Gigs

Goodbye 2013

Kruse Leave a comment

A mixed bag, 2013…  on the one hand: I fell off the “exercise more, drink less” wagon, and had a rather serious (looking back on it, didn’t seem like it at the time) motorbike accident; on the other: I visited 4 new countries, and gained independence/revenue by becoming a contractor.

Overall, I think I’m happy to see this particular New Year, as a fresh start (or re-attempt).  So – New Year’s Resolutions:

  • Eat one-handed
  • Drink water
  • Become British

And some probable side-projects:

  • Surrender to baldness… allow niece/nephews to shave my head?
  • North Korea – this year, hopefully, I’ll finally get around to my dream Trans-Mongolian, North Korea, Central Asia trip.
  • Get back on that hoss… the rowing machine hoss.

Enough looking forward… time to look back… Gigs…

  • Braids, at XOYO… a random gig, I saw it listed, at XOYO – so just around the corner – read a description of the band, figured it’d probably be alright.  And yeah, it was alright.  Except they’ve completely re-designed the layout of XOYO, so I was very very disoriented.  Yet the barmaid still asked if I wanted “my usual”… a little disconcerting.
  • Dave Dobbyn & Don McGlashan, at the Union Chapel.  You can’t really go wrong with those three ingredients.  Seeing Dave Dobbyn in London is kinda a kitsch right-of-passage thing for an ex-pat Kiwi… but I felt rather jealous of those who were doing it for the first time at this particular gig.  They alternated Dobbyn/McGlashan songs… mostly playing quite obscure stuff, until wheeling out the big guns at the end.
  • Sinéad O’Connor, at the Royal Festival Hall.  Caro had bought the tickets for this, and I went along.  I’ve only listened to Sinéad properly quite recently… she’s rather good, but her bat-shit insanity gets a little grating.  Turns out – her fans are the same!  But for a couple of hours – quite amusing.  Very enthusiastic fans… stuck in a fully seated venue.  Two girls in front of us couldn’t help themselves but dance terribly, sometimes seated, sometimes unable to resist standing and blocking other’s views.  But yeah, good gig…
  • Terrible covers band, Fidelity Christmas Party.  So yeah, the festive season, work parties, etc, etc.  Fidelity party was at the Lingfield racegrounds, out in the country.  So I rode down on Wednesday morning, spent a couple of days brain-dumping my knowledge of my project to a few new guys, and stayed at the Marriott at the venue of the party for a couple of nights… planning on riding back to London on Friday evening.  Which meant a 30 minute ride from work on Wed evening to hotel… through ridiculous fog.  So… turned out to be a 50 minute ride of constant terror.  Left my bike at work on Thursday evening, caught bus to venue – got changed, partied, woke up, and caught taxi to work.  Somehow left phone in taxi.  Rode to East Grimstead or whatever to pick up phone on Friday evening, the driver still had it in his car, and had gone home.  So, found hotel to stay the night.  Opted out of cheap/cheerful Premium Inn in town… thinking I’d find a nice pub with rooms to spend the evening in the countryside.  Found a place – checked in, realised that it was actually just a hotel, with small run-down bar, no kitchen/food, and very dodgy overall.  But, had a very cheap, very cheerful restaurant a 5 minute walk up the road, so I coped.  Woke up the next day, went to taxi office, still no phone, waited an hour, eventually turned up.  Back to London…
  • to do some work, and then see Electric Six.  Which didn’t happen.  Well – the work did… I’d been afraid that I’d be too tired to see/enjoy Electric Six (a bit of a guilty pleasure gig… I keep seeing their name pop up, so figured I’d finally give in and go see them)… but as it turns out, the work stretched out into the evening, so I ended up being stuck in the office until much too late.  Perhaps it wasn’t meant to be… Electric Six probably needs to be seen at Heaven (refer previous post).
  • Placebo, Brixton Academy.  An ex-workmate told me that Placebo was one of his top 5 bands, which I didn’t understand – as he is quite smart… so I figured I’d give them another chance.  (It’s not that I dislike Placebo, but more… yeah – couple of nice-ish songs, but I wouldn’t ever consider them desert-island-disc type material).  So – went to the gig, first impression – wow, enthusiastic fans.  Some people really really like Placebo.  Second impression – I’m still not one of those people.
  • Following night: Katzenjammers – not a gig, another christmas-period event.  German bar, steins, sauerkraut, etc.  But a late night, with lots of drink, little sleep… by this point I was already tired of the ‘silly season’…
  • So Tricky, at the Electric Ballroom the following night, was always going to be a struggle.  I was very seriously considering flagging it… but I’d missed his gig a year ago – when he played the entire Maxinquaye album, to go to Iceland… so pulled myself together, and made it there… very tired, very hungover, and just holding it together.  And was pleased I did.  It was one of those gigs where you think “wow – I’d forgotten just how awesome this guy is”.  And that was with a gig where I don’t think Tricky himself was even on stage for the first 15 minutes, plus 2 pauses for “encores”… during which he really made the crowd demand it… probably a total of another 30 minutes off-stage, and then the last 30 minutes was him just repeating the same chorus over and over again (with a couple dozen crowd members on stage with him).  But yeah – really, really good.  This video sums it up quite nicely, despite poor quality… short clips of a few songs, Tricky covering Ace of Spades with a dozen crowd members in on stage, in such a way that when it is followed by what is probably his most famous song, it’s nearly a let-down; and the insane final half-hour.  I just watched the entire thing again, and got the shivers.  Tricky is going into my list of top gigs.
  • Jeebers’s Birthday – left work a little early on the 24th… had a few drinks – then headed home.  Stayed awake for as long as possible, to try and catch people in NZ coming online for Skype talks, but couldn’t stay awake for that long, and only caught Mum.  25th – slept in, and headed to Caro’n’Dom’s at about noon.  Too exhausted from the month to be particularly good company, but Malachy seemed to like my gift of a dancing/singing Baloo (although his grandma seemed to like it more..), and I received in turn a pair of sweet Incredible Hulk lounge pants, which I am wearing right now.  It’s a good look.  Good food, good drinks, good conversation (despite, or because of?, my inability to contribute much) – and then some whisky tasting, leading to my staying the night on the couch.
  • Boxing Day – stuck around, helped build a Duplo airport/heliport, and generally just lingered until Dom’s wider family started turning up.  More food, more drinks… but I forced myself to leave once the red wine started flowing… to get home for work the next day.
  • New Year’s Eve… left work early, headed to a bar for some drinks with the Programme Director from work (he doesn’t like being called a Project Manager).  After a couple of drinks in Islington, a plan was floated to perhaps drop off his stuff at his place, and head to the West End to find something/somewhere to do for the evening.  I opted out, suggesting a couple more drinks locally, before heading our separate ways… as I didn’t have the energy for a full-blown night out.  A couple more drinks locally somehow turned into the barman suggesting politely “the way you guys are going through those wines, wouldn’t it be sensible to order a bottle… save a few quid?”.  Well – he’s the expert.  Next thing I know, we’re discussing politics, love, (no sport that I can recall), chatting up random girls, etc.  I eventually headed home – well, to my local – to see in the New Year.  But, I’m not sure I made it… I think I realised I’d probably drunk a little more than was good for me, headed home – and I rather suspect that for the first time in abut 20 years worth of New Year’s Eves – went to bed before midnight.  New Year’s Eve in England… I don’t really get it.  It just doesn’t work.

