if you had told me on xmas eve, as me and dangerous sat swigging cobra's in the shed, that we wouldn't have been at the british historic racing practice day on the 22nd of march in the year of our lord two thousand and twelve. i would have told you of my intention to expose my nether regions on ripley market place, we were well ahead of the game, smug as a very smug, smug thing, what the fuck?, where has it all gone wrong, i've been a good boy, most night's after my shift i've been in the shed, machining, cleaning, fabbing part's and yet, here we are, four day's until practice and no engine, i'm sitting in the shed, looking at the big hole where the engine should be, it's still in a hundred part's, scattered across derbyshire and nottinghamshire, oh well, only one thing to do, crack open a bottle of shiraz and get some wham on the cassette deck, 'everything she want's' tune, i'm dancing in my pant's me.........

the internet's great, but, me? i'm a luddite at heart, you can't beat a book or a magazine, i must have spent thousands on the printed word in it's various form's over the year's and you know what? i don't regret a penny of it, i can't pass a newsagent or a charity shop without going in for a browse and more often than not, i come out with a bag full of books or magazines or cd's or vinyl or even heaven forbid cassette's or video tapes, book's, brilliant........

 when johnny rotten walked off the stage at the winterland ballroom in san francisco uttering the famous 'ever get the feeling you've been cheated?' no one could have imagined the implications, punk was dead, long live post-punk, when mr lydon revealed his new band p.i.l or public image ltd we were all expecting a similar sort of three chord thrash, no, no, no, here was a bass heavy, dub influenced sound that was a million miles away from the pistol's, this was their first release from 1978, dressed in a 'sun' newspaper type sleeve and with a dig at one of the most popular radio one dj's at the time, the self-styled dave lee travis the presenter of the radio one breakfast show, he really was a 'smashy and nicey' type of character, coining the name 'the hairy cornflake' or 'the hairy monster' cringe worthy in hindsight, the p.i.l release was firstly a massive dig at malcolm mclaren and secondly, the whole 'wonderful radio one' world at the time, the centre spread was originally going to feature an erect penis with the tagline 'the hairy monster you love to wake up with' but, sadly, the virgin record label bottled it and censored the image, still a great tune though.......

friday dawn's early in the loveless house, i'm off work today, trying to use up my annual leave entitlement rather than losing it, but, the boy jack, need's to get to work at 0600hrs and i need the car, up, tea, dressed, do yet another hour's work for fuck-all, can't just walk away when there's stuff to do, even though i work for a big company who don't give a fuck about me, personally, i want to do a good job for my pay and can't just say 'fuck it', anyway, enough 'fuck's'  back home before 0800hrs, walking the dog's across the deserted derbyshire hill's and my mood lift's, it's a cold, cloudy day but, i'm not at work, so that has to be good doesn't it? andy smith, the guy i sold my mz racer call's down to pick up his wheel's that we have machined up, we talk about the respective season's, he's racing with the 'zed's with bemsee and i've jumped ship and racing with the british historic racing club, we have a brew and shoot the shit about bikes in general, i grab a shower and drive down to ben's new shop, ben and tim worked together at 'second skin' tattoo's on ashbourne road in derby, great shop with both artist's turning out some great work between them, all the time though was that desire from ben to open his own shop and to develop his own identity, a search for premises turned up an old post office building in shelton-lock, a suburb of derby, tim and his son jordan continue to tattoo from 'second skin' brilliant artist's laying down great work, today, i drove down to ben's new shop, a stone's throw from my old mucker's house stevie marsh, i parked up on his drive and knocked on the door, we made the short walk down to the studio and, fucking hell, is it ever nice, ben was putting the finishing touches to a girl's half sleeve, steve made a brew and shared out the jaffa cake's, the studio is pristine, three wall's in the reception area are old english cream, the back wall, a raspberry sorbet red, two panel's of black wall paper with a skull motif, candle chandelier, antique flooring and deep buttoned leather chesterfield settee's, no typical tattoo studio 'flash' on the walls, just a feeling of clinical, clean, peacefullness, the tattoo 'area' itself is brightly lit, surgical flooring climbing the wall's, the autoclave/kitchen/rest room area scrubbed to the 'n'th' degree, it remind's me of a dentist's surgery, efficient but homely, the lighting and background music more akin to visiting someone's house, just the type of place you want to get tattooed in, had a solid three hour's worth of tattooing, thank's ben, not just for the ink but for the hoodie too.............

now this little xs650? things that make you go hmmm................

