Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

So here we are then, in the middle of a somewhat warm and very wet winter. Which is reminiscent of the somewhat warm and very wet summer we had last year. Our climate is becoming almost predictably  monotonous. The only high spot in the whole winter affair this year has been Christmas. usually I don’t make any declaration as to what I may or may not wish for myself for Christmas in the line of presents, being more than prepared to allow myself to be surprised by my nearest and dearest. However, on reflection, that seemed a bit selfish as it forces said nearest and dearest to go out into the pulsing local society and hunt for possible gifts in the shops. I know that can be exhausting and I dislike the process thoroughly myself as I am not what one would call an accomplished shopper. This year then, things had to change. I actually put some thought into it. What would I really like and appreciate? Big question.

It was surprisingly easy to answer though. One frost free and clear evening I was again outside on the patio doing something probably extremely important and apparently easily forgotten, when I looked up and saw the night sky in all it’s glory. I’ve always been fascinated by the sky at night. I’ve had to navigate by it, I know a few of the constellations well and can name a few stars and planets and am always impressed when I spot the odd shooting star or other such celestial events. Seeing Orion so clearly represented in the south-eastern sky I decided I’d like to see it up close and personal, so to speak. I’ve used binoculars before but 10 x magnification is not exactly revealing. Nope, I need a telescope that can really do it for me.

I went off to my computer, Googled around for a while and then found an affordable but not exactly cheap Newtonian scope. That’s the one with a mirror at the bottom of a tube and an eyepiece at right angles to the scope. I left the picture on the screen and told my good lady to take a look if she was interested. She did. I said no more.

Christmas day comes and so did my telescope…. Surprise, surprise. It’s a beauty. Not to mention the size of the thing. Once assembled, it is quite impressive. The assembling of the telescope, by the way, was done with a total lack of assembly instructions. There simply aren’t any included. Luckily, most of it was pre-fitted and one can “feel” ones way forward.

I had to try it out of course and did so on the first clear night after Christmas. Wow! I lined the scope up with the pole star, as is recommended for calibration, and then fixed my beady eye on Jupiter. And all its moons. And other stuff you just can’t see with the naked eye. Despite the light pollution, I can see a whole lot more now than I could with the binoculars. I spent a couple of hours tracking our largest planet and following the movement of the moons around it. I would have stayed longer, but I got cold and decided that was enough for one night.

The really good thing that came with this, is the computer software that gives a good view of the night sky as it appears in real time from any chosen location on Earth. Which makes for better and easier navigation when observing. It also gives the names of all the objects out there and where to find them.  I know this is going to develop into another great hobby.

Now, where’s that local amateur astronomical society…

Dances with Worms

My new nickname. I think I’ve earned it. Autumn is setting in and I’ve been getting ready for the next growing season. This has entailed a great deal of gardening activity where I have had to go thrashing about in the jungle of weeds and turning the sod to make growing spaces. I had made two patches last spring. They aren’t huge but I managed to get a good crop of potatoes and tobacco, some garden herbs, which were planted by my wife, and a few wild artichokes and some rhubarb. Next year I’m going to expand the operation, so I have had to make a new patch. One is 144 sq. feet, one of 80 sq. feet and the newest at 110 sq. feet. I think I’ll get what I need from that. The summer has been awful though. Very wet. In fact, the wettest summer I can remember. We had twice the normal rainfall for every summer month. The soil is still soaked. It never dried out this year which means the worms have suffered. Luckily, I started a compost heap and they appear to have sought refuge there.

I had to fell the old tree that grew up the side of the house. It had gotten to be too big and was hammering the life out of the gable on the west end of my house. Every time the wind blew, we could hear the tree pounding into the brickwork. I now have a neat pile of new firewood instead. I have one more tree to get rid of though. A big multi trunked poplar right in the middle of the garden. It too has outgrown its place on the lawn. More firewood. And the space it gives me will do just nicely for the planned greenhouse. Oh yes. I want tomatoes and cucumbers and stuff. And exotic fruit if I can grow it… We’ll see.

I cleared up in the shed too. And put a new roof on it. Now there’s room for all my tools and firewood, boxes, plant pots, sacks of potting soil and my dried tobacco. The mice had moved in under the stacked firewood. I don’t mind. They eat all sorts of bugs so they’re welcome to hibernate there, or whatever it is they do in the winter, along with the hedgehog. Yep. I have a hedgehog in my garden. He eats slugs and other unwanted creepy crawlies. I hope he stays. Even if he does eat the odd worm or two.

