I've got an issue with the text app on this machine. I'm sitting here writing this and wondering what will happen to it, not the app, but the text I'm writing. Will it be lost forever or will it be easily found? The answer is I don't know. All I do know is that I've written stuff here before and then lost it, so it's anybody's guess.
It's Easter Sunday and I'm not cycling today purely because we're going out for lunch. What kind of a reason is that? Well, we're leaving around 1100hrs so if I'm out on the ride and I get a puncture, I'll have to walk home and if I walk it'll take ages and I'll end up missing lunch and ruining everybody's day. And if you're wondering why I would have to walk home, it's simple: I've run out of leeches and need to buy some more.
So, not going cycling you'd think I'd lie in, but no, I was up at 0600hrs as normal. There used to be a time when I could lie in bed all day, or certainly not get out before 1100hrs. Breakfast became lunch, slobbing around was the order of the day and the very idea of getting up early made me shudder.
Then, one day, things changed and I don't know how or why. Alright, one has to get up early during the week for work and, I suppose, that conditions us all into a routine of sorts and it means we're capable of getting up early, but rising at the crack of dawn when we don't need to? Yes, I do get up early for no reason; as soon as I open my eyes I'm ready to jump out of bed and do something. If I wake up ahead of my alarm clock (which I often do) then I try to stay put in bed, I try to get back to sleep and sometimes I succeed. Other times I lie there for about ten minutes and then I give up and go downstairs, make a cup of tea and and a slice of toast, say, or even go for it big time and make porridge, official confirmation that I'm up and raring to go.
Normally, once I'm up I switch on my lap top and faff around, checking the BBC website first, then my emails and then I might glance at my blog, see how many readers I had the day before. Often a disappointing moment, I can tell you, although, sometimes, I'm pleasantly surprised.
Right now I guess I'm experimenting. It's not early, but I have been up since the crack of dawn, 0600hrs to be precise, although I was up earlier,or rather awake earlier, lying there, getting fidgety, thinking about getting up. Eventually the alarm, actually no, the alarm didn't go off because it wasn't in the room, it's normally in the room, on the ironing board, but not last night. I'd charged it downstairs in the conservatory and, sure enough, when I went downstairs and slid open the 'patio' door, the sound of birdsong rang out. It's like that thing about 'do bears shit in the woods?' Do alarms go off when they're not in the room and you can't hear them? The answer is yes, they do. I switched it off and got on with my day. First, breakfast. Porridge with fruit and a cup of tea, apple and cinnamon, new tea I found in the store yesterday. What is it with me and fruit or herbal teas? I love them. Beats the usual builder's tea.
I put John Martyn's Solid Air on the sound system, arguably the most chilled out music around, ate breakfast and then messed around on the computer doing everything I mentioned earlier: the BBC website, email, my blog, you name it, and then, normally, I hit the road, but as I say I'm not going today because we're all heading into deepest Surrey, or is it Sussex, for a bite to eat, an Easter treat.
On the weather front, it's great for cycling; another amazing day with temperatures expected to be in the mid-twenties, probably hotter. I bet Andy's out there, he's probably taken a ride to Westerham or the lakes, places we both tend to visit only when we're alone, which is odd. I can't remember the last time I rode to the lakes, but I bet I was alone when I did it.
Actually, it turned out Andy didn't ride yesterday. He'd driven to Cornwall and back in a day on Saturday and felt very tired, so he stayed in,and probably started to wish he'd gone out, the weather being the way it was and, I hasten to add, still is.
The ride to Cornwall and back in a day seemed like a huge effort to me, a long haul. I would have been falling asleep at the wheel, but not Andy. He got there around 1pm and after doing what he had to do, headed home, arriving some time after 2100hrs. Americans think nothing of driving such distances and more, but in the UK it's a different story. I know if it had been me I'd have stayed over somewhere, that's how much of a wuss I am, but then Andy needed to be home.
He told me about his mammoth drive when I reached the green after cycling from home. It is now Bank Holiday Monday, or Easter Monday, and for a lot of people it marks the end of the holidays. Back to work on Tuesday for what amounts to a short week. I've got the rest of the week off. Take four days leave and get a total of 10, that was my thinking. I don't see my desk until Monday 29 April.
We rode the slow way to the churchyard, passing the aromatic oilseed rape fields on the way and occasionally glimpsing bluebells in wooded glades. As I probably mentioned in my last piece of writing on the subject, the churchyard is a wonderful place in the good weather. I could sit there all day with a newspaper and something to eat and drink. The same could be said for any field in the sunshine.
After drinking our tea we lingered awhile, savouring the moment, perhaps, but then accepted that we had to ride home to live out the rest of our day. Andy had shopping to do, but my chores had been done on Saturday so I was in the clear.
