A life more ordinary…

This evening at the Buddhist meeting I was reminded of this comic, which really expresses quite a Zen sentiment;

Saturday

Up at 6am for Zazen. I then changed into some warm bike kit and started fettling the bike for a bit (chain was starting to jump last ride, which says it’s really wearing out, so I gave it another coat of chain lubricant and noticed some small rust spots on the chain. It must really be on it’s way out – but I’ll live with it until it gets un-bearable), then I had some breakfast.

Dave arrived around 9:10am and due to the very strong winds (25mph from west) we loaded my bike on top of his car and drove to Garforth. Setting off we had the wind behind us, so made good progress across through Church Fenton and headed towards Selby. We stopped off in Selby for a rather nice Bacon Sandwich and a cup of tea (cheers Dave!)

Once we were fed and watered it was time to turn from riding easterly (and having a tailwind) to riding north-north west, so having wind coming from our left and feeling a little like a headwind. It’s knackering riding into a wind at the best of times, but this was pretty constant – I reckon 25mph or so at points. It was a hard slog riding back up the cycle path, but at least it didn’t rain too heavily and we did get some sun for a part of the ride.

We arrived back at my house and Josie came to pick up Dave and the bike – a great 32 mile ride.

Michelle had been cleaning after they’d been Horse Riding and the house was brilliantly clean.

A pretty chilled out afternoon and evening, and Michelle cooked the penultimate chunk of the turkey left over from Christmas as a turkey curry, which was very nice.

Sunday

First time Michelle joined me for Zazen this morning.

We then finished tidying the house and then I went for a nice walk to the local shop to pick up some bacon and some bagels which I cooked for breakfast. At the same time, I put a nice piece of gammon into the slow cooker with some apple juice, star anise, cloves and a bay leaf.

Once we’d done that it was down to Askham Bryan for the kids to feed the ducks, then a quick jaunt to Ikea to pick up a blanket for Lucy (and to replace a couple of broken plates) and then home.

The cars were looking rather shabby so I washed both cars, then spent some time making sure my dive gear was all ready for next weekend. I’m going to have to keep an eye on the long regulator hose as it’s starting to wear out. Might try and get a spare 2.1m hose sometime this week.

We then watched the penultimate Harry Potter before we also managed to see a very faint Aurora Borealis in the sky outside the front of the house. Not quite as green and bright as it was the last time we saw it when we lived in the wolds.

Monday

It feels strange doing meditation at my mum’s house. Although had a good 22 minutes before a cup of tea was brought up for me I am going to keep it to 20 minutes from now on. I feel like they’ll judge me for it, and I don’t think they’ll understand, so I best not broach it with them. Hopped in the car early doors (7am) to drive to Bristol. Arrived at the new office at 9am. Bit of a pain today but eventually we got things working which was great. The receptionist wanted to lock the comms room at 5pm so I suppose it was an excuse for me to clear off and find my hotel.

I can heartily recommend the Future Inn at Cabot Circus in Bristol. It’s a bit like an upper class Premier Inn – but actually that is doing it a disservice – it’s obviously swiping directly at the budget hotel market with it’s prices, but the rooms are actually as good as I’ve had in places like a Hilton. Although the first room they put me in all the sockets had failed! So they moved me without any quibble. Great customer service. The company had kindly booked me in on dinner bed and breakfast, so I had some Moules Mariniere which was lovely. I could have had a drink, but I’m keeping off the booze now.

Once dinner was over, I wandered over the road to the rather nice Showcase Cinema at Cabot Circus to see The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. This is a cinema that makes the enjoyment of a movie positive – Sony 4K projectors, decent sound system and raked seating that’s really comfortable. City Screen in York is similar – a cinema that actually wants it’s customers to have a great experience and come back for more. Somewhere that’s obviously passionate about the films.

Compare that to the frankly awful Vue cinema in York which has totally unhappy, grumpy and unhelpful staff, crap flat sound systems with damaged speakers, level seating screens (i.e. no raking at all) with very uncomfortable seating (apart from the premium seating that they’ve put in to cater for those people who drive Range Rover Sports), very crap projection and mostly small screens. You can tell I try not to go there if I can at all help it.

