A break in the rain...and a band called Rush!

It hasn't stopped raining for months... until Saturday 14 February (Valentine's Day). It was flagged up on my iphone many days prior, and sure enough, Saturday was a sunny, albeit cold, day and I managed a ride to Oxted, 20 plus miles and a huge hill on the return ride. I wasn't looking forward to the hill, it has to be said. In fact, all the way along the 269 on the outward ride I was debating riding to Westerham instead where I knew there were power points in the Esquire's coffee shop where I could charge my phone. However, when I reached the roundabout just past Botley Hill I decided to plunge headfirst down the hill and head for Oxted where I had a choice of coffee shops: Caffe Nero (which was packed solid); Starbucks, which was fairly busy; Costa that was virtually empty. I have a Costa card and I figured I must be getting close to a free drink so I bowled in and ordered an English Breakfast Tea in a takeaway cup. Sure enough it was free! Yippee!

Toronto, Canada, home of the band Rush.

I took a seat at the front of the store, pulled out my book, Remind Me to Smile by Martin Downham, and relaxed. It must be said that Downham's book is brilliant, it's up there in my opinion with Mike Carter's One Man & His Bike and I love it. Equating it with Carter's book is because it's such a life-affirming read; it's nothing like Carter's book in reality. Downham's book is about Gary Numan, plus many other things, while Carter's book is about cycling around the coast of England, Scotland and Wales, totally different premises, but they're both life-affirming.

Soon it was time to go, but I kept thinking about the hill. At one point I was going to ride towards Westerham on Pilgrims Lane and avoid it altogether but in the end I decided I would simply grin and bear it, but first, a wander around Oxted, a look in the charity shop and, on this occasion, In Between the Lines, a shop full of greetings cards and books and scented candles. I bought a book for my daughter and a (late) Valentine's card for my wife. Normally I remember. In fact, I didn't forget but one way or another I never got around to visiting a shop to buy it.

And then the phone rang. It was Andy. Rare for Andy to call me on a Saturday, he's normally cycling with Oxted CC, but call he did. He asked me where I was and I told him I was in Oxted. He wanted a lift home from Sheree's to Caterham because he had a problem with his bike that couldn't be fixed. Sadly, I couldn't help. My wife had the car and I was on my bike. I figured that by the time I'd cycled home, waited for the car and then drove to Tatsfield, Andy would have fixed whatever was wrong with his bike and would be long gone. Later I called him and all was well, he had fixed the problem.

The ride home for me was fine too. The hill is never as bad as I'd been leading myself to believe it was, and I sailed up to the top and then rode along the 269 towards home. I was glad for the long ride. The last few weeks have been just one ride a week and (on Saturday) I was looking forward to a two-ride weekend. But no, the rain returned with a vengeance on Sunday so it was still a one-ride weekend. I'm just hoping the pattern will be broken soon. It was still light at 1720hrs today, that's a good sign. It won't be long before summer comes, as Thin Lizzy used to sing.

I'm loving Rush, the rock band

Of late, I've been obsessed with the band Rush. I've bought Geddy Lee's memoir, My Effin' Life, and I've bought Moving Pictures, one of many albums. They're fantastic! And let's face it, I've known of the band for a very long time but never really bothered with them. However, now I've been listening to their stuff on YouTube, there are tunes, riffs, that I remember from parties in the mid-to-late seventies. But somehow I never bought an album and now I wish I had. I've watched way too many interviews with Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson and Neal Peart, their excellent drummer, although, sadly, very sadly, Peart died so now there's just Lifeson and Lee and this year (2026) they're touring with a female drummer and possibly even a keyboard player to allow Geddy to perform more up front with Alex. Sadly the shows (starting in June) take place in the USA and Canada only, although a video has appeared on YouTube in which Geddy Lee says that Rush will be touring the UK in February and March 2027 and also Europe. I'd love to see them in Toronto, their home town.

What I like about Rush is their friendship, they've known each other a long time, especially Lee and Lifeson (and Peart when he was alive) and there are many videos on You Tube that I could simply watch forever. One is them going out for a meal together, all three of them, and the laughter and love they have for one another is there for all to see as is Lee's and Lifeson's grief over the death of their drummer, Neil Peart.

