Wie spät ist es?

Firstly, happy birthday to Jim and Joan!

I'm at Kuala Lumpur International Airport and it's sometime after 2:30am, Sydney time, which answers the question that I posed in my best Austrian just now. So far it has been a fun flight with much entertainment. After watching Skeleton Key (ordinary, but the end was at least different), the end of The Island (seen it already), and 40 Year-Old Virgin (strangely amusing), I decided to play chess against the inflight entertainment.

I started off on the "easy" level, and thrashed the computer. So I moved to "medium" and also thrashed the computer, although the computer took longer to think about it. With great trepidation, I tried the "hard" level, and noticed that it took much longer to think about its moves. But it can't have been thinking very hard, because after four moves it had lost its queen in exchange for my pawn. After that, I ended up with a fairly hefty advantage, taking all of its pieces save for one rook, one bishop, four pawns and the king, with the loss of a couple of pawns and a knight at my end. The end was nigh, and after putting it into "check" for the nth time, the computer decided that it had enough and froze, denying me the chance to seal a glorious victory.

So much for the inflight entertainment. Deep Blue it ain't. Deep Brown, maybe. I hope I didn't take too much CPU power away from the onboard navigation.

The other thing of interest that happened was a woman two rows in front chundered all over the seat, and the flight steward said: "That's the second time today." I'm glad I didn't have the chicken.

Dinner at Angelo's

So this week, being my last in Sydney, me, maaa and dad decided to go out to Angelo's restauraaaaa, which is located at the edge of the water in Cabarita Bay, or Cape Cabarita, as it is called. The architecture around that area resembles the Sydney equivalent of Cape Cod. It lacks verisimilitude, but there are worse places you could live. Angelo's is a rather nice spot, and it's not crowded with tables, so we could enjoy a post-Valentine's Day dinner (Feb. 15 for the unbelievers) in peace and quiet.

Of interest was the seafood platter, which served two and cost $120. We watched several other couples getting stuck into them, and most of them struggled by the time they reached the chip mountain underneath the prawns. Some couples were straight out of Gormenghast, others were out of Monty Python's Meaning of Life. The waiter was nice and took our photo. We had a noice dinner and view, and several bottles of wine.
Me, ma, pa at Angelo's
© The waiter at Angelo's

Party at Brent's

One of my former riding colleagues, Brent McParland, turned 40 on Saturday, so he had a partay at the Bundeena Bowls Club, which went off. Brent is working in the pharmacology department at Sinney Yooney, and is now the father of two kiddies, Finn and Mathilda, to his long-suffering-time partner Kristin. It was tops to see them all again, and I indulged in a veggie burger and some bits of cake, along with a discussion about Sydney's water supply.
Brent and Kristin at his 40th
© Jeff Jones
Brent and Finn and large veggie burgers
© Jeff Jones

Heffa

The last race at Heffron was nothing out of the ordinary, in that once again, we didn't catch C grade, despite averaging 44 km/h. We didn't have any real drivers there on Tuesday, and although I felt good enough to do turns for most of it (finally), we needed a Chris Sutton or a Stuart Dangerfield or a Fleming Bros to go that extra 5 seconds quicker per lap. Oh well, I didn't fall off, so that was a plus.
Last race at Heffa
© Stuart Baker
The Giant, which I've now given back, was good, except I would have preferred the bottom bracket to be a little higher off the ground. 267mm is not quite high enough to pedal around the corners, so I scraped a few times. But its 7.1kg weight helped me to get up Garie in 10'00 and Audley in 4'30, which are pretty decent times in my book.

I actually saw a bike identical to mine in the ride on Saturday morning, which I mistakenly thought was Coluzzi when I hopped on it at 6:30 on South Dowling St.. Turns out it wasn't, but we expected to be caught. We weren't by Waterfall, so I went back through the Park, only going hard up the aforementioned hills. Then I waited five minutes at the top of Audley, but only saw the guys who I'd turned off at Waterfall with. Maybe the Coluzzi bunch vanished into the Royal National Park Bermuda Triangle^TM. One of these years, I might actually do it.

Segue

I can't wait to get to Gent. Reinhard tells me it's been as hot as 6 degrees and raining, or -2 to 2 when it's dry. But first I have to get to...ahhhh Vienna. It's now 3:20am.

Epilogue

I'm now in Vienna airport, with four and a half hours to kill until my final connection to Brussels. I think it might kill me first, as breathing in stale smoke at 6:00am, Vienna time, is not exactly my cup of tea. I moved downstairs to get away from it, but it's worse because now there's burned kerosine smell mixed in with the smoke. Vienna airport is for laying down and avoiding.
Ahh, Vienna airport
© Jeff Jones

My two travelling companions were amusing though. There was one older woman from Riga who had been visiting her son in Sydney for three months. He's got a nice looking flat in Redfern, according to the photos. Dunno where that could be though. Maybe Redfern Chase.

The other was a slightly mad German girl from Munich (where do these stereotypes come from?), who had been in Perth for 10 months. Maybe that's what cracked her. Seriously, I thought I was mad in the clothes department, but no, I clearly have some vestiges of sanity left. As it was 39 degrees when she left Perth, she was wearing shorts, fully aware of how cold it would be when she got out at the other end: "I have an extra t-shirt on," she said confidently. I had to put on my brand new Etxeondo winter training jacket because it was so damn cold in the fliegzug. I hope she didn't miss her connection.

Better get back to reading Brideshead Revisited and breathing in fumes. Oh yeah, I beat Deep Brown properly on the flight from KL to Vienna, while I wasn't sleeping.

Coma

I made it to Belgium and it's cold and grey. Apparently, it's on track to be the gloomiest February on record. I'm safely ensconced in Reinhard's flat.

