New Hyundai
This morning I decided to take a long ride on the bike, initially ending up in Burbank. I have a favorite bagel place there, so I stopped in and warmed up with a nice Cheese Everything bagel and a cup of coffee. When I left my apartment it was 55 degrees, but when I got to the valley it was much much colder, probably in the 40s. I wasn’t sure if the bike would start from sitting in the cold, but she’s been running okay lately, so I was hopeful.
After finishing my meal, I went out and she started right up. The cops didn’t harass me this time, and haven’t been lately, as I think they are starting to recognize me as a regular Sunday morning fixture. Plus I’ve joked with some of them in the past, and they seem to be regulars as well.
On leaving I decided to not ride through the park on the way back as it’s what I’d call “all jacked up.” So I picked out a path that would give me the most amount of riding time between lights, which is San Fernando Road (aka The Old Road). This road runs from way up north by Castaic Lake and heads south farther than I’ve ever taken it. It’s probably one of the longest roads around here, and it has the fewest lights so as long as you’re lucky on construction and the few lights you do hit, you’ll move through town fairly quick.
Anyway, getting closer to downtown I decided to veer off and head through Chinatown before making a ride through downtown. Sundays are usually best for this as there’s nobody around. So Chinatown is packed for some reason, and when I finally get into downtown I notice that the street is blocked ahead of me. I ask the motorcycle cop who seems to be camping out on the corner if the street is blocked all the way up, and he tells me he doesn’t know.
So I continue my ride to find that it is definitely blocked ahead of me as they are shooting a car commercial for Hyundai. They have a couple different new Hyundais out there, don’t ask me the models, and the have a chase vehicle with a camera rig. I figure I’m going to have to do a 180 in front of everyone, but notice there’s a side street right where the road block begins. I cut down it to find a metro bus sitting there at a light. We’re now following the detour together.
The detour winds through downtown on one-way streets, and we’re both forced to take a right at this T we come to. I look left and don’t see anything, so I pull out and head down the hill. The bus follows me out. A few moments later a car (a new Hyundai) blows down the hill and into a skid, followed by a chase vehicle. Tires are smoking, and I think the bus driver and I were sort of shocked by it, as was the crowd of people sitting outside of a coffee shop.
I could have potentially been in an accident with a car commercial had things worked out a little differently. How do you report something like that to your insurance? “Describe the accident.” “Well I was hit by a car that was in a car commercial, and the camera vehicle that was chasing it.” Actually, come to think of it, being Los Angeles, that’s probably not that shocking. They probably even have a protocol for it.
