Why should money be funnelled into saving art galleries or propping up theatres, and yet not given to Vulcan To The Sky to preserve Avro Vulcan XH558, arguably a beautiful aeroplane, a momentous engineering achievement and a tremendously valuable cultural and historical resource for the future?

Because society at large, and the media, seem to see only art as having any kind of value to humanity.

It’s generally ignored that engineering and manufacturing are inherently creative.  The media seem to assume that engineering and manufacturing do not speak to society, or of society.  It annoys me that if something isn’t deemed art, or culture, it’s instantly dismissed as worthless.

Plus, whenever a new vehicle is unveiled, it’s always the stylists  that get the glory.  Never the hundreds of engineers who’ve worked their backsides off for years to make that vision a reality.  To actually make the thing work.

To me, this is totally wrong.  Art and engineering are equally valuable to society, and should co-exist.  Who could deny that the Iron Bridge in Shropshire, as well as being an engineering marvel and the first of its kind, is in fact a beautiful structure?  For me, Antony Gormley’s Angel of The North blurs the line between art and engineering; the challenges involved in constructing such a huge statue from steel were immense.  Even the original Spen King Range Rover was displayed at the Louvre as an example of automotive art*.

Just as with art, engineering – creating things, making things with a purpose, to do a job, to improve people’s lives – expresses and explores aspects of our society.  In archaeology, not only do we learn about past civilizations through their art, we learn about them through their use of tools, how they worked their materials, how they made their weapons and their buildings.  We learn about them through their engineering.

This isn’t to hold engineering above art: far from it.  Both are equally valid.  I also don’t want to get into any kind of idealisation (or idolisation, come to that) of one over the other: both require skill, aptitude, and learning.  I was about to say that often people take up aspects of art (amateur dramatics, painting watercolours, sewing) as hobbies, but I know just as many people whose hobbies encompass engineering: tinkering with cars, Land Rovers or motorbikes, making models, flying model aeroplanes …

The key thing is that these are all outward expressions of something inside us.  I don’t think that us humans are ever satisfied if the results of our labours, be they at work or at play, are unseen or intangible.

It just annoys me that only arty things are deemed a valid way of expressing ourselves and our creativity.

[I freely admit that in the traditional sense, I’m about as arty as a smack in the face: I can’t draw, unless it involves a ruler; I can’t paint, not even walls; I can’t sculpt or make things out of clay; I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket; and although I’ve tried, I can’t play any musical instrument.  Although I can appreciate the skill in, say, a Monet, or a performance of a Shakespearean play, they don’t move me in the same way as hearing the distinctive howl of a Vulcan bomber's four Rolls-Royce Olympus engines.]

*The original 3-door Range Rover is, to me, one of the most wonderful marriages of form and function.  I do wish Land Rover would go back to this elegant simplicity from where they are with the current Range Rover: all the bling puts me in mind of lipstick and pearls on a pig, even though this shape Range Rover is hardly a pig.

I’VE FINISHED WRITING AND REVISING THE BOOK!

And it feels … er … like I haven’t.

I’ve been trying to finish writing Full Throttle for ages: as in, completing and refining the story, polishing my prose till it shines*, and so on.  But I’ve finally done it**.

When I thought about it last week, as the end loomed into view, it was simultaneously exciting and scary.  I thought I’d feel a tremendous sense of achievement; that I’d feel pleased, proud, happy, and satisfied with having produced a whole, coherent novel.

I don’t.  Instead, I feel like a big hole’s just opened up in my life.

I can understand why so many aspiring writers have drawers and files full of unfinished projects: sometimes it’s because the story isn’t right, and sometimes … well … finishing is a big deal.  It’s not just about the hours of work that have gone into it: we writers pour ourselves into our creations.  We can end up living and breathing our characters and our plots … until, one day, we have to say goodbye.

These characters first popped into my head in the summer of 1995.  Over sixteen years ago.  That’s over half my life.  I’ve known them for longer than most of my real life friends.  This isn’t just completing a novel, it’s drawing a huge part of my life to a close.  Admittedly, it was only four years ago that I decided to see if I could produce this novel after all, but still … it’s strange.  These characters are so familiar to me that I can’t quite grasp the fact that I’ve finished telling this part of their story.  It’s time for us all to move on.  (OK, I’m not ruling out any kind of sequel – but I don’t have any ideas for that … yet.)

