Yearly Archives: 2010

Finally! 100 Miles

By 42 commentsRides, ,

… And I Don’t Mean In One Day, Either.

At the beginning of the year, I set myself some targets.  You might know that on Sunday the first major one passed un-achieved.  I sat on my sofa yesterday morning feeling guilty as I ate a sausage butty and watched 36,000 runners completing the Great Manchester 10k Run.

My official time was 49 minutes 44 seconds, thanks to Fall Down Andy, my good friend and football buddy.  His £20 donation is on my JustGiving widget on the right hand of this page, so at least one of my targets has moved in the right direction this week!   Just Give it a click if you can help Springhill Hospice, too.

But back to the point… Back in January I didn’t set myself a “miles cycled” target.  Then (and indeed now), I didn’t know how much chance I’d get to get the bike out of the shed and ride.  Truth is, in the absence of a target I’ve been pretty lax, I think.

To stave off the guilt, I did open the shed yesterday.  My OH and I had a leisurely schlep to Hollingworth Lake before I went to pick up Number One Son who was staying with us in advance of his trip to Stamford Bridge today.  Yes Les, Stamford Bridge.  I advised him to take his camera as it might be the only trip there he ever makes, unless Man U secure the Premiership before the Chelsea away match some season soon! 😉

Our little Lake cycle took me past 100 miles cycled for the year.  This is a good thing 🙂  But in truth I’m still disappointed at my progress so far 🙁   I think I should be getting 500 miles in this year easily, so I need to pick up the pace and open that shed a lot more often.

Interestingly, I gave the Focus Fat Boy a good clean when we got home.  It’s amazing how much crap you can carry along in your chain if you over-lube it.  In most situations it’s impossible to have too much lubrication, but in terms of chains, the grit I was carrying around must have been slowing me down!  So in future, I must remember to give it a wipe after I’ve lubed it.

Anyway, here’s some evidence that I did actually go out, but looking at my famous pot belly I think a bit more time on the bike and a bit less sat outside cafes is in order!

The ride map can also be found in my MapMyRide pages.  Go on, have a shufty!  Tell ’em Phill sent you.

Any ideas how I can motivate myself to get a bit more cycling done?

Free Stuff – Gotta Love It

By 14 commentsReviews, Rides, ,

Free Cycling Jacket

A few weeks ago I subscribed to Mountain Bike Rider magazine.  I could pretend that it was for the pull-out route maps; the skills advice; the workshop articles… but to be honest, there are two reasons for me subscribing:

  1. 10% off the cover price.
  2. A FREE Altura Nevis cycling jacket.
I love free stuff, I do.

Smug Man in Free Altura Nevis Jacket.

The jacket’s last year’s model I believe, but it’s a cracking windstopper, and waterproof too.  The reflective bits on the front (as you can see here) and on the bumflap will be helpful and this used to retail at more than £50.  It cost me less than hat to subscribe to a magazine I was going to buy anyway, so I’m a winner! Hurrah for me.

Check Out My Cherries!

While I’m on a cheapo tip, look at these babies:

Tommies!

Virtually Free Cherry Tomatoes-In-Waiting

Regular readers will know about my £7-greenhouse-£25-base exploits.  Well, this propagator is full of seeds we dried out from actual cherry tomatoes, stolen from a salad.  They’re growing, actually growing and everything, which is cool.

They should be ready for transplanting outside before too long, then later in the summer we can have lots and lots of cherry tomatoes.  Salads; sauces; pizza; barbecues; soups… I’m going to be heartily sick of cherry toms by autumn but it’s pretty cool for the kids to witness.

Next year I think I should try to grow amusing-shaped vegetables. Any ideas what’s good to grow?

Target Update – Not Great News

By 7 commentsReviews, Rides, , ,

Time for Some Honesty

At the beginning of 2010, I wrote a post which aroused a fair bit of interest.  In it, I said I was going to train and complete the Great Manchester Run this weekend.  Well, to cut a long story short, I’m not running.

I broke a rib earlier this year and missed 5 weeks of running.  After the 5 week break I realised that I wasn’t going to get fit enough to do 10km this Sunday, so I’ve bottled.  The only silver lining is that I’ve raised an extra £20 for Mum’s hospice by selling the ticket on.