T minus one week

Again, don't ask me to explain. Suffice to say that I'll be in Sunny Belgium on the 21st of Feb. I think I'll wait a week before riding though. When I got there last year, I was doing 700km per week in whatever weather there was, and I don't reckon I got fitter any quicker. At least now I have a reasonable level of condition from racing at Heffron twice per week and not falling off. The latter is quite important.

Two more second places on Saturdays, both in similar circumstances. Last week, we had our monthly handicap race, and five of us (me, Pete McDonald, Robbie Cater, Spurge, and John Kenny), averaged 43 km/h and mopped up B and C grade with about 4 laps to go. Alas, I punctured on the top corner at this point, but took a lap out and borrowed a wheel so I could jump in with 3 to go. One lap later, and I would have had to chase.

At this point in the proceedings, Pete McDonald had placed his winning attack up the back straight, and as I was forced to rejoin at the rear of the peloton, I had no chance of following him. The puncture did work a little in my favour though, as I could move up to the front and attack with 1.5 laps to go. I closed some of the gap to Pete, but there was no way I could get back the last 10-15 seconds. However, holding off the rest of the bunch was worth a nice $120, so I took that happily.

Last Tuesday wasn't as good, as for some reason there was an FRF implosion after we'd caught C grade the first time, and half of A grade was left behind. I was in the back half, having done a turn in front at a bad time. Or more accurately, not hopping back into the train at halfway, which I should have done. Liam Kelly was also in our group, as well as Troy Glennan, Robbie Cater, Joe McDonnell, Matt Fleming, Tim Willing and a few more. Tim managed to get across on his own, but Liam decided that he'd attack up the back and then take a shortcut to rejoin the front bit of A grade, then started doing turns with them. We weren't impressed, and Troy let him have several serves, both during and after the race. Admittedly, I did the same thing the previous week, but didn't take any further part in the race and just sat on the back.

In the end, the fast bit of A tacked onto the back of C in the last lap, but couldn't get around them.

Yesterday was, as I said, rather similar to the previous Saturday. Except this time, Pete attacked after just 4 laps (ok, so I went on lap 1...) and four of us were left chasing him. The four became two when Liam Kelly lifted the pace with me on his wheel. He kept telling me to accelerate when I came through, but this was rather hard as I was already on my limit when following his wheel. If he'd left me out there for short turns, then we might have closed to Pete. As it was, we got within 5 seconds. But I wasn't strong enough to keep that momentum going.

We caught B grade and Liam gave up. I didn't want to sit on B grade for too long, and told Liam, but he could be bothered coming with me, so I ended up with second. Pete was slowing down towards the end, even after having lapped three of the original starters, and he didn't get much further ahead. But he still had a fair chunk of the length of the straight, so it was enough. $90 this time.

Saturday racing at Heffron has been very lucrative.

Two films

I finally saw Harry Potter 4 with mum, and it was good, I reckon. It's one of my favourite books in the series, and the movie wasn't too stale. The acting was generally good, even though Emma Watson (Hermione) tends to overdo it a bit. It probably befits her character though. And it was suitably dark at the finish.

The other film was Overcoming, about Bjarne Riis and CSC team, which I saw on Thursday as part of Martin Renwick's new women's team's non-official launch. Very intense, but there were some good moments with the riders like Sastre, Voigt, Basso and Bartoli. I preferred Hell on Wheels - that was beautifully done.

More, anon.

Two things

One, we broke the Heffron record on Tuesday. 15 laps in 39'55 (and then we got an extra lap for good measure). That's 45.5 km/h, and is bloody quick for Heffron. Quickest I can remember doing before that was 40'20 in 1995.

There were no particular stars there, except for Chris Sutton. We just had 15 "regulars" and pretty much ideal conditions: a light southerly, humid, and 25 degrees. It had also been some time since we caught B and C grade on a Tuesday, so there was motivation. Easts have been trying to win the series from C grade with their designated GC rider Aaron Richardson, but really...

First lap: 2'49, two laps: 5'27, three laps: 8'04, then we sat on a consistent 2'37 / lap until we picked up B grade with about four to go and C with 3 to go. We slowed down when we caught the two grades, but still did the 15 laps in under 40 minutes. Then we were given an extra lap, but it didn't really matter. Stuart Dangerfield won it with a last lap attack.

I was liking my Conti GP4000s, and had no problems on the corners until about the 9th lap when I suddenly felt like I had a puncture. It was weird, and I pulled off the back, only to discover I didn't have one. Grr. Was doing OK before that. I chased but the pace was still on, so I ended up taking a short lap to rejoin, but of course was out of contention. Oh well.

The second thing is a recipe for Jeff's Lucky Jade Heavenly Chicken, as I have re-christened it. It was inspired by Ma, who told me what to do, and I have now shamelessly appropriated it.

To save duplication, I won't bother with a list of ingredients. First, chop up onions, garlic, ginger, shallots, and maybe a chilli if you want. Also slice some capsicum, zucchini, carrot, snow peas, baby corn, whatever. Better still, get mum to do all this.

Chop up your chicken breasts into chunks. Then stick 'em in a plastic bag with some flour and five spice powder. Shake it all around, stir fry it with the onions/garlic/ginger/shallots, then stick it in a metal bowl somewhere. Preferably out of sight.

Stir fry the rest of the veggies and at the end, bung in some soy sauce and hoi-sin sauce. This is what gives the dish its unique flavour. I call it Excellent Soy/Hoi-Sin flavour. Re-add the chicken and stuff, which is probably stone cold by now, so you'd better not turn off the gas. Sprinkle a bit of sesame oil over the top and serve with a dish of delicious noodle.

Orstraya Day

My fellow Australians... Oh wait, that's probably not the best way to start. It's Jan. 26 today, approx. 218 years after the poms dumped a whole lot of convicts in the environs of Sydney harbour. If they'd actually dumped them in the harbour, then Sydney might be a better place. Then again, maybe not.

