Category: Other stuff

Pretty concise and snappy title eh? Yes I do have a life outside Mountain Biking. No, it’s no better written or researched.

That can’t be right.

On By AlexIn Bikes, Other stuff3 Comments

That post title could cover so many different wrongs; one of those would be refusing to vote in what is probably the most important election since I first proudly presented my voting card back in Yorkshire. Largely pointless really as the Conservative candidate was hunted down and eaten – a just reward for the temerity of attempting to explain ‘rich people stuff’ to a bunch of flat caps, who considered ownership of a whippet and an outside toilet a rather vulgar show of wealth.

Alison Yoghurt – Liberal – survived because “well she’s just a daft lass in a hand knitted cardigan with a wide ranging policy portfolio essentially honed down to being nice to kittens“, the emerging greens had no chance in a town where coal was forever king, so basically you voted for the dribbling nutter with the novelty hat or the Labour candidate. Often this was the same person.

Amusingly, while South Herefordshire constituency is a tight two way fight between Blue and Yellow, up here in the rarefied air of Ledbury (4 Deli shops in a town of about 19 people), the Conservative candidate (and probably land owner of every single voter) has been returned UNINTERRUPTED SINCE 1926. The majority seems to actually outstrip the registered electorate of the ward and, so confident is the fella in blue, we’ve not received even a token leaflet. Carol has collected – and pointedly – placed campaign literature from the, frankly, desperate other political options in easy reach of my desultory browsing.

I’ve had a look from the rational perspective of a cyclist and beerist, and find none of them fire any enthusiasm for much other than cracking open a bottle. But vote I must, if only to silence the tedious “No Vote, No Voice” refrain from bloody worthies and Guardian readers. I’d rather point them to www.voterpower.org.uk while shouting “1926, 22,00 Majority, tell me again that big idea about democracy“. Churchill had it right, and I’m sure he’d have given proportional representation the kind of short shrift that anyone who wants to be in charge traditionally has.

And he may have been right again, because I can give you only one example in the whole of history where the output of a committee has been genuinely brilliant. Yep aside from the American Declaration of Independence*, it’s all been politicised fudgery, spin and lost opportunities. I’m still of the opinion that the country would benefit from locking all the party leaders in a room, equipping each with a sharp sword and the last man standing gets to run the country.

Either than or install me as a benevolent dictator – let’s face it, at least I’d sort out those with pointless dogs and caravans. Plus anyone with marketing in their title would be either leaving the country or enjoying the company of a thousand scorpions. See, I’m not even single issue.

So I think a spoiled ballet shall register my disgust and weariness at a political class with noses in the trough and heads up their arse. It’s still a private booth isn’t it? That’ll do just fine.

Hmm, that was meant to be a single pithy paragraph. It appears I was slightly more irritated than I first thought. Anyway invoking a bit more Churchill and continuing the theme of extreme irritation, I have made a proper effort to Keep Buggering On regardless of the fact that the mechanical fairies stalk me still. Yesterday I broke something else – Rockshox make a fork that is the suspension equivalent of a Toyota HiLux. Not terribly sophisticated, bit weighty, aesthetically stunted, but with unchallenged reliability in the harshest of conditions.

I was making this very point to my friend Mike, extolling the robustness and performance of a component which I’d never even considered servicing** and yet was still providing unflinching service. When will I ever learn? Twenty seconds later 140mm of plush travel became 30mm of undamped bonginess followed by a hard wrist-jarring stop. The noise of various parts crashing into each other in an increasing cacophony of brokenness can be simply described as “expensive“.

My attempts to fix it by beating it to death with mile after mile of rocky descent proved unsuccessful. So as part of the revolving door policy I now have with my local bike shop, I offered up the offending items to Nick the mechanic while enquiring if he’d fixed my ST4 yet. He had not but only because I’d failed to furnish him with all the parts needed to do so. So I have a bike and a half being repaired, a bill that will probably have some negative effect on the country’s structural deficit, and no space left to write about what a great Exmoor ride we had.

More of that soon. Until then I’ll be desperately searching the pamphlets for some nugget regarding a grant for Cyclists recently inheriting a Jonah complex.