derby day, the street's of our fair city are buzzing tonight, forest, the ram's biggest rival's are coming to town, making their way down the sixteen miles of road that link the two cities, brian clough way, or the a52 if you want the official designation, they are after revenge for the defeat at the city ground when derby beat them with only ten men, the goalkeeper, frank fielding having been sent off early in the game, we are desperate to beat them tonight and inflict damge to their hopes of relegation survival as well as 'doing the double' over them for the first time in almost forty years, as we make our way to pride park, the home of derby county football club, we can hear the chanting of the rival supporters, the derby fan's walking in from the town centre and the forest fan's under police escort from the railway station, half a mile stroll from the ground, their are groups of fan's standing under the statue of brian clough and peter taylor, the dynamic duo who had massive success with both club's, as we queue for the turnstiles we see our rival's for the first time, and the tension rises again, up the stair's and the concourse is packed, singing, swaying people, drinking and spilling beer as they jostle and sing, just a coke for me and the boy jack tonight, it's a 'school night' so no alcohol, i honestly don't need it and make my way to my seat, the team's take to the pitch and the noise is incredible, a moment after kick off and the first tasty tackle goes in, yellow card and the scene is set for the rest of the half, it's a scrappy affair, the ball spend's most of the time in the air, being launched forward in the hope of connecting with a respective striker, the second half continues in the same vain, more bruising tackles and card's, one particularly savage assault on a derby player sparks a twenty two man melee on the half way line that see's our goalie running the length of the pitch to get involved, turn up the gas to mark 7, the next challenge see's our centre-back badly injured and stretchered off with career threatening knee damage, the forest fan's gloat and chant while the stricken player, shaun barker is receiving attention from the medical staff, a section of the derby fan's decide to retaliate with their own chant, 'where's your chairman gone?', reffering to the death of the forest chaiman nigel doughty a few week's ago, it's getting hot in here, time is clicking away,but due to the ref sorting out the battling players and barkers injury there are 8 minutes of extra time, then, it happens, jake buxton, on as a substitute for barker, stoop's low to head in the ball at close range, 95 minutes gone, the ground explodes in noise and i can actually feel the upper teir shaking as the derby faithful go wild, the next 3 minutes take an eternity, then mr durso raises the whistle to his lips and blow's...........'tell me mam, me mam, to put the champagne on ice, we beat the forest twice, tell me mam, me mam............'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01byhrg  a fascinating radio article on bbc radio four from last month, i missed it as i was at work at the time but, if like me, you have any interest in the racing mz machines then this will be right up your street, [thank's to nick for the tip-off] available to listen to now on the bbc i-player. [just click the link]

mz, the racers, the book by jan leek, originally published in 1991 by 650 publications, the story of walter kaaden, the father of the modern racing two-stroke, his secrets stolen by ernst degner and sold to the rival suzuki factory when degner defected  to escape the repressive east german regime and start a new life with his family in the west, the book is as rare as the proverbial rocking horse excrement, even rarer than dangerous getting a round in, yep, that rare, i've been after a copy for about four years now and still not managed to track one down, imagine my delight when i found out that squire neil from the comecon collection blog had spotted a copy on ebay and got a virtually new copy for peanuts............

sunday morning in the loveless household, the day's are finally getting longer, i'm aware that it's light and that the sun is shining but, the pull of the land of nod is too great, so, beat me up, we are a busy family, me and the boy jack are up at stupid o'clock everyday for work, mr's b does silly hours and home late everyday and jess? well, she's in the sixth form, you don't realise how hard it is putting your make-up on and talking to people on the phone, i drift into conciousness again, the dog's are stretching and sleeping respectively on the end of the bed, better get up then i suppose, drinking tea in the garden, still chilly but the first real spring morning, breakfast, mexican flat bread, eggs, veggie bacon and portobello mushrooms, more tea and off to walk the dog's, can't believe how quiet it is, there's nobody about, home, another brew and i try and get my list of job's prioritised, cut the grass, clean the car, clean the windows, sort out the security light that's given up the ghost, mend the airing cupboard door, fuck that, it's a lovely day, the first day of spring proper, 'just nipping out duck, the battery on the sporty need's charging, be half an hour' mr's b isn't impressed, i change into my riding kit, leather jeans, goretex jacket and dig out my trusty arai full-face, why didn't i clean the fly's and shite off the visor before i put it away for the winter? start the bike up and listen to the steady ruummpp, daruumpp, darummp, ruuummmp as the sporty vibrates down the drive of it's own volition, the sidestand threatening to flick up at any time and deposit the plot onto the tarmac, dangerous phones me, 'is that your bike?' ''yep, you should have motted your bike tosser, told you it was going to be a good weekend' my bike promptly splutter's to a halt, dangerous has been out on it last week and ran the tank dry, wanker, i scrat around the shed and find enough fuel in various can's to top the tank up, i'm just about to set off and dangerous trap's on his neighbours honda hornet thing, off we go, up to clay cross, chesterfield and call in at the harley dealers, the tea bar isn't open and we console ourselves with looking at the sad bastard hoggie's buying bubble wrap crap for their wank-glides, up to curbar, traffic thinning and so is the temperature, we are a long way above sea level here, picking our way around the frost damaged roads of the high peak, down through froggatt edge and call in at 'outside' for tea and toasted tea cakes, i don't know what it is about 'outside' but the young ladies who work there are stunning, replete we trap on, back onto the a6 north towards buxton, i've never had a run at these corners like this before, there's usually quarry lorries or john deere's in the way, almost always on the apex to a decent bend, cut back on the 'secret' road, onto the 515 back towards ashbourne, turn left onto the via gellia and y'all know what time it is, this is derbyshires answer to the tt course, frightenlingly fast, stone walls, damp patches, [on the roads, not just the rider's calvin's] pass the wanker on his kawasaki race rep, threepenny-bitting around the corner's on the drop into cromford, left turn clyde. the traffic is tailing back down the a6 and all the bikes are doing that, throttle, brake, fuck, watch the bus, twat! you can't do a 'u'turn thing, i can't believe how busy it is in the 'bath, first time i came here was almost forty years ago, it was a january afternoon and i was riding a puch vs 50, hand change moped, i got a cuppa and nearly fainted when the hot-aches kicked in, you tend to get cynical after all those year's, but, the lad's on their automatic scooter's profiling through the main drag have as much right to be there as anyone else, today, everything was different, i kept my cynicism in check, there were some great bike's out today, just because they don't fit in with your idea of 'cool' doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with them, the wes cooley '34' superbike replica, the triumph, uncle bunt hardtail, the goldstar, the lambretta with the stunning air-brush artwork, the sidevalve harley, the brilliant bsa goldflash, spring's here england, let's play some jesus and mary chain........