Return of the chicken suit.

I don’t often write about work. Because a) it’s wouldn’t make very interesting reading*, b) it has the potential to get me into trouble, and c) it would leave me little rant-room during the obligatory “putting the world to rights” post work beer sessions. I savour those rants, so wouldn’t want to waste them here.

Aside from asides on toilet humour and Recycling, there’s been little office gossip for the five long years I’ve been shouting, and you’ve occasionally been listening. And that’s not going to change now, other than to reaffirm my strong belief that any meeting with your betters can only be enhanced if one dons the chicken suit. It’s not failed me yet through many appraisal, all considerably less confrontational that this one

So I shall lightly talc myself up and go forth with a spring in my step, a smile on my face and my cap at a jaunty angle. I know not where things shall end, but it would be a huge surprise were it not in a place serving happy juice to desperate men – one of whom is sporting a latex rooster costume.

A question however that would benefit from “crowd sourcing”** is simply this; “chicken suit on the train, or wait till I get to the office?” My own view is that journey is three hours of tedium many of us must suffer at least once a week. It’d almost be a public service to cheer my fellow passengers up.

In entirely unrelated news, my slide over to the dark, tarmac-y side of cycling continues to accelerate. A bit like us really with a healthy 29ish kph average over 90 kilometres lumpily arranged over 880 metres of Cotswold hills. This included refusing to play off the ladies tee at Bishop’s Cleeve*** so straightlining the ascent up an ever steepening 25{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2} gradient. Arriving breathless and broken at the top, I was fairly sure – when I finally had the strength to look down – that my legs would be nothing more than bloodied stumps.

Happily not the case but they certainly felt that way for the next few kilometres. Which is excuse enough for my slackness of attention allowing a clubbed up roadie to sweep by on the descent. But I’d learned enough from Dartmoor to tuck in, drag myself into his slipstream before ripping past once the gradient backed off enough for gears to come back into play.

He wasn’t happy. Nor was the next bloke who we overtook twice. The first time we received an aggrieved grunt, the second – after a quick navigational conference saw him sweep past, a sad little smile on his lips – facial blankness on a stiff necked head. We responded with a determined speedy ascent of the next hill which left him miles behind, and me in an oxygen debt that’d have Slime-ball Osborne cutting my limbs off to balance.

I blame my Labrador mate who cannot look at a passing object – be it rider, car, next county – without feeling the urge to retrieve it. Good fun though and although it’s not Mountain Biking, it was a fine way to spend three hours under sunny skies and mostly headwind free. When another sportive option crept embarrassed into my inbox earlier, I found myself worryingly keen to enter.

Some of this is probably due to my flattery-operated psyche. Over @ Samuri, Jon is riding millions of miles and filling in the tiny gaps with sets of 300 crunches. I’m more your “Never finish a meal without three types of cheese and some port while sucking it in” kind of fella, but even so road riding doesn’t half shift the poundage.

Sure I still have the appearance of lumpy custard poured into a bin bag when encased in figure/blubber hugging lycra, but our next door neighbour responded to my un t-shirted torso yesterday with a wolf whistle and some complimentary remarks on well padded muscle poking out from behind layers of beer. She is a senior citizen and a tad short sighted, but I’ll take that thanks.

Wait till she sees me in the chicken suit eh?

* I appreciate this such a admirable tenet has rarely prevented “not very interesting things about bikes” being spawned all over the Internet. But you have to set the bar somewhere. Even if a supple cockroach would struggle to limbo under it.

** Assuming three people including my Mum constitutes a crowd.

*** That has to be rude surely. Or medical.

One thought on “Return of the chicken suit.

  1. Since currently training for a triathlon (i know a minor miracle considering how broken I was 18 mnths ago*) i’ve been doing a lot of all three attributes, but have been getting out on the road bike lots. This has lead me to discover that my road bike doesn’t have 3 gears up front and so leaves me to gurn, grunt and sweat my way up Chiltern hills. Of which there are many in every direction from where i live. This does mean that the return journey becomes faster that the outward. However, leads to an interesting complication i discovered, when generally quite tired and just wanting to get home, to go for a run..

    As I was bombing down this steep hill, at early o-clock, towards a roundabout at the bottom. I realised that my arrival would co-incide with another cyclists coming across me. Applying the brakes fairly vigorously lead to one skid sideways, a quick release and then reapply lead to another with not much reduction in speed. I could somehow sense the approaching cyclist feeling rather apprehensive as we appeared to be on a collision course. Not having much say in the matter I was thankful he backed off and moved away so that i could come barrelling through at a barely controlled velocity. I did pass on my apologies, but i think my shorts were possibly browner than his. Now who says road biking can’t be fun?

    * I won’t even being to mention the return trip to the alps i’ve got planned in 1 month. Still at least it’s a completely different area to where i broke my back. I’ve heard the Italian alps are MUCH nicer.

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