Country visits, mile ready and soggy humiliation

Country visits
Excitement mounts as the BlackLOG country counter shows 100 different countries have visited, French Polynesia being the 100th. I'm not sure on the Blogging protocol for the 100th country. Do I send them a congratulations note or a reprimand for taking so long to find me?

It might not mean a lot to you bloggers who get visits from a 100 different countries a day but it means a lot to me. Although it would have been nice if it had been a bit more exciting than French Polynesia. Other than having a name like a Gallic parrot leg complaint, it has a population of just 287,032 and is actually counted as being "overseas lands of France" - so not a country at all....Oh my, this really hasn't gone to plan, a bit like aiming for the stars and ending up hitting a low hanging branch from one of next door's trees.....

With this milestone out of the way I decided to see how far I had to go to get the full set of countries. This turned out to be a more difficult task than one would have thought. Depending on the source you use and your definition of a country there is a mixed opinion on how many countries there are in the world. The numbers that I came across ranged from 194 to 201. I found some interesting facts along the way :-

• England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland do not count as countries in their own right but as one under the banner of the United Kingdom (possibly not so united with a fair few Scots clamouring to be let off at the next pub and left to govern themselves). Well that's 4 potential visits reduced to 1 that I've lost out on....
• Taiwan does not count as an official country (China won't let them come out to play) yet the Vatican City (I'm sad to say that not one of its 826 - July 2009, estimated* - inhabitants could be bothered to drop in), Monaco and San Marino all seem to be classed as countries.....

* China has a population of 1,338,612,968 (July 2009 est.) so you can 1,338,612,977 understand 1,338,612,979 why 1,338,613,014 they 1,338,613,015 would use an 1,338,613,768 estim-1,338,613,846 -ate 1,338,613,969 etc etc....You would however think that the Vatican City could probably go around and just count the number of priests in about half an hour.....

• Interestingly enough the Vatican City has a population growth rate of :- 0.0003% indicating some of those priests are not as celibate as you would have thought - they can't all be Virgin births,can they? Don't get me started on suffrage though, the vote is restricted to males under 80, so much for women's and pensioners' rights....
• My favourite country, that has taken the time to visit, despite not appearing to have had time to register, is the "Unknown European Union".
• A big hand to the one person from China who managed to break out of their heavily state controlled environment to make it to the BlackLOG - I can't help but think it may not have been worth them risking their life and/or liberty. You can imagine their disappointment if the BlackLOG was all they managed to find in the world beyond the red walls, probably not enough to sustain them during the rest of their life as a political prisoner.....

Mile Ready
I managed to get Mrs B and her new bike past the 1 mile mark - so I guess she can now wear her "mile ready" badge with pride (apologies this is a UK related in-joke and may not translate outside of these borders. In fact, it probably doesn't even translate within these borders but what the heck?). It was nice to get out into fresh, warm air, with no real drama for once. Well, other than I managed to lose the magnet on my Cadence device (a device for counting the number of times the pedals go around RPM - Revolutions Per Minute) .

I'm not exactly sure what all this means other than it is a gadget - I am not afraid to admit I am a gadget whore - and Lance Armstrong swears by them...or is it at them.....? It was working perfectly** except (sorry, I'm going to get a bit technical here) rather than the thingy gliding effortlessly past the other thingy they in fact knocked into each other, making a sound like rampant grasshoppers shagging each other's brains out.

I soon discovered that Cadence counting was not designed to be a contact sport. After about 2 miles the magnet ejaculated (sorry could not think of a better, or more appropriate, word) itself off the bike. By the time I had worked out why the Cadence device had stopped working the magnet was long gone, probably making its way on an epic solo journey to the magnetic north pole....

We returned home after 25 miles and a rather welcome  lunch at the Axe  & Compass. Mrs B reported that she likes the new road bike and certainly managed the hills much better then on the off roader.  I wonder if it might be a bit premature to sign up for next years Tour De France.....