* and even this was more about taxes and whinging about perceived wrongs, the bit about freedom and the rights of the individual was a bit of an afterthought.

** as it was working. And if I’d serviced it, it wouldn’t be working at all. In fact, I would have probably thrown a blanket over the remains in honour of the tdead.

“Go and play outside”

On By AlexIn Bikes, Other stuff, PhotographyLeave a comment

A familiar refrain from when I was young, and one passed down a generation to berate my own children. And wanting to set a positive example, I abandoned what’s left of my bicycle collection this weekend, to spend it outside sometimes in the rain and mainly in the cold.

Still it wouldn’t be a proper Bank Holiday would it, without hail? Such are the vagaries of the British Weather, that on one day I dug a massive trench, and the next I emptied a moat of a similar size. The new Chicken run is not yet “out of the ground” with thin cross-hashed wire ready to be installed some 12 inches below mud level. With all the other anti-fox precautions we’re taking, it’s tempting to just get a couple of machine guns in really to finish it off.

The poor chickens will think they’ve entered some kind of Poultry Alcatraz

I have managed to cobble enough of a bike together to ensure my extra days holiday will be spent riding in Exmoor rather than staring moodily out of the window. There is tremendous pleasure to be taken in doing something your really enjoy in the happy knowledge all your friends are at work. It does mean getting up as early as if I was trudging into the office, but I’ll be heading due South the a truck full of car and a switched off mobile phone. And even the forecast looks promising.

Something’ll go wrong, it generally does. Not today I took my toys to a big hill in Wales and spent a happy part of the day throwing them off it. That one isn’t mine as I’m the shivering wreck behind the lens wondering if I can borrow a sheep to keep warm*. Fun tho and my new rather expensive, somewhat fragile and eyeball twitching fast flying toy managed a whole number of flights and landings where it was then available for re-use. This has not always been the case.

If I remember I’ll take a camera tomorrow to show you what a great time I had. If I forget to post any pictures, be assured I’m still having a great time 🙂

* Not for anything else. Whatever you’ve heard. Nothing was ever proved.

Pubs – what happened there then?

On By AlexIn Other stuff4 Comments

My brother used to espouse the theory that Pubs were the new Churches. This sermon was inevitably delivered in a beer serving hostelry, which neither of us had any intention of leaving its’ warm fug for the cold hostility of God’s place round the corner. He felt therefore that the overwhelming empirical evidence was with us, and the sooner the Church got a few barrels on and replaced the Cross with a dartboard, the more chance they’d have retaining their few, aged customers.

I was never quite sure it was so clear cut, and – even at that young age – a balanced view between atheism and the outside chance there might be something in this divinity stuff kept me firmly on the fence. Spiritually that is, physically I was getting shit-faced down the local on a multi-year research project to calculate the exact quantity of tequila chasers it took to render one permanently blind.*

I’m so much older now. Hangovers last for days, occasionally weeks. So I find myself capping the bottle early doors or substituting a nice cup of tea on a school night. And, since moving out of the beery post work paradise that was our old office, pubs have little gravitational hold on me nowadays. This has absolutely whatsoever with some kind of long term Puritan abstinence, more a slide into the habit of home based drunkenesss.

Why not eh? It’s not far to fall into your bed, and even if you do find a single flight of stairs too challenging it is unlikely you’ll be mugged on your own sofa. You know exactly what you’re drinking**, there’s unlikely to be an unseemly crush for the toilet, and your boorish behaviour is generally only exposed to a long suffering spouse. Or the in-laws, and let’s face it that’s sport “Go on, tell me again exactly who it is taking our jobs, and more on that great idea of your to arm the border guards”

We do pubs as families now. There may be a pub closing every day, but that’s more about demographics, social habits and – this seems to be lost in some of the hand ringing – because some are undeniably shit. The No Smoking ban may have forced out the hardcore pubbist, but the vacuum has been filled by those who fancy a pint, and know this comes with a no cooking option. But I can count on the fingers of one hand*** the frequency in which I’ve gone to the pub for a beer with a few mates in the last year.

