The Chapman Zone Dave’s Blog

1. OPENING JARS - She’s struggling. You take it from her hands, open it effortlessly and pretend she loosened it for you. She didn’t. Jars are men’s work.

2. CALLING SOMEONE ‘SON’ - Especially policeman but even saying it to kids makes you the man.

3. DOING A PROPER SLIDE TACKLE - Beckham free kicks - camp. A Stuart Pearce tackle is the pinnacle of the game, simultaneously winning the ball and crippling the man. Magic.

4. SHARPENING A PENCIL WITH A STANLEY KNIFE - Blunt, is it? Hand it here love. No, I don’t need a sharpener, I’ve got a knife thanks!

5. GOING TO THE TIP - A manly act which combines driving, lifting and - as you thrillingly drop your rubbish into another huge pile of other rubbish - noisy destruction.

6. DRINKING UP - Specifically, rising from the table, slinging your coat on and downing two thirds of a pint in one fluid movement. Then nodding towards the door, saying, “Let’s go” and striding out while everyone else struggles to catch up with you. You’re hard.

7. HAVING A THIN BIT OF WOOD - in the shed, solely to stir paint with.

8. HAVING A SCAR - Ideally it’ll be a facial knife wound, but even an iron burn on the wrist is good. “Ooh, did it hurt”. “Nah”.

9. HAVING A HANGOVER AND THICK STUBBLE - When birds have been partying they just whinge. You on the other hand have physical evidence of your hardness, sprouting from your face. “Big night?” Grr, what does it look like.

10. NODDING AT COPPERS - A moment’s eye contact is all it takes for you to share the unspoken bond. “We’ve not seen eye to eye in the past”, it says, “but someone’s got to keep the little scrotes in line”.

11. USING POWER TOOLS - Slightly more powerful than you need or can safely handle. Pneumatic drilling while smoking a fag? Superb.

12. KICKING A FOOTY AGAINST A GARAGE DOOR - Clang-g-g-g-g-g-! Stick that Becks, I kick so hard I set off car alarms.

13. ARRIVING IN A PUB LATE - And everyone cheers you. It doesn’t mean you’re popular, it just means your mates are p*ssed. However, the rest of the pub doesn’t know that.

14. NOT WATCHING YOUR WEIGHT - Fat is a feminist issue, apparently. Brilliant. Pass the pork scratchings.

15. CARVING THE ROAST - And saying “are you a leg or breast man?” to the blokes and “do you want stuffing?” to the women. Congratulations, you are now your dad.

16. WINKING - Turns women to putty. Doesn’t it?

17. TEST SWINGING HAMMERS - Ideally, B&Q would have little changing rooms with mirrors so you could see how rugged you look with any DIY item. Until then, we’ll make do with the aisles.

18. TAKING OUT £200 FROM A CASHPOINT - Okay, so its for paying the plumber later but with that much cash you feel like a mafia don. The only thing better Is peeling notes off the roll later.

19. PHONE CALLS THAT LAST LESS THAN A MINUTE - Unlike birds, we get straight to the point. “Alright? Yep. Drink? Red lion? George, it is then. Seven. See ya.”

20. PARALLEL PARKING - Bosh, straight in. First time. Can Schumacher do that? No, because his car’s got no reverse gear which, technically, makes you the worlds best driver.

21. HAVING EARNED THAT PINT - Since the dawn of time, men have toiled in the fields in blistering heat. Why? So when it’s over we can stand there in silence, surveying our work with one hand resting on the beer gut while the other nurses a foaming jug of ale. Aaaah.

22. HAVING SOMETHING PROPERLY WRONG WITH YOU - Especially if you didn’t make a fuss. “Why was I off, nothing much, just a brain haemorrhage”.

23. KNOWING WHICH SCREWDRIVER IS WHICH - “A Phillips? For that? Are you mad, woman?”

24. TAKING A NEWSPAPER INTO THE LOO - A visual code that says “that’s right, I’m going in there for a huge, long man-sized poo”.

I got my license through today, complete with Category A entitlement - meaning I can now ride absolutely any (road legal) motorbike I choose…nice!

I flirted with the notion of buying a Yamaha Dragstar 650 today - a colleague of mine was selling one for £2000, but it was red, and if I were to buy a cruiser, there are only certain colours it could be, and red ain’t one of them.

