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I was trying to keep my fitness up and maybe start to build towards triathlon fitness next year by doing bike work and exercises while I rest my hoof. It’s been nigh on two months of no running and my foot is still tender. Not actually painful, but not nothing, like my right foot. So as soon as I return to running I know it’s going to flare up again. I’ve stopped the bike training and exercises to try and fully rest it. I still cycle into work, but it’s only 2.6 miles each way, that’s hardly anything. I was beginning to think no matter what I did it was never going to heal. Then one of my friends on Twitter said I should see the physio. I had a lot of email advice from him for free during lockdown, but that can’t compare with a proper, physical, examination. It’s a great idea. I’ve emailed him and I’ve got an appointment for next Monday. It’s 17.00hrs in Stockport, so I’m going to have to go on the motorbike. Rush hour traffic around the M60 (Manchester ring road) is atrocious. Hopefully that will put me on the road to full recovery. I went around to Lisa’s last week, to see my mam. Lisa asked me what it meant when she was braking from speed the car pulled to one side. I said it was probably the tracking was out. (Though, thinking about it, it could just as easily be one brake failing). She is working full time and still can’t afford to live, so I said we’d pay for it. Get it done, it’s dangerous. Then my mam said the brakes feel spongy. Lisa said “Oh yeah, they said the brake pads were nearly worn out at my last MOT”. Spongy is a different thing, probably need the brakes bleeding, but get the pads done as well. Now. We’ll pay for it. “No, it’s alright, I’ll get it done in January when it goes in for the MOT.” I was talking about it with Wendy today and decided I’d best nag. Lisa hates to take anything off of you, but it’s just not safe, especially as we’re supposed to be getting snow and gales again tomorrow. I text her and said ‘book it in, tell them you want these 3 jobs doing, we’ll pay.’ She text back, she’d been to pick Nath up from work, just got off the motorway (luckily), went to brake and had nothing. She pumped the brake and just about managed to avoid smashing into the car in front. She’s booked it into the garage and isn’t using it. Bloody hell, Lisa! (Update: the garage has fixed it all and she’s safe to drive again.) In other news, I’ve not had any plague weakness for a few weeks, which is great. Quite possibly it is that post viral fatigue thing: you do a bit, you get wasted. At work, I’ve wanted to get trained on the tugs […]

I’ve been practicing my typing and I’m getting better at it. The quick brown fox does indeed jump over the lazy dog. Still have to remember to use the wrong hand for the B. As a result I may have to buy a yacht so I don’t have to keep typing “boat”. I don’t make the rules. I’ve not been able to go to the boat club for two weeks because it’s been blowing a gale, today it was 2mph, supposedly. It doesn’t even feel like that. No point in going. I’ve had a busy day doing other stuff. Wendy’s offside rear tyre keeps going down.Slowly, but it’s every few weeks. It was doing it before we got the new tyres so I assume there’s something slightly wrong with the wheel. A slight leak somewhere. I ordered a second hand wheel and tyre off eBay, it arrived yesterday so I went to swap it over this morning. I got the old wheel off, went to fit the new one, but in daylight there are lots of little cracks in the rubber. The tyre has lots of tread, but it’s a bit old and probably perished. There’s no point in risking it seeing as the existing tyre probably hasn’t done 100 miles. I put the old wheel back on. I’ll take it to the tyre place tomorrow and get them to swap it over and fit a new valve and balance the wheel. I’ve been thinking about getting rid of that project bike to clear out some space in my shed. It’s not just the frame, which takes up a big space down one side of the shed, but the engine on the workbench, the big box of spare engine parts, and all the other bike bits (exhaust system, seat, radiator, etc) filling up my shelves. I wanted it gone but I was putting off getting rid because I was anticipating hassle. I listed it (free to a good home as long as they take it all) and a few hours later someone said they would definitely have it. They are coming to get it later. That was easy. I don’t know what I was worried about. I’ve dragged everything around to the front, ready for them to collect. That was hard work, but I’ll be glad to see the back of it. (Later: they’ve been. It’s gone. Excellent.) I’ve brushed out the shed and moved Wendy’s, and my old pushbike into it. I’ll get around to moving my turbo trainer and other bike out as well. I need to set up the light and an electrical supply first. I’ve lifted my dahlias in preparation of following the American dahlia woman’s instructions. This could be the year I get it right! One (of the many) things I wasn’t doing right is to clean them thoroughly, getting all the dirt off, then leave them to dry for a week before putting them away in dry compost (or vermiculite) for the winter. I’ll […]

I find myself back in the same old rut, obsessing over buying stuff, even in the light of self knowledge. Somewhere down the line I’m going to need a car with a towing hook. And I find I’m loathe to use my “toy” motorbike. It’s a sunny day, fun machine. I don’t want to take it out in nasty weather and ruin it. Which is being owned by possessions, and a different subject. So that leaves me here. Going into winter without a workhorse bike, or car. So, if I need a car, I might as well get one. Then I’d have wheels to get to my boat club, and room to carry my kit, and towing capability down the road when I want to move my boat. I’m just writing this out to try and clarify what I should do. I have several options and I keep flicking from one to the other. 1, Sell my bike, use the money to buy a car, and a cheap motorbike that I’m not loathe to use. 2, Sell my bike, and just buy the car. 3, Buy the car, see if I actually use the bike/ would use a bike if it was a workhorse, then decide if I sell or keep. Hmmm, 3 clearly looks the winner. I’m going to be pushbiking to work for as long as I’ve got this job, and I don’t ever intend to leave it, so a motorised vehicle is just for going to the boat club and towing said boat for the foreseeable. I really can’t see when I’m going to use a motorbike. I don’t like to ride just for the sake of riding, I need to be going somewhere. But I’m losing nowt by waiting and seeing. If I sell now it’s gone. And going into winter is the worst time to sell a motorbike anyway. OK. Settled. Later, Buck. PS, I had several avenues of enquiry open on the car front. Ideally I want an estate (so I can throw pushbikes in the back) with a towing hook, and a big enough engine to not struggle. The boat isn’t particulary heavy, but I remember the Mighty Micra struggled to get up steep hills without any load. You had to drop gears to get up Windy Hill. Poor beast. The trouble is the estates tend to be bigger engines. Good for my needs, bad for my insurance. I kept circling back to the Peugeot 207 sw, (Station Wagon! *sigh*). The reviews said the best of the bunch was the 2 litre engine model,the insurance quotes said not. My best bet was the 1.4, which the reviews said was woefully pedestrian. I was going to compromise on the 1.6 model. A left field option has just popped up. A supposedly immaculate 2003 Volvo V70. It’s a 2.4 litre automatic estate with a towing hook. I did a mock insurance quote, £370. Way cheaper than the Pug! Weird. And it’s in Stockton Heath. It […]

