Hiiiighwaaay tooo the danger zone!

The picture is complete - I have a sport bike!

After scouring craigslist, ebay, and a million online/paper classifieds, I found the deal I was looking for. I found it on www.cycletrader.com from a woman in Dallas who was seven months pregnant and was in a hurry to sell her bike that she rarely rode. It's a 2004 Kawasaki ZX600-E (also known as a ZZR600, don't know why it's got two names). After doing some research, I figured out that the color is "metallic ruby red".

I debated a long time over getting a 500 or a 600 cc bike, but after hearing a lot of people say that you usually get bored with a 500 after a couple months, I decided to put all my chips in for a 600. A friend from my ENJJPT class who owns a sport bike, gave me a ride on Tuesday in his pickup truck down to Dallas to strap it in and bring it home. I was pretty nervous about the whole thing, but he seemed to know what he was doing. He didn't have a ramp so we had to pick the bike up and wheel it on (which is REALLY difficult when you've got a 400 pound bike). I think he underestimated how much it would be, but with the help of a third person, we managed.

Since then, I've been riding it around the base housing neighborhood and getting comfortable stopping, turning, etc. Today, I made my first venture out of the gates for a refuel and then I ventured onto "the open roads". Around here, there's not really any in-between steps from residential roads to highways. So after choosing a random direction and taking it wherever, I ended up on I-44 towards Oklahoma. I passed the border, turned around, and made it home all safe and sound, with some bug juice on my new helmet. It was an awesome feeling, but definitely intimidating. At highway speeds, the wind gusts can bully you a bit.

Hopefully, I'll get comfortable enough with it and the different traffic/weather/etc that I'll be able to ride it to/from pilot training every day and save some gas money. But even if I just end up getting to take it out for a ride on the weekends, it's still TOTALLY AWESOME!

And yes, Ellen gave permission for me to buy it....