Anyway, I am getting impatient about my 125 now. I will put it in freeads in the next couple of days if I get no sniffs from the forums or from Paragon’s notice board. I started looking for Bandits again, this time with the intention of making a proper enquiry and going to look at one.

After listening to some advice about spending a little extra on a bike with lower mileage, I saw one on Biketrader.co.uk that took my fancy, even though it was 56 miles away. When I phoned up after work, I was told that it was already sold. I wanted to say “well, why didn’t you take your sodding advert down then, you complete tool?”…but I didn’t.

I was a bit cheesed at that, and decided to keep looking on the net. On a freeads site, I came across a V reg Bandit, red, with only 9400 miles on the clock, for £1500. Now I don’t know much about bikes, whether it be riding, repairing or buying/selling, but this sounds like a bargain. I am going up with Cornell tomorrow to see it, as it’s in Liss (just outside Petersfield). I will be taking my checklist that I got in Last months ‘Ride’ magazine, and hopefully it will turn out to be a good deal, and I can get on the road.

Of course, this all hinges on the result of my attempt to extend my loan with the bank. I spent a good half an hour on the phone going over the details with an advisor, and I have to wait to see if the underwriters approve it or not, but he said that I should know by tomorrow.

Fingers crossed!

Slight hiccup in my plans.

Tom came up to me at Cubs last night with this expression on his face that I could instantly read as “I can’t buy your bike”.

His parents laid an ultimatum of sorts on him, and made him choose between a car and a motorbike, with the added sweetener of helping him out with his car insurance.

Oh well, no hard feelings. I have since put up adverts on the Paragon Forum, and the UK Bike Forum, so hopefully I will get an enquiry or two soon.

http://www.planetdan.net/pics/misc/georgie.htm

I think I have sold my bike…..to Spoon of all people.

He’s got the bug to ride bikes again and take his CBT, and I think he is going halves with his mum. Anyway, he had a look at it on Sunday evening, and I let Gary (his stepdad) take it for a spin, and it met with his approval.

So it looks like I will be losing the GN125 soon. All I am waiting on is for Tom to see how much money he has in the bank - we should do the deal either on Friday or at the end of the month.

Now I’ve just got to find where best to get the rest of the money to get a bike.

….and where best to insure it.

……and I still have to find a bike…….

…although I really shouldn’t complain. The Cavalier is over ten years old, has done almost 136,000 miles, and it sailed though its last MOT without a hitch.

I took the car into ProTyre to get the balancing and tracking checked after work yesterday. £34 I was quoted. I sat around for an hour waiting, then one of the mechanics asked me to look at one of the tyres - it was bald on one edge and would need replacing…another £34. Oh well. And to rub salt into the wound, the balancing and tracking were fine - it was the bulge that caused the wobble. So I could have saved myself £30 quid if I’d checked my tyres myself first.

About half an hour later, a different mechanic called me out to look at another tyre - this time with a serious bulge in it.

Another £34 quid.

Problem is, with it being near the end of the month (sort of) and with the expenditure on the Motorbike Course, I had a grand total of £100 left in my account (actually, I had £100 left of my overdraft). The final bill came to £91, so now I am totally skint!

At least the car runs smoothly now, and god knows what could have happened if they hadn’t spotted the bulge…blow out on the motorway at 70mph? No thank you!

I own a Dark Blue M reg Vauxhall Cavalier, and ever since I bought it about four years ago, it has let off this faint smell of burning fuel. I usually put up with it, but sometimes, when I’m stuck in traffic it can get really bad and I can get headaches and a bit light-headed - not ideal circumstances in which to be driving a car, obviously!

So, after driving a team of Scouts to Chichester to begin a hike, I decided to address the problem (finally). This was spurred on by Jake telling me that my car “stank” on the way up. Actually, I had almost gotten used to it, certainly when it is not very strong, but god knows what its doing to my health.

Anyway, my brother Rob had looked through the ‘ol Haynes manual and found a possible cause - the crankshaft ventilation hose can sometimes get blocked, and this causes the gases to leak, rather than get recycled through the air filter and back into the engine. Dad and I looked at this hose as soon as I got back and it was fine, but we discovered this nozzle next to the hose, that had nothing on it, and there were fumes coming out of it.

I had a good hunt through the manual, but could not find anything that described it (the manual, as usual, covers about six different versions of the Cavalier, and, surprise surprise my engine featured in about 5% of the photographs). So I phoned Rob (he used to own a Cavalier) but he could not shed any light.

