Last time I was down in Oz I asked my mate Mick what the kids were listening to these days. Sorry I didn't ask you, Stevie, but you've said so yourself; Mick's tastes uncannily mirror the wider population's. So he mentioned MGMT. September '09, I had never heard of MGMT. I think I might of heard a song of theirs on the radio once when I was driving and I thought "That's pretty good," but I had no idea who they were. I have since downloaded their album Oracular Spectacular and I love it. I listened to it all afternoon on Saturday while I rode my bike around the hills of Okazaki. I was having a great day until I ran over a cat. A wide road up in the mountains, no traffic, and this fat old ginger cat starts walking across the road, oblivious. I saw it immediately, and I was always going to hit it, but I froze. I was doing about 70 km/h, and half of me was waiting for this bloody cat to notice me, and the other half didn't know what to do. I didn't brake, I couldn't move my thumb down to the horn. I just yelled (okay, maybe I screamed) and the cat's head swivelled around, but too late. I shut my eyes and heard a da-dum as I ran over it. It wasn't like riding over a speed hump, but more like riding over (ironically) a cats-eye. Dead, I thought. I was sure I ran over the middle of its back. I looked in my mirror expecting to see a ginger M-shaped lump, but instead I saw it running into a house on the other side of the road. I have no idea what happened to it after that. Maybe I only ran over its tail or something. Maybe it crawled into a dark place and died. No idea. I felt that horrible rush of adrenaline you get after a close call and felt sick. Mainly I was pissed off because I had been enjoying myself up to that point and now I had this stupid cat to worry about.
The freezing is a concern. When I took my test we did braking tests and counter-steering tests and all that, but if that was a child or a car pulling out onto the road I would have been in real trouble. Something to think about. I'm going to spend the next couple of months buying motorcycle gear so I'm a little better protected, and then in August or September go for a long ride up to Takayama or Shirokawa or somewhere. Camp for a couple of nights.
I got my license in Melbourne a couple of years ago. I went and did my learner's, and then the next time I was down did my license test proper, both at a place in Kilsyth. A lot of fun. I recommend it just for a good day out. Everyone who took the course passed everything easy, even though there were some pretty unsure riders there, myself included. So I got my license, and then came to Japan.
The rule is that you can change licenses over no dramas if you have had your license in your home country for more than three months. It prevents people from going home for a weekend, getting their license, and then coming back and changing it over. Fair enough. I was one week short of this three month requirement. I despaired for a while, and then I realised that the Victorian driver's license does not have an issue date on it. So using a colour photo copier, I backdated a letter from VicRoads and used that as proof that I had had my license for three months and five days or something. Was that wrong?
Saved me a LOT of time and a LOT of money. Getting a license here, car or bike, takes months of lessons and often many, many attempts. And it costs a couple of thousand dollars, too. Me? Took me two Saturdays (admittedly a year apart) and a couple of hundred dollars. The down side is, of course, I'm not a great rider, and I don't know the Japanese road rules. But I've done almost 3,000 kilometers now, and I know my bike and I don't ride recklessly.
I did Legs & Back last night, and my legs are hurting today. The headache has subsided, though it was hurting a little before lunch today. Not so bad at the moment. I've got P90 Master Cardio intervals tonight, one of my favourites.
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