each rolled up here simultaneously, coming from two different directions, it was a coincidence, so we made introductions, took some photos and shared stories (and a nice lunch). Experienced high-mile riders appreciate better fitting all-day-comfortable gear that works and holds up. This means easy to use real-world-useful pockets, great functional venting and serious protection for hard rain and possible crash scenarios. Plus repair services if needed. Brook was an Aerostich ‘Rider of the Month’ a few months ago and is on a 3,000 mile loop around the western side of America, from home to home.  Paul is around the 500,000th mile of his million-mile ‘Chasing the Cure' for MS ride and stopped in because we were on his route home as well.  You may have met Paul at a motorcycle event or IMS show. He suffers from MS, which is why he’s donating his life to this cause, and has been partly sponsored by both Aerostich and Yamaha. He’d also be happy to have your support. Road directions to visit us are here. We’d love to show you around and help you examine the full selection of Aerostich gear.  We have (at this moment) about 153 R-3 one piece suits in stock, and another several hundred other models of Aerostich suits, jackets and pants in the store. Suits come in more than 60 stock sizes and our fitting experts will take measurements if you require alterations or would like a sewn-to-order garment in a custom color combination. Factory tours are always free, and this (recently gentrified) neighborhood now has several nice places to eat within a block or two.   If you visit, we cannot guarantee you’ll meet riders like Brook and Paul, but we can guarantee you won’t be disappointed in the gear or our service. -- Mr. Subjective PS - There’s a 10% discount for ALL purchases made here, and we ship your old gear home on the day of your choice at no charge.

After experiencing three days of sweltering 98º highs during the BMW Motorcyle Owners Of America’s National Rally in Springfield Missouri, I headed homeward riding up state route sixty-five. First stop, lunch in Sedalia. Temp still 98-99º. Sticky hot. By Iowa it was down to 87º and comfortable enough. At Minneapolis, 83. Very comfortable. All those miles of comfortable-ness made me want to keep going even though I was getting tired. Bike working well. Enjoying the ride, etc. Last gas stop was at Stacey, just north of Forest Lake. Still warm and comfortable at 10:45PM.Those who have spent any amount of time in northern MN during the early part summer already know what happens next. By Hinkley, I began to sense there may be a problem. By Finlayson, I was thinking I might see snow by Barnum, or maybe Carlton. Though this felt like a real possibility, thanks to the keen Aerostich-sourced digital thermometer stuck to the handlebars I could see it was still eleven degrees too warm at only 43º. Riding along in a T-shirt and vented leather Aerostich Transit jacket after spending the last twelve hours (and prior four days) in upper 90’s air, this digital temperature information was small consolation.Nearly an hour later I finally started to feel a little better after spending several minutes quietly standing under a nearly-scalding stream of hot shower water.– Mr. Subjective, June 19, 2022, a stubborn long-time rider of ‘naked’ motorcycles.PS – If you visited us at this event, thank you!PPS – If you are thinking of visiting us here in Duluth MN via an unfaired motorcycle, the best times are between mid-July and mid-September.

A famous old saying goes: “Nothing clarifies the mind like standing before a firing squad.” The last couple of years have been like that for more than a few of us. Hopefully we’re now on the far side of a fading pandemic. Surviving this plague (…so far anyway) has made me grateful and wanting Aerostich to focus more sharply on areas we’ve always been most interested in. One is making as long-term enduring products as possible. Typically sales are grown via the continuous introduction of ‘new-and-improved’ variations. Everything from laundry soap to fast-food items and motorcycle rider’s gear is commonly reformulated to increase sales. Though there are many exceptions, this business tactic is nearly universal because it works so well. Incremental improvements to Aerostich products are continuous, but our signature items are more like long-enduring successful products such as Levi’s 501 Button Fly Jeans, McDonald’s Big Mac sandwiches, and (in our field) Langlitz, Schott, and Belstaff motorcycle rider’s jackets. The technical rider’s gear from these businesses was first created to be worn as riders’ equipment, not fashion. Yet each soon became fashionable. Our synthetic-fiber abrasion-resistant armored gear represents another genuine rider’s gear advance and thus belongs within that timeline. Photo: Customer commend card from 1992, and accompanying letter. Click to download PDF version. When a market for anything new is created, later-entering businesses depend on coolness, fashion and style to sell their products. This means much of today’s rider’s gear is more like the specialized fashion clothing presented in ski and snowboard shops, which is revised annually with new colors (colorways) and design details intended to help boost sales. Selling ’new and improved’ is always tempting regardless of the functional value of what usually are trivial changes. One cannot easily improve a Langlitz, Schott, Belstaff, or Aerostich garment despite strident marketing claims otherwise. Our experience has proven that simpler and lighter and armored textile gear wears and works better over a long term. The Aerostich Darien, AD-1, R-3, Falstaff, and Roadcrafter Classic are each as lightweight, comfortable and functional as we can make them. And are sold without reference to fashion. They are gear-as-equipment, and we hope to continue doing the necessary business-discipline things well enough to be able to continue providing this gear for as long as riders want to wear it. So, what is new and improved at Aerostich? Like most manufacturing businesses we’ll always have a small wish list of things we someday hope to develop. Like an entirely new off-road jacket design which is complete and graded but has never been produced. It’s different from the Darien and might be better for some types of off-road riders. We also have plans for non-clothing items, including a revolutionary DIY bike service tool, and a new kind of structural fabric product which would be useful for protecting any bike, ATV or small side-by-side. And there’s more. Someday, and if all goes well for us, we’ll be able to introduce them. You probably understand how tough it is competing when making things in America. There are good companies from A to Z doing their design and marketing work in America with the actual production contracted to overseas manufacturers. Our business exists for many reasons, but my top three are: I wanted a kind of self-identity which involved having a small business, and I wanted to make stuff. Actual physical stuff. I enjoy the design and R&D work a great deal, but mainly as part of a vertical process which involves us making and selling stuff. I wanted to be able to ride my motorcycle more frequently, safely and comfortably, and drive a car less. It’s that simple, and in that order, too. I’ve never had a problem with consumers who desire the latest/greatest gizmo or fashion, but there is also nothing wrong with long-proven classics like Langlitz, Belstaff, and Schott jackets, Levi’s 501 denim pants or Big Mac sandwiches. And there’s nothing wrong (and a lot that is right) with Aerostich gear. Especially when it involves riding more, in a wider diversity of situations and weather conditions. If you’ve read this far and have never tried Aerostich gear, try it. There is a difference. You will not be disappointed. This is who we’ve always wanted to be as a business. - Mr. Subjective, May 2022

