Weakly posting

Well, that was a week that ended with a most peculiar echo of perversity ... had finally moved ahead with the plans to have tooth extracted, and it literally fell out the other night! :o

Well, may have a teensy bit of active encouragement by my wriggling it am such a kid at times ...

Anyway, so after all the angst and indecision of the past few days, things were looking kind of bright and bubbly ... Was well ahead of schedule on Friday - had coffee at Amici, went to bank, bounced into work nice and early, even bought Ranjit a coffee, all in preparation for my 1015 start ... except I was due to begin at 0745 ...

Karla was bouncing around doing meetings, etc. so by the time I got to chat with her about it, the afternoon was almost over! Oh but the look of sheer exuberance that came across her face was horrifying - "You know that you will now have to go on a PIP? But it is for you, they are designed to help you!" You reckon? Consequently I spent the weekend shuddering about such a possibility, and the first two days this week actively avoiding her ...

But, on a much brighter note (not that I went), there was the Brisbane Zombie Walk on Sunday, and apparently 8000+ people DID go ... Turns out Bec did go, as you can see below ...

In other news, I got myself motivated to email Ian to go on the BMW Ride for life - 85k from Valley down to Bay and then back in. Should be good, and we have nominated ourselves to go in the 25-27 bunch ... Which is fine, except we will be a) riding in a bunch, with a police bike front + rear; and, b) not really having the option to see how we feel, and consequently picking the pace up ... Did I ever mention I HATE bunch riding? Oh well, now that I think about it, it is clearly an opportunity to 'network' or to socialise with other lovers of bicycle riding ... Pity that is hardly a qualification for the people being 'good' people ... Or maybe I am merely articulating my lack of social skills, projecting my fears and inabilities onto others? :o

In other news, turns out the latest update to iTunes has created iCloud, which (in short) has allowed me to download almost 3 years of previous purchases ... ah, memories ;) Oh, and also downloaded the Goyte/Kimbra version of 'Somebody I used to know' ... somewhat eerily evocative ...

CQ11, pt 1

09/09 Brisbane to Goondiwindi
Took the day off work, utilising some of my flex-time to have a relaxed start to trip. Walked across road, bus came up other side, so ran back to catch it! Pottered around at the Transit Centre, before getting onto the back of the bus, relaxing, then watching the sky open, and the rain tumble down heavily ... The trip out was dark, cold, blowy - quickly regretted taking my long sleeve top out of the bag and leaving behind! Anyway, got in, and proceeded to find the Railway Hotel, which turned out to be a little further away then the map indicated ... Went and got ride starter pack; had some Red Rooster, which I had been looking forward to enjoying; stopped at Hotel, where I ran into people I had taken a photo of earlier :o
10/09 Goondiwindi to Yelarbon 57kms
Day started late, what with people still arriving, and having to restore/prepare bikes. Was quite a carnival atmosphere, with entertainers, music, and smiling faces everywhere. Wore my CQ11 red t-shirt, at least until we were out of town, and then took it off, so as to ride faster, but it was cold! At one point I was starting to wind up, and the computer head fell off ... at which point I discovered that the wire attaching the computer had also broken ... Which kind of made it redundant to be concerned about not having cadence! The ride was actually quite lovely, barrelling along at my own pace, saying hello to lots of people as I passed ... One of the most pleasant experience was barrelling along these absolutely quiet country rides being stalked by the driver of the ambulance - was he touting for business? Then cars would come along, but because of these wobbling cyclists, would not overtake too quickly, so I slotted in behind them for awhile, using the cars for drafting purposes ;) Caught a couple of 'trains' to pass the time, so it was not all passing, passing, get out the fucking way! Yelarbon is a very, very quiet town, tiny in fact. Main road passes through, past the pub, a few shops, and on the other side of the road is the railway station, so naturally enough, the majority of cyclists ended up at the pub :o So had my regulated two (2) beers at the pub, then headed back to the campsite, to meet up with Ian and co. for a bottle of wine, laughter, then dinner. But on way back to the campsite, I meandered through some of the back alleys in town, to gaze into yards, where fencing was more to keep dogs, etc. from wandering than to keep people from entering, or demarcating space/possessiveness. That first night I set myself up in the corner, away from everyone else, but unfortunately also someway from the actual road, so as to make it somewhat difficult to get back on out there ... One of the problems I kept experiencing on the trip as a consequence, and warning against, arriving too early to set up - a delicate balancing act! Anyway, decidedly moved away from all possibility of knowing anyone so as to meet and share the experience(s) with a new bunch of people, only to wake up and see Terry crawl out of a tent about 10m away ...
11/09 Yelarbon to Texas 65kms
Just as I was leaving, I ran into Ian, who asked if he could ride with me for a little while, before I got bored and left him behind in a cloud of dust? Spent the rest of the day trying to keep up with him!!! By the time we got to lunch, I was almost ready to climb on to the sag wagon, he had worn me out so much! Needless to say, we got into Texas before the bloody campsite was even open, and so were forced to come back to the pub for a couple of beers ... That crazy guy from last night was at the pub again, only this time he regaled us with tales about the goings on in Brisbane hotelier history, before teasing us with his intentions to get into a big hot bath with a stiff drink and unwind ... After getting in, showering, wandering about town, sending off a postcard, I went back to the site, and caught the tale end of John (from Epic Cycle) telling the audience about riding up hills, flowing down again - 'controlled descents' ... Best comment? You really needed to having started four (4) weeks ago for the going up the hills ... Looking at him, he was clearly a fellow who spent a lot of time bouncing over rough roads, probably on a flat bar - very accentuated triceps ... Some old guy was wandering about the site with his dog + g/f and so I said hello, as you do. He then had the gall to tell me that my back wheel was out of sync, and so I would be in a lot of trouble tomorrow riding down the hills ... WTF? So I spun the bike upside down and readjusted (by loosening) the front brake to stop it rubbing ...Did I mention that it is rather cold here???
12/09 Texas to Stanthorpe 101kms
An odd day - the longest (official) day, yet also the one that contains the most bumpy bits ... Ian and I rode again, with Ian again belittling his ability, promising not to slow me down too much, as he would be getting on the sag wagon at morning tea ... so we got in there, and I teased him a bit further, saying that at least get to lunch stop, catch the extra sag wagon from there ... then got to lunch, had a bit to eat, refreshed by the previous downhills :) I talked him into taking it slow, and we would call it quits at the afternoon tea spot ... except when we got there I turned to him and said that as it was only another 20km, we may as well press on? But used the tone of a directive, rather than as a question ;) The look on his face when we got in to Stanthorpe was so grey with exhaustion and fatigue - and 'grey' is quite apt, for when I turned to him and congratulated him on doing his first triple figure distance, when he realised the significance, it was like watching a beautiful day revealed by the withdrawal of grey storm clouds ... Needless to say, he deserved the night at the motel with young Pete as a reward ... Given that tomorrow was the rest day (+ I was absolutely nailed - not that I was ever going to admit that to Ian) I felt best to loiter about the site, talking to people about their achievement(s) and how well they had done. For me, one of the most endearing memories was the climb where Ian finally decided to walk (was starting to think he was just teasing me, and would never get off that bloody bike of his), waving me on, telling me that he would see me at the campsite ... But (especially) given that this was before lunch, I just stopped at the top to wait, turned around and saw a sign that proclaimed a 10% descent, so as everyone else just came over the top, there was me clapping them and congratulating them on having done a 10% ascent - isn't that the equivalent of a Category 1 climb in the TdF??? There was a rest day party with James Blundell, but I decided to have an extra glass of wine, then head off to bed ...