Sometimes after riding in far off places, with good old friends and a thirst that only a day spinning pedals can bring. Or forced stopovers in our lovely capital where there is nothing to do except get properly lathered. But no, going for a drink after work has been substituted by getting on my bike or driving sixty miles. And lover of alcohol as I am, it really mixes not well at all with tons of metal driven by people who have “Cock” tattooed in their DNA.

Until last Thursday when a combination of mono-lung, bastard strong prescription steroids and a visitation from those normally confined to the London hutch saw me stuck in a poncy Pub drinking orange juice and wondering what the fuck had happened. Context is required here; all round the Birmingham office is a gentrified Canal Basin full of identikit gastro-pubs and Canary Wharf wanabees. Even in these straightened times, Thursday night was full of champagne, sycophancy, forced laughter and testosterone braying.

Juxtaposed between these raging bulls and bored looking bar staff were two hen parties singing their way through a back catalogue of Karaoke favourites. Occasionally they’d hit the right note, but the general noise was as flat as the fizz they were drinking. I looked around and though “Jesus, either I got very old, or they’re all on some kind of sponsored acid trip“. The Son of God failed to illuminate my mind with any answers, so I made my excuses and got the hell out of there.

I do like pubs. Old pubs, or pubs that are made to look old. Hand Pulled beer. Pies. Jolly, fat publicans who know what they are serving. I’ll even put up with some nailed brass-ware and unidentifiable agricultural relics. I like sitting down in a creaky old chair and being able to hear a conversation without an ear bleeding accompaniment from a base speaker the size of Croydon, or the incessant beeping of some flashing machine.

You can put your bloody crackberry away as well. What’s all that about. Reading email IN THE PUB. How important do you think you are? And if you are, get your fat arse back to the office. It’s bad enough talking about work in the pub, never mind doing it.

You know I’m not sure my Brother was right. Pubs are not the new churches. I’m not exactly sure what some of them are, but I’ve absolutely no intention of spending any more time finding out thanks. Of course, you could argue I’m a grumpy old bugger that’s failed to move with the times. And, right now, I’d probably agree because next to me is a large glass of wine, and inside I’m already feeling a rather warming glow. Maybe I should open up to the public.

* I never found out, but it wasn’t through a lack of determined application. Really it would have been kinder to spoon my liver out with a rusty trowel, before affixing it to the wall with a nail gun.

** Until that horrible moment where you’re sober enough to be able to find the “Bio Hazard Drinks Bottles” but too pissed to care why you stashed them ten feet underground guarded by a tiger.

** Six. I’ve been inducted to the ways of the Herefordshire man.

Dr Leeches.

On By AlexIn Bikes, Other stuff8 Comments

That’s my internal nom-de-plume categorisation of the wizened old duffer who occasionally wakes up and pretends he’s my physician. In the coming up two years we have lived here, I have been to the Surgery exactly twice. First up for a speedy referral to a proper health professional with knee fixing skills, and secondly – today – to demand a miracle cure for squatting mouse-lung.

My expectations were not high, and to be fair they weren’t met. Twenty minutes sat amongst very old people clearly just waiting to die failed to improve my already twitchy demeanour. Sometimes I feel my age and wistfully yearn a little for the power of youth, but this morning I gapped these stooped and twisted wraiths by coming up forty years. Anyone with a mortality fear avoids hospitals and health centres for very good reason – they are full of sick people reminding you of what is going to happen. Sooner or later.

Let’s hope later eh? Anyway the suited wurzel gave me the once over and declared I wasn’t undergoing a month long Asthma attack. I agreed with him, and further agreed that it wasn’t strep, or some new allergy or hay fever or alien mind probes. I even saved him the bother of dusting off the Peak Flow Meter having self-certified myself at a “Route Must Not Include Stairs” 400 li/m. Even for a Lungy Cripple as myself, that’s down 30{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2} from a base that’s adequate at best.

Back in the days when I confused titles with wisdom, such a non-diagnosis would have left me tipping my hat and thanking the good Doctor for letting me waste his time. I’d probably have hacked my own leg off if he’d asked as well. Now, I’m a little less respectful and a little more direct; “What’s the plan then Doc, leeches again is it?”