I've just finished racing in "The Sunde" (the Joseph Sunde Memorial) at Heffron Park, in near perfect conditions. Negligible wind, 25 degrees, overcast and humid. Thus, a 44 km/h average didn't even seem that fast, especially as I did only one turn during the 50 km race. It was easy to sit on, but tricky to move up, as when there was space to do so, the speed would pick up. No matter, the object was to stay on the bike, and that goal was achieved. I was a little nervous after last year's pedal / corner incident.

The winner was Jeff Hopkins, of Jittery Joe's, who is the only rider to have won it twice. Chris Sutton turned up in his Cofidis kit but was a little off after flying back from France after a couple of days ago. I think he ended sixth.

The aim now is to go to Manly, where Willo (Hopkins' teammate) is having some quiet drinks at the Wharf Bar. Then to Balmain for a dinner with Sullo and friends.

The TDU ended on a positive note, with Gerrrrrrrroo winning from last year's winner Luis Sanchez, after some superb team riding on the second last stage. There was a break of 20 with two of Gerro's teammates in it, and two of Sanchez'. On the deciding climb, Sanchez attacked and put 10 seconds into Gerro, who was a bit isolated until first one, then the second of his teammates dropped out of the break and towed him back to Sanchez, who it seemed didn't quite get the same benefit from his own teammates.

That day was over 40 degrees, and a few of us (AT, Les, Sullo) decided to go down to Glenelg (a palindrome) beach late for some cool. Nup. Still 37 degrees on the beach, with a hot wind blowing. It was extremely bizarre.

I ended up having 3 hours sleep then going for a ride early Sunday to "beat the heat". Well it was still 36 at 7am so it was a bit pointless. Then I punctured going up Greenhill road, changed it, punctured again over the top of the hill, and had to repair my first tube because I didn't have any more spares. Quelle annoyance. Adelaide does have some great hills though - all 7-10 km and 5-7 percent.

It cooled down in the afternoon of the last day, which made the post race BBQ somewhat bearable. I didn't drink too much because the (free) beer was once again watered down crap and the (free) wine was for laying down and avoiding.

Also raced on Tuesday at Heffron - wet and windy. There were only 10 of us and I did turns until halfway but I was a bit nervous in the wet, especially with the crap tyres on the bike (swapped 'em now to Conti GP4000s). We didn't catch C grade, despite a 43 km/h average. We really need a smaller handicap.

I return to Belgium on February 21, just in time for Het Volk.

Adelaide still life

An update from Adelaide, where it's still hot and getting hotter. 38 yesterday, 37 today, 41 predicted for tomorrow. Hence the sunscreen, pictured in the composition below. The Jacob's Creek sparkling rosé counter balances it nicely. This is not a wine for drinking, this is a wine for laying down and avoiding.

Adelaide still life
© Jeff Jones

My hotel room in the Hilton is good, as usual. Except I'm on the sofa bed and my roommate Anthony Tan scored the double bed. But his back is buggered, so I'll give him that. Love the view of the hills:

It's a good view from my hotel room
© Jeff Jones

Speaking of hills, I've been riding most mornings, apart from the first day when I suicidally went out in the heat of the day. It's quite nice when it's only 25, and I've done a few good climbs. Rode up a valley today with a cool creek running down it...very relaxing.

More, anon.

Adelaide

I'm back in sunny Adelaide again, and it's January. It's also 35 each day. Ish. Went for a ride up into the hills and didn't beat my record up Norton Summit. Not bloody surprised as it was so damn hot.

Now I am drinking Coopers after the opening stage of the Tour Down Under. I am steering clear of Jacob's Creek this year.

The end.

Quo?

As promised, some pics of Christmas and Nina's birthday party thrown in for good measure. The latter was during my weekend frenzy of BBQs, which was mixed in between a fair bit of work. It was a tough weekend.

Saturday: work, rode up to Wyong for Nina's birthday, a fun time was had by all, including Nina. Ant, dad, Pete, Nina, Astrid all had gos on my bike. Well, Nina and Astrid's dolls did. The swing collapsed, much to Lucy's chagrin. We had nice cake and whatnot. End with more work.

Sunday: Work, short ride, Dave's BBQ at chateau Langles in Marsfield. Nearly met the vendors of our flat, but they left before I was introduced. Maybe a good thing. I had to cut the BBQ short so I could get to a BBQ at our place. Cousin Jus, Nick and Zoe (I have many cousins) came over, along with Uncle Jeff, Michael (also a cousin) and Mary, plus us five. We had two huge Atlantic salmon, courtesy of Cousin Dave (bro of Cousin Jus and son of Uncle Jeff), as he works on a fish farm in Tassie. We cooked the salmon on our brand spankin' new BBQ and it was good.

Two BBQs in one day. I was hammered. More work.

On Monday we settled on our flat at last, so we officially own the thing. Well, the bank does. Woo hoo! We celebrated with a coffee at the local cafe in Wilson St, which I've been meaning to check out ever since I saw it. Then took a stroll around the block up King St to check out the amenities: Thai, Vietnamese, African, Italian, Chinese, Lebanese restaurants + various cafes all within half a km. Also cinema, hardware shop, church, bakery, funeral parlour, clothes, newsagent, train station, 7-11, and more cafes. This place has got everything, trust me.

Was gunna race on Tuesday but we had a meeting, so I couldn't :-( Next week is TDU so I may race Saturday, but otherwise maybe when I return from Adelaide. The Giant is faring well. Broke a few climbing records on it.

I can also relate to the "Cartman Joins NAMBLA" South Park episode, after I joined a site called Where Are You Now? recently. It's a "global community" site with about 3 million members, and it's a good way to meet different people if you're travelling around. So I put up my profile and I keep getting all these instant messages when I log on (unlike Cartman, fortunately not from older men). Not even spam, which I'm quite surprised at. It's pretty funny, given the amount of time that I can't spend chatting online. But it could be handy.

