Although I managed not to fall off or fall down, I still felt like an awful wuss on the new motorcycle today. Thankfully the streets were deserted during the Texas/OU game so I was able to do my initial, nervous, slow-poke riding through some of my neighborhood's quieter side streets without worrying about cars or joggers.
The side streets feature stop signs at almost every cross-street so I had plenty of places to practice letting out the clutch without killing the engine. I also practiced coming to a full stop each block. Being able to stop when you want to is kind of important in my opinion.
During the last half hour, I actually managed to quit worrying about road rash and began to enjoy the ride.
The only embarrassing moment was when it was time to put the bike away, which involved getting it up my driveway. It's not terribly steep, but for a novice biker, it was a bit of a problem. Plus, my car was parked at the top of the driveway. I could see myself going full-throttle up the driveway, only to run into the back of my own car, and maybe even putting myself through the back window. (Since the car's a convertible, the back window isn't glass. So perhaps I'd just bounce off.)
But I finally managed it.