Last year an elderly friend emailed to inform me he’d decided to finally stop riding. A few months later he emailed me again about how he was missing it more than he’d anticipated and now was looking for one of those little (and somewhat hard to find) retro 250cc Suzuki’s, the TU250X. Those good machines have a small following in moto-geezer land but I’ve never especially been a fan. Should I be fortunate enough to make it to this elderly friends age, I’d probably go for something less conventional. Maybe a fat-tired 125cc Suzuki VanVan, or as a second option the similarly fat-tired Yamaha TW200. VanVans are slightly more high tech, being fuel injected, and both machines feature electric starting, low saddles and a fairly light weight. These things are unconventional enough so if one parked mid-trip at a rural roadhouse and the machine was piled with camping and travel gear, and was wearing an out of state plate, you’d surely get occasional questions like: “You rode that here? From Minnesota? Really?” This sort of attention makes any long trip more amusing, and a VanVan’s fattie tires might turn out to be both softer riding and safer for navigating into the nooks and crannies where you usually find interesting hidden places to stealth and poach camp and escape. My TU 250-seeking friend no longer camps.  Some of the coolest rides I’ve learned about involved bikes which were wildly inappropriate for the planned journey. Examples include those Australian postal-delivery bikes (Honda Cubs?) being ridden from Melbourne to Manchester, and Honda Rukus’s being ridden from Washington DC to Fairbanks, and then on to Los Angeles. This slow-boat-to-China touring method makes a lot of sense for young riders with more free time than money, as well as for elderly geezers living on Social Security with age-diminished skills and abilities.  John G. is now a few years past eighty and each summer he still rides all over the country aboard a small machine modified for long trips with a top box (for his little dog ‘Moose’) and windshield. Last year he was on his second TU250X and for this year he’s looking at further downsizing to Honda’s new 125cc version of the Cub. All his gear is carried inside one enormous waterproof duffel resting sideways across the passenger area of the saddle. He doesn’t camp and I’m sure it’s a challenge for him to lug it from the motel parking lot into a room. Which is another reason to favor old-fashioned tourist courts consisting of a strip of small rooms where you park directly in front of each room door. These ma-and-pa places are inexpensive, the room’s windows usually open, and though standards vary greatly, each is dependably unique. I love staying at those places too. During a typical 300 mile day John frequently pulls over to the side of any road at random times to shamelessly pee even as traffic whizzes past, and also to give Moose the same opportunity. It’s fun riding behind them as there’s a softball sized hole in the lid of the dog’s blanket-lined top box and every minute or two Moose pops his head up for a look and a sniff, then just as quickly disappears, unintentionally doing a hilariously perfect Whack-a-Mole impression. John G. and his dog, Moose. The best example of this kind of elder-logic touring was a guy I met at Milwaukee’s ‘Rockerbox’ motorcycle festival about ten years ago. Every summer a neighborhood there blocked off this shady side street for about half a mile and thousands of riders would come from Chicago to Madison and everywhere in between. They’d show up to ogle each other’s machines, make friends and enjoy themselves. It’s the same spontaneous vibe as the Twin Cities ‘Blind Lizard’ gathering of riders on Nicollet Island every summer on Father’s Day, and the annual ‘Bearded Lady Motorcycle Freak Show’ street event later in the summer in the Uptown neighborhood. Such slow-motion motorcyclist flash mobs started happening decades before cell phones existed, so if you’ve never been to one, find out where and when, and go. Back at the Rockerbox I’d become tired after so much walking and sat down on a bench in front of a friendly-looking neighborhood corner bar, to rest and soak in more of the warm summer afternoon and sweet atmosphere of passing people and motorcycles. A few minutes passed and an older man with an elfish smile sat down next to me. He was a wiry sort, and clearly enjoying himself as much as I was, so I started our conversation: “Did you ride here?” “Yes, I did, Yes!” “What do you ride?” He pointed to a generic moped parked about twenty feet from the bench, center-standed right on the sidewalk. It was not like any moped I’d ever seen, either. This one was fully outfitted for long-distance travel by a resourceful dumpster-diving type customer. Stuff was tied all over it in the classic haphazard Joad-family-Grapes-of-Wrath fashion, but there was also an undercurrent of method to the madness. On top of everything a one-gallon plastic lawn mower gas can was tied on with a single rubber bungee through its molded handle. Beneath that were plastic bags, pots and pans, canteens and a sleeping bag all tied with a mix of bailing twine, bungees and whatever else could be found. I gazed at this unlikely arrangement of Salvation-Army meets Army-Surplus store camping detritus for a long moment, taking it all in, and then said: “Wow! What a cool rig. That’s awesome!” I meant every word. It was easily one of the most incredible machines at the event.  “So where did you come from?” I asked, innocently. “Minneapolis.” The old elf replied, with a wide grin and a twinkle in his eye. We were about four hundred miles away from there. “No kidding! Really! Wow…So how long did it take you to get here?” “Three days.” “Wow. Holy sh-t! Ho ho ho…You are incredible! You are amazing! My hat is off to you, sir! You win!” There was a long silence and I just sort of stared at his moped for a while, thinking about this guy and his adventure, and how someday maybe if everything worked out for me I’d be able to be just like him. Then he said: “So where are you from?” “Duluth.” I replied. “Really? Know someone from Duluth.” “Who?” “Andy Goldfine. Great guy. Runs a motorcycle gear place there.” I smiled wide and said: “Hahaha…I know him too! And pretty well! I AM Andy Goldfine.” “No!” “Yes. Really! I’m Andy Goldfine. Nice to meet you again!…” The old guy looked at me very carefully for a moment, then smiled. Our conversation continued for another five minutes, with me asking him a few more questions about his riding history and listening to him describe long past and more recent adventures. He’d ridden that moped from his home in Minneapolis to the big annual bike rally at Sturgis, South Dakota, at least twice. I think he said he’d worn out one or two engines, or entire mopeds. My head was spinning, so I don’t remember much more, but I think he told me his age was somewhere in the mid 80’s. At one point two pretty women came by and he stood up and began flirting and then dancing with them, right there on the sidewalk. Music supplied by a rockabilly band about a block farther down. Motorcycles bring people together in such wonderful ways. What a great day that was, riding to the RockerBox in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and then meeting this amazing old guy. So if you are an old geezer, consider a Van Van or scooter. Or even a moped. (For inspiration visit www.mopedarmy.com) Just keep riding as long as you can. Mr. Subjective, April 2022 PS - I’m now age 69 and am not as skilled or strong a rider, or anything else, compared to ten years ago. Regardless of the loss I plan to continue riding for as long as I am able to. Hopefully many more years. Fluency comes with frequency, so the more often one rides, the better and safer they are. All this aging-out stuff varies so greatly it’s impossible to say what is sensible. I know maybe half-a-dozen people who still ride in their eighties. One still-sharp woman in particular took up riding in her forties and goes cross country camping on a BMW 800. Her ’safety’ protocol is to ride mostly empty backroads and take her time. Another very old rider has by increments downsized the bikes. His cross-country trips just take longer and again, he sticks to little-traveled roads. Another old geezer friend from Santa Barbara stopped riding MC’s at about 73 and rides an e-bicycle nearly every day with a posse of older moto-rider friends who’ve all also switched to e-mountain bikes. They trail ride those things over three thousand miles a year. Another long-distance and daily rider in his mid-80’s was just told by his decades younger wife to stop riding, so he’s looking at a Honda Grom for neighborhood-only riding. I hesitate to ask him to define ‘neighborhood’. Solutions are all over the place. My own plan is to see how I’m feeling day-by-day, year-by-year and follow these leads as best as I can. I’m no longer too concerned about what, where (or how) I ride. Just that I ride. PPS - Have you seen this wonderful long-form television commercial for a Taiwanese bank?(It became so popular a feature film was later made about the story.) Excerpts from an email from Muriel Farrington, received Aug 5, 2021:“On my nearly 8,000 mile trip to National in Great Falls, I ran through all kinds of weather…While I did limit my 114-degree day riding to 250 miles/day vs up to a 627-mile day, the weather was brutal…and (after visiting friends on the west coast) I was ready to make the last few miles home the next day. Olympia, WA to WRJ, VT in 7 days and 4 hours. It will be my last trip west - I am 80 in a month and probably should think about acting my age…Best, Muriel”

