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To my amusement we got our insurance bill for the month. It now has Mantis on it instead of the ninja. My insurance has gone down by a few dollars a month. I find that very amusing.

Its been almost a month since I swung my leg over my FZ6.

It was interesting how nervous I was at first. The bike was bigger and more powerful. Everything I had read on the internet had created a subconscious thought that the moment I moved the throttle the bike would shoot from under me and impale itself into a wall, leaving me broken and bruised behind it.

None of that happened. My ride out of the dealer parking lot was uneventful. I had one stall leaving the parking lot. I forgive myself for that considering I had not ridden in three weeks at that point.

Beyond that. Mantis is a bigger bike. He is taller and wider then the Ninja. However the riding position is more comfortable. I noticed immedatly on the ride home that I did not have the buffeting about the head that I did on the Ninja. Nor did I have much air flow across my body. Later rides with my other half where he complains about wind and I raise an eyebrow in puzzlement have led me to conclude that despite the half fairing has excellent wind protection. My legs are also tucked closer into the bike and do not receive the same airflow as the ninja. I may get a belly pan, I'm not sure yet.

The bike moves better. It 'falls' into turns more. I did not understand the term until I almost freaked myself out on the road to the house. The bike moves with me without my putting effort into my hands. The balance of my body is just as important. The ninja I pushed and pulled around. Some days it feels like I just tip myself into the turn and everything else flows with my wants.

I find the ride to be smooth. The ninja had a chug chug vibration to it that Mantis does not. In fact he kind of hums along butter smooth under 7k rpm. Under 6k the bike is managable. Nothing is unpredictable or suprising with throttle control. The thorttle is *not* choppy or twitchy. This was adjusted for 2007. Low speed is fine, but the FI likes to stay over 5 mph or it makes a bit of noise.

After 8k the bike buzzes. I think of it as excitement. Once you hit that 'magical' 8k rpm the inline 600cc engine comes to life and a beast bursts out of the bike. The first time I opened up, out of habit from the ninja to pass a car (I was in the left lane but the car was crawling and I didn't want to be beside it on the bridge), I opened it a lot. The bike rode up the rpm's hit 8k the mirrors started to vibrate and holy "fudge" I was at 97mph from 60 in a blink of an eye. That scared me a bit. I was in control but the bike just blew through the speeds and chopped up the road. My ninja had a longer wind up time and in general I was impressed.

I've managed not to drop the bike. I had the whole incident with the ramp but that has been resolved. The weight is higher and low speed feels different, but it is not hard or ungangly. Sometimes backing out of the shed is a bit of fun since I back down the ramp into the gravel driveway.

The brakes are large and incredible. The rear brake has a lot of power. I've spent a good bit of time getting to know them. Its also positioned better then my ninjas. As is the shifter. The bike shifts very smooth lacking the clunk of the ninja to announce each gear. However I do miss the neutral finder from Kawasaki. Sometimes going down through the gears while sitting at a stop is a bit of thought.

I now understand the torque debate. There is a difference. It isn't bad but where the ninja felt it was biting the road Mantis feels like he is sliding across it. Sometimes the feeling is a bit disturbing and I down shift a bit more. I now use more of my tire then I did on the ninja. I don't think I am riding more aggressively. I may be even more sedate then before. It is very easy to ask the bike for what it has and I don't need all of it.

The bike is very quiet. It winds up in the high rpm but its a mellow humming noise for the most part. I like it. I'm not into loud bikes and loud pipes. Gas millage is fine so far, we're doing about 50mph and we're not even to 1k miles so not yet broken in. I did my first service myself.

The end of next month I plan to take my first long road trip and visit Nalian in MA outside of Boston. I need to order some saddle bags.

And a transformers fan to boot.

Nice bike, how did you get "To punish and enslave" on there? Decal or paint?

Great decal. All my riding coworkers love it.

Are those the reflective rim stripes on there?

The saying is a decal. I found an ebay seller selling it in the correct font.

The rim stripes are not reflective. I was going to go for reflective ones from streetglo but I found a seller that has precurved stripes. Uber easy to apply (not perfect but they look pretty good).

The hubby asked me several times if I was sure I wanted to take the bike. Of course I am sure. Sure, it was wet and foggy and misting and drizzling occasionally and 60 degrees but hey.. thats why I have all this gear right?

So off I went. I had some paperwork errands to run. I hate doing those in the car. The bike is just more efferent. I finally got around to getting my first name changed and I needed to start doing the paperwork with Social Security so I can get my DL changed so that I can get everything else done.

People look at you strange as you swish and squeak inside the social security waiting lobby.

That was uneventful, but productive. I stopped at the bookstore and they had a book I was looking for. Yay for me! Next I went back home and thats when I met the stupid mini van.

For those that know Winchester VA, coming out of Winchester on RT7 you go across 81. The turn to get onto 81 is on the left hand side. This person didn't realize that and was in the right lane. Realizing they needed to be left, they decided to stop in the right lane, straddle the left lane, and plop themselves nose first in front of the person in the turn lane to get onto the interstate. The light for the interstate was red and the straight away was green.

Only, I, in the left lane, was unable to go thanks to the van. I honked. It made me feel better but I had no where to go and stopped and glared through my tinted visor. Once the light turned red the van proceeded against traffic (the people coming off the interstate had the green) and went.

Thats the crap that gets people killed. Yeesh.

Killed reminds me that we had a fatality saterday morning. The K-9 unit came across a wrecked motorcycle and a dead rider. Turns out he had been roaring up and down the road and wrecked into the guard rail, sliced his thigh open and bled out. He was intoxicated and had a history of doing this type of thing. The Sgt gets on scene and goes 'We arrested him last year for stalking his ex wife'. Seems he would climb onto her deck and peek at her and do other such things.

This picture is from Sunday morning after work. Day shift was having breakfast at IHOP. My other half had his duty night at his volunteer station and met up with me to have breakfast before we went home.

I just got my pair from NewEnough on closeout for 89 bucks. They are excellent. The quality is impeccable. They are well padded and comfortable right out of the box. The design is pretty subtle. The boot feels light weight compared to my race boots. They will get warm, but for wet weather and cooler weather (spring/fall/dry winter) they will be excellent.

I plan to start breaking them in this weekend and then use them on my ride up to Boston next month.

The trip was not hugely eventful although some things did happen.

For one we drained the battery last night and didn't realize it. So in the rain we had to charge it. That wound up pretty easy. My tank just hinges back once you take off two bolts. Then it was raining in general so I put all my rain covers on and my water proof liner and heavy duty gloves.

I left a very stressed Tim and headed out about an hour after I meant to. My route was very easy. I took 81 up to 84 and then 84 over. I passed Bloomsburg which was weird. I've not been up there in years but of course the scenery is unchanged. Hi Bill.

I wound up going through VA, into WV into MD into PA into NY into CT into MA. Very cool ride, scenic through the mountain even if it was highway. But I wanted to get it done and I can go 80 on the interstate.

The ride was fine. My neck started to get a bit sore about 3/4 of the way through. It was very windy in PA and it kinda wore my neck out.

Once I hit MA I hit traffic. That sucked. After eight hours I didn't want traffic but there it was. It delayed me by a good hour and a half to two hours as I crept along in bumper to bumper traffic. At one point Nalian was going to come and meet me but I decided to try to make it through the round abouts and stuff to her house and I did.

I pretty much instantly jumped into the shower once I got here. We then went to dinner with a friend of mine that just moved up here. I haven't seen him in forever and a day.

Very productive. Now I'm getting tired.