A time to change – growing old disgracefully!

The signs are everywhere. The government has dispatched the bowel cancer screening test, reading demands the use of spectacles and all the jokes about partying for half a century have faded into the dark distance behind me. Youth has officially left the building! Now I am able to to appreciate the sage words of the insightful George Bernard Shaw – youth is most definitely wasted on the young!

As I peer into the life that now lays before me, I think about the things left to be achieved (some of which are on Austin Power’s list of things to do before I die). Today, Australia Day 2010, I have ticked another box. I went on my first ride with the Ulysses Motorcycle Club – as a full member (the Ulysses web site will tell you what that means). Yes, I am a FULL member.

My plan is to grow old disgracefully so Ulysses is the perfect fit (this is their motto after all). If it has two wheels or a skirt you cannot afford it… so the expression goes. I have spent my life adoring both. My gorgeous girl Kitty talks of a motorcycle trike, that would be when I cannot hold the motorcycle up anymore – a long way off I hope!

Kitty has joined Ulysses also. A junior for now. I guess this means Kitty and I will are destined to ride off into the sunset – Tequila flowing and action aplenty and growing old disgracefully – Yaaaahhhhooooo!!!!!!!

Motorcycle Dreaming!

As the long hot summer of 2008/2009 continues the pain increases. I have been desperate and bikeless for six months now! This syndrome is akin to the feelings of anxiety that are stirred up with other situations that affect your natural balance. Listlessness, mood swings and feelings of being lost are prevalent right now. My partner tries to soothe my frayed nerves every time my head cocks sideways to the sound of a motorcycle.

I console myself with mental images of my next bike, perhaps a full tourer, perhaps a sports tourer or anything really. I like the new Triumph Bonnies, they take me back to a time of my life when things were very simple… a beer, a bike and the occasional girlfriend… and all the boxes were ticked. Now I suffer from Motorcycle Envy!

I am now in the process of looking for my next ride. Anticipation pumps through my veins. My imagination runs wild with possibilities. I am like a kid in a candy store as I look at lots of different bikes, always coming back to the Bonnie. It is not the tourer I thought I would be looking for. I just had a K1200GT Beemer in Canada for four years. I rode through nine western states of the USA and lots of western Canada… brilliant!

For now, the simplicity of the Bonnie and the memories of a simple time in my life are calling to me. The Bonnie will get me back “on the road” and that is critical. I want to tour to the MotoGP at Phillip Island later in the year, the Bonnie will be fine I’m sure. I have not been in the country for the past five years so I have missed my annual odyssey to the Island.

I continue my search for “the” bike. Now that I am “in the market” the anxiety subsides marginally but does not vanish completely… there is only one antidote for a full recovery… I hope it is administered soon!!!