Geezer with a Grudge: Another Brick in the Wall?

Sep 12, 2013

Another Brick in the Wall?

Fuel efficiency geeks have redefined the term “1 liter” car to mean “the amount of fuel needed to travel 100 kilometers.” If you know me, you know I love this definition. The VW folks are doing everything they can to make motorcycles seem as practical as fingernail extensions, buggy whips, and analog tape or vinyl. The newest, ready-for-production version of the VW hyper-efficient car, the XL1, knocks out 261 mpg with 0-60 “performance” of 11.5 seconds. With a 47-hp, 800-cc two-cylinder “power plant,” the XL1 is no muscle car, but it does have a top speed of 99mpg. You can read more about this state-of-automotive-engineering’s-art from Car and Driver Magazine here: Volkswagen XL1 Concept.

I want one. It’s hard to imagine a two-wheeled vehicle being able to compete in this sort of high-efficiency market, but it would be cool if it happened.

Technorati Tags: automotive,motorcycle,high efficiency,vw,xl1

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The Geezer Story

I stumbled upon this column name (Geezer with a Grudge) almost 20 years ago, in 1999. The first Minnesota Motorcycle Monthly editor I worked with, in late 1999, complained that the magazine was getting no mail and the editors wanted to know if any readers were still out there. I fired off a sarcastic note, as a joke, intended to provide a little humor and some feedback. He published it as an article and later called me to say he'd received more mail on that letter than he'd received in the past year! I followed that with an offer to write a monthly column attempting to piss off a particular section of the magazine's readership to see if that tactic would generate some mail.

It did, probably more regularly than the magazine wanted at times, and I wrote a monthly column for MMM until the magazine died in 2018.

I plan to post an occasional old Geezer article into the blog, followed by short comments about the current status of my perspective on our activity/sport/vehicle of choice.