The ride home was, well, different. The jokes are true: It really was fun to ride. It may have been paranoia, or the fact that everyone really was looking at me funny, or simply a mix of the two. I felt like I was doing something really stupid. But then, that felt kind of good, too, in a strange way.

There was a slight downslope on the first major road, and that was good since it helped give me a little push to keep of with traffic. I hit 75km/h at one point down the hill. Remembering that this was my first ride on it, it felt kind of fast. I checked for my wife since she said she'd follow me home to ensure my safety. She was following, but a few car lengths behind.

Over the bridge, through downtown and up the last of the major roads to home. I made it. My wife, apparently wanting to ensure that she was in no way connected with the man riding the scooter, made sure to stay well behind me, but not so far she couldn't see me.

I was hoping to ride it to work that evening, but rain was threatened. Just as well. With the company that we would have later, I wouldn't get a chance to ride it for practice, and I'd hate to ride a scooter in to work only to prove that I couldn't handle it very well.

The learning curve was steep, and there were a surprising number of things to learn on a short ride home...