BRRT: Tail of the Dragon, the Ride of My Life Part II: Getting the Hang of It

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Middle-Aged Man and Dr. Martens: A Love-Hate Story

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I first learned about Dr. Martens in 1992, when my friend Matt, who was cool as all get-out, was wearing a pair on campus at the small college I was attending in New Hampshire. The shoes were Docs, the 1460s, kind of shiny, and not the boots. When I got the chance, I had a pair of my own. Wearing Docs fit in with my developing darker persona in the early-to-mid '90s. I wore mostly black, listened to the Sisters of Mercy, wore an old Army-Surplus field coat, and was pissed off at the world. Living in Boston, and living without a car, I walked everywhere. The city streets are rough on footwear, and my jobs always required a lot of time on my feet, so the Docs were great! --Once I had them broken in. As a teacher, I liked that they were tough and comfortable and fit well with my lifestyle as a young ESL teacher on the make (if an ESL teacher can ever be said to be "on the make"). Then I moved to Fiji, and Docs did not work in that environment at all. They quickly molde...
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No, Toast Please.

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What a lousy month this is. The temperature hovers around freezing, it gets dark way too early, the landscape is blandly absent of color, everyone is sick, and it is often too cold to ride my scoot. Today, I missed a whole morning of teaching due to a sinus headache, and as I lay there in pain and fits of nausea, all I could think about was getting on my bike and riding. I finally got my leather over-pants back from my second tailor, so I can be protected from the wind. I bought a second Under Armor shirt to wear over the old one, adding a layer for warmth, and all my other gear is very well suited to the colder weather, but I'm sick, and, even if I weren't, I would still have few places to go - places that I would want to see are all a day's ride away. Complain complain complain. The older I get, the more I want to ride. I think this is my midlife crisis residue. When I was a kid, I'd ride with my best friends Chris and George, and we'd go far and wide, even tre...
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