If you commute every day or nearly every day, in all kinds of atrocious weather, this is for you. For those riders who are Road Grimed Astronauts and use their bikes for daily transportation, errands and last but not least, who commute as much as they can. If you ride mostly for fun, sport, entertainment and relaxation, or if you commute only when the weather is perfect, you may still like - and relate - to some of this, too. I am one of those everyday commuters. Either via a bicycle, an e-bicycle or my motorcycle. I almost always ride there. All three of these machines are relatively filthy with use, wear and weathering. My commute is an easy five miles, all on surface roads and a few blocks of dense congested traffic with crowds of pedestrians everywhere. My groceries and shopping errands require freeway miles and some steep hills. I choose which machine depending mostly on the weather, and on the time available. The more perfect the day, the more likely it is that I’ll pedal. But throw in a little wind and cold and I’m on the e-bike. Add to the mix a little rain, sleet or even a little snow, or if I’m running really late and then I’m motoring.  The protection offered by my R-3 suit, Elkskin gloves and Nolan Xlite modular helmet is just too nice to pass up. These three machines are far from pristine examples of the latest-greatest models, too.  The pedal bike is an ancient 26” wheeled folding bike called a Montague which supposedly was originally developed to be air-dropped with landing troops. I bought this as a basket of parts for $120 from a somewhat shady fellow who may have acquired it dishonestly some time earlier. I’ll never know. All he told me is he’d enjoyed riding it for a few years and then things on it started breaking and he took it apart to fix them and never put it back together. It’s been a fabulous cheap commute bike, and is today covered in a patina of abuse and long wear. It’s on its second fork, third or fourth chain and chainwheels, brake pads and various small parts. When I get to the local grocery co-op and lock it to the bike rack next to all the clean modern bikes there, the younger hipper riders either give it a wide birth or stare at it questioningly.  It stands out, it is different, it works great and I really like it. Folded, it fits nicely in the trunk of even a small car or the back of a compact SUV, which is a real bonus. I love riding it. The e-bike is similar but is only four years and 4,000 miles old.  It was bought new from an online selling e-bike company called FLX, and like the Montague it’s a little different looking in its acquired grubbiness.  It was delivered in a big box and was easy to set up.  Because it is a lower-end machine it’s had its share of mechanical problems, but nothing I haven’t been able deal with. Its aluminum frame was incorrectly designed and cracked after a couple of years where the seat post is connected to the top tube. That has now been repair-welded three times: first badly, the second time well and the third time also well plus a small fabricated stiffing gusset.  With the extra long seat post I added, and the nice gusset, I think it now is fixed for good. The semi-crude repair job is unpainted, and I have no plans to change this. The frame mounted 500w motor’s handlebar mounted instrument and control panel had to be replaced at around 3,000 miles to correct a problem and its now on its third or fourth rear cluster and its second front chain wheel and chain. The forks have been apart once to fix a locked-up-solid problem, and the brake pads recently wore out and were easily replaced.  Like the other bikes, its grips have worn smooth in places, too. But basically it is a pretty good bike for what it is, and for how I use it. Like the other bicycle, switching this one from its original 1.9 x 27.5 semi-knobbies to smooth treaded and slightly oversize pavement-only tires (Schawble 2.4 x 27.5 Super Moto X) has been a wonderful improvement. This year its original 17a 36v battery has started to fade, but I just bought another one directly from China, thanks to the amazing internet. The motorcycle is the easiest to describe. It’s a 1994 Honda XR650L which I bought new that year and which is still chugging around just fine on its second piston.  There’s a long list of modifications which you can see on this video I made about it in 2021: When you choose to ride this way, you don’t profile well to both the general public and among other motorcycle and bicycle riders.  For example, you’ll walk into a business meeting after riding through terrible rain to get there and water will be pooling around your feet and some otherwise intelligent person will ask:  “Did you ride your bike?” The room will get quiet and you’ll just stand there dripping and holding your helmet grinning like a fool. Like the fool everyone in the room thinks you are.   It's not a competition to see who is the hardest-core rider, either. This isn’t a contest. We all want to fit in.  And to be popular. To have the approval of others. The only contest is within ourselves.  Some of us want to ride as much as possible. For their own psychological, neurological, physiological, environmental and financial reasons.  Psychologists have given a name for the universal wanting-to-fit-in stuff: allodoxaphobia.  According to this essay in the Atlantic Monthly magazine, it means: “In the worst cases, anxiety about the approval of others can blow up into a debilitating fear, a diagnosable psychological condition called “allodoxaphobia.” Even if it doesn’t become a mental illness, worrying about the opinions of others can lower your basic competence in ordinary tasks, such as making decisions. When you are thinking about what to do in a particular situation—say, whether to speak up in a group—a network in your brain that psychologists call the “behavioral inhibition system” (BIS) is naturally activated, which allows you to assess the situation and decide how to act (with a particular focus on the costs of acting inappropriately). When you have enough situational awareness, the BIS is deactivated and the “behavioral activation system” (BAS), which focuses on rewards, kicks in.” - excerpt from Atlantic Monthly article, 'No One Cares' by Arthur C. Brook The essay says there is a cure: Ignore them. The yahoos. The normal people. Own your sh-t. Here’s what the author recommends: “1. Remind yourself that no one cares.  2. Rebel against your shame.  3. Stop judging others.” The full Atlantic Monthly article, ‘No One Cares’ by Arthur C. Brook, is here.  It’s not too long and explains all the underlying stuff a lot better than I. I say only one thing.  Ride there if you can.  Just ride, if that is what you want to do. Riding will quickly become easier and easier, and safer and safer, because the more you do it the more accomplished and fluent you’ll become. And yes, you’ll be better off for it. Within a week or two, riding for utility transportation will become the best part of your day, no matter what the weather or destination. - Mr. Subjective, 11-21 PS – I do own a car, two actually. One I bought new and have had for 48 years, maintaining it almost entirely myself. It has just over 100,000 miles and these days carries ‘hobby car’ insurance limited to under 1000 miles of driving a year. The other car is on my homeowner policy and is typical car insurance. On an early summer day about twenty years ago I brought that one in to the usual place for an oil change. They’ve taken care of it for me for many years and at that time they’d recently started keeping computer service records for each of their regular customer’s cars.  When I came in to pick it up a day or two later, the service writer looked up from his screen as he handed me the invoice and key and said:  “I think your car’s odometer might be broken. Our records show only 136 miles since you brought it in last fall.”  I grinned and replied: “No, that’s correct. I just don’t drive it very much.” PPS - This means I’ve become a comparatively awful car driver. Before coming over to the single-track side (the dark side, Luke), I drove ok. Both cars have manual transmissions and I enjoy driving them, but I’m pretty terrible at it now. PPPS - This is what transportation riding during the winter here looks like from one of our webcams. It’s far riskier and less safe than riding the rest of the year. You have to pick your days and ride extra cautiously. An added and constant problem is road salt, which admittedly makes the streets rideable more days. The practice causes two problems: 1.) When it’s warm enough so the salt melts the snow there is a brown runny watery brine everywhere that is messy as hell to ride in. Every passing car (in both directions) leaves a fine mist of it hanging in the air which gets all over the bike, clothing, gloves, helmet, face shield. It’s terrible. 2.) When the temperature drops so the salt stops working, the roads dry up nicely but whenever you are behind any other vehicle the displaced air and tires kick the salt/brine dust into the air and you have to breath it. If you ride any distance in conditions like this when you arrive anywhere you want to take a wet paper towel and wipe the dust accumulation off your face. Using your tongue you can taste the salt dust on your lips. Salting roads where it is not critical is terrible for the environment, buildings, vehicles and people. There is almost nothing good about it. It is a hold-over from the days gone by when snow removal technologies (plows, etc) were not as good, and cars did not have all-wheel drive or snow tires. There is no excuse for it today.  Except by the people who mine and ship and apply it, who have an interest in keeping up the costly practice for economic reasons. PPPPS - Hoping to put up a short vlog post about how this 'winter' bike was set up soon.