I don’t feel like celebrating.  I don’t even feel like mourning.  I’m not sure how I do feel.  Lost, perhaps.  Adrift.  I no longer need to prise the laptop off my husband so I can squeeze in some writing whenever I can … and that feels weird.  No longer do I need to spend spare moments contemplating plot and narrative.  I wasn’t consciously aware of doing it … and now, all I know is I’m not any more.  And I miss it.

It feels incredibly odd.  Sort of like someone’s dumped the clutch in my brain, and it’s freewheeling aimlessly with nothing to drive forwards.

I do have my next project lined up – with a completely different storyline and characters – and last week, I couldn’t wait to get FT sorted so I could focus on the new one.  And … I can’t.  Not yet.

I know how to deal with having a book in progress.  I don’t know how to deal with a finished one.  But I think it’s time I learnt.

*No, that isn’t a euphemism.  Though it sounds like it should be.

**To those people who manage to write books and blog several times a week (and produce regular podcasts, in some cases), all while holding down full time jobs and / or bringing up several children … I am in total awe of you and how you sustain it for any length of time without descending into screaming insanity.  I try my best, but I struggle to find enough time to work, sleep, cook, eat, clean and write as it is!

In order to copy this method, you will need:

• A printed copy of your manuscript, in whichever format suits (I used 2 pages per sheet of A4, single sided).
• A fine-tipped red pen.
• Highlighter(s) of whatever colour(s) you prefer.
• A pack (or more) of coloured index tabs (4 colours is the norm per pack).
• A nice cup of tea is a bonus.

Before I began, I defined my colour code for my index tabs: I had four groups of characters I wanted to follow closely, and so each colour stood for a different group.  In theory, you could use as many colour codes as you liked, for whatever aspects of your novel you want to focus on.  To be honest, for me, four was plenty.

As I read through my printout, I asked myself a number of questions:

1. Is this required – does it add anything?
2. Is this in the right place, either in time or space?
3. Am I following the right character(s)?  Are they consistent throughout the book?  Am I head-hopping?
4. Does this scene do the right things?  Do I avoid info dumps?
5. Are there any gaps here?  Is there something I’ve missed out?

If one or more of these questions demanded an answer which involved me reworking something, the page in my print-out got an appropriately colour-coded index tab and a scribble in red pen by the margin explaining my particular area of concern.  The highlighter came in useful if a whole scene was involved which spanned several pages; that meant I could see which scenes I’d tagged, but I didn’t need to tag them more than once to track them.

As I moved through the manuscript, I also used the red pen to address any typos, other errors or minor wording changes I needed to address.  These, though, didn’t merit a coloured tab.

I then decided it was worth a second read-through, in case I’d missed anything.  And I had.  Nothing major, but there were a few things I picked up on, and questions I asked myself, which had escaped me the first time.  So more coloured tabs got added, and notes scribbled in margins.  I have to admit that I also changed my mind about a few things I’d thought needed amending first time round.  If I was at all uncertain, I left the tab in.

Finally, I went through and numbered every single index tab consecutively, starting from 1 at the beginning of the book.  I then wrote the number, and a description of what needed revising, in a notebook.  So, I had a list of what needed revising, colour coded by area, and organised chronologically throughout the book.

This was useful on a number of levels.  I had an overview of my entire manuscript.  I had a detailed list of revisions, and where they were required.  And, most importantly for me, I could actually quantify and track my progress in making the required revisions.

Nothing saps my motivation more than feeling like I’m facing a large, immeasurable and unquantifiable task.  Which in some ways, this book has resembled for far too long.

Knowing what gaps I needed to fill meant I could get to work on writing them; knowing what things I’d missed, or not explained well, meant I could get to work on clarifying them.  Knowing what scenes were around them, and where it slotted in the timeline, gave me my boundaries to work within.

I don’t know if this is unique to me, or if other writers do this, but I seem to have a split approach to writing.  There’s the pure joy of creating, of letting Bob the plot bunny* roam wide and free, of discovering the story and the characters and exploring it by the seat of the pants.  Then, there’s the task of taking the story and making it orderly, making it solid, and making it readable and coherent, by letting my OCD streak loose.

