Verena wrote: ↑Fri Jul 21, 2023 8:10 pm

fatbikephil wrote: ↑Fri Jul 21, 2023 2:15 pm Hopefully cheery - going to try and sneak a bivvy in between the thunderstorms. They keep being forecast but never turn up....cue incoming....

Ah well that's the weekend weather doomed now then

Heavens just opened when you typed that out, not sure if Phil or Verena is to blame though…

Much unforecasted rain no thunder... yet....

Nobody had any CFs this week??

I was too busy at work to even think about it, will need to do a couple more hours this morning to catch up on absolute essentials, then very cheery as I have a week off

Will be quite a varied one with an outdoorsy Snowdonia weekend starting later today, then another trip to Germany with my daughter to visit my folks, which will include a day cruise on the river Rhine which I'm really looking forward to, and then, minus the old folks, Hamburg Pride weekend

Nobody had any CFs this week??

I thought it was just okay until last night when I realised that it had been quite cheery after all.

The DHL man who loves dogs got to play with mine plus the two Retrievers from the village - so he was happy. I told someone the story of my friend who's left testicle has migrated into his stomach - and they laughed.

So, in my book, those two things make it cheery all round.

Bearbonesnorm wrote: ↑Sat Jul 29, 2023 7:45 am So, in my book, those two things make it cheery all round.

Maybe not quite so much for your friend ...

psling wrote: ↑Sat Jul 29, 2023 8:00 am

Bearbonesnorm wrote: ↑Sat Jul 29, 2023 7:45 am So, in my book, those two things make it cheery all round.

Maybe not quite so much for your friend ...

Isn't that just basically haggis?

Ha!

Cheery here. After Thursday night's bivvy, Friday saw the big tent get some.use, camping in Edale with the rest of my family plus some friends who are down from Scotland. We're here for the weekend, planning on doing not.very much and eating pizza.*


*£12ish

Bearlegged wrote: ↑Sat Jul 29, 2023 8:19 am Ha!

Cheery here. After Thursday night's bivvy, Friday saw the big tent get some.use, camping in Edale with the rest of my family plus some friends who are down from Scotland. We're here for the weekend, planning on doing not.very much and eating pizza.*


*£12ish

Sounds perfect, enjoy !

Went to community bike repair/exchange place last night in the middle of Birmingham where the man that runs had an open evening to share skills and show poeple how to repair fix there own bikes and everyone chipped it and helped each other, I got very oily and fixed a few bikes and there was noone there who claimed to be the world's greatest man, if you know what I mean.
Cheery indeed.
Plus there was crisps!

Just had a (the?) Avro Lancaster WW2 bomber fly past.

Verena wrote: ↑Sat Jul 29, 2023 7:27 am Nobody had any CFs this week??

I was too busy at work to even think about it, will need to do a couple more hours this morning to catch up on absolute essentials, then very cheery as I have a week off

Will be quite a varied one with an outdoorsy Snowdonia weekend starting later today, then another trip to Germany with my daughter to visit my folks, which will include a day cruise on the river Rhine which I'm really looking forward to, and then, minus the old folks, Hamburg Pride weekend

Nice.
Yes, I actually had a CF. Had a good idea how to deal with a problem with a freezedrier at work and put the idea to use. Short ride to catch the train. Arrived in Scuol, hugged inbetween big hills. Staying here 'till Tuesday and filling the days with tons of bike carrying, HAB and techno riding. Today started with a bang (well, my pedals, chainring, mech and rear of bike saw quite some bangs against rocks). Felt completely wasted from riding just 36 km. About 33 of which in constant tricky tech terrain. Took me 7.5 hrs. Saw many wildlife and a hairy big poo (lynx or wolf).
Just had a huge meal do work against feeling wasted. Seems to be working. More tomorrow
Looking forwards to the big tent and big mat tonight.

Verena wrote: ↑Sat Jul 29, 2023 7:27 am Nobody had any CFs this week??

I was too busy at work to even think about it, will need to do a couple more hours this morning to catch up on absolute essentials, then very cheery as I have a week off

Will be quite a varied one with an outdoorsy Snowdonia weekend starting later today, then another trip to Germany with my daughter to visit my folks, which will include a day cruise on the river Rhine which I'm really looking forward to, and then, minus the old folks, Hamburg Pride weekend

That all sounds great Verena

We did here. We had to make our marriage official at the registry office. Both being averse to bureaucracy, if we could have done it by post we would have done, but of course we needed witnesses, so our parents came up and we had to make a bit of a thing of it for them really. So we got dressed up again, did the necessary deed, then went straight to the bakery round the corner for pastries. Made the staff's days.

Then we all went for a good meal in a pub in Northumberland, and to a fancy (supposedly) hotel - not really our scene, but kindly paid for by her parents, so mustn't be unappreciative, and drank some overpriced, underperforming booze. They'd booked us a second night which we made the best of by espcaing to a proper, community-owned, pub in a neighbouring village for real beer and a meal, then sat on the edge of the golf course with a bottle of Prosecco we'd brought, watching the moon rise and spotting meteors.

