Sylvie has gone to Motorbike Hospital and Jayne becomes a Vicar!

Sylvie was knocked over and damaged recently while she was parked up outside my place of work. So the Insurance companies have taken over in dealing with the repairs. So far it looks like she is going to be away for a while and I am greatly missing my beautiful girly bike.

While it is hard to take photos that show the damage, we have managed to get a couple.

  

Luckily it was a low speed impact, and damage was minimal, but the lesson learned here is to never rely on just parking sensors alone.

In the mean time, the Insurance company have provided me with a couple of Hire bikes while Sylvie is away. 

The first was another SV, a brand new bike with just enough miles on the clock to justify the first service! She was a beautiful bike, but with the standard clip-ons was murder to ride. Strangely, she felt much smaller than Sylvie, the seat felt lower and the bike actually felt much smaller and lighter. I cannot imagine that there are that many differences between a K3 (Sylvie) and a brand new one (K9), but I did notice an aluminum rear frame. 

Jayne and not Sylvie.

The saddest part of riding her though was not the position, it was the restriction. The SV was restricted via the horrors of a throttle stop, giving the throttle about a third of a turn before it stopped. Just lovely, in a very un-lovely kind of way. If anyone out there wants to restrict their SV, I fully recommend the restricted ECU as opposed to the throttle stop way. The ECU allows full use of the throttle and allows the engine to breath fully, but electronically restricts the bike rev speed. This keeps you legal, but still allows your bike to feel like a big bike. The throttle stop prevents the engine from hitting the power band, so it is always under powered, unless you keep it in lower gears than you would normally use. Then it goes everywhere screaming, which sounds great, but looks pathetic!

The next bike delivered was a Honda CBF600 and I was expecting great things.

Castration is a terrible thing to do to a bike.

The CBF was comfortable, but felt narrow at the bars and overly top heavy. Riding it though revealed that it had been badly castrated by the throttle stop, so badly in fact that it was unable to make it up our local hill, two up, in second gear. 

The ride to Gloucester was a nightmare of struggling to keep up with Carol and Alex on the gorgeous Kawasaki ZRX1100, the Honda was simply outclassed, which is such a shame because I have always held Honda Motorcycles in such high regard. The Honda has a power band starting at about six and a half thousand revolutions of the engine, the throttle stop prevents it getting much past four thousand unless it is again ridden in low gear and thrashed like a loon. Riding the Honda is an experience that in terms of excitement I can only compare with extreme sports such Knitting, embroidery or ironing! For such a good looking bike, it has a terribly bland ride and trying to fit Sylvie's luggage was a disaster because there are so few fitting points. The grab rail is actually a pair of handles that are open ended and do not give a tie down point or easy fitting of a seat pack. Were that not bad enough, while riding it has a disturbing feel to the steering that causes the rider to have to pull the bars back from a turn because it feels like the front wheel wants to fold under the engine. In all, the Honda feels entirely underwhelming and nothing like the Suzuki SV, which is a fire breathing monster in comparison. I miss my dear Sylvie.

So while Sylvie is away I must endure the trials of boredom by Honda and frustration by Insurance Company. Now to be fair, this has very little to do with my Insurance company and I can now fully recommend CIA Insurance (although I am profoundly grateful to not have to be dealing with the incompetent MCE at the moment. God alone knows what kind of a mess they would have made of this!), who have gone out of their way to be helpful with Sylvie. They have passed Sylvie over to a company called Plantec and it is from Plantec that I have had the hire bikes. Now having never heard of Plantec, I was more than a little worried about giving them my bike. Internet feedback seemed poor and advice from trusted people in know like dear old Lozzo from the SV forum made me even more worried. However, armed with good advice from these sources, I was and am still prepared for war. So far though, Plantec have been very good, with regular weekly updates on progress with Sylvie, checking that I am happy with the hire bikes and that I am able to perform pre-ride checks. Their service has so far been very good, I just hope that this remains to be the case and that Sylvie is returned to me very soon, especially as I am not sure that I could survive a long trip on the Honda, I might die of boredom first!

So, that is the ongoing Sylvie story, I feel like I have had a limb removed while she is away, luckily Carol has been a rock and continues to be so. As for my friend who knocked Sylvie over, she continues to be my friend, I just hope that dealings with insurance companies do not mess that up, she was extremely sorry and knowing how much I love my bike, shed a tear or two with me. Bless...

Yes, Bless her. In my newly acquired official capacity as a Reverend, I can bless her, I am just not sure as what Deity, if any, I should choose to bless her with!

Burn, you sinners!

Not being the overly religious type, not really believing in God and not liking religion makes it hard to be a Vicar in this modern world, but I do not see why only men who wear dresses (and possibly harm children) are allowed to perform such duties! After all, I am very well educated woman, I have an excellent vocabulary (although it is littered with filthy words and vile terms!) and I am able to listen to people while providing a kind and sympathetic ear. 

Now I feel that I have to explain my actions a little, after all I would not want you thinking that I am something of a hypocrite. I have a very strong and profound belief in something very dear. It is not in a deity, for in truth I am not sure that there is room in our universe for such a being, however my faith if you want to call it that is in something far more tangible. My faith dear reader is in you. I have faith that you as a human being are capable of many great things and many great acts of kindness and courage. If you take away the spooky stuff from religion, you are left with a moral code, if you remove the political nastiness from that moral code, you are left with some pretty basic good stuff. Be nice to each other, don't murder each other and enjoy life.

So ladies and gentlemen of my flock, this is my sermon to you.