Tuesday

Up, a short practice, and a nice breakfast (I forgot how nice Alpen is), then into the new office to finish off my work. Left mid-afternoon for the long drive all the way back to York. Home and cooked some tea and then out to the Buddhist meeting for the evening.

Wednesday

First swim this week – another 1km.

Into the office (very busy but productive day) and then home. Nice pasta for tea.

Had a bit of an emergency this evening – we have had a Philips Steam Generator iron (GC8261) for a few years now and apart from it randomly putting brown stains on clothes, it’s been fine. The thick hoses between the base and the handset had started to fray, but it looked OK – I sealed it with tape just to make sure about 2 years ago. Until this evening when the bit with the tape burst into flames and started sparking! Thankfully Michelle jumped away and I leapt up and unplugged the iron and put out the fire. What it looks like has happened is that the steam tube had failed and the mains cable inside the hose had worn away until the inside cables were exposed (quite a big flaw) and the steam shorted the mains out and caused a fire. Quite why my MCB didn’t trip is beyond me, but once the fire started, the hose started to burn, as did the tape, and the whole thing killed itself. I’ve cut the plug off the iron and it’s gone in the garage to be WEEE recycled. Very scary.

Was very tired this evening so was asleep by around 8:30pm.

Thursday

Michelle’s in the office early today, so I took the kids to out of school club and into the office by 8am. Lots of work today but very productive.

Home and sorted out a bit of a palaver at home. Quiet night.

Friday

Up early again this morning and at the pool for around 7:15am. Did 1250m today (50 lengths) which is a bit of a minor achievement for me – and it didn’t feel that hard either. I am slowly building up to a regular daily distance of 1500m and hopefully will get up to 2000m per day by March/April.

Into the office and another very productive day. Busy busy all day today but we arranged a few things we’d been putting off for months, which is great, and I think the brain cloud I’ve been under for quite a while has slowly dispersed. I can think straight for the first time in ages. I’m very motivated.

Home a bit later than normal, but we had a treat – some Dominos’ pizza. I suppose it balances out fairly the swim this morning. I am feeling tired again now, writing this (only 20:10) but I can only think it’s because I’m getting up a little earlier and burning lots of energy.

Saturday

Up early, zazen, then out on the bike.

Once home, defrosted the car for Michelle, postman turned up with my meditation stool, then while Michelle was off horse riding with the girls, had a nice bath, then made a bit of lunch for their return.

Out to get some bits & bobs from the supermarket, then home for Haggis, Neeps &  Tatties.

Another episode in the Harry Potter series this evening, then sleeeeeep

Sunday

5:45am zazen using the meditation stool this morning. Took me a little while to get used to it but eventually got there. Big benefit over half-lotus is that my legs don’t hurt as much and don’t go to sleep – I’m not a great fan of pins and needles. Especially cos it takes a while for my legs to wake up.

The rest of the house were still sleeping, so I read downstairs for a bit then started tidying the kitchen. A massive declutter and clean means our glass recycling box is full of old glassware. Once the kitchen was tidy, i made some nice poached eggs on toast for us all for breakfast.

Once that was done it was time for me to try and fix my car. The big Pathfinder is due a service, but on a mammoth work trip just before Christmas, it started playing up. When you put it under load it’s revs would drop as though it was getting something like fuel starvation. It sorted itself out again over Christmas, but this week it started to play up again. I put some diesel redex in the fuel  tank when I filled it up but this just seemed to make it worse! So that fairly quickly ruled out the fuel. But today I had a brainwave – I popped out the air filter and gave it a shake, and loads of stuff came out of it. Leaves, dust, sand – you name it. I also topped up the engine oil. And that seems to have cured it – where I would get power fade on acceleration before, it seems ok now. Cross fingers.

After a fantastic beef lunch, I packed my bags, loaded the car, and started my journey to Bristol for work.