I'll be back in Belg on the 21st of Feb or thereabouts.

And now for the photos:

Ant, Piers and Alec discuss matters of import at Xmas
© Jeff Jones

Lucy gets crankin' on the presents
© Jeff Jones

The Christmas table...
© Jeff Jones

Cousin Nina at Christmas
© Jeff Jones

Getting stuck into it
© Jeff Jones

Failing to light the brandy
© Jeff Jones

The table at Nina's birthday in Wyong
© Jeff Jones

Cousin Nina gets ready to blow out three candles
© Jeff Jones

Cousin Nina at her birthday
© Jeff Jones

Cousin Ant on my Giant
© Jeff Jones

Cousin Nina and Cousin-in-law Nik check out my Giant
© Jeff Jones

Lucy and Pete gambol on the swing, watched by Astrid (no cousin of mine)
© Jeff Jones

The obligatory Wyong group shot on the step
© Jeff Jones

I lied about the Christmas blog

Mainly because I haven't got the digital photos developed so I can post them here. My memory is fading, but I guess a fair bit has happened in the last week and a bit. So, with a great deal of further ado, I should wish the blog reading public a Happy New Year before someone else does. They've probably done that already so I'm buggered.

I'm also buggered because it was 45 degrees here in sunny Sydney today. It was the hottest New Year's Day ever, and 2005 was the hottest December ever and I think the hottest year ever. It must be all those polluting trees...

I, er, got up too late to go for a ride, so I started the New Year with zero kilometres. We (Lucy, Pete and I) started our NYE celebrations on the rooftop of Nick Riemer's flat in Kings Cross. Nick wasn't there, but Cousin Ant was, so we didn't have to break the lock. The roof afforded a great view of the dual fireworks over the harbour, and an even better one of the party on the adjacent rooftop, which we didn't get invited to.

Not to worry, because Lucy's friend Louise had a do on at hers and Anton's place in Chippo, so we saw in the New Year then, courtesy of Channel 9, Richard Wilkins, and Steinlager, which is a Kiwi beer. That shocked me, but then I also learned that Kylie has breast cancer and that Martina Hingis was making a comeback. We ended up fairly relaxed.

We also played SingStation.

Scroll back to Friday, December 23, where we celebrated Lucy's 30th birthday at the Australian Youth Hotel, which is one of several pubs managed by her friend Karen. We were in the Nude Bar, which was full of paintings of nudes. Surprisingly, our moderately sized group was the only one there. Normally it's packed. A good night was had by all and I stuck to safe beer.

Christmas Eve was another warm one - 38 or so - so I limited myself to a two hour ride in Centennial Park without suncream. Amazingly, I didn't get burned. That can't be good for you.

Christmas was about 30, so 100 km was possible, followed by much eating and Christmas cheering and cleaning up. We had about 15 people over at our joint and they were appreciative of our new pond and garden in the shape of a fish feature. I did receive many good presents, most of which were readable, some were edible, and one was an Einstein action figure given to me by my uncle. How cool is that?!?

From Boxing Day until the 30th I went up to Nelson Bay and visited Jim and Joan, which was great as always. We only had 10 of us there, so it wasn't quite as crowded and there was less cleaning up to do. It was very humid so I limited the riding a bit, but managed Lily Pily Hill once (900m, well over 10 percent grade). Swimming too - some half decent surf at One Mile Beach enabled me to catch a few waves and generally have fun.

I was gunna go up to Bluey's Beach on the way back to see Janelle and Tom, but the way was stopped by an inkblot. Actually it was more serious than that: a four car pileup near Buledelah had traffic banked up for kilometres. I waited an hour before the police told us to go back and go round another way. But by then it was too late so I headed back to Sydney, sans aircon, on a very hot day.

That more or less brings us up to the present, which is not actually the present because I've already written this.

Movies: Good Night, and Good Luck, with George Clooney and David Strathairn. About a TV journalist speaking out against McCarthy in the 1950s. Very good, topical, and I could relate to it too. Four and a half stars, or nine, depending on how you want to measure it.

Narnia: The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. Loved the books as a kid, and this wasn't a bad movie version. It had extra humour, which was good because the kids were a bit painful at times. The white witch was a bit insipid, I thought. But seeing a snow covered landscape when it was 41 outside was nice. Three and a half stars or seven.

There's a time for beer

It's almost Christmas, and a longer bit of Christmas bilge will follow, p'raps tomorrow. Christmas means Christmas drinkypoos, and that means a bit of effort down at the pub. Within the space of five days, I saw Josh at the Metro, had our work Christmas party at SPQR and thence the Clevo, then went to the ResMed mini-Chistmas partay at the Sackville. A summary:

Stella: quite drinkable in large quantities
James Squire Amber Ale: has a strong, dark taste and is good to kick you off on the road to ruin
Little Creatures: also has a strong taste but I don't like it
Erdinger Weissbier: comes in a huge glass and was flat when I drank it. I asked for a bottle of Pilsner Urquell the next time, but only got the Weissbier. Bugger.
Asahi: Fairly drinkable mild Japanese beer, and a good antidote to the Weissbier.
Cascade Pale Ale: Ditto, except it's Tasmanian.

That brings us up to the present.

Lucy and Pete have arrived from Londres and it's good to see them again. They are appreciating the RealSun(tm) that we get down under. As am I, because it stopped raining last week. Lucy seems to have no jetlag, which is good for her!

I'm still getting used to the Giant Advanced LE, which retails for $AUS8500 by the way. I'm not too fond of the integrated seatpost, as you can't adjust it to within 1mm, only 2.5mm. I need to file some of the spacers down because it's just a tad too high at the moment. Better than too low - I had it 0.5cm lower at Heffron last Tuesday and could barely hold on. The saddle also slipped back because the bolt wasn't lubed at all so you couldn't get it tight enough. Other than that, it's a nice bike - very nervous, climbs brilliantly, accelerates brilliantly, handles OK.