** A sure sign something is about to go horrifically wrong***

*** Which is no problem, just an indication that the world is working perfectly**** as it should, just ask Murphy and Sod....

**** Only that means it is probably about to go Pete Tong.... Good example of this was the dinosaurs, they just got the world as they wanted, so ordered a meteor shower to celebrate. (Don't forget these are dinosaurs and they didn't have long enough arms to operate fireworks safely.) One meteorite goes off track and with no Bruce Willis to save them. Wham! Dino and buddies were consigned to the history books.... Just as well really, man would probably have hunted them to extinction anyway.

Mrs B - Mile ready

Proof that Mrs B can do more than just hold the bike....

Photoshop is wonderful - you can't even see a trace

of the stabilisers on the bike ..

Does my bike look big in this......????

Complete and utter humiliation at the hands of pensioners' and some water
Having regularly been able to swim a mile at a time,  I foolishly allowed my friend Kirsty to talk me into coming along to "Swim Club".

The first rule of Swim Club - "You don't talk about Swim Club" but since I won't, can't, go back to swim club I'm going to peel back the pool cover and divulge all.....

Mrs B had warned me against it but male pride got the better of me and I turned up in my best budgie smugglers for stream-lining purposes.

There were three lanes to choose from :

• Fast;
• Medium; and
• Retard.

Decisions, decisions. Fortunately I thought it would be a good idea to get warmed up and so selected the Retard lane, joining the subdued looking pensioners floating listlessly at end of the pool. I had barely hit the water before they were off and I discovered my mile swimming pace was not going to cut the mustard. I set off in hot pursuit and just 8 lengths in I was gasping for breath and only just about holding my own.

As the session went on my fellow laners seemed to get faster and faster. To make it worse they had more wrinkles then your average elephant so could hardly be described as stream-lined. Then it dawned on me, once their wrinkles went wrinkly in the water they probably became super stream-lined. I never stood a chance.

I soldiered on for a bit but soon I was regularly being lapped . I think at one point "Eric the Eel" may have powered past me, leaving me bobbing in his wake. Oh the shame..... Eventually cramp came to my aid and I managed to slink out of the session with my pride in tatters and my virtual tail well and truly between my legs .....

For the record ex-swim captain - Kirsty uses the Medium lane, while boyfriend Joe, who is not particularly swim orientated, turned up and decided to go in the fast lane. He was not asked to leave and
in-between my bouts of attempting to drown myself, Joe appeared to be holding his own - Kirsty was not amused....

Mrs B's sympathetic response was "I told you so......" My plans for Olympic swim glory at London 2012 are currently on hold....

The last rule of Swim Club - "Never mention Swim Club again....... ever...."

Kirsty - Kind to small animals but not so kind to me....

Joe - "More carbs please, I've got

to keep up in the fast lane...."

McG joins me in the humiliation club
I'm not the only one who had a bad week. McG attempted to launch himself from the floor onto our bed, the other night, a height of no more than around three feet. I woke with a start to find McG's eyeballs staring wildly at me, his teeth fixed in a steely and determined grin, as he clung desperately to the side of the mattress.

We made the mistake of clipping his claws as a kitten, to stop him doing any damage around the house, ever since he has had a problem retracting his claws. (Although that is true about the clipped claws, I believe McG is really a crap cat, a special needs cat if you like. When cat abilities were being handed out he was either snoozing or got in the wrong queue and ended up with dog-like abilities to eat. But we love him even more for it).

Eventually I had to reach over and help him scrabble up.... not a very dignified position for a cat to find himself in.... he then attempted to do that - "I'm washing myself, do not disturb" - thing that cats do, but he over reached and flopped off the side of the bed.....His slink out of the room was very similar to my slink out of Swim Club - McG, believe me buddy, I truly feel your pain....

The first rule of Humiliation Club "Learn the art of slinking away unnoticed"

McG "Back off, I'm washing myself

- No humiliation here....."