I hear you the Ninja seems like the Tu250s sportbike counterpart and the new Honda has that sweet value of having full instrumentation and torque despite being a single cylinder vs the twin of the Ninja.

My commute will involve 7 miles of suburbia/city riding with the occasional delivery gig for my sushi bar.
Thats what I really dig about these standard bikes. You can remove the pillion seat and attach a rack or a trunk.
I plan on attaching a milk crate or something that can hold a medium sized delivery (I deliver to law firms and dealerships at times)
Plus if I ever feel comfortable to 2 up I got that option by putting the seat back on.
I like that these smaller bikes get 70 plus MPG which is far better than what I get in my current commuter:
a 2000 Nissan Maxima which craves premium fuel

heres an example of the little Suzuki done up in cafe racer style for the Japanese domestic market:

+1 on the Thumper. I hate to admit it but I have caught the motorcycle bug. My wife swears I am having a mid life crisis. Ive been poring over MSF books and class schedules. Lusted over pictures of Triumph Bonnevilles and Moto Guzzi Racers.

More than likely I will start on a Suzuki TU250x : a single cylinder "thumper" bike in the classic Universal Japanese Motorcycle style (which in turn as far as I am concerned influenced by Norton and Bonnies). These bikes are slow but from what I gather 250cc bikes are good learner bikes and since I believe nothing is as sad as a fat guy on a sportbike Im leaving the Ninja250R and CBR250 to the younger crowd.

Anyway a lot of folks have been converting these little 14hp bikes into cafe racers. Adding a BMW r90s influenced fairing and changing the seat. To me the cafe racer is a converted Triumph or Moto Guzzi. I love Harleys too but I think I love the old British style bikes more. I was enamored by the little (in H-D terms) IRON 883 for a long time but then I realized that was way too much bike in terms of $$$ and power. Im gonna start cheap and fun and work my way hopefully to a Triumph.

ONE WORD: DEKATORA!!


Image courtesy of redacted

Thanks UDMAN!!!

[youtube AiTWrYof_o8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiTWrYof_o8 youtube]

I call it Fleecing ala Dave Ramsey. Unless I have the disposable income to do so, I will not on principle buy a car new.

I have access to an honest mechanic
I can find a slightly used car with 2K miles on it from a private seller
or a all the bells and whistles car with lowish miles from a place like Car Max
But if you got the cash at hand then why not? ( But even then I probably wouldn't and use the money I save for other things)

"That car you're driving is starting to turn into a POS, you should go ahead and LEASE a new car"

"uhhh thanks but not thanks dad its actually a paid off POS"

now granted I am getting rid of this car because it is starting to have constant mechanical woes that are getting more and more expensive. But I will replace it with a cheap used car, probably a Honda Odyssey for our growing brood

actually in my part of the south (Florida), LA stands for Lower Alabama

I married into redneck but the usual lineup consists of a pickup and an SUV of some sort.

If I had to venture a guess it would be this: