Saved by the Hell
Mood:  cheeky
Topic: Ruminations
Over the past few months, since I told the G-Man to go take a flying leap, I've started to notice how much the little things about him really would not have made him a good long-term partner. (As the Barenaked Ladies famously quipped: Absence makes the heart grow fungus.) There has been a cautious rapprochement since New Year's (initiated and guided by yours truly, since G-Man cannot be bothered to do anything by himself, frankly.)

So G-Man has decided that he's going to start a new job in Suburbialand, leave the big city behind and (he says) have a job that's closer to home that will allow him to bike to work. (No comment.) In starting this new job, G-Man only has four days of holidays during Semana Santa. No skin off my nose, I thought. He still lives at home: Either he'll have the money to do something on his own or he'll scootch off with his parents, like he usually does.

I don't know what the hell got into my head, but for some reason I was feeling overly charitable last week. No, I'll be honest. I know what it was. Elevent months after the fact, he took the photos that I took - I was the only one who'd bothered to bring a bloody digital camera - and made a small video of it. (He'd talked about doing it before but hadn't gotten around to doing it.) And seeing that video reminded me that we really had a good time together, so Dummy Here thought, oh, wouldn't it be great to have him along again....

There's a theory in linguistics that says that native speakers of any language tend not to say more words than the absolute minimum needed in order to get the message across. Well, there are times when I am convinced that G-Man lives his entire life by that idea. I send him a message, saying that I'm glad to see the video and that it brought back great memories, and it's a shame that he couldn't come along on the trip. No response. Throughout this supposed period of rapprochement, it has struck me that, at no time, has he talked about what he wants or what he's prepared to give. As in, I wanna be friends again...but what proof do I have that he does, too?

Cut to yesterday, when, after being online for the better part of an hour, he finally sends me a message. We chat about the usual inane crapola for five or ten minutes, then he brings up the fact that his parents are going to the anti-ETA protest convened yesterday by the Partido Popular (who, it will be remembered, lost the 11 March 2004 elections partially because they lied about ETA being behind the bombings, when it was known, almost from the start, that it was the work of Islamist terrorists.) I won't bore anyone with the details, but G-Man basically cut off the conversation and shut me out once it became clear I didn't agree with him.

And that may have been the final snap I needed. After seeing him behave like a child in a situation like that, I thought, nope. No more kids in my life. So I'm thankful I didn't ask him to go with me. I'm glad that it was nothing more than words in an SMS message, the modern equivalent of words, whispered into the wind only to be blown away, yadda yadda yadda.

Sometimes it just takes the smallest gesture to realize where your priorities are.

Ooh, good new biking drink...
Mood:  happy
Topic: Planning!
Oooh, yum.

Forget Red Bull. I just got given a great recipe for strawberry Mexican (or should that be Mexican strawberry?) licuados (damn, I taught English for seven years, I should know this....)

1 pound ripe strawberries
1 teaspoon sugar
3 drops vanilla extract
500 mL bottle of sparkling water (or gaseosa, like La Casera, if you're in Spain)

Put the strawberries, vanilla and sugar in a blender and puree until smooth. Pour into a bottle and let sit for an hour; if the mixture should separate, pour off the water that forms on top.

When you're ready for a drink, put the mixture in a glass with some ice and top up (SLOWLY) with the fizzy drink of your choice. (If you're using a soft drink with artificial sweetener, don't pour too quickly, or the froth will go all over the place!)

You can use sugary soft drinks like Sprite and 7-Up, but beware of the sugar rush. The first time I made this, I made it with non-Diet Sprite and the sugar rush was so intense I had to walk around the block a couple of times to wear it off. (If I could figure out a way to mix this with cappucino or espresso I think I'd have a hit on my hands!)

Beats powdered energy drinks any day!!

Where are all the gearhead girls?
Mood:  quizzical
Topic: Ruminations
In spite of having something that threatened to turn into a nasty hangover, I almost made it on time. Jorge and Moncho had agreed to meet outside of the Fuencarral metro at 8:30 AM, and I was only ten minutes late. The ride started well, if chilly; and by 10:30 we'd made it up as far as Colmenar Viejo, some twenty kilometeres north of Madrid. And I didn't die. I was sure that somewhere around Tres Cantos I would surrender and have to turn around, but I didn't. I made it all the way up to Colmenar, where we had a break and a sandwich and a breather.

Being that I'm usually one of the only (or few, if Claire's along) girls who go out on rides like this, I usually notice how few women are out on their bikes on Sunday afternoon club rides. What was unusual was that Jorge (who's from Colombia) and Moncho (who's Mexican) picked up on it, too: they also noticed that the riders tended to fall into two groups: either they were older men, dressed in washed-out Lycra shorts, looking to reclaim their glory days; or they were youngish guys, riding very expensive rides. And as we stopped at the side of the road to take a breather and have a drink, even the guys noticed it.

