From my friend Will who clearly has an eye for the strangely relevant.
I never really understood that question anyway. I mean compared to what? I guess for women it might be Childbirth, but for blokes you’re never going to say more than a 3 are you even if the limb in question is hanging on by a single bloodied ligament.
Ho Hum, it’s the weekend and with my painting arm out of action, it should be a nice relaxing one. Unless riding with Random tomorrow somehow ends up with me elbow down in the shrubbery.
I didn’t post the picture of my “organic body armour”. Definitely need to turn safe search on for that. A chunk of the right side of the honed athletic frame / mildly chubby middle area splashed down in the crash is missing.
In its’ place are large red wields, yellow and purple bruising and stitches. Plus some assorted scarring that seems to doing it’s best to complete a large join the bloody dots puzzle.
After that description, might’ve be better just to post it 😉
Sore today in case you’re interested. Bruising in all the obvious places, some swelling which isn’t as exciting as it sounds. Thankfully my backup drinking arm is in full working order. In fact I am somewhat over engineered in terms of Disaster Recovery for getting my wine quota. Probably end up hacking it off in the next crash in a “value engineering” approach to riding.
In case the “God of Crashing” is on-line, I AM JUST JOKING. No more accidents this year please, I have a low pain/boredom threshold.
That’s me. A week of unspecified lurgy has kept me off the bike and in the shed. I am getting very twitchy about not riding, especially as March was another (modest) record in terms of distance and saddle time.
It’s all gone to poo tho. Cough, Bunged up head, snot everywhere and a throat that feels like it’s been sanded. It’s a possibility since everything else from the dog upwards has been given a good lashing of balsa dust this weekend.
Well enough to play with toy gliders, not well enough to mow the lawn. That’s my self-certified medical diagnosis. That glider is a Slingsby Capstan. My dad had a share in a full size one when I was no’but a nipper, and I had many vertigo-challenged hours in the co-plilot’s seat looking down at the ground and wondering when we were going to hit it.
We built the model as well. Must be – FLIPPING HELL – thirty years ago. Shit, there’s no way of saying that without instantly appending “you old fcker” is there? We didn’t really know what we were doing so the poor thing was beaten to death by Yorkshire stone. I don’t think we ever had the courage to chuck it off the edge, instead darting it into rocky scenery and innocent bystanders.
The company that made them went out of business years ago, but some enterprising young turks bought the plans and moulds and for£70 dealt out wingy nostalgia for those of a certain age. Carol bought me one for my birthday last year, but only now have I had the time to get jiggy with the sanding block.
The original seemed to take about a year to build. And about a 10th of that to destroy. My skills in both those areas are still about the same – so although it looks mostly glider shaped, it’s not been all plane sanding. Luckily Carol is on hand to help me with the difficult bits, and talk me out of apply powertools to any problem that takes more than 10 seconds to rectify.
I’m sort of embarrassed to admit that rebuilding my youth has been mostly good fun. Sure I’ve ingested around a kilo of second hand balsa, and invested time really that could have been spent doing almost anything more useful, but it’s therapy of a sort.
Man has cold. Man has shed. Man has mug of tea. Man has all sorts of tools, some of which he knows the purpose of. Man has things to build and instructions to ignore. Man has decent enough time while wondering if sympathy of family might extend to some fortifying cake.
Better be better next week. Once I’ve finished this, Carol will probably feel I’ve learned skills useful for general repair work and specific bevelling.
All Carol’s work of course 🙂 You have to admit it’s everything a monster from the enormous exterior footprint, to the capacious inner space separated into handy compartments; important people, small people, wine, food and dog.
Or possibly not dog. Our first family camping experiment was experienced in a retro-bell tent much loved for it’s height and space, but falling down on single living space and – nearly – due to rubbish pegging and a strong wind.
Murf was even more bionic back then; on waking at around 5:30am he’d meet the morn with a moist sniff of all pack members, finishing off with a sloppy lick roughly translated as “C’mon it’s MORNING, Let’s GO“.
