Changing Travel Plans
On the heels of deciding we would move to Northern Virginia I have been flooded with reconsidering a whole series of decisions including canceling plans to get to Amerivespa 2009. I am hoping that next year I will be settled and can make the trip to where ever it is been held.
Several friends have asked “how are you going to get all your scooter toys to Washington DC?” So far no one has taken the next step to say, “I can take care of a few scoots if you aren’t going to have room”
At the moment I am not worring about that. ScootRichmond is working on my Ducati moped and my 180ss. Since a 1965 Ducati replacement stator is non-existant, Dave is doing his magic modifying the electrical system. I have had to go back to Henry Hogben, in Canada for a new cylinder/piston since the little bug was only pushing 50lbs on a compression test. I have been wishing that I could watch over Dave’s shoulder as he brings the little sucker to life. But for the next few weeks I still have a regular job.
Good News…for me.
I have been pondering this post for the past week. It was about this time seven days ago I accepted another dream job. However, like owning a vintage Vespa, it comes with both risks and rewards. Those of you who know me might say I am a professional “do-gooder”. I have always worked in social services and in the past ten years, probably through sheer persistance or luck have become a minor celebrity influential in advocacy and politics, mostly in Virginia.
In August I will be moving to the Washington DC area to continue my do-gooder ways, but it means leaving the Richmond scooter community behind. To some of you, this means nothing, but you must understand that old Richmond has a traditional southern village feel and outsiders are not easily welcomed into the grits and fatback circle that is the south. Amazingly, the Seven Hills Scooter Club is a southern anomaly. It is a curious combination of carpetbaggers, old-timers and young southerners who all flock together around our love for scooters. Regardless of your ride or your scoot-cred, you are never an outsider and anyone who shows up, dues paying or not is treated like a member. 
Many thanks to Chelsea, Rick, Ed, Brendan, Dave the Mechanic, the myth legend known as Munn and many more club and ScootRichmond patrons for support of Scootercast and being so kind to an outsider. I will be attending my last Friday night parking lot scoot-in tomorrow night at ScootRichmond to witness the movie madness of “This is Spinal Tap” and revel in one more inclusive event that welcomes even an aging, slightly socially inept scooter nerd like me.
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Scooting Back into Your Life
If I were Catholic I would be saying, “forgive me father, it has been four weeks since my last post”. For those of you waiting for the disparaging words of self loathing and apologies, forget it. The fact is, I have a busy life and the best I have been able to do is store up the scraps of notes I have been making in anticipation of a soon to come barrage of insights, reflections and clever anecdotal scooter stories. All I can say is you’ll have to be the judge of that.
One point of interest in my life has been the travel I have been doing over the past few months. I have been out to Denver, where on my way to check out the new Ducati Streetfighter I stumbled upon a basement motorcycle museum that contains almost every vintage Italian motor bike I have ever lusted after. While driving down Market Street I caught a glimpse of a 90cc MV Agusta out of the corner of my eye. Since Market Street is one way, I circled back around the block and pulled up beside a fully restored masterpiece. Next to the bike sat a small sign pointing to a basement entrance of a warehouse that is Vintage Motos It houses hundreds of original and restored motorcycles, including Ducati, Giliera, Italjet, Motoguzzi, Parillia bikes and more. Most are under 250cc. What makes this such a find is that in order to do a quality restoration, one the best reference points is having access to an original specimen and at Vintage Moto, they have one of just about every 50s or 60s Italian bike imported. They even have a few rare scooters, like the 1956 Rumi Formuchino (Little Ant). 
So here’s my returning gift to you, a new place to check when trying to source parts or a place to go to get a first hand view of what a real Italian import survivor look like. For a small fee, you can ogle, touch (if you talk nice to the owner), speak Vintage Italian and take lots of detailed pictures. Check out all my pictures from the museum HERE.
Stay tuned for a new podcast and a recap of my recent visit to Seattle and a return to my roots in the Pacific Northwest.
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Jason Reeves and the Vespa Experiment – Episode 94
Back in April I was following a few of my peeps on twitter when someone posted a tweet about a group of three musicians who were putting together a west coast tour called The Vespa Experiment with sponsorship from Vespa USA. As an extension of the “Go Green” campaign Vespa was providing three musicians with scooters and they were planning a ride from LA to San Francisco with stops along the way to play small venues. Usually these marketing things don’ t really catch my eye, but I became more interested when I began to look into the back story and found out that Jason Reeves, one of the singer song writers, had started his career in Iowa City Iowa and had become one of Myspace’s most successful artists. To date his songs have gotten more than 6 million plays. Those are big numbers on or off the Internet.
I became even more curious, when I read Brian’s post over at 2strokebuzz, where he rightful railed about the miss-perception that scooters can make a significant impact on our environmental problems (bring on the hate mail).
I hope you will take a minute and listen to what Jason has to say about all this and make your own judgement about the Vespa marketing machine. I found Jason to be unpretentious and surprisingly reserved. It reminded me of what most of us were like when we first got into scooting. I say it’s all about enjoy the ride. It doesn’t need to really be any more complicated than that. With all the strong personalities in scooting, it’s nice to talk with someone who is low key and far from fanatic about things. Jason is new to scooting, but hopefully the scooter bug will stick with him long after he does 450 miles on a Vespa GTS.
I would like to thank Jason for taking time out of the tour to speak with me and also thank TJ at Warner Brother Records for helping put the interview together.
Day 9 – The Vespa Experiment
