number-plate-man retired

Finally, my scooter is fixed, yeah! I don't have to wear my number plate on the back anymore.

Ok, I have to start at the beginning. In the night 15th/16th July some wankers tried to steal my scooter. They dragged it about hundred meters away and tried to open the lock and the steering lock with a huge iron bar. Although they didn't manage to break the lock, they caused a lot of damage to the scooter like twisting the handle bar, breaking the seat lock and the most annoying part: they ripped off the number plate including the attachment for it.

I called the police and they recorded the attempted theft. The next day I called the insurance to report the incident and they sent me the claim form and asked me to do an estimate at a garage.
The garage faxed the estimate and I sent back the claim form on the 21th. First class to speed up the process!

So far so good. Took several phone calls the week after until they finally processed the form and the cost estimate from the garage. Another week later they asked me to bring the scooter to the garage again so that an engineer can have a look at it. This was the 1st of August when I remember it correctly and another 5 quid for me taking the tube to uni and back...

The most annoying part was to get the insurance to fax the repair authorisation to the garage. In the week starting from the 7th I called the insurance several times a day, everytime talking to someone else and telling him all the details. The music in the waiting loop is really crap. And then you have dialogues like:

me: "I brought the scooter to the garage last week and your engineer had a look at it."
she: "Alright, give me a sec."
5 min later...
she:"Was it an attempted theft or was the bike actually stolen?"
me: "-_-"

And all the time I was driving around with my number plate sticked to my back. People sometimes started conversation at a traffic light like:
"Dude, you have a number plate on your back!"
"Really? I didn't know. Thanks!"

Finally, the insurance faxed the authorisation and the garage could order the bits and pieces. The appointment was scheduled for today.

Of course the police stopped me yesterday (!!), even using the siren. They asked me why I was wearing the number plate on my back and checked my driving license, road tax and insurance. Clearly, they hadn't seen someone like me before. One of them made a call starting: "I have a stupid question, I have someone with a number plate on his back here...". Apparently it was kind of alright, since it was clearly visible. However, they didnt fine me and just asked me to get it fixed asap. I told them that I ll bring it to the gargae tomorrow anyway. Don't think they believed me ;-)

Anyway, after a lot of weird looks, random conversation at traffic lights, one guy taking a picture of me and be stopped by the police, number-plate-man officially retired :-)

una vacanza italiana

This week, Andy, Selma and I visited Ettore and Elisa in Italy for a few days.

My journey started on Monday morning at 2am after 2 hours of sleep. I had to go to Stansted using three different busses including some time in Kentish Town. I really hate to hang around anywhere with luggage in the middle of the night. I met Beppe in the bus to Liverpool Street and we arrived way too early, so that we had to wait for about an hour for the Stansted bus.

We arrived at about 5am at Stansted. Never saw the airport so crowded at this time. With the new security measures, the hand luggage was reduced to a transparent bag with wallet and passport in it. Looked really stupid. No liquids were allowed and you had to take your shoes off at the security check. Must be great to work at the security check these days with people taking off their smelly shoes.

With three hours delay (because our plane spent the night at Luton) we left Stansted. Although we had the theory that airlines distribute small children all over the plane to annoy everybody equally, our flight was pretty quite. After two hours we arrived in Bologna Forli. A really tiny airport compared to Stansted, 4 planes a day, but I like that.

Luckily, with Beppe we had an Italian speaker and he managed to get us to the train station and into the train to Ancona. The train was really packed, because one of the most important Italian holiday called Ferragosto was one the 15th. We had a chat with an Italian/Canadian woman who told us things about the cities we were passing. The train track is built along the coast, very nice.
At some stop, people came in and left again after one minute. Then our "guide" discovered that they took her wallet. So she had to leave the train to talk to the police. Not a nice expierence :-(

Elisa and Ettore picked us up from Ancona and one hour later we arrived in Tolentino where we met Ettore's parents and grandparents. In the afternoon we had a nice walk through the city. Parts of it reminded me of an old Counterstrike map called "cs_italy". I know, I know, that's geeky, but look for yourself :D
In the evening we had our first tasty Italian dinner followed by home made cake to celebrate Andy's birthday. Actually, there was always cake, but at this time I didn't know that :D

The next day, we got up early to get to the beach in time. Since it was Ferragosto we expected it to be crowded. The place was called Portonovo, really nice beach, but have a look at the pictures. Of course, coming straight from the office, I got a really nice sunburn ;-)

To cool down, we spent the evening in the mountains with food, wine and live music. Yes, great place Tolentino, beach and mountains very close. Very convenient.

Wednesday, we visited Ettore's other grandparents in the mountains in a place called Croce (hope that's right, Ettore) They showed us a parts of the village and also how they make their own wine. Of course we were invited for cookies and wine :-)
We spent the rest of the day driving around in the mountains and relaxing at a lake.

In the evening we had yet another dinner and and amazing chocolate cake. Don't know what the technique is called to compress chocolate so efficiently, but I was suprised that there weren't any satellite cookies in its orbit...

Thursday was already the last day and we planned to take the train around 4pm. So we had some time to do a bit of shopping to bring some Italian food and wine back to England. After some time in a supermarket we visited a winery. Although with our 4 bottles of wine we probably haven't been the biggest customers, they invited us to have a look around. So we got a free tour and saw how the first grapes were picked and processed and also the huge barrels in the basement.
Afterwards it was already time to say goodbye. We took the train back to Forli and from their with one hour delay the plane to London Stansted. Of course, upon arrival in London it was raining :-(

I really enjoyed my time in Italy. Great fun and tasty Italian food (A LOT ;-) Having a grandma that used to run a bakery is really dangerous. Especially, when she's producing the same amount of cakes after retirement. But now that I am back, I miss cakes after lunch and dinner...