That is, until he phoned up about half an hour later to tell me he’d found a photo of the same engine, complete with a hose attached to the offending nozzle, running down behind the engine. Lo and behold, when I had a look again at mine, I discovered that there was another nozzle tucked away behind the engine with an inch of totally perished rubber hose on it.

Bought a new bit of hose, attached it and took it for a spin…..no smell! Hurrah!

Actually, there was a little bit of a smell, but I think that is due to a leaky gasket on the rocker box cover (or whatever it is properly called - I don’t know squat about car mechanics). But it smells a lot nicer in there now!

So thank you Rob, for going out of your way like that! And thanks to dad for buying me the replacement hose and oil cap (that was leaky too).

All that’s left now (apart from replacing the gasket), is to sort out the wobble I’m getting at 70mph…balancing the wheels and checking the tracking should take care of it.

I had known for months that my test was to be on the 11th April at 13:08, and as it got closer and closer, so the underlying stress that I associated with it became stronger and stronger. I think that I’d used up all my stress quota for this period, as I felt no stress whatsoever Tuesday night, nor on the way to Paragon on Wednesday morning, now that my test was to be at 09:37. Even the fact that the test would now be held up on Portsdown Hill, along test routes that I have never ridden, and junctions that I am not familiar did not seem to register any fear with me. I guess that I just did not have time to think too much about it. That’s my problem you see, if I think too much abou anything, I start to worry about it. Maybe its a genetic thing.

I think also that I was keen to get the whole thing over with. That doesn’t mean that I was getting bored of it or anything, far from it. I had just spent four days doing nothing but ride a motorcycle, or resting. I had not been able to apply myself to anything else - I just did not have the energy. There was no pressure, as I had the whole week off work, but there were a hundred other things on my ‘to-do’ list, and I had intended to start doing them in earnest on Wednesday. Now I had another day of riding, and I was just itching to get on with the rest of my life.

I arrived at the shop at 07:15 and chatted to Dean over a cup of tea and a smoke. Dean is one of the guys also doing his DAS, but with Dave Whymark (Biffo). The rescheduling of the tests meant that Dean was testing at 08:45 (ish) and I was just after him. Mark and the other trainee, Dave, were due to test at 11 and 12 ish, so Dave Baglee (Baggers - the boss) took Dean and I up to the Portsdown Test Centre via a few test routes around Portchester, Cosham and over the back of the hill, and Andy met up with the other two later on.

We went in and out of the test centre a couple of times, so we could suss out how to do it properly, and then we parked up - Dean was now going to test. I hung around outside while Baggers went in to the test centre with Dean.

About two minutes later, they both came walking out.

“You’re never going to believe this, Dave” says Baggers

“What’s up?” says I.

“They’re in Gosport”

Apparently, Dave Blake (the examiner) had asked for the tests to be carried out in Gosport (maybe he was aware that our courses were all done there, I don’t know), but there was an admin cock-up and no-one informed Paragon. Baggers immediately got on the phone to Andy, who should have been at the shop with the other two by now, and told him to get straight down to the Gosport test centre, on the off chance that either Mark or Dave could bag Dean’s test slot. We then made a bee line to the test centre ourselves.

It was funny, after riding round the Portsdown test routes for an hour or so, all of which were scarily unfamiliar, getting back into the nice familiar roads of Gosport was like somebody putting a warm fuzzy blanket round me - I began to relax more and my confidence went up.

When we got to the centre, we learned that the other guys had also missed Dean’s slot, but they had managed to put Dean after the rest of us, at 13:08, so poor old Dean, after expecting to get on with it first thing, had to wait around for half the day before he got his chance. I was alright, since there was still twenty minutes before I was due to test, so we popped over to Burger King for a quick coffee. I was feeling the adrenaline by now, but I made a conscious effort to do everything at a leisurely pace, whether it was putting the cup of coffee to my lips, or getting on the motorbike in the proper fashion - “take it slow, don’t rush anything and make yourself more nervous”, I kept telling myself, and it did the trick - I got from Burger King to the Test Centre without tripping over anything, dropping anything or generally making a tit of myself.

Hung around in the lobby for only a couple of minutes before the examiner came out and asked me into a back room, where he explained the process, got me to sign a document and set me up with a radio. We then walked out to the bike, where he asked me to read a license plate, then asked me to show him how I would check the steering, and then tell him how I would check the tyres. He then went over to his car (his bike was in the garage being fixed/serviced) and I got on my bike, and off we went.

