Video Killed the Radio Star.

On January 9, 2007March 30, 2007 By AlexIn Bikes, Pretentious nonsense3 Comments

I’m sat on the train encased firstly by the lowest cost bidders steel shell and, secondly by a squawking aviary of electronic Christmas presents. To my left Video I-Prods, to my right manically tilted Sony PSPs and up front the irksome warble of Mario on steroids forced out of tiny Nintendo speakers. This cacophony of polyphonics is nutritionally accompanied by Resolution Salads prepared for those desperately exercising with all the effort a blistered thumb can offer.

Give it a month and the disagreeable smell of second hand vegetables will be replaced by the warm fug of Ginster’s pasties and half eaten Mars Bars. But right now I’m feeling worthy having endured my first visit to the pub since I gave up.

Gave up what I hear you ask “ surely not the Al-defining beer that is an essential component of a complex, but often misunderstood, athletic dietary plan? Well no, of course not “ I’m talking of the drinking equivalent of the Scottish Play; the cigarette. With the Government flipping smoking from social to antisocial at the start of July, this seemed an opportune moment to abandon the cheeky fag, or cancer stick as I’m increasingly coming to think of it.

I’ve never smoked properly “ well you wouldn’t would you as it’s unhealthy and potentially life threatening. But I started early at about eighteen, unbelievably believing it was somehow cool and, more importantly, adult. What followed was twenty years of packing up for long periods interspersed with a hardcore twenty a day habit in that happy twenties phase when you believe yourself immortal. I stopped for good once the birth of our first kid belatedly delivered maturity and parental responsibility in equally unwanted measures.

Well sort of. The odd cheeky cigar or a drunken assault on a packet of twenty doesn’t really count especially if one is vested with the willpower of a moth answering the siren call of a thousand watt lamp. But as a diagnosed asthmatic, smoking is pretty stupid if being around to watch your kids grow up forms any part of your life goals. So I counted this as stopping for a given value of quitting.

And then I sort of started again but “ as you would expect “ this is in no way my fault. We’re kind of the Arsenal of the Professional Services firms with an embedded drinking culture. And with a beer came the offered cigarette that soon became two, three and then ten. This habit never really extended beyond opening hours but a habit it was and self loathing followed me home after every cigarette.

So I was already determined to stop even before mono-lung bullied squatting rights, insidiously pushing out my previously working oxygen chambers. And it’s a perfect irony that my breathlessness coincided exactly with the quitting date of December 19^th, 2006. But whatever, that’s a date going down in stone so they don’t have to inscribe one for me too soon – if you get my drift.

From this I surmised one of two things; either it was too late and “ to take a phrase from a respected medical dictionary “ I was fucked or that this was a warning, a bullet just dodged, a simple truth that this level of bodily abuse was in no way carbon balanced by a bit of cycling.

I haven’t wanted a fag since but tonight I needed a beer and so horns with locked with the nemesis of the quitters. The inaugural meeting of Smokers Anonymous (Strand Chapter) dived deep into a therapy session admitting to weight gain, increased appetite and an increasingly desperate yearning to smoke a beer-mat.

Leaving after a couple (of beers, not barely combustible beer mats), I jumped on the bike donning the guise of an untroubled commuter. Racing was now a jolly jape for younger men “ I would instead perambulate with all the haste of a man heading to the dentist’s chair to face painful root canal surgery.

All was good, my progress was serene, the weather unseasonably warm, my lungs unbothered by any of that sprinting nonsense and my legs turning easy circles. And then “ because God hates me “ lurching past was nothing less than Lucifer’s folding chariot. Arrange these words into a well known phrase or saying. Bull. Red Rag. To. A.

I wanted to dump the bike in the middle of the road and scream an wretched entreaty to the sky FUCK FUCK FUCK “ WHAT DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS? WHY WHY WHY HAVEN’T I SUFFERED ENOUGH?“

But I didn’t, I did this instead: brain uninvolved with the kraken like awakening of twitching muscles, I was instantly out of the saddle snicking a couple of gears and straightlining the entrance to Hyde Park. The race was on.

