Friday Morning

Got up without too much of a struggle - but feeling a bit stiff. Strange that once again I woke up at 03:30 thinking it must be time to get up - went back to sleep straight away though I think. Train was normal - I must remember not to let anyone on the train in front of me! They parked themselves in the bike bay (=disabled bay!) and someone else meanwhile nicked my favoured seat next to my bike. I went thru a pantomime of struggling with the bike, suggesting by means of feigned (OK, mostly feigned) clumsiness that it might end up all over his business suit. He got the hint and moved. I feel a bit guilty though - he can of course sit where he likes, I would have coped somehow and I can't assume I'm going to get that seat every day...
This time I went to Charing Cross and carried the bike down the stairs to Embankment. Then up the Mall, Eaton Square, Sloane Square, Kings Road, out thru Fulham, almost to Putney Bridge and then up towards Hammersmith. The actual trip took 40 minutes today - plus then I have to get showered and all... Roads not bad at that time of the morning - and when you hit the Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, the cycle lanes suddenly get a lot better...

In One Piece

The journey back from Hammersmith was kinda scary. This morning, it was mainly a pleasant run without vehicular snarl-ups - but on the way back (I should have guessed), I found myself in queue after queue of nose-to-tail, diesel-belching traffic.
The first bit was fine - West Fulham seemed pretty quiet. But it soon got very snarly as I got near Chelsea Embankment. I think I'm gonna need to find some nice, quiet bike-shaped rat-runs. Once thru there, it was a part-exhilarating, part-terrifying zoom thru Pimlico, up to Victoria (where I seemed to wait at endless traffic lights - once again, some rat-runs are needed I think...), then in front of Buckingham Palace (which I hardly dared even glance at), down the Mall to Trafalgar Square and up to Charing Cross. Only took 45 minutes, including a couple of wrong turns and some map-reading stops...
So was in plenty of time for the 18:00 train and I felt so at peace with the world I even wandered off the train to get a drink, and even bought the train guard a drink of orange juice. Maybe he'll be nice to me at some point in the future...
So I'm back in one piece. Not quite sure how I feel about doing it all again tomorrow: on the one hand I'd like to refine the route a bit to avoid some of the problem spots from this morning, on the other hand, can I be arsed? We will see...

!

Well, I finally did it. To no one's greater surprise than my own. Yesterday I deliberately went out and bought a train ticket that would only get me as far as Charing Cross - no tube included. I slept fitfully - waking up at 03:30 (thinking it must be about time to set off), then again at 04:30 (thinking I'd overslept), then at 05:30 I actually managed to get out of bed without much struggle, dressed in my new cycling gear, bowl of rice pops (all there was) and a banana, then out into the fairly quiet streets. Train was on time, I got a space in the disabled bay for me and the bike, and snoozed til Waterloo East. Manhandled the bike down the stairs, and then had a fairly confusing few minutes picking my way round the sidestreets near Waterloo. Then down Lambeth Palace Road to Lambeth Bridge, down Millbank and West towards Chelsea Embankment. You see the strangest things: a group of Buddhists beating drums by the river opposite the Buddha in (?)Battersea Park. The worst bit was the part from Chelsea Wharf to Putney Bridge - tight little streets with loads of traffic. Must try to find a way to avoid that. Got to work and showered by 08:30, but surely I can cut down the time quite a bit - I had to stop and map read a few times. The showers here are pretty good - and there are lockers too. So now I've had my double espresso and in theory should feel raring to go... hmm we'll see...

Tuesday. Again.

Once again no bike. In my head, my cycling has a lovely dreamlike quality. I think I've been thru the whole journey - in my head. Just, not in actuality. The way I imagine it is as follows. I rise from my bed, filled with energetic anticipation of the brisk ride to follow. I get kitted up and push my bike out of the front door and onto the path. The freewheel makes that delicate clickety-clieckety sound. I mount the sturdy machine and leisurely cycle thru the quiet streets of Tunbridge Wells for a few minutes until I reach the railway station. The weather is calm and mild, the roads are dry. At the station, the train already waits for me, its warm compartments sparsely populated with early-morning commuters. A smiling train guard ushers me into the cycle compartment, where there is ample space to secure my machine, and a generous seat awaiting me from which I can observe my bike and pleasantly read or doze during the journey. The train sets off and whisks me speedily and quietly to Waterloo East, where I descend with my bike. The guard holds the door open for me and wishes me a good day. I walk the short distance to the platform end, from which there is a short, downhill ramp to the start of the perfectly marked and maintained cycle path. I set off thru the streets of London, which are just starting to awaken. I cycle smoothly and rapidly along the paths by the river, occasionally exchanging greetings with fellow cyclists coming the other way. The cycle path meanders thru Battersea Park, across a bridge, thru Chelsea and before I know it, to Hammersmith, where I lock my bike up in the underground car park and stroll upstairs for a warming shower. I feel braced, energised and exercised. I feel good. I have a double espresso and sit at my desk ready to look at whatever needs doing next. I exchange a cheery wave with the CIO - I am almost the first person to arrive.