To be startled from sleep by that hot breath, at the business end of a large black two holed snout, put me in mind of being woken by Darth Vader. There is also the small matter of my not so small 4×4 being squeezed seam-full of family, camping stuff, tent, emergency medical supplies* and squashed Labrador.
This – I think – gives me absolute carte blanche to go and buy a trailer. If nothing else it’ll make the trip out to our campsite a bit quieter. assuming the tarp keeps the kids inside. So£50 well spent I am sure on this pre-loved mostly mobile house. No idea how long it took to build, but next time it’ll probably be less than half a day, especially if the children aren’t involved in “helping” at all apparently.
An inaugural outing is loosely planned over Easter way out west on the “Welsh Riviera“. Where there are fabulous beaches, lots of fun hidden coves, great little eateries and an entire lack of anyone from London.
Apparently crumbly cliffs rear over these beaches, flat topped with soft meadows providing an idyllic spot for family picnics. By a strange co-incidence, these jutted butresses are also one of the very best sites to chuck toy gliders into a setting sun. Really, how lucky is that?
Got tent. Booked Holiday. Planned for dog abandonment. Just Spring left to turn up and we’re good to go.
* Comes in bottles. Normally Red. Always more than one.
Birmingham International airport has one very big thing going for it, it is not Heathrow. So the experience is marginally less unpleasant, slightly quicker and dispatched under the generally cheery auspices of officiating brummies.
But I don’t want to accentuate the positive here; it’s still fundamentally a dreadful way to travel. Not only did I map out the ten hour trip to Amsterdam by car, I very nearly grabbed my passport, a wad of tunnel funds and some pro-plus in order to drive there. I’m still not sure it was the right decision to fly.
Of the many horrors awaiting anyone careless enough to be trapped in a major Airport orbit, a prize for the most demeaning, pointless and wasting of time has to be the security checks. First let’s do pointless – actually let’s not because Bruce Schneier is significantly better informed and qualified that me.
Demeaning? Absolutely. It’s actually kind of interesting to watch a self-referential business person transformed to mumbling apologist on removal of their suited armour. Clothes maketh the man (or – and possibly – more noticeably Women) eh? There’s something in that I think, from all the research thirty minutes of watching it happening to other people.
Also briefcases? Definitely old school business accessory that. I counted more squashy man-bags than plastic Samsonite squares and this is the West Midlands, not some sophisticated metropolis. Because I knew what was coming – although by Christ I didn’t think it could possibly take so long on a Winters’ morning at 6am – my clothing, electrical accoutrements and hand luggage had been carefully chosen.
No laptop for a start. Two days with corporate lifeblood squeezed through the restricted optical arteries of a dumbphone. No suit because the Dutch office is of the opinion that a tie is not terribly important*. No little baggy for my toiletries either. An oversight mocked by the looping videos on how to remove your jacket – I guess to better show any concealed firearms – and the appropriate presentation style for exploding shampoo.
I had plenty of time to dream up a range of excuses ranging from “No shampoo, check out the thatch, can we compromise that toothpaste isn’t a liquid?” to “That man over there, yes him, he stole it, and he was messing about with his shoes as well“. Second one should have distracted the dozy staff enough for me to hurdle the barrier and make a run for it. Possibly ending with being shot by less dopy armed police, but embarrassment saved from having to beg for a ziplock.
The airport used to have two terminals. Now it has one. The upshot is a phalanx of herded passengers pressed into not-so-neat queues all waiting for one working scanner. On remarking at this apparently obvious bottleneck, my reward was a long suffering “well the new machines are slower and we’re not allowed to have any extra staff” followed by what I can only describe as a “trade union snort of derision“.