Go forth and enjoy your lives, show kindness to those about you, hug those you care for, do something that promotes human rights and most of all, watch out when reversing your car near my bike!

Bless you, now go and have some great sex with someone of the same or opposite gender to yourself!

Love each other and listen to lots of brutal black metal!

Today is national Day of the Arse Hole!

Today I shall proclaim to be the “Day of the Arse Hole”, this is why.

My day started in probably the most lovely way, I was snuggled up in bed with my darling wifey Carol and my cat Jasper was snuggled up into me, a perfectly blissful way to start a day if you ask me.

However, I needed to pop out on the bike to get some supplies and pop into the chemist to collect a new nasal spray to combat my dust allergy. Outside it was glorious, the Day Star was bright in the sky, there was not a cloud to be seen. I live at the sea side…

The roads were chock-a-block with traffic, bleached idiots wandered the pavements slowly turning red in the heat, the pavements are swarming with the proles, enjoying the first days of summer. This very time last year, our streets were covered in ice, how the summer continues from here I have no idea!

Once I had safely negotiated the clogged roads and made it to the super market I bought my supplies and headed over to the pharmacy to get my nose spray. From here it got progressively more difficult. I asked for a generic allergy nasal spray, similar to Beckinase. Because I happened to mention that one by brand they refused to sell me the other type, despite it being four pounds cheaper and almost identical. An argument ensued and came about because the woman serving behind the counter at the ASDA Pharmacy did not understand what Generic meant! As I argued, a large Boned (read obese, fat, chubby or grotesque!) woman pushed me, declaring that given that the woman was serving that bloke, meaning me, she wanted to be served too!

I left in disgust… only to find that some Fuck Nugget had pushed a trolley into Sylvie, putting a small scratch on the fairing and another on the clutch cover. At this point I boiled over and shouted to the trolley boy, demanding his immediate attention. I asked him if he had seen anything, but he was not able to say anything of use, a very angry, rather intimidating biker woman dressed in black biker gear and brandishing a trolley of shopping is a scary sight it seems!

The lad lead me to the security station on ASDA where I spoke to the chap behind the counter, only to be told that the security cameras in ASDA Weston Super Mare are blinded by the sun in Summer and are unable to see that side of the car park, so do remember that should any of you wish to practice breaking into cars and removing radios!

I steamed out of ASDA and packed my shopping into my seat pack and set off to Boots in Worle for my nasal spray. The roads were starting to flow and my pace picked up to almost touching the speed limit and I was starting to enjoy my day again. Yet for every moment of joy there is a moment when a pillock in a car likes to get in the way. While trying to change lanes, my indicators flashing, a git in a car decided that he did not want me in front of him. Well tough luck matey, a blip of the throttle and I was three cars ahead and managed to squeeze in there, before turning into the roundabout for Boots.

Coming off the smaller roundabout, and banked over to enter the car park, a young woman decided to stop dead in front of me. Fortunately I was not going fast, but the bike was leaned over, never a good angle to try braking hard. She had stopped because she had spotted another parked car and she was looking at it. She then drove past it and stopped again behind another parked car. Strangely there were plenty of spaces all around her!

I parked up and wandered into Boots and got my spray, my sneezes were now getting bloody, but that is the downside of a dist allergy. From there it was a simple ride back home, well it should be, but with the Day Star burning so brightly, idiots flock to the coast to wade in the faecal Coliforms, radiation and chemical waste that is the Bristol Channel.

Firstly as I passed by McDonalds, a large bus watched the car in front of me pass by, before pulling out right in front of me! Damn glad that Sylvie’s brakes work so well. The speed limit along there is forty Miles per hour and I was cruising at thirty five. I managed to get past the bus and was then on the open road again, I let out a loud sigh, the road was perfect, the tarmac Sylvie’s tyres were working together like they were for a GP race. Even at Forty, she feels like a poised and delicate hooligan. I love riding my bike.

I turned onto the Toll road, heading back home and up ahead was a large Landrover moving slowly along the road. I pulled over to let him pass and as he did, the Gentleman driving nodded and waved thanks. I started to pull away and had just got my foot back onto the peg when a lad in a green car hurtled around the corner on my side of the road and nearly collided with me and Sylvie. He braked hard and swung over towards to slow moving Landrover that was a few meters behind me. How he did not hit it, I just don’t know. That speed in narrow country lanes is idiocy!

Approaching the Toll road proper, another lad in a pale green car was driving “safely”. He was in a thirty limit driving at seventeen miles per hour and then as I approached him from the rear, he slowed down to fifteen and then stopped to give way to a car in the distance. The approaching car had to speed up to make the gap with out making every one wait for ages, but slid through, our young lad then pulled away and began to trundle onto the Toll road. The speed limit here is twenty five milers per hour, because the road can be treacherous with steep cliffs that people can drive off and die when they hit the bottom or the sea. Driving down here at less than fifteen miles per hour is taking it a little too seriously. Sylvie jumped past as soon as it was safe for us to go and we enjoyed the glorious countryside.

Finally on the home straight, less than two hundred meters from home, a Guy driving a large Range Rover pulls out in front of me, while not even looking. I know this road well and I know that it is rutted and potholed, so I was going steady, but still enough that I could get home with out getting off and pushing! I hooted my horn and the guy looked right at me, giving me the gentle wave of “oops, sorry didn’t see you mate!”.

I parked Sylvie and dismounted, the Range Rover, slid passed and I got another wave.

Today is a day when I should have stayed at home, tucked up in my bed with my darling wife and my lovely cat. Wont be making that mistake again…