I couldn’t tell you which route we took, but all the roads we rode on were familiar to me from the last four days, so there were no surprises. The only surprise I got was when he asked me to pull over, since he was still right behind me, and the road was far too narrow to do a u-turn on. As it turned out, he asks you to pull over and then pull away a few times on the way round, just to see you do it properly, with all the indicators and observations done correctly. That’s something Andy didn’t tell me about - I thought I had ballsed something up and that the test was over!

The u-turn went smoothly, and because he got it out of the way quite early on in the test, I was able to relax a bit. The rest of the test went smoothly, I thought. I’d made a couple of mild mistakes - I shaved a corner a little on a right hand junction turn, and missed a couple of mirror checks, so I thought I’d just get one or two minors.

Just to explain, there are three kinds of faults you can make on a test, a ‘minor’, a ’serious’ and a ‘dangerous’. ‘Minors’ are little things, and of themselves they do not cause you to fail a test. In fact, you are allowed 16 minors before you fail, unless you get 3 minors for the same thing, at which point they become a ’serious’. A serious is a fail (I think), as is a dangerous.

I was calm, I felt good, I took my time and thought my way through each and every manoeuvre…all up to the point at which I realised we were on the way back to the test centre. Then the nerve sreally started to kick in - I was confident that I’d done enough to warrant a pass, and really didn’t want to cock it all up at the final hurdle.

“Don’t muck up, don’t muck up, don’t muck up, don’t muck up, don’t muck up…” I kept saying to myself, over and over and over, all the way back to the parking bay at the test centre.

….actually, the word I used wasn’t ‘muck’, but it sure rhymed with it!

Got back, parked up, switched off and followed Dave (the examiner) back into the room I started in (with Baggers following). He relieved me of the radio, and then asked me a question.

“What differences would you notice in the performance of the bike if you were carrying a pillion passenger?”

………….total blank.

………………………………………………………….cr*p!

Think, dammit, think!!!!!

These were questions that we had been prepped for, and I knew the answer, but the adrenaline coursing round my body had closed off that particular receptor in my brain where the answer was stored.

After about ten seconds (although it seemed like an eternity), the answer came to me.

“The extra weight will mean that accelarating and braking are slower processes, and the centre of gravity will be higher, which will affect the steering.” I didn’t specify how it would affect the steering, because I had forgotten, but fortunately, he didn’t ask.

So then he looks at the marking sheet for a few seconds…………….

“Congratulations, Dave - that’s a pass.”

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

He then took my license off me to destroy so that he could arrange for a new one to be sent to me, and wrote me out a pass certificate. He said a few other things that I didn’t really take in, and then disappeared to ready himself for the next test.

I picked up my stuff ready to leave, when Baggers asked to look at the marking sheet. I had totally forgot that he gives it to you

And that was that! I went back outside, where Andy and the other three trainees were waiting, told them, shook loads of hands, chatted for a bit and gave the other guys a couple of hints (i.e. don’t panic when he pulls you over for no reason!) and then we headed back to the shop so that they could drop me off and Dean could get on with some more practise.

Actually, the ride back to the shop from the test centre must have been the scariest period of riding of the whole course - my mind was buzzing and I was worried that I would cock up because I was so distracted and euphoric.

Got back OK though, thanked Dave, wished Dean luck for his test and went home. I then spent the whole afternoon phoning everybody to tell them I passed.

So there you have it, I can now legally ride any size motorbike I please. Nice!

I intend to be sensible though, and get a nice sedate 600cc for my first bike, something like a Suzuki Bandit or of that ilk. I would still love a Harley, but am a long way off affording one of those.

I popped back up to Paragon that afternoon, to give Andy a little something for being a brilliant instructor as well as an all-round nice bloke, and also to find out how the other three guys did - they all passed. Nice one guys!

Having only ridden a big bike for three days to date, it is only natural that getting on them first thing in the morning, and pulling away, you can be a little unsteady. Every morning on the course, pulling away from the shop first thing, I would consistently do it at five or six thousand rpms, and wobble all over the place. The great thing is that it only takes a few minutes to remember what you are doing and relax into it. So, as soon as we started off from the shop, I was relaxed and not thinking about the fact that in four and a bit hours I would be taking my test - a test that would tell me if I can legally ride any motorcycle I wished, or if I have to book another day off work, shell out another hundred quid, and go through it all again.