Took a bike, with the full support of my wife but didn't end up riding it (fell asleep in bed watching the Tour de France Femmes on Saturday afterooon instead ).

Isn't that just basically haggis?

That sounds brilliant Tim

My Friday was quite cheery. After a very sad preceding week, I went to fetch a Ti Olsen - Cheers David. Drove home with it ready to take it for a quick ride, walked into the kitchen, put the kettle on and turned round to be greeted by the sight of water pouring through the ceiling. I ran up to the bathroom to hear that sound of water laughing as it escapes a pipe. Ah well, an afternoon of contortion instead of a ride. Saturday had to be the bike cheery day instead.

Local beer festival kicked off yesterday.
Leading a ride tomorrow.
Off on holiday in less than a week.

Bearlegged wrote: ↑Fri Aug 04, 2023 3:36 pm Local beer festival kicked off yesterday...... leading a ride tomorrow.

Erm

It was going okay until around 9am when the scaffolders arrived and proceeded to drive their truck into the gate post, thus snapping it ...

"how did you hit that?".

"I was looking in my mirrors"

"Why, were you being followed?"

Anyway, dug the remains out a couple of hours ago and I'll put a new post in tomorrow.

Other than that, not bad really.

Stu, don't put a new wooden one in, they are poor show these days and only last a few years. We've been putting in concrete gate posts* at my brother's, in one case it was replacing a five year old wooden one. They only cost a couple of quid more than the wooden ones anyway.

*Currently up to 39 of them There's another batch arriving next week!

RIP wrote: ↑Fri Aug 04, 2023 5:25 pm

Bearlegged wrote: ↑Fri Aug 04, 2023 3:36 pm Local beer festival kicked off yesterday...... leading a ride tomorrow.

Erm

I've been *very* restrained. Only one impy stout, and that came home in my bag, unopened. Prepping for August's BAM.

Trip to the foundry climbing wall with my daughter, some of my mates and 4 of their kids.

Excellent session, I was climbing better than expected given a poorly shoulder and back. Had a good catch up with mates, and also finally got round to teaching Zoe to belay. Then she went and climbed what was labeled as a 6a - didn't look to actually be that hard, more like a 5+, but either way that's pretty decent at just turned 10...

Then had a slightly odd conversation on the way home, with her asking if I'd be jealous/sad if she climbs better than me - pleased to say that my explanation that I'd be really happy and proud went down well by the second repetition!

Cheery Saturday here as local lad Charlie Hatton takes Gold at Mens DH World Championships All those years of practice in a wet Forest of Dean

Weather looked horrible...

psling wrote: ↑Sat Aug 05, 2023 9:33 pm Cheery Saturday here as local lad Charlie Hatton takes Gold at Mens DH World Championships All those years of practice in a wet Forest of Dean

Great stuff.

Spent half the day watching the races unfold on varying channels (SRF, BBC, GCN). The reaction of Emilie Siegenthaler was lovely. She cried (out of joy) when she realised that Charlie had won.
Also Andy Kolb dropping his bike, seemingly forgetting what he had just done (2nd) as soon as he realised that his team mate was in the hot seat.
I quite like how the racers celebrate each other.

Makes me want to go and ride a DH/Freeride track again. There's something special about riding down the same track 6x times a day and slowly gaining speed and intensity. Especially in the rain.

Feels like Friday. Popped out on me bike round town, ticked off a few errands and whatnot. Re-soled some shoes, had a nice chat with the cobbler bloke. Went to the railway station (no not the bloody "train station", I don't live in Toytown) as well, to book some bike reservations for September's Forest of Dean outing. Chatted to my chum Eileen about the proposed ticket office closures, and accepted a nice badge (below). Mental idea. My view is that ticket office people, in the same way as tax inspectors, bring in more money than they cost so let's have loads more of them (and tax inspectors) not less. There also seems no logic involved either - for example apparently all of Wales's offices will remain open (of course, sensible country), and Harrogate would too whereas Wakefield Westgate is far busier but would shut. Right, so the railways "need to save money" - well how about binning off all the piss-taking contractors first then. Mate of mine runs a large rolling stock depot in London. He needed to make alterations to the depot layout. Costed it at £12m but wasn't allowed to manage the project himself. Over-ran to £19m due to all the separate subcontractors arguing with each other, and £1.2m of which was spent on having to get another contractor in simply to sign off the work of all the arguing subcontractors.

Aaaaannnnnd relax.......

Terveisiä Suomesta!*
It's Friday here, and we've made it to the first stop of our big summer holiday. Slight downside of arriving late is all the food shops are shut, but we'll make.up.for that come breakfast time.

*Greetings from Finland

I saw this and thought of you (Stu):



Pilfered from the Gauniad

https://www.theguardian.com/news/galler ... est-photos