So I guess I’m about ready for the winter now. All the hard work is done, the earth is clean and dug through so the frost can break it up. The garden rubbish and old stems and so on are all buried beneath the ground, molding away to make new earth. I hope I’ve mowed the bloody lawn for the last time this year and I flatly refuse to clip the hedge again.

Now, how long was it till Christmas?

Our New Government.. A New Theme Tune.

It really pissed me off when, at their election victory party, the Social Democrats played one of my favourite songs. “At last”. I suppose meaning, that they had ‘at last’ gained enough power to form a government. And what a sorry collection of lying toads they are. Pretty much everything they promised before the election is suddenly impossible to deliver. Apart from easing off on the immigration policy. That will be done almost instantaneously. Otherwise, the people that believed them and voted for them and to whom they promised the world, are all feeling pretty dejected and cheated now.

Well, we tried to tell ‘em..

Suckers.

But it’s that song that still irritates me. So when I heard this the other day; I Youtubed it immediately.. 

The lyrics are great.. look at the lines I highlighted as you read it through. Says it all..

YOU LIE

It ain’t complicated
Well I’ve grown to hate it
I never liked the taste of crow
But baby I ate it
They tried to warn me
They said that you were ornery
So don’t bring me those big brown eyes
and tell me that you’re sorry
You might as well throw gasoline on a fire
The way you lie…
You lie like a priceless Persian rug on
a rich man’s floor
Yeah you lie like a coon dog basking
in the sunshine on my porch
Well you lie like a penny in a parking
lot at the grocery store
It just comes way too natural to you
The way you lie.
That ain’t my perfume, I bet she had a curfew
You told me you were out with the boys and
baby I believed you
So why you lookin’ so nervous
You know you kind of deserve this
I ought to kill you right now
And do the whole wide world a service
Well my daddy’s gonna straighten you out
Like a piece of wire, like a piece of wire
The way you lie..
You lie like the man with the slicked back
hair who sold me that Ford
Yeah you lie like a pine tree in the back yard
after last month’s storm
Well you lie like a penny in a parking lot at
the grocery store
It just comes way too natural to you
The way you lie.
Well I tell you what I’m gonna do
I’m gonna drive to the big old muddy river
I’m gonna park my car in the middle of the
mile long bridge
And then I’m gonna cry
Well maybe just a little
Then I’m gonna slip off the ring
that you put on my finger
And give it a big old fling and watch it sink
Down, down, down
And there it’s gonna lie until the Lord
comes back around
Because you lie like a priceless
Persian rug on a rich man’s floor
Yeah you lie like a coon dog basking
in the sunshine on my porch
Well you lie like a penny in a parking
lot at the grocery store
It just comes so dang natural to you
The way you lie.
The way you lie.
Well it’s what you do, it’s who you are.

So, that was Summer..??

I haven’t been able to keep up with the blog of late. I’ve been busy. And we had the most miserable summer I have ever experienced. In fact, summer was a wash-out. Cancelled. Rained off. Three endless months of pissing it down. A shameful event. I curse the weather gods.

I had a job for a while, on subsidised wages mark you, and now that’s over and done with, because the firm, despite being more than pleased with my performance, didn’t have the money to employ me on a regular, full paid, scale. Screw ‘em. Their loss. But it’s back to the ranks of the jobless. By the way, those ranks are growing, daily. Job prospects are about zero right now and especially so for a man of my age. So I’m not going to panic about the situation. After all, Denmark went mad a couple of weeks ago and put the bloody social democrats in power. My comrades in the party will doubtless tender me care and solace. (My ass, they will. They’re a bunch of lying, stealing, tax-fixated bastards and nothing they promised us under the election campaigns will materialise. I knew that before the elections. Everyone else apparently didn’t.)

So, apart from the rain, unemployment and national political disaster, what else went on?