I’m definitely in the latter phase, but although it’s harder work, it’s somehow more satisfying.  A large part of that is being able to cross items off the list as having been completed; to know that much as I don’t feel like it sometimes, I am making progress towards getting this book finished.  That’s a scary, weird, and exciting thought.

Funnily, I’m finding I can keep reading fiction this time around, and if anything, I’m finding that helpful.  It’s hard to proofread fiction sometimes when I’m stuck in my work writing mode: engineering reports have very different requirements to fiction.  Aerospace customers don’t like surprise endings, and they certainly don’t like it if you obscure information or lead them astray with red herrings.  And readers of fiction don’t like it if you explain in great detail beforehand everything that’s going to happen in the book.  Work reports need everything spelled out; novels don’t, at least, not right at the beginning.

Once I’ve done this bit, I expect I’ll print it out and repeat the process again.  I’ll also put it out there for my faithful friends to read and comment on (particularly ones who read the first draft).  So there may be yet more revisions still to come.

And then, maybe, this book might be finished …

*As outed on Twitter.  I feel rather insane, but somehow I now can’t think of plot bunnies without thinking I have a specific one called Bob!

However, I realised I was wrong.

5S is another Japanese methodology for Lean manufacturing and engineering*.

It’s also the one that tends to make engineers groan when their managers come round and demand to “5S their desks / offices”, because it’s invariably translated as “remove all the paperwork / folders / pens / mugs / work from your desk, including everything you actually use / refer to all the time, and spend a working day cleaning the office”.

However, the real 5S is a much more subtle tool than this, and the Ss are as follows:

Seiri or Sort

Keep only what is essential, in an easily accessible place, and eliminate what is not required.

For me, as a hoarder, I found this one a challenge.  When I restarted work on FT, I had files all over the place, in all states of repair and relevance, in a labyrinthine folder structure with an ad-hoc naming convention that even I was struggling to remember.  I mean, I’d got Word documents from 1998 that I’d hung onto, “just in case”.  Just in case of what, I’m not sure.  Certainly, they reminded me how far I’ve come as a writer since then, but it’s 13 years later – I should have developed my craft in that time.  Do I really, really, need to keep these files?  The answer, to be honest, is no.

You can also apply this to a novel plot: is this scene really required?  Does it add anything or move things forward?  If it doesn’t, get rid.  Harsh, but simple.

Seiton or Straighten / Stabilise

Basically, a place for everything, and everything in its place.

Following on from above, I decided to completely rethink my computer folder structure and file naming convention.  Research material was filed separately, depending on if it was a character worksheet or background information on the rally, or other stuff such as car data.  Old drafts were archived and labelled.  Seriously old material was deleted.  Exploratory ventures into sequel territory were squirrelled away in a Sequels folder.  Anything else which didn’t fit was placed in a “Random” folder.  I created a specific “Working Folder”, and in there I keep the latest draft, my Master Schedule, and any other file I’m working on for this draft, as it is.

Given that I have specific sections and characters I’m focussing on revising, I’ve named the separate files for the characters or sections concerned.  Each major revision is numbered and listed, so I know exactly what I’m doing (or so I pretend, at least).  My latest draft is revision numbered, and I’m using Track Changes to keep an eye on things.

Seiso or Shine / Sweep

Clean everything, and keep it clean, tidy and organised as part of the daily routine.

I think this is pretty self-explanatory: store files where they’re meant to be stored, and nowhere else.  I’d also add back up regularly, and have more than one back up if possible: given our laptop hard drive bit the dust a few months ago – and the laptop was less than 12 months old – I don’t take data integrity for granted!

I also make sure that files which are no longer relevant or useful get deleted or appropriately archived, before I get confused or bogged down by them in my working folder.

You could also apply this to your workspace, wherever you work.  I tend to work on the sofa in the living room, but I know where all my writing implements live (… on the laptop, or in the corner by the shelves).  Plus, a nice, clean and tidy living room makes me happy, anyway.

