Mean Machine

No Dungeons and Dragons this weekend unfortunately. Sam was throwing up in the middle of the night and in the early hours of the morning on Saturday (or at least that's what I gathered from the telephone conversations I had with my mum). So I thought it would be best to take a rain check since with a party of only three player characters and adventures in which character development is so important, and the fact that the characters are about to enter the next big chapter of the campaign and be introduced to the trials they must face in the near future... well I think you can see why I called around and postponed the session until next time.

But the was good news at the weekend. Very good news. On Saturday I visited the St. Leonards Gedge shop and bought some gear to go with the Versys. Just as I'm leaving, I'm asked if I've seen my new bike yet. Yes. It has arrived. I was lead into the murky and secretive lair of the mechanics and there it stood. Photographs do not do the bike any justice. I was also assured that it looks even better under natural light rather than artificial halogen illumination. The bike can best be described as compact. It's big, but it looks deceptively small. It's the tardis in motorcycle form. Circling it and marvelling at how awesome the green colour scheme really is, the bike looks lower and shorter. But as soon as I sat behind that massive tank I had the impression I would be riding something far bigger than the 500cc bike I've been having my lessons on. I would have taken photographs of my own but I have neither a camera-phone nor a digital camera.

On Sunday Trevor said that he was, again, very pleased with my riding. So my head was a little inflated. He said that if our lesson had been the test, I would have passed. The practical test is tomorrow (Tuesday). I'm to get up pretty early for it and ride to Eastbourne where it will take place. I don't really like Eastbourne because of the incredible amount of deceptive roundabouts, multitude of maze-like streets, and crazy motorists who can't drive correctly on a two-lane one-way street. But at least there is a lack of hills and the roads are fairly wide. I'm not worried about passing, but I don't think I'll be able to pass the test with only a single minor the way Sam did. Still, I'm going to put all my effort into passing because passing means getting my name on the ownership certificate of the Versys which is sitting in the dungeon under the Silchester Road garage... and now that I've seen it I have a two-hundred percent drive to get it.

I think Trevor mentioned that he has another student taking a test tomorrow as well, however this other student is taking the test on a 125cc bike as far as I remember. Which means I'll be riding the CBF500 all the way to Eastbourne... AWESOME! That'll be some good riding experience for sure. Otherwise I can only guess that Trevor will be riding the CBF and I'll be a pillion but he said we'd ride around for a while before the test to make sure I wasn't getting rusty (after a whole two days) so I'm guessing I'll be riding the CBF, the other guy will be riding his 125 (I feel sorry for 125 riders now), and Trevor will be riding his yellow Suzuki which has a model name so long and full of random characters that I have no chance of remembering it.

That's great! It means I'll be able to see what it's like to have power at my command on a big and open road. I've ridden to Eastbourne plenty of times before but not on a big bike. I can hardly stop myself from bouncing around, I'm so excited.