You find me now sitting in the garden at just before 1700hrs, it's still warm enough to be relaxing alfresco in a tee-shirt, there's a warm breeze, the sound of a distant light aircraft and, of course, the tweeting birds. I have an apple and cinnamon tea on the go and behind me to my left the wind chime plays its chilled out tune. I'm looking at a bed of tulips to my left, a lawn directly in front of me and a flowerbed on my right full of what I call The Devil's Forget-Me-Not. It's a weed and it covers my garden at this time of year and later becomes unsightly green leaves secured by a huge root. I've tried digging them up, but they always return so I've surrendered to the futility of gardening.
It's Easter Sunday and I'm not cycling today purely because we're going out for lunch. What kind of a reason is that? Well, we're leaving around 1100hrs so if I'm out on the ride and I get a puncture, I'll have to walk home and if I walk it'll take ages and I'll end up missing lunch and ruining everybody's day. And if you're wondering why I would have to walk home, it's simple: I've run out of leeches and need to buy some more.
So, not going cycling you'd think I'd lie in, but no, I was up at 0600hrs as normal. There used to be a time when I could lie in bed all day, or certainly not get out before 1100hrs. Breakfast became lunch, slobbing around was the order of the day and the very idea of getting up early made me shudder.
 |
| Heading home from the churchyard... |
Normally, once I'm up I switch on my lap top and faff around, checking the BBC website first, then my emails and then I might glance at my blog, see how many readers I had the day before. Often a disappointing moment, I can tell you, although, sometimes, I'm pleasantly surprised.
Right now I guess I'm experimenting. It's not early, but I have been up since the crack of dawn, 0600hrs to be precise, although I was up earlier,or rather awake earlier, lying there, getting fidgety, thinking about getting up. Eventually the alarm, actually no, the alarm didn't go off because it wasn't in the room, it's normally in the room, on the ironing board, but not last night. I'd charged it downstairs in the conservatory and, sure enough, when I went downstairs and slid open the 'patio' door, the sound of birdsong rang out. It's like that thing about 'do bears shit in the woods?' Do alarms go off when they're not in the room and you can't hear them? The answer is yes, they do. I switched it off and got on with my day. First, breakfast. Porridge with fruit and a cup of tea, apple and cinnamon, new tea I found in the store yesterday. What is it with me and fruit or herbal teas? I love them. Beats the usual builder's tea.
 |
| Andy's Kona Blast at the churchyard |
On the weather front, it's great for cycling; another amazing day with temperatures expected to be in the mid-twenties, probably hotter. I bet Andy's out there, he's probably taken a ride to Westerham or the lakes, places we both tend to visit only when we're alone, which is odd. I can't remember the last time I rode to the lakes, but I bet I was alone when I did it.
Actually, it turned out Andy didn't ride yesterday. He'd driven to Cornwall and back in a day on Saturday and felt very tired, so he stayed in,and probably started to wish he'd gone out, the weather being the way it was and, I hasten to add, still is.
The ride to Cornwall and back in a day seemed like a huge effort to me, a long haul. I would have been falling asleep at the wheel, but not Andy. He got there around 1pm and after doing what he had to do, headed home, arriving some time after 2100hrs. Americans think nothing of driving such distances and more, but in the UK it's a different story. I know if it had been me I'd have stayed over somewhere, that's how much of a wuss I am, but then Andy needed to be home.
He told me about his mammoth drive when I reached the green after cycling from home. It is now Bank Holiday Monday, or Easter Monday, and for a lot of people it marks the end of the holidays. Back to work on Tuesday for what amounts to a short week. I've got the rest of the week off. Take four days leave and get a total of 10, that was my thinking. I don't see my desk until Monday 29 April.
We rode the slow way to the churchyard, passing the aromatic oilseed rape fields on the way and occasionally glimpsing bluebells in wooded glades. As I probably mentioned in my last piece of writing on the subject, the churchyard is a wonderful place in the good weather. I could sit there all day with a newspaper and something to eat and drink. The same could be said for any field in the sunshine.
 |
| The Tatsfield churchyard |
You find me now sitting in the garden at just before 1700hrs, it's still warm enough to be relaxing alfresco in a tee-shirt, there's a warm breeze, the sound of a distant light aircraft and, of course, the tweeting birds. I have an apple and cinnamon tea on the go and behind me to my left the wind chime plays its chilled out tune. I'm looking at a bed of tulips to my left, a lawn directly in front of me and a flowerbed on my right full of what I call The Devil's Forget-Me-Not. It's a weed and it covers my garden at this time of year and later becomes unsightly green leaves secured by a huge root. I've tried digging them up, but they always return so I've surrendered to the futility of gardening.
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