a) Croissant b) Sock of the week. Delete as appropriate

Pleasant little jaunt out to TIBS via the Waverley Road; just long enough to make me feel alive and not long enough (or hard enough) to make me wish I wasn't.

We all know Hemmingway's old saw that it's only by sweating up hills you get an accurate memory of the country you can't get by car. I think we could add another remembrance to the list. The autumn leaves do look beautiful, but perhaps you can only really feel autumn when you ride through a wind-blown flurry of golden, fallen leaves. It was one of those mornings, so don't call it training and take it away from me.

Afterwards I rocked up to TIBS for the Croissant Of The Week and gossip. The gossip was of an epic fixie ride this Thanksgiving Monday which any sane person is giving a miss as there is no way it is going to end in anything but tears. The Croissant was Pear, Walnut and Brie. Maybe I was missing something, because I certainly missed the brie, but even so, just pears and walnuts was good enough. Add in a cappucino (a 'spro would have been too hard-core and an AMericano oo much volume) and it was a nice little morning out.

I do enjoy these mornings out, as they count as "me" time. Sure, little fills my days at the moment and most of it may be classified as "me time", but this is me time without screen time, which is just as important, and the phone is out of reach.

That's not screen-time as in too much Tomb Raider or Call of Duty either. I have got to thinking that to save time I should have my CV and generic cover-letter printed on race-bibs. The bulk of the text will go where the number usually is and then the usual responses printed on the tear-off label at the bottom, so instead of reading "Good for one meal" or "Entry to post-race" it says "Thank-you for your time. We have considered your application and 1) You are underqualified 2) You are over-qualified 3) why would we hire a 40 y.o. independent thinker when we can hire an ingenuous arts graduate straight out of school and mould them in our own image mwa ha ha. Thank-you for thinking of our company blah blah (delete as appropriate)". Alternately, the rip-off tag could be left blank, which would adequately describe HR's response ninety-nine times out of one hundred.

I did get some newspaper time at TIBS and saw a running-related "overheard".

It's a but blurry but the speaker is "ass-appreciative guy at the Rum Runners Relay". Either you find this funny or you start looking at all the guys on the relay sidewise and feeling in your purse for a can of Mace. My money is on Phil "Flashing Lights" McElroy. He already told me I was looking chunky to my face, so goodness knows what he's saying sotto voce to the other guys on the tech crew!

Speaking of appreciative guys, I broke out a new pair of socks today. Sure they're black, but today was one of those grimy days where the spray would ruin a fine pair of white socks, so it's perfectly acceptable to go with colour. What's not acceptable are the calf-high plain black ones a la Lance Armstrong. Go with a bit of colour, or maybe a motif. If you're going to wear black socks in non-ironic conjunction with athleticism, go big, go patterns, just go responsibly

Hence the egg-and-bacon socks. I'm training for cyclocross season already with these puppies. Nothing as crass as getting Old Bess in the mud and practicing my dismounts and run-ups (you've seen me do it so you can understand exactly how much time and effort it took to get them looking quite so sucky!). Nothing goes down after a 45 minute lung-burning session in the mud getting your arse kicked by 14 year-olds on MTBs than five-times the RDA of cholesterol served up in the full monty (as in full fried English breakfast, not stripping male steel-workers).

Til next time, wear black socks but enjoy them responsibly.

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