So we queued and queued in that uniquely British “musn’t grumble” approach to organised stupidity. Except for the expensively suited tribe who tapped Blackberry’s and watches, demanded to be upgraded to first-in-line, before being reduced to sheepishness by scanner wielding busybodies in a strange game of strip poker.**
My turn tut-tutted those behind, once my polite request for a bag was met with a large bellied man demanding to know if “he was a bloody bag salesman” to which one can only respond with “I don’t know, are you? If so, I’m in luck eh?“. Rather than the cavity search such cleverness probably deserved, he cracked a weary smile and fetched something rather less threatening than the rubber gloves I expected.
I made the plane with about 30 seconds to spare. Through the departure gate essentially mooning at the shocked gate staff, with my still unbelted trousers showing a fair slab of builders arse. Honestly in future, I’ll just get my ticket tattoo’d on there.
Next month France beckons. I’m going on the train.
* So easy to bore you all with a diatribe on the laughable conflicts of corporate uniform. But I shall not. As future employment is important to me.
** If you read this in a certain way, it does sound like an exceedingly hasty form of foreplay.
Chronologically I am on dodgy ground here. Ground that is still – for the most part – rock hard under a frost last properly thawed a few weeks back.
But there is enough, on closer inspection, to sow the seeds of hope that the worst of the winter is behind us. Although, my last reckless prediction heralding the start of spring saw a few of us hub deep in ice and snow. So it is fair to say this hypothesis is primarily driven by emotion.
Let me lay out the few facts I can offer in mitigation of it still being obviously bloody cold and dark. Firstly, a second ride was undertaken in mostly shorts. After finally succumbing to the awesome all-weather performance of bib-longs*, I have campaigned these lycra masterpieces since mid November – even perfecting the dangerous skill of the bib-crouch-pee.
But on Sunday’s MTB ride and an endarkened commute yesterday, a slab of pale flesh – bounded by long thermal socks and fleecy knee warmers – met winter’s worst without contracting exposure or frostbite.
It may still be some time before the light is at the end of the tunnel, but it is starting to make itself noticed at the end of the day. And morning now turns up before lunchtime which is a bit of a double edged sword. Especially if Reading is the first thing illuminated on this long journey to London. That’s enough for you to demand the return to eternal darkness.
Four weeks till March. Four more until the unmitigated joy of BST. In the last four, I’ve managed 300k, a weekly commute, lots of mountain biking and a strict adherence to a “no booze until Friday”** all of which has shed 2.5 kilograms from my bloated Christmas carcass.
Riding home last night, I was caught out by occasional patches of latent heat held in dips from the daytime sun. Overdressed and sweaty on the climbs, mildly overwhelmed that maybe the worst is over.
But It is not so much the dark, cold and general misery of winter that makes me so obsessional over any signs of change. More the childish delight and anticipation of my favourite season. Come on Spring, get a move on, there’s a few of us desperate to see you.
* Although it is impossible to carry them off with anything other than an apologetic reference to how unfrozen pink bits outweigh their affront to trousered dignity.
** except a cheeky beer post night riding. My view on that is it is a recovery drink
There’s something that I never believed would happen. Along with actually caring what profile a window frame was, and becoming an expert on problem solving in Club-Penguin land. It is very much akin to seeing your reflection and thinking “wow that old bloke is what I’ll look like in 20 years“.
But even a man so incurious to the working of politics, and apathetic to the power of lazy can only take so much. The government’s selling off of the publically owned forests is, at best rushed and ill thought out and – at worst – spiteful and stupid.
Sure, the specific issue for Mountain Bikers is the lack of legislation to retain access to the trails, but there is a much wider point here. If something is held in trust for the public, then there is significantly less pressure for it to turn a fast buck. Throw open ownership to private-for-profit companies, and any pre-sale weaseling promising altruism and philanthropy are lost in the quest for maximum shareholder value.
And you can absolutely see their point. They want no part in possible litigation if accidents happen on their land. A rider (be that on a bike or a horse) adds zero value to their bottom line, so why would they extend access rights to these groups? The CROW legislation of 2000 enshrines the rights of the much more powerful rambling bodies to roam over the land, but the rest of us were no-so-politely ignored when asking for similar protection.
