Biker man

Well this morning I finally did it and rode the bike to work. Its a lovely sunny day, no rain, not much wind, perfect conditions!! Everything went great, left home at 7.45 and arrived in the office about 8.30, I am pretty happy with 45 minutes for the first day, I was Captain Slow today so the journey will hopefully get a little quicker as I get more used to it. Learned a couple more biker lessons from today's jaunt though:

Lesson #2 - The Leg. As I was being so slow while riding between lines of stationary cars I had to keep pulling out the way to let other bikers through. It seems (and I might have this wrong) that to say thanks, us bikers stick our leg out on one side. They were every saying thanks or telling me to get off the road, not sure which!!

Lesson #3 - The Squeeze. Being a car driver I was always on the look out for bikes squeezing up between the lines of traffic, unlike lots of car drivers I never saw a problem with them doing this so was always happy to keep my eyes peeled. Now having done this manoeuvre myself I can appreciate the benefit for the biker and the problem for the car driver. Its fine to do as long as all drivers check first before pulling out, but lots don't. That's why I was doing about 10mph, had my finger on the horn and kept getting the leg (see Lesson #2).

All in all I am pleased with how it went, really looking forward to this evening now and the trip home!!

Fecking Shed....

After all the blood sweat and tears involved with dismantling and selling the garage, I have now spent a day of blood sweat and tears putting up a shed to replace it!! The end result is pretty impressive but it was hard work. I am going to be in bits tomorrow, already stiffening up (its no fun getting old!!).

I know we bought a cheap one (£220) but the quality of the shed was awful, there are more gaps in between the cladding than a hill-billys front teeth. The wood was obviously the last few scrapings left on the cutting room floor at tidy up time. And the less said about the windows the better......

Still Dickie and I did a sterling job of putting it up and the crap in the garden, the stuff that fits anyway, now has a home.

Now gimme a cold beer and an ice pack!!

Budding photographer...

From time to time H (aged 5 ¾) decides to nick our camera and sets up a series of thought provoking, evocotive and existential photoshoots with (mostly) his toys and (sometimes) his sister. The results are often as moving as they are daft......

Babies and the art of motorcycle mechanics...

After waiting from the age of about 5 I have finally done it and I now own my own motorbike!! Its not everyday you get to realise a boyhood dream and yesterday was one of those days!! Ok, it might not be the fastest or flashiest bike in the world, and I might not be on some wild ride across continent camping out under the stars but its my bike, I bought it, I can ride it and I am thoroughly enjoying it!! I can't wait to get back on and have another ride somewhere, anywhere!! Its a real buzz!! We had quite a long trip back from buying her which was nice as I had V behind me in the car so I was able to get used to it with a little bit of extra protection from the maniacs on the road!! Will keep a regular log of the new and interesting things I learn about being a biker!! Heres the first...

Lesson #1 - Its Hot. All of the protective clothing I've got weighs a tonne and is very hot to wear, I may have gone overboard but I wanted to be safe. Better safe and sweaty I spose!!

Back to baby names, we've had a breakthrough. Its meant to be hush-hush but no one reads this blog so what the hell!! We've decided on Chester for a boy, think it sounds wicked!! And a girl will be Ruby Rose. Finally!!

Nearly on the road

Managed to buy the bike I was after yesterday, a 2002 plate Honda CG125. Its in good condition and only has 7,200 miles on the clock. There are a few sratches but nothing to worry about and it drove around the block fine. Really looking forward to picking her up on Saturday after I buy all the protective gear tomorrow, its very exciting although V is still very worried for my safety. I don't blame her but I am going to take it nice and easy and slowly!!

CBT & 80's pap...

Congratulations to me!! I passed the CBT at the first attempt. Quite pleased about that as the other guy on the course with me was told to go home and has to try again another time!! I really enjoyed the day, especially the 2.5 hour drive around sunny Essex. I made a few mistakes, which is to be expected, but the instructor was very pleased with my overall performance. So now the hunt is on for a bike, there are a couple of options, one of which is buying one of the CBT bikes from the place I did the test. Not sure about that though as they've probably been dropped a lot!! I fancy getting a brand new bike anyway. Off today to buy helmet, jacket, boots, gloves etc. Should be fun (expensive!!).

Then went out for Phil's stag night in town. For some unknown reason the venue of choice was a awful 80's bar. Absolutely FULL of women (which maybe explains the reason) and pervy sweaty middle aged men gawping at them, pretty rancid!! And the music was dire. The highlight of the evening was the Only Fools & Horses theme music!! Phil got suitably sozzled though so mission accomplished!! Managed to get the second last train home and arrive in one piece, which is nice!!

