Sadly, I find there just ain't that much to blog about these days. I ride every day, in the rain or not, and sometimes drivers try to kill me, and sometimes not. Riding, as a whole, is just a part of my everyday life. There are trips, and the occasional fun event, but the daily commuting doesn't make for much newsworthiness.

Anyway. In my last entry I added a picture of an Impressive Tuning Box. One of the VStrom forums thht I'm a member of (vstrom.info, if you're curious) has a loaner program. Sign onto a thread, and when it's your turn, a Yoshimura Fuel Injection Tuning Unit (aka Yosh Box) will show up in your mail along with easy-to-follow instructions and the address of the next person.

Inside, this box is just a set of variable resistors, but it's sufficient to make slight changes in the fuel map of stock Suzuki bikes. Sort of a poor man's Power Commander. In about 10 minutes of futzing around, I reset my idle fuel maps to +2%, and the Strom's low-throttle roughness and weakness at 2000 RPM has been almost entirely cured. 6th is now a usable gear at freeway speeds (instead of "not even worth using until above 90mph"), and there's a lot more power down low. The bike will now not stall ever; idle throttle with the clutch released is enough to pull slowly forward from a stop. All in all, a great upgrade for zero cost. To do better I'd need a Power Commander, and though that's certainly a better answer, it also costs $300. For me, this is more than enough.

I'd still like to remove the secondary throttle valves, as I hear that gives a great benefit to low-end torque on the Vstrom 1000, but I haven't had the need to take the tank off. If I ever do, I'll be sure to remove those valves when I'm inside.

Weather in Seattle has entered the Worst Part of the Year; it's alternating between dry-and-stupidly-cold, and sort-of-cold-but-raining-heavily. I'm really looking forward to when it starts pulling out of this, probably around May...

Seattle is in the grip of Nuclear Winter, it seems. Actually, by the standards of just about anywheree else, we've just had a very mild winter flurry, but for Seattle, that's enough to bring the city to a standstill. 6-8" of snow in the metro area is a lot, and combined with it being below 20 degrees, there's a lot of ice and a lot of abandoned cars everywhere. Yesterday I was unable to get to work at all, since the Metro buses were shut down.

Haven't been on the bike since early last week, and I miss it. Hopefully all this ice will melt off and we'll be back to 38-and-rainy, as is usual for Seattle this time of year. Certainly won't be pleasant weather, but at least I'll be able to ride.