Forests are fun places. Not just for me and the jealous protection of much loved trails. But for everyone; special places are found under the trees, there is a sense of peace and oneness with nature. They are full of light, texture and things to prod, poke and explore. The value of providing this kind of environment for the public has inestimable value that you cannot put a price on.
But the Government has.£100 million apparently. It’s a big number but against a deficit of billions, it’s not even a stone in the water. It’s enough to make you angry and it absolutely should although I doubt my MP will lose any sleep over losing my vote, with his 15,000 majority and Tory view of the world*
I’ll not let that stop me at least having a voice in the debate. Already many have signed up to the 38 degrees petition and, more locally, to HOOF supporting the Forest of Dean. I know I have. In response, there are the expected charges of hysteria and misunderstanding spouted by the mouthpieces of government. But a precent was set only a few months ago when an FC wood was sold off a few miles from here.
Previously it had FC sanctioned trails and was a fun place to ride. The first action of the new owners was to erect massive “No CYCLING” signs and randomly police it with angry men carrying shotguns. It’s hard to see how there can be any winners in the forest sell, other than those whose quest for profit will be in direct conflict with public access.
And if that isn’t worth a bit of community action, I don’t know what is.
* There’s a fantastic old story where Lord Chesterfield was showing some Etonion Chum around his new estate. The high point was a visit to a huge tower with panoramic views in every direction. Apparently the stuffed shirt was so impressed he declared “Good Lord Chesterfield, you can almost see Poverty from here“.
I remember listening aghast as a shiny man sporting a bow-wave haircut declared confidently that, at the end of his two day training course, all sixteen of us would be skilled in the art of horizon stabilising with specific reference to events.
Fifteen poor saps nodded, a few wrote it down, a single grubby digit, somewhat incourteously* raised, interrupted the Smug-Meister mid bullshit. Into the silence I wondered loudly aloud how exactly that might happen to a bunch of shit kicking engineering types of whom at least half had failed the last training session. And that was to correctly identify the right end of a hammer. In one attempt out of three.
The bloke didn’t really give much of an answer which was fine as I’d already stopped listening. And while my somewhat keener colleagues suffered 16 hours of droning nonsense on managing projects such that any explosions and electrical fires were properly planned, I snuggled into a comfortable position, and drifted off to sleep.
At no point were any feeling of guilt foisted upon my person because, even at that tender age, the emperor unclothed was all a bit obvious. The course did end though with a tinge of disappointment when my request for a spirit level – for the levelling of event horizons – was met with a sneer and a throwaway comment that with that kind of attitude I would be lucky to find anyone to employ me. Fair play, bloke was a total cock but he may have been onto something there.
Any road, I cherished the mental nugget that never in my life would the word “event” ever be placed in a more laughable and ridiculous context. And yet here were are barely twenty years on and the grisly triplet of “Al” “CLIC24” and “24 Hour Event” have shattered that particularly fondly held word view.
Bikes, yes. Racing, No. Bristol Bikefest – Rubbish. Clic24-2008 – Rubbish and Painful. Clic24 2009 – Rubbish and Storm wrecked. Mountain Mayhem – Rubbish and Lazy. Welsh Enduro’s – Rubbish and On Fire. HONC – Rubbish and tedious. Rubbish, Rubbish, Rubbish, Not again, not ever, no way, done with it, it’s shit and I hate it, really hate it, hack my own arm with a rusty multitool to make it stop hate it. Never. Ever. Again.
That’s the summary, if you’re desperate to learn more the links keep on giving with whining and excuses. This year I was cunning enough to forget to enter HONC the day entries opened, so finding that there are at least 1500 more stupid people than me. I’m only doing a lap of Mayhem if they install a mid course bar, and any participation in the organised chaos of enduro race series shall pass me happily by while I stand head shaking at the lunacy of riders paying£30 to queue in singletrack.
