Weird weather

 But, at least it got better! This was at about 10.45, this morning, passing Gatwick Airport. thick fog, with the planes taking off overhead obviously subject to delays - the departures were much wider apart than usual. And, I have to say, the fog in this photo isn't all that bad, either - around twenty minutes previously, passing through Norwood Hill, I could hardly see the road in front of me. 

After Gatwick, it did improve slightly, and by the time I had been through Wimlands, and Friday Street, it was much better. the ride back up the Newdigate Road was glorious: fast, flowing, fun. Plus, I was lucky enough to be able to drop in to Tanhouse, for a pit stop. A wonderfully earthy espresso, plus a slice of Chocolate Fudge Cake that coated the ribs and set me up for the journey home.

It wasn't all plain sailing, mind you - on that return leg, my top gear started slipping. I'm fairly sure it's a stretched chain. I must have put at least 5000km on this one, which is plenty. I've been scrupulous about lubing it, and cleaning it after rides - but I do put in some strain, with all that climbing, and the winter weather will not have helped, at all. So, it's time for some remedial works.

Tomorrow, I'll be back on those roads, but it'll be on the Giant, not the Tarmac.

Today has been about sunshine and samples.

 This was the sample. About 50 seconds in. No prizes, obviously. 

Just jaw-droppingly amazing - and such a powerful moment. Sends chills up the spine. 

And the sunshine?

Well, that was from being back out on the bike, obviously. The weather this morning was just perfect. I was out a little earlier than I would have liked; just before 10am, when I left. The roads were still a little slick, and greasy, but once I had passed Esher, everything opened out, and the Sun filled the sky. 

I headed out past Esher, through Cobham, and up Hatchford Hill. Past Bridge End, through Ripley, then up Hungry Hill, and the full length of Ripley Road. This photo is at the top of the road, just before turning back onto the main road, and heading for home. It was a life-affirming experience, being out in the Sun again. I know, it wasn't exactly warm - but that'll come, too. 

Genuinely terrifying

 There were certain points in this video, where I got the fear, big time. A couple of the corners - I didn't think he was going to make it. At these sorts of speeds, there's not much room for error. Having said that, it does look like it's basically the most exhilarating thing, ever.

Oh, and one more thing, at one point, he's doing 80kmh. That's actually 10km/h slower than my fastest speed, on a road bike. Looking at this video, I'm actually tempted to vow that my days of going very, very fast are over.

Busy Weekend

 It all seems to have completely flown by, that's certain.

A bike ride on Saturday morning, once the fog had lifted, then childcare for the large part of the rest of the day, as Pip was out on a jolly (Brits afterparty, lucky for some)

That meant I had to do the run with Marnie, to her Swim Gala in Maidenhead today - up and down the 25, and the M4, on a sunny Sunday afternoon. Thankfully, the traffic was kind - this makes a huge difference, trust me. 

Being in the car for a protracted amount of time allowed me the luxury of diving deep into some of my recent Spotify obsessions, as well. Chief amongst those is Pale Blue Eyes - beguiling, and cerebral indie-Krautrock. This is chiming heavily with me at the moment: a renewed push to get on the turbo trainer has meant I've been listening to LOADS of Motorik Playlists, and bits of what Pale Blue eyes do, have fitted in, nicely.

Enjoy.

Memories

 Hilton Garden Inn, Oakville

Some memories popped onto my Facebook feed today, making me look back at the world tour that ended late last year. What an incredible time - 35 shows, from November 2023, in Japan, finishing up in Esher, the next November. In between, we visited the USA three times, went to Canada, Australia, played all over the UK... it was possibly the most fun I've had, as a member of the band. It wasn't without its challenges, don't get me wrong: at certain points, the sheer weight of responsibility almost overwhelmed me. I certainly felt that my mental health took a sharp turn for the worse, at a number of times. Learning to balance my life, between times of intense activity, and those periods of rest in between, was hugely difficult. 

