Posts Tagged burgman
Rainy season.
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on May 18, 2009
It’s just a rainy season
Sweepin’ across my sky
It’s just a rainy season
And I don’t have a reason to cry
—Crumbächer, “Rainy Season”
Here in central Florida we live in a tropical climate. Thus, between the months of June and October we can pretty much set our watches by when it starts and stops raining every afternoon. The geographic shape of Florida as a peninsula also contributes to this, in that the prevailing winds coming off the Gulf of Mexico to the west collide with the ocean breeze coming off the Atlantic to the east, with no real topography to break it up, causing the thunderheads to pile up and dump their loads pretty much right over our heads. Weather radios are a common household item to pick up those severe thunderstorm or even tornado warnings. Mind you, our tornadoes are nowhere near the kind you’d see along Tornado Alley in the midwest, but we do get them.
Ultimately, the summer weather makes it a pain in the derrière to commute back and forth to Tampa on the Burgman (my sole transportation at this point). I did it all last summer (when I had a job) and managed to “keep the rubber side down” on I-4 through some nasty stuff. I’m a lot more comfortable riding in bad weather than I was when I started riding a few years back.
We desperately need the rain this year, though. In spite of our being in tropical climes, Florida has been in a drought for the past few years. It reached the point that a couple of months ago the local reservoir had just a one-day supply of water that they couldn’t get out. So, as much as we hate the rain and hate having to travel in and through it, at the same time it’s welcomed like an old friend to replenish water supplies and make the area lush and green again.
Ever notice that life has its seasons, too? It’s a rainy season for me personally. I hate the storms, but at the same time it’s an opportunity to refresh, clean out some past mistakes, and start growing again. There will be some hurricanes still to go through (both personally and literally, as hurricane season starts on June 1st). But this is life.
Remember this: we don’t often choose what life flings at us, but we can choose what we do with what life flings at us.
Riding to Walt Disney World®.
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on April 7, 2009
I played around with the idea of mounting my video camera to the Burgman to see how it’d fare on a ride into Lake Buena Vista/Bay Lake. Looks like it needs some improvement to reduce the vibration. Also in the video—my first time in “The Land” to see some of the fascinating innovations in land and crop management being done by Disney.
Oh yeah—you get to ride GM Test Track with me, too. 
Done with the weekend.
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on April 5, 2009
It was a very interesting weekend, indeed. The Burgman is running again and back on the road, but it required me to walk the 5 miles (round trip) to Walmart and back to buy an actual battery charger rather than the Battery Tender, Jr. (which won’t charge a dead battery) and a multimeter to check the battery’s voltage so I wouldn’t overcharge it or blow it up. Anyhow, the battery is back to form and the Burgman is back on the road.
Almost as celebration (and because I desperately wanted out of the apartment), I visited some friends at the Plant City Bike Fest, then dropped my stuff off at the apartment and headed out to Magic Kingdom® Park for the last few hours that it was open. I arrived at the front gate just as the “Wishes” fireworks show was ending.
About half way through the evening I was walking from Fantasyland into Liberty Square near the Haunted Mansion when I nearly missed a little boy standing there in the middle of the walkway clutching his Disney toy like a security blanket. With all the crowds in the park for Spring Break, he got separated from the rest of his family and was lost and quite scared. I located a nearby Cast Member to pass him on to so she could call Security to help him find his family. About five minutes later I was walking toward Splash Mountain when I saw a mother and another boy talking with another cast member looking worried, and I overheard her mention someone missing. I asked her if she lost a child and she showed me her iPhone with a picture of the boy I had just helped out earlier. I told them I had just handed a boy off to a Cast Member at the Haunted Mansion and led them to their son. I never got any names but I got many thanks from the mom. I passed them again later on in Tomorrowland on my way to Space Mountain (which was “101″—internal code for “out of service”—for the night), and I discovered heading back to the TTC on the resort monorail that they were on the same trip, but getting off at the Contemporary Resort station while I went on to the TTC and the Burgman to head home.
So, I guess there was a reason for me to go that night, as much as I hate crowds and Spring Break. 
Scooter down.
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on April 3, 2009
Not a good day yesterday. I left the apartment for my daily pickup at the post office, turned the key on the Burgman, and—nothing.
The display didn’t even come on.
The Burgman has a parking light setting on the ignition; if one turns the key one more step past the steering lock setting it turns on some smaller lights on the bike (parking lights). I’ve done it a few times, and I’ve also done it a few times by accident, but caught it as I would walk away from the bike or a kind neighbor would tap on my door to let me know I had lights still on.
That neighbor is long gone; and I guess I must have done it again the other afternoon when I returned from getting my mail. In any event, I came out yesterday morning to a Burgman with no power. I’m assuming it’s a drained battery.
Luckily, a Battery Tender Jr. was only $26 shipped from Amazon.com Prime, so I’m waiting for that to arrive today to try charging the battery back up and hopefully on Saturday I’ll be back on the road. It’s a lot less expensive than a $75 motorcycle battery.
Job search frustrations.
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on March 31, 2009
Part of President Obama’s recent stimulus package was an increase in weekly unemployment benefits of up to $25 a week. The above was a retroactive payment from Florida for the three weeks between when the increase went into effect and when they got their system updated to issue the higher amount.
I really could use it this week—I was down to thirteen cents total in my bank accounts (not including an old account that’s currently overdrawn) and anticipating living on 16¢ packs of ramen noodles and the bulk pack of microwave popcorn I had in the pantry.
I’m getting further and further behind on paying the child support I’m obligated to, because of the lack of a job. I got a letter from the local DCF (Department of Children & Families) office stating they intended to take my tax refund when it came to pay the back support. Unfortunately, they’re about three weeks too late—it already came and got used to get the Burgman back in proper service so I can have reliable transportation for interviews (whenever someone decides to give me one) and commuting. I think not being able to honor my obligations to my boy (and thus being labeled a “deadbeat”) is the most frustrating part of the current situation.
The public benefit system is frustrating, more so to a single male with no children in the apartment. Because I’m a single male with no children in the apartment, I’m ineligible for state medicaid after my COBRA insurance expires today. Because I’m a single male whose unemployment benefits exceed 130% of the federal poverty level, I don’t qualify for food stamps. That said, though, I have to do a phone interview with the state to hopefully get some. It’ll be a temporary help until I’m back working again should they decide to approve me. Otherwise, essentially the only help a single male can expect is from the nearby homeless soup kitchen.
I count 71 jobs that I’ve applied for just in the past thirteen days since I started tracking them in Evernote instead of trying to organize them in Gmail. Received a rejection on one; no responses on any others. On the average I’ve been applying to twenty to thirty job postings a week on every internet job board I can find.
The way job hunting works in today’s internet age, one could be competing with literally hundreds—if not thousands—of applicants for the same job. Very few employers ask to receive a résumé by post or fax anymore. That makes getting one’s foot in the door a longshot at best unless there’s some way that we can really stand out or unless one already has “friends in high places.” It also makes it very difficult for people like me, who may not have the years of paid experience but who does have the ability to do the job or the ability to learn it quickly (something I’ve been noted for in nearly every position I’ve had in my career, ranging from secretarial/admin to programming and data analysis). I’m in that middle strata of applicants who are overqualified for entry-level work but don’t have enough paid experience for the “good” jobs.
I read somewhere a year or so ago that the typical worker in today’s market will change careers—not just jobs—at least five times during their working years. It makes me wonder how a worker in today’s market can be expected to become the best at a single field.
I’m sure I’m not speaking for myself in this frustration.
Burgman MPG Update
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on March 23, 2009
I finally got around to tallying up all the gas receipts (that I had actually written the mileage onto) into a Google Spreadsheet to get the gas mileage since I started keeping track.
Thirteen months.
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on March 18, 2009
This weekend will be a year and a month since the divorce was finalized. It seems life has both blown by quite fast but that in the end I really haven’t gone anywhere (like riding on Test Track). I managed to find work, then lost it, and find myself back where I had started, but without the hefty severance package to live off of (today I live off of $225 a week in unemployment benefits—it covers the rent and the basic necessities). I was blessed to have enough of a federal tax refund to finally get the Burgman back up-to-date on its maintenance.
