AP
An Alaska man might have walked away as the biggest winner of last week’s high stakes summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Anchorage. He rode off with a new motorcycle, courtesy of the Russian government.
Putin’s delegation gifted Mark Warren, a retired fire inspector for the Municipality of Anchorage, a Ural Gear Up motorcycle with a sidecar, one week after a television crew’s interview with Warren went viral in Russia. The motorcycle company, founded in 1941 in western Siberia, now assembles its bikes in Petropavlovsk, Kazakhstan, and distributes them through a team based in Woodinville, Washington.
Warren already owned one Ural motorcycle, purchased from a neighbor. He was out running errands on it a week before the summit when a Russian television crew saw him and asked for an interview. More
If anybody with a Russian accent calls you up Mr. Warren and tries to recite the last line of Robert Frost “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” hang up quickly. – Dr. Tar
Who knew Frosts snowy woods could spark such heated debates? Its like a winter wonderland turned Wild West. Keep the comments coming, folks—clearly, were all just stopping by to stir the pot! 🌨️🔥 #SnowyDebates
There were a lot of those running around in the early 2000’s…Simple,
rugged, and practical..Plus a Conversation starter at the Pub.
Mɪʟєs тo ҁo ъєғoяє чoц sʟєєᴘ.
Winning the hearts and minds.
I detest turning nouns into verbs. “Gifts”, as a verb, is awful.
Other word/English language peeves:
Dropping T’s from spoken language. Our press secretary is the worst at this. “Pu-in”
Overused and imprecise: “Largely” seems to be the word of the month now. And I never want to hear the word “nuanced” again.
Inigo Montoya gifts Florida man with a big green dildo to putins ass.
Weren’t the WWII Russian Urals direct copycats of WWII era BMWs?
Be interesting to see what Ural is doing now.
@AbigailAdams — About ten years ago, I heard someone use “gift” as a verb and it was almost as painful as listening to Chinese folk singers. But I looked it up and found that the first OED reference dates back to the late 1500s. It evidently fell out of favor and then made a comeback.
But I agree with you about the verbizing of nouns. 🙄
And glottal stops (character: ɂ) such as “Puɂin” and “diɂn’t” make me want to puɂ.
@Toxic D — https://motorcycle4sale.com/sale/search/usa/ural/all_models
“I detest turning nouns into verbs.”
I detest turning verbs into nouns. “Ask”, for example.
And yes, I saw that guy on Youtube say “Pu-in” over and over. While I realize that some New Englanders speak like that from their natural idiom, there are far too many dopes who picked up that speech affectation for no good reason, and they sound silly to normal people. Just quit it. It’s a verbal nose-ring.
Makes me think of the Yugo Stripper…
It works so long as you keep throwing money at it!
I have a few things to add to this topic.
1) I purchased a Ural Gear Up four years ago this month and it has been an absolute blast to ride and be seen with. We speak of the phenomenon affectionately called “UDF” aka Ural Delay Factor. Do NOT go anywhere and park where people see you with the machine and expect a timely journey. You will be asked questions about it like, “did you restore that?” or “how old is that?” or “can you take the sidecar off?” This is part of the charm of owning a retro looking bike. I believe the current Urals are the best machines they’ve ever produced and this is my favorite bike I’ve owned in nearly 43 years of riding!
2) The Ural company halted manufacturing after Putin invaded Ukraine because of a ban of Russian exports/imports. Many components in building them come from outsourced maufacturors like Brembo brakes (Italy) Kiehen EFI (Japan) Heidenau Tires (Germany) etc. Parts couldn’t come in and bikes could’t go out. Ural was forced to find a new factory to build bikes so, they are now completed in Kazahkstan, as mentioned in the article, which seems disingenuous on Putin’s behalf because the general public sees it as a Russian machine, which it no longer is.
3) There are two theories as to the origins of the Russian version of the sidecar. The first is that during the brief time where Germany and the Soviet Union were allies by way of the Ribbentrop/Molotov Pact where the Soviets were given license to build identical capes of the BMW R71 sidecar for military use. Proof of this deal was lost because any records were destroyed during the ensuing war between the two nations. The second theory is of course, Soviets reverse engineered the design from captured examples.
Rant over. Thank you for indulging me.
Thanks, @Bayouwulf! I really enjoyed reading your comment 😊!
It’s not safe for riding around here in Sarasota County. Too many old people (I’m one) on roads with too much traffic.
I can’t get my Russian wife to ride on my motorcycle with me. As a teenager, she was riding on a Ural motorcycle with a boy, and she was bounced off the back of it and through the air. She hasn’t been on one since.