Seiketsu or Standardise

Basically, working practices should be consistent for each particular job.  For me as a writer, this has involved me deciding that I’m actually taking this writing lark seriously and committing myself to it (which is hard to tell from this blog, admittedly).  This also means that I should be able to write using the same tools anywhere – so I can take my laptop to Starbucks, Costa or Nero’s, and still write as if I’m at home.  Win!

My lessons learnt from this book are being carried across to the next one – i.e., plan first.  After writing my first draft entirely as a pantser, I’m coming to see the value in at least some detailed plotting ahead of time: I have several scenes which are great, but they’re just not in the right place at the right time.  They’ll work, but they need reorganising to fit in the structure I now have in mind.

I’ve also implemented a much more organised and standardised approach to revising my manuscript, which I hope to carry across to any further projects.  I suspect that will be a blog post in itself!

Shitsuke or Sustain / Self-Discipline

Simple (ha).  Keep up the first 4Ss.  Keep organised, clean and tidy, and make it the way you do things as a matter of course – while also considering any potential improvements which can be made to how you do things.

I can certainly say that I’ve applied much of this thinking to the writing and revising process.  It’s making a tremendous positive difference to my writing, my motivation, and even my organisation; I’ve managed more in the last six weeks than probably in the last year.  What’s somewhat scary is that I applied this technique without consciously realising it!

I’ve got to admit that having gone through these steps, I’m wondering why on earth I didn’t do a lot of this earlier.  It would’ve saved me lots of time and several headaches.

*This is turning into the Lean Method of Writing, isn’t it?

Imagine my disappointment, and cries of “WTF?” when I saw the concept, and its orange “sport” twin.  Sport, of all things.  Words do not accurately express my contempt of that lifestyle concept.  The only sports Defenders should be associated with are hunting, shooting, and fishing, not the WAG-wannabe stylings of the Evoque*.

There is a reason people buy Defenders.  It’s not reliability (if it was that, they’d buy a Mitsubishi L200 or Toyota Hilux).  It’s go-anywhere, do-anything practicality and versatility; toughness and simplicity.  People generally buy Defenders to use them off-road, not because the speed bumps at Waitrose are too harsh.  We were recently in the Lake District, and the number of Land Rover Defenders around was very high: and they were all, without exception, vehicles which worked hard for their living.

Also, the variety of shapes of Defender was astonishing.  90 hard-top; 110 hard-top; 90 pick-up; 110 twin-cab pick-up; 110 hi-capacity pick-up; 110 station wagon; 90 station wagon; 130 twin-cab pick-up; 110 commercial station wagon; and they’re just the ones I remember!

But I look at the DC100 concept, and see none of those things.  Those bling alloys would be pointless for an off-road machine: a pothole would trash them, and I doubt you could get decent mud or all terrains in that size.  Sure, it’s got short overhangs, but that trim isn’t going to stand up to even slight scrapes off-road.  Same with the interior: that’s not going to withstand a muddy farmer getting in.  At least, not more than once.

Similarly, I can’t see the DC100 having such a huge variety of body styles.  Or being used by the Army.  Or the utility companies.  I know that the costs involved in designing any modern vehicle are huge, and that the variation currently enjoyed by Defender would be expensive to continue, but how would that compare to the sales lost?  Or are Land Rover targeting those who buy Chelsea tractors, rather than Massey Fergusons?

I know Land Rover are well aware of the difficulties of replacing such an iconic vehicle, when everyone will have their different two penn’orth to say … but I’ll add my own opinions, anyway.

Firstly, I bet the Wilks brothers are spinning in their graves at what’s happened to the practical workhorse they conceived all those years ago.

Secondly, and perhaps most importantly, please, please, please, keep it simple.  I doubt the average driver of a Defender gives a monkeys about having the latest touchscreen infotainment, 20” alloys, or any other lifestyle bells and whistles, or even Terrain Response; he’d rather Land Rover spent the money on making it work, day in, day out, for 20 years … in the Kalahari.  Or the Arctic.  Or a muddy, churned up field in Wales.  Towing a trailer full of sheep.

Thirdly, how about a choice of engines?  Hybrids – fair enough, they seem to be the in-thing – but how about a choice of decent multi-cylinder diesel powerplants to give it some proper workhorse gruntiness back?  That TDV8 would be awesome, for a start.

