"What's life without a joke?" Motorbike - Part 1

So we have this awesome neighbor "Rez" who taught us how to ride motorbikes and also let us borrow his until we got one of our own. I've been driving it to and from school everyday so I've been getting a lot of practice in. On Saturday, he took Holly and I out to buy motorbikes. We knew which ones we wanted, and we even got a good price. We were going for it, but knew that there still had to be some work done on the bikes before we could take them home. We both needed baskets, I needed a new brake pad, Holly needed a new anchor…nothing big, all minor things. So as we are filling out the paperwork (and paying) they are working on our bikes. We thought that we could take Holly’s home that day since the tags weren’t expired, but after our salesman looked into it further, he realized her tags were expired as well so we wouldn’t be able to take them home that day. However, Holly already paid the full price and wasn't going to walk away empty handed, so we gave them a hard time and they sent one of their workers to the post office to renew both of our tags (still not sure why they do this at the post office?). Most post offices are closed on Saturdays so they weren’t sure if we were going to have any luck or not. We asked why they don't call the post office to see if it's open before sending someone there, but we never got an answer. They just don't call ahead here. If it was opened, we would take both bikes home that day. If not, we’d have to wait until Monday to take them home.

So, after waiting around for what seemed like forever, we receive good news. The post office was open, and they were able to renew both of our tags. We could take our bikes home that day, woohoo! So they told us they’d be ready, all repairs done, within 2 hours. We have lunch, wait around some more, then go back to the shop to get our bikes and take them home...we thought. We get there, check them out to make sure all is well. As I put my key into the ignition, the key keeps spinning around and around and I couldn’t turn it off. I needed a new ignition. So they send a worker to another store to get a new ignition, and we wait around even more.

I finally get my new ignition, and we test drive the bikes to make sure all is well. I drive right down the parking lot to the gas station to fill up my tank. On my way there I notice my spedometer is not working.  I turned off my bike once I got to the gas station thinking I was going to fill up, but was so mad that such an obvious thing was broken even after they worked on it all day. I didn’t even want to get gas anymore, I just wanted to go right back to the store and yell at them for the broken speedometer. So I try to kickstart my bike (a million times) and guess what, it doesn’t start. I call our neighbor and he comes to my rescue. He manages to get it started but realized I need additional repairs to fix that problem...We go back and I was super angry. I yelled at the guy who sold us the bikes. I already gave them my money, and now all these problems...no. Unfortunately the store was about to close, so they promised that when I bring it in on Monday, they will fix everything.

We later find out that the guy who sold us our motorbikes doesn’t even know how to drive one...

So, at least we get to leave the store with our bikes, right? Well, we got home and decided we needed to make a run to the local convenience store to pick up a few things. I hopped on Holly’s bike and we left. On the way back, her accelerator decided to stop working. It just stops accelerating. Completely. We barely make it up the slight incline into our neighborhood, and as soon as we make it to the top it turned off. It just died. We laugh. We laugh hysterically for a long time at how ridiculous our day has been. Eventually we compose ourselves, get the bike started again, and make it home.

So, tomorrow after school we'll take our bikes to get all the repairs, where I’m sure there will be a part 2 to this whole ordeal. I’m so thrilled.

I’ll end with some wise words from our neighbor, Rez, who has been our saving grace. All day I kept saying “this is such a joke!” and finally he replied “What’s life without a joke?” That's a good question...

Before all the trouble started...but we still love our bikes!

My lovely blue motorbike 

Holly and Rez