17th October 2016 And there it was, gone again.

0/00

Monday 17th 47-50F, breezy at times, heavy overcast, quite misty. My post vanished. Probably because blogger is broken. Most times I Update or Publish I get a blank post editing page. It then appears in the post list with no content. At all! Just the same date as the original post but marked as a draught. Normally I click on it and safely delete. This time I must have deleted the basic post with date and weather conditions.

My legs were a bit tired from Sunday's ride. I walked for an hour and half along the marsh and though the woods. Somewhere out on the field farm workers were collecting stones dug up by their most recent cultivation. The gentle roar of the wind in my ears was repeatedly interrupted by a loud clang. Another large stone had found a new home for the first time in, perhaps, hundreds of thousands of years. I could barely make out the shape of a tractor in the murky, misty gloom. Buzzards, which were unflinching to the racket, cried and moved away as I drew quietly closer on foot. 

A spraying machine had obviously been out on the previously pristine fields. Leaving long, wide tracks for future walking routes. There seem to be many jackdaws and rooks about at the moment Either crossing the sky in their hundreds or moving individually, like oily rags, against the grey sky. They forage in large numbers on the fields and verges. Each with their own tolerance for passing cyclists or pedestrians. Some are fearless and will let me pass within yards. Others are in flight if they so much hear a rumour of a passing trike at a thousand yards. Gulls are just the same yet have few human enemies with guns.

I rode my missed, Saturday shopping route and returned heavily laden. Yet again there was hardly a single driver keeping to the lowered speed limits for the long term drainage and cycle path project. Yet again there were drivers racing up behind others on roads where there was zero chance to overtake either legally or remotely sensibly. Some of them obviously have delusions of grandeur. As they brush past me at high and illegal speeds to show just how important their journey to the supermarket must really be. I'm sure many of them think of themselves as minor royalty when compared with a lowly tricyclist. 15 miles.

Tuesday 18th 50-51F, 10-11C, very heavy overcast, light breeze with hundred yard mist. I have tinnitus and dizziness again. I shall have to ask to see a specialist to sort out my left ear deafness problem. I walked my usual loop via the muddy fields and tracks. The mist made anything beyond 200 meters a monochromatic silhouette. I could hear the excavator rattling its bucket out in the mist but could see nothing. The thick mist seemed not to affect traffic behaviour at all. Now there's a surprise!

I bought a new pair of yellow safety glasses while in the city. I find them useful for those endless grey days when sunglasses would be foolishly depressing . On first seeing them I was immediately upgraded from "clown on a tricycle" to "Lego-Boy" by The Head Gardener. Which makes the glasses rather good value at only a couple of quid. They have click-lock retractable earpieces. Which means they can avoid the usual "earpiece scratching in the middle of the lens" syndrome when they are shoved repeatedly in the back pocket of a cycling jersey or jacket.

A short ride in occasional, weak sunshine but mostly overcast and misty. The autumn beech forest looked gorgeous in the yellow sunglasses. Rather boring without. Which is why I didn't stop to take any more pictures. 10 miles.

Wednesday 19th 50F, 10C, grey, damp and spitting gently with rain. Patchy low cloud was pretending to be mist as I walked for an hour along the rural lanes. One of those rare days when the wind turbines are as still as the air. Even greater numbers of gulls than usual were sitting restlessly on a hillside. I managed to upset them so that they filled the air with movement and drifted away across "their" field. Common gulls are such copycats. A teasing glimpse of sunshine warms the autumn colours as I wonder whether a ride will be possible today. It wasn't, as it grew steadily wetter with some real downpours.

Click on any image for an enlargement.

00/0