I locked onto his plethora of red LED’s which put me in mind of the emergency ward I’d probably end up in. But to my intense surprise, the allegedly problem lungs oxygenated frantically gulped air to the power of my competitive gland. Muscles suffused with pure o2 span ever bigger gears and he was gone, gone, gone in the beat of a rampaging heart.

But this wasn’t enough and because there was more, I sprinted on even though a small accountant process was screaming that I probably shouldn’t. But I was high on how it feels to be fast; the unadulterated joy of working your body hard, pushing swift circles while perfectly balanced between pedals and bars. Sometimes your heart takes flight and you have to bottle that feeling, guard it carefully and only let it seep out in your darkest hours. It’s the stuff of life.

Sadly this metamorphis didn’t last long and on locking up the bike a few minutes later, I was suffering a bit. But that’s ok, because in that glimpse of something I’ve always taken for granted told me more than any shocking advert or government warning ever could that the time has come to stop. For good. It feels like crossing the last river to adulthood. Gulp.

Oh and the title? It popped into my ears when surrounded by the emperor’s new toys on the train. A small prize if you can name the artist. And no Googling because I’ll know 🙂

I’m turbo powered!

On January 7, 2007March 30, 2007 By AlexIn Bikes, Road Riding7 Comments

Have you looked outside lately? The country appears to be mainly underwater although there is a jolly jest doing the rounds that the hosepipe ban is still in force. Although exactly what purpose artificial rain could perform is somewhat beyond me since everything outside is sodden and gloopy. And if you happen to be lucky enough to have a roof like ours, quite a lot of inside as well.

So all new for 2007, indoor riding is where it’s at. What other riding experience delivers a warm, dry and windless environment? Well summer of course but that’s almost years away and how would you feel careering downhill at 25mph+ while watching a DVD or reading a book? Broken and stupid, that’s how you’d feel.

That’s why I’ve borrowed a friend’s turbo trainer and by cunningly sequencing MTB DVD’s on the PC, a new riding style has been born. One could reasonably argue that spending an hour riding while traveling precisely nowhere is rather pointless but then I say again- have you looked outside?”

It’s all a bit more structured than passing a couple of grunting and wheezing hours before the pubs open. Dusting off the heart rate monitor and actually researching how one is actually meant to utilise such a heathen device was an eye opening experience. My previous regime of just riding as hard as possible until either you bested your opponent or you’ve died trying was conspicuously missing from the fitness book of words. Except for the bit that says if you do this, you will get sick although we barely need to mention this as nobody is that stupid“.

/Waves.

There’s a plethora of conflicting information awaiting the unwary internet browser much of it I’ll file under the heading obsessed body Nazi’sï¿½?. However, it’s become clear that pedalling like a cocaine fuelled hamster until your heart attempts to rip itself out of your chest and black spots descend before your eyes may not be the elixir to long life and happiness.

So shuffle for rock music, stuff in the earphones and hit play on the DVD player before gentle pedalling prepares your heart for some three figure action. As your ramp up the revolutions, sweat rapidly exits every pore and rapidly creates an inland lake where the floor used to be. An hour is all you need and that’s sixty dull minutes you’ll never get back but it’s obviously been of use since you stagger off the bike having lost the use of your legs. The following hour or so could easily fill a wild west film sequence where the director is keen to show how an aged cowboy may walk after a few days in the saddle.

But let’s be clear, it’s not training. The great thing about the bike being clamped into the turbo means I can’t go and ride it on the road. And although my personal targets involve reclaiming “ by bloody minded force if necessary “ my 38 year old lung capacity and possibly shedding a little of the mid life, mid body excess, this does in no way constitute some kind of structured plan. Because sad old roadies do that and I’m only two of those things.

