Easy Rider

I did one of the coolest things this week while on the road — everybody from work rented Segways and we took a tour of Baltimore harbor. When you activate the gyros the whole thing levels out, it's an unreal sensation like you just switched on your hovercar or lit your lightsaber. It only took a couple minutes to pick it up: lean forward to go straight, tilt back to slow down or go in reverse, ZTR turns with a rocker on the left handlebar. I almost lost balance a couple of times turning on cobblestones, but never wiped (though my boss pulled a spectacular four-point dismount). At one point I got my right wheel stuck on a level raised curb while my left wheel started following the sidewalk downhill ... the platform I was standing on started to tilt more and more as the gap widened. It was straight out of Dukes of Hazzard. I hopped off the curb just in time and kept it together. I'm ready for the Segway halfpipe. If I only had five grand.