I went back this morning and read the “Dear John” email (for lack of a better description). If anything, it’s a crib sheet on what not to do in my new relationship (although I find myself in those same ruts anyway, like not answering the telephone).
Apart from the new relationship I’m in (with someone I’ve known since junior high school, so there is some actual history this time), I’ve pretty much gone back to being the same loner I was before I met the now-ex-wife. I do make an effort to attend the Bike Nights that the local F.A.I.T.H. Riders put on here in Plant City and use the annual passes to the various theme parks that I bought when I was actually working, but otherwise I don’t do very much else.
On the positive side, I have been blessed this past year to be able to make some trips and meet some very exciting people in places like PodCamp Boston and even here in Tampa Bay at the Second Life Community Convention. I’ve been able to reconnect with old friends from Saddleback and from Southern California, including the person that I’ve concluded I should’ve stuck with in the first place. Sitting on the front steps of that apartment in Fullerton, California and talking like time had never passed, but realizing that a lot of time had indeed passed, and our lives had all changed in very significant ways, was both refreshing but also indicative of the fact that “home” had changed too, and not necessarily for the better.
The primary goal for this year is getting back to work, so I can get caught up on the support that I owe my son and make sure he is properly cared for—something I really have no worries about, as from what I have heard second-hand his grandfather has been the role model I could have never been; to get my finances finally back on track and start paying off the debt I took from the marriage instead of drowning in it; and, most importantly, cultivating the new relationships that are taking root in my life.
My angel sent me a short Irish poem the other day. It’s worth repeating.
May those who love us, love us.
And those who don’t love us—
may God turn their hearts.
And if He cannot turn their hearts,
may He turn their ankles,
so that we may know them by their limping.
Thanksgiving Thoughts
Posted by Steven Buehler in Uncategorized on November 26, 2008
For the second year in a row I won’t be celebrating a Thanksgiving, at least not formally. Last year I was separated; this year I’ll have been divorced for nine months. Of course, I’ve been living by myself since April of 2007, so I should be used to this by now. I had thought of flying up to Michigan to spend it with my dad and his wife, but decided that it would be smarter to hang on to the money to pay down things, especially since I’ve been on three air trips already this year (Atlanta, which my employer paid for, in May; Boston, in July; and So. Cal. to visit my sweetheart, earlier this month).
The fact is that I’ve lost a lot this year. I started the year without a job, and while on the job hunt I lost my family and my home to a divorce process that seemed to pass like a blur. On January 6, she filed, and on February 21st, it was final. I walked away from everything that day. Lately, it’s all about money—the third of my net income that gets sent to the state every month for child support; the debts that I’m several months behind on in a few cases and are going into collection due to my being out of work for nine months and having to move out of the house on top of it, from which things never recovered.
That’s not say it’s totally depressing this holiday. I do have things to be grateful for in the midst of such a stormy season. I have a place to call home, even if it’s a small apartment in the middle of hickville. I have a job in spite of living in one of the worst IT job markets in the country when places are seeing layoffs in the thousands and tens of thousands, so at least my essential living expenses are getting paid. If the bank comes to repossess the little scoot, I still have the larger Burgman, paid in full, to get me from Point A to Point B. Most of all I’m incredibly grateful to have Vee in my life after so many years, and to be constantly overwhelmed and humbled by the love and passion she constantly lays on me across the miles. This last item alone has made life much more bearable and worth hanging on to.
So, let’s hear from you: What are you grateful for this year?
Sponsors…
About Me
I'm a 30-something blogger, sometimes writer/musician, and geek-of-all-trades starting life over in Plant City, Florida, with the faith of my youth, the love of my life, and prayers for a job before my unemployment compensation runs out in April 2010. I'm also the host of The Sacred Project Podcast—This Ain't Your Grandma's Church Music!
David Housholder's Blog
Michael Lewis
My Amazon.com Wish List