On Saturday we had the Christmas Pudding races and it was the hardest club race I've done for a while. 13 starters, but with Graeme Brown (Panaria -> Rabobank), Robbie Cater, Josh Marden (FRF), Jose Rodriguez (Clarence Street), Dave Treacy, who didn't puncture, Shaun Higgerson, Spurge, and a few more.

I felt just a tad under the weather following the work Christmas do on Friday, and the fact that it was really hot and humid didn't help me at all. So after one effort early on to bridge up to Brownie and Robbie, I had no more sprints in me. Eventually, Brownie got away with Josh, Higgo and Jose, and won the sprint with an amazing throw over Higgo. I ended up 7th, but well out of the cash and puddings.

Sunday was the Johnny Warren ride, and you can read about that towards the end of this page. Nice day on the bike!

Yesterday was the Christmas Trophy Race, and we had about 50-60 starters. It was 20 laps, and despite the quality of the field, the pace wasn't really on except in certain sections (main straight/back straight occasionally). We only averaged 42 and I avoided crashing on the tennis court corner where I crashed in the Joe Sunde earlier this year. Ironically, towards the end of the race, I got in a break with Matt Fleming (who crashed in front of me in Jan), Mr Cater and Ben Isaaksen. We got away with 3 to go and hung out there until the St George train mowed us down with 600m left and we were goooooooone. However, I preferred to do that rather than finish anonymously in the bunch this time.

Canberra redux

Miraculously, things did improve in Canberra over the weekend after Friday's rain. Not for everyone, mind you, because someone in Curtin was felled by a tree, which just goes to show how dangerous trees are.

Saturday dawned cold and windy, so I headed out to Cotter Reserve to cover the MTB race. Peter Hatton won it by a bloody long way and after waiting for the women's winner Rosemary Barnes to get in, I went back to the luxurious Saville Park Suits and filed my hard hitting race reportage. I'd decided by then that I was going to ride the 50 km handicap instead of the 70 km scratch race, and this proved to be a wise choice.

The handicap was from Old Parliament House out to Coppins Crossing, then to the top of Uriarra Crossing before turning around and coming home. Going out was into a block headwind, and our scratch bunch of nine had to catch some 145 riders in front of us. B grade ('chopping block') had a minute's start, and they'd extended that out to 1'30 by the time we left the 5 km neutral zone. We all had lead cars pacing us through there so we wouldn't go too fast, but I think we got a slow lead car...

We lost one guy after about 1 km, then another soon after. We climbed out of Coppins Crossing and lost a couple more, then Marcus Hayman decided to attack to make sure that we left them behind. I found out after that there was a bit of in-fighting between him and the other three guys in the bunch, which really helped our cooperation. We got Mr Hayman back at the top of the hill and then it was pretty much him, me, and John Forrest swapping off, with Neil Skipper coming through fairly often and Mick Payne very occasionally.

Surprisingly, we still caught 120 riders, and none of them managed to sit on when we got the speed wound up coming home. Alas, B and C grade were just out of reach, with B finishing 20 seconds ahead and C grade about a minute. Nevertheless, we still could sprint for fastest time, and I managed to pip Marcus for third place, $50 and a medal. Woo hoo!

In the scratch race that was run concurrently (via Coppins, Mt McDonald, and Uriarra), FRF-Caravello pretty much destroyed everyone and took 1-2 with Troy Glennan and Pete McDonald. I fail to see how Mr Glennan was honouring his contract with MG X-Power/Bigpond (he's signed for FRF for next season), as he wasn't even wearing their kit, but that's between him and his former team manager. Pete Hatton backed up pretty well from the MTB race to get about fourth. He's fit.

Sunday was not as easy. A 'hotdog' style criterium (two witches hat turns at each end of a 1 km road) and it was windy as buggery. It was a points score race, with 2 and 1 points for crossing the line 1st and 2nd each lap. There were also six FRF-Caravello and four Canberra guys in the bunch of 17, so you can guess what happened. I couldn't get around the corners at all well, and eventually pulled the pin with 3 laps to go after Rob McLachlan had us in the gutter for many laps. And we were the third group.

Then I paid a visit to my former piano teacher Colin Forbes and his wife Pat, who I haven't seen for eight years, probably because they live in Holt, which is a bloody long way out of Canberra. It was great to catch up with them and I have now completed the circle, because I saw the Forbes gels this year in Londres.

Drove home from Canberra fairly late and there were a lot of trucks on the road. Had nightmares of being blown off the road when I got to sleep.

Monday: Went back to work, paid the deposit on the flat (yay), got my new computer up and running.

Tuesday: Continued to get my new computer up and running. By the end of the day, it was getting there. My old computer sort of died, so it was good timing. I rolled down to Heffron for 15 laps at 45+ - nearly a minute quicker than last week. Again. But I did a few more turns this time, so that's something. We only caught C grade with 1 km to go and that means mega chaos = I don't bother sprinting, even if I could.

Wednesday: I heard that our loan has been approved, and we might even settle before Christmas. Woo hoo!

Thursday: Work. It's 40 degrees in Sydney.

Friday: Took possession of a new test bike, a Giant Advanced LE. Very carbon, very light (7.2 kg with pedals), very swish. The seatpost is part of the frame so you have to cut it off just right. I also got some new shoes to try out, so a double whammy there! Nice.

Ozzie Government rushed through 1354 pieces of fairly unpopular legislation this week. Why? Because they could. That's the problem when the senate is controlled by one party - no amount of debate helps. Democracy has been put on hold until the next election, or the one after, depending on whether we can get an Opposition.

