Ride/adventure wise; I still have no idea. Well, apart from a three day mini adventure with The Bear; Banbury to Portsmouth to Bristol to home. Which we will do, at some point, as soon as he starts riding again.

Life wise; Jen and I desperately need to go on holiday somewhere, anywhere, just somewhere nice. This always seem to get pushed back though, which it just has been again when we were given two months notice to move out of our house earlier this week. So, by the end of February we shall be living somewhere new. It’s the second time we have been forced to move in a year and a half, and I’m not at all happy about it. I’m not worried, just not looking forward to the process of moving. In fact, my initial thought when the landlady came round to tell us was how on earth am I going to get the sofas back out of the living room. Diagrams, and scale models, are currently being worked on…

To be continued…

Other than to say ‘hello’ to I didn’t know Eddie. In fact the most I ever spoke to him, was the first time we ever spoke, he was making sure that I was alright after I’d been hit on the back of the head by a skateboard. I did however know about Eddie’s ability to ride. I’ve been lucky enough to watch him quite a few times over the years riding both BMX and mountain bikes, and he ruled on both. Sadly, I will never get to witness his truly awesome bike-fu ever again as he died on Tuesday evening.

As I said, other than to say ‘hello’ to, I didn’t know Eddie at all. My friend Ray on the other hand knew him very well indeed, and I hope Ray won’t mind me sharing his Facebook post with you;

“Wanted to wait a while before writing this, wanted to remember as much as possible, include every aspect of who you were, and what you meant to me…
Now your gone I’m remembering so much.. Things I’d forgotten… 1st time I met you, you were this scruffy kid on a dirt bike wearing a hi viz jacket, it was at a dirt event at drayton track, you hit a big set and throw a massive no footer, I turned to a friend and said this kid is going to be someone, boi was I right!!
I enjoyed all of your personality, the mischief, the situations you got me into, the quiet chats, the honesty, the wild trips away and wild nights out!!.. even had great pleasure in getting you angry (BMX is more stylish than mtb!) you helped me become me, taught me to be honest with myself and not worry what anyone else thought, you had everything so dailed in life, you were so intelligent, and so fucking stubborn! Even when you knew you were wrong..
‘Think outside the box ray! Outside the box’ the one quote the keeps coming back to me…. I’m still not sure how to deal with this.. But, having you in my life, and losing you is better to have never had you at all… Your last great gift to us, your friends, is you’ve brought us all so much closer together, something I know you always wanted..
from time to time I’ll post a story or two, boast about the fact I KNEW EDDIE CHAFFE…
Good bye my brother” – Ray Smith.

RIP Eddie Chaffe.

‘Broken memory.
First of all I’ll start by stating that I have a terrible memory,’

And I haven’t the faintest idea what it was going to be about. Well. Clearly it’s about my lack of memory. But other than that, I haven’t a clue.

To be continued, if I ever remember…

Reading back through past posts it seems that I’ve written several times before about not taking photographs. In fact, it would appear, that I’ve written more times on not taking photographs than I have about taking them. And, I’ve fallen into that same trap again. I could blame it on a few things, but I think it really boils down to just one thing; I’m lazy. When I come home from work I like nothing more than sitting down in front of the television, and then staying there until it’s time for bed. Now, I’m not necessarily glued to the television, I’ve just installed myself directly in it’s path. The problem with this is that I’m sat down, when I could/should be doing something else instead. Like photography.
I have a huge love of photography, and should really make more time for myself to take photographs. Rather than just looking at other people’s in books and on the internets. I’m not claiming to be any good, but I do enjoy doing it and I am trying to get better. But it’s the photograph above that has spurred me on to knuckle down and take more.

Earlier in the year, one evening after work, I popped my head through the skylight in our bedroom and took four or five photos with the ломо. The sun had just disappeared behind the horizon, it had just finished raining, and it looked stunning. When I then picked the photos up I was amazed that, for once, I’d captured exactly what I’d seen. That may sound like an odd thing to say, or that I’m being self-deprecating, but it’s quite a rarity for a camera to reflect precisely what you seeing. Especially in poor or failing light. These few photographs however were superb, some of the best I have even taken,and pretty much a complete fluke. And now, thanks to my good friend Alan (he of Alan’s Law), I’ve had one of those photographs printed onto canvas and it now takes pride of place in the living room. I cannot stop looking at it. Every single time I walk in and out of the room I gawp at it. I want more like this. There is an empty space above the bed, and also a space in The Batcave/office, that needs to be filled with a big print.

I’ve spent the last year slowly building up a collection of expired films to load into the ломо. I’ve even managed to find a Kodak Ektachrome-X that expired in March 1979, no idea as to wether it’s going to still work but there’s only one way to find out…

To be continued…

Every Sunday, and every day off, I would head out into the countryside building up my pace and range. When I got to the stage where I could comfortably ride 60 miles in 4 hours, I started to ride with a weighted bag. It was far heavier than it need to be, much heavier than the stuff I would need to carry on The Ride, but I figured that it would help to build up my strength and stamina. As would handicapping myself on my commute to and from work by doing it on a singlespeed, the climbs became steeper and the gearing forced me to pedal all the time.

