Then someone got the bright idea and opened one in Medford. It was the carpocalypse around it for a month as all of Medford and surrounding states wanted to sample the simple magic that is the Double Double.
Now dear reader you know just how much I despise crowds, but let me enlighten you as to how much I love In N Out. I love In N Out enough to tolerate crowds.
When I got it into my head to take a road trip there was no question that it would be via motorcycle. The only question was whether to take The Bolt or to take the CBR. Having recently gotten the CBR more or less road worthy I opted to really give it a shakedown and take it on a trip where it would be at freeway speeds for a prolonged time.
As it happened my good friend Travis(Suzuki) was going to be laid off from Motorcycle Superstore the day before my run. I made arrangements with our other friend Brian (Ducati) to throw him a lay-off party the evening of my run.
The last detail was to get some brats to ride with me.
Pictured: my bags are packed.
First meet up, get Marv on his new R1.
Second meet up, Trav on his FZ1000R and Bobby on his VFR1200F
The fun really started once we hit Marcola road. It was damp but that didn't stop us from enjoying the hell out of the curves. My confidence was starting to return and I led the way. Regretably for time sake we took slab from Springfield south. We refueled in Roseburg and said hi to Marv's mom, then continued on.
More fun happened after Canyonville where we hopped onto Tiller International Raceway. Tiller highway is one of those places where you just have to dig into the corners and throttle out. Down low it has 100mph sweepers then climbs into the hills where you get 25mph corners, a hairpin, and some unexpected sunken grades in the apex of corners.
I learned on Tiller highway that I had lost much more confidence from my crash than I thought. My survival reactions went absolutely nuts on some blind corners. I dialed my speed way back and decided I'd rather be slow getting there than dead.
Nothing to report on Highway 62. Its still there, and boring. But it lead us to this.
Double double with Animal Style fries. OMG.
Travis, Ashleigh (Honda VFR), Brian, and other Ashley arrived while were were eating. Bike appreciating and bench racing commenced.
Notice the Batman shirt that I crashed in. Gotta redeem that bad luck.
Eventually the Brats headed back north, and the rest of us went to T&A's house to commence the lay-off party. Just as an aside, Travis' layoff sucks even more than a regular layoff because it means I can no longer take advantage of his employee discount. Sad Face.
Years ago in college we all went to this party where Travis brought a bottle of rather expensive (for a college student) liquor called "Yukon Jack". Think of it as high class FireBall. Anyways the party went fairly well up until Travis' consort at the time had an emotional breakdown and he spent the latter half of the party trying to keep her from cutting herself. This left the bottle of Yukon Jack undefended, which I valiantly tried to defend with my liver against a group of Marines on leave. Long story short Travis was really bummed out that he didn't get any of the expensive liquor that he had brought.
At another party he made the same mistake of bringing something good to a party of leeches who bring cheap light beer (or nothing) and was appropriately bummed about the outcome. Years later I decided to make good on it and brought a bottle of Yukon Jack (also Vodka and Rum) to the layoff party. Brian (being from Portland) brought a few Growlers of various microbrews.
So hopefully you see where this is going. Alcohol goes in, shirts come off, compromising pictures are taken.
Travis' expensive high performance foreign import Ashleigh (pictured below) valiantly tried to keep us hydrated by taking away our drinks and replacing them with bottles of water.
Sometime between the above pictures while the song "But first let me take a selfie" was playing and the picture below I puked and then passed out. Helluva party.
I woke up on an air mattress with a bottle of water and a puke bucket next to me. My friends freaking rock. Also the above picture was on my cell phone. By morning I was fully hung over and miserable. I repeated the drink water, go puke, cycle until mid morning when Ashleigh made hangover casserole for us (a greasy awesome confection of eggs, cheese, sausage, and tater tots) and we watched some really stupid movie while slowly eating and recovering. By noon we were recovered enough to depart. I geared up and headed north.
Whereas my ride down had been chilly until Hwy 62, my ride north was much warmer and I was sweating my hungover butt off in my cool weather gear, even with the liners out and vents open.
All in all an excellent Shakedown run, In N Out run, college reunion, and layoff party. Its weekends like this that leave me with the feeling that a motorcycle is really the best vehicle to get out and experience life. Riding with great friends, travelling through beautiful areas, eating good food somewhere different, all these things are what I look forward to all day while I'm stuck in an office yearning for the weekend.
