STINGRAY !


Bought this yesterday. What an anorak !

Everything is brilliant !

Read this, on teenagers on the Grumpy Old Sod page:

Last week Michael Perham, a 14-year-old schoolboy from Potters Bar, Hertfordshire, became the youngest yachtsman to cross the Atlantic single-handed when he ended a 3,500-mile six-week journey on the Caribbean island of Antigua. Perham, who left Gibraltar last November, has been sailing since he was seven. He survived gale-force winds, giant waves and storms that "really do knock your teeth out", he said.
Meanwhile 17-year-old Will Sharp is off to Africa aiming to become the youngest Briton to conquer all seven of the world's highest mountains. The challenge will take more than two years and lead him across seven continents.

And last April Jordan Maguire, 15, from Renfrewshire, realised his dream when he became the youngest person to reach the North Pole on foot. Joining a nine-man team, he had to drag a 176lb sled 111 miles across broken pack ice in temperatures as low as -22C to reach his destination. He had prepared for the trek by dragging tyres up hills and running every day and had spent a weekend in Norway to help him to acclimatise.

Which is excellent, as teens are always portrayed as bad, mindless thugs that mis-behave. Which they mostly aren't.

New Blogger and Old Blogger ?

Blimey, I am so old and behind the times that a new version of Blogger has crept up on me, making my current Blogger old-fashioned.
Ha. The google blog sign-on is exactly the same, so why the two entry points on Blogger first page ?

Weather for today, in Bala, is torrential rain, with a freezing level of 1000M, just above the top of Aran Fawddy:


Which is where I was planning on going today, to try out my Salomon mountain boots over a decent distance. Not exactly alpine, but somewhere I have yet to climb. The forecast for next week is better, colder, snow on Monday and dry on Tuesday. Tuesday it is, all being well.

These boots weren't made for walking, but thats all that they done, apart from a scary scramble up a track covered in ice.


Yesterday evening had a nice Australian red, from a screw-top bottle, £5. wine under a fiver seems very hit-and-miss, but I had a Spanish Rioja over Christmas, £9, that was so-so.

A weekend when I did two training rides. Excellent. Well, not really training rides, more plods.
Saturday plod to Catshill, Bungay Lake, Wychbold, Stoke Works, Gambolds and Lickey home.
A couple of beers Saturday night, and 1/2 bottle red.
Sunday a very easy plod , Hopwood, Alvechurch, Watery Lane (quite watery) and Hopwood home. Discovered a useful way of avoiding the scary, badly designed roundabout-cum-junction thingy at the top of Longbridge Lane. Go up a service road that comes out on the main road. A bit of a pain to cross the main road, but I feel safer doing that than negotiating the island then having to swing across the fast bit.

Dad for dinner, then did some work on the horrible Scheduling stuff. Can't get it right.
Then fun stripping rear hub, greasing and re-assembling it.
Shimano 105 wheels - used 'em since 2001, ridden in some awful wet weather, and across rough roads, Still true and the bearings are perfect ! Must have ridden at least 5000 miles on them.