Track Day @ Goodwood

July 2007 - Track Day

Well the Lamborghini day at Goodwood was absolutely amazing!! The event was booked from TrackDays.co.uk and was very well organised. We arrived at about 10.30 and I was helmeted up, sitting in the driving seat getting my instructions by 10.45. As you might know the Diablo is a huge car, very wide and long with zero visibility out of the back window, its about the size of a letterbox!! The interior though isn't particularly spacious or comfortable, considering the car costs about the same as a small flat!! One of the most amazing things was that there was no need to change gears once we were out of the pit straight, there is so much torque that we stayed in fourth gear the whole time even in the slow chicane. It still absolutely flew away in fourth gear as well. frightening speed and power. I managed around 150mph on the shortened home straight but the instructor kept telling me to push it harder!!

The hardest part of the whole experience was trying to get the right line through the corners. Unlike what I had expected you don't steer through the corners, what you do is stay straight after the apex and floor the throttle which brings you around. Its a hair raising manoeuvre though and took me a few corners to master but once I had the speed went right up!! At one point the instructor had to help me break as he said we were going into a corner at 130mph!!

After my laps were up I got a debriefing from the instructor where he explained how "boy racers" all drive wrong and don't use the throttle to steer and that was my lot. Thoroughly enjoyed it and would love to do it again!!

To know or not to know....

When we found out that V was pregnant with our third child I was thrilled and over the moon and all the things you feel when you see that little piece of plastic turn pink or blue or get a line or the line disappear (will someone PLEASE come up with a standard for that ordeal!!). But what I decided almost instantly was that I wanted to know the sex of the baby this time round. To me it made perfect sense to as we have a boy and a girl already it would help us prepare ourselves for what we were going to get. Obviously we have boys and girls clothes stashed in the loft so we could begin to prepare the appropriate lot and consign the rest to the charity shop. That's the practical side, the other HUGE benefit as far as I saw it was to help us narrow down the search for names.

This is already a mind warp job, not only does the name have to fit with the surname, it has to not clash with its siblings, not sound silly shortened, not lead to unfortunate initials and, to compound all of the above, we've given our kids two middle names which means we need to come up with another three names (that meet the above criteria). So if you multiply this by the two sexes we need to come up with 6 (six) suitable, not too normal, not too quirky, well matching, nice sounding, non-clashing monikers. Nightmare.

It seemed to me like a no brainer, find out the sex, half the effort. However, having gone through this well formed, well constructed argument with V she categorically refused to find out the sex and therefore that was that. I can see her point to a certain extent and if it wasn't our third I wouldn't even entertain the idea but surely the practical advantages out weigh the lack of a surprise after 9 months. In fact whenever you find out it is always going to be a surprise, just if you do it in advance you are spared the blood and screaming. There is also the possibility of them sonographer getting it wrong and poor baby Johnny coming out as a baby Jane to a nice blue nursery and a wardrobe full of blue sleep suits. Not the end of the world but not the perfect start either.

I don't know, perhaps it is best left until nature decides its time to know. As this will be the last time I go through this I will never know the flip side of the coin.

Lambo day

The lovely people at RNM bought be a Lamborghini Diablo track day for my leaving gift in April and I am finally booked in to thrash the 200mph beast around Goodwood grand prix circuit tomorrow. I am SO looking forward to it!! Unfortunately I only get three laps but I reckon I might pay for a few extra (depends on the cost).

I am determined to give it full welly even though theres a chance I'll have a £2,000 excess to pay should I (heaven forbid) ditch it. I think its worth the risk!! I'll give details, assuming I survive, on Friday. Wish me luck!!

Still no luck on the bike search, found a few more in eBay but they are either too pricey or too far away. Got my CBT in two days, after that I want to get a bike asap.

The name game

Still struggling with the babies names. V came up with a few today (all boys) that I thought could work, Dexter, Travis and Finlay. Don't mind any of them and none of them would haunt the poor sod in years to come (I hope). None of them feels right yet though.

Oh well, I'm sure we'll get there in the end.

Speaking of which, spent HOURS on stupid, slow, smelly, wet trains today going to Crawley and back. I can't WAIT to get my motorbike and kiss good bye to trains for ever. Incidentally if you have a Honda CG125 going cheap let me know eh!! I've got my CBT on Friday which will actually be me fulfilling a boyhood dream. Never thought it would be in an industrial estate in West Thurrock though, funny how dreams end up eh!!

Picasa rules & September arrival...

I've finally finished uploading 6 years worth of digital photos to Picasa and I'm glad its over!! I can't beleive they all fitted on the 1GB of free storage, was going to upgrade to 7GB but won't need to now until little Barr #3 shows up in September. Speaking of which, I think that is going to be the main topic of conversation on the Blog. At the moment we're agonising over yet another bunch of names (boy & girl) and have to yet again come up with 2 middle names for each..........seriously struggling at the moment!! Will keep you posted on progress!!