Actually, you don’t go through it all again. Paragon will arrange a retest that involves a half days riding with an instructor before going to the test centre. At least I think that is how it works - I was trying not to think about failing, as I find overly negative thoughts have a way of realizing themselves if you do it long enough.

So, a nice easy ride round in the morning of day four, with only one stop to do an emergancy stop and u-turn, which both Mark and I did without a hitch (phew!). No pressure, just a nice relaxing saunter around the test routes. I felt ready, I felt confident, I had an overall good vibe about the test approaching. I still wasn’t going to eat anything for lunch that day though…..

We were riding up to the Brockhurst double roundabout at about 11:00, when Andy and Mark noticed the examiner on the other side of the road, standing next to his bike with his trainee with him. We went round the roundabout and pulled over nearby, and Andy went over to talk to him. About five minutes later Andy came back over and told us that all tests might be off that afternoon…as the examiner had just been knocked off his bike while stationary at the roundabout. Apparently, some woman in a car behind had assumed he was pulling away, slammed into him and sent the bike spinning 360 into the central reservation…Ouch!

We went straight to Snack Attack to get some lunch and await the news. I figured, that since we probably weren’t going to be testing today, and since I was ravenously hungry, that I ought to eat something, so I ordered bacon, egg and chips. Mmmmm…….greasy! I didn’t eat it all, in case we did test and I got nervous again. When Biffo came in and confirmed that tests were off for definite, I quickly polished off the rest of the meal. I wasn’t really that disappointed with the news, even though I was looking forward to finally doign the test. I think the accident with the examiner brought it home that these things can happen to absolutely anybody - the only thing you can do is protect yourself with the best clothing you can afford, in case it’s your turn…

More chatting at Snack Attack, then back to the shop to see if Baggers had any more news. He said that he was hopeful that we would get a test time the next day, and that he would give me a call to let me know. Later that afternoon he did indeed call, and confirm that I would be testing Wednesday morning at 09:37, so could I be at the shop for 07:15.

07:15!!!! I haven’t been up at 07:15 all year, unless I’m going for a wee!

Oh well, there was nothing for it, if I wanted to get my license. Actually I felt that it might have been a good thing to do it the next day, as when I was driving home from Paragon, it started to rain, and when I looked at my clock I noticed that I would have been exactly ten minutes into my test….

There’s not a lot to say for day three - it’s not as if they teach you stuff on day one and two, and then throw something completely new into the mix on day three or four. To be honest, when you think about, there are not a lot of different things that you have to learn to pass a test, and from day one we were already doing all the things we needed to do, we just had to practise them over and over again. If you can pull away, speed up, slow down, turn left at junctions, turn right, pull over, take roundabouts correctly, do emergency stops, u-turns, and make correct observations…and do them properly, you will pass your test, and to ride on the road for more than a few minutes you will have to do all of these things anyway. It’s doing them properly that is the trick, and you get to this stage by practise, plain and simple.

There’s another thing that I liked about the course - there was no dull instructional video, no seminars, no homework (except a question and answer sheet that they give you to read in your own time, but that takes about five minutes to go through) - its all riding, and any talkie bit in between is about the ride you just had, unless you at lunch or stopping for a smoke break, as then you can talk about whatever you like, although the conversation was almost exclusively about biking one way or the other.

I was also surprised with how much I got on with everybody. Usually, if I’m stuck in a situation with a bunch of strangers I get very uncomfortable and clam up, but I felt totally at ease on this course, so much so that I almost miss being out on the course now that it is over - it was that much fun.

Day three was more of the same, plus a ride out to Rob Wilshers in Bursledon to look at some of the bikes. Here we met another instructor, Rob, who rode round with us in the afternoon and gave us some useful pointers. The afternoon was spent leisurely riding around the test routes and cleaning up any loose ends to our technique.

That’s all I can say really about day three. Getting home that night, the thoughts started to focus in on the test the next day - will I pass? Will I make a balls up? I tried to tell myself over and over “You can pass this test easily - you have the skills now, but whether or not you will pass is out of your hands - anything could go wrong on the day, so it’s not really worth worrying about”. I was partially successful too, as I remained calm throughout and got a good nights sleep, even if my thoughts did keep on creeping back to 13:08 the next day….