Good question! I didn't give motorcycles a second thought growing up in the northeast. Never even crossed my mind. But we moved out to California a little over 10 years ago, and somehow they entered my consciousness pretty quickly. Started reading motorcycle magazines in addition to the 5 or 6 automobile magazines I was already reading. A friend at work was just getting back into biking after a hiatus, which also helped encourage me. The wife and I ended up taking the MSF course together to get our licenses. The deal was she'd take the motorcycle course if we took a swing dance course as well. Enjoyed both courses, but we haven't been swing dancing since, while we've owned ten motorcycles over that time.
It's hard to explain to non-motorcyclists, but it intuitively makes sense to folks like us that have gotten into bikes. The part of the brain that says "damn, this is fun" when you're doing any type of sport that requires speed and coordination (like skiing, rollerblading, etc), that same part of the brain seems to *really* like motorcycling on a twisty road. And you can do it all day long without ever getting on a chairlift.