I’ve been reworking my story lately. I’ve decided to do it as a short story. I’m not happy with consistency of it, in keeping with what I now know to be the rationale to it, but I have a beginning, middle and end. I will be pleased just to actually finish one of my stories. This means I’ve been doing lots of typing. I’ve been using the laptop quite a bit and I realised I actually prefer the layout of the keyboard. It’s not something I’ve ever considered. I just muddle through with the touch typing, losing my place on the home keys every now and then. The laptop set up had a big red button in the middle of the keyboard so you stay centered. Once the idea took hold that you can get a better keyboard I had a look. Look at this beast I’m trialing as we speak. A clear division of hands, curved to fit the shape of your hands, and built-in wrist rests. When I get the hang of this I’m going to be way better. The one problem I’ve noted, being self taught, is that I use the wrong hand for the B. I keep trying to reach my right hand over and I’m hitting the N. It will probably be a good thing when I correct it. It only arrived this afternoon so it’s still a bit weird. I seem to have got back into reading again, which is a good. Sadly some of the books have been less than great. So, so, less than great. Which is a damn shame because they have had great concepts. Another new and exciting development is I seem to finally over my latest bout of plague weakness. It was getting me down, to be honest, it had been nearly 3 weeks. So, yay!Over that. Now I’ve just got a common or garden sore throat and cold. So that’s lovely. Variety is the spice of life. I had two days without shifts allocated so I said I was unavailable and took the time off to be poorly. I’ve only got a 7 and a bit hours shift tomorrow, so I should be ok for that. Wow. You don’t realise how many B’s you use until you type every one wrong. The weekend before last it was well windy, and I’d finished setting up all my new lines and sail on my boat, so I took it for a spin. Ha! It’s much the same as learning to drive anything else, you have to know what you are doing, and feel in control, before you can start enjoying the thrilling stuff. As it was I was just getting blown from tack to tack, without any clear idea what I was doing, while fighting the fierce gusts just to stay upright. One of them caught me. First outing of my full size, new sail (which is to say, powerful). No matter how I heeled out of the boat, turned […]

He was dead! In a frozen, frantic, second he took it all in. His own face reflected in Kasabian’s mirror sunglasses. (How was that his face? He’d never seen it before.) The pistol in Kasabian’s hand. (Who was Kasabian? Why had he shot him?) The realisation he was a second from death. (Who was he?) His lifeless fingers falling away from the pistol in it’s shoulder holster (Why did he have a pistol? Human life is sacrosanct, he could never kill someone.) The deck of the boat rising to meet him as his body fell limp. A frenzy of information assailed his mind while a mania of questions threatened his sanity. He was in a car. WHAT? He threw the wheel over, brakes locking, bumped up the pavement and slid to a stop. There was a long and frightening horn blast as a lorry slewed around him. What? What? What? He looked around frantically. In a car. Where was Kasabian? Where was he? He was on the pavement of a dual carriageway, not on a boat deck. He looked down, his suit was unmarked. He patted himself, not trusting his eyes, no bullet wounds. What? He took a few deep breaths, trying to calm the mind-numbing panic. First things first. Not dead. That was good. Try to be logical. OK. Not dead. Still good. In an old fashioned sports car. Could be worse. He adjusted the rear view mirror and looked at himself. The same face he’d seen reflected in Kasabian’s sunglasses. A white, thirty something man. Clean shaven, slicked, black hair, blue eyes, ruggedly handsome. It was consistent, but still not his face. Who was he? He couldn’t even remember his own name, or one single fact before dying. Oh no. Dying. Dying! He felt the rise of panic. Stop it! Work it out! Clues. He did a quick search of his pockets. In the right hand suit jacket inside pocket he found a long slim wallet. He snatched it out and opened it. A driver’s licence! Bingo! He looked at the face on the card, it was the one in the mirror, then the name. Charles Whyte. He was Charles Whyte. Charles. Charlie. Char. Whytey. He said them all a few times, testing for any sort of response from his memory. Nothing. A stranger’s face with a stranger’s name. He shuffled in his seat and felt in his trouser pockets. A few pound coins. He patted down his suit, only then noticing the bulge under his arm. He was so accustomed to it he hadn’t even noticed it. As his hand struck it he became suddenly, horribly, aware of it. Fearing, but knowing, what he was going to find, he pulled his jacket open. The butt of a pistol met his gaze, projecting temptingly from a shoulder holster. Oh no. Why? Why did he have a gun? To kill a human would be… his thoughts dissolved into incomprehensible panic. He started again. He couldn’t… his thoughts skittered away […]