...or like a sociopath? Almost nothing one can do during course of their ordinary daily life is as socially ostracizing as when one gets bundled up to ride somewhere for utility transportation through cold or crappy weather. You’ll receive the strangest comments, reactions and looks if you find yourself riding when, in the mainstream’s comfortably-sealed-inside-a-car worldview, one isn’t supposed to be out there riding. I’ve always wondered if this could be slightly similar to what it feels like to be a mildly sociopathic individual. Not a Ted Kosinski or anything so extreme, but still somewhere on that same craziness spectrum. Right now, it’s a moderately windy 35ºf (and about +5ºf ‘wind chill) at noon and still almost twilight-dark beneath a thick gray-cloudy sky. A typically depressing and moody early winter day, but the local roads have been dry and clear for a week so I rode to work yesterday and on Tuesday, a one-way distance of five miles. I also rode to a short business meeting, a storage rental place, a bank, and a grocery store.  The bank was a very brief stop to drop something off, so I walked right in without even removing my modular helmet. It was cold enough I didn’t want to mess around. This move was practical, time-efficient, and comfortable, but I might easily have been mistaken for a grubby suicide-bombing terrorist all bundled up in a dirty black Aerostich R-3 and carrying a worn backpack with a small carabiner on each strap from which dangled a loop of parachute cord, a door key and two small remote garage door opener transmitters. I sure didn’t look (or feel) like any kind of recreational, ADV, touring or sport motorcyclist you’ve probably ever seen. It’s possible I’m too sensitive. Or too dumb. I’ve written about this before. Here are the bullet points: Riding is fun and always feels good. Really good. Riding can sometimes be logistically a lot harder than simply walking, riding a bus, or driving. Riding can make you look pretty good to others if done ‘correctly’.  I.E. – in ways that seem right to non-riding observers. But only if you are wearing the ‘right’ kind of gear for the bike you are riding, and riding the appropriate bike for the situation, during the most acceptable type of weather. Riding done the way non-riders expect riders to look. “As seen on TV” or whatever. Non-riding observers cannot fully understand or appreciate the ‘why’ of riding. The only way to appreciate the multi-layered wonderful experience of riding is to actually ride. In America, non-riders are the vast and overwhelming majority, and they outnumber us riders by a very large percentage. Almost all non-riders in America view motorcycling as an optimal-weather-only form of recreation, sport and/or leisure, and not as any kind of useful or practical all-weather transportation. “Almost” means 98.483% of them, except most spouses and siblings. There is probably a determinable ratio describing the degree to which riding ostracizes one, corresponding with the adversity or horribleness of the weather. Maybe it’s 1:1. Perhaps when the weather is bad, the rider is ostracized and if the weather is twice as bad the rider is twice as ostracized. In all my years of riding, this 1:1 ratio is about how it feels. And this has become so predictable it’s also quietly more amusing than you might imagine. For example, yesterday my first stop was a business meeting, and as I put the bike on its sidestand and keyed off its engine a woman looking to be somewhere in her mid-forties turned, stared, and said to me: “Aren’t you freezing?”  She was wearing a nice puffy goose down jacket and had just emerged from her comfortably heated car after pulling into the parking space adjacent to mine. “Not really.” I replied with a smile. That was our entire conversation. She took in my reply with a mildly incredulous expression, then turned away and briskly walked into the nearby building. I followed a few moments later after removing my helmet and gloves, carefully putting the bikes key into my riding suit’s pocket and making sure the Velcro pocket flap was secure. Moments like this happen all the time when you choose to ride in crappy weather. I collected additional looks and comments at the bank and then at the rental storage rental place where I had to renew a rental agreement at their office. Only at the grocery store did the cashier say nothing. I could see in her eyes and general manner she thought there was something a little off about me, though. I also noticed the same look on the faces of the drivers in the cars surrounding me at stoplights and sign-controlled intersections. A look like what, exactly? It’s hard to describe. Going from most-to-least maybe it’s a blend of condescension + mild resentment + irritation + amusement + envy? Most notably not a shred of curiosity, either. It’s possible a tiny approval/envy percentage comes from other riders who were on this day sensibly sealed inside their warm and safe cars. You really do feel like an idiot whenever you are riding for simple transportation during bad weather. But conformity can be for suckers, and maybe discomfort is partly an illusion, too. Yesterday I was comfortably in my regular street clothing above a pair of ankle-high riding boots, with almost everything else beneath a light goose down sweater ‘puffy’ layered within a slightly oversize black Aerostich R-3 Light Tactical one-piece suit. With a small “Road Grimed Astronaut” embroidered patch on the left shoulder. Was I that astronaut, or another everyday transportation riding sociopath?  I was both, and it was great.  - Mr. Subjective, 12-21 PS – Or a stupid dumb f**k idiot?

Thanks to the internet, a far-away and never-met long-time motorcycle friend (Paolo, who lives in Turkey and operates this interesting motorcycle, philosophy and culture website) recently emailed me an amusing short essay about the misleading environmentalism of electric power-in-general. A link to a downloadable .pdf of that essay is attached at the bottom of this post, but before you skip directly to it, here’s what I thought about it: Paolo,Thanks for sharing this very clever essay. It is fabulous on two levels: Very creative. Clever and well-written.  Seems true. (I’m neither for or against ICE or electric vehicles, though.)I’ll share a copy with a couple of friends of mine, and it will be interesting to receive their comments. Every technological advancement adds a slightly heavier load upon the planet. There are no exceptions. The computer I’m typing this on may be more energy-efficient, powerful and durable than the computer that proceeded it, just like the latest bike is engineered to be more energy-efficient and better overall than the previous model, but when every comparable is factored in, the total load on the planet is always heavier the newer the product is: A 1915 Ford Model T has a greater environmental impact than a horse drawn Studebaker wagon made of hardwoods and iron, and a 1965 Land Rover car has a greater environmental impact than the Ford T. It follows that a Tesla electric car has a greater overall impact than an old Land Rover.   There’s not much we as consumers can do about any of this. We can consume and enjoy, or become a monk or nun and join a monastery and grow beans and apples and wear hand-woven robes and humbly ride old bicycles. Or we can become an Amish, Mennonite, or Hutterite farmer* and pull our steel-bladed plow with draft horses. But as ecologically good for the world as those choices are, I’m not interested. I like convenient ice cream, scotch whiskey and pizza too much, and I’m not giving them up. Not to mention riding motorcycles as much as possible. Life is about compromises. And being a hypocrite is unavoidably part of this package. Regarding actually protecting our environment, Greta Thunberg is at one extreme and most of the world’s autocrats, plutocrats, merchants, traders, technologists and strivers are at the other. Somewhere along this virtuousness spectrum and possibly not too far from the middle, is me.  When it comes to my own cars and motorcycles, I do my best to consume and enjoy what I: A) can afford and B) meld into my life with some awareness that there is no ‘free lunch’. My bike and car consumption values are expressed by having models which: A) tend to feature longish production lives, and B) tend to be on the ‘basic’ side of the spectrum of today’s available technology, and C) are comparatively more durable. Those values have changed little since I began my adult life as a worker and consumer.  