It's all in black and white

Life is punctuated by blinding revelations and ill-conceived decisions. The latter includes the decision recently not to defrost the fish before I cooked it. I found out my mistake 12 hours later. The former I include discovering that the woman I divorced and then spent fve years in thermo-nuclear warfare was in fact my soulmate...it took her death for that blinding revelation.

Today I combined the two. With the boy away I decided to cycle up from Brighton to home in Essex. By the time I'd carried the bik down from the fourth floor flat and peddled it a hundred yards I knew the likelihood of making the full 65 miles was remote. I got a new wind after a ten mminuute pause just after leaving the city boundaries. Fifteen miles down the road and I was saved from humiliation by a flurry of snow and a downpour of rain; clearly I had to turn back. Four hours later after a detour over a golf course, I wearily threw the bike over my shoulder and carried it back upstairs before diving into a hot bath.

The revelation is that just because you did something 20 years ago doesn't mean you can do it again. Especially when you can count in years the time since you last exercised. Having a heavy bag, semi-flat tyres, little refreshment, no padding in my shorts and no friend to keep my spirits up didn't help either.

Six hours later and the pain ensures a lesson well learnt.

Home alone

...and he's away with the school. A much anticipated (by both him and me) skiing holiday. The excitement had been building all week..you could tell by the number of times we nearly clashed...so who was most excited? He's got the chance he wants to show to all his friends what a great skier he is, and I have the chance to have my own space...something I've long been vocal about. One suspects that he'll be rather more successful than me as for the time he's away I've not managed to organise a single social event. Still having my lack of social life brought shaply into focus can only be a good thing. I think. In the long term. I think.

Long discussions had ensued as to whether he should wear his leather bikers (Triumph, of course) jacket or ski jacket for the journey. Practically I thought the ski jacket was a better bet, but credibility wise the leathers won hands down. As it turned out every one else was travelling dressed for the slopes. Embarassed? Nope not one iota...in fact it seemd to elevate him in the eyes of the girls. My school memories are always of never having the great clothes my friends had; perhaps they didn't see it that way, but it sticks in my mind even today.