C9
10-02-2004, 10:53 AM
I enjoyed RJ's story about the black leather jacketed bike rider this morning so much that I thought I'd re-post one of my bike stories.
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The Beezer and The Boxer
Just a short little story about a most interesting little escapade with a dog.
I’d bet that most of us have a similar story along the lines of dog vs. car although in this case it wasn’t a car.
Around 1958, at age 18, I got my first motorcycle. An out and out dirt bike in the form of a 56 BSA 500cc single cylinder Alloy Clipper. The BSA, or Beezer as it was fondly called, was built for competition and really built for the Six Days Trials that were held every year somewhere in Europe.
As I remember it, the Six Days Trials were a bit of a cross between an Enduro, which itself is very much like a Sports Car Rally, hitting the checkpoints on time, not too early, not too late and the other half of the cross being very much like an out and out Trials competition where competitors ride over difficult terrain losing points for falling, going outside the lines, touching the ground with a foot and the like. All of which made for some very good riders and some more than interesting competition.
The Beezer was one whole heck of a lot of fun and to a great extent was partly instrumental in making one particular summer a more than great time in my life. It was, “The Summer that Was.”
The other part, a beautiful young woman, fondly remembered, but not really involved in this story other than to wonder why I showed up at her house limping and skinned up now and then. She’d look at me, smile her beautiful smile, shake her head and ask the one question that was really getting a bit too familiar.
“You really are crazy aren’t you?”
I couldn’t do much more than nod my head and smile at that one. She did have a point.
Besides the aforementioned young lady, the summer went from riding into the hills above Ventura and meeting up with a small gang of riders mounted on 500cc British dirt bikes to running around with my best friends younger brother Bud and his Vespa. Bikes in the group were AJS, Matchless, BSA and occasionally a fish muffler Velocette. With everyone running very similar bikes it made for a great day of riding.
The Brit bikes were pretty much taken for granted, that’s just the way it was, but the combination of me and Bud on the Beezer and the Vespa was a bit of a weird combo. Some of the best parts, specially for Bud, was when we’d swap bikes now and then. We had a more than good time with both.
We went everywhere on our bikes and riding Bud’s little Vespa was kind of a kick. Eventually I got involved in some racing with the Beezer, but that’s a whole other story and I only limp a little bit now and then.
As for the boxer? Simple deal really. I lived at the southeast end of Ventura and Bud lived a little further west. Seemed like every morning, for most of the summer, I’d drag the Beezer out, light it off with a few kicks, head out to Bud’s house and we’d take off from there.
The Beezer was a good running and dependable bike. It took me darned near everywhere that summer and never missed a beat. It ran good, ran strong and it wasn’t an oil leaker. At least not as described by some former Brit bike owners. A couple of drops on the garage floor every couple of days, a little weeping and that was it.
Seemed like all it took to keep it squared away was a little tinkering, an occasional new gasket, a touch of Gorilla Snot to lock down some of the bolts and nuts and replacing some of the small bolts with nylocks. Which at the time were really fibrelocks. Regardless, they worked well on a bike that could get to vibrating pretty good when the engine was spun up near the max. Pretty typical stuff for the singles of the era.
Anyhow, I’d leave the house, run down the street a ways , make a left turn to the north and about three houses up the street was the biggest darned Boxer I’d ever seen sitting there on the right hand curb. He looked at me, I looked at him and didn’t think too much of it. As it turned out, he didn’t think too much of me either. Soon as I got near he launched himself off the curb, teeth bared and started running for the bike. And for me as it turned out.
I’d had a few dogs chase the bike, but most times it was no big deal. This dog though . . . this dog was serious. The Beezer was running along at the bottom end of third gear and I just had time to yank it up into second and pour on the coal. When the Beezer started accelerating hard, the Boxer misjudged it a touch, fell behind and I got away scot-free. That time....
Looking back about half way through second, the big dog wasn’t too far behind and trying his best to catch up, but it was not to be.
