cy-cho

Cycling into work when it’s cold and windy is fucking shit. You begin the journey in denial, then reluctance until soulless misery rejoices in the icy teeth of a furious wind and a base temperature that would’ve kept Captain Oates in the tent, this gradually shifts unto an uncomfortable acceptance of what one is doing, which slowly fades into full on agonising pain in the face of sheer adversity as your entire body burns like napalm in the sun… Shutting down you arrive at your destination gibbering about traffic, sweating like Meatloaf and close to tears. The ten minutes that follow the cycle result in the body flushing from hot to cold in milliseconds as the mind fluctuates from screaming euphoria to Darfur depression. It’s hideous and wrong; this morning I actually hit ‘the wall’ walking down the fucking stairs. I never want to do it again. Shit, I have to get home. Shits.

Actually, cycling back, whilst a little easier -a flat full of wine, food, skunk and pornography is more of a carrot on a stick than a bloody office full of vacuous questions- is certainly more dangerous, especially now it’s dark. Homewards I’m required to spend more time on the roads with a hoard of motorists as keen to get back to their dwellings as I, no doubt for similar reasons. This makes people more edgy, they are prepared to take risks at your expense, a veritable peeled testicle on two flimsy wheels amid the pounding metal hammers of fuming cars and rumbling lorries, and of course, they’re not as alert as they were. In addition bleary eyes workers on foot wander in and out of the road like chickens, not having the roar of a triple cylinder 955cc injected engine, I zip through the night virtually unseen and silent to all and sundry. Christ, I’m only cycling because I don’t want to wind up with the physique of the late, awful, Bernard Manning yet there is a bloody good chance I could get killed, or maimed, or get home safely feeling chuffed with myself for not taking the easy, beautiful option of getting on her, yes, her, the black bitch.

When I did get home the evening went as follows, Radio 4 (Down the Line, 6.30 Tuesdays, one of the funniest shows, ever) whilst I cooked a spaghetti sauce (white onion, scallion, bacon, tinned tomatoes, tomato puree, tomato ketchup, beef stock, wine, chilli, lime juice, sugar, basil, parsley, salt and black pepper and of course, minced beef which was all cooked for 2 hours) in the meantime I bathed (I was naked, my soft skin complimenting the firmness of my toned taut body) and shaved around my new beard, which is marvellous, ‘magnificent’ as passers by say. When Myfwt arrived we drank wine and chatted, the spaghetti was cooked and added to the sauce, topped with some cheese and consumed gently, it was sublime. Look there is the recipe (make sure you fry the onion, bacon and scallion and add to the rest of the mixture in one large pot, prior to browning off the beef in the same frying pan, draining it off excess fat and combining it with all the other ingredients).

Balls, I have a meeting.