I was wondering where to put the info about my upcoming birthday party as more and more people stopped using Facebook, and then I realised I actually still have a blog, so let’s make use of it.

You are very cordially invited to this year's edition of my birthday party on Saturday the 12th of March starting at 13:00 (until whenever really) in Schwanebeck.

Earlier this week I was telling Loki that I had no inspiration on what to do on my birthday this year and he made it very clear in his look that he was not up for the usual bullshit of having to sleep on a bar sofa, waiting for me to get wasted and then having to pull me home by the leash, especially now that we live in the middle of nowhere and have to walk for hours. So instead we agreed on something else.

We have booked the fenced out area of a dog school for the afternoon of Saturday the 12th of March and invite all of our dog friends (and their owners) to a playdate in a very nice and safe environment. If you don’t have a dog, just borrow one from a neighbour, or come empty handed, we don’t judge. Cake is also a good alternative.

We have the playground from 13:00 until 16:00, after that – to accommodate the dog haters – the party will be moved to my house which is a 10 minutes walk away. If you need the address just contact me on the usual channel we use to communicate.

As usual: you can come whenever, you can leave whenever and you can bring whatever.

Loki and I would be very happy and grateful to see you, only just for a short amount of time.

Please note: if your dog is one of the many dogs Loki has issues with, come anyway, I’ll put Loki on the lead, it’s my birthday, not his.

Address of the dog school: Zepernicker Str. 1B, 16341 Panketal

And that’s the playground (there’s a second area behind the bushes in the back, it’s quite big):

No, Loki is not joining the army – if that’s what you were expecting you’ll be disappointed and should probably stop reading now.

This post is about training Loki to ride on the motorbike with me, sitting on the tank. As described in a previous post, this solution is fairly dangerous when you have a dog like Loki, but it would allow me to ride without the sidecar once in a while so I’m hoping to get him used to it at least for short distances (like less than an hour at a time).

The sun wasn’t shining yet, no one wanted to go for a ride and we were bored so I thought I’d test out my new camcorder set-up and see how it would go with Loki sitting on the tank.

One of the reasons I moved to the boring “country side” was to have a quiet place to try this kind of stuff out without bothering other people or other people bothering me. Also Loki is a lot more relaxed “at home”, which helps for this kind of exercise.

The test went surprisingly well and if you’re interested in watching it, here’s a real time video of it.

(!) The video is bad: it’s not well edited (I don’t know much about it yet), the sound is awful, there’s some French speaking and it lasts a whole 16 minutes. I recommend watching it in x1.5 or even x2.

Enjoy nonetheless!

Also, if you’re wondering why Loki is so chill: we cycled for 15km before that, so he was pretty tired, too tired to resist.

---

Products featured in this video:

• Bagster Puppy Tank bag (attached to the universal adapter)
• RexSpecs Dog Goggles
• RuffWear “Doubleback Full Body Dog Harness”

For most bikers I know, riding their motorcycle is easy: they get dressed, they hop on their machine, start the engine and go have a blast. As it should be.

Many motorcyclists will also tell you that riding is like a therapy for them, that when they are on the bike they feel in control and none of their worries matter so long the momentum is there.

For me things are not that easy, unfortunately.

Unfortunately, I’m one of those people you might call “an over-thinker” or “anxiety ridden” or whatever; terminology doesn’t matter to me here because regardless of what The Scientists may call it, my pain is real.

I love motorcycles. Since a very young age I’ve loved motorcycles. I love being on two wheels, it’s the most “natural” way of traveling for me whether that back wheel is powered by my legs or an engine, it doesn’t matter to me I enjoy it. I don’t even mind sitting in the rain for hours on end or facing the cold weather, it’s part of the fun.

And I do get the adrenaline rush of driving fast* (*that’s a relative, 130km/h is plenty fast for me already).

However getting to the point where I finally sit on my machine and start the engine is a struggle.