It’s Cold

Kruse Leave a comment

Winter’s here, and it’s cold.

Three recent gigs…

Art Brut – who I saw last year, and was fairly impressed by.  This time, discovered that all the seemingly random banter, stories, etc… not so much.  Last year’s gig is a bit fuzzy in the memory (I believe I was concussed that night) – but I believe that all the gaps are filled now, from watching this year’s word-for-word repeat.  Summary: Disappointed.

Savages – went to see them on the back of them being short-listed for the Mercury Prize.  Decent enough music, but possibly the worst group of fans I’ve ever encountered.  Just… awful.  I don’t know how to describe how/why… but somehow I was turned into elderly judgemental woman, screwing my nose up and using a stick to keep people from brushing against me.  Summary: Distaste.

Future Of The Left – at gay nightclub Heaven.  Where I also saw Band of Skulls last year.  And I guess it’s making a bit more sense, as both bands could nearly be described as “Cock Rock”, at a first listen.  Except they both have hot female bass players.  (Well – probably not that hot… but put a woman on stage, with a bass guitar… and I’m happy).  Anyway – the gig.  Good… surprisingly good.  I wasn’t expecting much – as I seemed to recall I only really listened to the albums because of the singer’s previous band – Mclusky, and hadn’t enjoyed the new incarnation as much.  But it was good… they played a few Mclusky songs, which was good… but the whole gig was rather good.  Just… fun.  And next time there’s a gig at Heaven, I now know – thanks to the helpful barman who gave me the advice – I can buy a bottle of wine, and just leave it behind the bar for refills.  Probably saving myself a whole pound or two.  (The effort gone to to avoid homophobic jokes and/or openings for jokes in that was considerable.)  Summary: pleasantly surprised.

