Mode of transport: car, bike, legs, magic carpet, teleporter?

As a child I was given a bicycle. This acted as a force multiplier to me and allowed me to operate over a 6 mile diameter which was better than my feet, and by the time I was 13 that diameter was more liek 26 miles. 

At 17 I bought my first motorsed vehicle a tiny motorcycle, which I managed over 100 miles in one direction before blowing it up, and by 20 I was regulalry riding 120 miles each way at the weekends on bikes between 100 and 250cc when I wanted to drink at home with my mates and not be stuck on an army base with a bunch of twats...

At 23 after a near fatal motrbike accident my family repainetd my grandads car and insisted that I drive it, which was nice, BUT it was expensive to run, not fixable by me in far too many areas, and not particularly reliable, and eventually I gave it to my Brother on economic grounds as much as anyhting and resumed motrcycling (but with a bit more due care and attention)

27 sees me utilising my driving licence to park peoples cars at a well known local restaurant and I get a taste for Saab, Mercedes, Some beemers, not sure about Jaguars, and I really liked Rolls Royce. Just based on how nice they were to park and sit in. Soon after I get a new G/F and she wants a car. £99.00 ppounds later finds me draggeing a "green but should be orange" saab 99 out from under a tree in leicester and driivng it home... We once got stopped with five in the car, and one in the boot it was indesturctible and curiously good until some herbert hit it with his mini metro TURBO, but by then I'd been offered a 4.2 litre Daimler straight six with a whoel 3 months M.O.T. for 145 of your earth pounds in a pub, from an enthusiastic seller, and he agreed to keep it in his name for three months, so I could use the "drive someone else's car" part of my insurance. So suddenly I wuz driving a hueg striking blue car that would do a smoking u-turn across all four lanes of the A46 simply by me mashing my foot on the acclerator and turning whilst hoping for the best. (I only did it once or twice of course, because I needed my tyres to last the three months). The cost of fuel was horrific of course, and although I did get slightly over 3 months out of it, and insure it in my own name (surprisingly cheap being so old) and get a new M.O.T. once I'd had my fun, it was time to sell it. (£500).

Then I discovered company cars... Turning up in a jag had impressed teh fools enough to give me my first field service job and they issued me with a special red painted version of the astra 1.6 estate car.

Having ADD AND being unable to smoke cannabis during the working day, made my driving faster and faster, but my natural tardiness disguised this from my employer, and thus I transitioned from driving fast occasionally for fun, to driving as fast as humanly possible in safety over relativley vast daily mileages to my calls. 

The car easily did 115 Mph, it had really quite good brakes, and stuck to the road like glue even (or perhaps especially, because of the added weight) a full consignement of carefuly packed company spare parts). I did 58,000 miles in one year. To go fast all teh time and not crash or have the old bill on your case, actually imposes a savage discipline and requires a high degree of understanding and (believe it or not) kindess and respect for the other road users.

Yes, I really want to get past you and scamper off up the road, BUT there are very few places where I can, so there is no point in getting up behind you doing all that intimidating stuff, like some like to do, (because my speed after I am past will claw the time back) I can just bide my time and overtake as courteously as possible, as soon as possible.     

And that "not crashing" bit.

First, you need to have enough mechanical nous to ensure your vehicle will not fail at speed. And to be honest if you drive old vehicles fast a fair bit of luck as I found out, when a BMW 5 series front coil spring failed at thirty and not the ninety that I'd been doing for much of the previous 70 miles... At thirty I was able to get it off the road and not be a problem, thank god..

Second you need to really be abe to read the road and conditions, predict obstacles and hazards, as if your life depends up on it, (because it does, and if you get it properly wrong, so do other peoples) and react like a computer when the unexpected happens. In a split second on a motorcycle, when an accident unfolds, you haev to decide what combination of braking and motrcycle placement will cause the least damage to all concerned. Some people, (maybe most) get paralysed by fright as catastrophe looms and pilot their motorcycle straight into the side of the car at speed, obtaining serious injury in the process. When I was dumb enough to place myself in an unwinnable situatiion on a 250 yamaha in 1983 I applied the brakes without losing control, and whilst losing as much speed as possible made sure I impacted the car forwards of the drivers "A-pillar" to allow me to try and clear the bonnet and convert into a roll on the other side. I was largely sucessfull but I clipped the A frame with my shoulder, the glass exploded as I flew through it which maybe is why the roll was a bit sloppy, or maybe my speed was just so fast that centrifugal force acquired by covertting my landing to a roll just threw my feet out, but I ended up ltying on the floor winded and with really sore soles of my feet.BUT I had managed the catastrophe in real time for the best possible outcome.