OK - so much for the dream. With that sort of fantasy it's no wonder I haven't actually done it, since the reality is more likely to be the following.

The alarm goes off at 05:15. I can hear a howling gale and lashing wind from outside, and inwardly groan. Still, I don my cycling kit, still damp and clammy from yesterday, and shiver as I trundle on skaty streets to the railway. The train is cancelled. I wait 30 minutes, along with a growing horde of grumbling commuters. Finally a train deigns to arrive. It is a piece of pre-war wreckage pressed into service at the last minute, especially kitted out for pygmy-sized commuters. I try to struggle onto it with my bike only for some unsmiling, hatchet-faced ticket-Nazi to bellow "Nah boikes on this train! Gainst the rules, innit?". I sheepishly remove my bike as the stern commuters glare at my audacity, and I wait for the next train on which it is permissible for me to take my bike, some three hours later. I get on the 09:01 train and stand in the guard's van surrounded by a seething horde of angry passengers who were kept waiting for 20 minutes at East Grumblewich for a reason explained to them as follows over the PA: "We apologize for the delay to this train. This is due to train delays which are currently occuring to trains in this region." Finally we arrive in London. I totter down the stairs carrying my bike and try to edge myself onto the streets of London, which by now are a terrifying racetrack of white vans, diesel-belching buses, and immense 4x4s driven by chic London housewives. The journey proceeds as I run the gauntlet of gesturing cabbies until I finally arrive, in a fearful sweat, at the office. Everyone is in by now, and some of the trendy young office-girls titter openly at my cycling garb. The shower is broken so I change into my office wear and sit, steaming gently, and open my email. I wish I could climb straight back into bed.

Yep, all in all, better not to cycle, if that's what it'll be like. In fact, I didn't get up this morning because I have been stricken down by a mystery ailment, featuring achy joints and muscles, sniffling, headaches and dizzy spells. Well, there's always tomorrow, which I await with my usual optimistic anticipation. Bye for now...

Surprise, surprise...

It didn't happen. Got up at 05:30 and stood vacillating in a pathetic way. Finally copped out, and without even time for a shower, walked down to the station for the usual train + tube journey. Sigh. I think what really put me off was the worry about whether I would be able to get enough space for me plus bike, and what on earth would I do if I couldn't? I tend to feel, generally, that I don't have "a right" to be somewhere, and this is a further example of the same. I worry that someone will call on me to justify myself for taking up space on the train, just with me, let alone the bike as well. Further, would I have the "presence" to have a right to cycle thru Central London itself without being annihilated (figuratively or literally) by someone. This is "An Issue" for me, I know. Perhaps it is in itself a useful lesson that I have failed to stick to a plan that I did want to do. Anyone who chances on this blog will surely not have a clue what I'm on about, but since I'm the only reader, I know what I mean! Will try again tomorrow I guess... he says... without enthusiasm... I feel a bit of a failure this morning...

A Day Of Rest

Sunday today, and tomorrow I have absolutely ZERO, ZILCH, NADA excuse NOT to cycle to work tomorrow. So I need to rest up. Boy, do I need to rest up. Woke up at six-ish, and congratulated myself for a bit on waking up so early, which will of course make it that much easier to get up early for tomorrow. Read a bit of The Miserable Mill, which Sophie has lent me (I am gradually working my way thru all the Lemony Snicket books. And then fell asleep again. Finally woke up at half past nine just in time to scurry around getting myself ready and chivvying the girls to be ready for church. We were a bit late, as usual. After church the girls were staying around for some Sunday School Sunday Lunch Thang - so I wandered into town, bought a couple of books and naughtily browsed them in the Prince of Wales on Camden Road over a couple of pints and a ploughman's. I got Stupid White Men and ASP.NET Unleashed. The former I'd been meaning to read for ages, the latter coz I'm trying to get a bit of .NET knowledge under my belt. Not old-style ASP you understand, since I have no desire to go near any Visual Basic or VBScript, but ASP.NET supports C# which is much more Java-like and comprehensible for me.
I still favour Java and the whole framework but I can also begin to see how .NET really does give you something which is quicker and easier to work with. Anyway, it will be good to know a bit of both.
Next entry in this blog SHOULD be a description of my early-morning bike ride thru Central London! Why do I still find it so difficult to believe that it will actually happen?