I'm not sure if I say much about it on this blog, but I've always wanted to play bass guitar, and I mean I've always wanted to play bass. I used to play violin and I figured that the strings are EADG as opposed to GDAE on the violin, so surely there's a chance I might be reasonably good. Well, I guess life has got in the way, although I'd love to own a Fender Precision bass and be able to play it reasonably well. I keep meaning to go out and buy one and just start playing it. In terms of possessions, I've never been the guy with the Porsche or the designer clothes (to be honest, cars and fashion leaves me cold) but I did once have a Rolex watch. The problem with it was that it never kept time and it was one of those possessions that has the eye of the theives and, therefore, it can be risky wearing it in certain places. On the time front, if I set it for noon on, say, a Monday, by Wednesday it would be ten past twelve and so on, so I put it back in its box and stopped wearing it, using my various mobile phones as my watch instead. But I've always wanted to have something that was 'good', something of value. I mean, the whole bass thing springs to mind. I could go out and buy a cheap Fender copy or a cheap Hofner copy or a cheap Music Man copy and what have you, but I'd like to own a Fender precision bass, I really would and I can and I will, very soon. I might even buy one of those stands to put it on.

Oddly, I've met a couple of bassists, Bill Wyman I bumped into in the Kings Road, London, and I met Paul Simenon of the Clash on Kings Cross St Pancras station and none of those meetings were in any way planned. I met Wyman outside of Gail's, a bakery store on New Year's Eve around three years ago. At the moment, my favourite Rush track is Limelight but also YYZ, which is an instrumental and there's a complicated bass line on it that many a musician raves about on YouTube. I like Tom Sawyer and Working Man and Spirit of Radio and I'm hoping to buy more Rush CDs to play in the car as I know they're not everybody's cup of tea. I'll have to be driving alone, of course. I'm the sort of person who can write with background music and Rush perfectly fits the type of music I like if I'm writing anything. Right now, it's too early to be listening to Rush, it's breakfast time and I'd be met with calls of 'turn it off!' or 'turn it down! or somebody would come in and switch it off for me, but to be honest, it doesn't have to be on loud. I like the complexity of Rush music and the interesting lyrics of Neil Peart. How many rock bands' drummers write the lyrics I wonder?

A week has passed since I started writing this post and it's Saturday again, 21 February, and I'm planning a ride. It's not raining, which is good, so I'd better get out there fast and get back again*. I need to start waking up early again. I used to be up at 0600hrs and out of the house by 0700 and then back around 0930 to 1000hrs, but not today. If I leave now I'll be back before noon so I'd better be quick. Of course, I don't have to do a long ride, I could do what I call the Norfolk Nobbler (during the pandemic I gave my rides stupid names); it's a short ride of around 40 minutes, lots of hills, or a few hills, but whatever I'm going to do I'd better do it sharpish or I won't be getting anywhere. Perhaps I'd better start setting that alarm clock again... and getting an early night on Fridays instead of sitting there watching Graham Norton.

* I never got out there, events took over and now, Sunday 22nd February, it's raining.

Get on with it!!!!

A few dodgy starts on consecutive Sundays. The first one turned out to be disastrous, although that was probably too severe a description. Basically, I kept leaving the house and having to return; well, a couple of times, but I was already running late and when I remembered that my pump and 'leeches' for punctures were in a rucksack and that rucksack wasn't on my back I had to return again having made it half way up Church Way. Demoralising sums it up. The problem, of course, was not having used a rucksack for a while and then changing tack and using one, largely for carrying a book and glasses, but also a new bicycle pump and patches, the former being too big to fit in my crossbar bag. Annoyed with myself I returned home, vowing to go out later, which I did, but first I sent Andy a text saying I wouldn't be there. I rode to Westerham instead about half an hour after returning home and stopped at Esquire's Coffee where I read my book, Eric Ambler's Uncommon Danger. I was drenched by the time I got there because the weather turned as I approached Botley Hill. It rained continuously until I reached the town. While I sat there, the weather changed and there was no rain on the return ride. I did my usual thing: I approached Westerham in the normal manner, riding down Clarks Lane, and then went back the other way, turning left on to Pilgrims Lane by the Velobarn, which is never open these days.

The following week (last Sunday) I almost repeated the calamity but was determined to reach Sheree's as I hadn't seen Andy for a couple of weeks and, I remembered, I had a free cup of tea thanks to Sheree's loyalty card promotion. I was late arriving but all was well and while I left with Andy to ride home, I had glimpsed the ginger cake and decided to go back in and order a slice... and another pot of tea! I sat there chilling out and then left and rode home. While it had been a little rainy on the outward journey, again it had stopped for the return ride. There was mist (make that fog) so I was glad I had my lights fully charged front and back.

