Is it about a bicycle?

Mostly, but quite a lot of other things, some with a bicycle connection and others with none.

We (John and Sheila) live and work (unpaid now we are retired) in Lymington beside the Solent on the southern edge of the New Forest.

Quite a lot of our recreational time was spent walking, locally in and around the New Forest but also climbing into the hills, scrambling along ridges and reaching mountain summits. Cycling was something that we fell into by accident, taking part in the "Gridiron", which is an organised annual cycle ride around the New Forest, and then going for a few days cycle touring (short daily distances) along part of the Sustrans "West Country Way" with some friends who were experienced cyclists. In fact at the time Sheila was still recovering from an illness and ended up driving the support car.

We started out with a Trek mountain bike that John had bought himself some years before as a late 40th birthday present; and Sheila's 'Pink Peril', a very heavy Giant hybrid bike. From there we have progressed to joined-up cycling on a tandem including venturing from two wheels to three... Lots more in BICYCLES.

Cycling co-existed with walking, climbing, cross-country skiing and snow shoeing until the cartilage in one of John's knees decided to wear out. Luckily the no impact rotational action of pedalling is still OK and tandem touring has now been extended to include mountains and Cols so as to still take us by human power into high places.

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I walked straight up to the door and looked in.
I saw, standing with his back to me,
an enormous policeman
'Is it about a bicycle?'  he asked.

The Third Policeman written by Flann O'Brien in 1939 and and published after his death in 1967
Even with Ullysses and Finnegan's Wake behind him, James Joyce might have been envious
More quotes on other pages - Find out about bicycles and the atomic theory and who is the 3rd policeman?

.....MORE (and less)

His expression when I encountered it was unexpectedly reassuring. His face was gross and far from beautiful but he had modified and assembled his various unpleasant features in some skilful way so that they expressed to me good nature, politeness and infinite patience. In the front of his peaked official cap was an important-looking badge and over it in golden letters was the word SERGEANT. It was Sergeant Pluck himself.
' No,' I answered, stretching forth my hand to lean with it against the counter. The Sergeant looked at me incredulously.
' Are you sure?' he asked.
' Certain.'
' Not about a motor-cycle?'
' No.'
' One with overhead valves and a dynamo for light? Or with racing handle-bars?'
' No.'
' In that circumstantial eventuality there can be no question of a motor-bicycle,' he said. He looked surprised and puzzled and leaned sideways on the counter on the prop of his left elbow, putting the knuckles of his right hand between his yellow teeth and raising three enormous wrinkles of perplexity on his forehead. I decided now that he was a simple man and that I would have no difficulty in dealing with him exactly as I desired. I did not understand clearly the reason for his questions about bicycles but I made up my mind to answer everything carefully, to bide my time and to be cunning in all my dealings with him. He moved away abstractedly, came back and handed me a bundle of differently-coloured papers which looked like application forms for bull-licences and dog-licences and the like.
' It would be no harm if you filled up these forms,' he said. ' Tell me,' he continued, ' would it be true that you are an itinerant dentist and that you came on a tricycle?'
' It would not,' I replied.
' On a patent tandem?'
' No.'
' Dentists are an unpredictable coterie of people,' he said. ' Do you tell me it was a velocipede or a penny-farthing?'
' I do not,' I said evenly. He gave me a long searching look as if to see whether I was serious in what I was saying, again wrinkling up his brow.
' Then maybe you are no dentist at all,' he said, ' but only a man after a dog licence or papers for a bull?'
' I did not say I was a dentist,' I said sharply,' and I did not say anything about a bull.'
The Sergeant looked at me incredulously.
' That is a great curiosity,' he said, ' a very difficult piece of puzzledom, a snorter.'
He sat down by the turf fire and began jawing his knuckles and giving me sharp glances from under his bushy brows. If I had horns upon my head or a tail behind me he could not have looked at me with more interest. I was unwilling to give any lead to the direction of the talk and there was complete silence for five minutes. Then his expression eased a bit and he spoke to me again.
' What is your pronoun ?' he inquired.
' I have no pronoun,' I answered, hoping I knew his meaning.
' What is your cog?'
'My cog?'
'Your surnoun?'
' I have not got that either.'
My reply again surprised him and also seemed to please him. He raised his thick eyebrows and changed his face into what could be described as a smile. He came back to the counter, put out his enormous hand, took mine in it and shook it warmly.
' No name or no idea of your originality at all?'
' None.'
' By the holy Irish-American Powers,' he said again, ' by the Dad! Well carry me back to old Kentucky!'
He then retreated from the counter to his chair by the fire and sat silently bent in thought as if examining one by one the by-gone years stored up in his memory.
' I was once acquainted with a tall man, ' he said to me at last', that had no name either and you are certain to be his son and the heir to his nullity and all his nothings. What way is your pop today and where is he?'
It was not, I thought, entirely unreasonable that the son of a man who had no name should have no name also but it was clear that the Sergeant was confusing me with somebody else. This was no harm and I decided to encourage him.
' He is gone to America,' I replied.
' Is that where,' said the Sergeant. ' Do you tell me that? He was a true family husband. The last time I interviewed him it was about a missing pump and he had a wife and ten sonnies and at that time he had the wife again in a very advanced state of sexuality.'
' That was me,' I said, smiling.
' That was you,' he agreed. ' What way are the ten strong sons?'
' All gone to America.'
' That is a great conundrum of a country,' said the Sergeant, ' a very wide territory, a place occupied by black men and strangers. I am told they are very fond of shooting matches in that quarter.'
' It is a queer land,' I said. At this stage there were footsteps at the door and in marched a heavy policeman carrying a small constabulary lamp.
' Policeman MacCruiskeen,' said Sergeant Pluck.
Policeman MacCruiskeen put the lamp on the table, shook hands with me and gave me the time of day with great gravity. His voice was high, almost feminine, and he spoke with a delicate careful intonation. Then he put the lamp on the counter and surveyed the two of us.
'Is it about a bicycle?' he asked.

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Content and images copyright J&S Ward