Well, that was all jolly splendid!
Friday saw the arrival of Brummies - I had been given an insight into their geo-location en route via the magic of the interwebz so Nikki did comment that it was quite fun having an extra, invisible, friend in the car as I occasionally texted them messages such as 'woo, over 100km/h' and 'don't forget to wave in the direction of joglerville!'. Curry was ordered and consumed, some bike jenga carried out to fit the various steeds into the Den and EldestCub's bike fettled by Kim. Very traditional. We didn't actually get around to starting to tat up the bikes til well after midnight which, given how knackered and lurgied everyone was, might (in hindsight) have been a mistake. Saturday morning found some of us in particular a bit bleary and blurry.
The Cubs got themselves up and breakfasted and woke up Nikki on the sofa. Kim and Natalya were booting when I wandered downstairs and had decided, despite lurgies and tiredness, to head to the reading cafe and see how it went. So the Christmas wrapped electrons were applied to the trike
and the SmallestCub cast a 'spell' to protect Nikki's balloons
and off they went.
The Cubs and I then got ready and headed, taking the Eldest's Islabike with us, to the Smallest's school, where their karate grading was happening. Smallest was training and being assessed for his red belt, and theoretically the Eldest was hoping to be allowed to do his half-purple belt - which is the kata-only elements of the purple belt.
Nearly 4 hours of training followed, with me ducking out after the 10 minute lunch break to head home and collect the tandem. The advantage of working at the school - when I got back I didn't need to lock it up, I just let myself in the code-locked back door and wheeled it in
Got back in time to see the Cubs' gradings too - Smallest was looking good, Eldest confused me by being in a grading group with the half-purples and the very committed hard working blue belt kid who had been told he was skipping the half purple stage (which the club invented to get a group of relatively young students who all started together and progresssed relatively quickly to that stage, where it starts to get harder, through the well-known 'blue belt blues'). And he stayed with them as they demonstrated all the techniques and combinations. How odd. Turns out that the senior instructor had decided on the day that he could try for the full belt! Fingers crossed for them both - we might find out on Monday.
Then the already fairly tired boys got changed into more-approriate-for-cycling-kit and we extracted the tandem from the corner I'd parked it in. Chandhu the assistant site manager, who has heard quite a bit about our new purchase, asked if you can ride it with one person on and upon hearing the answer, asked if he could have a turn. And disappeared out of the car park saying 'see you next week!' although we actually found him round the front where the EldestCub was unlocking his bike, and Chandhu's wife was admiring our Shinies.
Panniers on, fairy lights switched on, and off we went to find CrinklyUncle and CrinkyAuntie at the lights at the end of Hospital Fields Road. They had tinsel and jingle bells and a secret weapon yet to be revealed...
On through Fulford, right at Naburn Lane, past the stinky poo farm to the tune of Cubs singing "Jingle Bells, Something Smells!" and me pointing out that the faster you pedal the quicker you get past it leading to a marked increase in power from the back and hitting about 13mph. Shortly after, at the dip under the bridge, we managed 15! I wouldn't have dared that on the tagalong. In Naburn it was a right turn at the rather good Christmas tree, avoid the village pensioners who had just been to the pub for their Christmas Dinner and pull up into the bike parking where we discovered that the other were already in attendance.
We found the people who had actually been for a ride installed in our reserved prime spot near the fire again, although there was a family sorting themselves out into one half of the space. When they realised that we had all the tables booked they started to move but given how absolutely fascinated the little girl was by the open fire and the fact that we could sensibly fit onto three of our four tables and still have some elbow space that felt very mean, and we persuaded them that we really didn't mind them staying. Oh, and CrinkyUncle revealed his secret weapon - the Best Christmas Jumper. Perhaps we need a new award...
Drinks, including sparkly ones, were ordered and menus perused. Barakta was suffering with, I think, the particularly nasty combination of still being lurgied, having had a busy few weeks at work, a long journey in a car, a late night, an early start, and having got cold which all added up to an evening of noise and chatter in the pub being somewhat suboptimal so she and Kim decided to make an early break for the relative calm of the Den and, with some trepidation given her history of doing so, Kim took my house keys. I'm quite proud that I remembered to extract the bike keys first!
The little girl mentioned earlier also decided she was quite fascinated with us as well as the fire and went around demanding introductions and handshakes and generally being cute. Food arrived and she was also quite interested in that!
There was spam fritters
and burgers
and chilli
and fish and chips
and half pizzas
_Some_ people even managed to find room for pudding. I have no idea how. Then out came the Hat. A few contenders tried it for size...
Including the current postholder...
Since the EldestCub had decided not to bling up his bike this year, we decided he could probably be the judge. And had to wear the hat whilst judging.
Fairy lights were switched on, jingle bells rattled, playlists queued up. It was a tough decision.... but it appears that Sherrif of Christmas is to be a job share role this year, since the fiber optic Christmas Tree swung it and m'stoker and me were awarded the prize!
Then a bimble back via the planets so the Sun, where we waved goodbye to Interzen and the Christmas Crustacean and headed to the racecourse. SmallestCub pointed out the the jingle of CrinklyAuntie's bells made a great advance warning of the bumpy bits and was how he knew it would be the rattly racecourse covers... "No treacle of Doom!", as he shouted. The silly sutrans gates were fiddly and needed a foot down but no dismount. Through the insanely busy corner near the racecourse and then we waved goodbye to CrinklyUncle and Auntie before hitting Bish Road and heading over the bridge, along the river path and so Denwards for choclate and warm baths and TEA and nattering.
Quite chuffed that with a knackered sleep-deprived and not very well pilot and a stoker who had done 4 hours of karate training before the 10 mile round trip we still managed to hit 13mph on the flat along the river...
