Finishing Early
A little after 2:30pm the phone rang on my desk at work. I picked up pretty much staight away, and stumbled over saying good morning, or good afternoon – still trying to decide which as I began talking. My other half's voice was on the other end.
“Can you go and pick Miss 12 up from school? She's in the nurses office”
And so it was that I shut my computer down, took a swig of coffee that one of my co-workers had just made for me, ducked my head into a couple of offices to let them know where I was going, and climbed back aboard the bike to hurtle through town at about the same speed as I ever go – having a single speed bike is still a novelty.
You can't really rush anywhere on a single-speed bike. Actually, I suppose you could, but you would end up dizzy from spinning the pedals ridiculously fast. A part of my route across town takes you up several hundred yards of continual gradient, and served as the first real “hill” I've done on the new bike. Of course I flew up it. You don't end up with legs like mine after 15 years of cycling to work without being able to unlock the odd special ability...
On-route to the school I figured I was going to arrive perhaps 15 minutes before they let the rest of the kids go anyway, and almost laughed out loud. Our middle girl has never been the craftiest kid – she claimed sickness halfway through the last lesson, rather than half-way through the day – so by the time I arrived to collect her, she only got out of perhaps 15 minutes of school. I guess she might actually be sick, but given that she walked home and chatted with me most of the way, I suspect she's not THAT bad.
So anyway... Here I am again. Sitting in the study at home, half keeping an eye on her, and half doing chores. I guess writing a blog post doesn't really qualify as a chore, does it... oh well.