2013 Honda CBR250R ABS - First picture...

2013 Honda CBR250R ABS

I've been too busy riding the CBR250R to stop and take pictures. This motorcycle is more fun to ride than it should be. After all, it's only a 250cc. The CBR250R ABS is quick, nimble and easy to ride. If you have a bit of riding skill it will surpise you with how well it can move. It's very much a CBR. This is not just a "beginners motorcycle".

That's an unfortunate tag that's applied to small motorcycles that are lacking across the board. Honda got this one right (Kawasaki, too).

We haven't seen many sports 250cc motorcycles in the U.S. besides the Ninja. It looks like more choices are coming in the sub-500cc category. That's a great thing. I'm looking forward to seeing what Yamaha and Suzuki come up with. KTM has the Duke 390 coming this way. That raises the bar very high.

The weather is finally warming up. It's time to get some mileage on this new motorcycle and get it past the break-in period. I'm looking forward to every mile of it...

CBR250R...gone riding

Finally - winter seems to be passing and I've been out riding the CBR250R ABS. In two months and very few miles I've gotten a very good idea of what this motorcycles is all about. Fun.

Fun is a matter of perspective, of course. There's a lot of factors that make this motorcycle right for me. The top three are it's quick, nimble and it fits. Next on the list would be that mysterious thing called "feel", range and fuel economy.

How a motorcycle "feels" is a hard one to describe. If you like single cylinder motorcycles this new Honda engine is excellent. If you like twins, it will feel familiar. If you prefer four cylinder motorcycles it's very different. Once you get past the "purr" you'll notice a single cylinder motorcycle is very light and narrow.

Back to the fun part. As motorcycles have become bigger and heavier the fun factor has been dropping for me. I don't do (or prefer) a lot of long, straight, (dull) highway rides. I'm a twisty road, day trip, type of rider. It's the difference between "getting there" and "being there". The CBR250R is downright playful. It keeps you involved with the process of riding without it coming across as work. It keeps prodding you to not just sit there and pilot it, but to ride it. This is a proper, responsive, motorcycle. To me - that's fun.

Honda got the fun factor right with this motorcycle. If you're a returning rider or a new rider - take a look at this gem. Motorcycles like the CBR250R don't come along often.

What is Google doing?

Google does things that baffle me sometimes. Android is great. Google Docs is nice - sometimes. Gmail and Calendar are very good. Contacts is a mess. Search has gotten a little wonky lately. It's hard to pinpoint that one, but there's just too much going on in the results page.

Picasa, the desktop app, went nowhere, so they bought Snapseed, which would have been better - and killed it. They bought Sparrow, the Mac desktop email client, and that went nowhere. iGoogle? Going, going, almost gone. Now Reader is being killed off. What next? I suspect it will be Blogger. Then there's Google Chat/Talk/Voice whatever that mashup is. I use Google Voice for Voicemail. It's convenient and the translations are often wildly funny. It's too damned awkward to use for phone calls on a desktop computer and pointless on a mobile. Youtube? I'm still trying to figure out Youtube. Publishing your own videos, I guess, but it's a cluttered mess.

I know Google is pushing hard to get everyone into Google+. I still don't need it, I still don't care about it. There's nothing there that really interests me. I can't think of anyone that uses it. I look up someone there and there's less information there than LinkedIn or Twitter. I don't know about Facebook because I don't use it - and never will. That's the problem here, I think. Google is determined to be Facebook. Simply put: why?

Part of my issue with Google+ is they still are pushing it as an identity service with no granular control for privacy. Maybe there is. There's a bit too much opaqueness in the explanation of privacy. Plus, they have all my info, so why this? No answer.

Now I realize they have to monetize these projects and I'm fine with paying for service. In fact, I do pay for storage on Google. I'd convert my Google Account to a paid account - if I had a single clue where Google is heading. Right now, they're all over the place. It's inconsistent. Next week they may decide that's it for Doc's, Blogger and Picasa.