Being of British descent, I was brought up via my schooling, home life and wider society as a Christian – I was Christened by my parents, and I was confirmed at my junior school. We had religious services every day at the schools I attended until I left at 18, but I never really felt like I understood the whole thing about church and never really felt at all religious or any connection. I have no idea now why I even got confirmed – maybe it was to do with Communion or maybe at the time I just wanted to be part of that club. I was in the choir so maybe they thought I was religious (truth be told, I just liked to sing and enjoyed the sound of the choir, and still enjoy choral music today, even without being religious). It could even have been as simple as just wanting to belong.

My parents weren’t overly religious and I never remember going to Church as a family unless it was a wedding or funeral. I remember going to Sunday School and Church on my own with my friends and people going on about how they had felt Jesus enter their lives, but I had never really understood it. They must definitely be feeling some vibes or something that just isn’t happening to me. Don’t get me wrong – I had some great times at things like JuCo camp (where I first did Canoeing and Climbing, amongst other things) but the religious aspect wasn’t for me. I fell out of any religion  in my mid teens whilst at school. Science and logic has always been how my brain ticks, and religion never really sat with that as a good bedfellow. I reckon around the time I was 13 or 14 I ended up turning into an atheist.

I should say at this point before I offend anyone (and I have many Religious friends who are very happy with their choice, thank you very much ) that I have absolutely nothing against monotheistic religions at all, and religion is a personal choice. I have purposely not pushed my children in any direction when it comes to religion apart from supporting them in whatever their beliefs are or turn out to be.

I’ve always been fascinated by different ways of life and at school the chaplain who did our RE lessons was very open minded, so they weren’t just about Christianity, but we learnt about Sikh, Hindu, Buddhism etc. I remember being fascinated by Buddhism – by it’s basic concepts which seemed to resonate with me. I always thought it was a religion but I realised when I grew up that it was less of a religion in a monotheistic sense (there is no God in Buddhism, and you’re not praying to a higher being at all), but it’s more a way to look at your life and how you fit in to the world. The only thing you’re praying to is yourself. It’s an inward journey but with the idea that you are a better person to those around you – more thoughtful, compassionate, and able to be altruistic.   I suppose the monotheistic religions give you that too, but alongside the praising an invisible god aspect and believing a book, both of which I never felt comfortable with. I read lots of stuff about Buddhism when I could back then, but never officially did anything myself about it.

Kinkaku-Ji Kyoto - Zen Temple

On and off since then I’ve warred with the materialistic and geeky side of my nature with the buddhist side, but more recently (last 5-10 years) the Buddhist side of me has been winning. I’d randomly do the odd bit of meditation (and did Yoga for a period of time too) but never kept the practice up daily. Until more recently when things have been getting difficult from a psychological perspective – I was diagnosed Bipolar in 2010 and when your moods are up and down it’s difficult to focus. In mid 2011 it got to a point where I had to do something so I resolved with myself to do the things I should have done years ago – you can see those things in my post here.

So I started swimming three times a week, building up from 3km per week at the moment with the aim of doing 6km per week and maybe more. I’ve lost weight, I’m feeling healthier. But most importantly this is making me feel happier.

But the biggest change is that I’ve eventually cemented my Buddhist side and started attending a group and meditating daily. And the meditation is the thing that is making the most difference to me mentally. I feel calm again, but I’m also seeing things I never saw before. A little bit of inner contentment I’ve never had before.

I remember someone I used to go to school with (I seem to remember his name was Michael Ryan – but not the guy who went a bit nuts in Hungerford of course) I once had quite a deep conversation with. He was one of those people who seemed to have an outside construct of a bit of a hard man. But he was quite a quiet and thoughtful person behind the hard-man persona, and I remember him recounting a pearl of wisdom which was ‘Never copy anyone else’s life, or pretend you are something you’re not – always be yourself’ which when you’re 12 seemed to be very deep. But it was something I remembered even now. Wierdly this is what Buddhism and meditation give me – the ability to peel away layers of protection and ego and be who I really am. It’s exceptionally liberating.

I was already up early this morning for my daily practice, so after that around 7am I looked out of the window to see what the weather was like. The clear skies, moonlight and frost made everything look blue. It looked cold. Normally I’d just dive back under the duvet and enjoy a warm mug of tea, but something posessed me to change into my cycling gear (my warmest tights, two thermal layers, thermal balaclava and warm gloves with merino undergloves) and go out for a bike ride.

