Happily Ever After
Life in The Rural Retreat with a beautiful wife, three cats, garden wildlife, a camera, a computer – and increasing amounts about running
Earlier posts can be found on Adventures of a Lone Bass Player, where this blog began life. Recent entries can be found here.
It's Alive!
by admin - 17:16 on 11 April 2014
Eighteen months – that's how long it is since Kawasaki San's engine has fired. Until yesterday. For on Wednesday Richard arrived from the salubrious suburbs of leafy Leamington Spa, his car crammed with tools, replacement parts, liquids and lubricants needed to get my bike moving again.
Work began yesterday, when following an oil change the engine turned over for the first time since September 2012. Other work included brake and clutch fluid replacement, a brake rebuild, and attempted replacement of the suspected dodgy ignition switch, abandoned because it was too difficult to get at without dismantling even more of the GTR than had already been done.
Today was the day when the test ride was carried out, shortly after the dodgy ignition had proved itself definitely dodgy and the new unit connected and bodged into a fairing pocket until it can be fitted properly. After eighteen months I was entitled to feel a bit rusty, but after two miles it felt as though I'd last ridden Kawasaki San the weekend before. Splendid.
Thanks to Richard's efforts the bike should sail through an MOT test on Monday. I can live without a functioning fuel gauge.
Equally impressive was that I still fit in my twenty-one-year-old leather trousers (although I admit they're a little tight – Matchgirl's new-found enthusiasm for juicing should solve that problem). So we look set fair for a bike club weekend in Dornie at the beginning of May.
The Pride will be less happy about the mechanical renaissance – our absence means they'll be introduced to the delights of a cattery for the first time. Maia is complaining already.
The Tabby Terror, you'll be relieved to hear, is now free of her stitches and officially recovered from her mystery injury. The puppy crate is back in the shed and Pandora is allowed run free and unsupervised out of doors.
Yesterday, Willow made the most of lack of supervision. The Grey Streak entered The Rural Retreat with a mouthful of lizard which she carried into the kitchen. I rescued the reptile, but not before it shed its tail which continued to squirm and wriggle like something in the climax of a horror film, much to Richard's revulsion. He's not used to the country. He'd also declined to handle the lizard while I held a wriggling cat. The wuss.
Maia watched the rescue and the detached-yet-animated tail with little interest. Some cats are too cool to take part.
Marten Update: If I'm lucky, it won't be long before daylight marten sightings. If the Pentax can capture the same sighting made last night by the Bushnell I'll be a very happy snapper.
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