4th Place

Thursday is the new Friday; practically a half day for me; I get to drop the older son at school, and generally finish around 4 and get the bike out, trek up to the nursery, collect Alex, stick him in the child seat, pedal furiously east thru' da 'hood to Tom's ASC and then slowly wind our way past Neill's bike shop, Scotmid for milk, then down the hill and in.

Boys stay the night, so I feel secure that they are sleeping soundly, happy, warm, clean, fed.

But the best bit of today? Working from home again, the sun was beating down most of the day. Nightmare start in that it took me over an hour to get my first piece of work done today (daily target? - 25....) So by lunchtime I had caught up but to get there I'd been suitably annoyed by a senior manager. 1215, and I'm in lycra, gloves, helmet and Bolle sunglasses. My aim? To hammer on the pedals of my road bike to a mantra / curse of S**** F****** A*****.

The road from my house to Cramond Island is pancake flat - it gets to the giddy height of 3 metres above sea level and plummets all the way to - sea level.

Head wind out, so stuck the bike on the smaller chain ring and worked it hard on the outward leg. Views over the Firth of Forth were so good I forgot all about my mantra of hatred and ire.

And I got to the River Almond and instinctively turned right and down onto the causeway and out to Cramond Island.

Out amongst the bird life, catching the wind which once you break out from land is stiff. And out to the island, couple of pics and back.

The return leg was a blast; topping 30mph easily; a bit of dog dodging but home, sweaty alive alert.

Stripped down a few layers and back to work, eventually battered through enough work to justify 10 minutes out to make tea and buttered slices of toast with poached eggs and a slice of ham.

Simple lovely lunch., Simple lovely lunchtime.

Photo is at the start of the causeway out to Cramond Island; blues aplenty, elemental, shadows, light.

And I had Strava running; 4th fastest Island to Shore time recorded. Had I know it was a segment I might have tried harder!!!!