The tobacco project. This took up a good deal of my time. I planted seeds, replanted young seedlings, finally got them into the garden and successfully raised a crop of baccy. Not the huge success it might have been because of the bloody god-awful weather but nevertheless, I did get a return. I reckon I have about four pounds of smokeable weed out of the affair. I’m currently trying different ways of maturing the stuff and figuring out how to convert the harvest into good tobacco. In fact, I was so successful that I’m going to repeat the success next year. With my own seeds this time. I hope the weather is better next year. My present crop survived the rain but tobacco doesn’t like standing in mud so I didn’t get the full crop up where I wanted it. Most of the plants suffered but stood bravely up until I decided to start harvesting.
I planted potatoes too. They did OK but they had far too much water as well. Still, forty odd pounds of spuds from my one little patch was a success. They tasted great and I’m gonna be doing that again too. In fact, I have great plans to extend the gardening idea. Next year, I‘ll be planting a shed load of stuff. If I’m going to be out of work, I may as well use my time saving on the food bills.
To prepare for this, I’ve been working my ass off in the swamp that is my garden today and have prepared the third patch of earth ready for next years grow. I now have about 320 square feet of good earth to get going on. The long haired one has suggested I get a greenhouse. Good idea, but there’s a bloody huge multi-stemmed poplar tree standing right there where the greenhouse should be so I guess more lumberjacking is called for. I’ve already cut one down that was way too close to the house. Loads of wood, but loads of cleaning up to do afterwards. Those branches don’t walk to the rubbish dump by themselves and the city ordinances won’t allow me to burn the rubbish. (More bloody social democratic shite..  Ooh.. think of the environment.. Right. What do they expect? Polar bears don’t eat wood. And while we’re about it, just what did the bloody environment do for me lately? Bugger all. It just pissed it down all over me for the last three months.)

Anyhow, that’s all behind us now. Chins up, everybody. It’s only twelve weeks to bloody Christmas so I’ll have to start thinking about that soon. I hope it snows.

It’ll make a pleasant change from the weather we’ve been getting.

Maybe I can get a job as a snow clearer….

Duck a la Drain..?

I had a day off today. So did my good lady. That doesn’t happen often on a weekday these days so we decided to take advantage of the situation and take my daughter and grandson out to lunch. This involves a long drive to get to her place and a long walk with the pram to get to the town centre. The walk was pleasant enough as we took the scenic route through the woods close to the town.

On reaching the town centre, we were amused to see a duck with five ducklings surrounded by a hoard of people. A canal runs parallel to the main street and the duck had obviously lost her way and seemed to have some difficulty in finding her way back to the canal through the adjoining sidestreets. I suggested I could take my jacket off and capture the duck, we could then round up the ducklings and transport the whole family back to the waters edge. Then I learned that that wouldn’t be a good idea as five other ducklings were caught in a drain nearby. A drainpipe, designed to remove the water from rooftops was actually missing and the five ducklings had gone down the remaining hole in the street leading to the main drain below. The cover to this drain was adjacent to the hole and we could hear the poor things splashing about in the drain below. Someone said that the rescue team had been called but this is not a priority mission for them, so I decided immediate action was necessary. I attacked the drain cover with my car key attempting to clear the lifting hole of sand and crud but soon realised this wasn’t going to do the job. The drain was surrounded with cobbles, so I attacked them instead, my intention being to rip the top plate and cover away and gain access to the drain.
A young man appeared, armed with a screwdriver and a hammer. He was as determined as I and together we soon had the cobbles up, tore the top off the drain and peered into the hole. Five ducklings, just over arms length away, were happily bobbing about on the top of the dirty rainwater trapped in the drain. He couldn’t quite reach them. I laid down on the pavement, shoved my arm down the hole and just managed to grab the feathers on a ducklings neck. I heaved it triumphantly up from the darkness and people cheered. One down, four to go. I managed to heave another three up without too much difficulty but the last one had learned well from its mother. Being afraid of me, it continued to dive under the water at every grab I made for it. I couldn’t reach it.
Finally, a local tradesman came with a dustpan on a handle and suggested we use that to fish the last one up. After four or five attempts the little duckling finally clambered into the pan and we hauled it up to the surface, me holding the dustpan and my young friend and fellow rescuer holding the duckling.

By now, others had collected all the ducklings into a cardboard box and had caught the mother duck. They were all duly transported back to the canal and released into the more duck-friendly environment. The youngster and I repaired the damage we had done as best we could, replaced the drain cover and blocked the downpipe hole with stones to prevent a repeat occurrence and replaced the cobbles. Happy with our handiwork we shook hands, told each other well done and went on our way.