It may not be a mainstream way to consume automobility. For example, because I mostly ride or pedal, if it happens to rain when I am inside a car, simply watching its wipers clearing the windshield is always a satisfying miracle. Computer-assisted driving (and everything else new) is great, but for me all taken together the latest technology doesn’t beat the wonder of even the simplest one-speed windshield wipers doing their trick. I am grateful to have, and deeply enjoy, the incredible wealth of two automobiles. One was bought new at a young age and is now 48 years old with about 105,000 miles behind it. It was manufactured in a series of incrementally improved versions from I think 1948 until 1984, and mine has never been back to an authorized dealer. The other I bought used (I’m it’s 2nd owner) at 5 years with about 100,000 miles. It is now 15 years old and has about 115,000 miles. This newer one is hugely better and far more high-tech: Fuel injection, disc brakes, climate control, power windows, etc. It is far safer, faster, quieter, easier to use and tremendously more long-term durable. But both remain equally enjoyable: One with its single-speed wipers and the other having several wiping speeds with multiple adjustable-wiping sub-modes. Both are equally miraculous for motoring through rain. My bikes are similarly owned. One’s 1975 and another is a 1994, both single cylinders, both Hondas. The 94 was also bought new, and oddly, Honda still manufactures this model, which turned out to be lucky for me because many important repair parts for the earlier 75 are now unobtainable. There also are two old BMW airheads with about 500,000 miles between them. Both were bought a couple of years after they were new, and both are now enshrined in dry storage in the basement of our home thanks to an incredibly understanding wife. And there’s two ’newer’ bikes, an 03 Suzuki 400 DRZ and a 07 BMW R1200R. Both were acquired three or four years after they sold new to someone else. The Suzuki is (again, fortunately) still in production. I choose to attempt to do most of the recommended maintenance and occasionally required repairs for all these bikes except the OBD-ported fuel-injected 07 BMW. Partly because I’ve always been nearer the hammer-and-pliers end of the mechanic spectrum than the engineering-degreed race-tuning technician end, and because I’m running out of time to invest in learning new things, which forces a more careful evaluation of what to spend one’s time learning. I can always read a shop manual, and like everyone else these days I learn a lot (and get confidence) from infinite YouTube how-to-videos. I consider myself fortunate to have these fine machines under my administration. By accident of birth location and historical timing I deal mostly with such circumstantial ‘first world problems’, and this is more than a cliché. When I’m thinking clearly, I’m thankful for each problem, no matter how intractable or difficult it may seem. And when it comes to the products my small business makes, and which I originally designed and continue to attempt market and improve, I’ve taken the same approach. Make things that work well, are reasonably reparable, and which last a long time.   Like nearly everyone I’m doing my best to get along with the people in my life, and to take care of the world in the tradition of my birthright’s Jewish teachings, of which I know only the most basic elements. But it’s been enough. The world we all live on seems to be a very ancient solar powered organism or system, following actionable rules we have evolved an ability to somewhat formulate, share and use. And however imperfect those rules are, at any given moment they just have to do. I strongly suspect this situation will continue long after us and all our descendants are gone, and don’t believe interplanetary colonization will be financially practical any time soon, if ever. Regardless of that possibility all of us live in the here-and-now and must do the best we can with the reality we find directly before us. The only thing I know for sure is that reality always wins.   - Andy PS - The greatest thing which has been achieved during our lifetimes has not been putting a man on the moon or eradicating deadly diseases or the ‘green revolution’ which helped mostly eliminate large-scale famine. Or any of the thousands of other incredible technological and intellectual advances which have occurred during our lifetimes. No, humankinds’ single greatest recent accomplishment has been unwinding the DNA code, which for the first time shows indisputably how all humans are 99.8% genetically exactly the same, and finally proving that after all is said and done ‘race’ is merely another cultural construct being put before us by those who on some level or for some reason believe they have something to gain by doing so. It will probably take a few hundred years for this recent discovery to sink in everywhere, just as it did when the earth was eventually proven to actually be round and not flat, and (separately) that our planet goes around the sun, not vice versa. The coolest thing about life, from both a practical and a philosopher’s point of view is how reality always wins.  *For American readers. For international readers, insert here any of the world’s more orthodox, fundamental, and traditional religious (and/or moral) life-guiding belief-systems. Whatever applies in your location. Download "Batteries, Did You Know?"

When I was younger (mid 30’s) I did two sort of endurance rides. Neither was specifically planned to be an endurance ride. I simply wanted (needed?) to see if I could get somewhere which happened to be fairly far away, in as little time as possible. I was not trying to set any speed record, though. Just wanted to get there without lallygagging. The bike for both rides was my old R100/7. No windshield other than a small home-made fairing from the headlight nacelle ending just over the top of the instruments.  A period photo of the machine is shown at the top of this email and here (dry-stored in the basement today, near our clothes washer and dryer). This bike started out as an ‘RS’ but shortly after I purchased it from its original owner in about 1981, I converted it to a /7 naked bike and sold its fairing and everything else that was ‘RS’. I still have this bike and would guess it has about 100-150K on its odometer (which was not working for a few years, twice). It has the RS’s bigger 40mm exhaust and a few other ’RS’ items. With the help of an extremely talented friend, and over the course of several winters, I hot-rodded it the way I wanted (at that time…): /2 ‘high’ handlebars, Kehin ‘slant slide’ pumper carbs, high performance cam, bigger pistons, mono lever swingarm, oversize Heinrich tank, frame stiffener bars, extra holes in its cast aluminum airbox, drilled-out straight-through mufflers, lightened flywheel, special clutch, etc.  It made 68HP on a dyno, which is a lot for one of these, and would wheelie on the throttle in 2nd with only a light effort. Which stock versions of this bike won’t do. It’s a tank, but back-in-the day was still a lot of fun to build and ride. One of my two quasi-accidental endurance rides involved two back-to-back 900-mile days riding home from Bike Week in Florida to Duluth Minnesota. What made it an endurance ride wasn’t the distance, though. It was the low temperature. The second day it was below freezing the entire time. When I reached my residence, it had gotten down into the low twenties, I think. There were quite large snowbanks on the sides of the roads from Chicago north, but the road itself was dry all the way. In my driveway when I got home there was about a foot of accumulated snow. I was so tired I ploughed into it as far as I could and then just left the bike on its sidestand right there, surrounded by great clouds of steam coming from the hot engine melting the snow. Then I staggered inside leaving a trail of shedded gear all through the house like a three-year-old and slept for ten or twelve hours. Woke up famished but alive.  The other long-hard ride was the year the BMW National Rally was in York PA. I rode there from Duluth in one very long day and when I pulled up at the gate at three or four AM wanting to camp, the entrance security would not let me in, so I got back on the bike and rode down to somewhere near the shore of the Chesapeake Bay, where I watched the sun come up over the water, then turned around went back to the rally site, got right in, set up my tent and slept until noon. I think the total miles of that ride was about 1,250-1,300 and the total hours was around 22 or 23. I don’t consider myself an endurance rider, but for most of my years when riding on road trips a good day is around 750 miles and an easy day is around 500-600. Today at age 68 I’m satisfied and comfortable with anywhere in the 3–600-mile range and have nearly zero interest going for more. The well-known cliche: "The older one gets, the faster one was” is sometimes true, but both hard-ride accounts are as close to accuracy as I can remember them. Famously, whatever doesn’t kill you hopefully makes you stronger.  What were some of your hardest/fastest/longest rides?  - Mr. Subjective, 11-21

"Good god no. I'm nowhere near old enough..." - Excerpt from a recent online (Revzilla Common Tread) discussion about "Building A Better Brand" and the R-3 and Roadcrafter Classic one piece suits    

