Even though the days are getting cooler I'm still riding. The Chinese scooter has acquired another 700 miles in about a month and with any luck I'll still be using it until the end of October for my job. I know I've said it repeatedly but it's been a major gas saving device. This last tank of gas in my minivan has lasted me over three weeks. The comical thing is that I rarely even visit gas stations because of it. When I fill up the car I also fill a couple of gas cans and then I fill the scooter from them. I have one five gallon jug that lasts me a couple of weeks at the rate the scooter burns gas. The rumors are that the oil companies will graciously lower the price of gas to $3.50 a gallon soon and we're supposed to be happy with that. As I recall I paid about $2.75 a gallon a year ago. It means that my gas bill has gone up from $55.00 a week to nearly $70.00 or another $60 a month based on my need to fill the car every week during the cold weather. I'll keep fighting the expense as long as I can and if I can last into November, all the better.
The 250 Yamaha I bought to restore has challenged all my analytical skills as a mechanic. At first it wouldn't start when I wanted and I would spend hours cleaning the carburetor, changing the spark plug and swearing at its stubbornness. Then I noticed one day that if I fiddled with the kill switch it would start. Of course it would still die at inopportune times when I rode it and I would turn off the ignition, flip the kill switch on and off and it would eventually start. It finally occurred to me that it would start after I turned off the ignition switch to flip the kill switch and that must be related. The next time it wouldn't start I simply jiggled the ignition switch and it fired right up. I'll assume for the moment that the switch is dirty from years of non-use and see how it runs by making sure I turn the switch on with authority. It pulls real well for such an old bike and I have to get where I can trust it and do a long straight run on it. I find it amazing how resilient old Japanese bikes are. This one hadn't run in over five years after years of abuse, yet it started and ran after I changed the motor oil and cleaned the carburetor. Just to give you an idea of  how long, I found a healthy mouse nest in the airbox instead of a filter. Yet it started just the same. Give it to the Japanese, they build rugged equipment.