But I wouldn't have changed it for the world. I sat and pored over the photos, this evening, and selected just this one, to represent what it was all like, for me. A hotel room, in Toronto. My base for about three days. What felt like an oasis of sanity between some hugely complicated travel days. there's my suitcase, by the door. My laptop bag, on top. the two bags that followed me all over the globe - through airports, in vans, into venues. Pushing that case into hotel rooms, lugging it onto the bed, opening the zip. Letting my life, in packing cubes, bags of dirty laundry and washbags, tumble onto the bedding. There's the generic hotel bathroom, repository for the same old toothbrush, the cologne, and the shaving cream. There's a TV on the wall, but it's never switched on. I've not watched a TV, in a Hotel room, for over a decade: it's my sanctuary, my place of rest - television would be an unwelcome guest. 

I stayed in dozens of rooms like this, for the tour. Different views, from the windows, but much the same sorts of places. All of them welcoming, to me, for a short time: but equally, they would all let me go. 

Life on the road is transitory - in that sense, it's like all of our lives. But the transitory nature of road life has its own magic: a glory in the tiny monotonies that make it all tick.

I love being out on the road - and can't wait to do it all over again.

Wow!

 John McKay, the guitarist for Siouxsie & the Banshees, who left at the start of the tour for "Join Hands", alongside drummer Kenny Morris (causing a massive scandal, at the time) is releasing an album of recordings made shortly after he departed the Banshees. It absolutely sounds like a lost post-punk classic, and is incredibly nostalgic, for me. Hearing something sound like a time capsule of 1978, is a Proustian rush. 

It's been a while

 since I felt confident enough to recommend a new young happening band, to all of you hipsters out there. I mean seriously, who's going to care what an old fart like me thinks?

But, I really do think this lot are fantastic, and have some real spark of genius. Whether that translates into any real sense of greater commercial success is up to you lot, I guess.

From what I can tell, they're a loosely organised art collective (hurrah!) sometimes reaching anywhere up to a dozen people, with shifting roles. they have a full-time tambourine player (YES!), whose primary role seems to be summed up as providing "vibes". Honestly, if that isn't a reason to love them, I don't know what is. 

but who are they? And, what do they sound like? Well, they're Mandrake Handshake, and they sound pretty much like King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizzard listening to Krautrock, while simultaneously skinning up on the sleeve of an old Hawkwind album.

And look - they're great live, too. That'll be the "vibes", I reckon. 

Overwhelming relief.

 I've been rather unfit, of late.

Some of it is my fault - bad diet, laziness, drift.

some of it has just been a sense of mild depression and self-loathing, I suppose. mixed in with a large amount of residual grief, following Dad's death. Even writing that down feels strange, alien, and unsettling. 

But it's left me unable to truly enjoy the one thing that makes life noticeably better: getting onto my bike. It's been compounded by the fact that these last eighteen months have been one of the most successful periods for the band, in over three decades. We literally haven't stopped, and that's meant that my work has ramped up, too. I've been buried in logistics, planning, and music. So, trying to exercise, and ride, has been a frustrating pattern of stop/start. It's been almost impossible to build and maintain fitness, so - as you'd expect, fitness has taken a nosedive. One of the really obvious manifestations of this was my reluctance to get onto the turbo trainer. that had previously been a place where I could just get on, smash my way up a mountain, and marvel at the insane levels of effort. I could see the result, sweat my way into fitness and feeling healthy. 

But when fitness takes a dive, so does your confidence. You don't feel like heading back to those hills, because at the back of your mind is the nagging thought that you won't live up to your previous performances. You'll feel like you're failing. So you don't bother.

But, little by little, I've hopped on the trainer, these last few days, and I'm learning to love it again. I'm nowhere near heading up the Stelvio, or Ventoux, just yet - but today, I managed a PB up Puerto De Tudons. Faster than my last attempt, which was actually four years ago. I'm feeling much more energised. Here's to getting healthy again, and banishing all those other demons, too.

Here's the climb, I'll start the video from Sella, as that's the segment on Strava. It took 40 minutes for me, from there to the summit. Around about 215 watts, for those 40 minutes, which really isn't too bad. 

Onwards and upwards.

Back to Donuts

 Almost a decade ago, I started listening - really listening- to "Bitches Brew", by Miles Davis. I mean listening in a constant sense, not just infrequently. I think there was a period where I played it at least once a day, for a month. And then, at least two or three times a week. It enabled some sort of meditative state, in my mind. Hearing it became calming, for me. I relied on it. 