And the final benefit? You get to where all that old cross country Lycra without anyone outside chortling as your gut crests the waistband. I know it’s wrong but it feels so right 🙂

Sod the expense, feel the quality

On December 31, 2006December 13, 2008 By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding3 Comments

Our mini roadtrip consisted of 360 miles, one night in a bed and breakfast, one curry in the terrifying post apocalyptic horror that is Maesteg and various cakes, coffees and beers. Oh and an epic 14 miles riding. That works out about £3 a mile and you could run a Challenger tank on that.

There are mitigating circumstances. Firstly daylight is something that only happens in seasons other than winter. There is a counter argument which goes something like “well you have a set of very expensive lights you could use when it gets dark”. That’s all very well but a dark, cold Welsh forest in the middle of winter inhabited by things that may kill you or at least deliver a light mugging, is not my idea of fun when the option is warmth, light and beer.

Obviously we could have set off earlier but that would have removed one of my excuses for not wanting to ride more than once. MonoLung(tm) and heavy bikes mix as well as Relatives and Christmas. Uphill was actually ok as I’ve learnt to manage my lungs when Asthma strikes. Downhill, working hard to get the most out of the bike, left me breathless and stationary at the side of the trail.

Still it gave me time to wonder how the route could be so dry and so much fun. Man made trails are great in winter, they offer a consistency of experience regardless of the weather. There was plenty of grip and not many people which makes for great riding between desperate gasps for a lungful of clear air.

So once the man with the bike carrying van said no and the night plunged down the hill, we abandoned any thought of riding and instead dreamt of edible recompense for our awesome calorific efforts earlier. A sweep of the local offerings suggested no one in South Wales eats outside their own houses until March. We resorted to a meandering trip through the nearby ex-mining town of Maesteg, which told me everything I didn’t want to know about what happens when an industry dies. Streets full of thrift shops, boarded up buildings and really quite scary eyeballing young people.

Still we ate like kings for a tenner each and were burpingly joyful on returning to the car and finding it still had all the wheels attached. We talked long of a big day out tomorrow and slept the sleep of the worthy.

Unfortunately 8am brought Noah out looking for a lost giraffe.

We bought coffee and watched DVDs in the cafe and silently hoped neither of us really wanted to go out and drown. Eventually we abandoned any pretence of riding in Wales, perambulating in a ziggyzag fashion back to Oxford via other possible riding spots. All of which looked fantastic if your imagination could insert “dry, warm and summery” when your eyes reported “slippy, wet and bloody freezing”.

I felt a little guilty about the whole thing until it occurred to me what a great mood had now rolled over my previously miserable form. I didn’t feel any better physically but mentally the excesses of the holiday period had been properly cleansed.

It’s still cold outside but the rain has stopped and the wind died down to a point where I no longer fear for the fence. I think I’ll take monolung out for a gentle ride.

Too Posh To Push.

On December 27, 2006December 27, 2006 By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding2 Comments

My preparations for dragging my post festivities body pedalling a pre festivities new bike have been somewhat hampered by a medical complaint. It’s properly medical and I’ve certainly been doing all the complaining and quite right too. What one hand giveth, the other snatches away which medically transpires to a bastard snotty cold and the removal of a lung. The cold has taken up residence in my nose, head and, bizarrely, ears. It clearly intends to outstay it’s welcome sometime even past that of my in-laws. The lung has gone the other way, ravaged by winter Asthma and offering all the oxygenating possibilities of a moist paper bag.

I’m wondering what the cycling equivalent of a cesarean section is. Although there may not be an obvious parallel with those ladies who insist on having their vital internal organs rummaged through in a find the baby? game. But I too am too posh to push? and riding uphill? in this state is nothing more than twisted tautology. If I am to be spared, the nice man with the uplift truck will be operating, otherwise I feel I may be measuring myself up for something sturdy and long lasting. In pine.

But I’m going anyway. One because there’s at least a single Alex based anatomical feature that resembles a mule and, two, after a week cooped up with small children and latterly annoying relatives, the option is some extreme body burying patio action.