By the time I was in my forties I had a real speed thing going where I'd set the speed control for 115 on the return leg of my daily commute going back home up the m5 from Bristol, and see if I could safely and comfortably avoid turning it off before the M42 turn off.. 

Then they put effing speed cameras everywhere!! 

So, I learned a great deal more about speeding and how to not get points on your licence as a matter of some urgency. 

I also got a pilots licence as a new "edge of the seat challenge" and a narrowboat for a couple of years to sample a really slow and dodgy handling vehicle. I've driven a landrover bllnd folded around some cones in a field under instruction from the mrs, (we won that) swam through a swamp in an amphibious vehicle, done hang gliding, segway, rode a unicycle, owned and flew an Evans Volksplane. 

But, although it was not strictly a mode of transport, (I only hovered briefly, instinctively, mid fall, long enough to carefully pull my arm back though the hole in the glass I'd just punched when the fall started, and then the fall resumed instantly as soon as the dire need passed) I have levitated once, in front of a witness. That (unbelieveable, I know, and I was there exprerienceing it!)  experience makes me very, very gullible now, if anyone spins me a yarn about personal levitation or indeed telekinesis, so I can't allow myself to be interested in that stuff amy more. But I'm glad it happened, it saved me a LOT of BLEEDING...

I pretty much have come to hate Aircraft, as they seem needlessly dangeorus noisy and ineffficient compared to what we might have had if Townsend Browns work hadn't become classified immediately after he demonstrated his discs to the navy... 

Not a lot of people know this, but there was a publication in 1956 entitled "The G-Cars are coming" which listed all eth north american aerospace firms who were racing to make a vehicle with the recenlty discovered advances in undertadning gravity and magnetsim. 

Then suddenly it did not happen. There's a reason for that. 

Yeah, personal travel interests me, greatly, Debbie!

Hope you enjoyed the story.

As a child I was given a bicycle. This acted as a force multiplier to me and allowed me to operate over a 6 mile diameter which was better than my feet, and by the time I was 13 that diameter was more liek 26 miles. 

At 17 I bought my first motorsed vehicle a tiny motorcycle, which I managed over 100 miles in one direction before blowing it up, and by 20 I was regulalry riding 120 miles each way at the weekends on bikes between 100 and 250cc when I wanted to drink at home with my mates and not be stuck on an army base with a bunch of twats...

At 23 after a near fatal motrbike accident my family repainetd my grandads car and insisted that I drive it, which was nice, BUT it was expensive to run, not fixable by me in far too many areas, and not particularly reliable, and eventually I gave it to my Brother on economic grounds as much as anyhting and resumed motrcycling (but with a bit more due care and attention)

27 sees me utilising my driving licence to park peoples cars at a well known local restaurant and I get a taste for Saab, Mercedes, Some beemers, not sure about Jaguars, and I really liked Rolls Royce. Just based on how nice they were to park and sit in. Soon after I get a new G/F and she wants a car. £99.00 ppounds later finds me draggeing a "green but should be orange" saab 99 out from under a tree in leicester and driivng it home... We once got stopped with five in the car, and one in the boot it was indesturctible and curiously good until some herbert hit it with his mini metro TURBO, but by then I'd been offered a 4.2 litre Daimler straight six with a whoel 3 months M.O.T. for 145 of your earth pounds in a pub, from an enthusiastic seller, and he agreed to keep it in his name for three months, so I could use the "drive someone else's car" part of my insurance. So suddenly I wuz driving a hueg striking blue car that would do a smoking u-turn across all four lanes of the A46 simply by me mashing my foot on the acclerator and turning whilst hoping for the best. (I only did it once or twice of course, because I needed my tyres to last the three months). The cost of fuel was horrific of course, and although I did get slightly over 3 months out of it, and insure it in my own name (surprisingly cheap being so old) and get a new M.O.T. once I'd had my fun, it was time to sell it. (£500).

Then I discovered company cars... Turning up in a jag had impressed teh fools enough to give me my first field service job and they issued me with a special red painted version of the astra 1.6 estate car.

Having ADD AND being unable to smoke cannabis during the working day, made my driving faster and faster, but my natural tardiness disguised this from my employer, and thus I transitioned from driving fast occasionally for fun, to driving as fast as humanly possible in safety over relativley vast daily mileages to my calls. 