Other news: I’ve downloaded and printed off the 59-page form for applying for “Indefinite Leave to Remain” in the UK.  And bought the book to teach me about “Life in the UK”… as I need to pass a test that I know how to be British.  Once again – lots of effort being put in as regards not making any of the obvious jokes.

Back on that hoss

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Firstly – a couple of gigs:

  • Cat Power – she may be cray-cray, but she can sing.  This was re-scheduled from last year, so had been looking forward to it for quite some time.  Not disappointed.  And as a bonus, as I was hanging out in the member’s bar, had a chat with the Customer Relations Officer, or some such.  And I happened to mention I was gutted to miss out on tickets to The National – scheduled for the very next night – which had effectively sold out in under 5 minutes.  She gave me her card, so I could call the next day – in case she could do something about that.  I did call, she could do something about it (had a couple of spare ‘hospitality’ or VIP tickets or something – which she’s not allowed to sell) – and I got my name on the door, and made a donation to the Roundhouse charity, for about the price of a ticket (I actually rounded it up a fair bit).
  • So – The National.  Very pleased to get into this… considering the ridiculous demand for them, and there was no way of buying ‘scalped’ tickets.  And yeah, good.  Other than new songs, rather reminiscent of the last time I saw them – didn’t play “All The Wine”, and did acoustic Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks… but I was pleased.  I do like me The National.

And then it was time to get back on that horse… or all 70 of those horses, on my sweet new bike.  I sold my old one for £70… which I felt guilty about.  It would have felt a bit better if I hadn’t got any money for it, but… I used the money for new gear, and to get a MOT (WOF) for the new one (which I’d been assured it would come with, but did not).

Anyway – the new bike.  A 1997 Triumph Adventurer… when doing a bit of research on it… one of the first reviews I read had described it using the phrase “adds dollop of crass to already glittery, faux concoction.”  This intrigued me.  But when I went on to read “…the Triumph Adventurer is about as cool and stylish as purple velvet loon pants.” – I bought the bike without ever having actually seen/touched it – let alone sat on it.  (I bought it over the phone, and had it delivered from Stoke).

I took it out for one short ride, on a slightly wet Sunday – and confirmed that it worked, an that I worked (my legs, in particular).  And then, the following Sunday – with essentially all new gear/clothing, a backpack, and the hardly-ridden bike – set off for the Czech Republic.

A couple of things came apparent:

  • My new Kriega backpack/rucksack is awesome.  I read all sorts of reviews, claiming it takes the weight off your shoulders, can hardly feel it, etc – with suitable cynicism.  But they’re all true!  Good work Kriega.  But then, any company who puts a 10 year guarantee on their backpack is probably pretty confident in their product.
  • My nerves are shot.  Riding on the motorway, every little noise, shudder, gust of wind – had my head full of visions of my front wheel falling off.  And that just got worse as I headed into Germany – on the autobahn, where one feels obligated to go even faster; and in Czechland – where the roads had lengthy stretches of constant ‘bumps’, which I could never be sure were actually in the road… and my mind was constantly coming up with possible scenarios explaining what I was feeling… most involving my bike about to fall apart underneath me, at 130km/h.

But – I made it safe-and-sound.  Caught the ferry from Dover, to Dunkirk – and then headed into Belgium.  Stayed a night at a pension in some weird small town, which seems to exist in order to allow people to come and do some pilgrimage?  There were multiple shops selling ‘religious items’, and what I think were big bottles of holy water.  But not a single restaurant/supermarket/etc willing to sell me food after about 9pm – when I arrived.  Eventually the people at the pension I was staying at – took pity on me, and cooked me a dinner.  A massive, massive dinner – which I tried very hard to finish, but could not.  And the nice man from the hotel/pension I’d originally booked a room in (but closed at 8pm – so sent me elsewhere) – offered to store my bike indoors for me.  Much appreciated.  Well done, weird little Banneux.

