Author: Alex

The Reykjavik Express – Part 3.

On By AlexIn Other stuff7 Comments

Somewhat out of sequence. Parts 1 and 2 shall follow shortly. But I REALLY needed to get this off my chest this morning.

Picture the scene. Quiet carriage blissfully free from shouty mobile phone conversations , and tedious exec wanabees feebly sparring with their junior staff. Opposite two old school, old blokes greet each other warmly probably surprised the other is still alive.

One is executive director of this, the other retired chairman of that. I know all this because their privileged upbringing is not governed by the same rules as the rest of us. They talk loudly and confidently, either unaware or uncaring that twenty other people are firing up their stares of death.

No one says anything of course because we’re British. Except when a grumpy Northerner, with a bastard head cold, is stripped of even the faintest veneer of social politeness.

Worthy 1: “So have you seen old Bryan Potter at all?”

Worthy 2: “No not since the last ‘Crush the Poor’ black tie do at the Grosvenor“

Worthy 1: “Yes, he didn’t look well did he?”

Grumpy Northerner: “He’s dead. Obviously“

Worthy 1: “I beg your pardon“

GN: “Dead. Brown Bread. Gone to a better place. Oh sorry, wasn’t I included in your conversation? You were just talking so loudly I assumed it was a public meeting“

Worthy 2 Splutters: “How Rude“

GN: “Yeah you are, why don’t you f*ck off to next door where all the other noisy self-important wastrels* are?“

Silence in the carriage again. Embarrassed silence I’ll grant you but silence all the same. Broken only by two old blokes huffing out of their seats, and lamenting the lack of respect from their lessers.I cannot tell you ladies and gentlemen how much I LOVED that. 41 and going soft on the outside, 21 and still railing against the bloody world on the inside.

* I was particularly proud of “Wastrel”. Because normally when I’m that angry the my vocabulary is reduced to “F*ck off you F*cking F*ckers“

Revolving doors

On By AlexIn Other stuff3 Comments

Last week, a vicious and unprovoked attack was visited upon my innocent person. What was surprising – since I was in London so fully anticipated being killed and eaten – was that the assault wasn’t some scally with an eye for quick mugging, no it was powerfully executed by a door.

Well a set of doors to be accurate. They guard the portal of our client building, and sport an interesting differentiator in being programmed to commit corporate manslaughter.

These doors and I have previous. They perambulate gently until an innocent attempts the fiendishly complex procedure of entering or exiting the building. As the victim triggers the doors orbital sensors, rotation increases to gently smooth their way into the building.

And right there is a failure to translate design intent into implementable reality. The now terrified occupant of the whirling glass box of death spins at every increasing speeds until reaching escape velocity. There are only two possible outcomes; either he or she is fired out onto the main road – generally into the path of a passing taxi – or launched at the phalanx of security guards who form a protective huddle to the front of the expensive reception furniture.

Now I don’t know much about “valuing our clients” but such door based behavior seems to test the rule “you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression”

To date, I’ve applied Yorkshire Logic to the problem, eying up my doory nemesis with a manly stare before exiting via a firm shove – ignoring the whooshy nonsense of acceleration. And that has worked just fine until the day the building droids re-calibrated the sensors.

Striding confidently towards a decent cup of coffee, I matched my speed with the accelerating door, and made a beeline for a closing gap betwixt door and frame. At which point, the rotational motor was hotwired with a 10,000 foot electrical jolt up the japs eye. That can be the only explanation for the “smoking axle of spin” which turned a simple door into a human blender.

i wouldn’t have been ejected into the road, more likely I would have been transported to a far galaxy had I been bulleted out of that rifling barrel. Fortunately my desperate lunge failed to gain access, and instead I was skewered between door panel and frame. Rucksack to the back, snozzle to the front and arms waving pointlessly in between.

The only thing saving me from major veterbre trauma was the works laptop acting as a rucksack based buffer to the increasing strains of the killer electic motors. But I really didn’t want to break that after what happened last time. However, right now my concern was more the queue of increasing bystanders quietly pissing themselves.

