Kansas City and electric motorcycles

Sorry for the backlog; typing on a phone is MADDENING.

The trip from St. Louis to KC was rough, really rough. Missouri is desolate, but without the dramatic vistas of Kansas or Colorado. Think of 300 miles of straight road with just enough Applebees and BP gas stations to keep you technically alive and moving. I stopped in a tiny town of Blackwater. I believe the population was 199, and their claim to fame was that 1972 first-time Democratic VP nominee Thomas Eagleton gave a speach there once. Eagleton was dropped from the D ticket by McGovern when it came to light he had undergone shock therapy for depression a few years earlier. He probably got it from Blackwater.

After getting a wee bit lost in the actaully-fun-to-ride backroads of MO (all street names are letters; TT or V or JJ. And no east/north designations. So you can see how I got lost), I booked it to KC in blistering 104 degree heat. Downtown KC was actually awesome! Probably the biggest surprise of the trip. I got off the bike and changed into street clothes in a garage, then wandered for about 2 hours. The Power and Light district is a cool area of nars and nightclubs and music venues (refreshing lemon gellato, too), and across the interstate is KC's hipster district. Boutiques, design studios, record stores, coffee shops, graffiti, and ild warehouses turned into condos. It all had a distinctly art deco vibe, too.

I then headed for Harry Mallin's house, know on the internet as Brammofan. He's a gov't lawyer in KC, but got into motorcycling a few years ago when he found out an old classmate of his ran Brammo, makers of the most popular electric motorcycle on the market. We became familiar with each other the Hell for Leather Magazine comments section, and he gratiously offered to put me up for the night! After grabbing some awesome Mexican food ans talking bikes, Laguna Seca, the TTXGP, and Law School, I crashed at about 10:30. In the morning, we rode to an unfinished subdivision, amd swapped bikea to put them through their paces. I'll do a full ride report of the Brammo Enertia later, but let's say I was really impressed!

Ok back on the road; I'll type my thoughts on Kansas later.