Oh how we laughed. Well coughed really but it was a moment of togetherness. In a flurry of activity not seen by this fella for about twenty years, he withdrew an armful of bloody and perscribed a course of pointless steroids that would have no effect other than to eat through my stomach lining. However, so desperate am I to remove my “Mouse-Lung on Board” sticker, I’ve downed the first six chased by a Nurofen* and now rattle as I make slow progress towards where the real drugs are kept.

£14 for a prescription? You can get a decent bottle for that. Apparently if the old soak remembers to send off a sample of my red stuff, he’ll give me a call back Friday to offer information on whether there’s anything nasty going on and/or a chance to stick my name down on the embalming schedule. Or was that he’ll only call if there’s a problem. I can’t remember, and I don’t suppose he will either.

Three years ago when this all went off, I bored friends, family and strangers alike with my imminent demise. I’m far more sanguine this time round because it feels the same, and so eventually the mouse shall pack up and leave, returning the fitness I cherished back in January.

Until that happens tho, I retain the right to be grumpy especially as Dr. L left me with a stern – if shaky fingered – warning to desist from any activities involving significant aerobic exercise and the cold. In keeping with my new found scepticism of all things health care, I think you can guess exactly how much notice I’ll be taking of that.

* Amusingly I’ve strained a back muscle while attempting to get some air into my lungs. Maybe it’s not as funny as it sounds.

I’ve got a note from my mum

On By AlexIn Other stuffLeave a comment

Which means I shouldn’t have to go to work. MouseLung(tm) has taken residence which makes daily tasks including de-icing the car, walking up stairs or aggressive typing a trigger for a swipe on the Ventalin. Asthma is a bugger, especially when you think you have it licked. Then once or twice a year, back it comes and you feel your early year fitness disappearing. Annoying, damn right.

More annoying is this breathless event has co-incided with a dump of work stuff I’m thinking of as vocational snow. It has come unannounced from the sky, landed entirely on my head, stopping me doing what I want to be doing, and if any more falls, there’s going to be an INCIDENT. Which may involve nail-y sticks and war cries.

Again perfectly timed as we’re off on Hols for a few days to see if the dog can eat my Brothers’ house in Devon. Four people who’ve lived with the dog for eighteen months think this is pretty unlikely, one who has not is insistent that he fully expects the stairs to be gone by morning. Suits me, I can’t run up them anyway.

Anyway, this made me laugh. Not entirely work safe.

Oh I changed the site theme again, not much point really as 90{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2} of hits come from RSS Feeds. I might place some nekkid ladies on here as a reward for the traditionalists who have yet to harness the power of google reader 😉

I only work here.

On By AlexIn Other stuffLeave a comment

Well only if the much heralded “Be extremely Charitable to Verbs Day” had finally dawned. We’ve a long and proud history on the Hedgehog of documenting* that the British Service Industry is as much an oxymoron as “A night of song and entertainment with Les Dennis“.

The Car Park/Large Note Depository abutting our offices installed a shiny line of mutli-currency payment machines where one can part with a weeks’ wages for the pleasure of parking your car for an hour, and descending stairwells smelling of old tramps and fresh piss. The only obvious wet-wear** in this electronic package is a lonely soul hutted out of harms way and surrounded by a million monitors, which he cheerfully ignores as your homeward transport is being car jacked.

Except not tonight. A snaking, shivering and vibrationally angry queue trod a menacing line to his armoured window. The reason soon became clear – a total systems crash had left the normally chirpy machines dark and silent. Occasionally one flickered fireflying desperate commuters to its’ blinking screen only to accept their ticket but reject their payment. These poor deluded types then attempted to rejoin the now epic queue from whence they’d left. Ranks were closed and cold shoulders turned to indicate the only place for such technology believers was right at the back.

