Originally Posted by
seypat
At that point, I knew we had only one option. The only option was to take him back to Va Beach. I had to be back in Richmond by 6 to work as a volunteer at a high school football game. But this was one of those times you have to do the right thing. So I told him I would take him back to Va Beach. I bought us some food at a Hardee's and we got on 64 headed east. Rolled through Hampton, Norfolk and Va Beach at Friday rush hour traffic time. Went to the dealer he bought the bike from and dropped him off. I went in to pee as they unloaded the bike. They put a scanner on it and found a blown fuse and a faulty electrical socket connector. I told him I had to go. He gave me a big hug and started crying. I left and headed back to Richmond. Found someone to cover me at the football game until I got there. With the traffic delays I got back about 7:30. You gotta do what you gotta do. Forgot to mention the young man was Navy, E3 on a carrier. He worked on the flight deck.
On a side note, one of the traffic delays was a wreck on one of the tunnel bridges. A dog was ejected from one of the vehicles. He went over the guardrail and into the water below. It took the rescue team about an hour to fish him out of the water. He was alive when they got him. I never heard of that before.
Good man. When I was repping in the bike biz I'd occasionally do a day of sales calls on my motorcycle. After one call in Portsmouth I was heading for Norfolk when the bike died suddenly. Electrical, I just knew it. Phoned the dealer I'd just left and he came to get me and bike in his battered Ford Ranger, then let me drive it home after dropping him off at his shop. I troubleshot the bike that night in the truck bed in my driveway (several wires had rubbed through the insulation on the edge of a hole in the headlight shell), then drove back the next morning and returned his truck with many thanks.
It's all a big circle. We need help and we get it. Or someone else needs help and we're able to help them.
Riding with my girlfriend in her car to visit her parents about an hour away, we passed a cyclist walking a wounded machine. Tacoed rear wheel. Young guy in the very early days of an E>W TransAm in dawn of the BikeCentenniel days. I told him I was a mechanic but had no tools with me. "Oh, I have some tools!" We gave him a lift to the folks' place and I trued his wheel as well as could be done and sent him off to the nearest shop in Charlottesville.