A Friday Feeling

Fridays always have a special feeling. From my earliest days Back in the 1960s it would be the day mum would "get the car". That meant getting ready early for school & going with mum in the car to drop dad at work. Most often at the mine's office at Whitebridge, over bumpy Flaggy Creek, through the bush until the sparkling sea vista opened on the left & pit ponies in the yard to the right. On the way home mum was relieved, she only needed to get dress up nice & shop for the rest of the day. There'd be Savemores for bread, cereal & veg, & the health food store for a jar of oozy peanut butter on tap. Then her favorite shop The Store, an expanse of racks of clothes, shelves of wool in every colour, bolts of cloth, household goods & appliances. Here you could waste time & dream a little, plan outfits to make & gather new ideas. Afterwards, if there was any fat left in the allowance, some nice cuts of meat from Gordon Booth's on the way home. Ah but I digress! 

Nowadays I like to save good things to do on Fridays; bike rides, swims & buying big tickets items to mention a few. And today is no exception as this afternoon I will collect not one new motorbike, but two. Actually two Royal Enfield Himalayans, both black, stablemates with low mileages. So, the day will be hectic & anxiety inducing; get a wad of cash from the bank, wait to hear from the seller & get myself there using limited public transport that literally cuts off at nightfall & the seller had been famously tardy. But its the hope that I may pull off the improbable that makes Friday special.

Another habit I enjoy on Fridays on particular is to read or watch nice things on social media. This morning I read a series of reminiscences about the Golden Gate Bridge by Lloyd Kahn of San Francisco. 

 Lloyd enthused about having been to the top, at sunset over a decade ago to photograph soft remnant sunlight playing with the bridge, the land & sea scapes. His writing is energetic, artful & inclusive of the reader. As a fellow surfer I have a sense of sharing an  unidentified aspect of our shared natures that informs our views of the world. 

All those hours over decades spent immersed in a liquid medium allowing natural water forms to rise & fall below us as we dance across their surfaces. That's got to massage your spirit in a way that few humans understand.  

  

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After oats & brewed coffee, animals fed, I'll mount up & go to town to print a legal document for the Merewether estate, & get cashed up for the Himmies. 

Weather is dodgy; medium level full cloud, but ragged & a keen S breeze. I need to ensure I get more from the day than just running about & waiting on others. Maybe, do the legals & cash on the way to the neacj, swim, write, walk, then catch Sven & juggle bikes. Ride to Maitland Station, train to Newcastle, same. Then ride to M Ck, ride or commute to Maitland & back? 

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1400hrs: Home Again.

Cashed up now waiting for the 1548 train which I'll catch with my folding bike. From Newcastle I will ride to Merewether, do the deal & snatch two Royal Enfields!

I am feeling quite:-

   excited; about owning two new new Himalayans, one for me, one for my son. 

   Stressy: about relying on public transport & everything else mechanical going to plan.

   Guilt: I spoke to my son earlier & had to lie to keep of secret from him, but also gloating while he's doing it tough right now*. 

* Joe doing it tough relates to him applying for a position away from home where he will be based for the foreseeable fiture, without a firm understanding that he will get a position in the same job, linear home anytime soon. I just encouraged him to focus on his long term "dream job" & see this as a necessary first step towards it. I also normalised this experience by drawing parallels with his sister "eating shit sandwiches" on her early career, & my own experience of working in a rim shed, I'm a grimy industrial area filing pieces of steel for weeks, on the path to a better position. 

Its cute that he's still looking for a good firefighter position rather than any position. 

* 21:15hrs, At Home: After a makeshift meal I have a moment to gather my thoughts. The handover of two bikes did not go to plan, mainly due to Sven's partner (Venora?) not wanting to pay the rego. But I softly asserted that the deal had been done. To his credit, Sven stuck to his guns, but I think his ears will be ringing tonight. 

Anyway, what did go to plan was lashing the Brompton on the rack & riding back.

i did have to stop over on the long way home to adjust the brompton. @ Hickson st, merewether.

* With 5k on the metre, the Himalayan still feels fresh & a bit tight. She climbs easily to 90kph but revs a lot after. Its partly still running in, windage from saddlebags & the bikecon its back, but also a bias I have against hard cruising. Overall she's a very capanle bike which for some reason also feels safe. It has racks everywhere, jerrycan holders on the tank, engine guards, pannier frames & a rear rack. So perhaps it feels stronger & safer? With saddlebags & long travel suspension she makes my Honda look tiny. As a potential cruisey, hard wearing adventure bike, she's looking the goods already.