What did you do on or to your other bike part 2

[Gone in 60]

Got a text from the very kind gentleman I bought Superbird from. He found a few bits that go with the bike and wanted me to have them. His house was in a part of L.A. that was on the way to the museum, so I told him I could drop by to pick them up on my way to work Saturday morning.

I swung by and he gave me a bag of goodies, a battery charger, clamp-style cruise control, and a side stand foot enlarger. He came out to look at the NC and liked what I had done and said I’d made it look brand new. He said as soon as he saw me, he knew the bike would be in good hands and was glad I wasn’t some young kid who would abuse it. I told him I’d been going through some tough times at work, and that working on the NC had sort of been therapy for me.

I had planned to take a few cool shots of Superbird in front of the museum since it was early morning and I could park across the street and not have traffic in the way of some nice pictures. But he and I had chatted so long that I was running late and dashed straight there to get into uniform and check out the cars I’d be showing.

After a lovely shift talking with people about the collection, I suited back up and headed to the garage. A few of the museum guests I’d been talking with followed me out, and gave me some very nice compliments on Superbird.

My future boss asked if I’d be up for a meeting this morning to look over the “Blood Bike” I’ll be riding and to go for a nice Sunday ride. Sounded great and he gave an address for our meetup. It sounded familiar, up in the hills near the Hollywood sign. I figured I’d go ride by just to see where it was, especially to get a better orientation when I show back up this morning.

Rode up into the hills onto “Wonderview Drive”, but the directions peeled me off to the other direction from the tourist melee near the sign. Whew. The narrow street wound further up the hill until it passed a huge home with a long sweeping driveway. At the top were some very nice cars, along with a pair of bright yellow BMWs with “Blood” printed on the tail boxes.

Ok, looks legit…I turned around and headed back down the hill and jumped on the 101 for the long ride home. Traffic through Hollywood was jammed but I sailed through. I needed a pick-me-up though and decided to stop for a coffee.

Ducked off the 101 and headed to the Bike Shed. I like their iced coffee and figured why not cap off a great day by chatting with some fellow riders.

There was a lot of unusual activity going on in the area… blocked off streets, and strange looking people milling around. I figured maybe some kind of protest or demonstration was going on. No big deal. A few people were waving at me like they wanted me to get out of the area. What was their deal?

Turning onto Industrial Street with the Bike Shed in view ahead, I was horrified to see a swarm of police cars and fire trucks all around it. More people were waving at me but I wanted to see what was going on!

I got closer and a police motorcycle pulled in front of me. A security guard jumped off and angrily waved for me to turn around and get out. He pointed up and behind me.

I looked back to see a pair of large snorkel lift trucks with their platforms high in the air, with several people and cameras on them. They were all glaring at me.

Turns out that the whole neighborhood was being used as a movie or tv filming set. I had gone around some kind of makeshift barricade blocks back and was riding through their shots blissfully unaware thinking of coffee and chatting with other riders.

I sheepishly waved to everyone in apology and slunk away and headed home, still in need of that coffee. When I got to my garage, I took the goodies out of the bag Superbird’s previous owner gave me. He had slipped a note in the bag that wished me well and safe riding.

Suiting up now to go meet up with my new boss. I love Superbird but I’m taking the CB1100… I want to impress!