All throughout this period I changed my bike in a few ways to make it more comfortable, and slowly built up my equipment. Although, for some unknown reason, and even after the very wet Watlington ride, I didn’t get a waterproof jacket. The Bear and I also took part in a couple of the Evans Ride It events where we were encouraged to ride at a faster pace than we’d been training at, and forced to ride further than we ever had before.

Everything was geared toward The Ride. Every Sunday we went out we would undoubtedly ride past several country pubs that would have the aroma of a roast Sunday dinner beckoning us in, which we always resisted and always promised ourselves that after The Ride we would succumb…

The thing is, we never have. And it’s not, as I thought might be the case, because we threw our bikes into the sea when we reached Lands End. Somewhere along the way, through the training, despite the arduous To Poole And Back weekend, and the gruelling ride itself, we found we actually enjoyed it. Since we’ve been back I’ve continued to ride, and continued to push myself. I’ve just bought a new cycle computer that will let me know how I’m doing in comparison to my previous best, which is as frustrating as it is useful. And, I’ve finally bought a waterproof jacket so I’m all set up for training over the winter. But for what reason? I don’t know, it doesn’t really matter, I know it’s not for a triathlon*, I just enjoy doing it. I’m sure one day that we’ll go on another proper big adventure. And I quite like the idea of doing the Paris-Roubaix one year, as I know Simon the guy on singlespeed we met in Kendal is planning on doing. But, for now, I’m quite content riding and training for no other reason at all than I enjoy it.

Just started reading Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut. You’re never going to guess what the protagonist finds himself doing…

To be continued…

The Constant isn’t the last of Desmond’s time-traveling, he is forced to do it once more in season six. And, when I say forced, I mean tied to a chair and sat in front of a huge electromagnet. Unlike the previous two times however he ends up at some point in his distant future, and when he eventually leaps back he has a whole new outlook on life…

Without doubt the time-travel episodes of Lost are some of the most complex, but they are also some of the best written. The most important part for me however, was the fact that they started out with the type of paradoxes that they were going to employ, the rules to time-travel they were going to use, and then adhered to them strictly throughout the series, despite what the characters thought they could do. And, when I say characters, I mean characters, for it wasn’t only Desmond that got to time-travel…

To be continued…

The following day at work The Bear stated that it was “a bit good,” and that was then all we talked about for the rest of the day. In fact, that was all we did every day that followed each and every new episode for the rest of the first season. As the story built, and built, our joint interest intensified. When it came to the season finale, I can remember us texting each other despite the fact that I did not want to miss a second of it. Why did those people snatch Walt from the raft? Did that big bird just say something? How on earth did The Black Rock end up so far inland? What on earth was that thing made of smoke that tried to drag Locke underground? And, more importantly, just what was beneath The Hatch? Thankfully, we didn’t have to wait too long to find out – as the second season aired in the UK very quickly after the first – but I don’t think that either of us expected it to be a Glaswegian called Desmond.

The second season seemed to run at a far slower pace than the first season had built to, but the one thing that prevented my interest from waining was Desmond; A man, that for the previous three years had found himself in a scientific research station called The Swan, who had to push a button every 108 minutes to help control the pocket of electromagnetic energy that the station was built on top of. The season finished with the button not being pushed, and everything that was made of metal flying toward an area of the station that had been concreted over, left with no choice Desmond turned The Failsafe Key and there was a great flash of light.

When Lost returned for the third season it appeared to have completely lost it’s way, and The Bear as a regular viewer, it seemed disjointed and appeared to be treading water. All that was left of The Swan station was a crater, and a passing comment that it had imploded, it’s three occupants however were all still alive. As the season continued it appeared that what happened to The Swan was going to remain unexplained, and as to how Desmond had escaped the implosion and been found wandering naked through the jungle. But then came the eighth episode, Flashes Before Your Eyes, where we treated to the greatest episode of the entire series so far. In a drunken confrontation with Charlie, Desmond explained what had happened to him when he turned The Failsafe Key…

At first, it appeared that what we were watching was a flashback. Except it hadn’t been proceeded by the usual flashback noise, and Desmond didn’t seem to know what was going on. He also appeared to have a memory of being on The Island, despite the fact that  that hadn’t happened yet. It was, without doubt, extraordinary. What Desmond was experiencing was Conscious Time-Travel, just like Dr. Sam Beckett. Except, unlike Sam, he was doing it within his own timeline. He was experiencing his own life in the wrong order. In this… Leap, I suppose, he encountered Eloise Hawking who appeared to know what he was experiencing. She explained that he cannot change the future, and, if he tried, the universe will course-correct. And it’s with that, despite not realizing it at the the time, that the rules by which time-travel would adhere to in Lost were explained. Shortly afterwards Desmond is hit round the head with a cricket bat and finds himself naked in the jungle, exactly where we first found him after The Swan implosion. From then on in the series appeared to find it’s feet. The clumsily introduced new characters were quickly killed off, the writers negotiated an end date for the series, and the season finished with a flashforward; showing some of the characters having finally escaped from The Island.

In spite of my best efforts to explain Flashes Before Your Eyes to him, it was this episode that got The Bear back on board. But it was only after I watched The Constant, in season four, that I managed to make my description of Flashes’ make sense…

To be continued…