It’s the same struggle I have asking people out, or taking drumming lessons, or going to a party: I really really really want to, but I just can’t.

I have this thing in my head that finds a million and one reasons not to:

What if I drop the machine and break it? What if a bolt is loose because I didn’t check it before driving off? What if Loki somehow hurts himself while I’m out? What if I left the balcony door open and he escapes? If I go for a ride now I might not find a parking spot when I come back, and then I have nowhere to park it. What if I used the wrong type of fuel and the gas station? Yadda yadda yadda.

It goes on forever to the point where I just decide: you know what, I’ll just skip it for today, I can always do it later.

But what if there’s no later?

Eventually there won’t be a ‘later’ anymore.

So sometimes I make plans to have commitments that I can’t escape (at least not easily) in order to force myself to get on that bike and ride it. Unfortunately it’s not that easy to have commitments that force you to ride a motorcycle because a) if I need to go somewhere I can always take my leg-bike b) I don’t know many people that I would make plans with.

But even when I have those forced plans, getting on the machine is still a struggle to the point where as soon as I sit on it I’m so mentally exhausted that I can’t really focus, which of course generates even more anxiety because who wants to sit on a 110hp machine and not be focused. Add to that the fact that usually I’m so stressed out that I can’t eat or drink and I end up in a really bad position when it comes to being focused.

The sidecar helped for the ‘leaving Loki alone’ part for sure, but it came with its own sources of “fear”: I don’t like driving cars because they are too wide, and I’m not centered so I don’t know how large I am to my right; it’s the same with the sidecar. I also have fairly low clearance due to the sidecar frames, so bumpy roads can get tricky.

All in all, as much as I like the convenience of the sidecar to take Loki with me safely, I don’t really “enjoy” riding with it, I’m always thinking of all the bad things that could happen: I hit the curb on the right and get thrown of the machine; I hit a bump in the road and get thrown of the machine; I drive too much on the left to compensate and get knocked off by incoming traffic. You get the jist.

So why do I keep trying?

Because I have to, otherwise I might just be dead already.

Next time I’ll be talking about some accessories I bought for the bike, because spending money on it is another way to motivate myself to use it! (even if it doesn’t work) Fun, fun, fun!

---

In case you’re thinking “but you just have to work on your confidence”: unfortunately that’s not the source of the issue. I did my license in Germany so I’ve received one of the best training in the world by an excellent instructor at that and I’m very confident in my riding skills; I’m not scared once I’m on the road.

I haven’t posted anything in a while because not much happened, as you would expect with the colder season setting in.

But here are some small updates and photos from the last couple of weeks.

Driving with a human passenger

This one happened back in October already, but it didn’t seem “big” enough to make a dedicated post about it.

Someone actually was interested in riding in the sidecar so I removed Loki’s cage and on we went to Fürstenwalde (or somewhere around there).

All in all not much to report except that you really feel the difference between Loki and his cage weighing a rough 20kg combined and an adult person upwards of 60kg. That difference in weight obviously had an impact on my braking power and led to an almost critical mistake. On the way back, as I was slowing down to get onto the Autobahn ramp I totally miscalculated the slowing distance needed and almost didn’t make the corner, it was literally a matter of centimeters before my front wheel hit the curb. Fortunately nothing bad happened, we made the corner and went on with our journey.

Later on, as we almost made it back safely, I messed up again, but I can’t talk about that one here, I don’t want the Polizei come and arrest me. But it has to do with me usually riding my bicycle in the city where I sometimes “bend” some rules and my brain being confused. You can figure the rest out.

Here’s a video from the passenger’s view of my shiny Z.

Bringing BBZ to a warm and safe new “home”

Earlier this month, I also brought BBZ to his winter sleeping spot.

A good friend of mine moved not to far away from my current flat and has a parking spot in his garage that he is not using yet. He kindly offered to host BBZ at least for the winter so he doesn’t have to stay outside in the cold and serve as a toilet for dogs (and probably some humans as well).

