Reintroduction Thread

[dm_gsxr]

Been out of the loop for a couple of years. As I said in another thread, I got the ultimatum from SWMBO that I'm spending too much time on forums (and other stuff) and not enough time with her. Being the dutiful husband (and of course, SMBO), I cut my time down on line and had to drop some forum activity. I was spending time on five motorcycle forums (STN, CSC, AdvRider, Sportbikes, and SuzukiHayabusa) and had to pick one. I'd been on STN the longest and decided it would be the choice. Turns out it wasn't the best choice. It's a good site and all and I'm a sport-touring type of rider but there isn't much of a local scene. I found myself spending too much time in Off-Topic and not really participating in the bike related forums and bailed for a few months. I rejoined last year but that didn't last long as I found myself in the same situation. After a bit of riding, there isn't all that much that's new. And interestingly enough, after I got back and posted a few times, nothing was said. Where here, I've posted in one thread and created a new one and both times I got responses asking where I'd been (which is why I'm writing this now ).

So what have I been doing?

In the summer of 2008 I took the 'busa up to Alaska intending on reaching the Arctic Circle. A wrong turn outside of Fairbanks had me in "Circle Alaska" and my return to Fairbanks to try the Arctic Circle again resulted in a flat (ran over something sticking up in the dirt) which resulted in an extended stay and much gnashing of teeth over the scumbag BMW/Harley/Honda shop in Fairbanks. I'll post further details in another thread (my pics aren't showing up on my site for some reason).

2009 I headed out to the big gaming convention (GenCon) and then further east to visit family and back. Lots of fricking rain in Wyoming and the Dakotas. A dropped 'busa and broken clutch lever had me stuck in ND waiting on a part. GenCon was great fun. I played in quite a few games and got some fun pics. Family was fun too of course. I've been riding with a little surging problem which I tried to fix while on the road so I spent a couple of hours trying to troubleshoot it (unsuccessfully) at my brother's house. I headed back and rode through Oklahoma through the tail end of a hurricane.

2010 I'd reconnected with long lost (actually I'm the "long lost") aunts, uncles, and cousins through Facebook so the trip was a roundabout run to Oklahoma for an aunt, south into Texas for an old friend, west to San Diego (and through 120 degrees in Yuma), north to visit my brother, then Monterey to a mini family reunion with cousins, aunts, uncles, etc, north along the coast to visit my daughter in Portland, then home Idaho and Lodo Pass.

And back in December, Rita pestered me about the poor Fender Telecaster I had sitting around. I should either sell it or start taking lessons. So I started taking lessons. I seem to be doing pretty well, at least technically and even had a little Telecaster forum jam session a couple of Sundays back.

In April we went to Prague on vacation. Lots of great stuff to see although there was entirely too much walking

And a few weeks back I sold the SV and bought a Fender Stratocaster guitar. I'm saving for a PA system right now so of course, I'm really getting into music.

So I made a decision. I can do sport-touring on my own with what I've already picked up, either from STN or experience but it's hard to explore Colorado without riding with others in the area. So I've selected several single subject forums to satisfy my hobby needs. CSC for motorcycling. rpg.net for gaming. tdpri for Telecaster/strat-talk for Stratocaster (I'll have to make a decision on which one though eventually). Most of the computer stuff is not something I want to follow on a forum so no forums for that.

Good to see the same folks are kicking around. Looking forward to some rides this summer. I'll post some pics here shortly.

Carl

[Sean]

Welcome back! Hope the busa is holding up well?

Congrats on getting into guitar! It's a great hobby that can be a lot of fun. I have a '54 reissue tele with a Mary-Kay finish. Great guitar. I swaped out the bridge for a more modern 6 pole, put in some Lindy Fralin pickups, had the frets leveled and put on a new nut. It plays much better! There's a couple of guitar players on the board so feel free to kick around those discussions too! Why a PA? Are you looking to start a group/gigging?

[Dr. Joe Siphek]

welcome back carl...but the CSC just isn't the same...now everyone has dirtbikes. Street bikes are for chumps BTW...Welcome back.

[Devaclis]

Good to hear from you again Carl. You have been away too long man

[dm_gsxr]

The 'busa is running perfectly. I found the problem about a month ago. Turns out when I put the front sprocket on, the spacer fell between the nut and the shoulder leaving just a little wiggle room for the front sprocket. I couldn't tell because of the chain until I actually replaced it and it wiggled quite a lot. I put the new sprocket on and ensured the spacer was in place and there's no play at all and the surging is gone so I'm happy about that. I do have an electrical short somewhere in the cowl as my low beam isn't working. I suspect the plug and plan on a tear down to track it down and fix it. The only other issue is I put the back seat on and apparently neglected to put the release back in place so I can't get back under the seat. I suspect I'll need to cut the seat out so I'm probably going to replace it with a Corbin seat.

