One of my fondest near-death memories of youthful stupidity was had on one of those wonderful machines.
Schumi story time.
I was about 20, home from college, going to go on a date with
the hottest girl I'd known in high school and never had been with before... we'd started talking and I told her I'd take her out and we'd hit up this party while I was home blah blah blah.. I was feeling pretty good.
That afternoon I was playing some music at a friend's house who I'd known forever when his cousin brings up his 748. Bright yellow. Less than 6,000 miles. Their whole family was into Ducs... I'd seen my friend, his cousin, and his dad pass around 748's, 900SS's, 916's etc over the years.
So I admire the machine a bit and say that I gotta head over and pick up Kelly for our date. She lived about 3 miles down the highway, out in a rural area. Brad had seen my helmet in my Jeep earlier when I was talking about some autocrossing, and he says "grab your helmet"... I didn't get it at first, then he tosses the keys to the 748 to me. I'm still a bit confused. He says "Go pick her up on that and bring her back here."
Now Brad assumes I'm a pretty smart guy and I guess somehow (mistakenly) thinks I ride. I don't. I'd been on very few two wheeled motorized devices before. Yet without thinking, I take the bike. I rode at about 10 mph all the way down the long driveway, contemplating what I thought was about to be my own death. I'd done similar things before, knowing that, given such pronounced opportunity, I cannot resist temptation.
Surely enough, I pulled out on to the empty highway and within a few seconds was straight lining-it at about 130 mph.
I pulled up to Kelly's house, and she's on the porch on the phone. She doesn't know who I am with the helmet and the bike and all. I take off the helmet and look across the yard at her, and as I do she says into the phone ".... holy %#&. gotta go". She grabs her helmet (she actually roe a lot with her dad who was a big bike guy, choppers and stuff) and we took off, repeating the 130 or so MPH run back down 3 or 4 miles of highway. There were a few twisties that were making my ass pucker up trying to keep this thing on the road, but all in all it went smooth.
As did the rest of the night... I couldn't have asked for a better start though. She was about 5'10", blonde, 105 lbs, and a dancer-slash-cosmetologist-in-school. Yep, you know her.
Aaaaaaaaanyways... ever since then I've wanted a 748. Just to putt around, y'know....