I looked a mess as I walked into the restaurant where we were to have lunch. Hands dirty, my once white shirt front filthy from laying on the street and my jacket covered in dust. Luckily I know the restaurant owner, explained how I arrived in the condition that I was in and excused myself to the washroom to get cleaned up. And then we had lunch. Which was, by the way, absolutely delicious. My thanks to Charlie, our charming and understanding host.

I am sure now, that ducks in the future, sitting round their duck camp fire in the evenings, will recount this tale to their children. I shall forever be a hero amongst ducks everywhere.

Or maybe not.

I really don’t care. The thing is, five ducklings are alive and well with their mother this evening because two people couldn’t just stand by, waiting, and do nothing.

Which makes me wonder what the world could be like if everyone else couldn’t just stand by, waiting for others to come and sort the situation out and doing nothing, while everything else, other than ducklings, is going down the drain…?

The Plantation

OK, I haven’t actually planted much of anything yet, but I’m ready to do so. I just need to get through next week with its threat of frost and then, well, I’ll be planting my tobacco out. I’m looking forward to it too. I’ve been nursing my tobacco for a while now and the 40 selected plants are looking great. I have 20 Virginias and 20 Lizard Tail Orinoco. It’s hard to tell them apart. I think the Virginia will produce a broader leaf, if the seedlings are anything to go by. They are going into patch no.1, alongside my spuds. The Orinoco is going into patch no.2 beside the long haired one’s herbs. I have planted one of each tobacco variety already as a survivability test. I have some reserve plants in case of failure. In fact, I have a whole lot of reserve plants..!! Planting the seeds was a challenge to my failing eyesight and I probably have twice as many plants as I thought I had! A few of those are going to be sent off to a friend to try out in his garden. Then I’ll have something to compare with and who knows, I may be able to get him on the grow it yourself bandwagon too. The more, the merrier.

I’ve marked out my rows and prepared the soil as best I can. I’ve dug deep, loosened the soil after a few weeks rest and weeded out today. It’s all pretty much virgin soil apart from the lawn having grown on it for the past lord knows how many years. I have started a compost heap and that will all go back into the soil in the autumn after, hopefully, a good growing season. In fact, I’m going to dig all the left overs back into the soil ready for next year. If the tobacco experiment doesn’t work out, then a veggie garden might be as much fun to try anyway.

I thought hard about the price involved in all of this, the effort and the cost of potting materials, tools and other stuff needed just to get going. It hasn’t been exorbitant or extremely expensive. The work involved is initially hard, but one the ground is broken, it isn’t too bad.
The best incentive is to imagine the tax collector not getting anything out of me for my tobacco as I fill my pipe with my home grown weed later on. The greedy sod just taxed himself out of my pocket. I don’t mind paying a fair price for anything but once the taxation got too high to be called “fair”, I decided to cut him off. So screw him and the state that employed him. Using taxation to control the behaviour of the people is not a thing that I support in any way, shape or form.

OK, I’m down off my soapbox again. Sorry.

Here’s a few pictures of my efforts so far. The top 40 plants (in individual pots), my reserve plants (still in the seed tray), and the patches. Lookin’ good, eh?

It’s gonna be a long week waiting for that frost to disappear.

   

 

Down and Dirty

I’ve never been much of a gardener. My father was. He couldn’t bear to see a patch of earth with nothing growing in it. He had to dig it up and plant something. It always grew. He loved his garden. Me? Not so much. However, now I’ve got the idea into my head that I can grow tobacco and screw the tax man, well, I have to go out and dig. I swear I could hear the old man laughing at me as I toiled with it.

