Scootercast Scooter Internet Radio

SHOWNOTES: It is hard to believe, another milestone. It was just a few weeks ago I spoke about having started scootercast a year earlier. Now, I am on the verge of the 50th episode. In this show I am going to talk more about what is in store for that show, about some new riding gear and also about the developments with my blown Vespa Sprint.

Show notes: If you have been listening to the show for any length of time, you have heard me talk about my three Vespa beauties. My first is a 1981 P200e with a sidecar. It is still my main ride and is always a eye catcher because it has a California sidecar. Another is my classic 1965 Vespa 180ss, a Red Italian beauty that I pamper, that sleeps under a blanket, the one that gets a gentle soapy sponge bath, never the direct spray of the hose. An then there is my little '67 150 Sprint, which I finally will say, I ride the piss out of her. I'm sure you know the riding technique, crank it wide open and see if you can get just a few more miles per hour out of her. Although I have mentioned it in passing a few times, I have tried not to bring too much attention to the fact that my Sprint is one of those...yes you know what I mean, dare I even say it? A Vietnamese import. She came to this country as a refugee almost 10 years ago, just when the first bikes were making their way from overseas. It wasn't easy to get her through customs, but she made her way to Denver and lived for a time in Texas with me, until I brought her to the east coast. She is a long way from home. Podshow PDN {podshow-a9929f73a9e94ccafcb68c0dab9371a3}

Shownotes: I don't know what more I can ask for, it was almost seventy degrees here today. Having worked so much in January, I had a nice afternoon of riding planned. But as you might expect, work again, interfered with recreation and I spent the afternoon at the Virginia legislative building, listening to the big wigs argue about money. But then again, such is the business of the people and I did sign on to this gig. What had really gotten me hyped up, was another beautiful Virginia weekend. It was in the sixties and just right for wrenching a bit on my scooters and spending part of Sunday riding out in the country. You may not remember, but I live in Richmond, a small city hoping to fool everyone else into thinking it is a big city. The true is, we operate like any other small town in America. Plenty of hopes and dreams mixed up with lots of southern tradition, small town political bickering and easy access to some of the most beautiful countryside in the United States.

SHOWNOTES: You may not know that this is year to the day that I launch the Scootercast web site and posted the first podcast. It is an amazing milestone given that I always wonder if I can keep it going beyond the next few months. Much of the shows success and my persistence has to do with you the audience who have given me lots of encouragement and direction. Along with “don't do that?, you have suggested everything from audio improvements to topics like long distance riding, purchasing a scooter, winter riding, rallies and of course music. It seems you either like the music or don't, everyone has an opinion. So this is the point at which I must pause and thank a few supporters. First to thanks Chelsea over at ScootRichmond. Chelsea was the first person to submit to the rigor of my amateur questions along with my bumbling remote recording skills. She has continued to be a supporter of the show along with Dave Munn and all the folks at ScootRichmond. Second, thanks to Steve Williams from Scooter in the Sticks. Steve has also been on the show and has been for me and many other bloggers, a great literary and content inspiration. Over the past year I have spoke to or exchanged emails with dozens of scooter bloggers, who all point to Steve as an influencing factor in their own development. He is both a gracious individual and a talented writer.

SHOWNOTES: Steve Guzman from the Scooter Scoop sounds over the moon about his new job with Italjet. It also seems that the rush of preparing for an upcoming Indianapolis Dealer Expo next month, making it tough to track him down for a full length interview. He has assured me that we will talk and at that point we'll hear a whole lot more about what the LS Motorsports and Diamo. The month of January is always a non-stop marathon for me. Here in Virginia, it the time the legislature is in session and does it's work. Like most of you, I have my own escapes and one of those rejuvenating activities is scooting. But since bragging last week about our balmy weather, the weather gods have struck back with a vengeance. Today it is cold, in the 20's, so no riding for me. I have done a little investigating into the problems I am having with my Vespa Sprint and will need to deliver it to Scoot Richmond for some serious repair.

SHOWNOTES: There has been a big development in the scooter blogging world. Many of you may know that one of the best scooter blogs for news and information is Steve Guzman's The Scooter Scoop. Always top quality blog posts, lots of outstanding pictures, done with a fantastic sense of humor, both about scooting and about those of us who sometimes take our selves to seriously. In a post on Thursday January 10th, 2008 Steve announced that as if that moment he was “the official point of contact for Italjet USA? he went on to say that “LS Motorsports has brought me on board to manage all aspects of Italjet Sales and Marketing.? which is probably a good things, in that when I looked at the LS site for news, the last post was September 8, 2007. Apparently Steve will be working closely Italjet Moto (Bologna, Italy) to bring the Italjet Dragster as well as the Torpedo, the IT50 back to the US market. We all congratulate Steve and wish him the best of luck.

