MooN

I just discovered that this is actually FAR older an attributed to Marcus Aurelius ( and probably has a quite different meaning taken in context) "neque hoc metueris, ne vivere aliquando desinas, sed ne nunquam naturae convenienter vivere incipias" " it is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never begenning to live"

In France no MOT for motorcycles (yet) MOT for cars every 2 years and you have to have one les than 6 months old to sell a car. Commercial light vehicles ( like our works vans, not HGV's it's every year, but overy other year it's just a pollution check not a full control. Cost for a car is about 80€ currently.

that's why Pete moved there...

Thank you, one of the last pieces I made during my year of training.

always have been... despite my busy schedule for the weekend I found time to take part in the demo ride organised by the FFMC ( French FEM affiliated motorcycle action group) protesting against the proposed legislation imposing a "Control Technique" ( french equivqlent of the MOT) for motorcycles, and this despite numerous independant and even govt sponsored studies concluding that: "no evidence can be found of a link between mechanical failure and motorcycle accidents" " No other european country where such testing exists can demonstrate any corrolation between the testing being implemented and and a reduction in the number of accidents imvolving motorcycles" " technical or mechanical failure is a demonstrable cause in les than 0,3% of motorcycles accidents in France" and so on and so forth. The main mouving force behind the attempt at implementing this new legislation is a millionaire businessman whose name is... DEKRA which just hqppens to be the same name as the largest chaine of MOT testing stations in the country ( the potential market is possibly worth 5 billion euros)... so yes, the french are revolting in the way they are best known for, despite covid Regs, and despite shit weather. about 250 bikes held a protest ride around the 3 DEKRA testing stations this afternoon. It may well be a waste of time, but similar demos have been held all over france this week end and with general elections looming, who knows.

This weekend I will be mostly: making shutters: I had 3 quotes to have our downstairs shutters replaced, 2 pairs 1m50 x 1m ish and one triple shutter 2m20 x 1m50 ish all 3 quotes were over 3000€ ! That's just taking the piss so seeing as I have 3 weeks of furlough to deal with and the weather should be good enough to work outside I thought I'd have a go myself. Though I've never made any shutters, I did originally train as a marine carpenter / boat builder. I had to clean nearly 20 years of cobwebs off this before I could start Having no power tools other than a cordless drill, I bought pre sawn planks for about 100€, ( doing one to stqrt with and see how it turns out) a box of screws, and a couple of thicker planks for the cross members, took the measures from the existing shuters and set to. dismantled them this morning for a 1st coat of varnish tomorrow. just then need to reassemble, 2 more coats varnish and fit to the existing hinges. total cost around 130€ per window.

I got in on the tail end of DSUK I think, pretty much as it merged/ morphed into maximum bikes which I sorely missed when it dissappeared into the morass of "fess de bouc" and promptly died a death. I leapt at the chance when you got this going Pete.... fuck that says a lot about how sad my life is! ?

"a few prawns short of a sea food salad" " bercé trop pres du mur" is my fave french one. Literally meaning they rocked his cradle too close to the wall, inferring his head went; bump... bump...bump...

" madder 'n' a box o' frogs"

trawling through some photos yesterday amd came across this from our last Britanny trip. In Britanny they make ( apart from crépes) whant they call "Kouign" ( pronounced "Queen") which are pancakes more like blinis and can be savoury or sweet. This restaurant extrapolated this and produces a "Burger Kouine" ( burger King, get it?) which has "Kouine" instead of a bread bun. Bloody lovely! uuuurrrpsss !

"froler la mort n'est rien, passer a coté de la vie est autrement plus grave" french biker proverb. "dicing with death is nothing, missing out on living is far more serious"

Ah, "Bodgit and Scarper" I remember years ago replacing a through hull fitting on a boat in the water and when the company director asked how it went, my oppo replied point at himself and I, " Bodgit and Scarper" boatfitters to the gentry! I nearly wet myself, never having heard the phrase before... still makes me giggle now.

I wonder how many times I've used that bike park in my misspent youth? My CM125 used to know the road from watton to Norwich on it's own I reckon. The Forum wsn't there in those days though. @Slowlycatchymonkey I was member of the the Norfolk Mountain Rescue team for a short while...

I want to know why Phil's GS is disguised as a honda... red white and blue striping, gold anodised rims... ?

to be fair though, that's not just women...

I'll send you mine, please PM address...?

oh yes they can! insofar as any one individual is concerned ( you in this case) you do what you feel right with and don't go with a trend just because "they can't all be wrong". Unfortunately for me, the adv shape bike is what suits me best physically, always has been so I just have to put up with people assuming I'm just another ADV trend follower... Fuck'em, who cares what the others think ride what suits you.

great photo, is that a nuthatch?

only cos they always ease lockdown too soon and everybody goes apeshit and sets it all off again! there was an interesting quote doing the rounds a while back, something along the lines of " your grandfaters generation suffered the depredation of world war and endured the hardships of being drafted, forced separations, kill or be killed, the horrer of the trenches and all that war entailed, followed by years of rationing and hardship to rebuild their country. You are being asked to stay home on the sofa infront of the telly with your loved ones AND YOU CAN'T EVEN FUCKING MANAGE THAT! It boils my piss. there I said it.

nononononononno.... Biscuit comes from the French "bis" meaning "2nd" or " again" and "Cuit" meaning "cooked" so by definition a "biscuit" is cooked twice. Legally ( and not a lot of people know this... ) the difference between a biscuit and a cake or pudding ( to be fair, this is english law) is that a biscuit is hard, and goes soft when stale and a cake or pudding is soft and goes hard when stale. ? now you can't say you never learn anything useful on here!

well I've driven 6 hrs and 600km to spend an our and a half with broher in law today, as we're being locked down again from monday. limited to 10km of the house ( except for work, which has to have written justification) but I'm furloughed again till 26th anyway so that's that. schools closed as well for 4 weeks so animals kids are at home too. this is now valid for the whole of france.

looks yummy, but erm... those are not biscuits buy the way. ?