My role during this season of goodwill to almost nobody has been to remove the kids from the chimney on Christmas Eve while my wife has done everything else. This may seem a rather disproportional split but when you consider our chimney is buried behind a foot of plaster and two expensive kitchen cabinets, the split of resources suddenly becomes fairer.

Still on the upside, I bribed them to clean my bike.

Right dad, which bit do I wire brush?

They didn’t do a great job but at least it gave Carol sufficient time to relocate the remaining strands of her sanity. How’s she survived two small children and one rather larger (lager?) one for the last week is a mystery to me. She seems quite keen for me to bugger off though, which may or may not be unrelated to her studious examination of our life insurance documents.

Christmas Bonus

On December 24, 2006December 24, 2006 By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding3 Comments

In that I managed to go riding before the onset of delirium, tedium and bedlam, as I naughtily consider my relatives. When the foggy stopping distances flipped from imperial to metric, we made haste in a northerly direction to the Freeride Mecca that is Chicksands. A pagentastic Saturday worship delivered a little mud, tacky but limitless grip and but a few other apostles. Our tempting apple was a warm car when compared to a cold outside, partially frozen beneath a steel gray sky.

But there’s only so long one can stare vacantly at a muddy field enlivened only by the pinging of a fast cooling engine before boredom takes hold. Closely followed by instant frostbite as cold metal stings warm flesh. Eventually after the ten commandments of faffing (of which more at some later day) had been completed, a worthy band of five went searching for the last ladder before Christmas.

Soon our Judas had been outed after declaring himself broken. In an attempt to protect a recently healed fracture on his wrist he performed an experimental dismount on the wooden Shore. His wrist survived but the deceleration trauma on his chest and face somewhat compromised the benefits. The rest of us complained of a litany of ailments raging from fear to hangover passing through cold, apathy and asthma. I was replete with the full set and things weren’t really going to plan until a quick suspension service at fettle central improves the bike if not the rider.

Nice Trousers!

Close your eyes and pray

Continue reading “Christmas Bonus” →

Wow. A mountain bike post.

On December 22, 2006December 24, 2006 By AlexIn Bikes, Mountain Bike Riding7 Comments

It’s been a source of some gratification that I’ve seamlessly transplanted my rambling style from mountain bikes to all manner of other nonsense. Bypassing the old adage to write about what you know, instead I’ve written a shit load of drivel about stuff I know nothing about. What’s even more surprising is that you lot keep coming back to read it. I’m not sure if that’s encouraging or just plain scary.

Anyway, with a barn load of bikes and little excuse not to go riding, last weekend provided the perfect early winters day to detox my pie laden body. For reasons of apathy and antipathy, the core of my riding cluster has imploded to just the Bracknell Two?. Both riding proper manly hardtails but ensuing the lentalist nonsense that is singlespeeding to the power or retro. Honestly, the car park was littered with these machines lacking suspension, decent brakes and any form of obvious enjoyment.

It’s like the ancient sixties car population in Cuba except without any vestige of cool. Still I soon found myself cursing their simple, if difficult to pedal transmission, as rain soaked trails dispatched my gears to a dark and muddy place. My friend was suffering almost not as all since he has one of these fancy internal hub gears, and hadn’t spent a couple of hours fixing his bike the previous night. Yet again, in the face of all historical precedent, spanners were twirled with wild abandon in the mythical search for mechanical perfection.

Actual result in the cold, sober morning light was nothing more than a loose connection between shifting and gears. Cogs refused to engage as I desperately thumbed the shifter, and then viciously dropped three gears when I stamped angrily on the pedals. Luckily I was saved from a difficult head first dismount by a stout contact between helmet and handlebar.

Meanwhile, Nige having no trouble with the Cannondale Bastard? (so named because various non standard parts have been carefully angle grinded onto it’s once pristine frame) whooping and swooping through the slippy singletrack with nary a slip of gear of tyre.