SHOWNOTES: I guess that most of you have seen the Vespa that I use for my Podcast logo. It is a red 1967 Vespa 180ss that I got back in 1998, when I was relatively new to scooting. In the summer of 1998 I started looking for a new scoot and the 180ss or the GS kept coming up, but as I read more I was attracted to the style of the 180, the large frame and unusual trapezoid headlight. To make a long story short, a crate arrived twelve weeks later from Performance Scooters and the scooter was even more beautiful than I had expected. Now some of you who have been around for a while might be thinking, Performance Scooters, that sounds familiar, but isn't there another story about them? Performance went into bankruptcy on November 8, 2000. I was just lucky with my web purchase, but honestly wouldn't do it again. Think about it, I plunked down big money for a scooter unseen from someone I didn't know. Why not just ask someone punch you in the face and take your money?

SHOWNOTES: For those of you who have been watching you can probably tell, I have been tinkering around with the format of the website this past week. That should explain why it has been changing, sometimes, minute to minute. I guess there is a way to do all this off line then update the site, but I haven't figured out how to do it that way yet. When I first built the site I set it up to work best in a Firefox browser, the one that I migrated to several years ago. The site seemed to display fine in the Mac Safari browser, but did funny things in Internet Explorer, like throw the sidebar lists to the bottom of the page. Hopefully those of you using Explorer will find this has been fixed. One of the new features on the SCTRCST website is a new page that includes a photo album. I haven't settled on everything I plan on including, but started by posting some of my pictures from Amerivespa 2007, photos of some of the scooter shops I have been to, photos from our trips to Italy and of course, I had to include a variety of my own family and scooter pictures. If you were listening last week, you know we didn't have time to get to Chelsea, at ScootRichmond www.scootrichmond.com She has graciously volunteered to supplement my meager technical expertise and this week is going to answer a listener's question about adding ground effects lighting to his classic scooter.

SHOWNOTES: It's been another long work week which took me to Baltimore and Washington DC, but as usual, the best part was coming home and settling back into my routine. Marcel is away in Denver this weekend, so I have spent some extra time putting together a special show. I want to say thank you for all the email you have been sending and if I haven't gotten back to you yet, please be patient, I will answer you. I have been emailing probably one of the best traveled scooterist here in the United States, after having met him here in Richmond at the Modern Vespa Workshop. Any of you who belong to the Modern Vespa Forum know him as Bobo. He is Mark Bobotek a veteran of the Cannonball scooter runs and frequent rally attendee. I spoke with him about a week ago, just as one of the first snow was making it's way into the Washington Baltimore area. As you might expect, he had just returned from the west coast where he did a LA to Tucson to Nogales scooter ride and was settling back into being at home with his family. Check out some of the subjects we talk about, Bobos website, the Cannonball Run website and the Alaska Bike Run. Thanks to everyone who entered the drawing to win one Scooterist a way of life by Christian Bauer. I have eight consultation prizes in addition to the DVD and will be email all of you to get your shipping address so I can get those out this week. One of the DVDs goes to Melvin. The other DVD goes to Brian seven more lucky individuals will get a specially designed scootercast t-shirt, just right for wearing to any rally.

SHOWNOTES: I want to remind you that you only have a few days to get a 20% discount on Christian Bauer's Scooterist DVD and make sure you email me for your chance to win one of two free DVDs I will be giving away on the December 16th show.. Mention you want me to through your name in the hat for the drawing. You can also call the voice mail line at 206-888-6174 On the last show I talked allot about the scooter groups and forums on the web. As a source of information they are fantastic and if you follow them with any regularity you start to get to know the people posting. I mentioned that they operate much like a social community and as a result, you hear about all kinds of things. This past week some of the posts referred to past scooter accidents and injuries and I began to think back to a post by Steve Williams that I had breezed over. Steve had made a reference to how pilots dont talk about crashes and I thought about how I have never really talked about scooters and risk and what I think about every time I take off out of the garage. So here it is.