Before we know it our ICE (internal combustion engine) motorcycles will be replaced by electrics. And not specifically because the bikes we currently buy only slightly contribute to the greenhouse gas effect, but more because they are too costly to make, too difficult to ride and too tedious to maintain. Even today’s most fabulous and desirable bikes will meet the same fate as old-fashioned steam locomotives. They’ll be appreciated mostly as inspiring historical relics which required too much cost and effort for so little power and result.  Many younger people already view older long-time riders as "the last of a breed" (gearheads/petrol-heads or whatever…) and consider our beloved ICE machines too costly and requiring too much of an ownership and maintenance commitment. Future riders will aspire to own and ride electrics partly because of their far lower maintenance requirements*, magic-carpet smooth silence, and no gear shifting. Some of the future electrics will be a lot faster than the latest and fastest ICE bikes now available, too.  Speed, acceleration, efficiency, and synaptic-level nimbleness are all core reasons for the enduring appeal of motorcycles and scooters. It’s just hard to believe that the accompanying sweet tunable exhaust noise, along with all the vibrations and acoustical harmonics which have always been such an integral part of motorcycle experiences, are about to fade into history just as the romantic and inspiring sounds of a steam locomotive’s ‘choo-choo-choo’ hissing and chuffing, and the piercing shriek of their steam whistles has.  I’m already nostalgic whenever I hear (and smell) a passing two-stroke ICE bike “on the pipe” -- the narrow near-wide-open-throttle RPM range when the engine’s carefully engineered tuned exhaust scavenging hits its perfect harmonic, and the bike crisply leans itself out just a tiny amount more as it produces maximum power. In some ways I’m not quite ready to feel that way about the sound of a four-stroke ICE engine coming onto its cam, but it probably won’t be too long. After it’s mostly gone I’m gonna miss that music, but future generations of riders won’t. Two general ‘news’ moments during my lifetime stand above the rest: I’ll always remember with a kind of granular clarity exactly where I was when I first watched astronaut Neil Armstrong step onto the moon live (though delayed 1.25 seconds by the distance), and similarly I will always remember where I was when I turned on a television and first watched the terrible attack that destroyed the World Trade Center buildings in NYC. Seeing repeats of those two news videos will always stop me cold. Though not comparable in significance or emotional impact, two motorcycle-business ‘news’ moments have also stood out. About fifteen years ago I read a press release from Honda (of Japan, not their USA distributor American Honda) announcing they were going to put fuel injection, anti-lock brakes and catalytic converters on every bike they made. EVERY model, including all sizes and types. As the years have passed, they’ve done this. From their cute ‘Monkey bikes’ to their best-selling-motor-vehicle-in-the-world, the C-50 Cub (now both are 125’s) to the luxurious Gold Wings, everything they produce on two wheels has, or will soon have, these technologies. That long-ago media release was Honda saying there would always be motorcycling, for at least for as far into the future as they could see. Some of the very smartest people in motorcycling and ICE engineering telling everyone they believed it was worth the huge investment to redesign their long-ago-paid-for and highly profitable products like the Cub. It was Honda telling the world there would be motorcycles for as long as there were people, and they intended to always have some of this business. This news could not have made me happier unless they’d have also added they’ll be giving these updated bikes away free. Then there was the day several years ago when the late movie star Peter Fonda announced he’d hired the famous Sotheby’s (or Christies?) auction company to sell off all the props and memorabilia he’d kept from the movie ‘Easy Rider’. His ‘Captain America’ leather jacket and everything. This told me the market for Harleys was about to turn downward and that after their truly phenomenal thirty year run of success, from a struggling and near-bankrupt company to a $2 billion dollar plus ultra-profitable company which along the way became a global fashion-darling, that this growth, and the coolness of this brand, was about to start to decline. Which it has. The actual tipping point from ICE to electric bikes has not happened yet, but it is coming. The elements of riding which are the most fun and important are not all the cultural constructs, fashions and socializations surrounding riding. Rather it’s the physiological, neurological, and psychological experiences of actively balancing and guiding the machine. Riding feels as great at 5 mph/8kph as it does at much higher speeds, and most importantly, the benefits to riders -- and to the society which surrounds all of us -- remain the same, too, regardless of what technology makes the machine go. So even though someday not all that far off it may be unfashionable and impractical to ride an ICE bike for transport, leisure or sport, there are certain to be multiple super-fast and/or super-great electrics available for doing just such riding. They’ll be more affordable, more reliable, easier to ride and require less maintenance than the best bikes of today. And even faster, too. Many of tomorrow’s e-motorcycle riders will come into riding as a natural transition upward from a pedal e-bike just as they’d earlier moved upward to those pedal e-bikes as a move beyond their pedal-only bicycles. When they decide to become licensed motorcyclists, the transition from pedal e-bikes to electric motorcycles will have been notably smoother and easier than what most of today’s ICE bike riders experienced.  Pedal bikes have always been a gateway drug to motorcycles. Soon pedal E-bikes will be the gateway drug-of-choice to you-know-what.  And the rest is history. - Mr. Subjective, Sept 2021PS – There’s irony in the fact that earlier technologies which are relatively more challenging to operate and maintain are often (and maybe perversely?) more strongly loved by their users and caretakers. In a paradoxical way people seem programmed to balance more difficult physical, mental, and emotional challenges unconsciously yet rationally with correspondingly greater emotional attachments and satisfactions. It’s inversely proportional -- The more difficult something is, the more its seemingly valued. There’s a humorous eternal truth in the classic question: “Why do you keep banging your head against a wall?” and its inescapable answer: “Because it feels so good when I stop.” Future riders of electrics may not bond quite as strongly with those bikes as we do with our ridiculously and wonderfully antediluvian ICE bikes. Which I think will be ok. It will still be more than enough. *I’m far from a good mechanic, but still find the process of working on an ICE bike an enjoyable challenge, and the results extremely satisfying. Setting valves, changing tires, balancing wheels, changing fluids, bleeding brakes, replacing or mending broken parts, tuning, farkeling, setting adjustments for best operation and much more. I’ve accumulated a mixed assortment of the necessary tools and have always been able to arrange a small acceptable space to do this work. I get into trouble occasionally and must rely on shop manuals, friends and YouTube videos for support. It’s always too much work, and not for everyone, but with the luxury of time (though not enough is available sometimes) it generally feels nice to be able to take care of my two-wheeled friend.

A Short Mr. Subjective Blog Post See attached. This model Honda is in short supply, and high demand. Last night (Sept 6th) this auction closed at midnight.  Location: Chicago area.  The MSRP on these is $3899.  This one had 180 miles on its odometer. Whomever sold it probably bought it to flip. He or she just made a pretty easy $600. Screen shot is from 5 seconds before the auction closed. When something in demand is scarce, this type of price-gouging happens.  At the start of the covid pandemic it was toilet paper. If you find someone to sell you one of these at MSRP you could do this also. Or you can ride it. Tough choice. Or, if you flipped six of these you could buy number seven for yourself with the proceeds. In an era when most motorcycle models are being discounted, this is the rare exception. - Mr. Subjective, 9-21 PS – This model Honda is I think made in their factory in Thailand, one of the world's largest motorcycle factories.  More of these are on the way as I speak/type. PPS - The history and origin of this fun and useful bike goes back to the 1960’s and is one of the most interesting stories in modern motorcycling. Much more than fashion was involved. Honda’s official history of it is here: https://hondanews.com/en-US/releases/honda-ct-series-history