Finally, I accept that the premium, posing SUV as embodied by the BMW X5 and Porsche Cayenne is here to stay.  Fair enough: use the Range Rover** brand to target them.  If rich people are going to buy that sort of thing, then I’d rather they sent money the West Midlands’ way!

But please, Land Rover, bring practicality back.  Reinstate simplicity and true classlessness to the Land Rover brand as a whole, to Discovery and Freelander and Defender.  A Land Rover should be a vehicle which is just as at home on the school run as it is towing the horse box, navigating the Sahara, or bumped up on a kerb in Chelsea … with mud up to its doorhandles.

*It’s nice enough looking, to be fair.  If you like that sort of thing.

**So long as the original Range Rover can still properly hack it off road.  Brand DNA, isn’t it?

Two routes presented themselves: incorporating Pimms into the body of a cake, or into a drizzle and / or icing.

Given that Pimms is most often consumed with lemonade, using Pimms as a drizzle over a lemon sponge seemed a logical solution.  I went for cupcakes rather than a loaf or round cake because I regularly inflict cakes on my work colleagues.  It’s much easier to distribute individual portions of cake than hunt around for plates, knives, and so on.

Three trials later, tweaking the recipe each time following feedback, I give you my prototype recipe.  Please pass it on, if you like, but a) please credit me and b) let me know how you get on.

For the cupcakes:

• 100g butter, softened (margerine works well, too)
• 125g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 150g self-raising flour
• 50 – 75g candied peel, preferably the sort you have to chop yourself, in 5mm chunks
• Zest of 1 lemon
• 2tbsp lemon juice
• 2tbsp natural yoghurt

For the Pimms drizzle:

• 75g sugar
• Between 100 – 125ml Pimms (depends on how you’re feeling!)

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/ Gas Mark 4 and line a 12-hole muffin tin with baking cases.
2. In a bowl, cream the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy.  Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.  Sift the flour into the creamed mixture, add the candied peel, and mix until all of the flour is well incorporated.  Add the zest, juice and yoghurt, and mix until just incorporated.
3. Spoon the mixture evenly between the cases.  Bake the cakes for about 20 minutes or until risen and golden.
4. While the cakes are baking, put the sugar and Pimms in a heavy-bottomed saucepan and simmer gently until the Pimms has reduced and thickened a bit.  I can tell you from impatience and experience that if you’re not careful and ignore this bit, you get soggy cakes!
5. Let the cakes cool for about 5 minutes or so in the tin, before turning out onto a wire rack.  Prick the tops of them a few times with a skewer or similar, and spoon the warm syrup over the still-warm cupcakes.  Leave them to marinate for a few hours.
6. Enjoy.

Observations:

The cooking time for the sponges will vary depending on your oven, so keep a close eye on them and adjust accordingly.  Golden and well-risen is what we’re aiming for.

If you can, leave the cakes in an airtight container for 24 hours before eating: the sponge becomes wonderfully moist.

I included candied peel because to me, big chunks of citrus fruit is part of the Pimms experience*.  Plus, I like candied peel.  If necessary, you can use the ready chopped mixed peel that you can buy in tubs at the supermarket – which I did try in one batch – but people said they preferred the big lumps of peel.

If you wanted to try icing, a Pimms and strawberry buttercream icing, possibly with a hint of mint, would work well.  I haven’t experimented much with icing in general (mostly because I don’t have that sweet a tooth, plus time spent icing could be time spent eating cake), so if you try, let me know how it goes.

Also, if you can think of ways to improve this recipe, please let me know!

*Not, however, cucumber.  I hate cucumber.  And cake containing cucumber would be wrong.

However, my plot demands that all these interweave consistently (unless I want to repeat my brain fart of a first draft).  I might be a pantser when it comes to my characters’ interactions, but I need structure to create the novel, otherwise I’m just randomly flinging paint at a wall, hoping somehow I’ll create a perfect copy of a Van Gogh.

I need a way to know who’s doing what, where, and when.  And it must be clear, concise, and easy to read.  Much like a project timing and resource plan.

Enter the Master Calendar.

The format should look familiar to anyone who’s ever used Outlook, but I’ve used Excel to create a table resembling a diary (I’ve included a screen capture of this for clarity).

