Day shift on a Bank Holiday is normally a happy time in my household. 12 hours of double time is never to be sniffed at…but today has not been a happy day:)
<Rant Mode>
Rode to work, at 5am, lovely morning, not much traffic, nice fast run in… travelling over Blackheath…drop down a couple of gears for the roundabout, open the throttle…and suddenly my bike sounds like a MotoGP bike…which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it does mean something isn’t quite right with the exhaust. But hey, that’s not a problem, I have some tools under the seat, when I get a quiet moment at work, I’ll whip them out, get the exhaust sorted…
Get to work, sort myself out for the day, then go back to the bike, examine what has happened. The can has some how worked itself loose…no matter, and relatively competent at these things…whip the can off…ahhh I see… the clamp that holds it to the middle section of the pipe won’t undo, the bolt has been corroded by too much salt over the winter. Right, what I need is some WD40. Someone at work is bound to have some… errrr no, they haven’t… So I bimble along to Metropolis, get some Motul stuff which is like WD40, come back, spray the offending part, leave it to soak for a couple of hours, and come back to it… still won’t budge. Oh and I’ve now rounded the head of the bolt off. Because it’s a cheap bolt, and the tools aren’t the best either. Start scratching my head, wondering how I’m going to get home tonight…start trying to force the can onto the pipe…It eventually goes on, after much swearing and grazing of knuckles.
Right, lets tighten up the exhaust hanger… oh, why won’t that tighten up…because the exhaust isn’t seated in the pipe properly…but I can’t get it out now either…bother. Ok. Don’t panic. I only need to get it home tonight, then ride it to work in the morning, and then home again tomorrow night, and then I might have some time on Wednesday to sort it out…but it is a bit wobbly. I could look at it when I get home, but I have no garage, and it’ll be getting dark… I know, I’ll phone my Dad. He’s got a garage, and lots and lots of tools…and he knows more about these things than me anyway. He’ll be able to help.
Phone Dad. Explain story. No problem says he, bring it round after work…
Ride home, very gingerly, hoping that the exhaust won’t fall off.
Get to my Dad’s at 8pm. I was kind of expecting the car to be on the drive, and the garage open waiting for my bike…but no, all in darkness.
Park the bike on the road (it’s quite a steep road, with a steep drive sloping away from the road…not exactly ideal bike parking…)
Pop in the house. Dad’s in the front room…empty glass in front of him…ahhh I smell scotch…well it is sort of like a Sunday isn’t it?
He says he’ll look at the bike on the road (it’s a busy road, and it’s getting a bit dark now)
I tell him I’m quite worried about either him or the bike getting hit by a passing bus… but no he wants to work in the road (it’s quite a busy road I might add).
So after a discussion which got quite heated ( on my part because I’'ve been at work since silly o’clock this morning, and I am very tired and I have to get up at silly o’clock again tomorrow, and possibly even earlier if I don’t get the bloody bike fixed and have to get the train to work - on his part because he’s drunk half a bottle of scotch and doesnt want to get the car out of the garage because he’ll probably crash it, and he won’t let me do it)
I think we’ve reached an agreement whereby he’s going to get my mum to get the car out…I start pushing my bike backwards to enable me to roll it down the steep drive into the garage. I look round and my Dad is coming towards me with a ratchet in hand to work in the road again… I turn round to remonstrate with him (remember I’m holding a relatively heavy fully fueled Bandit on a steep hill, and in my defence I am very very tired) and I loose balance slightly, followed by the sinking feeling that the bike is now over it’s centre of gravity, and I really need to use my reserves of strength to stop it falling over…oh ****…well that’s torn it… the bike is now on it’s side in the middle of the road. Bugger.
Tomorrow I will be mainly going to work by train. And going to a bike shop to buy a new indicator. And phoning my mechanic about sorting the exhaust out. I’m now going to bed.
Thanks for listening/reading/allowing me to let of steam.
</rant mode>
get the bike fixed, and the next day off, go and blast it about for a few hours, get it out of the system… either that or go and beat the hell out of a punch bag at the gym!