My dear old Dad never allowed me to buy or ride a motorbike, for good reason, he’d seen too many people injured by them. Generally,  these were younger men lured by the thrill of speed. I was very tempted and the closest I ever got to one was a Honda 50 scooter in the last year of my college days. One of my good friends also had a scooter and the sight of her backside going over the crossbars at a set of traffic light in Central Manchester is something I can still picture now. We were racing and she’d forgotten that one is supposed to stop at the lights. She survived with nothing more serious than blushing and bruises.

Riding back to Wigan from Manchester on a cold December day also nearly finished me off as I appeared to have a gap in my trouser fronts and the breeze freezed. My hands also took about an hour to thaw out when I got home.

A good school friend of mine had a brother with a more powerful machine and he gave me a ride on the back of that one time. Sparks came off the foot rest as we went around the corners. I very nearly ruined a perfectly good set of “y” fronts, again. I was never tempted further.

That’s about the whole of my motorcycle career in three paragraphs.

More seriously if one does have an accident on a bike like my dear friend Margaret’s son Ollie, then those first minutes afterward really count. Fortunately, Ollie survived and is making good progress towards full recovery. He and his family were much helped through the difficult time by Headway

Those vital first minutes after an accident…

Since the accident, Margaret has been busy raising money for Headway and in my own attempt to help I will be donating whatever anyone will pay for the drawing here, which is one of my British Character pieces for the Exhibition in August. I’ll be taking offers for it over the week and every penny will go to the charity.

This one’s called: A liking for traveling in leather. 

Here’s a poster for the Exhibition and you can see more about it on my new website:
My new site