Saturday: Set up the bike, took it for a spin at Heffron. There was big money up ($150 for first) and only six bloody starters in A grade!?! It's a bit silly, as you can now win more on a Saturday than you can on a Tuesday, which is much, much harder.

Lap 1: Pete McDonald goes off the front and we see him again.
Lap 2: Dave Treacy chases him and almost catches him when he punctures, according to the Jones/Treacy exclusion principle, which states that if either of us are at a race, then one of us will puncture. 9 times out of 10, it holds true, even in Belgium.
Laps 3-18: We drop people one by one until Dave and I are left chasing Pete, who wins by about a third of a lap. I feel OK, despite saddle being a bit high. Dave leads out into the headwind at 200m to go and I come around him very easily to get second and $90. He did 120 km of motorpacing in the morning, but I maintain that had nothing to do with it. I actually won a two man sprint.

Sunday: Work. I return to present tense writing, which is bad style. The rain returns for a bit and I get wet in Centennial Park for a couple of hours. Then I rev the Laser up to go to Bonnell's Bay, for the construction of Aunty Margaret's Water Feature. It is a great occasion, with 20 persons gathered in Margaret's house in Pelican Avenue. Apart from Margaret and I, there were: Jeff the elder, Jim and Joan, Ron, Kate, Lillian and friend Meg, Priscilla and Greg and children Rachel and Stella, Penelope and Kevin and children Alix and Michael, along with French and German exchange students, one of which was called Sabine and who liked kangaroo (or perhaps that was the other one), and Rocket the dog.

Much food is consumed, including steak, sausages, kangaroo, fish, potato salad, tuna/pasta salad, Ian Parmenter salad, fruit salad, bread, ice cream, bikkies, Christmas cake, and a Paddlepop. Collapse of stout party. There is consternation when we discover that all the water has vanished form the water feature, cause unknown. It doesn't appear to be a leak, so we fill it up and it stays full.

Robert Allenby won the golf. I am back to past tense.

Rain stops play

I'm here in the nation's glorious and unsullied capital, Canberra. If all had gone according to plan, I would have just finished a criterium in the city centre. But all did not go according to plan, as at approx. 4:30 pm, Parliament House Time, the heavens opened and our glorious capital was battered and drenched in a thunderstorm. It was still raining heavily at 6pm, so the organisers decided to call it off. Hmm. This would never happen in Belgium! Admittedly, there would have been a few crashes...

So I'm holed up in room 209 of the Saville Park Suites on Northbourne Ave, and very nice it is. Well it's better than getting wet. I'm also updating the blog because the alternative - watching "The World's Biggest Loser" or whatever it's called - sends a chill through my soul.

What I did today

Much mucking around. I planned to leave Sydney at 10am, Petersham Central Time, but things conspired against me, and it wasn't until midday, Stanmore Cycles Time, that I finally set off. Driving the (t)rusty Laser lent to me by Simone, Steve and Charlie the dog, I ended up on the M5, but decided to visit a service station in Hurstville after I heard an alarming sound when I turned on the aircon. I checked everything with the dude at the servo, and he assured me that everything was OK and the car was in tip-top condition. I drove the rest of the way with the aircon off, sweltering slightly.

I made it to Canberra at 4pm, Saville Park Suites Time, and had to make a Decision. Well, I'd come all this way so after calling the media person, I drove approx. 1 km to the start/finish of the crit, where it was raining heavily. After consulting the oracle at the race, who had examined the auspices (the BOM site), I learned that it was all orf for this evening. However, there will be a consolation criterium run on Sunday. That'll give me something to do then, before dropping in on Colin and Pat in the arvo and then heading back to Sydney.

Somewhat desolate, I found a food court in some mall in central Canberra (how I hate malls). I partook of a Dai Ho Combination Laksa, followed by a caramel slice and a caramelatte at Gloria Jean's (how I hate Gloria Jean's, but it was that or Macca's or Hungry Jack's for anything resembling dessert).

What an evening.

Here are some pics, including those of sculpture by the sea

Rain stopped play in Canberra on Friday. Wimps!
©: Jeff Jones
The fountain of youth is in Canberra, our nation's glorious capital.
©: Jeff Jones
Hugh Kimber wants to race!
©: Jeff Jones
Check out this food court in Canberra. It's great.
©: Jeff Jones
Our landscaper Mick Purdy's People's Choice winning sculpture.
©: Jeff Jones
Cool, eh? You could own this for $27,000, if it wasn't already sold.
©: Jeff Jones
The Dali-esque sculpture from Mongolia.
©: Jeff Jones
More Dali from Mongolia.
©: Jeff Jones
Sculpture by the sea. How about one of these on your patio.
©: Jeff Jones
This wave won a prize, I think.
©: Jeff Jones
Crushed aluminium cans qualify as a sculpture.
©: Jeff Jones
Look at the sculptures, Ma.
©: Jeff Jones
Bondi. I don't think this won a prize.
©: Jeff Jones

Closer

As of today, Australian time, Jones & Jones are one step closer to owning the property concern in Newtown. I managed to get the planets, bank, solicitors, and agents aligned and we exchanged the contracts. There's a five day cooling off period (requested by me) so we can bail if the premises collapse in a pool of rubble on Saturday. But I have been led to believe that it won't. So by next Monday, we should be well and truly locked in Eddie.

It's been raining just a tad recently, and my planned big training week has been scuttled by the forces of nature. It's just not as fun riding in the rain in Sydney as it is in Belgium. Too many cars. So I've been limited to about 60-70 km a day for the past few days, with no racing. The bee-sting swelling has disappeared though, and strangely I didn't have any side effects from the prednisone. It did work.

The CA Awards were a slightly more memorable occasion than last year, namely due to the fact that I stuck to beer and beer alone. I swear they watered it down though, because I'd normally expect to feel some light headedness after 11 glasses. Maybe I'm just used to the real Belgian stuff.