Our garden hasn’t really been touched since we moved in around eleven years ago. OK, I’ve trimmed the hedges and mown the bloody lawn (I hate mowing the lawn) but apart from that, nothing much as happened in the earth department. Today, all that changed. I haven’t dug into the soil since I dug fire trenches and foxholes in the army about thirty years ago, so to say I am unaccustomed to this physical effort is a bit of an understatement. Remembering how my father marked out his patch, I drove four stakes into the lawn to give me a border to work to and started swinging my trusty spade. The first bit was hard. Hedge roots and tree roots, bramble and old rhubarb roots all had to go. I found artichokes too. My wife planted them years ago and they produce tubers every year. Add to that the grass, ivy and cooch grass and you can imagine how much time I spent removing the rubbish as opposed to actually digging. The patch is about 4 x 4 meters, the first of 2 that I intend to cultivate. It will provide the room I need for my Virginia tobacco and a few potatoes. Patch number two, when I get round to it, will be a little smaller but doubtless less difficult to get through as it’s only covered by the lawn now. I dug like a demon. I sweated oil. I cursed, puffed and panted and just as I hit my second wind at the half way point, it started to rain. I had to abandon the project temporarily and seek shelter from the downpour. An hour later and the rain had stopped. Determined to get the job done, I returned to the patch and grabbed my spade and started again. The rain had not helped. The soil was heavier and sticky and the going was tougher than before. Undaunted, I continued and, after an hour or so again, I was finished. Luckily, so was the digging. 16 square meters of newly dug black loam laid out before me. It actually smells good.
Really earthy and strangely fresh. And full of worms. I seem to remember that worms are good. The dogs had been keeping a close eye on my labours and, even though they do not understand what is going on, they respected my shouting “Get off my bloody garden”, which is something I also learned from my father many years ago.

To ensure they respect the newly tilled soil, I erected a temporary fence in Dachshund defensive height. That will have to do until I can get some woven willow fence to enclose the patch. The plan now, is to let the elements break it down a little before I actually get round to planting anything. My tobacco seedlings are doing well but it is far too early to consider putting them out yet. They need to be potted now and placed in the mini greenhouse, which I also had to build, to harden and reach a size fit for planting out. I suppose I could get my spuds down though. I’ll have to make a decision regarding that soon.

Right now, I ache all over and have pain in places I didn’t know I had. The visual satisfaction is enough to compensate though. The effort was well worth the result and I‘ll be back out there sometime later in the week to start patch number two.

One small notice of belated appreciation has to be placed here. I have done less than one tenth of what my father did, every year, in the garden today. He fed a family of seven from his garden and allotment. My mother rarely had to buy vegetables. Feeling as I do now, I have nothing but respect for that monumental effort he put into the soil. I hope he can see me now, wherever he may be, and is content with my poor accomplishment.

Racking ‘em Up

My dearest lady decided the old music system was over the hill. A new one was required. Unilaterally, she shot off into town and used a huge amount of money on a wall mounted CD player. Naturally, I had to put the thing on the wall but, luckily, I am well enough equipped to do such things with a minimum of fuss, foul language and loss of blood despite having to resort to power tools to get the job done. Two holes, two rawl plugs, two screws and one extension lead later, the thing is up, plugged in and working. Hooray. She thanked me and proceeded to dig out CD’s from the myriad of boxes we have for such things. Yay. We have music in the house again. For me, that would have been enough.
Not so for the dear one. “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a rack for these CD’s?” she asked. Innocent enough a question, I thought. “Yes”, I said. “Good. I’ve seen them in the Ikea catalogue…”

Today I was sent off to Ikea. About 15 miles away. The drive was OK. Sunshine and light traffic, radio on and no rush. My mood changed when I saw the overfull car park. Parking took me a quarter of an hour. Finally, parked as far from the entrance as I possibly could be, I went shopping. I hate shopping. Well, maybe not the shopping bit, but all the idiots one has to fight with just to make headway through the way too small aisles and dodge round the far too many shopping carts that no-one seems to be attending but that are strategically parked in the aisles. The fat people who take up far too much space and can hardly walk, let alone get past the gawping masses that don’t really know what they are looking for and, therefore, have to stop every two steps along the way. The multi-ethnic families of twenty four people in varying sizes of tentage that all have to stop and admire plastic crap disguised as furniture while their children play a game of shouting, screaming and getting in the way.
I eventually found the department I needed to visit. I even found the CD thingy to put CD’s into. Borrowing a computer placed there for customer usage, I identified my CD rack’s stock number and even found out where I could collect it. Of course, the warehouse section of the whole affair was as far away from where I was presently standing as possible, so I had to fight my way back through the madding crowd and go two stories down just to get close to what I needed. After about a half hour and a forced detour through parts of the shop that had no interest for me at all but is apparently vital that I see, I reached the warehouse section. I found a guy to help me. He helped me get two of the rack things out of the section and loaded the two meter long boxes on to my shoulders. All the shopping carts were still filling aisles in other departments, so there wasn’t one for me. Total weight, 21 kilograms, total length, about two meters. I then started the long forced march to the check-out area trying not to kill people with the load as I swung round the corners.
The wait to pay and get out was ridiculous. It took twenty minutes standing in the check out queue before that particular ordeal was over.

