It's Starting to Look Like a Tom Cruise Autumn

Initially, Hurricane Helene looked like it was coming right at us ("us" meaning my family -- we live a few miles west of Gainesville, Florida). It ended up shifting just enough west that we didn't take the brunt of the storm, and my household in particular was, other than lacking electricity and Internet for 36 hours and cell service for a somewhat shorter period, was mostly untouched.

Now here comes Hurricane Milton. The current storm track has it passing just enough south of us that, once again, we'll be on the edge and maybe not take the worst hit. In fact, last time I noticed, my county (Alachua), isn't even included in the governor's "state of emergency" declaration.

But even the slightest northward shift from the storm's projected path could change that. So, starting late Tuesday or early Wednesday, you may not hear from me for a few days.

In more cheerful news, a motorcycle update:

I rode the Italica Bulldog 150 out to High Springs and back yesterday, having coffee and conversation with reader GregL and a new libertarian friend, LeonA, at the midpoint. It was a great time.

I had tentatively planned on then riding further out, to GregL's place, perhaps for some backgammon and whatnot, but the weather had me worried. I was definitely not going to spend the night, as higher winds are in the forecast for today and I still find wind problematic on a two-wheel vehicle. I came back home mid-to-late afternoon. Ran into a little rain (not a problem) and a little wind (not a problem), and only had one close call. At a particular intersection where there had obviously been heavy rain not long before, a little bit of standing water made me cautious, and rightly so -- during the turn, I got a little rear tire skid, but managed to keep the bike upright.

I also got to travel a little bit of semi-local territory I'd never been over before (I came back by an alternate route that took me over the road between High Springs and Alachua, then skirted Alachua using county roads before hitting the road back into Gainesville, which I had been over before on the 50cc scooter).

As for performance, I have to say that the Brando/Fonzie jacket was a great purchase. As long as the bike was moving with it partially unzipped, I was reasonably cool. I just needed to get it off if I was stopping for more than a minute or three and dismounting. When I got home, the only parts of me that weren't wet were the parts covered by the jacket and by my helmet.

According to Microsoft CoPilot's AI chatbot, the most fuel-efficient RPM rate for a GY6 150cc engine is between 5,000 and 6,000. Based on my experience, I believe that. Between home and High Springs, I ran the bike at, mostly, 50-55 miles per hour, which meant 7-8k RPM. When I got there, I fueled up, and Fuelly tells me that the mileage for the 42 miles between the previous fuel-up and that one was only 59.19 miles per gallon. Almost all of the miles between fuel-ups were "highway"/higher-speed miles rather than town cruising. Other mileages have been in the 65-70 mpg range.

If I seem obsessed with gas mileage, I'm really not. I'll be happy with 50 miles per gallon once I get the bike to be able to reach a top speed of 65-70 miles per hour and cruise comfortably at 55. And I expect that I will have to use more gas to make that happen. The performance air filter has arrived, and I'm considering my options on the exhaust side. A good performance exhaust is kind of expensive, and it's possible that I can just modify the current exhaust for better performance. Once those modifications get done, I'll be able to tell whether the stock carburetor is sufficient, or whether I need to up-jet or replace it to get the power I want out of the bike.

Why do I want more power out of the bike? Because I want its engine to be in its happiest place at that 55-60 "country highway" speed. A happier engine lasts longer. I'd rather spend some money here and there on mods, and slightly more on gas, than have to replace the engine at 10,000 miles (in fact, I doubt I'll replace the engine, ever, unless I just decide I like the frame so much that it's worth doing a complete rebuild with a 250cc manual-shift motorcycle engine to keep that frame; I don't expect that to be my conclusion).

Anyway, a happy ride and an enjoyable time at the ride's mid-point. I was, however, quite sore this morning. The ride back was pretty bumpy compared to the ride out; some of those county roads aren't nearly as well-maintained as the state roads I used to get to High Springs via Archer. I assume Chesty Puller was correct, though: Pain (this kind of pain, anyway) is weakness leaving the body.