Steve and Simone's wedding went off on Saturday, and the heavens lifted especially for the occasion. Everything was in Steve's garden in West Pymble, and it was the most chaotic wedding ceremony I've ever seen. Things got signed so I'm sure it's legally binding. 100-odd people there, the bbq was good, and I found out from Dave that The Property is actually being sold by a friend of his! He said no-one turned up to the auction four weeks ago!! That's pretty funny. But both Dave and Steve have stayed there, and reckon that it's a goer.

Finally, I just finished reading The Corporation by Joel Bakan. It's an interesting read, examining big, publicly traded companies and their ethics. Basically, because a corporation is legally required to maximise profits for its shareholders, it is sometimes forced to act in an amoral and often illegal manner. Think clothing sweatshops, for example. But the costs of breaking the law are outweighed by the benefits in doing so, so it continues. From a normal human point of view, this is a bad thing, but the corporation is so dominant and powerful at the moment that we have little choice but to accept it, even if we did know what was going on all the time. The continuing deregulation and privatisation merely adds to a corporation's power, and that has as a consequence a more inhuman society and a more selfish population, which I reckon is a bad thing.

The book details many examples, and Bakan reiterates his point several times per chapter. It's a little belaboured, the back and forth switching between two sides of the argument is confusing at times, and the logical conclusions predicted are often unrealistic, but overall it's still a good read, informative, and not written by a radical. At the end, Bakan proposes a whole lotta solutions, with the main one being that governments have to reclaim their power to regulate corporations, because now with all the money being poured into government coffers by the corporations, democracy is thrown out the window. Donations to political parties at election time are a good example.

I am kind of glad that I work for a privately owned (and ethical) company.

Property tycoons

So Lucy and I are about to become property tycoons, after I made an offer on this place in Wilson St, Newtown. No, we won't get it that cheap, but I reckon it was a damn good price because it's in one of the desirable inner city spots in Sydney, and it's also quite a nice 2 bedroom unit. Speaking of desirable places, there's always this one. You probably have to be Sydneysider to get this - a tunnel subsided a few weeks ago and this flat was practically on top of it!

Back to the tycoons. The offer was accepted on Wednesday, so the next step is to exchange contracts and pay a deposit. I have left the matter in the hands of my solicitors, Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel. Sorry, I always think of the Marx Bros (and Dickens, for that matter) when legal stuff involving property is concerned.

Once the deposit is paid, there's a 42 day settlement period, then we've got to cough up the rest of the cash. No worries. There's a tenant in there at the moment too, and he can stay until one of us (likely me) moves in there later next year. Get someone else to buy your property for you, that's the ticket. Our country's negative gearing laws help in that regard.

So far, it's taken about 3 weeks from when I started physically looking for places, helped by Lucy's able assistance from afar and Domain.com.au. It's not as hard as I thought it would be, but I wish I'd listened to sagely advice and applied for the loan very early in the piece.

Raced at Sutho last Friday and managed to break even by winning the first prime. It's a matter of attacking just at the time when you think they are going to blow the whistle. Maybe I'm psychic. Actually, I'm probably not, because I chose the wrong side to sprint from in the finale - the surge came on the right and I was on the left. 8th. And a free PowerBar, so I finished ahead for the night.

Tuesday at Heffron was interesting, because we had the whole of the Korean track team there. They were better than expected, because Heffron is usually a specialist track. If you haven't raced there much, you'll often have trouble in a Tuesday night handicap. We ended up with a huge A grade bunch - maybe 25 to 30. I played it safe and sat on, although I did have the urge to do some work. Whenever I tried to move up, there was a Korean or three in the way. We averaged 43.5 and caught B and C on the last lap, so it was a bit chaotic...

On Wednesday I got stung by a bee while riding through the National Park. The bugger hit me in the forehead when I was doing about 60 km/h and by the time I'd stopped, it had well and truly stung me. I made it home OK, but during the afternoon, my face swelled up like a balloon (think Jon Vaughters in the Tour de France that year) and on Thursday morning I could barely open and close my eyes! I went to the doc, and he gave me some prednisone, which has reduced the swelling a bit. He warned me that if I was a professional cyclist, I'd have to declare it, but I'm not, and I can't see myself being tested in the next [arbitrary time period].

Tomorrow, there's the CA Awards, so I hope I'm unswollen by then. I won't be drinking much wine though. Then on Saturday there's Steve and Simone's wedding chez Lane Cove. Coolness! They have been some of the major forces at work in our garden recently, and it has been completely remodeled in the shape of a fish. And this week we found out that sculptor Mick Purdy won the People's Choice Award at Sculpture By The Sea. Good on him. I voted at least three times for him. Damn, I should have voted for Lucy too. Anyway, he did some nice work in our garden too!

Multifarious bilge

As I wait for my speedy dialup connection to upload these pics from Londoninium, I will put finger to keyboard and write spew forth some bilge.

I'll start with London, seeing as that was a while ago already. It was another lightning early week trip to see Luce and the gang, meaning that I left on Monday afternoon at 3-ish, got the Eurostar to Waterloo, tube to Angel, walked to the pub where I met Luce, Pete, and Caz, with Mandy following suit at the Indian restaurant a while later. There were some drinks consumed but no olive pip throwing. Mandy was a bit knackered after starting rehearsals on a Mozart piece that was two hours and forty minutes long...and that was the shortened version! Too many notes.

Tuesday dawned cool and grey but Luce and I were somewhat more organised than last time (and she has a new bike) so we cycled along the Thames to the Tate Modern. Check it. Therein, we saw the new installation, which is a bloody great construction of plastic blocks blocks blocks taking up a fair chunk of the Tate's big hall, which is very big. Then we saw some more art (not bad at all) and had a coffee on the top floor.