Outside and in the fresh air again I comforted myself with the fact that I could now simply load the car and drive home. Until… I realised the guy in the warehouse had given me the wrong coloured racks. My wife specifically said black, and so had I. These buggers were.. WHITE. My life hung in the balance. Do I return these or just go home and plead ignorance?

I returned to the store. Returns department. I went to the counter with my 20 kilogram load on my shoulder. “Take a number”, said the assistant. He didn’t assist me at all, so why do we call them that? I took a number. Another twenty minute wait and it was my turn. Returning the racks was no problem. The guy gave me a card credited with the money I had paid and told me I could go get my goods and pay with the card at the checkout.
Back to the bloody warehouse then. I found what I needed, this time unassisted by the jerk that set me wrong last time and loaded my shoulder again. Back to the check-out queue then, but the difference this time was that I didn’t really care if anyone got whacked in the ear by the exceptionally long and heavy load on my aching shoulder. Another wait, this time thirty seething minutes. OK, the card bit worked. Hallelujah.

Finally, after about one and three quarter hours, I loaded my car and sat myself in the driving seat and lit a cigarette. Now I know why they call it Holy Smoke. I made a solemn vow never to return to Ikea on a weekend again. Ever.

At least the drive home was pleasant.

The racks? Oh, that was easy. I assembled them and filled them up in no time..

Right now, I’m shagged out.

My wife, on the other hand, is both impressed and grateful. Little does she know!

Seeds of Revolt

I make no secret of my affection for the briar and baccy. I am a smoker, I enjoy it and I enjoy my pipes every day. For me, the thought of giving it up would be akin to stopping breathing. There are those out there in the great big world that would deny me this simple pleasure and if I am to believe their incessant lies, I should have been dead twenty odd years ago as tobacco is killing thousands of people at a distance of some miles due to so-called second hand smoke. Wierdly, I’ve been sucking first-hand, directly injected smoke for donkeys and amazingly, I still wake up in the mornings. Maybe the second hand, used variety is deadlier. As a smoker, I wouldn’t know. I’m not new-religious. And frankly, my dears, I don’t give a damn.

What really gets my craw up, is the obscene taxation that our oh-so new religious, anti-everything-enjoyable government is forcing upon me in order to “regulate” my behaviour. I’ve had enough. The time has come to revolt. To deny them their pornographically high extraction of my hard earned cash. I hereby declare my independence of their tobacco taxes. Or at least, the beginnings of that revolt.

I have a garden. Little but doubtless productive, I have decided to dig in the earth and prepare it for war. Not by digging trenches. Oh no. I’m planting tobacco. I’m gonna grow my own. Tax-free and legal. And no-one’s gonna stop me.

I’ve sent off for seeds, been to the gardening centre and bought all the necessary paraphernalia to get my seeds going and now I am waiting for the ground to thaw. While I’m waiting, I can get my seeds sprouting and will have time to prepare for the coming agricultural adventure. Obviously, all the hard work starts when I can get digging but until then, I have a lot to learn. My father was the gardener. Not me. So the learning curve will be long and steep. I then have to learn about drying, curing and storage of the expected harvest. One can’t really just pick a leaf, cut it up and smoke it. There are many processes involved after the growing is done before one actually gets to enjoy the weed.

There are places I can go to read all the information necessary. I have joined an internet forum to help me get started. I am not alone with this. I am making contact with other home-growers and a few professionals. I won’t say success is guaranteed, but it is achievable.

The first blow has been struck. I have planted my seeds today and await their germination in about five to ten days time. Six weeks from now and they will be transplantable and will probably go into pots for a hardening period. By then, the weather should have improved enough to start serious planting.

I’ll be back on this topic later. Wish me luck.

People that Ride Bikes…

…are bloody stupid.