But CLIC24 is different for many reasons. And most of them are under ten years old but cursed to die before their parents. As a parent, it is absolutely clear to me that nothing will rip your world apart more than one of your kids being terminally ill. Just writing that has me welling up. Clic Sargent take a situation that looks only black and punches it full of light with a range of services from clinical care through to specialist holidays and every conceivable support service in between.
So many times arguments are advanced that all this should be government funded. And that’s the kind of bollocks talked by people who would like to find someone to blame. Because all the charities I’ve raised money for tell the same story; they don’t want targets, politicking or shysters looking for an photo op. And further this stuff really isn’t what the NHS is there to do. This is about creating a community of carers to ease the crushing blow of the stay-awake knowledge that you might be burying your kids.
And because of that, little lives are not measured in duration only in how much fun can be packed into what’s left. Don’t waste time worrying about tomorrow because look what we can do today. Hey if we’ve got an end date, let’s stick a couple of fingers up and hit it with a roller-coaster. And there are achingly fantastic happy endings for lots of the kids where cancer doesn’t foreshorten tragically short lives, but there are many more where those last days/months/years were made something special by the people at CLIC Sargent.
So if you feel you would like to donate, I’m not the only one that would be extremely grateful. Don’t do it because it’ll get my lazy arse out of the tent at 3am. Don’t do it because you may occasionally find my ramblings amusing. Don’t do it only because you’ve got kids yourselves.
Do it because you’ll make a huge difference to blameless kids who meet joy and desperation with smiling faces.
This is the site where you can do that: Virgin giving
Thanks.
* Giving the instructor the bird 30 seconds in. Classy.
Ah the simple joy of feeling the wind in your hair. Except it wasn’t really a wind, more icy gusts punctuated by moments of flat calm. And my little remaining thatch was well hidden under a hat last worn by “Benny from Crossroads“.
So more Arctic blast freezing my eyebrows interspersed by periods of mild terror when the wind decreased in velocity and the model in altitude. I am still not entirely through the trauma of my favourite glider being significantly inconvenienced by rather more ground than expected at the moment of crushing impact.
If, however, there is ever a market for piloting skills to surprise the earth with a beautifully disguised vertical plunge, I’m in the money.
The glider in the picture is exactly the same as the one I destroyed. Except that it a) isn’t mine b) was flown rather better and c) wasn’t removed from the slope in a brown bag.
In the time it has taken my friend Matthew to buy, build and get around to flying his Luna, I’ve wrecked my way through a distinguished lineage of previously enjoyed gliders in a spookily similar manner to my bike collection.
I even managed to crash my latest acquisition before it had actually flown. Three times it had been to windless slopes, and three times it came back unflown. Yesterday would have been the perfect opportunity to commit it to aviation had I not accidentally launched it from the rafters in my workshop.
Broken? Yes. Repairable? Probably. By me? Take a wild guess.
So aside from the odd glider slipping gently below the slope and being retrieved by the “trudge of shame”, much fun was had by many with nary a smashed anything. After some Olympic class dithering Matthew finally converted his expensive desk ornament to flight with only mild encouragement – “Come one what’s the worst that can happen“*
The bugger not only flew it with an aplomb entirely missing from anything vaguely controlled by twitchy-thumbs here, but landed it in a manner that made the glider entirely available for re-use. Lucky, that’s what I call it 😉
So no time for riding this weekend. Too much time on underpinning the chicken house so preventing local rat population from helping themselves to both the food pellets and some rather tasty shed door. Only way those buggers are getting in now is if they install a flailing masonry bit on their noses.
Couldn’t even ride in today with the train scheduled to arrive some thirty minutes after I needed to be here. It would seem that the entire population of the West Midlands has seized upon the same New Years Resolution “YOU ARE NOT WORTHY OF THE ROAD. I ALONE AM BEST“. This is trying my Christian Motoring approach to the traffic.
* Answer “it’ll all go wrong and be smashed into a thousand pieces”. Response “Okay, fair point, what’s the SECOND worst thing thar can happen?“
