Duels or Duals: Duality in Motorcycle Lore

Two exhaust pipes or a pair of pistols. That discussion is best left to the mechanics and historians.

The Trouble with Torque Wrenches and Other Mechanical Misadventures

Protruding from the exhaust port on the forward cylinder head of a Harley Davidson are two bolts onto which the exhaust header is attached. Similar bolts grace the rear cylinder head. These beautiful threaded studs reach out to embrace the shiny flange that secures the header in place with the assistance of a couple of nuts. It is important to use a torque wrench to tighten these nuts using the proper amount of pressure. About 22 ft.-lbs. on the scale of mechanical pressure. Carefully adjust the wrench to the setting, lock the setting in place, and torque down the nuts. Simple enough. But perhaps I know not the subtleties of the torque wrench. With such relative ease, I managed to snap off the forward stud, leading me over the next hours to curse my stupidity, attempt to drill out the stud, snap off a carbon steel easy-out in the drill hole (a process that preoccupied no small amount of time), whacking, tapping, spraying with liquid wrench, cursing, staring silently at the holes I punched in a piece of plywood with a tack hammer, laughing and then facing the inevitable: time to give up my mechanical masquerade.

News

In Geneva, the U.N.'s World Food Program said Israel had agreed to permit two oil tankers to sail into Lebanon to ease a growing fuel crisis in the country. •The United Nations warned that the longer a spill of 110,000 barrels of oil is not cleaned up from Lebanon's coast, the more severe the environmental impact will be. The oil spilled two weeks ago after Israeli warplanes hit a coastal power plant.

Britain's biggest theme park has called off the country's first "National Muslim Fun Day" because of lack of interest, the park said on Wednesday. •People in a village outside this Hezbollah stronghold used a front-end loader's scoop to carry away some of the dead Wednesday after a night of Israeli airstrikes and a commando raid inside Baalbek that residents said killed at least 15 civilians.

"I shot a guy who wouldn't stop when we were out at a traffic checkpoint and it was like nothing," he went on. "Over here, killing people is like squashing an ant. I mean, you kill somebody and it's like 'All right, let's go get some pizza.' " - private Steven D. Green, later accused of premeditated rape and murder of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and her family.

Anonymous

"We find it unfortunate that we murder innocent women and children," said an unnamed (Hezbollah/Israeli) official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to give official statements to the media. "They (Hezbollah/the Israeli Army) are the real murderers, though, because their cause is not just." A photo of the lifeless body of a (Lebanese/Israeli) child was distributed to the media inside an unofficial press kit, because no one was authorized to release the official press kit. "It is the innocent who suffer at the hands of (Hezbollah/Israel), not (Hezbollah/Israel)," the unnamed official added. He denied that (Hezbollah/the Israeli Army) was responsible for the death of (300/3) (Lebanese/Israeli) villagers when a (Israeli bomb/Hezbollah missile) leveled a shelter where the villagers were cowering in a sickening pall of sweat and fear before the dust and falling debris crushed and choked out their existence. "We heard the screams of one of the boys who was blown out of the building," says Abbas Kassab, who also lives in Qana. "He was alive but his legs were badly damaged and someone came out of the rubble with the boy's dead sister and laid her next to him."

Note: As of August 2nd, an estimated 653 Lebanese civilians have died from Israeli bombing. Hezbollah rocket attacks have claimed the lives of 55 Israelis.

Who is this woman who hates my children and changes from day to night princess to warrior friend to foe lover to hater friend to enemy...
life, in the whirlwind, it seems so sad.