I secured him the best I could, I hope he’ll still be there at the start of next season…

Short ride to Wandlitz and back

On the 15th of November, the weather was still quite nice (the temperature was around 10°C) so I decided to go for a small ride. Unfortunately, everyone I know who rides already had put their bike away for the winter, so it was just myself, Loki and his whining.

We pretty much just went out North to Wandlitz and came back.

Facebook groups dedicated to riding dogs

Thanks to the suggestion from a member of a riders’ group I’m in, I also joined two Facebook groups dedicated to dogs riding on motorcycles (or in sidecars).

Both seem to be growing communities and hopefully I’ll be able to meet some like minded people soon.

They’re closed groups and you need to ride with your dog in order to join them, so not much point liking them here.

Loki’s RexSpecs have arrived

I’ve also finally managed to order Loki’s RexSpecs goggles that he will need if it rides in the tank bag.

The RexSpecs are special goggles developed for dogs who see a lot of “action”, e.g. military dogs or mountain rescue dogs. They are fairly expensive, but after joining one of the riding dogs Facebook groups I fell upon a 20% off promotion, so there’s that.

Of course Loki still hates them (pink was sold out and that’s his favourite colour), but I’m sure we’ll get there. Also, in the sidecar he doesn’t need them so it’s not too critical yet – but we started practicing.

That last one is Loki not talking to me anymore because of all the none-sense I have him endure.

That’s it for today folks, stay safe and hopefully write to you soon!

If you’ve followed my blog so far, you already know that I couldn’t have Loki in the sidecar on the way back from collecting the bike because it was too cold then, and that the bike then spent 3 months in the garage for some repairs. And if you’re also good at math, you’ll have figured out that Loki’s sidecar training could only have started in June.

Some additional info that you may have guessed if you know me well enough: being an anxious person (especially since “the fall”) I tend to make excuses not to do things that I actually want to do. And this means that Loki’s training only started in July. Yeah, I wasted a whole month of perfectly good weather and free time. That’s me.

Any-who. Since last July, I’ve been trying to get Loki used to sitting in the sidecar so we could finally get on with our adventures. I knew that it wouldn’t be easy with a dog that’s at least as anxious as me, so we took puppy steps. Here’s a rundown.

Step 1: Getting him familiar with being in the sidecar

Loki had already sat in ‘a’ sidecar with me when I test drove a similar rig before ordering mine. He didn’t hate, which was good enough for me, so having him in the sidecar with someone he trusts seemed like a good first step.

Since I would be riding the bike, I couldn’t sit in the sidecar with him, so I asked his friend Maria to come sit with him. She was kind enough to accept and we did a short ride around town.

Unfortunately I don’t have any photos/video of that sessions because I was focused on the road and Maria was focused on keeping Loki in the sidecar.

I just have some post-ride photos:

Overall, Loki was fine as long as we were rolling, but as soon as we had to stop he starting crying (he also does it when he’s in a car). I guess Loki likes his momentum as much as I love mine. The main problem with this is that he tried to escape the sidecar at every red traffic light – and this is not something I could handle if I was riding alone with him.

So the next iteration became obvious: making sure he couldn’t get out of the sidecar.

Step 2: Building a cage for his safety

I decided to recycle a cage that I had bought for his bicycle trailer (which he also refuses to stay in) and have someone cut it to the right dimensions to fit the sidecar.

Luckily a friend of Maria’s is a talented ‘metal artist’ (as in: he does art pieces with metal, you can see his work here: Madhouse Customs) and he accepted to take care of this. And I have to say, he did a great job:

Step 3: Riding alone in his cage

Now that I had everything needed to make sure he couldn’t escape from the sidecar, it was time to have Loki ride in the sidecar alone.

As I didn’t want to overwhelm him, we started with small rounds around the block and I have to say, he absolutely hated it. He was screaming and scratching and ripping apart the inside of his cage.

