Month: March 2008

Pain in my ass

At five to six last night, while Karen, Bernard and I were having dinner (well, technically Karen and I were looking at our empty plates while Bernard very slowly polished off his chilli con carne) I sat up straight and clicked my fingers.

*Darn it, I forgot to go out for my bike ride this weekend.*

Karen looked at me like a cat.

*Or did I? I could squeeze it in after dinner.*

Karen cocked her head.

“You could go out right now, if you want, ” she said, gesticulating at Bernard’s plate.

Long story short, I did. Findings:

1. It wasn’t too cold at all. Long-sleeved t-shirt and shorts were adequate.
2. It wasn’t too dark either. It was getting a bit dark by the end of my half hour ride, but I’m cool with that.
3. The track through the woods wasn’t too wet (though obviously today’s rain will have seen to that).
4. Bike is in fine condition. One of my front lights might need new batteries, but I have no shortage of front lights, nor do I have a shortage of spare batteries.
5. I am not in terribly good condition, endurance-wise, but hopefully a few weeks will sort that out.
6. Ow my arse hurts. Another thing that you get used to.
7. My new gloves are awesome.

I would have cycled to work today, but I was put off by the gale force winds and heavy rain, which you may have noticed.

So, looks like there’ll be no cycling to work this week. Maybe next week. We’ve made progress, at least.

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Gaming

When did I stop enjoying computer games?

Okay, perhaps I’m being a bit melodramatic, but I feel like there’s been a shift of some sort.

I used to play games all the time. I liked racing games (eg Gran Turismo, Midnight Club), action games (eg GTA, Hitman, The Getaway), survival horrors (Silent Hill, Resident Evil), adventure games (Tomb Raider), FPSs (Half Life, Max Payne) and text-based online RPGs (Urban Dead, Nexus War). Quite a wide variety, really.

But these days I find playing games to be quite an unfulfilling experience. I’m playing a little Tomb Raider lately, it’s true, and I have picked up the controller to play Gran Turismo 3 (to unlock more of the arcade mode tracks) but for the most part, I find that the most enjoyable part of the gameplaying experience is the relief that I feel when I finally turn the bloody thing off.

The advantage of this is that I can make a single game last me for many, many months (I’ve had my PlayStation 2 for more than 5 years, and I still only own 9 games for it, 4 of which I have completed in their single player mode. I’ve also rented a few games over the years, but that still only bumps the total up to 12, and I’m not sure if that counts because each one only occupied one weekend. So gaming is not an expensive habit, for me.

I’m not really sad to find myself in this situation. Gaming was never exactly a passion of mine, just something that I enjoyed doing.

Y’know, maybe I’m just overthinking it. Maybe I enjoy gaming as much as I ever did, but excessive introspection is just highlighting the cracks. That aside, the facts don’t lie: whereas I could once play a game for six hours at a time, I now get bored after half an hour. No bad thing, you might say. I’d be inclined to agree.

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Meander

Evenings

As I may have mentioned before, my wife likes to go to bed at about 10pm. For the most part, I am happy to stay up a bit later.

Recently, I have been finding that one of the following things happens:

1. At 10pm, she goes to bed. I’m tired too, so I go to bed as well.
2. At 10pm, she goes to bed. I can’t think of anything important that needs doing, so I figure that I might as well get a bit of extra sleep too.
3. At 10pm, she goes to bed. I’m not ready to go to bed yet, so I kill a bit of time before going to bed at 11pm. Last night, for instance, I fiddled about with the oven timer and then played Gran Turismo 3 for half an hour.
4. At 10pm, she goes to bed. I fancy watching a film, so I do that, and join her at midnight.

I remember how I used to have all sorts of interesting projects on the go, and would beaver away industriously until midnight or 1am, before finally, reluctantly, retiring to bed. But I don’t seem to have any such project happening right now. Also, whereas once I would happily spod for hours, I no longer gain pleasure from twiddling my e-thumbs. Which is why I find myself at 10pm with no appealing options, other than “get some sleep”.

I’m old, boring, and curmudgeonly.

A curmudgeon with an Oxford comma, mind.

Uphill

Any day now, I’m going to resume cycling to work. Aaaany day now.

It’s difficult to overcome the inertia that has accumulated since mid-November. I know how much I will enjoy the cycling, once I finally pull myself together and do it, but I don’t want to commit to the 10 mile round trip until I’ve been out for a brief ride to check that (a) it’s not bollock-shatteringly cold and (b) the bike hasn’t suffered some catastrophic failure over the winter, for instance, mice knawing through the brake cables. Right now, I’m failing to escape the draw of the cosy warm automobile.

I’ve got gloves. Bernard bought them for me for Christmas, and I’ve only had one or two opportunities to use them so far. Instead of wearing a pair of crumbling wool gloves (which have acquired holes at the tips of the fingers, and are probably destined for the bin) I’ll be wearing a proper pair of cycling gloves, with textured palms that allow me to actually operate that bloody twist-grip gear change system when it’s raining, instead of having to give up and ride home in whatever gear I’ve found myself in.

There’s more light right now than there was when I packed the bike away in November. The sunset was at about 4pm then, and it’s at nearly 6pm now (and at the end of the month, it will be at 7:30pm, of course). So light is no excuse.

Cold and wet, however, are. Oh, and laziness. Don’t forget the laziness.

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