Had a long telephone conversation with Buddy Helscel.. BTW.. looks like he will need to delay his trip to Texas for another month.. Maybe he will be up to it in October..As disappointed as I am that my old friend can't make this month, I am sure pleased that he is still mending and his health is improving.. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that he'll continue getting better.. During our talk, we couldn't help but reminisc just a bit.. We were reminded of a spontaneous run we made with a group of bikers from South Dallas.. More than twenty of us decided to make an overnight run to Kansas City from Big D.. Buddy and I being the only two "white guys".. naturally, we stuck out like a pair of sore thumbs.. We made one helluva run to the KC and started the run back home the next day.. Somewhere in northern Oklahome, everyone decided to hit some of the smaller highways and back roads..MISTAKE.. big time.. At first we all really enjoyed the scenery and the ride was uneventfull.. Just before dark.. the weather turned sour, as it does in that part of the world.. suddenly the sky lit up and the bottom fell out.. That time of year, it was a cold, chilling downpour.. The rest of the guys ran ahead of us a little bit and Buddy and I slowed down, while we passed a bottle of Tequila back and forth a couple of times, to "warm ourselves" just a bit.. "Fat Daddy Jones" realized what we were doing and dropped back to get himself a little "warm up" also.. After his little nip of "warmup", while I was busy replacing the cap on our Tequila, Jones sped up to rejoin the rest of our friends.. It had stopped raining, but the ditches and roadway still had considerable water standing ... Buddy and me sped back up to catch everyone and we commenced seeing tail lights bobbing up and down and dancing every which way.. When we got there, we found motorcycles scattered all over a field.. Seems that the highway took a real sharp left turn and the leader of the pack failed to see it in time.. He straightened out that curve and blasted through the water filled ditch, plowing through a muddy field that was ahead of him .. The rest of the pack, just followed the leader, all of them plowing through that muddy field which was standing in water.. Jones having been delayed by the "warmup" nip realized what was going on and got his old Harley stopped.. When we got alongside.. the first question, of course..was.. WTF is going on.. Fat Daddy kinda chuckled and said.. "Well.. looks like for the first time.. drinking and driving has paid off for me".. Getting all those motorcycles out of that muddy field was one helluva job.. some of those puppies were touring bikes and buried in the mud, up to their axles.. Whew.. belive you me.. that crew was hunting some good concrete to ride on, for the rest of that run.. Your friend in Irving Bill Walker