Tuesday night was dinner at Cousin Polly's place, complete with baby Eva and cats. My memory for animal names is not so good, but it was a good dinner and great to finally catch up with Polly again after about seven years of living within about 3 hours of her. This is the first year I've managed to get enough time off during the season to go and visit though - one day is not sufficient.

That was a very potted summary of another fun time in London, but it'll have to do. Pics are here:

Setting out from Sabine Road
© Jeff Jones

A glorious day in London, complete with Millenium Bridge
© Jeff Jones

Lucy on her new steed that actually fits
© Jeff Jones

The large Tate Modern
© Jeff Jones

The installation of plastic boxes. Cool, innit?
© Jeff Jones

Chinatown in London is pretty small
© Jeff Jones

Bustling Chinatown
© Jeff Jones

Cousin Polly in Balham, Gateway to the South. Note pic of Battersea power station.
© Jeff Jones

Me and Cousin Polly
© Jeff Jones

The Oz report

Since last I updated, things have been busy, as usual. I'm on holidays for a couple more weeks (yay) and am making the best use of my time. House buying is coming along, but I need to get the cash together before making an offer on somewhere. The inner city/inner west is reasonably affordable with Lucy and I pooling our resources, so that will be good. By the end of next week, I hope things will be somewhat further advanced.

Last Saturday I semi-cleaned up at Heffron, netting a massive payout of $65 for coming second. That's not bad for a club race - about the same as fourth in the Zwijnaarde kermis last year. The reason was that Il Presidente decided to run the race as a three grade handicap, and there were about 40 C graders, 20 B graders and just 6 A graders. It was 16 laps (for A) and we had to catch and then lap C grade. Tricky, but with Josh Marden, Spurge and I driving the groupette, we managed to get C grade the first time after less than four laps. A couple of laps later, the other three A graders had diminished off the back and I made the executive decision to continue with just Josh and Spurge.

It turned out OK as we caught B grade with four to go and C grade a lap later. There was some confusion for a lap or so as everyone was yelling 'hold your line', including a B grader who tried to pass me on the inside of the corner after the start/finish. There wasn't room, but I let him through and then attacked fairly hard. Josh and Spurge caught me with two to go and brought another five with them. Josh asked Spurge 'Is this it?' and Spurge replied in the affirmative, however Josh interpreted it to mean that this was the last lap, instead of 'yes, we have caught everyone'. So on the straight coming up to the bell lap, Josh wound it up and I was wondering what the hell he was doing as I was trying to close the 10m gap off the back. He crossed the line and then was downcast when they rang the bell.

I was a bit stuffed but I went again, fairly ineffectually, but it split the group up a bit more. Then the only remaining C grader countered and Spurge chased him down with me on his wheel. We caught him at 1 km to go and I went again, with Spurge easily taking my wheel. I was resigned to second place (didn't even try to sprint) but there is no shame in that. And we did split the money anyway.

Moving along...

The rest of Saturday and a bit of Sunday was spent going to Sculpture by the Sea at Tamarama/Bondi. It's a pretty fine exhibition and extremely popular. There were over 80 sculptures there, some of which were very big, including one by one of our garden landscapers Mick Purdy. It was four faces made out of sandstone and was easily one of the best there. I think he sold it for $27,000. Dad's going to enter in it next year, he reckons...

Monday was dinner at Cousin Sophie's place, complete with Husband Nik, Toddler Nina, Cousin Anty and Soph's three month-old pregnancy (yay). Again, it was most excellent to catch up with them all and we had some fine wine and even a roast dinner!

Although Nina is not even three, she remembers me making faces at here through the window at Wyong earlier this year, which shows she has a much better memory than moi. She is also on the way to becoming a very clean and tidy person, unlike the majority of the family. Anty is working for the public service in NSW regional water management (correct me if I'm wrong, Ant) as an interim occupation before going to study law at Oxford. He reckons he's going to float himself on the futures market to fund his degree, which we thought was a sound idea. You never know when you will need to have a stake in a high court judge.

On Tuesday, the weather was somewhat inclement: a massive southerly change brought in quite a bit of rain and I was the only one fool enough to turn up to Heffron. I knew there wouldn't be racing on, but I wanted to go there to reclaim my mobile phone, which I'd left there on Saturday. No dice. Got it back on Thursday. I did a few laps and didn't get blown off.

The weather was similar on Wednesday so I went through the Royal (via Artillery Hill for the first time in ages) and then did the Otford Wall. The latter is one seriously steep hill - it's nearly 2 km long - and I needed the 39x25 just to grind up it at 10 km/h in bits. Coming home was fun with that tailwind though.

Wednesday and Thursday evening consisted of pub meetings and one sausage sandwich for dinner (spread over two nights) along with much beer. Caught up with Josh (Saunders, not Marden) last night over a number of Hoegaardens and that was good. We discussed Fort Street's 20 year reunion (in 2008) and a 'where are they now', among other things. Where am I now? Am I the only one of our extremely successful year to end up as a journo? Maybe I'll find out in 2008.

On holidays (nearly)

After two weeks of semi-intense work in the Surry Hills Office, I have earned myself a bit of time off. Three weeks, to be precise. That should be nice, as I have reached that "battery empty, need recharge" phase of the season. It won't be a relaxing period, as I have to sort out this house buying, but hey, it'll be something different!

Step 1) Get cash
Step 2) Acquire house

Easy!

I've been racing four (4) times at Heffron. Got 6th and 10th in the "Snowy Wilson", 6th A on the first Tuesday nighter, 5th on a crappy Saturday race, and dropped in the last Tuesday nighter after four (4) laps. I had bad legs for a week before that, so I wasn't really surprised. But I've replaced my flexy carbon seatpost with a more solid titanium one, and I already feel better. I'll start racing at Sutho next week.