The much chastised attendant was having to ring through every credit card transaction as the cashless economy foundered on the rocks of the minimum wage. From my place mid-queue I idly calculated that five minutes per ticket processed had me standing in an every more grumpy crowd for about 45 minutes. At which point it went properly dark and started snowing. Briefly a rumour circulated that if you had the right change, a combination of two machines and some Fibonacci key sequence may stamp your exit card, but most of us were far too savvy to fall for that queue jumping trick.***

At this point, a second attendant began to police the rank informing us all the ticket machines weren’t working, and – more importantly – how this wasn’t his fault. Bored, I engaged the fella in conversation:

“So tell me, how can all the machines fail at the same time” / “Dunno Mate”

“Isn’t there some kind of backup, fail safe, that kind of thing” / “Dunno Mate”

“Do you know when it might be fixed” / “Dunno Mate”

“Have you asked?” / [receive look of intense trade unionism] “I only work here Mate”

Time passed. Skies turned to black. Feet turned to ice. Brummies turn to near violence. My turn at the booth ended with a brief round of applause, as I was holding real currency and thereby short-cutting the approval process by five minutes. Even exhibiting the first signs of hypothermia I retained sufficient mental collateral not to ask for a receipt. Because I have other things to do this year.

My exit from the centre of this EMP strike was briefly halted by a third “parking operative” stopping me splintering the barrier movie style, by inserting his rather over-fed girth between me and the slot where tickets open Hell’s Portal to the Hagley Road.

“What’s up” I asked innocently “Got to check your ticket”

“But the exit machine is working now isn’t it?” / “Yes”

“So why are you having to check my ticket? That’s stupid” / “Dunno”

“Did you ask?” / “Just doing my…..”

Let me stop you there I thought. Here’s some advice tho, if you’re ever lucky enough to exit via the second exit from the Broad Street car park in Birmingham and you notice a rather lumpy sleeping policeman, you ain’t see me right?

It is become increasingly clear to me, I am the only sane man amongst a bunch of lunatics. It’s like The Matrix with no red pill.

* Or if today was instead “stop poncing about with fancy words” we’d probably have to admit to Moaning.

** I’ve been hanging out with programmers for far too long “Yeah sorry chief, got to net myself some realtime in the blueroom to interface wth the wetwear” which roughly translates as “I’m off outside for a smoke and a bag of chips”

*** In the olden days, we would have RELISHED this. People would have joined the queue merely in the spirit of enquiry. World’s gone to shit, I blame the Internet.

I was so angry..

On By AlexIn Other stuff1 Comment

… I wrote a letter. Yes that’ll show ’em. ’em being eON the purveyor of not enough electricity and excuses. We survived last winter on convection heaters and wearing eight layers of clothing. All the time soothed by various identikit representatives from eON that, as the fiasco was entirely their fault and they’d cocked up fixing it not once, not twice but THREE times, they would pay for the eye watering costs of running five 3kw carbon unfriendly heaters.

A year on, and nothing has happened. Well I say nothing, from our end we’ve been polite, considerate and diffident asking for the occasional update on when we might be repaid. The latest email from the jobsworth from engineering this morning denied all knowledge of any agreement, and wondered if he could fob us off with a different department. Attractive as that solution was, instead I went for the nuclear option creating this email and copying it to the head of public relations and the managing director.

I don’t expect they’ll ever pay, but hey I feel better.

”

Dear smartypants,

Your recent email is nothing more than another wasted effort to resolve this problem. eON have shown a total lack of ownership, clarity and urgency to resolve a problem ENTIRELY of their own making. eON further have clear and documented liability in failing to provide us with sufficient power to run our heating system.

The convection heaters were a tactical solution to keep our young family warm during the winter. As parents, the health and well being of our children is of course our primary concern. Whereas eON’s primary concern should be the rather more simple supply of electricity. It really shouldn’t be that difficult, nor should it have dragged on FOR ANOTHER YEAR in which eON have failed to deliver on their promises, comedically failed to sort out our account and attempted to wheedle out of their responsibilities. All this time we’ve been paying for electricity eON had promised to reimburse is for.

You clearly are not interested in us as a customer. You have many others, and I am sure we are nothing more than a difficult issue that you don’t want to deal with. From our perspective however, we are powerless in our attempts to seek closure to a very upsetting and financially crippling set of circumstances that ARE ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT. We are staggered that you offer nothing but lame excuses, and even those have to be dragged out after weeks of silence. Did anyone ever make clear to eON that their customers are kind of an important tenet of their business model?

