Eunos Chump

It's hibernation time for the MX5 already, as the tax expires in a couple of days and I won't get chance to use it for the next couple of months, anyway. It's final run of the year was to Weymouth, for a reunion of Wokingham District Council's mainframe operations team (60% of it, at least).  Amongst the expected chips and ice creams we had a ride in a rowing boat, a drive along the coast, a visit to an art gallery, had a browse in an artisan wooden furniture place, and had cream teas in a beer garden. We have become so very  OLD,  but it's OK, as being old suits me just fine.

I'm trying to extend my riding season until the end of October, which requires me to become waterproof. Instead of buying proper textile kit like a sensible person, I've taken the cheap option of a flourescent yellow one-piece rain suit!  The weather forecast for next week is heavy piss-taking by colleagues .

I've got gammy toes, they got wet during a ride some weeks back and I've had some kind of fungal infection since, it's not nice.  I'd put a photo up, but there's enough photos of distressing body parts on the internet already. My bike is no longer fast enough, it's lost it's ability to frighten me.  I now want a Street Triple for general hooning about, and a late 90's Honda VFR for distance work.  I don't know where I'm going to find the thousands of pounds necessary to fund this, however.

My 2 weeks holiday is almost at an end :( Instead of replacing the dead clutch in the Berlingo, I've spent much of the past 3 rainy days playing Rollercoaster Tycoon 3.  It's wonderful but horribly addictive; it's rather like building a model railway, except the customers are real and you need to make sure they keep spending their money, so you can buy more stuff. Look at the happy people!  Note the absence of hour-long queues, rain, and overpriced warm Coke; I should be running Alton Towers. But I doubt the shareholders would be keen on me blowing 5 years takings on a single rollercoaster with a giant crystal-palace style station. Check out the giant aquarium complex in the background here.  The ungrateful visitors find it boring and it's only lost money, but I like it so it's staying.  You can of course actually ride everything in this game, unlike the previous versions. Berlingo came back from the garage yesterday, complete with a bill for nearly £600. ...

The Classic Superbike show, at the South of England Showgrounds; sounds good, but it was in fact SHITE.  Despite the huge amount of space available it was held in some cattle sheds, and comprised about a dozen blokes in Transits selling bike scrap (at exciting prices), with a display of perhaps 2 dozen classic bikes.  This is one of the more interesting ones: And I got completely soaked 3 times on the ride there/back.  I'm most definitely a fair-weather biker.

I replaced the engine breather on the 530D today, as my bruv suggested it might be the cause of the occasional heavy smoking.  It's fairly easy to access, once you've removed all the pointless panel work that makes the engine look pretty (it actually looks like a WW2 U-boat engine when bare).  Old filter was date stamped 6 months  before the car was built, so unsurprisingly it was absolutely solid with filth and nothing could have been passing through it.  New one cost ~£50.  All good so far... MonkeyYouth and I went to Intech Science Centre today, they have a planetarium which is ACE!  I knew our galaxy was tiny but blimey, not that tiny and insignificant!

Had a ride to Poole this evening for Bike Night, which happens every Tuesday during summer.  It costs a quid to get in (which goes to charity), and apparently there were over a thousand bikes there today.  You actually have to ride your bike through thick crowds of people, it's a good test of slow speed control! It's a Van Van!  I love Van Vans, if they did a 500cc version I'd have one. Oooh!  I think somebody has a crush!  My favourite of the evening. Had new tyres put on the SV today, Michelin Pilot Road 2.  Let's see how long these last; current mileage is 22802.

Had a few days in Norfolk with da family.  My brother and I spent Sunday riding around the entire coast... passed through Hunstanton... and ended in Great Yarmouth, with a couple of other stops along the way.  There was a bit too much traffic on the roads, but it was good fun and we covered around 160-odd miles in total.