auchmeddan

My lovely bicycle. Poor thing has been through the wars on its first couple of trips for this year. To see photo full size just click on it.

Went out for my first cycle last Friday (27th Jan). When I decide to go the night before that’s usually it and I go regardless. Got up Friday morning and there was a lot of wind and what looked like rain coming. However, I had already made up my mind so I got the gear on and took the bike out to the car to use the cigarette lighter air pump to fill up my very deflated tyre’s.

I had just finished when the worst squall I’d seen in a little while came in from the west. I opted to run back to the house and wait it out. Left my bike out by the car, no time to carry it back with me. Waited 10 min and everything looked ok for going out. The first half of the journey was surprisingly easy considering I hadn’t cycled in about 9 mths (I came to realise the wind was with me pushing me on). The new speedometer by the school clocked me at 38k going down that hill, yippee!.. I had broken the speed limit.

Got as far as The Reefs hotel and my arms were starting to hurt at the elbows (always happens the first cycle back) so I opted to turn back. The first set back was the wind was now blowing gusts of up to 35/40mph right at me so its equivalent of cycling up a very, very steep hill. I wasn’t going anywhere fast and I was on the flat. The second set back was the hail storm that came from nowhere, I hadn’t even gotten as far as Church Bay yet. I thought I could work through it but it got to the point where I couldn’t see where I was going, that and it was starting to really hurt my bare legs and face so I took refuge in a bus shelter. No sooner had I stopped so had the hail, oh well, onward and upward. What should have been a 30 min round trip took me nearly 50 mins and I thought I wasn’t going to have the strength in my legs to finish. Ok, I didn’t, I had to walk the bike back to the house once I got off the main road, but I cycled most of the way.

Not to be discouraged I decided to go for a cycle today (31st Jan), again it was windy but I figured at least the sun is out and I might be sheltered on the railway trail. Took my camera to photograph those places you never usually stop at. The one to the right is of a view from the small bay at Boaz Island Bridge, the one to the bottom left is of the Maritime Museum at Dockyard. Like before just click on them to see full size version.

While at Dockyard trying my best to get a good crashing wave shot (they were all crap) I realised that the weather was changing. I could see very dark clouds over the place I had to cycle back to and thought it best to get a move on. I had barely left Dockyard when the rain started and like last Friday the wind was blowing right at me, 38/44mph gusts again. Stopped at the gas station to get some Ziploc bags to protect my camera and phone and waited there for 10mins as the wind and the rain passed. I was hoping that was going to be the worst but the whole way back I was fighting the wind and cycling through some pretty bad rain. Of course when I got back to the house the sun came out!!!!!!!!! As the sun was out I got the chance to give the bike a wee rinse, had lots of sand and dirt on it.

I have another cycle planned for Thurs this week, fingers crossed the weather is nice, don’t think my legs could take another beating like this.

Now that I’ve added an auto-update in the top right that tells you what we last listened to in ITunes, I guess I better try and make sure that last thing I listen to before going off-line isn’t too weak. Or I need to kill itunesblogger before playing my Barry Manilow

Its Thurs on my first week not working, the house is starting to look pretty tidy. Waking up on Monday was really strange, I felt like I should be getting up for something but knew I didnt need to. Didnt get up until 10am in the end, was so slow getting started. I think that I need to try and plan my days so I get at least one thing done every day. Monday was picking up the rest of my crap from work and recovering from the long walk that Dave and I did Sunday (I’m not as fit as I thought I was. Tuesday was spent doing laundry and for some reason going on a 2 and a half hour walk from my house to horseshoe and back. Was very sore and tired after that. Wednesday was spent clearing out my closet, its a big closet and took me about 4 hours and 4 trash bags. Looking very nice now, even organised Dave’s closet so everything is now in order. I cant believe how many blue T-shirts he has.

After last nights high winds and the most irritating squeak I’ve ever heard I couldnt get up this morning. I got some groceries and started this post. I dont think that I’ll be doing much today except typing up my recipies and going to my salsa class later on. The winds are still high and the sea is looking really cool with lots of white caps, got a couple of photos this morning. Just tried to get the photos off Dave’s Canon camera but aparently its too complicated for me so I went out and got a couple with my camera. Have put one below, click on photo for full size version:

Just set up my account with site5 today, and already have the DNS updated and this blog up. It’s a very good service and a really good price.

One of the very cool features is something that Site5 call “fantastico” - it’s a cool tool that ran a script to install the Wordpress blog engine for me, which I am now using to maintain the site. As much as I liked my menu on my old site, this will be much easier to maintain, and this blog will allow Jules to post with her own username.

So, welcome to the new site. Unfortunately, now I need to migrate all the old Blog Entries across..

Just installed Google Earth yesterday, and did what everyone else does as soon as they load it - tries to find their house. To my utter amusement, I found our car parked outside. Don’t know when they did the satellite imaging, or how often they will update it, but it amused me greatly.

The photo is below. Cllick on it for a larger version of the picture.

UPDATE : a friend just sorted out the date for me. The photos of Bermuda appear to have been taken some time over Cup Match 2003. After checking some landmarks, it looks like they are right.