So here’s some news. We’re not going away. We’re not going to be fobbed off, beaten down by your apathy and excuses, re-directed to someone else who will waste our time. We’ve made our case patiently and politely and you’ve responded cravenly and inconsistently. It is pointless to try and convince you of the justness of our case, although any outside review body would clearly see it as absolutely watertight. Therefore three options present:

1) Pay us the money you promised. Within thirty days.

2) Provide us with someone in your organisation who has authority to resolve this. That person clearly isn’t you. Failing that, we’ll start with the MD.

3) Do nothing (I’m guessing from the history of this fiasco this will be your default position) in which case we’ll opt for OfGen and the local press who I’m sure will be delighted to cover a human interest story where “ as usual “ faceless corporations ride roughshod over poor consumers.

You may take from the e-mail that we are angry and frustrated. And you may feel insulted by the tone. Please understand we really didn’t want to go for the Nuclear option, but you’ve left us with no option. eON have “ for over a year “ failed on their obligations to serve us as a customer. And the only people suffering in this time are us. So we have every right to be irritated with both you and your firm.

Please advise us of your response.

”

Do I sound angry? I hope so, I certainly felt fairly vexed while I was writing it.

It’s probably an urban myth, but..

On By AlexIn Other stuff1 Comment

.. wouldn’t it be great if it were true.

”

If you’ve ever worked for a boss that reacts before getting the facts and thinking things through, you will love this story…..

Arcelor-Mittal Steel, feeling it was time for a shake-up, hired a new CEO and he was determined to rid the company of all slackers.

On a tour of the facilities, the new CEO noticed a guy leaning against a wall. The room was full of workers and he wanted to let them know that he meant business. He walked up to the guy at the wall and asked, ‘How much money do you make a week?’

A little surprised, the young man looked at him and replied, ‘I make about $400 a week. Why?’

The CEO then handed the guy $1,600 in cash and screamed, ‘Here’s four weeks’ pay, now GET OUT and don’t come back!’ The guy left without saying a word to the CEO.

Feeling pretty good about himself, the CEO looked around the room and asked, ‘Does anyone want to tell me what that goof-ball did here? ‘

From across the room came a voice, ËœPizza delivery guy from Domino’s.’

”

That’s it from me for a couple of days. Very early tomorrow morning, I hope to be sober enough to drive the 100 miles south to open up a couple of riding days in the lovely Quantock Hills. Not been there for a couple of years, and in those years my exposure to steep, pointy hills has increased 100{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2}. I still expect piss poor performance though, because my mate Jas turns up here later and he’s cracked the knack of getting me drunk* on almost every occasion we get together.

When I explained that we had a hard start at 0-fuckme700 hours, and old greybeard here needed some proper undrunken sleep, so let’s make it a quiet one eh, his response didn’t convince me I’d secured his agreement.

He was still laughing when I put the phone down.

* By simply asking “Another beer Al, you’ve only had 11″

Phone Bill.

On By AlexIn Other stuffLeave a comment

The price I paid for losing my mobile earlier was to learn that even our little part of the world is sadly full of cocks. The phone and I parted company on British Camp, the most easily accessed and therefore busiest on the Malverns. It should not surprise regular readers that I’d abandoned it, what with my personal belonging regularly being scattered far and wide over a number of continents. Phones, Wallets, Sunglasses and – I kid you not – on one occasion my car tend to go AWOL, although mostly returned through the kindness of strangers.

Losing the work phone SIM is a bugger because until you’ve smothered yourself with Nutella and been prostrated naked in front of the Vodafone helpdesk, they refuse to even accept you have ever owned one of their products, never mind losing one. I say SIM because it was encased in my old “weekend” mobile which I’d thoughtfully left on silent. Furthermore it’s furnished with only a few names of chosen drinking buddies and my wife via her nickname*.

So the poor sod who found it was faced with a dialling dilemma: “Trousers Jenkins” or “BogDoor Bob” being a couple of the more sensible entries, and this to a man who does not have English as his first language**. Eventually my Mum received an 8PM phone call from a nice fella recently of Poland, who enquired if she had a geographically displaced son with a penchant for lobbing expensive electronics out of his backpack. After initial confusion, she rallied magnificently and soon I was on a mercy mission to re-unite myself with my phone.

