A storm, a Saturday and honestly, some fun.
Strom Kathleen was due to arrive today, and despite my apprehension I was talked into going out on the grounds that it was just going to be a wee trip to Edinburgh and we wouldn’t be out in the gusting winds.
Edinburgh, my arse.
I should have known better, after all I know them. Anyways – we were out and heading to Kilmarnock today to take a look at a Yamaha XSR900 in MCS. It would have been fine if John didn’t have to head home on his Grom and swap over to his big bike as 45mph flat out wasn’t cutting it for him.
Despite all that, us arriving at MCS, and John looking like Blofeld’s special cousin when he took his lid off:
It was a decent ride over. This is the bike we came over to look at:
It was a beauty – and there may be a test day coming up so I could compare it to an MT09 and see which I like better. Anyway, enough talk of financial ruin.
After some grub at the burger van at MCS, we rode East with the winds through Sorn and over towards Muirkirk. I’m not gonna lie – the road over there would have been a great run in calmer weather, but a 55mph crosswind seemed to have the sole purpose of damaging my goddam calm today. It was not pleasant, but at the same time I’m glad I did it.
See – warmth is something I can dress for, water is something I can see, but wind is invisible and it seems I still have some issues with suddenly finding myself making a significant lateral move at reasonable speed on account of the last time it happened I broke 8 bones and was, somehow, annoyed by that.
As we went further East though, either the winds were calmer, or I was getting better at dealing with them – maybe both – but I was enjoying the ride more and more as it went on.
We ended up at the Greggs in Broxburn, and because we don’t ride Harleys we didn’t camp out in Starbucks, high fiving and rubbing each other like mouth breathing knuckle draggers – we did it like the deviants we are. Personality counts for a lot.