16.02.2024 64km/40 mile ride.

 ~o~

 Friday 16th 47F/8C. Unusually mild, heavy overcast. Possible showers around lunch time. Up at 7.15 after earlier failed attempts at lift off. Strangely hyperrealistic dreams again. I was in an extremely hilly city with lots of traffic and pedestrians. Asking for directions to somewhere which I thought I knew to exist. Though not in this reality.

 8.30 Aching all over when I got up. I now realise it was lifting mattresses and bricks which have probably caused the muscle pain. I thought it was the museum. Now I am going of a walk. The stove can wait. 63F/17C in the room.

 9.15 Back from my walk. The hazel catkins are everywhere. It took longer than normal to walk off my lower back pain. So I couldn't shorten the distance today. The sky was nearly 50% blue as I retraced my steps. The flail tractor had clipped the hedge on one side of the road but not the other. It had left a broad swathe of mud. Which forced me out into the road. With no chance of escape to the muddy verge when cars failed to drive around me. Though most of them did. 

 A huge and long, low loader, with a similar trailer, went wide on a sharp, 80º blind bend. It was obvious why. The drooling moron behind the wheel was using his mobile phone handheld. Lucky there wasn't a school bus going the other way and using half of the opposite lane. As they usually do. Despite the double white lines. Which have recently been restored but are already beginning to wear. Global headlines are only ever a fuckwit's idiocy away!

 9.45. Sunshine? I had better have a ride. I found my waterproof trousers the other day. They can go in a pannier. Just in case I am back too late to miss the promised, lunchtime rain.

 10.15 Finally dressed and ready for a ride. Circling several charity shops I think.

 14.30 61F/15C in the room. Returned from a 64km/40 mile ride to several charity shops. Disappointed to find the last and furthest away is closed on Fridays. I found another Jamie Oliver Tefal frying pan in a smaller size. In good condition by the look of it. I paid 25 kroner. Which is about £2.90.  

 I had been hoping to add a smaller version of my own largest pan. Which has revolutionised my cooking. After struggling for ages with the enamelled pans Which I had inherited from my late wife. Now I can put away the enamelled pans and enjoy my cooking. Oh, dear. The "new" pan is the same size as the other one! Not to worry. Still useful if it has retained its non-stickiness.

 It was raining hard as I left and kept it up for ages. So I had to stop and put on the waterproof  trousers. They were stiff and uncomfortable. So I took them off again as soon as it brightened up. There was even some watery sunshine at times. I was fighting the wind for much of the ride. 

 Flooded fields everywhere again. Riding through the deep puddles on the roads was a mistake. It washed the mud off the tires but soaked my trousers! I ate two small choccy bars but had nothing to drink. The battery charge dropped from 100% to 16%. Which is close to shut down. 

 The B67 saddle was weird. I started feeling some discomfort at 40km. Then it went away. Sort of. I wore padded racing shorts under my thin and stretchy, cycling trousers. The B67 is already showing signs of sagging and shaping itself. This is not a criticism. It is what is expected for saddle comfort. I shall avoid re-tensioning it until I see how it goes.

 A couple of blokes were poking about in the sheds next door as I rode down the drive. I could see them through the bare hedges. They had a white van open at the back and a silver car. There is no way of knowing if they are supposed to be there. There's not much left to steal. Not my place to get involved in the security of an empty home. They could get nasty if they knew they'd been discovered. They might have been tipped off that there was some building materials left lying about. 

 Dinner was sausages, mushrooms, egg and chips. I need not have turned the egg. I used the original [new] frying pan. The recycled one has been washed up and is being further soaked overnight. Just in case of some unwanted residue.

 I reached down for a damp cloth on the bathroom floor and it fell strangely cold. A salamander was sitting on top of it! Both the cloth and the wildlife were black. So it was perfect camouflage. I carried the salamander to the greenhouse. No idea how they are still getting into the bathroom.

~o~