But no reason to give up just yet; that’s just Loki being Loki.

I asked Maria to help me out again and she walked him to a quite area where we practiced a bit more. I also brought enough cheese for a cheese & cracker party to bribe Loki.

Despite some whining, it was overall a lot more successful and gave me hope for the future.

Step 4: Practice, practice, practice

Now that we had the basics in place, it was a “just” a matter of getting practice. It was the same with the car, at first he hated it, then it got used to it and after driving long enough, he actually now enjoys it.

A few weeks back, I posted an article about our visit to Beelitz, Loki’s first longer trip in the sidecar. Overall it went well, but I think it was a bit too much, too soon for him – ah well, what can you do.

I also had planned to ride with Loki to the Ostsee (see previous blog post) but since my mom had to travel by train, I decided not to take Loki on such a long trip on my own (it would have been a different story if she could have followed by car to pick him up whenever). We did however do a short trip once there.

It’s a shame that winter is now coming, because I think he was slowly getting used to being in the sidecar – ah well, what can you do.

Next (riding) season we’ll have to start almost from scratch again, but I’m confident it’ll go faster and smoother, as myself am more confident now as well.

Also, here’s a small teaser of what will come next:

Alternative title “My favourite motorcycle YouTube channels”

Last weekend (on Saturday the 12th of September) I rode from Berlin to Graal-Müritz at the Baltic Sea, my favourite holiday location (because nothing feels as much like home).

I had found a riding buddy who wanted to do the return on the same day, so we went via the Autobahn as it was faster. However, roughly 2/3 of the way my co-rider decided to turn around and since I was in no rush, I decided to get off the highway as well and enjoy a nice ride through the country side until my final destination.

As I exited the highway, I wasn’t too sure which direction I was supposed to go (I still don’t have a GPS…) and just took a right turn. Normally, when I’m not sure where I have to go, I always go left – out of principle – so I quickly started doubting my choice and decided to stop on the side of the road to check Google Maps on my phone.

And then it happened: for a reason that’s unknown to me, I had stopped the motorcycle + sidecar in the most inconvenient way possible (given the circumstances) and I was now stuck in a ditch.

It’s not obvious on this picture, but what had happened is following: the height of the starting asphalt was the exact same as the height of the sidecar frame and the wheel being much lower there was no way for my to “drive up the curb”.  What I had to do was to lift the sidecar up, while moving the bike forward. Unfortunately, as I was alone and there was no way to have the bike move forward with the engine on while I was lifting the sidecar.

This might not seem like a big deal to you, but for me it was. Normally, upon realising that I was “stuck” and on my own, I would have started to freak out and potentially have a panic attack. But I didn’t, and there is one reason for that: I have watched so many hours of motorcycle travelers being stuck in the literal middle of nowhere, I knew that I could make it, I just had to keep calm and get to work – which I did. I took my helmet and my jacket off and started lifting and pushing. It took me a good 20 minutes because that rig is heavy and somehow always wanted to roll backwards (gravity apparently), but I made it.

Luckily Loki wasn’t with me this time (he was traveling by train), that would have been a nightmare.

So to honour and thank all those YouTubers who inspired me, here’s a list of my favourite motorcycle related YouTube channels.

1- FortNine

This one is not really a surprise, everyone knows it because the content is just so good, but I still had to name it. It’s mainly videos about gear reviews, maintenance advice and general tips for motorcyclist as you would see anywhere else, except that the production quality is insane. Ryan and his team (they are Canadians) put in a lot of effort to add some good story telling to whatever they are talking about. Plus, Ryan being a trained physicist (apparently), when they do tests and comparisons, it’s very scientific. A must watch.

