Saturday night fever

May distance: 267 km

Sembawang, 52 km. I'm so sick and tired, I sleep more than ten hours before I awake. I want to rest more to recover fully from my cold and intend to train tomorrow, but a loud party tonight puts paid to that. And so I cycle.

Again, what was meant to be a shorter ride ends up 2.5 hours long, including several rounds of an old road where I keep my eyes peeled for wild pigs darting across the road. Well, none tonight but on the big roads, a big bus buzzes me.

Fear of fur

Mandai 51 km. Thunder rumbles in the distance. I cycle in search of grass and clear skies. In a park, I cycle on a slope so steep, my pedal hits the side as I cycle along the contour.

Along the road, I see that it has rained. It is misty. Rays from the setting sun filter through the trees. It is red. It is beautiful.

But pain and suffering is nearby. I have close calls with pedestrians crossing the road without looking, a motorcyclist who bullies me the way drivers bully him, and close call with a car and a bus.

Coming closer than people are dogs. As I turn into the road where they used to hangout, I hope they are gone. I peer under the parked lorries and in the distance. Even black rubbish bags could be dogs. Suddenly, I see them. I turn back. As I pass a parked lorry, a furry face peeks out. The chase begins. I speed to safety.

Three hour's of training, longer than I'd intended.

The F word

Caldecott, 34 km. Yesterday, I dismantled my headset to remove the creak. Though it is stainless steel sealed bearing, somehow rust formed on the aluminium part of the system. Without a bicycle stand, it is hard to hold everything together, balance the bicycle and clean all at once. It's a sunny day but I do this instead of cycling as I wish to recover from my cold.

Today, it rains, so I wait till it stops. To avoid mud and mess (and muck in my headset), I stick to the road. There are 15 traffic lights on this route. Two drivers and a pedestrian come close to giving me grief. But I do not end up like the crushed mango I cycled past.

Mango that fell from a tree near a place full of long-dead people. There are more uncrushed mangoes on the road, for the picking, but I ride on by.

My knee hurts, so I ease off a bit from my Fartlek. When time is short, make the most of it. When the pain goes away, I put more back into the training. Back home, I prod myself. Tender tendon, not a meniscus mess. All I need to do is tend to my thigh. Whew.

Unexpected

Kranji, 51 km. My knee hurts when I go up and down stairs, and I feel a cold coming on. So, I will be
an easy rider today. I'll just do a short, scenic ride then head home. Yeah, right.

Instead of pedalling a piddling 40 km, I end up cycling over 50, including over grass. Just what I need to train for my race. And the views are nice too.

I didn't expect today to be even tougher than the past weeks; all that hard riding after a hiatus since Dec has taken its toll. But I made it back.

Similarly, I was hit by the unexpected at work. After six months, I seem to be making it back too.

Something is better than nothing

Caldecott, 39 km. By the time I'm on the road, it is almost dusk. It's dark but not just became it's late. Black clouds hover overhead. I look where it is light and head there.

When I get there, I realise the clouds are in a pincer movement: over where I start and where I head. Ah well, I train anyway. A nice loop, several km long, with no traffic lights at all.

Though I don't have much time to train, I put what I have into it, keeping my heart rate up. I keep my tyre pressure low for more rolling resistance. And it doesn't rain. Nice.

Loop de loop

Caldecott, 40 km. Traffic averse, I look for a more efficient way to train, one with less time and less traffic. So I go around in circles, with one loop six km long. As I head up one of the steepest hills in the country, someone shouts "100%!" then goes "oh!" A car comes up, I squeeze my brake, my rear tyre skids.

I go downhill safely. Nice, going round in circles can clock some distance.

Something of everything

Apr distance: 114 km

Caldecott, 31 km. Because of stress, I want to play. Because I want so much, it leads to stress. To finish a book, to train for a race (but look at the grey sky), and win a computer strategy game.  And to rest. How much of this matters?

Things turn out well. The sky is dark and rumbles but does not rain. I read some, ride some, play some. In moderation: something of everything but not all of everything.

Still missing

19 Apr Bukit Brown 25 km. The missing piece of plastic from my shaken-apart tail light remains missing. Is it somewhere in the cemetary? Did it get washed away in the rain? In any case, it's gone.

Just a missing piece of plastic, but it's ruined the entire light. There are many lights to be had, but that one was different. It was a gift. Just like there are billions of people in the world, but ...

This route I'm on is half the distance of my Woodlands route. But it takes more than half the time. It's got off-road and at least a dozen slopes. One of which is neck-breakingly steep.

Missing

File photo

Bukit Brown,  22 km. I'm tired and I hear distant thunder. I drag myself out to cycle. The moment I'm on the road, I feel good. I travel back to where I was last week and I find what I seek: the missing cover from my tail light, which was shaken apart. How that happened, I don't know.

Back home, I fit the missing piece back but realise that another piece is missing.

I thought it was so easy to find the missing piece. Too easy.

When something is broken, it's hard to put everything back together. When you miss someone, it's hard too. To move on when the person is gone, especially when gone for good from this world, forgive yourself.

Small wonder

Bukit Brown, 36 km. I'm so bored today, I cycle in the mid afternoon sun - not literally of course, I
mean I ride under the sun. I have several options: go north? east? In the end, I head south, the way things seem to have gone.

What a journey. From roads with traffic whizzing past (this is Sunday, in the suburbs, but the traffic volume exceeds peak hour traffic in Auckland or Adelaide), to a trail with no one in sight, to a busy cemetery (busy with live people, I mean). And grassland, where I can train for my race.

Yes, living on a small island sucks, but it's so compact, there's variety to be had in a short ride.