So there you go. I’m not proud, but I know I can’t run 10k on Sunday so I’m not going to try.  Running’s never been my forte so I think I should stick to the bike from now on.  I won’t belittle my fail, it’s a big one.

Back To The Bike

Number One Son did his distance running PE lesson on Thursday, so his little legs were aching over the weekend.  Nevertheless, we headed out for a ride.  All I can say is that exactly 10 miles later I was very proud of his efforts.  We used almost all the gears but he didn’t stop once (except for our tea break and a pee).  Top riding, sunshine. 🙂

Our Weekend Bike Ride

Nice loop around Hollingworth Lake and through Milnrow.

i-gotU @trip GPS Device

I bought Number One Son the i-gotU device for his birthday and this was its first trip in anger.  I have to say I was well impressed.  It’s a simple little GPS point marker but it also allows you to waymark points where you take photos, to load those photos to a page on the @-trip website when you load up the track data.

The beauty is in the @trip software that comes with the device, and the web page where your trails are stored.  He can now save his trails, share them with his mates and show off accordingly.  We have a little learning to do but on first impressions I’m impressed.  Check out his first tracked ride here.  Sorry about all the bogus photo points: it was in his pocket – must sort out that mount properly…  The 3D view is great if you’re 12!

I might head out to get those final 1.8 miles towards the 100 mile marker tonight.  Fingers crossed…

Cycling Kit Haul

By 12 commentsReviews, Rides, ,

Yesterday, Joby stuck a big Aldi advert on his blog which saved me a fortune.

I’ve read a few blogs by the ladies where there are regular posts following uncontrolled shopping expeditions.  These “Haul” entries seem to exist primarily to ease the inevitable feelings of post-purchase dissonance and to garner positive reinforcement of ill-considered decisions from internet friends…

.. so I thought “Brilliant! I’m going to do one of those!“.

My Aldi Haul.

After picking up my little girl from school, I reminded myself where Aldi was (I get them and Lidl mixed up all the time) and dragged her along as my unwilling accomplice.  This is what I got:

That little lot cost me £33.00 !  How’s that for a bargain?  Not bad considering, as has been pointed out, that a new top at Evans is about £40.00.

I’m chuffed.  I suggest you get down to your nearest Aldi and see if there’s anything decent left, this instant. Tell ’em Phill sent you! 🙂

Garden Growbag Bargain – Or So I Thought

By 4 commentsTat,

Garden Project 2010 – Number One

One of the girls has been doing allotmenteering at school this year, and has developed a healthy interest in all things home-grown.  Keen to reinforce this and to build on the wonderful appreciation of our garden-grown strawberries (all 6 of them) last year, we’ve invested in a few small self-sufficiency projects.

  1. Improved strawberry growing. I’m not saying how this has been achieved. It’s a secret from the kids.
  2. A raspberry plant. I bought one last year but a neighbourhood idiot uprooted the “sticks” from the embankment in front of our house and threw them into the canal.  This time they’re in the back garden!
  3. A growing house for tomatoes.  This is what this blog entry is about.

The Tomato House

In an attack of bargain-hunting that orange fraudster David Dickinson would be proud of, my Other Half snapped up a steel-and-plastic mini-greenhouse for about £7.  “Excellent!” we thought.  Over the weekend I took the bits out of the box and realised that, while a very good idea and no doubt excellent for tomatoes, the weather-proofyness of said greenhouse was less than ideal for the foothills of the Pennines.

So, down to B&Q I went and spent £25 on materials to build a suitably stable base for our £7 greenhouse.  Brilliant.

An hour or two later, with blistered office-worker hands thanks to my battery failing on the power drill, I chocked up the base so it was level and attached the uprights of the greenhouse to the shed.  Now the thing will only blow away if the shed blows away too – and the bikes should stop that happening!

A job well done, I think.  What do you think?

The tommies are propagating at the moment so they should be in there in about a fortnight.  Watch this space…

p.s. I did get out on the bike, 9.3 miles around Hollingworth Lake after being delayed by my own poor workmanship.  Time lost due to a 3-step puncture repair, gah.  But a nice ride nonetheless. 🙂

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