1st March 2019 The great escape [from reality!]

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Friday 1st March 38-46F, calm and dark grey. After a run of fine and mild weather the clouds are back. There were a few spots of blue in the sky on my walk to the village and back. Quite a lot of pheasants about too. No wind suggests a ride might be in order if I can just get the trike over "The Wall." I could claim it was a national emergency but it is unlikely to get a pass by The Border Guard patrols.

Despite my doubts I was actually allowed out for a ride to a 10 mile distant DIY outlet. By the time I had detoured on the way back to try my luck at another DIY store I had managed 25 hilly miles. The wind turbines were all standing still but it still felt like a headwind whichever direction I rode. There was even a little sunshine.

My legs were fine for the first 3/4 of the distance but beginning to tire on the hills by the end. Hardly surprising given my very low mileage of late. My average speed on the computer has dropped to below 11mph. From a high of 13+ during my highest mileages. Rides on two days in a row? This could become a habit! Even a bit OCD?  😉

Saturday 2nd 33-42F, overnight frost, thick mist with a grey overcast. It should get brighter depending on which of the two complete opposites in which you place your faith in total, meteorological fantasy. The Head Gardener has expressed an interest in a special offer from a supermarket chain which is not locally represented. If I leverage this correctly there could well be a ride in it. With the headlines full of stories of multiple pileups in thick mist I must hope that it thins.

Given the totally undisciplined driving style, in fog or otherwise, around these parts, nothing [at all] surprises me. The inhabitants of the capital refer to our geographic area as the region of the "special people." With decreasing respect depending on how far west these [supposedly inferior] people live.

A bit like Londoners thinking everybody from Devon or Cornwall is a yokel and as thick as a brick. Or two short planks, depending on personal preferences. Some believe that everybody north of the M25 is a peasant. While I personally believe most Londoners suffer from MVM [Morbid Village Mentality.] 

Many of the locals, hereabouts, obviously think of themselves as special. Though I wouldn't go so far as to allow them "special powers" behind the wheel. Which so many obviously believe they have. No headlights in thick fog despite a national law demanding dipped headlights 366x24? No rear fog lights despite the drooling idiocy of not using them when required?

Driving nose to tail when there is no legal means of overtaking for literally miles of double white lines, endless blind bends and blind humps? Cutting every single corner even when traffic is already using their only legal side of the road themselves? Or literally clipping the verge on every other?

Routinely overshooting the rest by at least a car's width? So that the double white lines are completely erased, on every single bend, over much of the Danish road network. Every traffic light is a welcome opportunity to RLJ. One not to be missed [at any cost.] City traffic speeds could be doubled literally overnight if they provided roundabouts. Instead of  further excuses to break the law in broad daylight.

Talking of accidents: I stopped counting when I reached 50 vehicles falling of the 3 miles of local roads within a few, short years. All left stranded on the verge, sometimes on their sides or even on their roofs. All waiting for the rescue services to tow them away. Some were there for a week! How, on earth, do these people survive?

A Dane once said that Danes ignore the rules of the road as a low key protest against having the highest taxations, service charges and retail prices in the world. That may well explain the daily headlines of motorway closures due to <cough> "accidents."

Meanwhile, the politicooze have far more pressing matters to attend to than mere driver survival. The pressure is really on to slash taxes for the "offshore" ultra-rich. While leaving 73,000 of the weakest, elderly Danes without any, official, home help. They have no bread? Let them eat cake!

A huge machine was spraying the prairie as I walked along the road to the lanes. Too far away and still too misty for my TZ7 camera zoom to make much impact. Two geese went overhead while the Wood pigeons practised their stalls in the hope of <cough> pulling more birds.

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Add another 15 miles to the triking total. I could feel my knees slightly today despite trying to stay between 95 and 105rpm. Did some climbing out of the saddle too. It felt much cooler than of late.

There is a political argument going on about the legality of children taking time off from school to protest against climate change. I wonder, do those same students insist on walking or cycling to school as we did in previous generations? Or are they driven up to the school gates by their doting parents in a large and impressive saloon? Just in case the other students sneer at them for their family's, undoubted poverty.

Perhaps the same students should protest against the use of patio warmers? 1500W electric heaters, for use outside while the owners enjoy nature in the raw.  Probably while wearing the traditional Danish, winter wear, of short sleeved, cotton T-shirt and shorts. As they do all winter in Denmark. Probably with the central heating turned right up.

Add that to the strings of "landing lights" burning all day long outside. So that the home owners can come home, in their individual cars, one for each of the family, to a safe and welcoming wash of artificial daylight. While simultaneously advertising their absence from home, all day, every day, to any passing thief looking for an easy target.

These <cough> security lights often use old fashioned light bulbs burning hundreds of watts per hour, often 24 hours a day. Because their owners are too lazy to update to compact florescent, let alone fit modern LEDs. I blame the crooked, compact florescent manufacturers. Flogging expensive "low energy" replacements for traditional incandescent bulbs.

The light outputs were obscenely overrated per claimed, replacement wattage. Which often meant buying several examples before enough light could be had. Of course nobody mentioned they filled the house with mercury vapour when they broke. As many of them did. Not to mention the heat they produced. Often on a par with incandescent bulbs!

 

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