samuri.co.uk

Bike: Crosslight
Distance:25 miles

Great early morning offroad blast in the rain. Really enjoyed myself, bit parky mind. I like my crosslight, it rides really well but the front disk is seriously pissing me off. I’ll piss about with it for an hour at home till it runs perfectly, set out for a ride and after about 20 minutes it’ll start squealing like crazy, no reason. Get home, mess about with it some more, it’s good for another twenty minutes, Bonkers.

Bike: Van Tuyl
Distance: 35 miles

I *knew* I was doing more than 25 miles at these sessions. A chap had a mileometer thingy with him tonight and he did 32 miles and missed the first 15 minutes so 35 miles it is. Saying that we rode like demons so I’m saying 30 miles from now on.

Right.  Got there having just been phoned by my dentist to tell me I needed a tooth coming out, fecking great. Not a happy bunny.  Plenty of time so sat having a coffee watching Chris Hoy riding around. I should really get his autograph for my son.  Then we started and straight away it was clear everyone was on a mission. Lummee! We rode fast and hard. And the last 20 minutes was absolutely balls out! I think only six out of about 25 eventually stayed in the line. I’m surprised the track wasn’t on fire.

I really enjoy that sort of session.  Lots more people tonight were chatty too, I spoke to about 4 or 5 different people who I’ve never spoken to before, wow. Roadies eh?

You probably don’t know because I don’t like to talk about it much but I have a pet hate when it comes to cycling kit.

It’s not white tyres or overpriced courier bags or cycling socks or carbon mechs.

No, the biggest rip off in the world of cycling, is handlebar mounts.

Lets say I buy a GPS, which of course will break after two months – as will the 3 replacements after it), and I want a handlebar mount to fix it to my bicycle. I have to go to a GPS shop and buy the exact, correct handlebar mount for that GPS, which will cost me ten quid. I can’t go anywhere else and they fucking well know it. It arrives and it looks, to my untrained eye, like a bit of moulded plastic with a screw in it. In fact it looks so much like the bit of mouled plastic with a screw in it that I got with my 4 quid set of commuting lights from Asda, that I have to go and check it’s actually different. It is, but only a bit, and obviously the GPS won’t fit it.

Of course, when it comes to high quality lights the same can not be true, surely…

Indeed, expensive light mounts are made from metal, whoopee fucking do. Obviously I have to pay extra, because it’s metal. It’s a *tiny* bit frustrating because I’ve just spent £250 quid on the light itself. It smarts just a tad that I then have to pay twenty quid for a handlebar mount. Twenty quid!!! It’s must be made out of Titanium! Nope, it’s made out of steel I think. It’s got a bolt, a little hinge a little knob and a spring! Well worth it, eh? Plus at that price it’ll last a hundred years. After all, the ASDA commuting bracket has lasted over a year already and that gets the shit kicked out of it.

I pull on the knob (ooh eerr), and the end of the knob flies off, the spring jumps thirty feet to never be seen again and the knob comes off in my hand (I’m not even bothering with any more Finbar stuff). At least exposure (oops, I mentioned the manufacturer) (the GPS that broke 4 times was a Garmin HCX by the way) replaced it immediately, and this one worked when it arrived. Sweet!

Well, for one ride anyway, after that the light rattled around annoyingly until I learned to put a small strip of paper in between the light and the bracket. So, a happy 9 months of night riding was spent. I say 9 months but obviously this was mostly during summer so it’s probably seen about ten or fifteen actual rides. Which means it’s got a good 1000 more left in it.

PANTS!

I’m not bitter or anything. But it’s a huge great pile of smoking crap.

Bike:Crosslight
Distance:29 miles

Managed to fit in a quick blast after tea, even got some offroad in too. It was cold mind, and many, many cockedns on the roads, ho hum.

So that makes it 104 miles for the week, just snicked in over the ton but it’s looking like it’s going to be very tricky to reach 5200 my the end of December unless I apply some creative working hours, which is proving difficult now they’ve got people shadowing me for the handover. Might have to make a number of extended visits to ‘water sites’ through the christmas wokring period and claw the hours back in the evening.

Edit: Oh, and that makes this the highest mileage year for me on record EVER!

Bike: Crosslight
Dustance:50 miles

The Vela has done a good job all year but it’s now time to retire it and get my crossbike back out. I’m starting to feel the need for offroad again, but fast offroad. It needed a few bits and some tuning but it’s mostly good now.I was lazy and didn;t put my new big ring on which was silly. The first time I stood on the pedals it just slipped round, right in front of a big group of roadies. Oops. Then I got a puncture after about 5 miles. I big piece of glass ripped a huge hole in the back tyre. I almost turned back then but carried on after repairing it. Glad I did, the rest of the ride was great. Not the hilliest ride it has to be said but plenty of offroad ice crunching going on and I went further than I thought.

Sweet! Still a bit short of the 100 miles for this week so I might nip out this evening if I can get some lights sorted onto it.

Bike: Van Tuyl
Distance: 25 miles

Doing badly this week for mileage already. Why? That’s right I’m back at work and I’m doing stupid hours again. Up at 23:30, still working and the pressure is just getting higher and higher. I was having some doubts about leaving my job over the weekend. Silly me.

Anyway, reasonable session at the ‘drome. Got there nice and early for once so had time to have a coffee and watch Chris Hoy meandering around the track. Did the session, I’m enjoying the 16 point sprints, they’re fun and I’m getting much better now, some chap *just* managed to pip me by half a wheel on the line, but it only happened once.

Edit: I did swap my saddle because my wanger was feeling numb on the last session, likewise on this one, I need a proper grooved saddle like on my roadbike.

