monday night, out on the sporty, it's getting cold, my fingers soon numb off with the combination of temperature and the vibration, i stop after 60 miles to warm my hands on the cylinder heads, the roads are great, very little traffic and dry, this is the best time to ride these roads, as i sit on the bike to take the photo's i'm struck by the simplicity of the sporty instruments, big speedo, no tacho or temperature gauges, couple of simple warning lights for neutral, high beam, oil pressure and indicators, the high level supertrapp is hot against the inside of my right thigh, i can smell the warm oil drifting up from the shorty s+s bellmouth, this is motorcycling at it's most basic form and i love it, i stop in matlock for a coffee, it's dark now but i sit at one of the pavement cafe's to drink my beverage, some of the famous illuminations are lit and i think about visiting here with my mum and dad when i was a kid, dark october and november nights, cold and crisp, watching the boats on the river derwent and marvelling at the lights, bag of chips and asleep in the back of the car on the way home, different times from a long time ago, imagine telling a child today that you were taking them to see thousands and thousands of 60 watt lightbulbs in the shape of cartoon characters, santa and snow white and the seven dwarves, they would say 'no thank's, i'll stop on the wii, playstation, x-box thanks', i finish my coffee and head home.

kent, early nineties, my bmw cutdown, me looking like judge jules with yellow shades, we had been up all night in the rave tent, dancing with the hells angels, more continentals there than brit's, we had travelled further than most of them and they had to come over the channel, great day's, 'you have the fire?'.......

converse, been wearing them for 35 years, i still get the same buzz buying them today as i did all those years ago, this is a pair of 'sailor jerry's', got these in florida, possibly five-six years ago.

sunday afternoon saw chris w, gordy, barse and me up at kev's 'le rock' open day, after a misty, cool morning the sun broke through and we made the short 20 mile run up to mansfield, tea in hand and time to catch up with the 'usual suspects', bob, midnight, crog, neil, wheeler and wayne, pleasant couple of hours chatting and i skinned out around 1400hrs, the police helicopter was hovering above the a38 as i joined it from the m1 junction 28, probably one of their last chances to extract some revenue from us, i meandered my way home down the 'b' roads and lanes enjoying the sunshine on a lovely autumn afternoon.