I am SO out of here :-)

Counting the minutes

Tomorrow is my last day in my current job and the winding down process is dragging on a little.
In the meantime I have been copying and deleting files from my C: drive and generally tidying up for the exciting swap over to a new computer. This time I am getting another Dell and I already have my iphone so I should be up and running by the end of Friday.

In the meantime, I am hoping that Crank Brothers are going to start making their rather nice wheels in 29er sizes...

Twittering again

I have posted about Twitter a couple of times and I can see that a couple of the family have joined up, but neither of them ever use it. I put something up there a couple of times a day but I am pretty sure that nobody reads my posts.

I think it is rather like farting in a empty room. There is nobody there to laugh or be disgusted at it so where's the fun?

The weather is great here today again so I biked into the wind all the way to work and I am looking forward to a much easier ride home in preparation for a very exciting weekend when I am racing against Bjarne Riis and Ned Overend. This is the coolest thing that will ever have happened to me on a bike.

I am such a geek.

Wooden anniversary

Sounds a bit rude if you ask me.

Saturday was our 5th Wedding anniversary and we celebrated by not going out for dinner but by shipping J off to T&B and spoiling ourselves with expensive champagne and a big hunk of beef fillet (about 30cm lopped off the end of the fillet) that was barbecued and delicious.

Yesterday we went to the forest with J's nursery and had a nice time running around and eating cake (not at the same time). All in all, it was a nice weekend and the weather was fantastic.

Getting to the end of it all

I got my new iphone the other day, but have not been able to figure out posting from it yet...

I have been very busy this week having spent time in Belgium, Spain and incredibly Denmark. This morning I dragged myself out of bed and cycled into the office. I am looking forward to ride home for a change seeing as I will actually have a tail wind for a change.

Weeee!

Weekend in the forest

Yesterday we had out annual family trip to see the flowers that carpet the forest at this time of year before the leaves come out in the trees. The flowers are called Anemone (I think that is the correct spelling) and yesterday was a beautiful day for it.

All quiet on the blogging front

This week has been fairly hectic despite (or perhaps because of) it's abbreviated length. I spent 2 days in Belgium and 2 days at home recovering from the trip to Belgium. Next week will be similar in that I am on the 06:35 flight to Brussels on Monday morning, but then it takes a different turn in that I fly directly to Barcelona on Monday night for a full day workshop on Tuesday before returning home at about 11 on Tuesday night. I plan on taking the remainder of my employment a little easier, starting with cycling to work on Wednesday and not working more than 45 or so hours for the week for a change...

This weekend we will be out and about doing various stuff including a trip to the woods and dinner with T&B and MK is taking J to handball and a concert at the library. I will try to take some photos as I think I have been neglecting my duties to the absent grandparents for a while.

New front mech

When I was cleaning my rather special new bike at the weekend I found the reason for the poor shifting on the front chainrings. The titanium cage had a broken weld. Bummer

This evening I took the bike into Fabin where I bought it and they replaced the front mech without any trouble and were very nice about it too. It is very thoughtful of them not to make me feel like a fat bloke with more money than sense and he even weighed my bike for me...

6.9kg or 15.2 lb !

He even told me that most riders in a pro peleton would be envious of my bike. That made me really happy, but now I just have to ride it more.

Little to report

Went to the hotel, had a beer, something to eat and then went to bed.

The room was very hot even with the window open so I didn't sleep too well, but I can have a nap on the plane on the way home this afternoon.

Easter round up

The weather has been great in Denmark over the very very long weekend so we have been busy outside more or less all the time.

We have dug and planted and moved and mown. We've watered and weeded and sown and pruned as well. The result is that we now have carrots, parsley and peas planted from seed. Another rhubarb plant growing alongside our new sage and rosemary plants in the vegetable patch. Then to add a little life to the garden and cover up areas that currently need mowing or weeding we have planted a rhododendron, an astra something or other and a magnolia bush. We have also relocated the rose bushes and replaced them with ones that will cover the ground and planted a row of strawberries to boot!

In the meantime, I have managed several good bike rides including mountain biking with J in the forest (sort of mountain biking anyway) and yesterday we all went out together, I towed the trailer with the kids in it and MK just got to drag herself around for an hour or so. It was great. We even managed to have 2 barbecues over the weekend much t J's excitement. I guess the final big news of the weekend was that DK is now crawling, he has only managed a metre or so to date, but I am sure we'll be locking things up before we know it...

I am now back in Belgium for 48 hours, but I am looking forward to getting back home to more gardening, barbecues and biking.

Over hot coals

It is turning into another busy week. But hang on a minute...

This is Denmark isn't it?

It's Easter as well so that can only mean 1 thing...

A 5 day weekend (with a supplementary day working at home as I worked 60 hours last week)

Hurray, the sun is shining, it's not too cold and I'm going to ride my bike every day until I go back to Belgium on Tuesday morning.

The next project is to decide what to do for our wedding anniversary, but I have a little time left for that.

Have a good weekend everyone, see you on the other side!

Weekend work

It is not unusual for me to do some work at the weekend, but it is unusual to go to the office. I got home at 11:00 on Friday night and got the call on Saturday morning at 08:00. That was the day gone because I got home at 7:00 just as the boys were going to bed. Having been away all week that was a real pain. It was also the first day of the year that was remotely warm and sunny so it was a double pain in the bum.

At least it is a short week this week and I am hoping to get some time back at some point... In the meantime, I am unreasonably busy for someone who has handed in their notice...

By the way, didn't anyone like my new watch?

Just for me!

Antwerp and beyond

We finished a little earlier than usual last night (meaning 6 o'clock if you're interested) so we went to Antwerp for dinner. I had never been there before and it was quite nice. Just like Brussels but smaller. I had moules and frites which were very nice and a beer or two. The other two guys were less brave.
This is the cathedral:

Here is the powerboat factory thing next to our hotel

and this was the view to the left of the above. It looks quite nice, but it is in the middle of a fairly large industrial estate surrounded by water.

Just becuase I'm missing them all

It sucks a lot that I can't go home tonight :-(

Tour of Flanders

This Sunday the Tour of Flanders will take place not too far from where I am sitting in Belgium. A couple of years ago I rode the route in the "sportif" ride that is open to the public on the day before the main race, but this year I'll just be watching it on the television.

The race is extremely tough, it is about 270km long with about 40km of cobbles and 16 "bergs". These bergs are short and very steep hills, often cobbled and so steep that often the pros end up walking up them when they get there in bigger groups. The race is brutal and I can't wait to attack our very own ironing "berg" whilst I'm watching on Sunday afternoon.

I'll be doing my own little Tour on both Saturday and Sunday this weekend. I have a 12 hour mountain bike race on the 1st May and I am nowhere near ready for it yet...

Tail winds, head winds and no wind(ows) at all

I am in Belgium for a couple of days and it looks like the weather is nice. Unfortunately I am stuck in a meeting room with no windows so I don't really know at the moment.

Yesterday was a busy day. I managed to motivate myself to cycle to work and back for the first time since December. Getting there was fine, I had a tail wind and it was nice to be out in the fresh air. The journey home was another story, having ridden 45km in the morning meant that my legs were not fresh and the kind tail wind had of course become a fierce head wind. At times I wasn't even sure if I would make it, but eventually I got home after 2 hours of struggling. I guess the only way it will get easier is if I do it more often. Given that I resigned from my job yesterday, I suspect that I will be able to find the time a little more easily for the next month at least...

Happy Birthday G

Have a good day and may the dentist treat you kindly!