If you haven't noticed, it's damn near impossible to remove a Google service from your account without deleting your entire account. If you really want some fun, try removing a device from Google Play. You can't. That's ridiculous.

The harder Google pushes Google+ the more I resent it simply because I don't like being pushed into a service I don't care to be pushed into. I'll gladly join - on my terms. Push hard enough and there are alternate services.

I have a LinkedIn account that's far more relevant to my interests than Google+ will ever be. I have even been dabbling with a Twitter account. That's interesting. And - that's all I need. I don't have the time for more social networking than that. In fact, it's eating up too much time as it is.

Google, you make it hard sometimes. Slowly, but surely, I use your services less and less because it's all getting too inconsistent.

Motorcycles: Small is big...

KTM 390

I just read a great article in Cycle World: The New Normal: Will Getting Back to Basics Save Motorcycling? Small displacement, big sales?

Small displacement, reasonable cost, high level, street motorcycles have been rare in the U.S. for many years. With the exception of Kawasaki and the venerable Ninja 250 there hasn't been much to choose from. Honda upped the ante with the all new CBR250R in 2011.

These may be "entry level" in terms of cost, but not in sophistication or capabilities. Both are highly rated, very popular motorcycles. There's nothing bargain basement here. In fact, there are higher spec 250's out there. Honda and Kawasaki are more easily available.

That's a KTM 390 up there. It may come to the U.S. in 2014. I hope so. That's a serious motorcycle and I'd buy one if the price was right.

I won't repeat the excellent article, but, as a rider, I know what put me off getting a new motorcycle for years. They were getting absurdly expensive and ridiculously big. The cost of ownership and operation didn't make any sense. Things went so bonkers that we ended up with gigantic, expensive, scooters, too.

I mentioned in another post that I traded my 750cc Shadow RS for a 250cc CBR250R recently. In every way, the CBR is a better motorcycle. It's also 500cc smaller and several thousand dollars less expensive. It's not about one being a retro/standard and the other a sport/standard. It's about the engineering, technology, overall usefulness, the "bang for the buck" factor.

I expected a few questions about my sanity/decision to go from big to small. There were none. Instead, there's a lot of interest - and compliments.

I understand that these lower displacement, smaller, motorcycles aren't for everyone. The same could be said of the big displacement, large, motorcycles. Until recently we had very little to choose from.

It looks like 2013 will be there year things start changing. Less is more sometimes. That KTM is a whole lot more...

Motorcycle Security - Abus Detecto 7000 RS1

Abus Detecto 7000 RS1

I've had all kinds of motorcycle locks over the years. A fork lock just isn't enough. Lately I've been using a disk lock and it's convenient. I wanted a little more security - an alarm. Combining the two seemed like a great idea.

I just got an Abus Detecto 7000 RS1 and it's a combination disk lock and alarm. Abus is a rare name in this country, but they're known to be excellent lock makers. This is a very well designed device.

As you can imagine combing a strong disk lock and an alarm makes for a large device - and it is. It's not awkward, though. Most big disk locks, with or without alarms, can be chunky things and that makes the awkward to use. This fits your hand well so clamping it on a disk is easy. It's also big enough to hold steady so you can unlock it without setting off the alarm.

I checked out another disk lock alarm. It had all the right features, but the shape was awkward for carrying, there were a few "gotchas" in terms of using it, and little things like changing batteries was a bit more convoluted than I thought necessary. I returned it before it ever made it to the motorcycle.

The Abus, on the other hand, is very easy to work with because it's very well thought out. The only downside is the microscopic text on the instruction sheet. Once I read the instructions, and there's not a lot of them in text or pictures, you realize that there's not much to learn.

Now all I need is some nice weather to get out for a ride without freezing myself stiff. At least when I stop for coffee, I'll know there is this big, impressive, lock on my disk and on guard duty.