I was worried it might be a bit wobbly, but actually the gritters have done their job and the roads were great – very little black ice. Coming out of the village the sun was starting to rise and there was a fine layer of mist rising off the fields like a cotton wool blanket. The sky was a light blue but you could see it was very clear today.

Turning left along the road towards Bishopthorpe, I tried to keep away from the edge of the road because of the camber, which when it’s icy has a tendency to drag your back wheel down and make you spill. I don’t fancy that. I also can’t use any cycle paths for fear of ice (I reckoned it was -2C – the computer says average was -2.4C with a maximum low of -5C) so I stuck to the main road in and over skeldergate bridge. At this point I followed the ring road for a short way and then turned left up Piccadilly. I rode up through the centre of town (I think I went the wrong way down a couple of one-way streets but the traffic wasn’t there so I wasn’t causing a problem!) and then down past the minster, where I stopped to take some photos and have a drink.

Following past the Minster and through the Bar at Monkgate, I turned left along Lord Mayors Walk, and then Left again along Gillygate.

Turning right at the lights and along Bootham the roads became quiet again, passing all the students going to Saturday morning school at St Peters. At Clifton Green, I took a left and went past the Youth Hostel, then crossing the River Ouse again over Clifton Bridge. Then the long slow climb up past the RSPCA. I was starting to get a bit cooler, so the climb was somewhat welcome as it meant I warmed up bit.

Then the only climb of the ride – Carr Lane. Well, it’s not a big climb – but it takes you up away from the river and into Acomb. Stopping to get some cash in the high street, I carried on through and past where we used to live in Foxwood, and then crossed over the ringroad and out towards Askham Richard.

The ducks didn’t seem too happy on Askham Richard pond as it’s started to freeze over!

A quick drink and then it was up the other hill and back home. Even though it was so cold, I had no wiggly moments and a great ride.

Monday

Up early and off to the pool this morning for a swim. Was quite busy this morning but enjoyed the 1km swim. Only thing was my left ankle was a little bit painful after the swim. Didn’t think any more of it though.

Into the office for the day, then home a bit later than usual.

Read a bit this evening, and then an early night. My left leg was a bit swollen for some reason and I seemed to have a bite (or scratch) on my left leg that hurt somewhat.

Tuesday

Woke up this morning to find my left leg was all swollen. Quite worried as I’ve never had anything that felt like this in my leg before. I think that I may have either caught it on Sunday on a thorn on a climbing rose, or else maybe been stung by a wasp. I did pull some sort of barb out and the sharp pain stopped, but nothing has ever had this kind of reaction to me. Thankfully I had some antiseptic spray, so I sprayed it onto my leg.  I went to the doctors who gave me some antibiotics and told me if it went even more red I should go to A&E.

WFH and then took the first step in doing something I should have done years ago – I went and joined a Buddhist Meditation group. I’m sure I’ll end up writing more about this sometime soon, but it was brilliant. One of the things I resolved to do was make sure I made space for daily practice.

Wednesday

No swim today as I wanted to give my leg chance to heal a bit more. (It still feels a little strange). Felt very calm and peaceful today. Into work today. Home and cooked a rather lovely Lamb Tagine which was wolfed down by the kids. Cool. Had a TV free evening and read quite a bit, and chatted too.

Thursday

Up at 5:45am for a daily practice. Quick breakfast and then in the car early and over the pennines to Manchester today. The new BBC site at Salford is just amazing. It’s enormous and just is such a flagship site for our main broadcaster. I never thought they could re-create the feel of Pebble Mill or TV Centre, but this is pretty close. Once my meeting was over I left after Lunch and came back across to Leeds. Driving on the M62 the sun was shining and the views are beautiful. Round Saddleworth you realise what a pretty part of the world this is. If I wasn’t having to get back into the office, it would have been an ideal day to dip off the motorway, get out the tripod and camera and take some brilliant pictures. Such good light today.

Back to the office and then made my way home. We watched Dara O’Briain’s ‘TITS’ (This is the show) this evening which was fab.

Friday.