In the end, we counted 12 women. A dozen women among a good two or three hundred men, during the whole time we were out. And that includes the four girls on the tandems and the mother with a kid on the back of the bike.

On the one hand, it makes me think, damn! If I were to join a club and start racing, I could probably be one of the top-ranked riders in the entire community. In the entire province! I could be in the Top 100!

And then I thought, dude-ette, if there are only sixty-eight women competing anyway, that's not really a good sign....

I got spanked by traffic yesterday
Mood:  quizzical
Topic: Ruminations
I got seriously spanked by the traffic yesterday as I was riding up to class. And not just traffic -- they're rebuilding the interurban bus stop (intercambiador in Spanish, though it's more like a series of informal bus stops that really ought to be a station). I'm starting to wish that I was riding a mountain bike. Thank God my bike has front suspension because even riding singletrack is not as wearing as riding on the Castellana.

You can tell it's election time in Madrid. The streets are ripped up, supposedly in the name of progress, but all it ever seems to do is raise peoples' blood pressure levels.

It took me an hour to get to class, which is what it normally takes me if I take the Metro. I'll still ride up there at least once a week, but dan...I think I need new tires.....

Fear of Flying Solo?
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Ruminations
I don't know how much thought other cycle tourists give to travelling alone or travelling in groups. I didn't, really, until this year. A lot of the time, if I said that I was going on a bike trip, I'd have six people express interest, two of whom would actually come along. But this year is different....aside from ending a relationship (such as it was) with a guy who was (almost) always ready to head out on a trip or two, if he could...and learning the hard way that a lot of my friends are... um.... well... not as up and prepared for cycling long distances as I am... I'm doing two long trips in the space of six weeks. I'll be heading to Andalusia between March 29th and April 9th; and then heading out to do the Camino de Santiago between April 26th and May 8th.

Alone.

As in, I'm looking forward to this "camaraderie among cyclists" kind of thing because, truth be told, I am REALLY excited to be doing these trips...but I'm also freaked out, too.

One of the disadvantages of being in a cycling relationship with someone (which does not have to be the same as a romantic relationship, by any means) is that you get kind of lazy about finding new partners. Maybe it's a kind of hangover from being in a romantic relationship, as well - you get so reliant on one person that it doesn't occur to you what would happen if that person decided not to take part in a trip. Or when that person becomes effectively divorced from your life. It's like losing a part of your geographic memory. And at the beginning, I was really excited about going solo ("Thank God, no more snoring/nookie at weird hours/silent treatment/listening to his teeth chatter because he's in a summer sleeping bag/complaining about pain/complaining about having to cook"), maybe out of a misplaced sense of superiority, maybe because people are really good about mouthing off about how much they don't need people - and how they do it when they're at their most vulnerable.

And there are practical considerations as well, too. Things are a lot more expensive when you travel by yourself - hotel rooms, food. There's no one to share pannier space with if you decide to camp. But it's a lot easier to get you and your bike onto a bus when you're by yourself. You don't have to justify changes in the schedules to anyone but yourself. You've only got one voice whining at you, if at all; you know that at least one person is going to find your jokes and wry observations funny. The worries that typically come with travelling by myself don't tend to worry me ("You're gonna ride off into a gulch and break your bike/neck/ankles/legs and no one will know where you are!"...or..."You're gonna get raped/attacked/robbed/hit by a semi/food poisoning/sunburn...")

The first bike trip I did was supposed to be from Ecija to Ronda, going through a lot of the mountains that I plan on doing this year. My inexperience (and a €99 bike) meant that I had to cut it short after the second day because I didn't have enough strength and experience (and chain ring power) to battle the wind coming in from Africa. And I remember being scared absolutely SHITLESS when I set out because I wasn't entirely sure that I wasn't going to die. Sure, things happened. Five kilometres out of town my bra strap snapped (right in front of a pig farm, no less), nearly sending me into the ditch in shock. I had a head-on collision with the sirocco winds the next day. The trains linking Seville and Osuna (where I'd stopped the night before) didn't take bicycles. But things weren't totally unmanageable, either. There was no problem getting the bike on the bus to Seville, and then onto Ronda (three cheers for midweek travel!). I can still taste how good the avocado and shrimp salad tasted on the terrace of the restaurant in Marinaleda. The owner of the hostal in Osuna couldn't have been sweeter. So, yes, a five-day jaunt got cut short by about three days because of various problems. But that was fine.

And I know that it'll be fine when I go. I'm a smarter, more prepared, fitter cyclist. I don't anticipate having to deal with a lot of problems on the bike; but if I do, it's no big deal because I know what I'm doing. I know the territory where I'm going, and I know that I'm never further than a phone call away from reassurance. And I know that I'll be a much better person when I finish these trips, because I will know how to deal.