“When you own your story, you get to write the ending.” Brené Brown Because Aerostich gear isn’t hanging in cycle shops, and is made in America, and is available only factory direct, media exposure is important. Almost any kind of exposure in social or traditional media is good, which gives professional journalists and ‘influencers’ the space to take their Aerostich gear stories in just about any direction.Personally, I’ve always appreciated stories about Aerostich gear ownership which include the idea that riding gear can be a little more about the function, durability, and practicality -- than the latest ‘tech’ style and fashion stuff. This includes the idea that useful refinements and improvements are incremental and are not driven by a marketing need to announce “new and improved” redesigns every year or two. The idea that if you hope and plan to ride for the rest of your life, then having durable, functional and comfortable gear which is less influenced by fashion (because it was never ‘in fashion’) is a good thing. And the idea that an investment in quality gear one can wear for many years and still get a zipper fixed, or a little crash damage taken care of, is a smarter choice than chasing whatever is the latest-greatest.I also look backward at Aerostich gear as a unique and pioneering original. The still-popular Aerostich Roadcrafter one piece suit was first to combine all the important ingredients for what has become the standard recipe for armored textile riders gear. In the beginning this recipe was so unusual most motorcyclists were reluctant to try it because it didn’t look ‘correct’ in the accepted moto-fashion sense. Sometimes even the more experienced and expert a rider was, the more reluctant they were to accept this entirely new and different way to dress for riding. See this Steven L. Thompson story from a 1986 issue of Cycle World magazine.Today the Aerostich R-3 one piece coverall and the Aerostich Darien and Darien Light suits embody everything we know about making superior quality better wearing equipment and gear to help people ride their motorcycles more easily and comfortably, to a wider range of destinations, and through the widest range of weather conditions and situations.Many riders actually don’t want to ride more. Rather, their priority is to be able to ride better, farther, and safer and faster whenever they do decide to ride somewhere. They also like to look like they know what they are doing, regardless of if they do or not. Online forums are full of posts by enthusiastic and experienced riders strongly testifying how and why their latest ‘it’ jacket is well worth its (high or low) cost. I’m sure they all are. But when I look a little deeper, at least few of these online emperors-of-riding-expertise can seem slightly undressed, at least when measured against my well-known arbitrary Mr. Subjective goal of riding more conveniently, safely and often.If you are reading this far, you already know that in most of the rich and advanced parts of the world motorcycles are toys and riding is consumed primarily for sport or recreation. I too enjoy riding because it simply feels cool and is such great fun, even when it’s raining and/or cold. Riding helps me feel I’m somehow a bit superior to the nearly infinite masses of people which seem to require at least four wheels to get themselves from A to B. It’s so much fun I just want to do it as much as possible, thus the Aerositch coverall.And in addition…Consider that some types of useful gear may be a bit like those original and now classic denim work pants, the ‘Levi’s 501 button fly’ jeans. According to some skillful marketers these jeans can be even further improved with added decorative pocket stitching, or by adding pre-engineered torn, weathered, and distressed areas. All the better for fashion-marketing reasons, except those versions do not make functionally better all-around general wear and work pants. Yes, they may be excellent for signaling to others (and to oneself, when seeing one’s reflection in a mirror) how cool one is, and how directly connected they are with the latest fashion trend. But if one simply wants a good pair of jeans for a wide variety of wearing situations, those basic 501’s (and all the Wrangler, Lee and other very close copies) remain tough to beat.Specialized armored textile riders gear marketing is a lot like that, so don’t go to an online rider’s forum and call out someone who just spent $1,600 on the latest-greatest riding jacket. Those ‘latest-greatest’ versions really are good jackets, and their wearers will be offended the same way a teenager would be if a parent criticized her carefully considered (and costly) pre-ripped jeans. That fashion-aware kid will pout and be offended because how can anyone be so clueless to not understand the importance of looking cool? Peer approval is one of our most strongly hardwired needs.Despite all that, simply choosing to ride any motorcycle is one way to partly step away from our species-wide social-approval instinct. It’s a legal way to throw some of the societal norms about personal mobility under the bus (sorry…) and simply do what feels most right.So (in conclusion) I’ll always enjoy any media exposure for Aerostich gear which celebrates or at least recognizes the un-coolness-coolness aspects of riding a motorcycle, and the related un-coolness-coolness component of most Aerostich gear, because it is motorcycle and scooter riding itself which is so cool, and anything which helps us make it easier, more comfortable, and safer is cool. So, enjoy the ride, and from time to time take a few chances. PS – Here’s my first-ever vlog. The oldest vlogger and most boring vlog you’ll probably watch this week. About thirty minutes exploring and explaining an uncool old bike I ride.

An essay by Mrs. Subjective… Last week was the first time I rode on the back of a motorcycle in more than ten years. It was the first time I rode with my husband, Aerostich’s “Mr. Subjective”, whose life revolves around the activity, or what he would call ‘a social good’. In my years of knowing him, he has talked more about motorcycling and the benefits of motorcycling than anything else. The first time he launched into a monologue about it, I thought he was a bit off, even a little weird. Who was this guy, so passionate about motorcycling? I already knew he was a philosopher. That is one of the main attributes that drew me to him. But I didn’t understand his drive (pun intended). I was intrigued. Throughout the years, I have heard him talk about these beneficial factors to countless people; friends and family, strangers, and more. And he’ll talk about it anywhere. At a dinner party. On the airplane. Even at our wedding. So when we headed up HWY 61 in Duluth the other day, I knew that I was in good hands. But I was still a little scared. It had been so long since I had been on a bike and even though I have my motorcycle license, and owned my own motorcycle once, I hadn’t ridden in ten years. And I forgot. During our ride, I was surprised how quickly I went from feeling scared to feeling alive, calm, and more in tune with the present moment. It dawned on me that I had forgotten so many things about motorcycling that I liked, the ones that drew me to get my own license eleven years ago. I forgot what it felt like to see the world from a new perspective, one without windows intercepting my vision. I forgot what it felt like to notice things on the streets I have driven down countless of times. Mouldings on buildings. A lady sitting on her front porch step smoking a cigarette. The child learning how to ride a bicycle. I forgot what it felt like to feel the wind push against my body. I forgot what it felt like to fly. I smelled the fresh spring flowers and the fresh spring rain which had just come down earlier that day. So much freshness is not something you encounter when sealed in your car. I connected. I smiled at people. The elderly couple at the stop light next to us. I waved. She waved. And gave me a little grin. And the younger couple at the stop light on the way home. They smiled and looked at us a little quizzically. I even stuck my hand down to wave at another biker as we passed in opposite directions. I also connected with my husband. Feeling my body press against his. His left hand patting my left leg, letting me know he was thinking of me. I tasted.I tasted freedom. And the fresh Lake Superior windblown air. I heard.I heard the sound of the bike rumbling against the pavement. I heard the birds chirping in the trees. I heard the wind as it brushed against my helmet. At one point he said, “We’re whimsical”.I liked that. I forgot all of these things. And that short ride up HWY 61 reminded me and solidified everything he’s been telling me about riding since I met him; motorcycling is a human and a social good. It brings us closer to others. It gives us better awareness of our surroundings. It helps one to see more details and to be aware at all times. It makes us better all-around citizens and car drivers. How one can connect with others, and oneself, easier. And how motorcycling can bring one to the present moment, experiencing all of the senses at once, in a new, and transformative way. All of these attributes make me a better car driver. I am now even more aware of those around me, looking out for others who are not in cars; motorcyclists, bikers, walkers, etc. Motorcycling is a solo activity, one which connects one to others in a profound way. I don’t love motorcycling the way Mr. Subjective does. I probably never will. But I have tasted a new sense of freedom within and I want more of it. It’s been five days since we first took that ride together. And three of those days, I’ve asked him to take me again. I have drunk the Kool-Aid. There’s no going back and I’m a better person for it.