Which is where the story should end happily, but it doesn’t. Because this amicable gentleman, out taking an early morning walk with his lad, had attempted to flag down some mountain bikers after failing to get my attention once I’d launched Space-Nokia-1 into a low orbit. Now if it were me, or the guys I ride with, we’d have stopped, exchanged pleasantries, and either taken it into care until an Internet forum burped up the owner, or offered any other help we could have.

Not these cocks tho. A whole bunch of them basically told him to fuck off and get out of their way. I can only assume he was somehow in their way, and their version of shared trail access worked on the principle that some animals are more equal that others. This has made me really bloody angry. For two reasons; firstly how can people of some kind of shared-outdoor-experience be so damn rude and inconsiderate? Secondly – and far worse – was the chaps acceptance that somehow “it’s okay, I don’t mind, some people are like that. Especially to us“. No it bloody well is not okay, it never is and it never will be. The shrug and phrase “especially to us” made me wince with embarrassment.

Sure I only know one side of this story, but riding in London for three years de-constructed the myth that all cyclists are good and everyone else is a twat. Almost the other way round in far too many cases, and nothing since has convinced me otherwise. So I could well imagine this playing out exactly the way it was told, and someone needs a good bloody slap. Forget the fact that cyclists are already demonised by most other trail users in the Malverns, many of who are on a mission to enact a partial or full ban. That’s merely a side show to the fact that we are the most scary people in those popular hills, and we need to show a bit of bloody respect.

That’s why we ride early in the morning or late at night. It’s why we try really hard not to bring ourselves into conflict for the sake of it. It’s because we understand the fragile nature of competing groups on a small set of hills. Well most of us do anyway.

I’m pleased I’ve got my phone back, I’m really fucking angry about how.

* we’re not going there. Glad I got it back tho 🙂

* Kindred Spirit you might say.

SkateFraud.

On By AlexIn Other stuff1 Comment

Verbal has just bought a skateboard. She’s already conquered the ex-board to the point where we no longer pre-book a hospital appointment every time she swishes along on the deadly thing. Which has taken a while as that wheeled lunacy is nothing less than an accident that hasn’t quite happened yet.

But apparently it’s rubbish at tricks mainly due to the weight and the inability to plot a course that involves straight lines. So a£10 skateboard from Argos* and some youthful enthusiasm has already turned the kitchen into an impromptu skate park. My first attempt was pretty typical of anything that merges an Alex, something with wheels and anything requiring balance skills. I gave the board some ‘umpty with my right foot only to find I’d suddenly acquired seven league boots without the luxury of a seven league crutch.

The board sped off backwards almost kneecapping the dog, while I – in the manner of comedic potential energy – rocketed forward landing carefully on my face and elbow. This illicited howls of delight from the kids “Dad THAT WAS ACE, DO IT AGAIN” and a whimper from yours truly here. The dog pitched in with his terrifying slobber of life, and I was back on my feet before drowning was added to an escalating list of injuries.

I wasn’t allowed a skateboard as a kid. This may have been, in part, due to the demand being made while lying in a hospital bed with a busted pelvis. Even back in those unenlightened times, the physio couldn’t see any benefits whatsoever of placing a healing mid section of hip atop a small wheeled cart with no brakes. I did sneak a go on my mates, which was my first and last attempt at the alien skills of the boarder. Too fast to get off, too scared to turn it uphill, my brief – yet tremendously exciting – skateboarding history ended in Mr. Mills hedge having easily cleared his low front wall at the point of impact.

So, already my ten year old daughter is better than me. That will not stand. And neither will I at the moment especially having googled “Advanced Skateboarding” only to find myself entirely wrong for the sport. I have no trousers with gussets terminating just above ankle level, no wild thatch of hair, no ability to rotate and flip my ageing body except from vertical to horizontal and no tattoos. Surely though, an experienced Mountain Biker like myself with the hand-eye co-ordination of a special needs stoat should be able to master the simplest tricks.

Like getting on without falling off. I know some of you must have pierced the inner circle of these dark arts. Time to pony up and share your secrets!

* A place I’m coming to think of as “The LIDL REJECT STORE“