Stuff 'n Things
Not updated in a while again- been busy enjoying the end of the summer.
Autumn arrives
When boblink mentioned that it must be getting on for autumn a week or two ago I thought it wasn't quite yet- it was getting a bit colder and darker in the evenings, but it didn't seem that different (by the standards of this summer, at least). Over the last week or so it's all changed though, it's definitely chilly at the start and end of the day (if I wasn't biking in to work I'd have stopped wearing shorts in), and it suddenly seems to be getting darker much earlier (I suppose about now is the time when the days are getting shorter faster). Suddenly it's not picnic time any more, it's brisk walk to a warm pub time. I've not resorted to putting the central heating on yet but the first winter blanket is now installed on my bed and a couple of weeks ago I had the slightly sad thought that I'd just listened to the last international cricket commentry for a match in the UK for another year.
Bikey Stuff
My bike now rejoices under the name of 'Zoomer' on the grounds that I go zooming around on him, although Cat thinks he really ought to be called 'Plodder', and insists I only zoom a little bit. It's odd how inanimate objects pick up definite characters, but Zoomer seems to remind me of a particularly dumb greyhound whos greatest pleasure in life is to run around without really minding where.
He's had a couple of teething troubles lately; Firstly I noticed that his back brake was getting quite loose and got my Dad to look at it when they came down a few weeks ago. The problem turned out to that the brake pads were so worn they almost weren't there any more (yes, I probably should have spotted that myself really). I suspect that the brake blocks were wearing very quickly in the first few weeks I was using him because the wheel rims were considerably rougher than they ought to be due to residual rust. A quick trip to the bike shop up the road got me a new set of pads for the grand sum of 60p each, and some fiddling by my Dad with a screwdriver got me back in business again.
Secondly, on the same day I was heading into work on an emergency call (of which there've been way too many recently), and was just getting into town when I felt that one of the pedals didn't seem quite right. A couple of minutes later I was heading past the Exam Schools when my left side pedal fell off into the road with a 'clang', prompting gales of laughter from the workmen putting scaffolding up there. Fortunately I wasn't being followed by a bus and had time to scuttle into the road and grab the pedal and the nut that should've been holding it on. The rest of my journey to work and back was achieved by pedalling as little as possible and stopping every couple of minutes to tighten the offending nut again as much as I could with my fingers.
The nice man at the bike shop tightened it up again properly for free, but this morning on the way into work I thought it was feeling a bit loose again. I checked when I got in, and sure enough the bolt was distinctly untightened. 'Aha!' Thought I, 'I know what to do now', so at lunchtime I trundled into Robert Dyas and got myself a socket set of my very own to tighten it up with (for the grand price of a fiver). After fixing Zoomer I spent some time at work looking for other bolts that looked a bit loose, and now feel incredibly masculine- you're not a real man until you've got your own socket set.
End of Summer Excursions
The parents went to Greece at the beginning of the month, so Cat & I decided to take most of the week off for a holiday-ette in the New Forest to look after the animals. For various reasons we only stayed over the weekend, but stompyboots and Daniel joined us for a lovely end of summer weekend which involved beer, takeaway Chinese, and on the Sunday we trundled off to the New Forest
Otter, Owl and Wildlife Park, highlights of which were the clan of Asian Shortclawed Otters that ran around in a sort of mobile bundle of squeaking fur, the wallabies sitting around scratching, and the wild boar (their enclosure was very obvious compared to the others- there was a big fence, then an electric fence, and after that the ground looked like someone had just fought a major battle. As far as animals go I don't think I've seen anything that quite so comprehensively trashes it's environment).
We came back on Monday, in time to go to St. Giles fair on Tuesday. Somehow I was talked into going on the largest ride in the fair again- an enormous vertical rotor with a pod at each end containing two pairs of two seats back-to-back. As the rotor spins each pod also spins on it's axis, so you end up with a few very good views of Oxford's skyline from upside-down. I'd been on it last year, so thought I knew what to expect, but this time was slightly different- because it was still quite early in the afternoon we were the only people in our pod, so its weight wasn't distributed evenly (it sat with about a 30% tilt down on the side we were sitting). When it was moving this didn't make a lot of difference, but we had to stop right at the top of while the pod at the other end was loaded at the beginning of the ride, and being sat higher than most buildings in Oxford in a seat you'd be sliding out of if it wasn't for the safety bars with nothing under your feet was not a terribly pleasant experience. Being span around upside-down was actually rather a relief.