Up at 5:45am for daily practice. I was around 15 minutes through (I reckon – I can’t really tell time when I’m meditating! The whole point is to push away all thoughts so the time sort of isn’t relative to my consciousness) when the cat pushed the door open to the lounge and started meowing at me. It’s hard enough when things are testing you like the Hard Disk spinning up in the Sky box or the boiler making the radiators tap (I remembered on Tuesday night at the group session, the whistling radiators in the Friends meeting house). But I’m trying my best to keep my meditation going with what I can only presume was the cat sat directly in front of me meowing. Label it as distraction and pop – it evaporates. After a minute or so of trying to get my attention and realising he wasn’t going to get anywhere, he jumped onto the sofa and curled up to wait for me. My alarm went off at 20 mins and I went to feed the cat as he’d waited patiently!

Then quick change and off to the pool for a swim. This morning it was brilliant – the laps lane was only just the two of us swimming – myself and another regular I see there pretty much every day I go. The 1km went by easily and I felt more refreshed and happy.

Off to work and then home. The chip supper neutralised the lack of lunch + the swim in the morning

Tuesday

Up early and went for a swim. Only 750m today, still doing some drills and skills to try and get my swimming stroke more efficient (I can heartily recommend ‘Total Immersion‘ if you’re wanting to improve your swim – it’s a great book).

Into the office for the first day of 2012. I get the feeling if I write anything about work on here it’ll get me into trouble, so I’m not going to.

Kids were still off so Michelle had tea waiting for when I got home. (Thankyou!).  Time for Harry Potter 3 this evening.

Wednesday

No swim this morning – into the office, home and then some more reading and kids running around preparing for their first day back at school tomorrow. Had a great email discussion and started reading a recommended book (Zen Mind, Beginners Mind) which is very interesting. The wind was seriously strong this evening – the airfield 6 miles away from us recorded averages of 45-50mph with peaks of 65mph. Eek! You could hear the tiles on the roof rattling through the night.

Thursday

Up early again this morning and off the pool. Something clicked this morning and the 1000m swim was easier than it’s ever been before. I only stopped swimming because I ran out of time and needed to be in the office!

After work, I stopped off to pick up the kids and then home. Michelle was late home due to working offsite today, so it was a reading and TV evening.

Friday

First icy morning for a while this morning. Haven’t had to scrape the cars off for ages. Into the office. Missed lunch due to conference calls timed for lunchtime, so I survived on a diet of Oat So Simple and Bananas. Made up for it when we got home and I cooked Sausage, Egg and Chips for tea. Yum

Onto Harry Potter 4 during which I dipped out to have a phone conversation with my mate about some diving we’re planning.

Saturday

Up and out on the bike this morning (see this post for details!) Back home, some time tidying the garage so Michelle can use the treadmill, then indoors and updated this blog a little bit. Then a bit of meditation at home whilst the girls are out horseriding, during which I get regularly interrupted by the cat jumping on top of and curling up on my crossed legs! Just don’t put your claws in, cat.

Yum – a nice bacon and sausage sandwich for lunch (you don’t have to be a vegetarian) and some more tidying before the kids requested we watched *another* Harry Potter movie (Harry Potter 5 this time – only 3 left!)

Once that was done I quickly nipped to the Co-Op to pick up some Creme Fraiche and Parmesan, and then I made a lovely Nigel Slater Chicken Risotto. this link is a variant and quite close to the one I make – I use Vermouth (Dry Martini) initially with the butter and onions to fry the rice prior to adding the first bit of stock. Then I add Creme Fraiche at the same time as the Parmesan once the rice is cooked, a couple of minutes before serving, but essentially it’s very similar. If you do a roast chicken on a sunday, you can use the carcass to make the stock on the sunday night, ready to make this on the Monday night – I just used some sliced and pan fried chicken breasts.

Sunday

In the car and off to Castle Howard for a nice walk through the grounds this morning. Went to the front of the house and up the hill into Ray’s Wood and then through the wood and down to the lake. Kids played in the adventure playground for a bit and then we went to the boathouse cafe for a cup of tea and a nice cake.