Thanks Ettore, Elisa and Ettore's (grand)-parents for these lovely days. I felt very welcome. The only thing that has to get better next time is my Italian :-)

Shit, a motorway!

I am proud to present another story of me getting lost on the scooter. Max, Erdem and I had an appointment at 7pm at Bell Lane, North-West London (here) to have a look at a rehearsal room for the band. Ok, no problem, I own this huge A-Z map, so quick look at Google map and a highlight it in the map. Tottenham Court Road, Marylebone Road, a lot of traffic, terrible but normal at this time.

Here, I realised that I left the map on my desk. Great. However, I had the picture in my mind. Turn right at Brent Cross shopping center, easy, right? Unfortunately this junction was much bigger than on the map with at 17 possibilities to turn off. Of course, I took the wrong one, the North Circular. Big road for a scooter with really everybody faster than me which was quite scary. I was about here, when I first called Max and told him, that I've no clue where I am. The problem with this big roads is that you can't turn easily. I knew I was totally wrong, but you have to drive and drive...

It some point I managed to turn aroud and took the North Circular back. Then I made the biggest mistake near here. Instead of staying on the North Circular I ended up on the M1 towards Luton. Did I say that the North Circular was scary? I was wrong, the motorway M1 is. I realised immediately, that I am totally wrong, but you're not I allowed to turn and all I could do was hope that there was a junction soon.

After 20 really scary minutes later (maybe less, but it felt like 20) I arrived at a Service Station near here. I was really glad, because I could buy some petrol and ask for help. I just hoped that there was a way back to London that didn't include the motorway. The staff at the petrol station was very friendly and directed me back to London using the A41/A1 which is still a big road, but not a motorway. Eventually I arrived here and from there I knew where I was. Phew!! It was already quarter past eight and I was just to be alive, so I decided to head back home. What a ride!

I learned two things:
1) Never be too lazy to go back and take the map
2) I need a faster scooter ;-)

The Missing Screw - revisited

Hooray, I finally managed to fix my skates. I know, took some time, but after the last screw disappointment I was kind of unmotivated...
I looked up a hardware store on the web and was thinking if I should give them a call before going there, but then I thought, "Are you selling screws?" is a stupid question, it's a hardware store. When I arrived there, the shop was shut down. Of course! Next time I'll call. Luckily, next door there was a similar shop, but they didn't sell screw. However, the guy behind the counter was very helpful and drew a map for me to get to a bike store called "bike fix". And I had luck, they had the missing screw. Yeah!! Spent 20 min in the shop to fix it (was a bit tricky) and they girl provided me all the tools. Very nice, although she thought I was Dutch ;-)

On my way back, I passed the Post Office near Russel Square station. That made me realise that I (or men in general) never pay attention to their environment. I was looking for a Post Office this morning and ended up near Oxford Street. The one in Russel Square I passed for about 5 month nearly every morning when I arrived with the tube and it's much much closer!! Damn.

Unfortunately Londonskate was cancelled today due to the rain. As we were already in Hyde Park we decided to skate a bit. Nice skate-stroll through the park including getting lost near Kensington. We skated through Kensington Palace Gardens. Nice street, many really posh and expensive houses there.

Are we lost?

I was invited to a BBQ party on Saturday evening so I met Stef and Max at UCL at 5 pm to get some stuff from Tesco for the party. Spending about 15 min deciding if we should bring beer, wine or spirits we went for spirits and wine. Took another 15 min to choose the right vodka. With the cheap one you can only clean your car and risk to become blind. Too expensive and no money for meat left... After we chose one, we dropped it. Of course after we paid it, but the lady at Tesco was quite nice and gave us another one.

Since Stef doesn't like the the Tesco wine selection, we had to walk to oddbins. 15 min walk from Tesco, just around the corner. Heard that quite often... Anyway, we walked around the area of Marylebone High Street and I have to admit, it's a really nice area with lots of shops, restaurants and bus. We took the Jubilee Line from Bond Street to Cannary Wharf station. Nice view there. Out of the tube with the station 10m behind us, Max' first question: "Are we lost?". "Yes, indeed, we have absolutely no clue where we are, let's light a bonfire and have the meat right here!" ;-)
Finally we arrived at the party, which wasn't that easy. We had a map with street names, but the street had no names. The bonfire suggestion came up more than once. The party was really good. Many people there and everybody brought meat and drinks. Actually, we wanted to take the last tube back, but then decided to stay longer and go by bus, because we had a great time.

Guess we left at about 2 am and walked to the next bus stop to wait for the D-whatever. Busses starting with a letter don't have the best reputation in terms of reliability I was told. We waited fot quite a long time (at least it felt like this). The bus was for Trafalgar Square and passed Londonbridge. After about 15 min without a sign of the bridge I asked the driver: "Are we near London Bridge?", "bla grrr bla grr!", "I see, so I get off next stop then?", "bla grrr bla grr!". After this inspiring conversation, I found myself at 2.30 am at a bridge that clearly wasn't Londonbridge. I could spot the Tower, but very far away and my stupid brain told me that I was eastbound from the Tower, with Londonbridge westbound which of course wasn't true. However, with this distance in my mind, I took a cab to Londonbridge. Still a long ride, but not as long as I expected it. Stupid brain! After I waited 30 min for the 43 bus I spent another 45 min in the bus before I finally arrived at home. What a journey! I hate taking the bus when I had drinks.