So I got my wife and kids in the car on Tuesday, and we drove up to Barnsley to pick up the bike I’d bought. I’d called first to make sure everything was ok. It was, they were going to MOT when I called, so we got ready to leave 30 minutes later, which took 20 minutes. Then it was half an hours drive.

Of course we got there and it wasn’t ready so we had to wait 30 minutes (with whiney kids) for the guy to get back with the freshly MOTd bike. It wasn’t good news. The bike had passed it’s MOT fine, but he wasn’t happy with the rear brake so he wanted to strip it down and sort it out before I could have it. They said it’d take an hour. So we went home having arranged for them to deliver at “tea time”.

About “tea time” we got a call to say that for logistics reasons with the delivery van (engine on the back that they’d couldn’t get off because the recepient was out when they arrived…) they couldn’t deliver. They’d do it the next day in the afternoon.

Thing was, I’d be at work then, which made it a bit of a pain, but since work is 15 minutes walk from home we arranged for them to call me when they set off and I’d be there. Of course, I’d got home after work and eaten my dinner and was getting ready to bath the kids when they finally turned up. And when they did the ramp on the truck broke and the bike took a drop onto it’s suspension. All seemed ok and they left.

Did a bit of riding, bike taking a bit of getting used to after a few months of no riding, and riding on much less sporty bikes. This bike goes pretty nicely. But the gears are a lot taller, I’m having trouble timing my downshifts right for the engine. Too much engine braking causing me to loose the backend. I need more practice.

I’ve ridden it for about 2 hours in 2 small rides.

Yesterday morning the weather was glorious and I was really looking forward to a ride. By the time I’d done my family duty and could have got it out and gone for a ride, it was pissing it down. It rained all day and all night. Today? Weather gorgeous again. So I really regret the fact that my wife is on a 12 hour shift and I’m at home with the kids. Which is terrible because usually I love that. But as it is, I have a “new” bike and I’m stuck in on my own.

The bike? Kawasaki GPZ500S. ‘91 J Plate.

Question is, after all the hassle getting my licence and bike, am I really fated to ride out?

This was posted on Sunday, March 30th, 2008 at 2:51 pm and is filed under Witterings. It has been tagged with bike, fate. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.