Once we’d wandered back past the house to the main entrance complex, we stopped at the Farm Shop to get some nice food for the freezer, then hopped in the car to make our way home. Saw lots of road cyclists out on the way to Sherriff Hutton – nice day for it as there’s very little wind. Stopped off at the Supermarket at Monks Cross for some essentials, and then carried on round the ring road and picked up a new light from B&Q for the dining room.

Around 12 months ago the downlights in our dining room went pop one morning. They were already up when we moved in, and they had been fine since then. I’d put MCB devices in the garage and turning the light on created a big pop, and the MCB tripped. Hmm. So I reset the MCB and still none of the lights in the dining room worked. Flipping the power off again, I took the fitting down to have a look, and it looked like the transformer that powered the silly little LED’s that were on the base of the lamp had gone pop. Lots of scorching – didn’t look good. Meh.

So I went to B&Q and bought one of these – Atria 3-Light – it looked reasonable for the cost and I didn’t mind energy saving bulbs as they usually last for ages. But I was stupid and didn’t realise it was energy saving bulbs ONLY. And  I didn’t realise when you switch it on it took around 20 minutes to come to full brightness (yep – 20 minutes!) It seemed OK until November 2011 when in short sequence, all three bulbs failed – all less than 12 months old. When I got to B&Q to get some more bulbs (that you can only get from there) I had a chat with a lady who was filling up the stock in the light aisle and she said it was because they packed the lights with starter bulbs and they don’t last that long. That’s bollocks – nowhere on the packaging does it say that – and I’d never heard that before, but I bought three more bulbs for the lamp as it’s winter and the lights are used alot!

Christmas Day, one of the new bulbs started to fail (it would intermittantly work and not work), and then a second one started to fail this week. At this point, I’ve had enough. I can’t find the receipt but to be honest, I don’t want it fixed and they’ll be unlikely to replace it. I’m not buying more bulbs just to put in a doomed light! So I stopped off and bought a new fitting that took both normal (up to 50W) GU10 lamps along with energy saving ones. It’s now fitted and the old one’s in the bin So buyer beware – those B&Q Energy Saving GU10 fittings and bulbs don’t save you money and have a very short lifespan. Oh – I can also recommend the 4.5W Osram LED GU10 lights – they are just as bright as a 50W Halogen bulb and have a 25 year lifespan. Although costly at £11 per bulb, they are brill.

Getting up and out on the bike this morning, it was one of those ‘it’s really windy – do I go out?’ moments. But I figured if I get used to the headwinds and don’t let them phase me, I’ll be fine.

Kitted up I got the bike out the garage and put a small dab of chain lubricant on each of the chain links. I’d left the chain to dry last week with just a coat of TF2 (Teflon) without putting any proper long-lasting chain lubricant on it – so it needed this to make it smooth running. Hop on the bike, start the garmin, clip into the pedals and we’re off.

Spending time caring for the bike carefully reaps dividends. If you don’t maintain your bike, you’ll end up fighting against it, and not enjoying your ride. With me, I know when my bike is working well because I feel like I’m at one with the bike. Everything works exactly as I need, and the bike just becomes an extension of me. (My Zen philosophy coming out there somewhat I suppose).

With the wind blowing from the west, I had an easy ride east out of the village. 20mph with no stress because of the tailwind. I had planned (in my head) to ride through town, however, turning left towards the pub in Acaster Malbis, I remembered that I can’t go that way today due to flooding;

Ah. Ok. So I turned back and decided to head into my fear and ride into the strong headwind across the airfield because it’s the one thing I need to get comfortable with that seems to frustrate me when I’m riding. So I did. And to be fair, if I keep a tight profile and keep my elbows in and be streamlined, I can slip through the air.

Once I’d come over the bridge towards Colton, I turned right into Colton and stopped to take some photos of the Phone Box turned Book Exchange that’s now in the village

At this point the wind was behind me again so I got blown home, which was ever so nice

So not exactly the fastest ride I’ve ever done, but definitely one that helped me overcome my headwind issues. Cross fingers the wind drops tomorrow so I can ride a bit further!