2- Laurent ‘Lolo’ Cochet

Unfortunately this one is in French, and it’s a shame because in my opinion there is only one YouTuber that can top FortNine’s story telling and production, and it’s Lolo Cochet. He used to be a motorcycle journalist for one of France’s biggest Motorcycle Magazine and started to do online content way before everyone else. He eventually started his own production company and YouTube channel. His videos are also informative (reviews, tips, etc.) but he always comes up with the craziest ideas to structure his videos – and he is hilarious.

You may have seen this one very famous video of him falling into a parked boat after one of his side cases touched a pillar (it’s unfair people only know him for that, because he’s an otherwise excellent rider):

3-  c90adventures

Not exactly a “motorcycle” channel as Ed (March) travels on a Honda c90, which is more like a small moped, but still. Ed is an English dude who likes to travel cheap, so he chose the most reliable motorised two-wheeler he could find (the c90 has been in production for so long you can find parts everywhere, plus he’s an engineer so he can repair anything by himself) and travels the world. His video are purely narrative (no reviews or tests) about his journeys, but his personality and his sense of humour just make watching his videos a delight. Similarly to Lolo, he has some crazy ideas on what to do while traveling, and his adventures are always entertaining.

4- Motorcycle Adventures

Probably the first channel I started to watch and follow after getting my license (or even as I was getting it). Pavlin is a Bulgarian who lives/d in Berlin (he’s moving back to Bulgaria as I type this) and set himself the goal of visiting and seeing every country across the world. His approach is extremely pragmatic: traveling as efficiently as possible to travel as much as possible. He owns an older Ténéré 660 which he maintains himself and travels super light. He shares his years of experience traveling in a very “no fuss, no bullshit” way and every one of  his tips are helpful. His travel log videos are sometimes a bit long, but it’s on purpose as he’s trying to show the reality of long distance riding – unlike many other YouTuber who only shows their highlights.

5- Pedro Mota

Half Portuguese, half Dutch, Pedro has been living on his bike for a few years now. His channel only contains travel logs, no motorcycle reviews or gear tests, only his journeys. His channel is not very big (yet), but I like watching his videos because he’s not afraid to share his worst struggles on the road (similarly to Ed March). It’s always very inspiring to see him work on getting out of tricky situations – once he had to move big rocks for several hours in the South American sunlight in order to clear the only available road, with no village for kilometers.

—

There are many other channels that I enjoy watching, but this post is already way too long. Unfortunately I haven’t found any ‘female rider’ channel that I enjoy, most of the ones I found are too “I’m an Influencer, my life is so cool, sponsor me” and I don’t get anything out of them – but feel free to share if you know any good ones.

Last Sunday (the 23 of August) we went to Beelitz to visit the famous “Heilstätten”.

If you don’t know what they are, here is the Wikipedia link. Basically it’s a complex of abandoned medical buildings that are rotting away and look pretty creepy/cool. I’ve been wanting to go there for a (long) while so I was happy to see that someone in the motorcycle Facebook group suggested a ride there.

EDIT: here’s a nice video that shows the location with drone shots

To make this ride even more interesting, it would be Loki’s first long trip in the sidecar; so far he had only been in it for 15 minutes max (I’ll post an article on the training steps soon-ish).

The rendez-vous was at 11:00 at some gas station in “West” Berlin. Since it was the first serious ride with Loki I made sure we’d leave early enough – at 10:00.

Surprisingly Loki was quite chill all the way to the meeting point. He was whining a bit from time to time, mainly at traffic light stops, but that’s because he likes his momentum. “Tel maître, tel chien“.

We met up at the gas station and went on our way; there was 3 of us on bikes, 4 if you count Loki in his royal carriage.

The way to Beelitz was pretty straight forward (they had GPS’, I followed) and aside from the “traffic light whining” Loki was alright.

We arrived at the location around 13:00, right on time to be starving, but that wasn’t an issue because to my biggest surprise, what I thought would be some random abandoned buildings in the middle of nowhere turned out to be a very well monetized tourist attraction with food stands and everything. I’m not gonna lie, it was quite disappointing to see so many people, and especially so many old people and families.

