Roscoe the Prologue

I found this while reseaching the Roscoe archives. I was one of those unmentionalbes and proud of it, ah those were the days, nothing on the tube just our bikes and the imagination to create our own moto history.

The blogs titled “dog house - A Roscoe History” parts one and two are long. You will find them below or tucked away in the June 2005 archive. Tedious , I know. Get comfortable, I’ll tell you why.

In my formative years, my circle of friends and I grew up on the slightly rolling, glacial plains of Indiana, USA – farmland. The neighborhood kids lived two miles away. Because all of our parents tired of driving us to each other’s houses, they allowed us to buy mini-bikes and small off-road motorcycles. The bikes enabled us to visit and when we crossed the fuzzy line of acceptable behavior, mothers sent us home.

The enlightenment of cable or satellite television had not reached us in the outback. We tuned in six fuzzy channels; three network, one religion, an independent and the Public Broadcasting. We entertained ourselves inventing practical jokes, building moto-cross tracks, throwing dirt clods and sharpening our senses of humor watching cartoons and BBC imports of “Benny Hill”’ and “Monty Python”. Fine literature encompassed fishing, hunting and off-road motorcycle magazines. We made do creating our own fun. Jump ahead a few years and the ol’ bunch, now states apart, continue to laugh and joke around on bulletin boards and blog sties.

One friend and I shared a secret from the others . . . His Ma turned us on to J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings”. Had the gang known that we read books, let alone books about Elves and Wizards, they would have kicked our Asses.

Later, Tolkien wrote “The Silmarillion”. A precursor to “The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings”, it provided historical backgrounds for characters in the first / next book and trilogy. “The Silmarillion” confused me so that I read the book on how to read “The Silmarillion”. Similarly, George Lucas introduced the “Star Wars” trilogy, episodes 4, 5 and 6, before prefacing them with 1, 2 and 3.

But, what has “dog house” to do with Tolkien and Lucas? “dog house” has nothing to do with Tolkien and Lucas except for a few feeble comparisons.

Unlike Tolkien and Lucas, “dog house” is not as action packed. Peter Jackson will not bang on the camper door begging for the movie rights. Like Tolkien and Lucas, “dog house” precedes the rest of the story. It’s a history to the adventure of why “traveling in this great country, especially with a good woman and a chimpanzee, is the American dream”. It’s a tedious read but it helps explain stuff that comes later.

Take 10 or 15 minutes to read it and join in if you like. If you don’t like, remember you’re reading a drivel filled blog site for entertainment.