The next day – headed off into Germany, and the autobahns.  Some people really do go quite fast on those… but generally, probably not much more than countries which do have hard speed limits.  Anyway – I trundled along on that, once or twice winding it up to see how fast the new bike (and my nerve), was capable.  Well – my nerve failed first… I was happy to see the speedo hit 100mph.  According to one website, top speed is about 190km/h.  I don’t see any need to prove/disprove that.  Anyway – mostly headed along at the ‘recommended’ speed limit of around 130 km/h, often dropping down a bit slower and just cruising behind trucks/etc in the ‘slow lane’.  And made it all the way across Germany in a day… found a small town just before the Czech border, and eventually found a hotel/pension to book into.  Lovely place – garage for the bike… but once again food was problematic.  I’d arrived at a decent time – I thought – but still very difficult finding anything on a Monday night.  So – found an icecream bar which served beer, and bar-snacks in the form of “ham-and-cheese toast sandwiches”.  Good work Vohenstrauss.

Next day – across the border into Czechland.  From memory, the motorway between Germany & Prague wasn’t too bad.  Just the wind messing with my head, making me continuously think I was going to die.  But after Prague – eastern Czechland… particularly the right-hand ‘slow lane’… horrible horrible constant ‘judders’.  And like I said above – my mind constantly coming up with explanations for this, involving a stone in my tyre about to cause it to burst, or something snagged somewhere, about to lock a wheel completely, or just that it really was the road – but was about to cause a tyre to burst or something.  Just constant doubts/terrors.  Awesome, good fun.  But eventually made it to Pustimer, where the ridiculous hospitality began.

Ludek’s parents… without a word of english between them – guessed who I was, invited me in, and just started plying me with pivo, slivovice, and food.  I was stranded there for a couple of hours – just being bombarded with brutal quantities/qualities of hospitality, until everybody else returned from visiting castles.  More pivo & slivovice, and eventually left to go to Ludek’s auntie’s house, which she’d given over to us for the week.  So yeah – my first impression of Czech hospitality: freely given beer, slivovice, food, and a house (with a swimming pool).

Slivovice probably warrants a word here.  After having this clear liquor forced upon me… I did a quick google search, to figure out what it was I was reading.  The first half-a-dozen ‘hits’ were all news stories, about how the Czech government had banned all hard liquor for a period last year – after several deaths… from people drinking slivovice.  Apparently, quite a few cases of blindness also.  Apparently now, a popular toast is “see you later” – making fun of this.

Anyway – a few days of such hospitality, lots and lots of very hot sunshine, and a couple of bike rides around the Czech country-side… the days passed by.  I’d nearly forgotten there was a wedding involved.  But there was a wedding, so we went to that.  Very nice wedding, and very good reception.  From what I recall.  I remember somebody giving me a beer soon after I entered the reception venue (while this doesn’t sound that strange… nobody else was); I vaguely remember a haka; and I vaguely remember dancing… including one very successful “knee slide”, and two very unsuccessful knee slides (evidenced the next day by spectacular bruising… injuries now more evident (visually and pain-wise) than any lingering effects from falling off my bike).

The usual post-wedding hungover tired lazy day or two… a couple of nights in Prague (Prague is quite nice) – and then a few days taking mostly non-motorway routes back to England.  The sat-nav took me on some brilliant roads, and also some rather dodgy ones.  The Adventurer isn’t really designed for gravel roads. but it coped.  I took a detour to ride along the Rhine for a while, that was spectacular.  Koblenz valley, I think it was called – with constant castles on the skyline.  Very cool.  A night in Germany, a night in Luxembourg, and a night in Belgium – before catching a ferry from Calais back to the white cliffs of Dover, and back to London.

2,500 miles, or near to, by the end of it.  Didn’t get pulled over once – which is lucky, as it seems my left rear indicator hasn’t been working since I don’t know when.  And in France, there’s all sorts of ridiculous rules for motorists, and motorcyclists in particular.  Have to carry a breathalyser (which I did), but also – put 4 reflective stickers onto your helmet.  And they have to be such a type that they are impossible to remove, “without damaging the helmet”.  WTF?

All in all, a good trip.  And it’s probably about time I learnt how to perform some basic maintenance on the bike… overdue for the chain being cleaned/lubed/oiled.  A general clean is also overdue… I got my glittery faux concoction a little dirty over the last couple of weeks.

Just looking over photos – I’d nearly forgotten about our daytrip to Brno – visiting the castle, and the pub where your drinks are delivered to your table by model train.  Such a brilliant concept/gimmick.

EDIT: To answer the little sister’s question… by the end of it, motorways still gave me irrational fear, but I’m loving the small country roads/etc.  But I guess that’s the way it should be anyway.Booze Train

Booze TrainGermany-Belgium border

Germany-Belgium border

Winter drags on

Kruse Leave a comment

Still winter.  Apparently the vernal quinox this year is the 20th March – after which date I’m assuming there will be sunshine.  And no more snow.  Snow in March, what the hell?