Saturday 31st Dec 2011

Up early and looked out of the window. The sun was just peeping over the horizon through the odd cloud. It had been raining all night so the roads were wet, with small puddles, but the sky seemed fairly clear with some broken cloud, so I kitted up, did some quick checks on the bike, and then out for a quick 13.5 mile bike ride.

Going through Acaster Malbis, you could see the river Ouse was quite high, but thankfully it hadn’t flooded over the roads. I followed the bishopthorpe road past what used to be the Terrys Chocolate Factory (now a derelict site since Kraft took them over and closed them down), scooted onto the cyclepath and turned right off the main road down the little alley which leads to the towpath. It looks like some people have been out clearing the brambles and the cyclepath as it was lovely and clear – very little leaf litter and all the brambles cut back. I went down past millennium bridge, up onto skeldergate, over micklegate and then through town and out the other side by the rowing club, following the river as I went along. A couple of times I stopped to have a quick drink from my bottle and watch the early morning rowers gliding by peacefully, the odd gentle sound of their oars breaking the surface of the water out on the slightly misty river.

For some reason it felt harder this morning, but maybe it’s because I need to get back cycling more often. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy it – more that Christmas food has added to my bulk. I think it’s time to go back on a diet.

Once home, a quick shower and the kids were playing upstairs, so we settled down to watch the TT movie – Closer to the edge. Guy Martin is a legend, but all the TT riders must have balls of steel.

We then set off to our friend Suzannes for the evening – sat in front of a roaring log fire with some great company listening to some music and just chatting. Around 10:30pm the kids were just flaked out, so we drove home and watched the fireworks on TV and saw in the new year..

Sunday 1st Jan 2012

Happy New Year. I have to say at this point, there were times in 2011 when I didn’t think i’d see 2012, and at points came very close to not being here due to being so depressed and suicidal. I need to keep the black dog away from my door and at the moment things seem to be going OK. So I’m going to try to keep that going.

A lazy morning and the kids were up late. A Light breakfast – start as I mean to go on for 2012 – and some more rain today.

We went into town around lunchtime. It was strange being in town, as being new years day, half of the shops were open, and half of them were closed. Also, random car parks were locked up. The one we tried first was closed so we had to go to our second choice!  Went to the new Wagamama’s for lunch (great as always). Wandered around a very wierd York city centre but the rain was incessant (as was the whining from the youngest child), so we came home.

Watched Harry potter 1 with the kids, then when they went to bed, we watched Four Lions, which is a very comic, black and stark movie.

Bank Holiday Monday 2nd Jan 2012

Tidied away the christmas decorations. Disassembled the tree. I Tided the loft a little, and got all the christmas decorations squared away for another year. Weather was gorgeous today but I couldn’t go for a bike ride as my bike needs a bit of TLC and a service.

Watched Charlie Brooker’s 2011 wipe (still on form – even if he does look more and more like he’s just walked out of the TV programme of his own creation – Nathan Barley). We then went to Monks Cross to get some clothes for Lucy, and I went to Evans cycles to get some degreaser, some Fenwicks bike cleaner, and a new chain.

Home and I washed, degreased and serviced both mine and Michelle’s bikes. My bike took me around an hour including a full drivetrain degrease. I now have the new chain and already have a new rear cassette to fit, but they can wait for another day. After giving it a good once over once it was all cleaned up, my current chain (KMC X9) still seems in good nick and I’ve not had any jumping or mis-selection of gears as yet, so I’m going to run it until it starts playing up – it’s done 5000 miles so I’ll keep an eye on it. It looks lovely and shiny

Michelle’s bike took me 2 hours. The mech and chain was very clogged with thick grease and clumps of stuff, so I used pretty much a whole can of Muc-Off Degreaser (and alot of elbow grease with various brushes) on her drivetrain trying to give it a good clean. Once it was all clean both bikes drivetrain got a quick spray all over of TF2 to drive out the water, add lubricant and teflon, and to soak in until tomorrow when I’ll put a small drop of Finish Line Wet Lubricant individually on each chain link.

Once that was done, back in for dinner (a nice ham which was slow cooking all day) and then a second helping of Harry Potter. Back to work tomorrow