... that besides my ill-disciplined measuring devices, my bread has also decided to behave rather badly of late.

I've made bread very successfully - albeit with the aid of a machine - for the last ten years or so and in the past few months I've noticed that the tops of the loaves are, at an increasing rate, collapsing in the final stages of the process. The bread is perfectly alright to eat; it just looks a bit sad - like it's lost its teeth. I've revisited the instructions and although there are various pointers to where the problem might lie, none of them apply to me - I'm perfectly able to operate measuring devices, all the ingredients are free of weevils and the like (although I notice there are a couple of mysterious puncture wounds in the side of this particular loaf), and the machine makes all the same noises it made from the outset. It's a bit of a poser.

I had every intention of getting on with a million things this last weekend and all I managed was the manufacture of the pipe from the brake fluid reservoir to the master cylinder. I had some work left over from Friday - the refurbishment of a salt spreader - that needed to be delivered on Monday so, having found that in an effort to complete the repairs themselves, the owners had managed to sheer off some of the bearing mounting bolts, that put paid to Saturday's fun. Anyway, I had Sunday to myself and was able to make a list of the bits and pieces I needed to complete the spare wheel mounting. Actually, it was only a 22mm bolt and a couple of nuts - a short list, so to speak.

I've drawn up the seat mountings and sent that off to the laser-cutting people. While I was measuring everything I happened to glance in the direction of the old exhaust pipe which reminded me that I needed a flange for the new pipe (yet to be produced). I've got a 2" pipe coming out of the manifold - rather like my old Ariel VB had. That was a nice motor cycle; I'd bought it almost the day I left school (I had £13 saved from a holiday job and borrowed £37 from a teacher friend) and used it for nearly 30 years before selling it. I sometimes think it would have been nice to keep it but, being a side-valve and having a sidecar (a VP), it couldn't really keep up with the traffic and I felt that I was becoming a bit of a liability to myself and everyone else. Still, I had fun, as did a lot of other people who came along for the ride in the sidecar although it was surprising how many people refused to go in the chair - I think they'd seen too many movies.

The most I ever managed was to pull the sidecar tyre off the rim on a trip to Southwold via the country lanes. Mind you, I had a pretty enthusiastic passenger who was climbing all over the outfit as we swept through the corners. We seemed to be going quite quickly and at one point I had to whip the clutch in to avoid disaster with a partial seizure a few miles from the town. After a 10 minute rest, the engine could turn over and it sprang back into life.

You've probably noticed a second flange on the drawing; that's for a chum's Riley.