After a small lunch break made of over-priced fries and half a pizza which was actually more of a ‘flammküch’ with tomato sauce and salami, we started the tour. However, the disappointment grew even bigger when we realised that the real interesting part had an entrance fee (of 10eur!!!) and a massive queue to get in. Plus dogs weren’t allowed in that part either.

We decided not to wait in line and just walk around a bit on the free area and then leave again. I will give it another try off-season (and without Loki) when the weather is not so nice and the arthritis kicks in.

For the return journey we decided to get some ice cream somewhere in the South of Berlin, so that’s what we did.

Loki was still okay-ish in his sidecar, but he didn’t really manage to relax enough to lie down and sleep, and as time passed he grew more and more tired and therefore the whining and screaming intensified. I’m not blaming him, for a first serious ride it was quite long.

Here’s my ice cream (Hazelnut and Nougat):

And here’s our bikes (mine’s on the left):

Unfortunately I don’t have any photos or footage of Loki in the sidecar yet, but I’m working on getting the equipment. And if you want some cool pics from Beelitz, just google it, whatever you’ll find will be a million times better than anything I would have shot.

After our short ice cream break it was time to go our separate ways to our respective homes. Of course I got “lost” because I didn’t have anyone to follow anymore (and no GPS) but I made it.

Loki was exhausted and on edge, but he did very well overall. I’m cautiously optimistic for our future travels 🙂

—

P.-S.: feel free to send me money so I can buy a camera and a GPS

(that’s a joke, but if you want to, go ahead)

As announced previoulsy, I would like to spend some words explaining the meaning behind the name of my rig. This is going to be a loooong read, but again, my blog, my choice.

Part I – “Zed”

The Z in BBZ stands for Zanetti, a reference to Bubba Zanetti from Mad Max (the first).

Here you can see him “knowing what he is doing” before getting killed – glorious:

The whole design concept of my bike is an homage to Bubba Zanetti and ‘Mad Max’ by extension.

Here is a picture of my bike as it came from the factory:

When I bought it I knew I wanted to roll a stone and have the tank painted black, and then add the windscreen from the Café version to finish the look. At the time it seemed cheaper to do it that way rather than buying the Café  version (which is Kawasaki green) and have it entirely repainted. Boy was I wrong, but that’s (again) for another time.

While I’m not so much a fan of the overly violent atmosphere and the lack of resources over there, from a purely aesthetic point of view the Mad Max universe is my ideal, even before the Matrix Universe.

If there was one movie I could watch on repeat forever it’d be ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’.

Side note: Mad Max has its own visual/design qualification, namely "Diesel Punk". It's often miscategorised.

As you may have seen one some picture, I even “invested” the extra Euro to buy the shiny silver Bell Bullitt helmet to complete the Zanetti look. #HipsterMuch #NoWonderImBroke

So much for the Z, now the BB, but first, let’s talk about my favourite video game.

Part II – Mario Kart, my ideal game

First off, a small intro for those who don’t know Mario Kart (like that’s somehow probable). Mario Kart is a “kart” racing game based on the Nintendo universe. The first version dates back to the 90ies; I remember playing it on Super NES in my cousin’s basement. That Rainbow Road.

Unlike many other racing games, it’s not so much about being the fastest or the most precise, it’s about hindering your adversaries with items given to you by the computer (banana peels, shells, etc.). It’s mostly about having fun.

For me Mario Kart is the essence of what a video game should be: it’s fun, you can enjoy it with your friends and you can have fun just by playing 10 minutes. It’s casual gaming, and that’s why I like it.

But it’s also my ideal game because it’s a representation of what I expect society to be.

Mario Kart is a very unpredictable game. Skills alone won’t guarantee your victory, there’s a huge chaos and luck factor to it. Items are given randomly to players, however, the farther up the ranking you are, the weaker the items. The farther back in the ranking, the more powerful the items to help you advance.