Security came to my aid by pointing out my predicament to anyone within earshot. Eventually after frantic flapping and undignified waving of trapped limbs, the pressure eased and I was ejected outside in the manner of a hand slapping “and don’t bother coming back, we don’t want your sort in here”

The door leered at me. I’m sure it did. Still I’m pretty sure I pulled off my painful exit without the loss of any dignity. Hardly anyone pointed to their friends and said “it’s him, no honestly he was stuck in the door, got it on my phone, I’ll stick it on YouTube later”

Somedays I feel I am pushing at a door marked pull.This experience merely confirms it.

Signs of madness

On By AlexIn Other stuff2 Comments

Regular victims of eruptions from my venting spleen will know I am much troubled by the idiocy of life as presented in daily packages of stupid. Lately the eye of vexation has strayed to signage – not useful stuff pointing out certain death if you touch that* but the entirely pointless or just plain bonkers.

Let me quote a few representative examples

“Please leave these toilets as you would expect to find them“. So I installed a small bookshelf, line of optics and reading light.

“Turn Left for Guide Dogs for the Blind“. Now that’s just silly, the dog can’t read that. Especially if he’s driving as well.

“Baby on Board“. So what? Want me to make amusing deformed rabbit impressions as I pass?

“Give way to pedestrians“. As opposed to what, just running the poor buggers over?

“You are entering South Yorkshire, a Nuclear Free Zone”. Okay it’s a bit old, but even at the age of 11, I could see that no Russian Bomber pilot was likely to respect the fact that Barnsley had a bloke selling socialist worker.

I could go on, no really I could. Just try to stop me. However, it’s Friday night, Wine O’clock and I’m in the slot for preparing the house for my Dad’s 70th Birthday party. I am not working from a high water mark here either – Having got the kids to sing Happy Birthday down the phone, I excused the lack of card with an airy “No card yet Dad, kids have made you a lovely one”

Tap-Tap on Shoulder. Whisper. “Not now Random, we’re talking to Granddad, anyway Dad as I was saying..” Tap-Tap-Tap”No DAD We haven’t” ‘RANDOM SHUT UP‘ “No Dad, You never asked us, we’ve not done it” ‘RANDOM!’ LEAVE IT “Dad, she’s got a memory problem, probably dropped on her head as a baby“.

So here’s a top weekend tip. Don’t ever work with animals, children or speakerphones 😉

EDIT: And just this morning – although since it is actually before 7am, a chronological value of “still the middle of the bloody night” would be more appropriate – two more missives has reached my analogue inbox:

1) Fresh Fruit ready to eat. Packaged in South Africa and Poland. What is wrong with that sentence 😉

2) A scribbled note on the carriage door “The quiet carriage has a vibration this morning. For customers wanting quiet, please use the non quiet carriage located in the next carriage”

This kind of repetition whiffs of the kind of thing Chiltern Railways’ used to get up to.� It sort of makes sense if you remove any trace of irony, and disassociate it from how Human Beings normally communicate. They can’t help themselves tho, and on my return journey I expect to find a sign “carriage, carriage, carriage, broken, carriage, carriage, late, carriage.”

* but don’t you want too anyway. Just in case it’s a big hoax. And if it isn’t you’ll be far to dead to worry about the embaressment.

This commuting lark.

On By AlexIn Bikes, Road RidingLeave a comment

This week is worringly my third anniversary of an employment period I was absolutely not going to extend past the first twelve months. It is also my fourth winter commuting by bicycle, although the frequency has dropped from four times a week to once a month. Assuming I can be arsed to ride that often.

Which I should as it is now far easier then when I was playing with the traffic in London. The bike friendly train company solves the logistics puzzle of two bikes for one journey. No longer is my commute tediously extended by a half clothed dash between buildings in order to abandon grubby steed, grab a shower and finally trudge over to my place of work.