Nothing too bad and the engine runs great.

I've had my blue Tele since 1999 and have plunked about with it but never really had the motivation to do much more. When I started taking lessons, I found that much of what I'd been doing with plunking was the hard way. Zack showed me the right way and I took to it immediately, surprising Zack with how well I was doing. It's best when you're doing it correctly

I received the Technical Stewardship award at work back in April and it came with a monetary award which I used to pick up a Princeton Reverb amp. Then when I sold the SV, I bought the Strat and a Line-6 JM4 looping machine which was what Zack's using for backing tracks during our sessions. So far it's been working quite well for my practice sessions.

With the Jam session, Kevin brought his PA and I thought the addition of singing to the playing really sounded great. It also made playing the guitar more in line with what I'm trying to achieve. I'm still not quite sure what I'm trying to achieve though The nice thing about the Line-6 is it has a plug for a mic and the Princeton has two input jacks. So I can plug the strat into one and the Line-6 with a mic in the other and work on singing along with playing.

So no group or gig just yet. But I have the bulk of the funds now. I'd rather spend a month saving and get the PA now than try to scrape it together in a year when I'm ready to really play, if that makes sense. I can get a smaller rig right now but I also hate buying a make-do rig when in a year I'll just have to sell it to get a more appropriate one.

Do we have a sub-forum for the musically inclined?

Carl

[dm_gsxr]

Originally Posted by Dr. Joe Siphek

welcome back carl...but the CSC just isn't the same...now everyone has dirtbikes. Street bikes are for chumps BTW...Welcome back.

How about dual-sports? I still have the TransAlp

Carl

[dm_gsxr]

The 'busa at 100,000 miles:

[Wrider]

You've done exactly what I want to do with a Busa... Very nice!

[dm_gsxr]

Originally Posted by Wrider

You've done exactly what I want to do with a Busa... Very nice!

It's an excellent platform for touring. Other than stupid things I've done, it's never given me any problems. When I took it in a couple of years back to have the seals replaced (some leakage in the front left), I had them do a ring job and other work along with new pipes and PCIII. The mechanic showed me the cam chain and he said it was in excellent condition showing I'd done good maintenance and didn't ride like a maniac

I expect it'll get to 200,000 miles without much trouble. One of these days I may have to replace the plastic though. Both sides have taken some damage from tipovers (you can see the two cracks on the right side in the pics).

Carl

[Sean]

Originally Posted by dm_gsxr

How about dual-sports? I still have the TransAlp

Carl

Yeah, lots of dual sports these days. Also, a ton of people have been going the DRZ/sumo route. It's kind of oddhow the craze caught on. Don't see to many TransAlp's around.

[Ghost]

I've not been to GenCon in years, I *almost* made PaizoCon this year (just ended this weekend) and had 3 things in print that I wanted to be there with, but...didn't happen...

I'm envious that you made the Arctic by bike, I've been there, but only as a kid too young to drive.

Originally Posted by Dr. Joe Siphek

welcome back carl...but the CSC just isn't the same...now everyone has dirtbikes. Street bikes are for chumps BTW...Welcome back.

+1

Anyway, Welcome Back!

[dm_gsxr]

Oh, GenCon was great fun:

[dm_gsxr]

[dm_gsxr]

This is Wendy, she's one of my group here in Colorado.



Great fun

Carl

[dm_gsxr]

Oh yea, the trip too:





And coming home:



Carl

[Ghost]

Originally Posted by dm_gsxr

This is Wendy, she's one of my group here in Colorado.



Great fun

Carl

I don't know her, but I recognize the name and the face from the local Denver RPG MeetUp site...

[dm_gsxr]

Originally Posted by Ghost

I don't know her, but I recognize the name and the face from the local Denver RPG MeetUp site...

I'm one of the three Coordinators of the site. Jon owns the site and Wendy and I Co-manage it primarily for Jon. He doesn't do much day-to-day management.



Carl

[Ghost]

Originally Posted by dm_gsxr

I'm one of the three Coordinators of the site. Jon owns the site and Wendy and I Co-manage it primarily for Jon. He doesn't do much day-to-day management.



Carl

Lol, never made the connection, you're THAT Carl, got it.