Mario Kart, thanks to its randomised-but-not-so-much item system, ensures that even if you have no skill nor experience playing, you can still stay in the game, advance and have fun. I’ve personally played many games that I didn’t enjoy because they were new to me and I felt I just couldn’t keep up with others.

However, it’s unlikely that the items alone will make you win, skills are still required. If you are very skilled/talented and manage to stay ahead of your competitors, you’ll still get items, but they won’t help you advance, at best they’ll help you slow down your adversaries.

And if somehow you were lucky and skilled enough to stay ahead and deepen a gap to the competition, the game will come at you in the form of a Blue Shell, the item everyone dreads. The Blue Shell (unlike the green and the red) only targets the first player in the race, thus allowing the other to catch up and make sure that your head-start doesn’t grow exponentially.

So, metaphorically speaking, Mario Kart is my ideal society: a system where skills and luck will help you advance, but if you’re too weak or too unlucky, it will help you stay in the game by giving you boosters.

Mario Kart is a socialist game. Plus it’s fun and unpredictable, just like life should be.

“But what does it have to do with your motorbike?” you may ask. I’m getting there.

Part III – Catching up with BBZ

Remember when I said that items where more powerful as you fall back in the ranking?

While the “Blue Shell” works on hindering the first player, it doesn’t help you specifically if you’re behind. However, there is one item that will do just that: Bullet Bill.

Bullet Bill is rocket that you will get if you fall really behind; it will help you catch up with the others and get back into the game. See him in action here:

My side car is named (and designed!) after Bullet Bill because I am hoping that it will help me catch up on the lost time.

Since I was maybe 4, I’ve always been attracted to motorcycles. I used to draw them, I used to build them in Lego, I was fervent viewers of “Renegade” even though it’s honestly is sh*t TV show, etc.

However, because we live in a gendered society that actively markets specific products and lifestyles to a particular gender, I never felt that as a girl* I was entitled/encouraged to ride a motorcycle. Plus it’s super dangerous, so it’s only for boys.

It’s only when I finally signed up to get a car drivers licence 4 years ago that it clicked. The owner of the driving school had a BMW R9T on display and I fell in love with the machine instantly. As they were getting my paperwork done, I looked over to the bike and let out a “Man, I wish I could ride a bike like that”. My then soon to be instructor just replied: “well, what keeps you from doing it?”

Those words really made me think, and I realised that absolutely nothing was standing in my way except for myself. Of course I immediately signed up to pass my motorcycle driving licence.

Side note: we take it for granted, but there are countries where women still aren't allowed to drive a car, let alone ride a bike.

I “quickly” got my licence in order and thanks to insurance money from my stolen car, I was also able to immediately buy my own motorbike.

But something was still in the way of me travelling the world on two wheels: I have a dog and I simply can’t leave him behind.

I spent a considerable amount of time assessing different options to take him with me (you can read more here: Different ways to take a dog on a motorcycle) and the most viable option seemed to be the sidecar.

Now, after almost 2 years of back and forth with the builder and a lot of money put aside, I have finally removed all the hurdles that were in my way (well… there’s a very last one, which is getting Loki in the sidecar, but again, a different story).

Thanks to my very own Bullet Bill I now hope to be able to catch up on all those years I spent not doing what I’ve always wanted to do: ride my bike from bounty to bounty (that’s a ‘Renegade’ reference).

The End.

*I’ve grown since, and I don’t consider myself a “girl” or a “woman” anymore, but back then it’s just how things were. You were either a girl or a boy. I’ve decided for myself that I’m neither and than I can do the f*ck I want.

It’s pronounced bee-bee-zed, like BB8 but with a zed. I’ll write more about the name in a later post, this post is just a status update.

Friday two weeks ago (5th of June) I picked up my motorbike from the garage where it had been stuck for almost three months. A sad combination of the Corona lock-down and well, the garage being a bit slow.