Screen capture of my "Master Schedule"

As you can see, days are listed down the left hand side, and I’ve broken them down into hourly slots (this allows me to represent the rally schedule with reasonable detail).  Across the top, characters and their rough geographical location have been listed.  To try to keep this simple, I’ve focused only on my major characters, whose points of view I use extensively and are critical to the plot.  After all, I’m doing this to help myself out, not tie myself up with unnecessary work.

Just as you can in Outlook, I’ve blocked out chunks of time to show what each character is doing, who they’re with, when they’re doing it, and where they are.  Even if it’s not detail I’m planning to include in the narrative, I’ve bunged it in just in case (although my example screen dump is blank – I don’t want to give it all away, do I?).  It helps me have a handle on them as independent beings, with things to do, places to be, and people to see.

It also acts as a sanity check: I can confirm my timescales are realistic (particularly where travel is involved), that I’ve given all relevant information, and I’m with the right character at the right time.  I considered using separate tabs for each day, but having all the information on the same page allows me to see the flow of events much more clearly.

Me being me, I intend to use shading to show whose point of view I’m following at any given time.  I’ll also highlight bits that I want to amend, add or remove.

So, there we go.  It’s like I’m my characters’ PA, in control of their diaries and scheduling their lives, cherry-picking parts for public consumption.  It also serves as an “at a glance” summary of the book and its current status, which is pretty cool (even if it wasn’t one of the things I wanted this to achieve).

It’s important to note, though, that this spreadsheet doesn’t give any backstory, it doesn’t detail character conflicts – it doesn’t define the nuances of the plot as a whole.  Just as if you looked at my diary, you’d get an idea of what went on in my life, but you wouldn’t get an idea of me as a person.

This is purely my approach to tracking what’s going on in my novel.  Some may call this overkill; I call it attention to detail*.  If, like me, you have plots and subplots spanning countries and time-zones, and a strictly defined plot duration, it could be a helpful approach.

*I think I’ve already talked about my CDO streak; it’s OCD with the letters in alphabetical order, like they should be.  And I work in aerospace, where such tendencies are positively welcomed.

First of all, it’s orange.  Bright, pearlescent, orange.  Now, I loathe the colour orange.  I own no orange clothes or accessories, and wouldn’t consider using any shade of it to decorate any room of my house, ever.  Generally, I avoid orange like the proverbial plague.  But, the thing is, it suits the bike.  It gives it a presence and attitude that’s missing in its blue and silver cousins.  Also, it’s shiny.  I like shiny things.

Secondly, people who think Harleys are the nexus of the customising scene should think again.  Seriously.  You’d be amazed just how much stuff is available to bolt onto your BMW GS to make it all your very own.  You can buy crash bars, panniers, huggers, various protectors for various bits, you can buy bits in metal or carbon fibre* or plastic …

So far, my bike has had bolted to it:

• Adventure-Spec crash bars – look huge, but easy to fit, and they cover much more than the standard engine bars for not much more money.  They also seem to be well-rated in use!
• BMW Handguards – the dealer fitted these for me.  They look pretty robust, but as yet I can’t comment on their wind-deflecting or protective abilities.
• MachineArt Avant & Mudsling – basically, a fender extender for the front to cut down on road muck chucked at the engine, and an intimacy-avoiding hugger at the rear to protect the rear shock.  Fantastically simple to bolt on, and they look good.
• Rugged Roads Headlight Protector – because at well over £250 for a new headlight, it’s easier to replace a bit of perspex!
• Touratech Brake Pedal Extender – I don’t know what it is about how I sit on a bike, but I seem to have a knack of not always being able to find the brake pedal.  This bit of metal makes the pedal much bigger.  Also, I believe it’s law that all BMW GSs must have at least one Touratech accessory fitted.

And this is just the start.  I’m already considering my next additions!

It’s also worth noting that this bike came with the low seat.  I’d sworn blind that I did not want a low seat (low seats are for girls), as I can get the balls of my feet on the ground quite comfortably on the normal seat.  However, the low seat means I can get both feet perfectly flat on the floor, with a bit of a bend in my leg, which is very similar to the position I’d be on my 125.  And there have been a couple of times already where it’s been reassuring to be able to do that – just as a confidence booster.  So the low seat stays, at least for a while.

