~reposted from HT~

I was out using my half day to my advantage accomplishing more errands in an afternoon that I had over the last month. As I'm walking out of a store in the Old Town section of Leesburg I realize that people are standing on the street waving little American flags and cops are blocking off the intersections all around me. I figured some sort of (insert oppressed people here) pride parade was going to take place and I didn't want to stick around to find out who it was for.
I walked to my car on the opposite curb and just as I get there I hear a ridiculous amount of sirens. I turn around and see row by row by row of police bikes all headed my way, each of them with lights and sirens going. I then figured it was perhaps a police funeral and the locals had turned out to show their support for an officer killed in the line of duty. After 52 police bikes rolled by me I looked back to find the rest of the procession.

Two blocks down the street I see an ambulance, fire truck and fire chief support vehicle with their lights and sirens on. At that point I realized it likely wasn't a funeral but rather an "official" parade of some sort. I couldn't figure out who had a parade on August 18th, a Friday for that matter. I asked one of the pensioner flag wavers about the nature of the parade and was informed it was a 9/11 memorial ride. A 9/11 memorial ride in August? Yes, a 9/11 Memorial ride in August.

From behind the rescue vehicles emerged a column of chrome and rubber. They were running 2 by 2, in relatively close quarters honking their horns and revving their engines. I wondered how many there were and decided I'd try and count. Surely it couldn't be more than 40 or 50, right? I stopped counting after 400 bikes and the "parade" as it were went on for at least another 5 minutes after that. After the last rider when by the support vehicles appeared, pulling up the rear. At least 20 minutes had passed and while I did see some BMWs there wasn't a single sportbike in the lot. Surprising? No. Disappointing? Yes... for whatever reason.

Here are my cell phone pics... it killed me not to have my dSLR there.

Well, it's upon us. I thought I saw another thread for this but I couldn't relocate it right away, so here's our new one. This should be a very good weekend - the Soup (<!-- w --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.superbikeplanet.com">www.superbikeplanet.com</a><!-- w -->) is already posting up a storm of times and information. If you're down there then enjoy your three day drunk fest. The rest of us, forced to watch from our living rooms, will actually be aware of the motorcycles on track... and who'd have thought, the traditional fast men are at the front already:

Leading the way are Ben Spies, Mat Mladin, and Neil Hodgson in the top four of superbike. Eslick is strutting his stuff, and so are DiSalvo and hacking in the various 600 classes. There's more, but just bust a nut over to the Soup.

Something amazing has happened this weekend already, though. Anybody familiar with motorcycle racing already knows that the AMA has made a joke of themselves over the past couple years. This year in particular the organization has degenerated into something that actually makes my heart sink. Everything was done poorly and the riders complained about huge safety issues left and right. At the end of the day the AMA didn't accomplish a damn thing and the riders were left with an unpleasant taste in their mouths over the reasonable expectation of safety in their racing. Things are looking up, though, check this out:

Superbikeplanet.com Wrote:The track took up some Armco barrier overnight in the final turn to make the track safer. Jake Zemke and Jamie Hacking made the request on Thursday and the AMA and VIR made it happen.

http://www.club-s12.org/forums/index.php...opic=14594

I'll let you be the judge.

..from the salem civic center went (the rodeo..singing the wrong national anthem and other hilarity in front of 5000 rednecks)

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Race is Sunday. Anybody know what time? My computer here at work is so old that it's got a positive click keyboard (the cliky type) and a dot matrix printer, so I'm not going to look it up.

RJ and I were thinking we'd watch it at MM @ Arlington if that's cool with the residents there. What say all? Anybody else coming?

FTW! 8-10PM on Spike TV tonight!

Did anyone see the old Randy Couteur / Chuck Liddell fight that was on right before it? Chuck Liddell is such a freaking animal. I cannot believe how bad he stuns people with his punches. Hell, he made Tito Ortiz look like his bitch, and that says a LOT.

Basically this article is saying that the explosive that was purportedly to be used in the planned terror plot is sufficiently difficult to make, certainly difficult enough that the terrorists were unlikely to kill anyone but themselves. A humorous read for sure.

Quote:The genius of this scheme is that TATP is relatively easy to detonate. But you must make enough of it to crash the plane, and you must make it with care to assure potency. One needs quality stuff to commit "mass murder on an unimaginable scale," as Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Stephenson put it.

While it's true that a slapdash concoction will explode, it's unlikely to do more than blow out a few windows. At best, an infidel or two might be killed by the blast, and one or two others by flying debris as the cabin suddenly depressurizes, but that's about all you're likely to manage under the most favorable conditions possible.

http://bhendrix.com/wall/Gmaps_GVideo_Ma...zvous.html

It's showing tonight at 10 pm at some places and I was thinking about going to see it since I'm gonna be at VIR this weekend for AMASBK.

Hey I desperately need a trailer to borrow for tomorrow. Something to tow my car, uhaul is giving me the goddamn runaround and they cant find one for tomorrow. I will pickup from your house and whenever you want me to I will drop it back off.


You let me borrow for just tomorrow ill give ya 35 bucks, let me borrow it and you pick it back up from harrisonburg ill give ya 55.

Needs to be a trailer thatll tow the gsx on all 4 wheels.