And this is the first Yuletide period I’m no longer convinced every motorist secretly wants a dead cyclist for Christmas. Riding the Kona is fast, fun, and almost entirely without a high ratio of traffic cockage. So I can only explain my rubbish commuting statistics to a combination of the lazy bastard gene and a nice car parked outside.

Two weeks ago, I made a determined effort to greet the frosty pre-dawn blackness with a powerful light and slightly weaker legs. The lightening sky promised one of those perfect autunmnal mornings with a low sun bathing the countryside in soft glowing rays. I nerver got to see that once my new light comically dived into the bushes, and left me making a speedy – if terrifyingly dark – progress down the biggest hill of the commute.

Five minutes of searching for the remains proved conclusively a rear light maketh not a useful torch. I slunk home, hit the shower and grumped workwards into the car. It’s taken me all this time to raise the enthusiasm to try again. And the faint hope of a repeat sunrise was dashed by the kind of drizzle that doubles suicide rates.

First I was too cold, then too hot, then a bit frightened on dropped bars and wet roads. It was one of those mornings where getting on with it distills simply into counting the alternatives, and finding none.

But then days like this remind me that the choice is really between being dry and warm now or fit and fast come spring. And with a 1000 feet of climbing on silly racing ratios, even one or two twenty five mile commutes a week are going to put me firmly in the second category.

And even when it’s all gone a bit dark and horrible, there’s always a guilt free bacon sandwich to look forward to. Or possibly two – this kind of physique doesn’t come without sacrifices!

An accident waiting to happen.

On By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding, Photography2 Comments

Bit chilly, very windy, much fun.

A statement that well describes both an elongated plunge into a handy bush, and the dreadful way I dispatched a vast quantity of decent red, the evening before. The two may have been related. A weekend of much alcohol occasionally interrupted by riding was both fantastic and slightly frustrating.

Before I suffered serial navigational confusion, a tree accosted my riding person and threw me into the squidgy dirt. This was merely an end game which was nicely set up by fat floaty tyres, a trail of tractionless mud, a head still more drunk than hungover and the unpleasant sensation that you’re no longer in charge of the steering.

I’m fine thanks for asking, but still a bit confused.

You see back in the Chilterns, I knew most of the good stuff. Where to ride when it was gloopy – so that’s nine months of the year then – the best descents, the cheeky trails and when it was safe to ride them. Here, I’m still a bit of a trail remembering novice and, with my legendary navigational skills, getting lost happens always as often as getting it right.

None of this is helped by generally riding with people who know where they are going. And mainly in the dark. Attempting to translate light strobed memories into confident trail finding was about as successful as failing to open that ‘last’ bottle of wine. Although the Malverns – with the help of young whippersnapper Tim – was not so much of a problem as the Forest of Dean the following day.

Although “not so much of a problem” may not be an entirely accurate description of “er, hang on fellas, left here. No right, no straight on, ah that’s a quarry is it, right definitely left” and “bloody hell, it all looks a bit different in the light“. A hangover sharp enough to shave with wasn’t the best sidekick for a day when I was nominally in charge.

The Forest of Dean held no such fears. I didn’t even pretend to know my way around there. After a night of incessant rain, the mud was almost as constant as the rubbishness of my route finding. After the Malvern ride, the bikes were merely wiped down to remove splatters of dirt. Once we’d slopped back to the Cafe in the Forest, a full on hose down and relube was required. And that was just the riders.

It’s made me more determined to get out and get exploring even when the weather edges to the increasingly ploppy. Once you’re up to your armpits in winter vegetation, and properly lost half way down a steep hill, getting wet and cold are mere bagatelles to the main problems at hand.

On the upside, I was super confident in the twisties of the wine cupboard, and showed great bravery when presented with a line of difficult beers. Tomorrow I’m going to ride to work and if I don’t arrive, I can probably be found looking lost and confused on the road to Hereford.

Guess what?

On By AlexIn Bikes6 Comments

I’ve bought it! Mike is going to brew me up a rear hoop through the alchemetic art of wheelbuilding, and also provide some pre-loved spiky things to attach pedals then legs too. And I have found some brakes in my spares bin that I cannot remember ever owning.