SHOWNOTES: I have been very busy I was at work, but more to the point I have had one of those weeks where I ask myself, do these people really think I am that smart? You know what I mean, that little nagging voice that you have in the back of your head that says, “if everyone knew how really stupid I was I would be fired on the spot. I do know that this is my own little nagging insecurities, but indulge me for a minute. After much heartache I have learned that this is a useful little quirk to have, because it keeps me honest, both with myself and with others and also has helped me from getting to far out on a limb numerous times. What the hell does this have to do with scooters? It is related to the idea of making more scooter connections so you don't get out there and on the web it means getting into groups and forums. Most of groups I know about are through Yahoo Groups. This has got to be one of the easiest ways to communicate with like minded fans and to establish a place where people can ask questions, share information and exchange ideas. Some that I still follow are about disablities rights, politics and other things not so atherial like McIntosh Stereo equipment, Mini Coopers, Ducati, Harley Davidson Sprint motorcycles and of course Scooters. Some groups are large (thousands of members), but most are small to medium sized (hundreds of members).and each has what I would term its own distinct personality. In addition to the Yahoo Groups, the other place to connect is through the online forums. In my view, the forums provide an avenue to both connect with other scooterist and in most cases, get some of the best free advise in all the scooter community. Many of the scooter forums, like the Internationalist BBS, which has been around for ten years, have more resources on riding, mechanics, clubs and rallies than you are going to find if you do something like google search. And most times, the information is more current accurate and reliable. As one example, the modern Vespa forum includes a section with all the modern Vespa parts and workshop manuals, with a separate section for repairs and technical tips. Now that is a resource!

SHOWNOTES: What a great week. Here in the US it is thanksgiving weekend. That means Marcel has been here in Richmond and I have had four days off from work. There has been plenty of time for hanging out, visiting friends and puttering around in the garage and I want to tell you about what I have been doing with my Vespa Sprint. Those of you who have been following my blog, know that I have been trying to become more social, not always one of my personal strengths. So I have joined Facebook and Myspace and have been shooting out invitations left and right to anyone who posts themselves with their scooter in their profile. In doing this I happen to stumble upon Christian Bauer at scooterfilm.com. He responded almost immediately by sending an email, inviting me to take a look at his latest film Scooterist, a way of life. It is an hour and a half packed full of rallies, racing, wrenching and the scooter lifestyle in England and Germany, and is just fantastic. I am always amazed at the way people become inspired and how they build those things that they have passion for into their lives. Christian Bauer is one of those remarkable individuals who has taken his passion for scootering and turned it into art, in this case a film about scooting life in England and Germany called “Scooterists, a way of life?. He now lives and works in London, which is where I caught up with him for this interview. Through December 10th you can get a copy of Scooterists for 20% off, just click here. I mentioned earlier in the show that I have been working on my Vespa Sprint. This is a bike I got about ten years ago from Randall over at ScootRS. I was one of those people who took a chance with Randall very earlier on in his Vespa restoration business and I must say that for the most part I have been pleased. After watching Christian's DVD I was inspired to pull the carb, something I have been meaning to do for a long time. It has been sticking and hasn't been easy to set the idle. I am lucky to have ScootRichmond in my backyard and picked up a new Spaco reproduction carb to mount back on the bike. Boy what a difference. I can already feel how much more responsive it is and hopefully will be less prone to get out of whack.

SHOWNOTES: I have to say that it was sad to leave Denver last week, but was relieved to finally get back to Richmond. The weather has turned cold here, well for those of you who live up north, you would probably say it has gotten cooler here. Despite this, I was so excited with the plug DB gave me on White Roof Radio, I pulled out the P200e and snaped a boat load of pictures of it with our Mini-Cooper S. When I looked at them later in preparing to pick one for posting I was impressed with what a natural pair they make. Both are small, efficient modes of transportation, with a built-in fun factor that is out of this world. The Mini gives you that wild adolescent feeling of driving your friend's go-cart around the neighborhood at top speed, hoping your parents wouldn't find out that you were driving in the street. It is unnerving how quickly a Cooper S, which is the supercharged Mini, can go from 35 mph to 75 mph before you know it. I have the same exciting experience riding my scooters. Although they top out well below 70, when I am riding the winding roads around the James river, 35 feels like 70 and with every turn the smile on my face gets bigger and bigger. For those of you who are fans of all things small and quick I will put a link to Mini's latest creation. It is called the Mini Clubman, a longer, wagon type mini with the same built in fun factor. It's not due out until next year, but the web has lots of leaked and official