If you want to ride a motorcycle often it’s always part of a system. Simply owning a motorcycle is great, but by itself that bike isn’t quite enough if you wish to ride a lot. Just like most individual recreational activities, riding (and racing) require a support system of parts, tools and equipment. And the more frequently and longer you want to be riding, the more extensive a support system you’ll need. If you’re mostly a fair-weather and/or occasional rider, you may only need a place to hang a riding jacket and possibly a shelf for a pair of gloves, or gloves + a helmet. But if you want to ride nearly every day in all kinds of weather, and occasionally travel long distances by motorcycle, you’ll need more. Much more. Long-time high-mile riders usually have a closet full of old gear and a garage full of parts, tools, lubricants and assorted bike-related junk/crap/stuff. Maybe even an extra (or alternate) motorcycle or two. One for daily riding around town, and another for traveling. Or one for when the other one is broken and/or awaiting service, or perhaps another one as a “project bike”. It can be quite a commitment to ride a lot, year after year. For a few riders all of this extra stuff is worth it simply because it means they get to ride all the time. And this is important: every time they ride -- rain or shine, day or night, long or short, hot or cold -- it’s always fun. No matter what. Riding provides one with a nice subtle (but measurable) dose of neural and physical medicine. You feel a little better after riding somewhere, even if it’s just going to the grocery store or wherever you may work. Bonus: If you choose to ride this much, you are also doing the planet and everyone sharing the roads a little favor, too. One Less Car and all that. Road-builders, carmakers and oil companies won’t appreciate that, but they’ll probably manage to get along ok without quite as much of your business.  Side note: I’m fortunate to live in a single-family home, with a non-riding but extremely riding-understanding wife. Our house isn’t unusually large (+-1800 sq ft) but being in this circumstance makes having a system a bit easier. In an apartment or condo there’s a similar system, but it is necessarily a bit smaller since most apartments and condos are smaller. In these places your riding gear usually goes into the entry closet and your helmet and gloves go on the shelf just above. Having a system does not require living in a freestanding home. There’s this, too. I’ve lived in two residences over the past fifty years and my system hasn’t changed much. It involves a garage large enough for a single car, a smallish adjacent space for a few shelves and a clothes-hanging bar positioned high enough so even a one-piece coverall riding suit can hang without touching the floor. In some ways this personal bat-cave setup is as important as the motorcycle itself, just because it makes near-daily riding so much easier and quicker: Get up, out of bed, brush teeth, get dressed, make some tea, read email and/or watch some news while drinking that tea…and it’s time to go.   For me this means walking down a flight of stairs into a basement containing a furnace, water heater, laundry sink, a washer and dryer, too many boxes of stored items, and most importantly, a garage space with an electric door. (Side note: For many years this garage door was not electric. I’d open it, roll the bike out, put the bike back on its side-stand, then go close the garage door. Now that’s all done with a button dangling from a mini carabiner clipped to the shoulder strap of my small backpack.) Mr. Subjective's suit hanging set up: Previous house -- current house. On go the boots, then the riding suit, then the helmet, then the gloves and then (finally…) “I’m outta here!” Off and riding! Best part of any day, rain or shine. The clothes-hanging bar where my jackets, pants and riding suits hung at my first home was a water pipe which ran along the ceiling at a spot near the furnace, but still far enough away so there was no danger. Where I live now, I had to make a hanging bar with supplies from the local home/hardware store, but the job was simple. It’s a piece of wood screwed to one of the floor joists above, supporting one end of a closet hanger rod. The other end is held by a hanging-rod-saddle screwed to the adjacent wall. This whole thing took less than an hour to make and is only two feet long, but there is plenty of room for my gear. And it makes all the difference in how easy it is to go riding. The other bat-cave installation is a narrow set of freestanding shelves reserved for riding gloves, a couple of helmets and assorted small items like ear plugs, bike keys, face shield cleaner and other incidentals. At my first home this stuff was located in a corner of the garage right next to the bike. Where I now live it’s located about three feet from the clothing hanger setup with the riding gear. Both worked just as well. (The little shelving thing was fully assembled and came from an unpainted furniture store and cost less than $100.) That’s all there is to it. Same idea as Batman had for his bat cave, except my system doesn’t involve fighting evildoers. It’s simply about getting around on two wheels more often and easily. Nothin’ fancy.  Motorcycling is a system. What's yours?

My reply, whenever people ask, “Aren’t you hot?” is “Yes I am.” But my favorite reply to any question about wearing Aerostich gear on a hot day came from my friend John Chase. Thirty years ago, we were riding back roads and cross-country dirt trails heading diagonally north-west from Phoenix Arizona toward Yosemite National Park in California, and trying to ride about as close to an as-the-crow-flies route as possible. The route-chart guide for this journey was privately developed by an old desert-explorer rider named Allen Naille, who was an Aerostich customer. He ran one of those leased-from-the-park-service ‘concessionaire hotels’ on the rim of the Grand Canyon, and had a bunch of cool ‘Lucky Explorer’ Paris-Dakar bikes. (Alan, if you are reading this, I’d love to hear from you.) At that time colorful Aerostich and Aerostich-type armored textile gear was still uncommon. Our route hopscotched across the west, stitching together two lanes, dirt roads and two-track trails. In some sections getting gasoline was a problem. One section required us to detour about twenty miles up a dead-end road to a little copper mining town where there was a single small gas station. This combination C-store gas-station was just a worn-out metal building with a couple of small windows and selection of old worn-out tires on the roof. There were broken and/or junked cars over to one side and the entire town looked like maybe it could be movie set or a perfect place for some strange cult to hide out, except it was actually all there to house workers who were paid to remove underground veins of copper at as low a cost as possible. Every soul there (three hundred?) will leave the place as fast as they can, the moment the mine closes. As we were filling our tanks under a blazing hot sun a rough looking biker guy rode up on an older stripped-down chopper looking as if he’d just ridden out of a scene in one of those awful biker B movies made in the 1960’s. A rusty, greasy shovelhead, I think. He leaned the unmuffled machine way over onto its sidestand at the pump just ahead of the one John and I had just been sharing. As he got off and turned toward us, I could see strapped to his right thigh a holster carrying a well-worn 45 cal revolver hanging low on a wear-burnished leather cartridge holding gun belt. Hard to miss that kind of big hog-leg riding accessory. John and I were standing there sweating in our colorful Cordura-Gore Tex armored nylon Aerostich suits, almost ready to go, but both our helmets were still hanging from our bike’s handlebars as this rider turned directly toward us, and said in a disapproving challenging voice: “Hey, why are you wearing all that stuff?”. He might have waved a hand gesturing at the helmets. I instantly felt a little shot of adrenaline, and didn’t know what to say. But without missing a beat my friend John gave this guy his widest toothy smile and replied in a serious, sincere questioning voice: “Because I fall off mine all the time. How do you stay on yours?”. Silence. Then the dusty gun-toting outlaw chopper rider from Central Casting smiled and let out short laugh. A brief friendly conversation followed. Scene: Two riders in the middle of nowhere, standing under a broiling sun beside two beat-up dusty rusty gas pumps, sweating inside their armored sci-fi outer space Martian astronaut riding suits. Just another relentlessly hot Arizona summer day talking casually with some broken loner 1880’s cowboy-outlaw-biker who’d just ridden up on an old-school oil-dripping exhaust-belching hardtail chopper. Wearing a well-used Colt revolver. Another proof that you really do ‘Meet the Nicest People on a Honda’. On every other motorcycle, too. “Aren’t you hot?” You reply while smiling: “Hell yes I am,”, or, if you’d prefer to reply a bit more like ‘Forrest Gump’ might, then after a pause to consider this question, you use your slowest most serious and earnest voice: “Yes I am.” It works every time. People just want to know. They ask only to somehow reassure themselves that you are the idiot, and they are not. Mr. Subjective, 5-2021 The Best Aerostich suit for riding in Every Weather? For our first fifteen years, all Aerostich advertising was headlined: “ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY RIDERS CLOTHING” with the smaller sub-headline: “COOLER THAN LEATHERS”. Every suit came with a detailed four-page Owner’s Manual, and part of it explained how to dress in layers for varying temperatures. (Hot = shorts and a t shirt. Cold = base and insulating layers) Today riders still receive an updated version of this guide with new Aerostich gear. We now offer several completely different types of armored riders gear. Leather. Waxed Cotton. Synthetic textile. Basically, all the synthetic textile models, the Roadcrafter Classic, R-3, AD1, Darien and the ‘light’ versions of these suits, wear slightly better in warmer conditions, with the ‘lights’ being a bit cooler-wearing than the regular versions, and the lighter colors (tan, gray, Hi-Viz) also being a bit more comfortable when it’s hot and sunny. In extreme heat conditions all can still be very cool if you add ice to the outer pockets, but this is seldom necessary. (Note: Water from pocketed liquifying ice flows to the outside through the needle holes around the perimeter of each pocket, not to the inside of the garment.) When it’s over 95ºF the suits work best when all the vent zippers are closed. Especially in desert areas. This helps create a slightly moist internal micro-climate which is healthier than exposing your skin the desiccating/dehydrating wind blast. (Which is why for countless centuries Semitic and nomadic peoples living in the world’s hottest desert areas prefer wearing hot-looking long robes and tunics.) For cooler rides, and in order of their warm-ness, first is the waterproof leather Transit suit. The next warmest wearing (this is a tie) is the Falstaff and Cousin Jeremy waxed cotton suits. And like the synthetic textile models, this gear also has a wide comfort range thanks to multiple zippered air vents. Both the Corium leather and waxed cotton are relatively breathable if the ambient humidity is not super high. You’ll freeze in the synthetic textile models if the temps drop into the 60’s (ºF) and you are just wearing a t shirt and shorts, but worn this way the Transit, CJ and Falstaff will still be pretty cozy down to the 50’s (ºF). – Mr. Subjective, 6-2021