During the past couple of months, my friend Mark and I have been nudging each other to buy a folding bicycle. This is so we can visit some of our clients without needing a car or relying on public transport. Two weeks ago Mark blinked first and bought a Specialized Globe Mity. I took a tiny test ride around the area where I live, and after a few wobbles – it’s been 27 years since I last road a bike – I was hooked and placed my order for the same bike along with lots of accessories, some more critical than others.

My bike arrived last Monday. Mark kindly fitted my lights and tweaked a few other things so that the bike suited my somewhat amateur riding style. That day I peddled around for another few minutes, learning to turn left and right under control, and trying out gears, which was a first for me. When I was 11, my one and only previous bike only had the one gear. The Shimano SL-R440 Rapidfire gear shifters are a joy to use, except that it took me ages to remember which direction was which. Mark suggested I ignore the indicator – and that’s advice I’ve taken on board rapidly since.

The following day I ventured further afield for about 20 minutes, just riding up and down a quiet road, practicing gear changes, looking behind and signalling left and right. Fortunately this was all quiet easy. It really is true that you never forget how to ride a bike!

Wednesday saw us going on the road. My first real road trip for decades and quite worrying since I’d only been on a road with a bike a couple of times before. We travelled up Stratherrick Road in Inverness and then, on Mark’s instruction, wandered around Lochardil so I could practice some junctions. All was fine except for the initial climb up Stratherrick Road, henceforth known as The Hill, for I wibbled and wobbled all over the place and ended up walking up the steepest part of the ascent.

Thursday was my first trip out on my own to visit my dad at Lochardil. I did The Hill wibble again and concluded that I really need to get more comfortable on my bike and tune my legs before trying it again. I also discovered that I am capable of the one-leg-off trick at stops and junctions – I guess I did this when I was younger. Therefore I’m going to gradually raise the seat post to get a better position on the bike. The journey back was both quick and enjoyable. I’ve been driven most places since I don’t drive a car and if I’m in the passenger seat I always keep a look out for hazards, upcoming turns, junctions etc. Being on a bike is therefore relatively straightforward, and the rear-facing mirror is a joy to use.

Today, I needed to pop up to the local shop to buy some milk and some new batteries for my smoke detectors. I just hopped on the bike, went up Dores Road and that was the job done. Being a Sunday, there are a few people travelling to shop by car (and why do people go there in pairs?). It made me smile to see all these trips by car, that would end up not being any quicker than my journey. Once you assert your presence on the road – remember it’s illegal to ride on the pavement! – and you’re comfortable in handling the bike and knowing what you can do with it, particularly setting off and accelerating, such trips are very pleasant. In fact they are exhilarating, despite this one lasting only five minutes each way.

On the journey back I pushed my legs a little harder in a lower gear. Mark suggested I do this to help prepare for The Hill in future. I’m also planning on going the Dores Road / Holm Road route to Lochardil in future. It’s a longer journey, which isn’t a problem and has a couple of easy roundabouts. Then I’ll do the Stratherrick Road / Drummond Crescent route on the way back. Thus avoiding The Hill.

Imagine a world in which people didn’t go off topic in message boards. Quite frequently, threads on the MacNN boards end up being rants for and against Democrat and Republican parties in the US, along with anti-Bush / pro-Bush sentiments.

This MacWorld thread starts off about how Yoko Ono is releasing John Lennon’s back catalogue of music to lots of online music stores, but not the iTunes Music Store. This goes off topic in all sorts of ways.

One of TextDrive’s servers crashed last night. Their administrators used this as an opportunity to ‘take advantage of this crash to put on a new kernel’. As a result the server was down for nearly two hours.

This is wrong. When you run a business that provides web servers to people, uptime is everything. If you need to install a new kernel or perform anything else that affects availability or the level of service, schedule downtime. Site5 seem to manage it, as do PIPEX.

A bizarre poll in today’s Times newspaper implies that 50% of Conservative Party voters support David Davis as the new leader of the party, compared to 37% for David Cameron.

Why is this bizarre? Two reasons:

1. Conservative Party voters, i.e. those that support the party, don’t vote in the leadership election. It’s only members, and previous polls have indicated that they prefer David Cameron.
2. The same Times/Populus poll shows that 45% of voters think that David Cameron is more likely to win a general election, compared to 11% for David Davis.

This second point indicates that these voters would be quite happy for David Davis to become leader, but David Cameron to win the election. Sorry, but you can’t have it both ways. Isn’t it obvious what to do?

Another thing that I’ve found strange over the past few years is the archaic voting system in the Houses of Parliament. Today, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw is coming back from Russia for a crucial vote on the Terrorism Bill. Chancellor Gordon Brown was called back from an official visit to Israel just after he landed in that country. Yes, you have to vote in person! No proxies, no internet voting. Nothing as organised as that.

Which brings me to the Terrorism Bill. The core issue appears to be the length of time suspects should be held for without charge. Currently it is 14 days, but the government wants this extended to 90 days, following dispositions from the Police, “because of the complexity and mass of evidence in terrorism cases.” Australia is also debating this issue, however, they are discussing extending this duration from 7 days to 14 days. These two extremes tell you a lot about the level of competence in the respective police forces.

When clients (and bosses) go bad

And that’s something I learnt the hard way. When you work for someone else, there’s never an opportunity to experiment with different ways of addressing these issues. Sure enough, we’ve been in the same boat, because our experience of how other companies operate influenced how we operated. It was only after three years, and one almost catastrophic situation that we changed how we work. As a result, we work less, do more, and keep our clients happier.

BTW, I was writing another post which had the same title as this one. But I never posted it. So instead I’m re-using the title for a shameless link to one of the greatest novels every written. I don’t care what Jakob Neilsen writes... this is my blog. It has my quirks, my obsessions, my phobias and ruminations.

1. Gwen Stefani is about to release the 5th single from her debut solo album. Back in the dim and distant past, e.g. the early 80s, singles were released much less frequently, and it was likely that a maximum of three singles would be released per album. The purpose of singles today is to promote an album. Or in Gwen’s case, to promote an album which promotes her clothing range.
2. The Eurythmics are back too. Turns out that this is actually for two new tracks which are to appear on their ‘Ultimate Collection’, which is a compilation album, out now, along with the re-release of all of their back-issue albums. Just in time for Christmas, of course.
3. Speaking of compilation albums.. Destiny’s Child, who split up this year are now being wooed back to release two new albums.
4. And you can buy a ‘Geldof in Africa’ book and DVD, and a CD, which includes, according to the TV advert ‘a Chillout CD’. Nice.