In the last few years, although it's still in rotation, there's a new pretender to the throne. I must have listened to "Donuts" a thousand times, and it still floors me. To take so much that's already been formed into musical language, then reshape it, into something else entirely? I can't quite comprehend its beauty, sometimes. There's a looseness to it, a fragility that can only come from an analogue heart, beating its way through the digital realm. And the sampling! Oh my word, it's perfect.

In fact, listening to this - a collection of all the samples on the record - is filling me with a melancholy wonder. 

Donuts, I love you.

Sunday morning blogging

It's early.

I'm sitting on the sofa bed, in the front room, wondering when I'll hop on the trainer and get a ride in (the weather looks rotten, for the rest of the day). I have a cat sitting next to me, the house is quiet, and the sun is beginning to peek over the houses outside. It's a lovely, peaceful start to the day - and one which comes as a relief, following on from yesterday. that was Milo's birthday celebrations, so we had a houseful of (just) teenage boys, eating Pizza and being lunatics, for a couple of hours. 

Marnie is off to SSP today, so I may be dragged into town, with a boy and his birthday money, desperate for Lego. Hey, there are worse things. 

Another task for today is to fettle a Spotify playlist for as much Motorik as possible. I've found that it's particularly well suited to indoor cycling - that relentless tension, the beautiful monotony. Spotify has its own suggestions, of course - but, as you'd expect, they're patchy, and algo-driven. Sod that.

I am my own algorithm, and I get to say what I want. 

This popped up today

 And I suddenly realised, it's basically my favourite era, for U2. It's that period between October and War - when they were still finding their feet, but musically, they were a simplistic, post-punk thrash, of a band. 

I mean - this is, fairly transparently, an attempt to sound like Wah! Heat. But it's marvellous. Soon, everything would be Red Rocks, and flags, and bombast. US remixes, filling dancefloors. A move towards the big, brash and obvious. 

But in this transitional period (Fire, Gloria, A Celebration) they were untouchable, to me. And, without getting into complex musical analysis, it's just wonderful to hear a song that's so basic! "A Celebration" feels like it's got about three notes. And it's all the better for it. 

I note, with some interest

That posts on this blog, for the year, are now more than at any other time than 2019. That's hugely comforting, and it gives me a small glow of pride, too. Within a month or two, it could be the most amount of posts since about 2012? 

Hey, blogging is the future, after all.

Web 2.0 posse, let me hear ya.

 

A day of business, some drift, admin and boat thoughts.

 Seriously, how am I still thinking about being on board?

Sunrise on the promenade deck

It's been - what - three weeks? And I'd get back on that ship, in a heartbeat. I loved being amidst the absolute silence of the waves, in the stillness of the early morning, watching the world slide gracefully by.

Hell yes, I'd do it all over again.

Today though, has been a day on dry land. Or, it would have been, had it not been bucketing with rain for most of the time. So, instead of heading out onto the open road, I took a day away from the bike, and used my time to catch up on lots, and lots of admin. 

Some of that involved some Google Meet action, and I'm constantly amazed at how much better than Zoom it is. Over the past six months, I've migrated all of my business over to Google Workspace, and it's been revelatory. The ability to scale up one's dreams and ambitions, backed up with some hugely user-friendly app ecosystems. It's changed the way I do business, but also the way that I think about business.

This is required viewing.

 Seriously, it's one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Recreating the entirety of The Human League's "Don't You Want Me". I'm not kidding here - every single second of this is pure genius. 

Back outside

 Though it may be the last time for a week or so, looking at the weather to come. But, as ever, nothing acts as a salve for the tortured soul, quite like heading up onto Ranmore Common. I even made it up the hill, in about 7'30", which - given my parlous state of fitness - is nothing short of miraculous. 

I also managed to absolutely hammer it down Staple Lane, in a PB time. Considering I'm on a rim brake bike (so, theoretically, less secure and "safe" feeling than a disc brake bike) again, a bit of a miracle. 

This TCR is making my heart, and my mind sing, at the moment. I'm in love with this damn bike.