I prematurely gambled on the weather warming up last week – shaving off the February beard, and optimistically stopped wearing an overcoat to work.  That lasted about two days.

Enough inane chit-chat about the weather.

Have refrained from buying any tickets to gigs this year… although a few have really piqued my interest.  The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, in particular, curating All Tomorrow’s Parties this year.  But – will I be in the UK, or on a plane headed to NZ?  I do not know, and therefore I won’t book any tickets one way or the other.

Gigs I’ve been to this year though, with tickets bought last year – or because it was free… Brad, Frightened Rabbit, and Fargo Fatale.  Brad was good, I was disappointed with Frightened Rabbit, and Fargo Fatale was also good… brilliant self-indulgent birthday party.

Haven’t taken the Spectre out this year yet.  I’ve wanted to – I don’t want to be a fair-weather only rider… but I figure as an inexperienced rider, snow’s probably not a good idea.  And I had the key sitting on my desk this morning, to remind me to at least start her up today… but it seems I may have a broken foot.  So I’m currently trapped in my apartment, and nobody has heeded any of my text messages asking for crutches to be brought.  This is worrying – as this coincides with my wine ‘cellar’ being very nearly dry.  And, the end of my “grocery cycle”.  Trapped, with limited food, limited booze (relatively), and nobody to do errands for me.  The only places I’ve found to sell me crutches wouldn’t ship until Monday (and therefore arrive on Tuesday).  I tried the ironing board… didn’t work as well as I would have expected.  I am bang in the middle of one of the greatest cities in the world, and I’m going to starve (or sober – that’s a verb now) to death.

Year-End

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I guess I’d better recap my last gigs of the year.  Well – it’s either that, or get ready for the international flight I should be on in a few hours.

Rufus Wainwright – gay.  Not in a derogatory way.  Just… gay.  Possibly – no, definitely – the most “camp” gig I’ve ever been to.  Opened by Leonard Cohen’s son.  Who, as chips off the old block go – as you can probably guess by the fact you’ve never heard of him – a very small chip.  But apparently also has a sister, who has a child with Rufus (quote: “… and none of us can figure how that happened!” …cue laughter).  None of which I knew beforehand – and couldn’t figure out how much of this banter was serious.

Glasvegas – went along with a workmate who had tickets.  And yeah, it was Glasvegas.  Solid standard rock gig.

Martha Wainwright – much better than her brother.  Allusions to family much more muted, but still there.  The Wainwrights – syndicated drama series – or so they’d like to think.

Beth Orton – at Union Chapel… a brilliant combo.  Good gig, very good.  Charming crowd banter, that voice, in that venue.  Cool.

Wye Oak – gave a spare ticket to random guy outside the venue.  He didn’t even buy me a drink… said he would, then didn’t.  Which maybe put me in bad mood, as I didn’t really enjoy the gig as much as I did the previous time I saw them.  Or maybe the venue was just a little too big for the show?  Although Scala – not exactly a big venue.  Or maybe I was just too tired.  But – good gig, just not up to my very very high expectations after last time I saw them.  But watching a youtube clip just now – I should have enjoyed it more.

And two gigs got cancelled on me – Felice Brothers & Cat Power.  Was looking forward to both very much.  But, hopefully next year.  And that leaves my gig count for the year on 69, I think.  Far too many, and I am going on a gig diet in 2013… try to get my bank balance to rebound.

Weekend rides and gigs

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Constantly feeling tired – as now my weekends don’t consist of slothing around the house, but rather researching a random place to ride to for lunch.  And then mid-week gigs, a ridiculous commute to work, and yeah… not cool.

Gigs:

Gemma Ray – really good.  Small gig at the Borderline.  Zero expectations, but she was very very good.  Just cool music.  Playing the guitar with a butcher knife seemed like a bit of a gimmick at first, and it was – but it worked.

Beirut – I was very very tired.  Nearly falling asleep during the entire thing, grumpy and disliking being in the midst of so many people.  But obviously good, judging by the irritating enthusiasm of all the people.