So for a while there, the big Boxer and me played a strange little game. Going home, not too big a problem cuz I was usually rolling down the street at 35-40 per. The speed limit was 25, but I figured they could stuff that. I’d rather take my chances with the Gendarmes than flit around and get grabbed by the Boxer.
It worked out pretty good for a while, I’d leave the house, the Boxer could probably hear me the quarter mile away where I lived and he didn’t have too much of a problem wandering out to set up an ambush. The Beezer wasn’t that loud, it did have a muffler, but if a dog is listening for you, he’s gonna hear you a long ways off.
I figured I had a pretty good handle on getting by the dog, I’d head for the corner, gear down for second and once I got through the always shallow sheet of water on the corner and had a little traction or at the least was reasonably straight up and down I’d nail the bike in second and sweep right on by the dog.
Dumb dog I figured. He finally gave it up and I went back to being a reasonable guy as far as speeding through the neighborhood went.
The Boxer wasn’t as dumb as I thought he was. He laid off for about a week and one morning I was surprised to see him launch himself from behind a parked car catching me totally by surprise. He aimed for my booted foot and got in a small nip before I could get away.
Well, two could play that game. Once I got around the corner I figured the Boxer was laying in wait so I did the side-saddle bit which got my leg up and out of the way. It didn’t seem to deter him though. He loved the chase and he got even smarter.
He started laying his little ambushes closer to the corner. The whole thing kinda ticked me off.
Why was the dog even running loose for one thing, but that’s kinda the way it was at the time. People didn’t keep their dogs locked up as well as they should have.
I gave some thought to carrying an ammonia filled water pistol, but knowing how badly the damned things leaked I figured I’d be more of a victim than the Boxer.
I thought the whole thing had kinda come to an end when the Boxer couldn’t bite me on the leg while I was doing the side-saddle bit. In retrospect, the darned dog was big enough to bite me on the arm if he’d simply jumped up a touch. Something I didn’t think about at the time, but as it turned out, it didn’t make any difference.
The darned dog started trying to bite the front tire. It was sorta interesting to watch, I’d kinda square the corner, get straight up and down before I could really lay the throttle on due to the almost always wet and sometimes slimy road surface, the Boxer would come out on a sweeping curve accelerating to keep pace with the Beezer, I’d be hard on the throttle and the idiot dog would have his head darned near underneath the tire trying to bite it.
I thought at the time that it was going to be real interesting when he finally got hold of the tire.
There was no doubt that one day he would succeed and to tell the truth, it did worry me a bit. It didn’t look like the best idea in the world to drop the bike and be sliding along the pavement with a most interested and mean son-of-a-bitch Boxer after your hide.
It took a while, but one day he finally did it. Maybe my fault cuz I’d gotten a little lackadaisical about the whole thing. Probably because the Boxer was playing his cards just right. He pretty much lulled me into a false sense of security. For a couple of reasons.
One, he wasn’t out there every morning.
Two, I thought that he was running all out when he started his little attacks.
What I did find out, that along with being one mean dog, he was way smarter than I’d given him credit for.
One bright and foggy July morning, and it really could be bright and foggy at the same time in Ventura, I rolled around the corner and wasn’t thinking about the damned Boxer. I hadn’t seen him for a few days and figured, hoped really, that he’d given up his stupid little
game.
Me and the Beezer rolled around the corner, I was easy on the throttle in second just thinking about where we were headed for on our little ride when all of a sudden this huge muscular flash of brown comes out of nowhere and grabs onto the skinny 3.00/21" front tire with his teeth, his head gets carried around and down and the Beezer front end makes this big jump into the air. That part wasn’t so bad, but what worried me was when the back tire would go over his head. Most times a bump like that would toss you over the handlebars. Bad enough to go down and be sliding along the pavement in front of a downed bike, having a PO’d Boxer after you was gonna be the frosting on the cake. I figured I was dog meat for sure.
I was lucky though, the Boxer yanked his head back and went running for his front yard.
