Monday, March 09, 2009

Bike hippy misses bike

Hi, readers... those of you who are still around anyway. If you're still coming back and checking for new posts every so often, thanks for sticking around. If you're still coming back and checking every day, you're insane and need new hobbies.

I've not exactly lived up to the "bike hippy" label lately. I've been out for some nice day rides close to home (Dorset and Somerset), many in combination with geocaching, but for the last few months I've been peddling the feeble excuse of being far too busy working.

It's not like I've got a real job. Touring made me very much allergic to permanent work, however travelling and life in general take their financial toll and after almost three years of the both of us being unemployed / running our own not-yet-profitable business, it was decided that somebody had better go out and earn some proper money. I think I did pretty well out of it to start with the basic requirement of getting any old contract to top up the bank account (after all it's only for a few months) and end up on a ridiculously cool project developing a brand new website for the BBC. I'm just over half way through a six month contract and having an awesome time.

I'm living part time in London at the moment. I only get home every two weeks or so and whenever I do it always seems like there are hundreds of things to do, the bike rides never seem to happen and it makes me sad. However, working in London was a good opportunity to get the poor neglected little orange brompton out so I'm still getting something of a cycling fix in the form of a 5 miles each way commute, but up and down the A40 is not very adventurous and I miss riding through winding lanes, between green fields, up and down mountains, across continents... see? Daydreaming again.

If you use twitter, you can follow bikehippy. I'm hoping that even if I can't come up with full blog posts all the time I might be able to manage 140 characters every now and then.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

now-don't be offended and apologies for my ignorance, but do you mean to tell me you do all these travels on a brompton?! Love the blog and it makes me want to go out and bike til my legs ache(even more than usual), but have to disagree with the scottish thing-"only the smoked fish"? Did you not try the haggis?
pedal_pushin_red..

Hel said...

Nooo... I love the brompton but don't tour with it. I ride a Dawes galaxy for touring. I didn't try the haggis... not my sort of thing and I was quite glad not to have encountered any :)

Unknown said...

ach! ye dinnae ken what yer missin :)and yeah, i never rode a brompton, but should've realised that it wasn't the ideal tourer..d'oh! great blog and amazing pics too(flickr)
thanks for the info/inspiration :)

Anonymous said...

Hel, you will always amaze me, you're a brilliant sort! This makes me want to come visit you in London to keep you company but unfortunately, finances are tight at the moment. Someday we will come, family and all! I want you to meet the man that runs my life these days (not the husband, as if you needed clarification).

Anyway, sorry to hear that you're not getting out on the bike much these days. I'm actually looking at getting back on mine after years and years of neglect. Having a little one makes you want to do more outdoors. Go figure. ;)