No, those are not the glowing eyes of a monster out to get me, they are the battery meters on my lights telling me that the life is quickly draining from my battery, and I am south of US 250. All sorts of things go through your mind when this happens; first and foremost is, when exactly was the last time I charged my batteries up? Running the totals in my head, let's see, I've got about 8 hours of use on the big pack, and it went red on Emerson Road heading out. I switched to the small one at that time and thought I had it made. But wait, now that I think of it, there are 5 hours of use on that battery.
The second thing that goes through your mind is, if I have a mechanical problem, I'm screwed. I'm not sure that if I have to change a flat, I have enough power to do it and still get home.
I guess I need to take a more proactive stance with keeping them charged . The back roads of Wayne and Holmes counties are rather dark places to be.
Luckily, as I rolled in the driveway the red eyes had just started to flash and the pure white LED started to fade to yellow. You can bet that from now on, I will keep better track of keeping the batteries charged.
Coming in on Kansas, I saw 4 sets of headlights going south. Smiling to myself, knowing that I'm not the only fool out there refusing to give in to the cold and dark.
Soon, night riding will be a thing of the past for me. I am due to go on to second shift in a week. Not my prefered shift, but after spending a good portion of the last year on unemployment, it's just plain out good to be working again.