I looked back and I could see blood streaming from the side of his face. Too bad I figured, maybe he’d realize the old Beezer could bite back and he’d leave me alone.
He did leave me alone. At least he did for a while. I’d see him sitting on his lawn giving me the eye when I rode by now and then. I figured he’d learned his lesson, but what he’d learned was to stay away from wheels.
It wasn’t long until he was back in attack mode. For a while there I wasn’t sure where to expect him from. Sometimes he’d be close to the corner and sometimes up at his house.
The times he came blasting out of his little hideouts he would be aiming for my leg. I’d gotten out of the habit of riding side-saddle. It was too risky riding the bike around the wet corner side-saddle and if you had to accelerate hard with the still-wet tires, you’d probably go down somewhere along the line. My biggest ally in all this was the faithful little Beezer that never missed a lick and never failed to accelerate hard when called upon.
The Boxer finally got me a good one when he laid in wait further up the street where I had to slow for another corner. It was a total surprise, he’d never ambushed me north of his house and he nailed me a good one. I was thankful that I had a pair of lineman’s boots on.
Even so, the bite hurt and I ended up limping for a while.
Now the Boxer would vary his ambush spots and they were different every time. It would be easy to think that he was just in a different spot in his neighborhood when I came along, but I don’t think so. This was one cunning animal and he knew enough to vary his routine and his hiding places.
Now and then, he wouldn’t be out there at all. The day after he bit me, I was really on the lookout for him. Especially down by the first and always wet corner. Even though he was smart enough to vary his ambush spots, one of his favorites was right after the water covered corner when I would still be running slow. He was even smart there, he knew enough to chase me on the dry pavement and would only venture onto the usually wet corner when it was barely damp. Seemed like he knew as much about traction as I did.
So I got around the corner, rolled through second on the throttle pretty good, clicked it into third and figured the Boxer was somewhere else that morning. He was somewhere else, the son-of-a-bitch was laying in wait in the same place today that he had been yesterday when he’d had his little success in biting me.
He came boiling out of his hiding place, his eyes locked onto my leg and totally locked into an interception course and I was screwed. I’d already clicked the Beezer into second, slowed and committed to the turn. At least I’d had the good fortune to spot him just a second after he launched himself and I knew right where he was headed. When he got there he lunged for my leg, I kicked it forward under the handlebars, and the Boxer stuck his nose right onto the blistering hot barrel fins of the Beezer’s engine. He hit the bike hard enough to darned near knock it over and that meant that his nose stayed in good solid contact with the fins for a bit. Best part for me was watching him run for home and listening to the yelping and whining.
Surprise, surprise. Sometimes things aren’t as tasty as you thought they would be.
I thought that would be the end of my troubles for a while, at least I hoped so.
I was just about to the point where I was going to stick Bud on the back of the Beezer armed with one of dad’s old golf clubs and maybe between the two of us we could beat the damned dog to death. Bud would have done it too. He liked dogs and so did I, but we figured this was one dog the world wouldn’t miss too much.
As it turned out, that was the end of our little game. I’d ride by and see the big Boxer sitting on his lawn. Kind of interesting, he had big scabs on his face and grill marks on his nose. Maybe he figured bringing down the Beezer just wasn’t worth it. Even so, it still looked like he was thinking about it and I didn’t trust him.
Not long after that the Boxer disappeared from my life and for sure I didn’t give a damn.
The score ended up: Boxer one, Beezer two.
Even though me and the Beezer came out ahead, you could probably call it a draw. Me still limping a bit and the Boxer somewhat scarred.
For a long time after, when I’d ride around the always wet corner I’d be looking for the Boxer and hoping in my heart that he wasn’t there looking for me.
I knew he had a score to settle and even though I hadn’t done a thing to start our little contest, I felt like one day he’d get even up. Or worse.
I wanna tell ya. It was tough duty herding the old Beezer through town headed for the hills and a day of riding all the while looking back over your shoulder for the dog from hell.
Even today, I still find myself looking back now and then.
