travelling in style

i bought a bike a couple of weeks ago. bored with buses in the heatwave i decided bikes were the future. and it's not just any bike, it's a beautiful, old fashioned town bike with curved handlebars, a wicker basket and a bell. i love it.

it's not a bike for donning a lycra catsuit and zooming along at the speed of light to get in your cardio for the week. this is a bike for gracefully meandering down winding lanes with the breeze blowing in your hair. i felt that i could not help but look graceful and elegant on this bike. i failed to take a couple of things into account...

the first is that i'm chronically unfit, that even a five minute ride to the supermarket leaves me the colour of a beetroot and sweating in places that i wasn't even aware i had (i know that girls are not supposed to sweat, we 'glow', but after pedalling ferociously for more than 60 seconds, there's no way you could say i 'glow').

the second thing is 'helmet hair'. normally i have fab hair. i looked like a experiment in blindfold hairdressing for about 20 years until i discovered my gorgeous hairdresser and now my hair is ace. people are always commenting on it. it's my thing. it is however, not the kind of hair that fairs well under a helmet and i do tend to end up looking like the wicked witch of the west.

however, my piece de résistance came the other day when cycling to a friend's house. in an attempt to distract people from my red shiny face and eccentric hair i was wearing a gorgeous floaty dress that i felt complimented the old school style of the bike. having not yet mastered the art of cycling in heals however, i was still wearing my all stars. i can now say with some authority that a loose, floaty skirt and long trainer laces are perhaps the worst possible things to place near a bike. as i was cycling up a particularly busy road near ealing, my trainer started to feel a little strange. i looked down and saw that with each push the lace was becoming more and more tightly wrapped around the pedal. being on a busy junction i couldn't stop and have the crisis i felt necessary so i tried backpedalling in an attempt to detangle. this would have been great had not the change in motion forced my skirt towards the spokes.

to cut a long story short i wiped out in spectacular style in front of a bus and it's a miracle that i didn't get squished to a pulp

the bike is now sulking as it hasn't been taken out in a week


(i think i may like mr eligible)