The car easily did 115 Mph, it had really quite good brakes, and stuck to the road like glue even (or perhaps especially, because of the added weight) a full consignement of carefuly packed company spare parts). I did 58,000 miles in one year. To go fast all teh time and not crash or have the old bill on your case, actually imposes a savage discipline and requires a high degree of understanding and (believe it or not) kindess and respect for the other road users.

Yes, I really want to get past you and scamper off up the road, BUT there are very few places where I can, so there is no point in getting up behind you doing all that intimidating stuff, like some like to do, (because my speed after I am past will claw the time back) I can just bide my time and overtake as courteously as possible, as soon as possible.     

And that "not crashing" bit.

First, you need to have enough mechanical nous to ensure your vehicle will not fail at speed. And to be honest if you drive old vehicles fast a fair bit of luck as I found out, when a BMW 5 series front coil spring failed at thirty and not the ninety that I'd been doing for much of the previous 70 miles... At thirty I was able to get it off the road and not be a problem, thank god..

Second you need to really be abe to read the road and conditions, predict obstacles and hazards, as if your life depends up on it, (because it does, and if you get it properly wrong, so do other peoples) and react like a computer when the unexpected happens. In a split second on a motorcycle, when an accident unfolds, you haev to decide what combination of braking and motrcycle placement will cause the least damage to all concerned. Some people, (maybe most) get paralysed by fright as catastrophe looms and pilot their motorcycle straight into the side of the car at speed, obtaining serious injury in the process. When I was dumb enough to place myself in an unwinnable situatiion on a 250 yamaha in 1983 I applied the brakes without losing control, and whilst losing as much speed as possible made sure I impacted the car forwards of the drivers "A-pillar" to allow me to try and clear the bonnet and convert into a roll on the other side. I was largely sucessfull but I clipped the A frame with my shoulder, the glass exploded as I flew through it which maybe is why the roll was a bit sloppy, or maybe my speed was just so fast that centrifugal force acquired by covertting my landing to a roll just threw my feet out, but I ended up ltying on the floor winded and with really sore soles of my feet.BUT I had managed the catastrophe in real time for the best possible outcome.

By the time I was in my forties I had a real speed thing going where I'd set the speed control for 115 on the return leg of my daily commute going back home up the m5 from Bristol, and see if I could safely and comfortably avoid turning it off before the M42 turn off.. 

Then they put effing speed cameras everywhere!! 

So, I learned a great deal more about speeding and how to not get points on your licence as a matter of some urgency. 

I also got a pilots licence as a new "edge of the seat challenge" and a narrowboat for a couple of years to sample a really slow and dodgy handling vehicle. I've driven a landrover bllnd folded around some cones in a field under instruction from the mrs, (we won that) swam through a swamp in an amphibious vehicle, done hang gliding, segway, rode a unicycle, owned and flew an Evans Volksplane. 

But, although it was not strictly a mode of transport, (I only hovered briefly, instinctively, mid fall, long enough to carefully pull my arm back though the hole in the glass I'd just punched when the fall started, and then the fall resumed instantly as soon as the dire need passed) I have levitated once, in front of a witness. That (unbelieveable, I know, and I was there exprerienceing it!)  experience makes me very, very gullible now, if anyone spins me a yarn about personal levitation or indeed telekinesis, so I can't allow myself to be interested in that stuff amy more. But I'm glad it happened, it saved me a LOT of BLEEDING...

I pretty much have come to hate Aircraft, as they seem needlessly dangeorus noisy and ineffficient compared to what we might have had if Townsend Browns work hadn't become classified immediately after he demonstrated his discs to the navy... 

Not a lot of people know this, but there was a publication in 1956 entitled "The G-Cars are coming" which listed all eth north american aerospace firms who were racing to make a vehicle with the recenlty discovered advances in undertadning gravity and magnetsim. 

Then suddenly it did not happen. There's a reason for that. 

Yeah, personal travel interests me, greatly, Debbie!

Hope you enjoyed the story.

I Sperg said:

By the time I was in my forties I had a real speed thing going where I'd set the speed control for 115 on the return leg of my daily commute going back home up the m5 from Bristol, and see if I could safely and comfortably avoid turning it off before the M42 turn off.. 

Very interesting history, thanks for sharing.

The above reminded me of the lifts I used to get from Eastbourne to Portsmouth when I was younger.

My boss had a new Ford Escort RS Coworth and we'd be in it late at night so he'd go well over 100.

I had to close my eyes sometimes and pray.