Funny part is, it’s not always looking back down memory lane.
I just know that damned dog is out there somewhere.....
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The Beezer and The Boxer
Just a short little story about a most interesting little escapade with a dog.
I’d bet that most of us have a similar story along the lines of dog vs. car although in this case it wasn’t a car.
Around 1958, at age 18, I got my first motorcycle. An out and out dirt bike in the form of a 56 BSA 500cc single cylinder Alloy Clipper. The BSA, or Beezer as it was fondly called, was built for competition and really built for the Six Days Trials that were held every year somewhere in Europe.
As I remember it, the Six Days Trials were a bit of a cross between an Enduro, which itself is very much like a Sports Car Rally, hitting the checkpoints on time, not too early, not too late and the other half of the cross being very much like an out and out Trials competition where competitors ride over difficult terrain losing points for falling, going outside the lines, touching the ground with a foot and the like. All of which made for some very good riders and some more than interesting competition.
The Beezer was one whole heck of a lot of fun and to a great extent was partly instrumental in making one particular summer a more than great time in my life. It was, “The Summer that Was.”
The other part, a beautiful young woman, fondly remembered, but not really involved in this story other than to wonder why I showed up at her house limping and skinned up now and then. She’d look at me, smile her beautiful smile, shake her head and ask the one question that was really getting a bit too familiar.
“You really are crazy aren’t you?”
I couldn’t do much more than nod my head and smile at that one. She did have a point.
Besides the aforementioned young lady, the summer went from riding into the hills above Ventura and meeting up with a small gang of riders mounted on 500cc British dirt bikes to running around with my best friends younger brother Bud and his Vespa. Bikes in the group were AJS, Matchless, BSA and occasionally a fish muffler Velocette. With everyone running very similar bikes it made for a great day of riding.
The Brit bikes were pretty much taken for granted, that’s just the way it was, but the combination of me and Bud on the Beezer and the Vespa was a bit of a weird combo. Some of the best parts, specially for Bud, was when we’d swap bikes now and then. We had a more than good time with both.
We went everywhere on our bikes and riding Bud’s little Vespa was kind of a kick. Eventually I got involved in some racing with the Beezer, but that’s a whole other story and I only limp a little bit now and then.
As for the boxer? Simple deal really. I lived at the southeast end of Ventura and Bud lived a little further west. Seemed like every morning, for most of the summer, I’d drag the Beezer out, light it off with a few kicks, head out to Bud’s house and we’d take off from there.
The Beezer was a good running and dependable bike. It took me darned near everywhere that summer and never missed a beat. It ran good, ran strong and it wasn’t an oil leaker. At least not as described by some former Brit bike owners. A couple of drops on the garage floor every couple of days, a little weeping and that was it.
Seemed like all it took to keep it squared away was a little tinkering, an occasional new gasket, a touch of Gorilla Snot to lock down some of the bolts and nuts and replacing some of the small bolts with nylocks. Which at the time were really fibrelocks. Regardless, they worked well on a bike that could get to vibrating pretty good when the engine was spun up near the max. Pretty typical stuff for the singles of the era.
Anyhow, I’d leave the house, run down the street a ways , make a left turn to the north and about three houses up the street was the biggest darned Boxer I’d ever seen sitting there on the right hand curb. He looked at me, I looked at him and didn’t think too much of it. As it turned out, he didn’t think too much of me either. Soon as I got near he launched himself off the curb, teeth bared and started running for the bike. And for me as it turned out.
I’d had a few dogs chase the bike, but most times it was no big deal. This dog though . . . this dog was serious. The Beezer was running along at the bottom end of third gear and I just had time to yank it up into second and pour on the coal. When the Beezer started accelerating hard, the Boxer misjudged it a touch, fell behind and I got away scot-free. That time....
Looking back about half way through second, the big dog wasn’t too far behind and trying his best to catch up, but it was not to be.