Continue reading “Wow. A mountain bike post.” →

Today is the shortest day

On December 21, 2006March 30, 2007 By AlexIn Pretentious nonsense4 Comments

Except it isn’t. The planetary tilt and the elliptical arc of the sun combine to shorten the days from the front, while sluggishly extending the daylight past four o’clock. But the facts are unimportant here, the Winter solstice is the cyclists’ poster child for lighter times ahead and represents the diametrically opposite emotion to the longest day.

But this day of little daylight has heralded the onset of winter which got in on the act a couple of days earlier. Outside of my window, Mandelbrot spirals are iced into spiders webs and a windless sky clamps the country in dense and freezing fog.

According to the Met Office, this is officially a good thing after an Autumn dominated by heavy rainfall and worrying temperatures. Apparently this was the warmest pre-winter season since records began, so in search of statistical satisfaction, I trawled through my own ride diaries for the last two years.

Abridging the raw data shows 2005 as bloody cold” and 2006 as bloody wet“. So we’re either facing a abnormal meteorological spike or the planet’s about to explode. Either way, the results are all around us with normally snow capped alpine peaks barely dusted with the white stuff.

I was proud of our stunningly proportional response to the devastating environment impact of human colonisation on a once unbroken world. Rather than showing one second of humility and searching for something in our life that stays our voracious appetite for destruction, instead we jump on the winged nemesis of polar ice caps and fly to North America where the snow is still falling.

Stewardship of the world for the next generations? I think probably not then. So maybe that’s what the airport closing fog is all about “ the planet has decided to take the matter into it’s own hands. If there is some precise smiting of the environmental disaster that defines many of the leaders of the free world, it could just be onto something.

And another thing…

On December 16, 2006December 15, 2006 By AlexIn Bikes, Road Riding3 Comments

Ranting is about the easiest thing to do at this time of year; to your right a barrel of fish, to your left a shotgun. I did consider an electronic screech at the political correctness of office decorations but obviously The Sun could do it so much better. So instead, two more bad apples in the bag of all things commuting shall be cast out into the virtual compost heap.

Firstly pretend Policemen who, having narrowly failed to scrape in last time, wrongly escaped a righteous bruising. This part time ponces exist in the high-viz netherworld between security guards and traffic wardens. They can be easily spotted by some physical manifestation of the reason that even the hardly fastidious MET refused to employ them. This may be a forty inch waist, a sixty year age or a hundred fat chips on a shoulder.

They swagger around, accessorised by pathetic facsimiles of those bobbies gainfully employed, directing traffic, persecuting cyclists and being laughed at. And they have an image problem which isn’t going anywhere even with a name change. Special Constables became Community Support Police but this doesn’t hide a certain twisted desire to come home from work and put on another tie.

And because catching real criminals is difficult, instead they criminalise those they can catch. Including cyclists who perform acts of terrorism including running red lights, borrowing a bit of pavement to make a gap and answering back. In a year of yellow jacket overload, I’ve yet to see these sanctimonious busybodies do anything useful at all. And don’t give me this shit that they’re unpaid volunteers until you’ve asked yourself why that may be. No real friends and absence of personality ticks all the boxes for a bloke trying to bridge communities doesn’t it?

Citizen arrests and vigilante groups won’t solve the problem either but at least they’re a bit better dressed. More proper police please. And maybe we’ll take them seriously.

Secondly scooters. Specifically scooters not motorbikes and that’s an important distinction. Modern motorcycles are urban missiles piloted by a similar breed to us – living by the staying alive traffic rules. Scooters are normally driven by people in suits who lack the spacial awareness which would otherwise allow them to weave into gaps. Instead they just park up the arse crack of two stationary cars and we’re forced to queue behind them. And apart from that they’re just rubbish aren’t they? Fashionable in Milan, ludicrous in London and out-accelerated by anything with a pulse.

My motivation needs recharging so it’s with a happy grimace that my final 06 commute finished this week. I’ll leave you with a quote from a fellow street-lifer which neatly encapsulates my thoughts for riding through the winter.