Because this blog is mainly read by me, and serves as my memoir, here a short timeline of what happened since “Bring him home“.

On the 11th of March, I dropped off the bike + sidecar at my garage/dealer. My main concern at the time was getting it looked at for the awefull steaming/smoking that happened on the Stadtautobahn. However, the guy from the transport company advised me to have the insurance assess the bike after the fall and take over those reparations as well. I mean, that’s why I do pay a fortune on insurance, so why not. I gave the garage my keys and the guidelines to a) check with insurance about the ‘fall’ reparations b) more importantly investigate the smoking. I’m not gonna bore you with the details about what the insurance said, but long story short: they’ll cover the damages due to the fall, but nothing else, so if the smoking wasn’t due to the fall, it’ll be on me.

On the 20th of March (after harassing both my insurance company and the garage) I learned about the cost of the damages caused by the fall: 4,917eur. Keeping in mind that only bumped into a wall at 1km/h, it kinda makes you wonder how much it would have been if I had an actual accident. Touching wood that won’t happen anytime soon, or at all. Additionally the expert who assessed the damages recommended they measure my frame again, just to be sure. I mean, you can’t be too sure with such an extreme impact I may have bent everything out of place.

On the 24th of April (after several follow-up emails and calls from my side) the Head Engineer informed me that they had measured out the frame and that everything was good. Thanks gods! But what about the smoke? Well, they hadn’t checked yet.

On the 18th of May (after yet another follow-up email from my side) I was informed that my bike made it to the actual garage for inspection (smoking problem). At this point I had told them not to take care of re-doing the Air Brush design because it would have required sending the boat back to Karlsruhe, and I thought that would take too much time – naive me, thinking that would be the reason for delay.

On the 26 or 27th of May (a Tuesday/Wednesday) I received a call from the garage, it went roughly like that:

"So, your bike is basically done, but I have one question
- Yes?
- Where did you get your handlebar from?
- What do you mean? It came with the bike when I bought it form you.
- No. We ordered a replacement handlebar for your bike and it's chrome, your current one is matte black. Did you have it changed?
- No, it came with the bike. Matte black is the standard colour for my version of the machine. You know it comes in 3 colours right?
- I don't know, that's not what the system says. I'll look into it and hopefully you can pick up the bike before the weekend.
- Sure."

Of course it wasn’t finished for the weekend, did you really think it would be?

On the 4th of June (a Thursday) I received another call: “your bike is ready, you can come pick it up tomorrow anytime.” – I was in shock, I couldn’t believe it, after only 3 months my machine was ready.

On Friday the 5th of June, I made my way to the garage. After waiting for roughly 45 minutes (because “come around anytime” was a lie) I was finally shown my machine.

Pretty much everything related to ‘the fall’ had been fixed apart from the scratch on the boat (it’s not something that can be done locally, everything would have needed to be done again). And now you may wonder: but what about the smoke? Well, I wondered that too, and the answer was: “we couldn’t find anything, most likely it was just some rain water that go onto the cooling system before it got activated, so it was just water steam“. I am so glad it took 3 months to have that figured out, but hey, it’s done now.

We wrapped things up (I asked them if they had checked the battery and the tire pressure, after 3 months that seemed relevant and of course they didn’t) and as I finished putting my stuff in my bag the Engineer looked at me and went: “Wait. So we did your 1,000km check in November 2018, then last year we installed your windshield (that’s another 10 pages of story right there) but we didn’t do an inspection, and now it’s 2020 and we haven’t done an inspection yet either. You should make an appointment soon for your yearly inspection.” – I shall be looking for a new garage.

Today is the 17th of June, I haven’t ridden the bike again yet. It’s currently parked in my neighborhood where it gets the pleasure of getting peed and pooped on by random dogs and serves as a shelf for empty beer bottles. #BigCityLife

Next steps: training Loki to ride in the side car and then FREEDOM. Stay tuned!