So for a while there, the big Boxer and me played a strange little game. Going home, not too big a problem cuz I was usually rolling down the street at 35-40 per. The speed limit was 25, but I figured they could stuff that. I’d rather take my chances with the Gendarmes than flit around and get grabbed by the Boxer.
It worked out pretty good for a while, I’d leave the house, the Boxer could probably hear me the quarter mile away where I lived and he didn’t have too much of a problem wandering out to set up an ambush. The Beezer wasn’t that loud, it did have a muffler, but if a dog is listening for you, he’s gonna hear you a long ways off.
I figured I had a pretty good handle on getting by the dog, I’d head for the corner, gear down for second and once I got through the always shallow sheet of water on the corner and had a little traction or at the least was reasonably straight up and down I’d nail the bike in second and sweep right on by the dog.
Dumb dog I figured. He finally gave it up and I went back to being a reasonable guy as far as speeding through the neighborhood went.
The Boxer wasn’t as dumb as I thought he was. He laid off for about a week and one morning I was surprised to see him launch himself from behind a parked car catching me totally by surprise. He aimed for my booted foot and got in a small nip before I could get away.
Well, two could play that game. Once I got around the corner I figured the Boxer was laying in wait so I did the side-saddle bit which got my leg up and out of the way. It didn’t seem to deter him though. He loved the chase and he got even smarter.
He started laying his little ambushes closer to the corner. The whole thing kinda ticked me off.
Why was the dog even running loose for one thing, but that’s kinda the way it was at the time. People didn’t keep their dogs locked up as well as they should have.
I gave some thought to carrying an ammonia filled water pistol, but knowing how badly the damned things leaked I figured I’d be more of a victim than the Boxer.
I thought the whole thing had kinda come to an end when the Boxer couldn’t bite me on the leg while I was doing the side-saddle bit. In retrospect, the darned dog was big enough to bite me on the arm if he’d simply jumped up a touch. Something I didn’t think about at the time, but as it turned out, it didn’t make any difference.
The darned dog started trying to bite the front tire. It was sorta interesting to watch, I’d kinda square the corner, get straight up and down before I could really lay the throttle on due to the almost always wet and sometimes slimy road surface, the Boxer would come out on a sweeping curve accelerating to keep pace with the Beezer, I’d be hard on the throttle and the idiot dog would have his head darned near underneath the tire trying to bite it.
I thought at the time that it was going to be real interesting when he finally got hold of the tire.
There was no doubt that one day he would succeed and to tell the truth, it did worry me a bit. It didn’t look like the best idea in the world to drop the bike and be sliding along the pavement with a most interested and mean son-of-a-bitch Boxer after your hide.
It took a while, but one day he finally did it. Maybe my fault cuz I’d gotten a little lackadaisical about the whole thing. Probably because the Boxer was playing his cards just right. He pretty much lulled me into a false sense of security. For a couple of reasons.
One, he wasn’t out there every morning.
Two, I thought that he was running all out when he started his little attacks.
What I did find out, that along with being one mean dog, he was way smarter than I’d given him credit for.
One bright and foggy July morning, and it really could be bright and foggy at the same time in Ventura, I rolled around the corner and wasn’t thinking about the damned Boxer. I hadn’t seen him for a few days and figured, hoped really, that he’d given up his stupid little
game.
Me and the Beezer rolled around the corner, I was easy on the throttle in second just thinking about where we were headed for on our little ride when all of a sudden this huge muscular flash of brown comes out of nowhere and grabs onto the skinny 3.00/21" front tire with his teeth, his head gets carried around and down and the Beezer front end makes this big jump into the air. That part wasn’t so bad, but what worried me was when the back tire would go over his head. Most times a bump like that would toss you over the handlebars. Bad enough to go down and be sliding along the pavement in front of a downed bike, having a PO’d Boxer after you was gonna be the frosting on the cake. I figured I was dog meat for sure.
I was lucky though, the Boxer yanked his head back and went running for his front yard.
I looked back and I could see blood streaming from the side of his face. Too bad I figured, maybe he’d realize the old Beezer could bite back and he’d leave me alone.