So either I have been “Sleep-Thieving” or a hole has been wrenched asunder in the space time continuum. Smack bang in the centre of the “Jiffy Bag Of Unknown Bicycle Spares“. I’m basically short of just an 8 speed cassette and a 27.0 seatpost. A delve in the grotty aperture of doom still raises enough stuff to build something else.

Assuming that something else needs three handlebars, two saddles, no transmission and just the one wheel. I think we’re into the realms of a unicycle here.

Things left to do? Well apart from carefully build it when all the bit converge on a time poor Al. Tell Carol, really mustn’t forget that bit.

It must be the cold.

On By AlexIn Bikes, Photography16 Comments

Because what other reason could there be to find myself stroking the monitor, when I saw this:

1993 Kona. Also known as Als Insanity
1993 Kona. Also known as "Al's Insanity"

I used to have a really nice Kona but sold it when the Emperor turned up with some new threads. That one up there is even older. About 1993, which is WAY before I even started riding Mountain Bikes. Although those of you privileged to have seen me ride would probably prefer the more accurate “Short legged man being inconvenienced by a bicycle”

This one was built before the advent of suspension forks, fat tyres and the marketing fallacy that without a ‘integrated component stack of class leading technology” you would die the instant you hit the trails.

It is not without problems. Some of them are technical around old standards and the need for some advanced shed-bodgery. Others are more ethereal, but rooted in a houseful of bikes already and the proximity of a rolling pin. After the Pace, I said no more. Then I bought the Jake. Which reminded me how good Kona’s are.

You see. It’s not my fault. And I have a whole box full of spares – okay none of which will actually fit but that’s just you lot being negative.  Shame on you. Anyway I’m going to sell the Roadrat. And some pedals. So basically we’re looking at the financial instrument of extreme dubiousness “Cost Neutral”.

In no way related new,  those of you wish to read something that is not merely an electronic prod to my vanity, try my friend Alan’s blog. He doesn’t write much but what he does makes good sense. Almost the opposite to me then 🙂

Next time..

On By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding1 Comment

… I’ll walk the dog. 7PM yesterday evening, some confusion about whose turn it was to drag Smurf The Smelly around the local field. I wasn’t keen due to an appointment with some snow, mud and cold – all wrapped up in a dark and windy night – starting about now. Carol wasn’t keen on the grounds she was warm and dry in the house. The dog – frankly – didn’t look up for it either.

Shirker of responsibilities that I am, I left them to it and headed out into a night about as wild and dangerous as a saloon bar in Goldrushtown, Gunsville, USA back in the early 1900s.” The ride started drizzly with a stiff north wind belying the above zero temperatures. Half way up the first climb, I felt about as overdressed as an Oscar Nominee at a Cage Fight, with sweat from the inside vying for “Dampest Thing on Al” against the increasingly persistent rain.

An hour later I was congratulating myself on three layers, all of the outer ones waterproof, buff, thick gloves and clear glasses. However that was somewhat accentuating the positive ,as we slogged up wet grass in a weather event dangerously close to a full on gale. The God of Darkness is a vengeful deity – he taketh away traction and warmth before even handedly chucking in horizontal sleet and a clump of unwanted chainsuck.

We’d already been within tree striking distance of some big accidents, travelling horizontally off roots and having less steering input than a sleeping passenger. There was unclipping here, facebush(tm) over here, and an undertone of grumpythermia* as a sleet battered route conference insanely selected a long route home over high ridges.

A decision that left us unprotected by the shoulder of the hill, and climbing on increasingly snowy paths that limited both grip and visibility. The latter was less of an issue what with the icy wind driving spiteful sleet into a faceful of numb and squint.” The descent was even more amusing with a desperation to get off the summit tempered by not actually being able to see where you were going.

