Studio711.com – Ben Martens

Some people are impressed when I tell them I work for Lockheed Martin. I have a security clearance and write code that protects the country and brings peace to the world (by bombing the snot out of the bad guys.) I'm like a geeky James Bond. Maybe. I thought I'd give you a little glimpse into what happens behind the scenes in this high intensity work environment. The scene takes place five minutes ago in my cubicle.

I said, “I wonder what people would do if I started wearing my motorcycle helmet around the office.” I put on my helmet and went back to work. Pretty soon Rick had stolen the baseball that I keep on my desk and was throwing it at my head to see how well my helmet worked. So there we were… I'm wearing a helmet and typing at my computer while my cubemate is throwing baseballs at my head.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go back to saving the world.

This morning I went out for a long ride on my motorcycle. Aside from the usual thoughts of “Does that car see me?”,  “What if a duck waddles out in front of me?”, and  “Do I look like a dweeb on this thing?”, I was pondering something else. They say that there is one guy for every girl and vice versa. That's always bugged me. First of all, there are 6 billion people in the world. If there's only one girl out there for me then we're talking about a search of needle-in-the-haystack proportions. Even if I know 10,000 people, I've only met 0.00014% of the 6,000,000,000 on this planet. Of course only approximately half are women so that gets me up to 0.00028%. But let's forget about that part because obviously it's not quite that bad. Look at all the married people. If those odds were really correct, then this planet is on an incredibly lucky streak. Ok, so “the one” is out there. What if I had been born five miles away from where I was born? What if I had been born 3 years later than I was? Would “the one” still be the “the one” or would there be a different “the one?”

I guess you probably think I'm stressed out about this, but I'm not. I'm enjoying life and looking forward to whatever is coming down the road. That whole saying is just an odd phrase when you really start to think about it. And when I am left to think alone, I think about odd things. I'd probably scare/bore you if I blogged all my random thought topics. There's one good example of this. I was driving along on a cross-country trip with my girlfriend. We'd been talking for hours and ran out of things to talk about for a while so we were enjoying a nice period of silence. After about half an hour she utters those words that every guy hates, “Penny for your thoughts.” I was scrambling for something deep to say because my current train of thoughts was not worth sharing. “Ummm…..” “Just tell me what you were thinking right when I said that.” “Ok, well… if you're taking care of your car and you have the money you'll buy the expensive gas. The rest of us buy the cheap stuff. Why do they make mid grade gas and who buys it?”

We take risks every day of our life whether it's skiing down the side of a mountain, getting dragged behind a boat on skis, or driving a little too fast down the road. Even eating that piece of chicken involves risk. How much risk are you willing to accept?

For the past few months I've been working on a new project. Some of you won't be happy with me, and that's one reason I've kept it quiet. Only a couple people know that I've been working on this. I tend to blabber on incessantly about everything I do so I figured I'd use this as a little test to see if I could keep my mouth shut about something.

Over a month ago, I passed the written exam for a motorcycle license and got my learner's permit. Last weekend I took the Motorcycle Safety Foundation's three day training course and got my license. Friday I purchased a used bike. Saturday I got insurance and registration and I've been riding all weekend.

A motorcycle is still a dangerous mode of transportation, but there are things you can do to make it safer. I bought a 1995 Kawasaki Vulcan 800. It's an old cruiser, not a sport bike. I wear a full helmet, not a half helmet. I have a coat with protective pads instead of riding in a T-shirt. I drive two lane roads with stop signs to work instead of bopping down the interstate. My friend Aubry has been riding for years and has been my mentor through all of this from pointing me to the MSF course to teaching me motorcycle maintenance and giving me tips for riding.

Feel free to call me and tell me what a fool I am, but trust me, I know what motorcycles can do. A childhood friend passed away my second year at Purdue in a motorcycle accident. I had that fairly serious accident with a motorcycle two years ago. Plus I know a number of people who set off metal detectors because of all the metal plates they have in their bodies.

So why do it? Hop on the back of my bike sometime and I'll show you (although it will be a few weeks before I'm comfortable enough to give someone else a ride.) The feel of the open road is difficult to describe. The power of the bike underneath and the roar of the pipes as you accelerate are invigorating.

But enough of my excuses, some of you think this is awesome and I know you want to see pictures. Head on over to see “My Whips.”

In case you didn't make the connection yet, this is the answer to the three clues I posted. Here's how they relate.

• Clue #1: Take the first word of each line. Slow, look, press, roll. That's how the MSF course teaches you to turn. Slow the bike down, look where you are turning, press on the handlebars to initiate a lean, and roll on the throttle to increase stability in the turn.
• Clue #2: Some of you think my choice is illogical, and the bike I bought is called a Vulcan.
• Clue #3: My horse (the motorcycle) is significantly faster off the line than my pony (the Mustang.)

There you have it. The end to the mystery and the end of my little silence experiment. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to figure out where I'm going to ride my bike to for lunch.