Tag: weather

No such thing as bad weather (only bad kit)

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The shoulder and part of the face of someone wearing a silvery reflective cycling jacket, with a light sprinkling of raindrops. Behind them can be seen a double decker cycle storage rack and grey sky

My town bike is waiting for a pair of new tyres so I had to take the cargo bike to the station this morning. Now, the cargo bike is a tank, as bikes go, it’s long and heavy, but it also has an electric motor so getting it up the hill is rather less of an effort than getting a Pendleton Somersby up there on pure pedal power. I appreciated that this morning: it’s wet, so I zipped my jacket up, but it’s not all that cold, so I’d have been uncomfortably hot by the time I got to the top if I’d been doing it unassisted.

Anyway, the bit I really enjoyed was going down the other side. There was no other traffic, it wasn’t wet enough to impede my vision, and the wind and the rain on my face were exhilarating. I once read somewhere that cycling may be the closest most of us get to knowing what it’s like to fly (as opposed to being flown, I mean). It certainly felt like that this morning.

Winter morning

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A cluster of trees, from which the leaves have started falling but which are still reasonably well covered. The grass beneath has a very thin coating of frost

My habit of observing 1 November, All Saints, as the beginning of winter often feels just as ridiculous as using the winter solstice. This year was no exception: the beginning of the month was unremittingly gloomy, but not what you’d call cold. But here we are, three weeks in and not even touching Advent yet, and it’s got properly cold (by British standards, anyway). We didn’t get the surprise snowfall that hit much of the country; instead, it’s been bright and sharp, there was a very thin layer of frost on the ground, and my ears got thoroughly chilly when I went out on the bike this morning.

You know it’s been windy when…

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A litter bin with the handle end of a black umbrella poking out of it

… the umbrellas in the litter bins are the big ones that only close up in one direction. Everyone expects those little folding ones to fail in the face of a stiff breeze (of course they’re going to, with that added weak point half way up the spoke) but the big ones need the wind to put in more effort.

I do own a little folding umbrella. The canopy is printed with Alphonse Mucha ladies and I bought it during a sudden downpour in Prague. I don’t use it much. The Fen winds would have it inside out in seconds. My preferred brolly is a 1960s vinyl number with black polka dots: it has nice strong spokes, but a comparatively small diameter, which is handy. I find umbrellas a bit awkward to manage, and wouldn’t trust myself with a golf one. The plastic is beginning to decay at the edges, though, and it’s not going to go on forever.

On Thursday I managed to forget completely that umbrellas exist and that it would be a good idea to take one with me, so I got very damp. Oh well. Possibly you shouldn’t take advice on umbrellas from me.