He did leave me alone. At least he did for a while. I’d see him sitting on his lawn giving me the eye when I rode by now and then. I figured he’d learned his lesson, but what he’d learned was to stay away from wheels.
It wasn’t long until he was back in attack mode. For a while there I wasn’t sure where to expect him from. Sometimes he’d be close to the corner and sometimes up at his house.
The times he came blasting out of his little hideouts he would be aiming for my leg. I’d gotten out of the habit of riding side-saddle. It was too risky riding the bike around the wet corner side-saddle and if you had to accelerate hard with the still-wet tires, you’d probably go down somewhere along the line. My biggest ally in all this was the faithful little Beezer that never missed a lick and never failed to accelerate hard when called upon.
The Boxer finally got me a good one when he laid in wait further up the street where I had to slow for another corner. It was a total surprise, he’d never ambushed me north of his house and he nailed me a good one. I was thankful that I had a pair of lineman’s boots on.
Even so, the bite hurt and I ended up limping for a while.
Now the Boxer would vary his ambush spots and they were different every time. It would be easy to think that he was just in a different spot in his neighborhood when I came along, but I don’t think so. This was one cunning animal and he knew enough to vary his routine and his hiding places.
Now and then, he wouldn’t be out there at all. The day after he bit me, I was really on the lookout for him. Especially down by the first and always wet corner. Even though he was smart enough to vary his ambush spots, one of his favorites was right after the water covered corner when I would still be running slow. He was even smart there, he knew enough to chase me on the dry pavement and would only venture onto the usually wet corner when it was barely damp. Seemed like he knew as much about traction as I did.
So I got around the corner, rolled through second on the throttle pretty good, clicked it into third and figured the Boxer was somewhere else that morning. He was somewhere else, the son-of-a-bitch was laying in wait in the same place today that he had been yesterday when he’d had his little success in biting me.
He came boiling out of his hiding place, his eyes locked onto my leg and totally locked into an interception course and I was screwed. I’d already clicked the Beezer into second, slowed and committed to the turn. At least I’d had the good fortune to spot him just a second after he launched himself and I knew right where he was headed. When he got there he lunged for my leg, I kicked it forward under the handlebars, and the Boxer stuck his nose right onto the blistering hot barrel fins of the Beezer’s engine. He hit the bike hard enough to darned near knock it over and that meant that his nose stayed in good solid contact with the fins for a bit. Best part for me was watching him run for home and listening to the yelping and whining.
Surprise, surprise. Sometimes things aren’t as tasty as you thought they would be.
I thought that would be the end of my troubles for a while, at least I hoped so.
I was just about to the point where I was going to stick Bud on the back of the Beezer armed with one of dad’s old golf clubs and maybe between the two of us we could beat the damned dog to death. Bud would have done it too. He liked dogs and so did I, but we figured this was one dog the world wouldn’t miss too much.
As it turned out, that was the end of our little game. I’d ride by and see the big Boxer sitting on his lawn. Kind of interesting, he had big scabs on his face and grill marks on his nose. Maybe he figured bringing down the Beezer just wasn’t worth it. Even so, it still looked like he was thinking about it and I didn’t trust him.
Not long after that the Boxer disappeared from my life and for sure I didn’t give a damn.
The score ended up: Boxer one, Beezer two.
Even though me and the Beezer came out ahead, you could probably call it a draw. Me still limping a bit and the Boxer somewhat scarred.
For a long time after, when I’d ride around the always wet corner I’d be looking for the Boxer and hoping in my heart that he wasn’t there looking for me.
I knew he had a score to settle and even though I hadn’t done a thing to start our little contest, I felt like one day he’d get even up. Or worse.
I wanna tell ya. It was tough duty herding the old Beezer through town headed for the hills and a day of riding all the while looking back over your shoulder for the dog from hell.
Even today, I still find myself looking back now and then.
Funny part is, it’s not always looking back down memory lane.
I just know that damned dog is out there somewhere.....