Modern Vespa

Early Yes, Geneis or Pink Floyd from Wish you were here onwards, now you are talking.

Maybe throw in some Bill Bruford, Weather Report and Brand X for good luck.

Bill X

Arrgggghhhhh....PROG ROCK

So as i'm going to be a student again I thought I'd get some practice in last night and get VERY VERY drunk indeed.

Barby on the beach followed by lots and lots of drink, talking bollox and watching Trev cop of with strangers ahhhh! this is the life.

i'm taking the day off work due to my horrendous hangover (i didnt get home untill 4.30 this morning)

LOVELY

Not even a student yet and already skiving - nice one!

I kind of regret not being a Student because it sounds like alot of fun.
I left work at 16 years old and went straight to work knowing full well I wasn't going to be the academic type.
I think my school experiences put me off for life to the point where I tried to learn some French recently and I found I was getting panic attacks while on my way to the class.
My education wasn't the best so I've tried to spend as much time over the years to learn about the things that I don't understand mostly by sticking my nose into a book and learning at my own speed.
One of my problems is that I can't absorb something I'm not interested in which is why I think that many of my schooling years went to waste.
Arse

Bill X

Good teachers could have got you interested in just about anything. I'm just the same BTW - and the boring teachers never got their subjects over to me. Luckily progressing through school I eventually had at least one non-boring teacher for each subject, so picked up a smattering, even in Greek!

i followed a similar path bill.

left school at 17, got a job as a van driver, followed by a stint as a lorry driver, followed by many long, hard years as a courier.

it was only when i went back to college in my late twenties to study philosophy that i realised what a hard life i'd been having compared to all the students.

i never looked back and spent the next 5 years in full time education / out of my head. studying was piss-easy compared to driving 13 hours a day and delivering 30 kg boxes of paper around england. in fact, i did so much part-time work in my spare time that i didn't even suffer too much financially.

it's a funny old life

Interesting. I agree with Jim that a good teacher can teach you anything and looking back I can still see the bored expressions of the faces of my teachers and year heads but I can't blame it all on them.
I know the years I was at my local secondary were transition years for the teachers I always got the impression that most of them didn't want to be there.
I also have a short attention span and quite often I have to re-read pages of a book because my mind starts to wander.

Kam like you I got the work ethic quite early and stuck with it but boy I don't miss those courier years.
Riding in all that shit - the rain, snow, ice, hail and avoiding being killed on a daily basis does make you live life day by day. It puts you in a short term frame of mind.
You survive injury and death one day and then you try to do it again the next.
Like you I did the vans for 6 years after that but even that drains you of your lifeforce.
No I don't miss it but it built my character.

More ......

I'm lucky that I'm now in a job that I actually enjoy and although I say it myself I'm quite good at.
Being a bloke I quite cars and I'm lucky to work in an industry that I'm actually interested in.

Bill X

i've been teaching one thing or another since i was fifteen years old .... started as a swimming instructor, then moved on to art teaching and finally lecturing, which is what i still do and love. i've been told i have a gift for making complex ideas more or less interesting and digestible. good thing i've got a job for life because i'm crap at everything else

Can you tread on Oranges ?

i don't know i've never actually trod on an orange. i've probably tripped over one though

I didn't know you had a smattering of Greek, Jim! I'll be testing you on the aorist tense up at Ryka's tonight. (Fnarr.)

"Had" is the word. Nothing left except a rough comprehension of the alphabet, and that's probably more to do with maths and physics than language.

I've been a security guard, solicitors clerk, solicitor, office manager, tutor and finally a cartoonist.

The cartoons started first as I drew on the bedroom walls as a nipper. Thanks to hippy parents it stayed like that for the next 18 years.

Law is a bowl of hot turds - resort to it only when every other human impulse has failed. That advice is pro bono to everyone.

See, all the time I was unemployed/doing data entry for a pittance in my early twennies, my mum kept telling me it wasn't too late to start a career in law, and I kept telling her no way. I'm glad I was right!

51 minutes till I can leave work for Box Hill 8)

What a great ride-out! Well it was for me, I just 'did my thing'.

Thanks for tail-gunning Alice, superb job. And kudos to the L-platers who may now have been bitten by the ride-out bug.

That was a great ride-out Jim, and all the other riders were nice. I'm still smiling

I wouldn't say bitten, probably mauled, then thrown aside, then mauled some more and left covered in saliva, all done by an angry rabbit.

Thanks for the jump start, that's two I owe you. Two pints for you next time I see you

i've just sung the praises of yesterday's ride over in the rallies section, but i'm happy to do it again: great ride! good food, good company, nice pace, and a wonderful route. what a terrific way to spend a warm summer evening.

we're just off to the vet to get some rabies shots for alex. that rabbit didn't look right to me.

Good call, whoever ordered up the weather! Shame I had to extract myself from central London in it, but the ride later on was worth it.

Did I miss any good goss from the pub?

It sounds like I missed a good ride out. Nevermind I'll wait until the next one.

But I did enjoy a relly good night at Wembley watching Gary Go ( who was very good ) James Morrison who wasn't that good and Take That who were fantastic.
I won't bore you with the details but they were amazing.
I left just before the encore and planned on using the North/South Circular and it was all going well then just outside Dulwich where the entire road was dug up for re- surfacing and the was no detour so I rode up on the pathways and traffic islands and got around it. Cheeky Boy.
Got home at 12.30 a very tired little Bill X

I still feel like I missed out though.

I don't mind doing it again Bill. Do you get week-days off at all?

