I blogged too soon Saturday. About 7:30ish, I got cold, and my body absolutely rebelled. So I guess I learned something new about this stupid condition, even if I do everything right, major temperature changes will mess with me just as bad. So Sunday night, when I started to cool down, I put on a robe and it worked out okay. It was really rough Sunday morning, though, having to get up and get going after puking and suffering that horrible headache the night before. This shit is really starting to affect my quality of life. I wonder if I can still sue Nash Finch?

But I passed, and now I still have to get my helmet and my license before I can start riding (there's no helmet law in Iowa, but I'm not stupid). They told us that right now, the Iowa DOT is only doing random driving tests for people with birthdays on the 10th, 20th, and 30th days of the month, but October 1st, it'll switch to my birthday, so I'll definitely make sure to get it done before then. I'll still have to take the written test, so I'll have to review the Iowa material before doing so, since some of the terminology between the course and the DOT is different.

The class was definitely worth taking. I learned so much that would have taken me ages and more than a dash of courage to learn otherwise. We learned on smaller bikes than mine (Honda Rebels with 250cc, the step down from the Shadow that I bought, which is 600cc), which also helped. So I'll have to practice everything I learned on my bike, so I can feel comfortable. I'm still not entirely comfortable with doing everything I learned, so a lot of practice will be in order before I feel like I can do any real riding or any long trips or anything. Or passengers. It's amazing how many people want to go for rides with me, even my boss half-jokingly asked this morning. The only thing I have to say is that you may want to hold off on that for a while, especially not having watched me ride at all. If you had seen me even yesterday, you might have second thoughts.

My attitude is that I'm going to take the rest of this riding season to concentrate on learning how to ride. I've got the basics, and now I need practice. It's been a long time since I learned how to drive a car, but this feels the same way. It's a whole different attitude, a whole different skill set, a whole different set of instincts I have to develop. Once I feel more comfortable with that, then I can really ride on a regular basis. I think I'm really going to enjoy this journey.