I forget which suffragette said that a bicycle was a key to freedom. It is, and not just when it comes to questions of mobility - it's also a key to gaining confidence when you feel that life has knocked you back a bit more than what's fair.

Daily Bike Count: 15!
Mood:  cool
Topic: Ruminations
Moncho the web guy doesn't carry a lot of lights on him when he rides. He goes 30 km per day up to the very north end of Madrid, on an old Cannondale that he's lovingly restored.

Yesterday when we met up to hand stuff off I'd just ridden back from an ESL class. I feel like I teach better when I've had the chance to ride to class. And I came across five or six people who were riding. And as I was saying good night to Moncho outside of the bar, three more people rode by us. That's not including the increasing number of bikes you see chained to posts and fences around town.

Slowly but surely....I don't want to say that we're winning, but at least I'm not getting the weird-ass looks I used to any more....

The Website is on its way!!!!
Mood:  happy
Topic: Planning!
Oh joy! It's finally happening! The Spanish Cyclepaths website is now a done deal!

Graphic master Moncho Davila has worked his wonders to create a website that's cool, efficient and stylist - not to mention informative! So we've purchased the domain name, are in the process of putting all the stuff together and will have the brand new, improved SPANISH CYCLEPATHS 3.0 up and going as of the first of March.

This is sooooo exciting!!!

Three cheers for the suburbs!
Mood:  hug me
Topic: Ruminations
Three cheers for Arroyomolinos!

Okay, if you've never been to Spain, you've probably never heard of Arroyomolinos. It's a suburb-commuter town located about twenty kilometres south-west of Madrid. I don't really know how many people live there - technically, it's probably a part of the city of Mostoles - but I want to give them a quick tip of the helmet for having inaugurated twenty-two kilometres of bike lanes throughout the town.

Given, twenty-two klicks doesn't sounds like a lot, but given that we're talking about a place that doesn't even have ten thousand residents. However, that just might make them the community in Spain with the most kilometres of bike lanes per capita.

Three cheers for small towns!

Madrid, get your act together already!!!!!!

TRUCKIN' WITH TRANSHUMANCE
Mood:  bright
Topic: Ruminations
Sunday's sight of the day: Sight of the Day: The annual transhumance (sheep movin' parade) march took place through the center of Madrid, and not a moment too soon. Shepherds were worried that spending a week in the Casa de Campo, surrounded by Nigerian prostitutes would be detrimental to the health of the flock, as some sheep - wait for it - had taken to eating prophylactics left by the sex trade workers. (And they wonder where Almodovar comes up with his material...I tell you, folks, you cannot make this stuff up....)

Were the sheep cute? Yes, especially when they jumped the police barricades to get at the flower beds. (Spanish to the core, these sheep! Tell 'em not to, and they're THERE!) But the sheep have relatively little to do with the entire merino culture: the pendones, teams of standard-bearers who carry 15-meter high staffs bearing damascene silk banners, were far more interesting and, frankly, were having a lot more fun. Ditto for the Maragatos, descendants of Moorish horse traders from north-west Leon province. True, most of those dressed as Maragatos probably don't still live in the region, and I'm willing to wager that 80% haven't been near a horse in their lives. But it's exciting to see that they're willing to dedicate time to preserving the culture of their region. Other Spaniards may be embarrassed at what they see as provincialism; for a foreigner, it's a singular opportunity to witness a part of Spanish culture that doesn't come to Madrid very often.

And what about the sheep? Odds have it that they'll spend their winter away from the sex trade workers, in a specially enclosed area in the Casa de Campo park; when March comes, they'll start the long march back up to Leon and Asturias.

Sundays are BETTER ON A BIKE
Just in case some of you have come directly to the blog without going through the Spanish Cyclepaths webpage, this is a quick reminder that the MEJOR CONBICI bike ride is this Sunday.

MEJOR CONBICI is a new initiative to promote bicycles as a form of urban transit. Sponsored by ConBici (www.conbici.org) and the Ministry of the Environment (www.mma.es), the initiative (www.mejorconbici.com - website in Spanish only, still under construction) to get people moving on their bikes. The number of participating cities has increased - Santiago de Compostela is finally on board, which only makes sense when you think about how many people are doing the Camino de Santiago on bikes because, let's face, who the hell can afford 35 days of walking in this day and age?

I don't know about other cities, but in Madrid, the ride will get underway about 12ish (this is Spain, after all), in front of or near the Jardin Botanico, to the immediate south of the Prado Museum, just south of the Museo del Prado. Weather forecast is clear but slightly nippy. Enjoy!!