“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”
– Sir Winston Churchill
Hi Everyone,
The trickle charge –
I have a love of motorcycles; I’ve had many different bikes over the years. I am particularly enamored with Italian bikes. When I was a teenager I would buy old motorcycles, fix them up, and then sell them for a small profit. Rick Farley one of my mentors growing up, who I’ve mentioned many times in the DOB would work on the bikes with me. We’d talk about our days, life, and of course restore motorcycles. It was a wonderful way to learn a lot and be productive at the same time. Rick spent much of his career as a doctor helping veterans with post-traumatic stress syndrome. I was always curious about how he helped people, what techniques he used, and how was he able to graduate people to a more normalized life.
Italian bikes have great engines, but their electrical systems leave a lot to be desired or more bluntly – usually suck. I can’t tell you how many starters I rebuilt or bikes I rewired, but it seemed to be a standard part of every restoration. Unfortunately, that also meant that I usually had to replace the battery, which were often hard to come by and expensive. In the shop I had a system set up to trickle charge the batteries to protect my investment. Sometimes, I could avoid replacing a battery if I added water, put it on the charger, and nursed it back to full strength.
Covid has worn us all down –
I was chatting with Matt Heidemann the other day about how messed up our Christmas vacation was. As some of you know, I came down with Covid right before the holidays (I am fine and feeling great now) so I couldn’t go to San Diego to see my family and enjoy a vacation. We also missed my mom’s 80th birthday party which was a big disappointment. During our conversation I mentioned that I’d like to take a vacation and that I needed a break after this last year. Matt said something that struck a chord in me … I’ll paraphrase … Given everything that’s going in the world and the cumulative stress of the pandemic, a big vacation to reinvigorate oneself won’t work like it used to, you need to recharge yourself a little bit every day.
Let’s go be great!
Brad