Being sensible with money

What do you do when you buy a house?
Move in, maybe buy some furniture and get yourself settled?
Well in November 2013 I was doing just that, but I had two rooms that lacked any furniture at all. I'd walk into these rooms that felt cold and empty and ponder how best I should make them feel like home.
I knew other rooms needed finishing to. The spare bedroom had no bed, the living room just had a sofa in it and the study was filled with boxes of books. So some budgeting and prioritizing was in order.
After some sole and internet searching the plan became clear.
One of the garages was going to have to wait a bit longer than the other.




After three years of caging I was buying another motorcycle,  but what to buy?
As aforementioned I had been off of bikes for 3 years so I wasn't going to get anything to silly, but on the same hand my last two bikes were Fireblades so I was kind of used to a little power to play with.
I was going to need something that was fun and good for commuting as I had a 15 mile commute and had to be fairly cheap.




High on my list was a VFR750FV as an all round sensible option. I'd had one before and I found it to be a good balance between power and confidence inspiring usability. Oh and they wheely pretty good whilst sounding like no other bike on this planet.
Supersports 600's are a good place to get back on two wheels if your feeling brave/stupid but they would do the job just fine so long as I didn't try driving down to Portsmouth or anything.
Some of the bigger naked bikes have their benefits. Good looks and cost along with a crap load of torque were off set by bugger all weather protection and virtual un-usability on motorways.
Finally there is the 400 class. The GSXR400 was my first sports bike, The CBR400RR a clock work rocket ship, the VFR400 a pocket RC45 and the ZXR400 was a tracksuit wearing hooligan. They all have cheep insurance, road tax, tyres, handle well and look sublime.
So I was getting a 400. Well that was until I saw that the prices had doubled since I sold mine so bugger that, I still remember the rotten exhausts and sketchy electrics.
Well it wasn't that easy. I nearly bought 4 different GSXR 4s in various states of bits in boxes before I finally accepted I needed a VFR750. Problem 2 followed rapidly as I found that VFR750's are hard to find with less than 50k miles on the milky glassed clock.
So the next logical solution was to look towards something a little newer . Enter the VFR800 (you know full well that this was far more convoluted than even this 200 word essay but I couldn't bore you any further).
I found a blue 01 VFR800 FI with 17k miles on the clock on Granthams Honda's ebay outlet for £1750. The description was basic but the images showed a blue screen, seat cowl and baglux seat cover as its only mods, 66% tasteful.
I rang them up, stuck a holding deposit on it and asked for it to be made ready for me to collect if I chose to buy it.

It was December by now but the need for a bike was far more important than the summer bike kit I had, Christmas presents I was yet to buy and other aforementioned stuff so I got a lift to Grantham on a Saturday evening. to pick up my new toy (yer I had already bought it in my head).
Arriving at the Honda dealership a fair bit later than planned I caught them packing up. After explaining what I was there for one of the staff went to get the bike whilst everyone else tried their hardest to look busy.
The bike rumbled up to the front of the shop and I was left to look her over. The blue screen was horrible, the seat was now original but with holes in the back and the seat cowl was nowhere to be seen. It was fairly tidy otherwise and that V4 engine sounded lovely even with the stock pipe. As if to support this a VFR12 was started and silently ridden into the shops garage. I'd seen more exciting sounding mopeds but rarely uglier.
The sales person came out with the paperwork. He told me the bike had been looked over, MOTed and was ready to go. When I asked about the missing extras he told me he's have a look and post them to me. Well not 100% win but fuck it, it's still cheap and I'm there and it does sound nice.
Money exchanged and paperwork signed I was on my bike (*cough*) and fucking freezing at that!
Yer those draggin jeans and summer weight coat were not up to the December evening. Meanwhile I was trying to decide if the rear wheel was held on with chewing gum or if the rear tyre had been inflated by mouth. It was however nice to be back on two wheels and I might have mentioned the engine sounds nice and oh yer its freezing, time to make this journey a repressed memory.

With blue fingers I held the garage door over my head looking at my new motorcycle tick as it cools in its new home. That warm motorcycle smell wafted up my nose as the rumble of its engine still rang in my ears. I felt giddy and excited or it might have been the onset of hypothermia so I went inside and pondered. She was the right bike wasn't she? Is a bargain really a bargain?
Well time would tell but even then I knew I was going to drag this bike kicking and screaming up to the standard I wanted just as soon as I had found my Haines manual, I'm sure its in one of these boxes.

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