SHOWNOTES: The biggest news of the week has been starting to look for another scooter. As you might expect I have gotten a lot of suggestions to look into maxi scooters as well as some of the new offerings by Genuine. I must say that I am trying to keep an open mind, although I am already drawn to the new Vespas and stopped in Charlottesville this past week to look at a used GTS. Several of you have suggested that I keep an eye out on Craig’s list, which around here means checking Richmond, C-ville and metro DC. So far there have been al lot of 50cc bikes. My guess is that this has to do with a phenomenon that is widely known, that many people get a scooter not realizing what is involved in riding, then decide to dump it 500 miles later, or they get something like a 50cc bike and realize it is too small and doesn’t fit their needs. Any way, I haven’t decided new or used yet, but will keep you updated on my search. I mentioned earlier that I am in Denver. Friday I took a late flight out from Richmond and got here about 2 a.m. During the trip I listened to Steve Guzman’s interview on Just gotta Scoot. Steve writes The Scooter Scoop. Last week I mentioned that David Harrington had interviewed Phil from Scooterworks and this was another enlightening discussion with one of the best scooter news bloggers on the web. It was interesting to hear that Steve is a relatively new convert to scooting and he has taken his passion and turned it into a very informative and fascinating pass time. I must say, I was particularly interested to hear him talk about how he has been able to monetize blog, although it hasn’t been so lucrative that he can quit his day job. Thanks again Steve, for all the great posts and we hope to see more of your video post in the near future. Look for a link to David’s interview with Steve here Scooter blog posts The Honky Tonk Dragon has updated us on his move to New England here in the United States. For those of you who didn’t know, Ben lived in Oregon and he has written a few quirky posts on what it like to be swimming in a new pond. His posts include pictures of his award winning “steam punk? scoot named Quell in her new environment. He has also been posting videos. I had forgotten that he mentioned to me a few months ago that he like country music, I thought this was very curious, coming from someone who also pays homage to performers like the Cure, the Violent Femmes and the Slits. But his video posts include both the Slits and a Three on Trail a yodeling country quartet. On the other side of the world, John Ranna at Who rides a Vespa has been posting regularly putting out trivia challenge that has us identifying the Vespa sighting in a number of different movies. But what is more amazing is to see that he has outed himself by reporting on his own birthday party, held last month. In addition he reveals that he and Bennette just had an anniversary. The post includes a link to their audio invitation from 9 years ago. This wedding stuff is part of John’s day job. Oh yeah, for those of you wondering, this sage old scooterist is all of 35, wise beyond his years don’t you think? So a belated happy birthday to John and happy belated anniversary. One rather sad post this past week reveals that another scooter blogger is putting posting out to pasture. The site was called twstngogrl and vespajitsu. This is probably a rather obscure blog, but if you found it you realized it represented two people’s view of scooting and the love for the life/travel. The last post is rather sullen, but represents one of the things all of us in podcasting or blogging struggle with. When you create something and put it out there you want people to see it, to consume it and hopefully tell you what they think. What we never tell you about is how hard it is to master the technology, to get the word out, to make new connections and to plug what you are doing without seeming like a self promoting ass. I would like to say that I am sorry to see Cody leave our blogging community, truth be told, it is not an easy gig. Last week I got a little plug from the Peanut Butter Scooter Time blogger. His note reminded me that not everyone understands or has heard of podcasting. Sometimes when I am asked, I say, well it is radio on the internet. Most people say oh, yeah and walk away in a daze. I know many of you listen to the show on the your computer and I thank you for that, but what I find really liberating is when you figure out that you can download a podcast, take it with you and listen to it at your leisure. Think about how great it is to listen when you are out walking, or exercising or driving to work, like I do Podshow PDN {podshow-ff9cfdbdfe7a44b28d78f825a931a4ea}

SHOWNOTES: I have been way over busy the past couple of weeks, but this also means that I have been traveling a bit and this translates into time in the car when I can catch up on listening to podcasts. I haven't talked much about other podcasts I listen to, but I have gotten a few emails asking me about how I got into podcasting. My first podcast was an automotive podcast called Whiteroof Radio. It is a podcast where three guys talk about the new BMW Mini Coopers. I have tried a number of other automotive podcasts, but most don't hold my interest, either because they are about things I am not interested in or to be honest, they are too technical for me. There aren't many other scooter podcasts out there, but I want to suggest you check into one called Just Gotta Scoot. David Harrington is a scooterist up in Minnesota that has a number of scooters and probably as many different business interests. You can find out more about all this at his website Just Gotta Scoot,.Dave may not be everyone's picture of the typical scooter fanatic, but his last show with Phil McCaleb from Genuine Scooters or you may know him as the owner of Scooter Works of Chicago was great! Regardless of what you think of Phil or Scooterworks, his story about creating the Genuine Scooter company and their network of dealers is really interesting. This week I got an unsolicited suggestion from Marcel that I consider getting another scooter. Is she the perfect wife or what? But I think it really is more that over these many years we have developed a regard for each other that is unique. I use to worry about every penny we spent, you could even say, there was a time when I was the naysayer of doom. But then I started to realize that even if things did follow the path I had marked out they always seemed to turn out OK. So as of today, I am officially research my next scooter, and will share that experience with you over the next few episodes. Hopefully it will be a little less impulsive that some of my other automotive purchases and I will try to impart some of my success and failure as I go along