When you’re thinking this crap about ‘might as well have another hour in bed’, remember that you’re actually already awake, and you’re not actually going to sleep for the next hour, you’re just going to try for a fumble, get denied, and get lie there watching the clock ticking down to he next ‘getting up’ point. Get up and ride instead?

Naive Nativity

On December 15, 2006December 10, 2008 By AlexIn Other stuff, Pretentious nonsenseLeave a comment

Random and Verbal attend a proper Church Of England School. Proper in that it shuns any of that modern multi-denomination malarkey, instead brainwashing pliable minds and demonising other faiths. Okay, it’s not quite that bad but the annual nativity play is straight down the line Christian dogma with a few hedgehogs (honestly!) thrown in to provide amusement.

The intake is predominantly white and while that feels like a bad thing, there is no way I am getting into an argument about it on here. But in what must have been an inspired piece of casting, the little Muslim fella was cast as a King from the East. He did look a bit confused though when, twenty minutes in, he was surrounded by farm animals, a small baby doll and not even the slightest mention of Muhammad.

The kids are amazingly precocious – all aged between five and seven-“ able to recite dialogue from memory and sing many songs all in cute harmonies. And their accompanying hand actions are a joy to watch, especially when it all goes wrong and Rebecca from class R inadvertently pokes the teacher in the ear.

Random was a Star (literally) this year pirouetting around the stage while marshalling the first year kids. She looked remarkably assured and rather tall which came as a bit of a shock really – I mean are they meant to grow up this fast?

Verbal on the other hand has not inherited her Dad’s “Everyone! Look at ME” persona and so last week’s piano recital was met with much pre-angst and blood draining worry. I was watching through the steepled fingers of the truly terrified because I so wanted her to be ok. Not good you understand, just not stage frozen and traumatised. She gave me a look, that belied her tender seven years, which translated to “Dad, I’m shitting the bed here”

But she was great. Sure she missed some notes and so it was a contemporary take on Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, but it was worth all the naked terror to see how rightly proud she was.

The problem with the school hall = other than the smell which transports you back thirty years and has you wondering if you’d done your homework-“ is the dust and grit that flies about. On both occasions where the kids have been performing, something’s stuck in my eye and caused it to water. Odd that.

Still It’s the Christmas Disco tonight. Which allows for me to smuggle in a couple of cans of lager and check out whether the poor bairns do in fact dance like their dad.

The Office Christmas Party….

On December 14, 2006December 15, 2006 By AlexIn Other stuff, Pretentious nonsense2 Comments

… was this week and I didn’t go. Having never been to the firm’s bash, I’ve no idea if it mimics the social car crash of almost every one I did attend. But I decided not to risk it.

And this is almost entirely due to my ground state of ˜grumpy bastard‘. However it also breaks Al’s Life Rule #1 which, while complex and erudite, can be simply distilled to Life’s to short to drink with arseholes?. It’d be plain wrong to suggest everyone who shares my workplace – especially those who are privy to the scribblings of the hedgehog and to you I extend a wavey hello, nice to know we’re all in this shit together eh?? “ is an irritating nonce with the social panache of a special needs gerbil, but you know how it is.

You don’t? Ok, Christmas parties pay direct homage to their clichÃ©d stereotype, where a largely dysfunctional flange of those battered by a year of sneering, bullshiting and lying are liberally doused with alcohol and flung together in a seething mass of petty rivalry, sweat and imagined slights. Is it any wonder that every sane man would light the blue touch paper before running away at top speed? Slipped of the leash of corporate responsibility and rendered fearless on gassy lager, it’s only a matter of time before a testosteroned swagger across the dance floor ends in a slurred Hey mate, you’re such a useless wanker and annoying little shit. I’ve hated you for ever and at last years party shagged your other half. What do you think of that then eh? Wanna make something of it??.

Insults are screamed; first pushes and then punches are traded. Security are called just before someone slings a drunken arm round the protagonist and offers that most anodyne of beery advice not worf it mate, just not worf it?.

And that’s just the women.

Continue reading “The Office Christmas Party….” →