I come to this conclusion after hours of careful observation. For instance, the roads lately have been covered with snow and ice. It’s hard enough to just stay upright on your own two feet so how the hell do they suppose that balancing on two rather thin rubber tubes on a mechanical device while maintaining a forward motion is going to be any easier, or quicker, as a form of locomotion? Apparently, they believe that the laws of gravity and friction (or the lack of the latter) don’t apply to them. Equally, they don’t seem to appreciate that a car on ice cannot easily brake and that, therefore, it is extremely dangerous to take a sudden and violent swing out into the road in front of one of the said cars. Or dirty great big lorries…

Red lights also do not apply to cyclists. I don’t know why. Perhaps one will explain it to me one day, if they survive the winter, that is. This is equally as dangerous as the aforementioned swing into the road but cyclists, as they all know, are immortal and undamageable. We, the motorists, will protect and preserve them. Continuing onward, oblivious to crossing traffic despite the red light, is popular amongst the two-wheeled psychopathic, egoistic, suicidal, bloody stupid cyclists.

Another form of light is also unknown to the greater majority of these eejits. A white one at the front of the machine, and a red one at the back. They aren’t even expensive, but they are apparently very hard to find and affix to said machine. Or maybe this is just further proof of stupidity. But hey, all we motorists have infrared vision, so no worries, eh? We can easily see them in the dark. Even when they wear black. 
Cyclists are also dyslexic or illiterate or irreverent. One of the first lines in the Bible is “Let there be light”.

I can’t help wondering what they are thinking as I sit in my car, heater on ten, comfortable, warm and dry and trying to steer my way through slithering traffic, while they are out there, in the cold and snow, open to the blizzard that is upon us and freezing to death as they attempt to propel the iron horse forward through the ten centimeter deep snow covering the ice below. This can only be a sign of stupidity. I can only assume that the slow freezing of their otherwise atrophied brains is also depriving them of the ability to see the absurdity of their own situation.
Or how about the summer months? I sit in my car, comfortable, air conditioning on, cool and relaxed, while they are out there again, under the broiling sun, sweating like pigs, working like dogs and still attempting to propel the iron horse forward risking heart attack and dehydration.

I know why they don’t have a car. They are too bloody stupid to pass the driving test. Clearly, they have no knowledge of the rules of the road. Not only that, they are probably too bloody stupid to have taken any education or training and therefore haven’t got a good job, so they can’t afford a car. This is probably a good thing for all us motorists. And dogs, cats and small children or anything else that has the misfortune to cross the road in front of them. Think what would happen if we allowed these morons to command and control a one and a  quarter ton of motorised vehicle. The death toll would rise appreciably.

I wouldn’t mind it all so much, but why do they have to dress as if they are in the Tour de France, in the middle of winter, while riding on a converted garden gate on wheels? Stupid? Well, they certainly look it. Denmark is as flat as a pancake, so why do several of them have a shirt with red spots? Who do they think they’re kidding? There are no bloody mountains here. I even saw a yellow jersey the other day. He was the first one to cross the red light.. Must have been his sunglasses that hindered him in seeing it. It wasn’t Lance Armstrong, even if the bloody stupid and apparently schizophrenic cyclist is convinced that he is that very persona while he is on his beloved velocipede .

But worst of all, is the bloody stupid cyclist with a child, strapped to the machine, sitting behind the bloody stupid cyclist. They are having a hard enough time of keeping the damn iron horse upright with only themselves to worry about as cargo. If the machine slips and tips in the snow and ice, they can save themselves by simply hopping off the mechanical deathtrap. The little kid on the back, strapped securely into the plastic and often padded seat, can’t. Which means a long fall at some speed for the helpless little kid with no chance of escape or rescue.
Which is why we now have kids going round with post bicycle traumatic stress disorder, ensuring the next generation of mentally disturbed youngsters who will doubtless continue to scribble incomprehensible graffiti on everything due to the brain damage they suffered in the fall and steal cars to get around in at the age of fourteen, due to that trauma, instead of riding a bike. Eventually, they too will ride a bike, because of the sentence, dished out by the courts, banning them from driving a car for life due to repeated car theft.

And thus, Ladies and Gentlemen, fellow motorists, be aware and afraid. With the next generation of bloody stupid cyclists on the horizon… the cycle continues.

If you’ll pardon the pun.