Rigid’s to Columbus AFB, MS- Approximately 540 miles; 5 States (or least portions of them)
Yesterday, my day began with an email I received from Rigid's wife, Francine, informing me that the guys were on the road, having shoved off from Nebo, NC at 0920 EST. Nebo is in the Western part of the state, approximately 100 miles North West of Charlotte, NC. Overtime and Rigid started heading due South, straight towards Columbus Air Force Base, Mississippi.
When I heard from the guys last night they were headed out to grab a bite to eat, but with Overtime on the horn, I could just hear in his voice that something had happened and if nothing else, it would be amusing. He mentioned that he'd created a word doc on a laptop Rigid brought on the road, and that as soon as they were able, they'd send me the doc on the day's events. When I asked what it was all about, laughing hysterically, Scotty said "think, Easy Rider meets Deliverance... I'll tell ya all about it!" And here we go...
The following is Overtime's account of the day's ride...
"Staying at the Visiting Officer’s Quarters – beats a tent.
Casual observation here; to date, My wonderful home state (SC) has the worst roads so far.
There is definitely a bad trend starting here, as every time I commence a ride with Rigid, it is colder than an Eskimo’s outhouse, and today was no exception. We are hoping that will change – and soon.
Day started with an auspicious beginning.
Not 5 miles into the ride, one of us, graphically demonstrating a complete transition from CRS to CRAFT (if you can’t figure that out, call Shane) forgot a minor item, without which the ride/trip could not be completed. I elected to wait while Rigid retrieved said item. Not a bad idea, as the radiant warmth beat my self induced wind chill – that is until I saw a beat up old pickup truck drive by with two, shall we say, characters in it.
Let me digress for a moment to set the stage a little more thoroughly.
Here I am, where God left his shoes, with absolutely no clue where to find civilization when all of a sudden, the previously mentioned truck reappears having turned around. As it starts to slow, visions of the last scenes of “Easy Rider” come to mind.
I strategically placed the bike between me and the truck.
As it rolled to a stop, the window came down and the two men were smiling at me – at least I think they were smiling, as they maybe had three teeth between them. All of a sudden the movie theme shifted to “Deliverance” – complete with the sound track from the musical duel. All was well as they were only being considerate enough to see if I needed any assistance.
A short while later, I saw Rigid in the distance and proceeded to saddle up.
As he blew by, doing the bagger equivalent of a wheelie, he let out a Rebel yell that could be heard in the next county!
All went well until somewhere in N. Alabama I discovered that my heel shift lever had gone the way of the dinosaurs. Oops – this is a show stopper as completing the trip in first gear didn’t seem like a viable option. Fortunately, the two of us had enough functioning brain cells (and tools) to take the one off of Rigid’s bike and put it on mine. A feat accomplished without a single adult beverage."
Now, for those of you who've been reading this thing start to finish, you'll recall that the heel shifter on the Road King is a mission critical cog in Overtime's ability to ride due to a lack of vertical mobility in his left foot. With this peg missing, they have a show stopper on their hands! Though with Rigid able to make the adjustment and ride using only the forward shifter, at least temporarily, crisis averted!
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