Kimbra.  Her first biggish headline gig, I believe.  And where better than Union Chapel.  I was a little confused at what she’s trying to be… serious soul singer, Amy Winehouse with tutu, pop with talent?  But I guess that’s a good thing – she’s none of those things, just doing what she wants.  But the dress… what the hell?  Good set, I get the impression she’s still trying to nail her stage persona – or else she’s got it, but it’s just crazy.  Played pretty much her entire debut album, plus the song she did with Foster The People (still gutted about missing them, passing them over for chinese with an Ex).  But now I guess I kinda saw a bit of that gig, because even played by Kimbra’s support band – a Foster The People song can’t be mistaken for anything else.  I’ve seen her effort at SXSW linked to from a certain website dedicated to awesome stuff, so here’s hoping she goes on to big things.

We Are Augustines… missed these guys earlier in the year due to a clash with something, can’t remember what.  Snapped up a ticket to this one… and got the impression it was their last tour or something?  Don’t know – can’t be bothered researching the veracity of that.  I’ve had the impression from their videos that they, or the lead at least, are earnest earnest young men.  And although it comes across as a little annoying in the videos (albeit, I believe there is justification for that) – it was kinda ‘sweet’ in the flesh.  He really seemed blown away by playing in a ex-theatre-type venue like SheBu (that’s the Shepherd’s Bush Empire).  Which, fair enough – the first time I went there, I was all like “wow… cool… gig in a London theatre”, and then the 10th time I went there I was all like “wow, the toilets are a pain in the arse to get to, and there’s a friggin’ Walkabout next door”.  But – the earnestness actually made the gig – they seemed genuinely stoked to just be there.  And an enthusiastic crowd to egg them on… made it a really enjoyable gig.

Next up was Radiohead.  With paperless ticketing, which ended up being more hassle than dead-tree-ticketing.  My card expired, I hunted for hours to confirm that my replacement debit-card would still get me in, then I got an email disclaiming that – asking me to call and give them my new card details.  I don’t like calling companies like Ticketmaster – they spend an hour with an automated voice telling me I can do anything I want on-line, while I’m swearing at them, reciting in turn that if there was any chance, ANY CHANCE, that I could do something “on-line” rather than picking up a phone and talking to somebody… it would have been done yesterday.  But…. rant over.  Radiohead – fairly high expectations for this, as one would assume.  And…. a little disappointed.  It was a good gig and all, but… just not spectacular.  Well, spectacular in a way, but not… innovative.  I couldn’t help thinking – Snow Patrol did the whole floating TV screens better than this, and Jay-Z/Kanye West absolutely smashed the whole concept of big-screen TVs.  It just seemed like they were just doing their job.  Which they were.  I had something in my head when I thought “Radiohead gig”, and what I got did not match that.  And I lost my debit card.  But I’m not going to be one of those “they only played the new in-accessible stuff, I wanted to hear only their first two albums” humbugs.  I’ve got a workmate who went as well, and he complained about “they only played their self-indulgent stuff, screw the fans”.  Nope.  Incorrect.  By now, if you haven’t figured out that their Kid-A onwards stuff isn’t that much different, well… you might as well go to a Bod Dylan gig and yell at him “Judas!”.

The Gaslight Anthem – last night.  Very good.  Very pleased about that gig… pure pleasure in playing exhibited by the band.  Check them out, they really are rather good.  Just wholesome blue-jeans rock-and-roll.  Imagine The Boss, if he’d had a couple of Clash records in his collection.  Or something.  That was only last night, so can’t find any decent videos yet – this will have to do.  Boring last encore.

Rides:

And on the weekends, I can’t really remember – every weekend possible I’ve gone out for a day-trip somewhere.  I’ve now done over 2,000 miles – and am ticking over each fraction of the bike’s total mileage as I do it.  The bike’s nearly 30 years old, and I am now accountable for nearly 1/7th of it’s total mileage.

Brighton, tick.  Hastings, nice bike parking facilites, but terrible seaside.  Cotswolds – inland, so no seafood, but beautiful ride… little villages, great pub at the end of it, good food – seriously considering a repeat.  Southend-on-Sea – terrible seaside.  Dover/Deal – “10th Best Seaside Pub In England”, I certainly hope not.  And then there’s just the random places I looked up, as they’re on the ends of peninsulas, to get there and realise they’re industrial ports.  But – all good fun… the Spectre’s running fine, and it’s something to do on the weekends… until I go broke.  (Petrol for a bike is fairly cheap, but dining every Saturday & Sunday at a ‘gastropub’ – not so much).

My plan for upcoming weekends is to start going to more touristy venues… and eat at cheap(-ish) pubs.  A photo album of the Spectre in front of Stonehenge, Windsor Castle, Leeds Castle, etc, etc.  There’s got to be a very very niche market for that.