I can always take a day off for a ride out between now and the end of the Summer. I need to take a morning of to get a couple of broken teeth re-built seeing as my Dentist cancelled on me the other day so I could combine it with that.
I'll let you know when I get a date arranged.
Cheers Jim.

I look forward to it.

i was trying to decide whether that's better or worse than a bowl of cold turds .... but as i've just had dinner i think i'll leave it alone and ponder it later.

Sounds good. I'll get a day sorted when I can grow some new fangs in the morning and we can have a quick run in the afternoon.
Pub lunch again ? mmmm tasty.

Bill X

Just thee and me Bill could be a Very Good Blast. If I take the Fuoco though it is severely limited in its lean angle as I found out on the ride, so you may be chasing the GP800. The roads can't be WOTted (word?) in many places anyway, full concentration required!

PS, I was full of admiration of Alex and David as L-platers who grew hugely in their confidence once they discovered what riding on open roads was really like rather than teetering around London. Well done boys!

pps, Alex, I hope you have sorted out why your battery is a bit 'weak' - me suspects you need the charging stuff and the battery properly tested.

ppps, what are the chances of a scooter rider carrying jump leads?

When it's you, Jim, pretty high - I confidently expect you to have anything that might be needed in the boot.

Bill, you are a bad, bad boy - but I'd have done the same in a state of tired, late-night misery. Thanks for the warning as I'll be using the South Circular this evening!

Liz seems fine now, Genie rekons it was 'vapour lock', I'm not sure what, if anything can be done to sort that out. Gonna test the battery tonight, and see where to go from there. Talk about being prepared, it look like you had everything in the space under the seat, there's probably an emergency scooter in there aswell .

It was my pleasure Alice. I was so tired when I got to the road block I can't even remember where it was but I know it was about a mile up from the Fridge and that big Church opposite it on the A23 because that's where I found myself when I tried to go around it. I would have settled for the A23 South it being an easy route home but the Courier genes in me said no, take the shortest route so the South Circular drew me back..
But I should have also listened to my instincts when they said just get on the M4 and switch your brain off. It would have been longer but a darn sight easier than the one I took.
Give me the O2 any day of the week. It's so much easier to get to.

I canned the run to Camber today due to a massive HR problem I had at work yesterday which put me in a bit of a closed door session with my Managers so I went back in today to put it as right as I could.
Fingers crossed that I still have a job in a few weeks time.
You know when you are so annoyed with yourself/someone that you can't focus on riding or driving ? Well I was in that condition this morning so I thought it best that I went in and distracted myself appraising stuff.
It was just safer that way
I might well give it a go in the morning.

Take care all.

Bill X

agh bill that bites. HR = nastiness from hell in my experience. i've got a meeting with my HR people next week regarding a wee query i have about why they've been knowingly underpaying me for three years i expect no miracles and will be pleased if i don't leave the meeting without throwing something.

went into central london on public transport and was very glad to have done so as the streets were teeming with gay pride. walked all the way from jermyn street to the chelsea pensioners hospital then back to soho where the party was still banging. had some supper and now ready for bed after a long scooterless but nonetheless nice day (and i successfully avoided going into all of the shoe sales on the king's road that rates a medal in my world.

is right. every time i use public transport i wonder to myself why ... why.... why????

the bus stank of chicken and they had the heat cranked up with no proper ventilation and the new bendy 38 is a long 'orrible fibreglass tunnel of skank. i miss the routemaster

Sorry to hear that human remains are giving skokers a hard time.

I did my lawyer schtick for a friend who was accused of stealing from a bar he was working in. Gave him a brief about what to say in the meeting in Bar Italia and off we went.

Meeting commenced, argument about whether friend was entitled to lawyer (he wasn't and I knew it). Vampire manager escorted me out of the room.

As he held open the door for me with a creepy smile, I glanced down at his feet and remarked,

"Nice shoes, are they Prada?"

Strangely, all allegations of theft were dropped the next day.

I can imagine the well-delivered tone of your voice, must have made him think *very* carefully how to tread from thereon in.

On the way back from Camber Sands today I was stung in the bollocks by either a bee or a wasp.
I was wearing my Summer riding combats and all of a sudden I felt this stinging sensation in my left testicle and without even taking my eyes off the road I struck down with my left hand down into my groin to flatten whatever was digging its barb into my nuts.
I must have got whatever was causing me discomfort because there was an orange smear all over the seat but it was too late because it felt like someone was stabbing me with a needle while I carried on riding because lets face it there was no piont in stopping.
Once I got home I inspected the damage to my balls and sure enough the left was bigger and a bit more sore than the right. Ouch.
How ironic being stung in the balls by a wasp while on a wasp.

And now the bad news -

The reason I was coming back from Camber was because I'd arranged to meet Tracy and Spider there at the 3 day Scooter Event at the Holiday Camp but when I rang Spiders mobile Tracy answered and told me they both collided with a car doing a 3 point turn in the middle of the road while on the ride out.
Poor Spider has a "smashed" pelvis - Tracy's words and will need many operations to put it right and Tracy is badly bruised.
He is in Hastings Hospital and I'm guessing he's going to be in there for quite a while although Tracy has been released but from what I can gather she's not leaving Spiders bedside.
She sounded really shaken but gave me permission to post the details here.
If I hear anymore I let you all know.
Lets all wish them a swift recovery.

Bill X

Jesus, how horrible.

Best to the both of them - is there anything that they need help with that we do?

Bummer. That's awful.

I'll give them a call later and find out if we can help in anyway.

Poor girl sounded really shaken up.

Bill X

that's terrible news. give them both my best. maybe we should organize a DSSC get well card for spider?

Maybe sign it all at Duxford ?

very good idea.