We changed electricty suppliers. Why? Because the current suppliers were overcharging us massively.

So I phone up to provide the meter reading and that’s where the fun begins.

“Here’s our final meter reading to you like you asked in your letter”
“That’s different to what your new supplier told us, do you want me to change it now or just ignore this?”
“Lets get it sorted now.”
“OK, hang on.”

/5 minutes later

“OK, it’s done now, the cheque that was on it’s way is now invalid and we’ll issue a new cheque which should get to you some time in February”
“Sorry? February? If I owed you £500 (Yes, that’s how much we’ve been overcharged) you’d be on my back immediately, I’d not get two months to pay you back, you’d set the lawyers on me after 5 days.”
“You didn’t let me finish before sir, (I don’t remember him even starting), this now has to be re-processed through our admin department (clearly the slowest department on earth), and there’s christams so it’ll be February.”
“But when I asked to get it sorted now, you didn’t then say ‘you understand this will add two months onto you getting the cheque’. Would you like an extra 500 quid leading up to Christmas? Do you understand why I’m trying to get this sorted now? Come on,  you must understand this is a lot of money to anyone and we want it as soon as possible and getting it before Christmas would be a bonus, change it back, forget I phoned you.”

What a bunch of cock. He was a right arsey little bastard too. I try to do the right thing and it cocks us up. 500 quid extra!!! He seemed to agree to do it but I bet he doesn’t because I had a go at him.

And don;t get me started on the phone bill. They send us a letter dated date n which is 4 days ago saying they’re cutting the phone off unless we pay them 200 quid right now (my wife mis-understood the package I’d got which was free calls anytime to landlines only), we’d had no statement or warning letters.

So we sorted it too late and they cut us off, 15 years paying them a fortune and they cut us off like that because they didn;t send us any bills. CUNTS! So I phoned, paid the bill and let them know we’re changing providers very soon now purely because of their shitty business attitude. Watch them run scared now!! Eh! Eh!!

Bike:Pimpino
Distance:45 miles

It’s roughly 45 miles, I don’t know the exact figure because my GPS BROKE AGAIN!!! At some point it just turned itself off. Just like they all start doing. What a waste of money that thing was, it’s spent more time travelling between Garmin and me than it has spent doing it’s job.

Anyway, started off nice and sunny, so I rode up to Rivington, over Winter Hill via the two lads, down to Belmont and over to Tockholes. Back through Brinscall and down into White Coppice, back home via Rivington. Great ride although my front disk started playing up. I had to adjust the pads every twenty minutes, they started wearing our really quickly and were providing no braking at all.

Got some pictures, more on my flickr page.

Now I’m strongly of the belief that criminals are made and not born. It takes a set of (specifically home based) circumstances to create a career criminal and it’s these things we should fight.

Take my niece for example. She’s technically my wife’s niece not mine. Her brothers daughter. Now she’s had a hard life and no mistake. Very poor upbringing, mother died very young, her father suffered many mental problems and has just died. She’s had three kids so far and has another on the way. But she’s OK for the most part. She has extremely low self esteem and as a result has hung around with some seriously dodgy blokes. The most likely chap being a fat, scouse thug who I’d shoot like a mad dog if the law allowed it. He’s beaten her up, her father, her current boyfriend (who’s claimed he’s going to rectify that situation shortly) and no doubt a selection of people who have looked at her at all).

Anyway, she’s got a variety of children to the blokes she’s known. We went round her house (me for the first time) the other day. This is what greeted me.

One 6 year old playing GTA4 (highly violent, sexually explicit – you get to have sex with prostitutes in it) on a nintendo.

One 18 month year old baby on the fire guard, ON THE WRONG SIDE!.

One 18 month year old baby staggering about with a nappy round her ankles being followed by a very bad smell.

A quick tsck! And the 18 month year old lad was retrieved from within 6 inches of the fire. Then him and his sister adopted the position. I’m still of the opinion that crims are made and not born but these two were against the fireguard, arms against the grill, legs spread wide. They were ready to be searched. Get used to it!

Then, the 18 month year old boy found A SHARPENED SCREWDRIVER FFS!!! And started trying to prize a cupboard apart like he was jemmying a door. It really was quite impressive, he was almost in when I decided to take the sharpened tool off him. I wish I could have taken a picture of him doing it. Like a professional he was.

The tableau was complete when the older lad dropped his nintendo and shouted at my son, “Chase me, I’ve nicked some money and you’re the coppers. You’ll never catch me”, and darted out the door into the kitchen.

Again, get used to it, expect expect to be caught more often.

I’ve been banned by my wife from trying to suggest that there might be alternate moral paths for various members of her family to take but really, I can see exactly what needs to be said and done to this family to stop them turning into the family fromhell. I can stop it right now and make their life better overnight, but oh no, we have to look after the mothers feelings. She’ll suffer immensely in the years to come as her children deal out suffering to a succesion of strangers and it could have been stopped with some simple and easily applied controls but no, it’d hurt her feelings.

Bike: Vela
Distance: 36 Miles

Tried to finish off maintenance but didn;t get very far. Just went out for a ride instead. The Vela needs some serious maintenance doing on it. At least it’s clean now. I like the ride I did today, completely new to me. Out to Tldsley, Bolton, Brompton Cross up onto the moors, over to Belmont, over the hill to Rivington, back home. Nice, I might make it my regular ride, needs less puctures though. I suspect this rear tyre is ready for replacement but around 3000 miles is pretty good I feel. I suspect it’s life has been prolonged through so much riding in the wet. I also need more maintenance days. New seat to go on the track bike and sort the brakes on the pimpino.