Week 77

Cycled past a house with (what I’ve just learnt is called) a “flexi tub” full of cooking apples outside. I didn’t have a pannier with me – had only gone out to put some recycling out, next thing I knew I was miles away on a bicycle – but I had the bag for life the recycling had been in, which I filled with cooking apples and tied to the bike.

Closer to home, disaster struck – the bag for life split, apples all spilled out, a couple got sliced up by the spokes of the back wheel – it could have been a spectacular disaster if it it hadn’t happened at such a low speed, which I suppose is just as well. I still managed to convey most of the apples home, and they baked very nicely.

There have been happenings in the car park here, folks in “test and trace” branded gilets setting up awnings and trestle tables and directing traffic. Hmm.

Had another look for some Toblerone ice cream. There was still no Toblerone ice cream. Then, in a burst of spontaneity, went on a bus to a seaside resort – which I wouldn’t’ve been able to do if there had been some Toblerone ice cream, cos if it would surely have melted in my bag, so that’s good.

The seaside was OK, warm and grey. Plenty of unattractive people walking about outside (as opposed to inside shops). The beach was deserted. Perhaps I’ll go to some other seaside resorts next week.

Had … a Nando? No, Nando is the creator (of the famous South African Portuguese restaurant chain, and the restaurant nearest to my front door), so suppose I had their monster, and it was merely OK. Nothing I couldn’t have cooked myself. Got the hiccups.

Went to a Paul Foot (the mulleted comedian, not the dead journalist) Zoom show, which was at least worth the price of admission.

Cycled towards some roadworks (it was the evening, so no work was happening), where I was about to dismount to obey the one-way system enforced to accommodate the roadworks. A motorcycle roared past me, ridden by a self-employed delivery person. A worker dressed in PPE leapt from a van, where apparently he’d been guarding the roadworks – so that accounts for some of the high (according to local newspaper comments) cost of the roadworks – and shouted patronisingly at the rider for roaring across a cycle path – you can’t do that, mate – and normally I’d be on the side of the what some would call “jobsworth”, but here there were no pedestrians about and I felt sorry for the gig economy dude who was merely going to park outside a restaurant. But I was too spineless to shout back in their defence. Cool story.