GERALD

I've got a bike you can ride if you like .......

I bought my bike because I hurt my knee somehow and it's a 25 minute walk to the gym I go to.
My knee seems to be getting better now but I still ride to the gym and generally about town.
This is relatively new to me as I hadn't really ridden a bike since university days in Wellington in the 1970's

(not a penny farthing)

Bone shaker

Although, riding over the cobblestones of York does shake the old bones up a bit.

My bike is a swish looking red mountain bike. It only cost me £40 (about $100 NZ) as I bought it from an internet trading site. I must admit that the guy I bought it from looked a bit like Fagin so worry that some schoolkid is wandering around out there looking for his pride and joy.

I'm enjoying riding it as York is a pretty safe bike-riding city with lots of bike lanes and seemingly not many irascible old music teachers ready to run you over. If the weather is fine I take the long way through the countryside on the way to the gym. It's a great way of getting fit. I don't know why I go to the gym.

Oh, OK, I do know why I go to the gym.

Riding my bike isn't without its embarrassments however. As well as the obvious one of an old guy riding a red kid's bike there are, as an example these three.

1. A few weeks back I was riding pretty fast into the wind and thought I was doing pretty good, slipping past slow cars and moving at a good clip. Just before I congratulated myself though I was overtaken by someone else. An old geezer (even older than me) on an old fashioned, no gear black bike sailed past me. He wasn't bent over the handlebars in a racing position like me. No, he was rigidly upright. Bastard. I'm sure he must have had one of those little motors connected to the rear wheel.

2. Last week I was moving along fairly briskly after starting off at the traffic lights and was once again overtaken. By an old woman (well about my age anyway). She was also riding one of those old bikes. With a basket in front. The basket was full of groceries. She must have had the advantage of sailing through the traffic lights when they were green.
I didn't chase after her and pass her. I (ahem) didn't want to embarrass her.

3. Yesterday when I'd cycled to the inner city supermarket I mounted the bike with the groceries in my back pack and as I took off the groceries unbalanced me and I fell off. On the road. Fortunately there was no bus behind me but I landed heavily and scraped knees and arms and received a few bruises.
I felt like a twit especially when two little old ladies stepped off the footpath to help me up. As one dusted me off the other was fossicking in her handbag for some medical suppplies.
"I'm fine" I pleaded.
"No dearie" one of them said "Mildred is well equipped for emergencies".

I told them that what was mostly hurt was my pride, thanked them and manfully rode off only stopping to limp up the stairs when I got home.