My bike has been restricted to 33bhp, down from the F650GS’s 71bhp as standard: this took the form of a new inlet manifold, an ECU remap, and a throttle stop.  To put this in perspective, this is still 3 times the power and 5 times the torque my 125 has.

It’s tremendously torquey, and doesn’t feel at all choked or hindered by the restriction; it’s very willing and able, and wonderfully predictable and smooth for a parallel twin.  I’m blown away by how much more stable than the 125 it feels, especially at low speeds: it’s tremendously confidence-inspiring.  It’s not particularly heavy, but it’s nice and solid.  I need to get used to is how wide the bars are – at full lock, my arms can be a bit stretched.

I also need to stop being distracted by the rev counter – quite why my eyes should be so drawn to it, I don’t know, but it’s suddenly fascinating!  Given all the cars I drive have had rev counters for years, it’s not like I haven’t seen one before …

As yet, I haven’t had much practice with the notorious BMW 3-button indicators: one on the left bar to indicate left, one on the right bar to indicate right; the cancel button is on the right hand side, and in the same place on the left is the horn button.  I suspect I’ll be beeping the horn to cancel the indicators for a while!

That aside, I’m disappointed that BMW are moving to the conventional single-button indicator system: it just doesn’t seem right.  I’m assured by Dave that soon the 3-button system becomes intuitive and is easier to operate than the single button.  I suppose I’m disappointed that a big brand like BMW is in essence giving up on one of its trademark quirks of personality.  I want things to have a trace of personality, of the thoughts of the engineers who designed it.  (I’m probably alone in that.)

In conclusion, I LOVE THIS BIKE .  I’m looking forward to becoming much more acquainted with it.

*I work with carbon fibre, so I tend to look at bolt-on carbon fibre bits, however expensive, and think “Hmm.  Cheap carbon fibre.  I see better than that all that time!”  My bike isn’t going to get any carbon fibre bolted to it…

What makes it weirder is that I passed both parts of the test first time.  I did question the examiners both times, as I couldn’t believe it.  I’m not sure how many other people ask the examiners if they’re sure they’ve really passed!

Part of it has been that for various reasons, we’ve been unable to find me a bigger bike, so I’ve still been pootling about the place on my 125.  And while it’s a great machine to learn on, it’s really not cut out for riding any kind of distance.  I’m pretty sure if Ewan and Charlie had wanted a real challenge, they’d have done the Long Way Round on CG125s.

Don’t get me wrong: my Honda CBF125 has taken a tremendous amount of abuse and it’s been utterly reliable.  It’s fun to ride on relatively low speed twisties.  But it’s not a touring machine.  To be fair, it isn’t designed to be.  But my first long trip after passing my test turned into an endurance ordeal rather than a fun weekend away.

So I’m partly excited, partly apprehensive, to say that at last, I’ll soon be taking delivery of my new big bike.  A BMW F650GS.

It’s the bike I’ve lusted after for about a year.  Yes, I’ve had brief flirtations with Hondas, Kawasakis, Triumphs and Moto Guzzis, but ultimately, the GS won.

Me and Kawasaki ergonomics (on past and present bikes) just don’t mix: a Honda CBF600 would’ve been worthy, but it looked dull and didn’t stir me; a Triumph Bonneville looked gorgeous but I had worries about its weight (and cleaning the chrome); and a Moto Guzzi Breva was beautiful, but just too rare, and I worried about parts and servicing availability.  An outsider was a Triumph Street Triple, but I’ve come to realise that what I like in a bike is an upright seating position with plenty of legroom.  Just what the F650GS delivers.

In comparison to, say, the Guzzi, the F650GS is chiselled, purposeful, and distinctly Germanic; and those asymmetrical headlights make me think of Herr Flick wearing a monocle.  But it’s small, light, and sturdy: ideal attributes for a first big bike.

I pick it up in about ten days’ time.  I’m looking forward to getting to know my new German friend, and getting some fun miles under my belt.  Roll on the summer!

This week’s been something of a strange one.  I don’t feel like I’ve had much time to write, but I’ve still managed 2326 words.  It’s more exploring and pinning down back-story than actual novel, but some of it will definitely influence the final manuscript, so it still counts.