From: mmanning@icomsim.com (Michael Mannning)
Subject: Who buys these things?
Organization: Icom Simulations
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 23:44:51 GMT

Well I was at a local HD dealer (Suburban in Palatine Il.) today to get a 
little thing of turquoise touch-up paint for the stone chips in my front 
fender and the one on the rear fender that I don't want to talk about when... 
There are these two FatBoys on the floor (bikes, not salesmen), both `92s, 
both black. I check the odometers the first one has about 1700, I nearly 
puked. I go over to the second one and it reads, brace yourself, 562 miles. 
Even more scary is the prices, both of them were for sale for more than I 
paid for mine new. Something like $12,700.00 and I'm not sure that includes 
license, title, tax or not. These had no, absolutely no, add on bits. I've 
heard of things like this but never actually seen it myself. Not that you'd 
ever meet one of the people who bought these things, I mean what are the 
odds of actually catching them riding one.

I should be careful or I'll get run over by bad karma, maybe there's a 
good reason these bike rotted for a year or so.

It's possible they may have belonged to a set of twins who saved forever 
to finally own a new Harley but were kill three days later from infections
they received from sharing a dirty tattoo needle.

Maybe one was a gift. I imagine his family shows it to him, he has a heart
attack. Rather than calling an ambulance, he insists that he be allowed to
ride his new hog to the hospital; in Montana. He dies just this side of 
Duluth. The family is forced to have a closed casket funeral as the
embalmer is unable to remove the stupid looking (at least in death) grin
from his face.

Perhaps a woman, tired of denying herself the thing she wants, decides to
change her life. She begins to live a life on the road on her Harley until
the money runs out and she decides to support herself by robbing
convenience stores. Eventually the law catches up with her and she is
pinned down in the Kwikie Mart outside of Memphis. She dies of food
poisoning contracted from eating a unheated microwave burrito during the
28 hour stalemate.

Perhaps a partner a a mid-sized law firm decides that his dick will no
longer get hard because he didn't do all the things he wanted to when he
was younger. He tells himself he could have hung with the wild crowd in
school, but he was too studious. So he buys the Harley he has convinced
himself he always wanted. It scares him on the way home then sits in the
garage next to the Ferarri till the gas turns to varnish. The next year
he sells it to help pay for his inflatable penile implant. There are 
complications. He is currently serving a life sentance for killing a
systems analist for saying to him in a meeting, "you of all people 
should know about UNIX."

So what have we learned; well the people who buy these bikes are doing no
one a favor. I'd like it if they lost money after a year. It'd be different
if this meant bargains for us, then someone who normally couldn't afford a
new Harley could get one for a song at the dickhead's loss. But these bikes
are selling, and will sell mind you, for as much as a new one. If I make a
huge impulse buy of something I don't really want I would expect to take a
major loss when I had to dump it. These guys make a profit. No bargains for
someone who truly lusts after the bike the way one should before buying it.
These people have no appreciation for the machinery. That's what pisses me
off. It keeps them out of the hands of people who would really love the
bikes for what they are, not what they think the bike will make them into.

BTW. It was 28F Monday and 40F or so Tuesday here in Chicago, so I road
both days. First time in a week or two. More of a tease than anything.
Today it's snowing. Why do I live here?

Re-reading this it's pretty obvious I need a vacation or a Valium or
something. Some nice riding weather maybe.

Take it easy,
    Michael

--
mmanning@icomsim.com

`92 FLSTF FatBoy
`92 Ducati 900SS
Newsgroups: rec.motorcycles.harley