Things have been a little stressful of late: mum was admitted to hospital with pneumonia and spent a while in ward B5 after enduring three days on a gurney in the corridor. I visited daily. It's amazing when you consider that the UK is the world's fifth largest economy that the hospitals are not unlike those you might find in Gaza during the pummelling the Palestinians were given by the Israelis. We've all seen shots of war zone A&E departments on the news and that's exactly what it's like in, of all places, St. Helier hospital in Carshalton and elsewhere in the UK. The fifth largest economy in the world! There are also a lot of people in the UK living in poverty and relying upon food banks, there are homeless people, including ex-servicemen, living on the streets, single mums with young children sofa surfing or living in sub-standard, mould-infested rented accommodation. 

Mum was eventually placed on a ward and given oxygen and antibiotics and soon started to recover, but it's not looking good long-term. The doc suggested she was fit to go back to the home but he wasn't confident that the infection would stay away for long. That said, mum has always been a fighter. When dad died she calmly announced that she had breast cancer, but soon kicked it into touch; then she was told she needed a hip replacement and sailed through the whole thing without incident. After that a few falls and a diagnosis of dementia saw her being placed in a nursing home for her own safety, where she is now, and that's kind of where we are; it's not been easy. Yesterday, I found out that mum was a little better, not brilliant but definitely better so, while it's still a little touch and go and will remain so, there has, if you like, been a stay of execution.

I'm glad she's back in the home as it's a far better environment than the hospital. In the bed next to mum in ward B5 was a woman who would suddenly scream like in the horror movies. It made me jump, put it that way, but mum wasn't phased at all, she didn't even flinch. I wonder what that woman is doing now? She's probably still there making the other patients jump every five minutes.

I'm going to the home tonight, it's a 25-minute drive from where I live. If it was lighter in the evenings (as it is during the summer) I'd probably ride over there on the bike, but, to be honest, after a day in the office and the commute home, the last thing I'm thinking of is cycling. Especially today as there was a derailment this morning at the depot in Selhurst and also a signal failure of sorts which have both caused problems that are ongoing.

On another topic, I simply must get my act together. There are so many things I need to address (one of them being more cycling) and I've now resorted to considering (note that word 'considering') writing a list and then ticking off all the things I need to do. However, I am literally 'considering' the list; it is, in fact, something I need to put on the list, ie writing the list itself is one of the things I haven't gotten round to. I don't know how I'm going to get out of what has become a spiralling state of not doing the things that I need to do. Even writing this blog has become something I don't do that often. Back in the day I was always writing about my rides to here and there, but now I don't post as often as I should and that, along with everything else on the mythical list, needs to be addressed.

It's Saturday 7th February now and guess what, yes, it's raining. So no cycling today and I can only hope they'll be one tomorrow. Last Sunday's ride to Sheree's was fine, but there was a touch of rain so it's not as if I'm not going out in it. Today, however, is fairly heavy and that means I'd be soaked through by the time I reached the top of Church Hill. Clearly, there's a need for an alternative sport and that will inevitably mean enrolling as a member of the local leisure centre. Something else for the list. In fact, it's been on the list for many weeks now and nothing has been done. I guess the problem is money: there's not much on the list that doesn't cost money, not that I don't have the money.

So it's looking like another week of just one ride, the Sunday ride. Normally I head to Oxted today where I sit and read in a Caffe Nero before heading back up the hill and home. I can't remember the last time I did it, but hold on a second, I'll take a look at Strava. It was 20 December, so before Christmas. Since then I've done the odd Norfolk Nobbler, the Sunday ride and a few walks. 

I'm finding it very difficult to start something and keep it going. So I managed to do one thing on the list (bring the trim wheel in from the garage, it's taken me weeks to do it) but I haven't used it yet. As for the dumbells, I've yet to start using them. I haven't booked a membership at the pool either. And things keep getting in the way. Admittedly it's normally the rain where cycling is concerned, but then there's other stuff too: we've got to go here or there and do this or do that and exercise takes a back seat. So, a clear need for getting my act together. 

As I write this it's raining but I'm going to check in a second or so and might (I stress that word 'might') go round the block. But who am I kidding? I'm not going to commit to anything, it's not worth it as something is bound to get in the way.