More to write, but it's getting fairly late, one for another night I think.
Autumn arrives
When boblink mentioned that it must be getting on for autumn a week or two ago I thought it wasn't quite yet- it was getting a bit colder and darker in the evenings, but it didn't seem that different (by the standards of this summer, at least). Over the last week or so it's all changed though, it's definitely chilly at the start and end of the day (if I wasn't biking in to work I'd have stopped wearing shorts in), and it suddenly seems to be getting darker much earlier (I suppose about now is the time when the days are getting shorter faster). Suddenly it's not picnic time any more, it's brisk walk to a warm pub time. I've not resorted to putting the central heating on yet but the first winter blanket is now installed on my bed and a couple of weeks ago I had the slightly sad thought that I'd just listened to the last international cricket commentry for a match in the UK for another year.
Bikey Stuff
My bike now rejoices under the name of 'Zoomer' on the grounds that I go zooming around on him, although Cat thinks he really ought to be called 'Plodder', and insists I only zoom a little bit. It's odd how inanimate objects pick up definite characters, but Zoomer seems to remind me of a particularly dumb greyhound whos greatest pleasure in life is to run around without really minding where.
He's had a couple of teething troubles lately; Firstly I noticed that his back brake was getting quite loose and got my Dad to look at it when they came down a few weeks ago. The problem turned out to that the brake pads were so worn they almost weren't there any more (yes, I probably should have spotted that myself really). I suspect that the brake blocks were wearing very quickly in the first few weeks I was using him because the wheel rims were considerably rougher than they ought to be due to residual rust. A quick trip to the bike shop up the road got me a new set of pads for the grand sum of 60p each, and some fiddling by my Dad with a screwdriver got me back in business again.
Secondly, on the same day I was heading into work on an emergency call (of which there've been way too many recently), and was just getting into town when I felt that one of the pedals didn't seem quite right. A couple of minutes later I was heading past the Exam Schools when my left side pedal fell off into the road with a 'clang', prompting gales of laughter from the workmen putting scaffolding up there. Fortunately I wasn't being followed by a bus and had time to scuttle into the road and grab the pedal and the nut that should've been holding it on. The rest of my journey to work and back was achieved by pedalling as little as possible and stopping every couple of minutes to tighten the offending nut again as much as I could with my fingers.
The nice man at the bike shop tightened it up again properly for free, but this morning on the way into work I thought it was feeling a bit loose again. I checked when I got in, and sure enough the bolt was distinctly untightened. 'Aha!' Thought I, 'I know what to do now', so at lunchtime I trundled into Robert Dyas and got myself a socket set of my very own to tighten it up with (for the grand price of a fiver). After fixing Zoomer I spent some time at work looking for other bolts that looked a bit loose, and now feel incredibly masculine- you're not a real man until you've got your own socket set.
End of Summer Excursions
The parents went to Greece at the beginning of the month, so Cat & I decided to take most of the week off for a holiday-ette in the New Forest to look after the animals. For various reasons we only stayed over the weekend, but stompyboots and Daniel joined us for a lovely end of summer weekend which involved beer, takeaway Chinese, and on the Sunday we trundled off to the New Forest
Otter, Owl and Wildlife Park, highlights of which were the clan of Asian Shortclawed Otters that ran around in a sort of mobile bundle of squeaking fur, the wallabies sitting around scratching, and the wild boar (their enclosure was very obvious compared to the others- there was a big fence, then an electric fence, and after that the ground looked like someone had just fought a major battle. As far as animals go I don't think I've seen anything that quite so comprehensively trashes it's environment).
We came back on Monday, in time to go to St. Giles fair on Tuesday. Somehow I was talked into going on the largest ride in the fair again- an enormous vertical rotor with a pod at each end containing two pairs of two seats back-to-back. As the rotor spins each pod also spins on it's axis, so you end up with a few very good views of Oxford's skyline from upside-down. I'd been on it last year, so thought I knew what to expect, but this time was slightly different- because it was still quite early in the afternoon we were the only people in our pod, so its weight wasn't distributed evenly (it sat with about a 30% tilt down on the side we were sitting). When it was moving this didn't make a lot of difference, but we had to stop right at the top of while the pod at the other end was loaded at the beginning of the ride, and being sat higher than most buildings in Oxford in a seat you'd be sliding out of if it wasn't for the safety bars with nothing under your feet was not a terribly pleasant experience. Being span around upside-down was actually rather a relief.
More to write, but it's getting fairly late, one for another night I think.