I pointed the light directly at the front wheel to try and give me something to work with. But it was just placebo, and the route down was a full on trials brake-squint-deep breath-roll effort. In a further moment of madness, it was decided that we’d have a crack at one more big climb. And why not since we were already cold, piss wet through and head-to-toe muddy?

This proved an incautious decision as the now settled snow sucked power from your legs and traction from your tyres. The descent was nothing more than a “just get me out of here alive, I’ll vote Liberal, I’ll start going to Church, just get me OFF THIS SODDING HILL“. Sanity returned in the guise of a soul destroying drop back onto tarmac, losing painfully gained height but preserving sufficient core temperature to stave off proper hypothermia.

The ride home through freezing puddles and proper full on stormy rain actually wasn’t that bad after the horror of the previous hour. And when I’m sprinting up the climbs next spring and snaking down dusty singeltrack, nights like that will return more than they took. But as I shivered in my car, with the heater on full blast and the sky exploding overhead, I couldn’t help thinking:

“I should have walked the bloody dog”

* A sub symptom of hypothermia bringing together the coldness of all extremities with the unhappiness of being stuck outside in a pissing storm.

Earthquake!

On By AlexIn Other stuffLeave a comment

Not the sound of Random attempting to combine “quiet” and “stairs“. I discounted that having established we were all in the same room, yet there was a trembly rumble that can be best described as a train passing through Platform 1, Our bedroom at speed.

Only later did I find out we’d been somewhere close to the epicentre of a proper earthquake, although I’m still suspicious of the cause. We’re smack bang in the middle of a rather large tectonic plate here, but not too far away from lots of drunk people falling over in Birmingham.

Co-incidence? I’m not sure. Anyway, just thought you’d like to know we’re all still alive and, from what I can see, the house has the same number of walls as it did pre-shudder. That’s the good news, the bad news is I’m back at work and shall be spending the entire day really adding value to the firm, by reading and deleting 180 emails.

I shall be nominating myself as leader of a World Dictator Priority Committee establishing new rules on “talking to people when you want to find something out“. A sub group shall be recommending penalties for anyone sending out pointless emails to 20 people and asking for comments. I will be pushing back on anything less stringent than “instant and painful death“.

As my mum is on holiday….

On By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding, Photography3 Comments
From Flickr Images. Random bloke giving it large
From Flickr Images. Random bloke giving it large

… May I be allowed a “FUCKING HELL THAT WAS JUST BLOODY FANTASTIC” ? Thank you.” But I cannot really tell you quite how good that was because a) I am so happy to be still alive and b) I don’t really have the words to adequately describe the feeling of mainlining adrenaline.

Cwmcarn Uplift Day Cwmcarn Uplift Day

Five minutes of riding downhill with your bollocks on fire* packs in a whole lot of life events. A gamut of emotions rollercoasting from joy to abject terror accompanied by a staccato commentary “fuck, get a grip, get inside that bloody corner, pump that, jump that, back back back some more that’s steep, fuck fuck fuck that’s rocky, get off those bloody brakes, let it go, breathe, breathe, breathe”

Cwmcarn Uplift Day Cwmcarn Uplift Day

Chasing your friends is a big part of the fun, having the same limb count at the bottom is some of the rest. The course is not hardcore compared to some of the rockfests in Scotland, but if you take liberties, it’ll respond brusquely by trying to kill you. Near the end of our seventh run, I thought I had it’s measure and went for some stuff that quickly proved I didn’t.

Cwmcarn Uplift Day Cwmcarn Uplift Day (27 of 24)

We failed to crack the five minute barrier but it’ll definitely go. And the burly bike build is staying. Okay I may remove the elephant prophylactics masquerading as inner tubes, but the rest makes the whole package just so much fucking fun at a speed on the margin of fear and unreconstructed joy.

Blasting out on the Van stereo, as we ascended for our last run, was Bono lamenting he’d yet to find what he was looking for. Looking at the bike shadows cast by the falling sun, I think maybe I already have.

* this is a metaphor. Although those DH boys were suspiciously messing around with their ciggy lighters at the top.