Thursday, 27 January 2011

Minä ja Masa

Ollaanko me yhdessä kaksikko, vai kahdestaan yksikkö? Mene ja tiedä, mutta meillä on varsin tunnepitoinen ja jopa, sanotaanko, impulsiivinen suhde. Kaikkihan tietää, että joka suhteella on omat ristiaallokkonsa – niin myös meillä. Meidän yhteiselosta ei jokatapauksessa puutu mitään mitä Churchill tai joku muu hurja oisi halunnut tarjota valtakunnalleen; verta, hikeä tai kyyneleitä.

Välillä mä rangon Masaa niin, että ulina vaan kuuluu ja taas toisin päin. Tälläkin viikolla haukoin happea lattialla oksennusämpäri kainalossa pitkälläni koettuani masan intensiivikäsittelyn. Ei siihe mennyt kun neljä minuuttia ja mä olin kanveesissa. Ei o elämä helppoa ei. Ja onpa meillä hiivuttavan tuskaisen pitkiäkin sessioita ollut, ja yleensä niissä se on Masa, joka on last man standing. No se tästä puolesta.

Onpa meillä myös yhteisiä harrastuksia; me katotaan leffoja yhdessä, kuunnellaan musiikkia ja kuntoillaan. Masa on keskimäärin suht meluisa, mutta auta armias jos sitä polkasee ihan kunnolla – siitä se mekkala vasta syntyykin. Toisaalta hei, aina välillä on koeteltava rajoja. Leffa ja musiikki maku meillä on aikalailla sama, eikä sillä saralla kumpikaan pahemmin poraa. Mutta osaa se olla vaativakin kumppani; päivinä joina mä oon ihan vetämättömissä se huikkailee ja kurkkii omalta paikaltaan ja kutsuu ratsastamaan ja mä vaan en jaksa! Yleensä siitä seuraa pieni murjotus ja seuraavana päivänä allekirjoittanut saa taas kyytiä – oli sessiot pitkiä ja hiivuttavia taikka lyhyitä ja intensiivisiä.

Joka tapauksessa mä oon sitä mieltä, että me ollaan kahdestaan yksikkö. Minä ja Masa, Masa ja minä. Ja nyt viellä selvennyksenä, jos se nyt kellekkään epäselvää oli että kyseessä on keittiön nurkassa torottava Wattbike, jonka nimi nyt vaan sattuu olemaan Masa.

Ajatuksen riemuvoitto tämäkin. Ei anneta sen kuitenkaan häiritä. Kiitos kuuluu euforiselle tabatasessiolle ja sen jälkihuuruille. Sekä Oskarille: ”Ilman sua mä en olis tässä”


Thursday, 20 January 2011

Forced to rest.

Well, yes. I've been off training last week due to flu, cold or illness – you name it. Frustrating, but not that bad, I'd say. But always look at the bright side of life, ha? It ain't too bad and next thing I'm gonna do is to jump on Wattbike and get gently started again.

Still, I managed to do loads of things during these days. I wrote essays, log books, coaching plans and so on. So uni things took a major step forward, and to be honest I really enjoyed most of the work, although writing reflective log considering events 30 days ago may not make that much sense. Yes, mom, I should have done it back then, but it was only one text of five missing!

Anyway, I'm now even ahead in my studies, which is only due to the illness. That just makes things easier for me for future training camps and races. Good times to look forward.

Yerrr, what else? Nothing really. Ordinary life is ordinary, I guess. But it can be made more enjoyable at times, by gettin' foods you miss from home. I've been missing loads of foods, and the I went to Ikea in Cardiff. Kötbullor, tunnbröd, lingonsylt, gräddsås, Singoallas...could be worse, aye? I was just about to go cashiers, but then I spotted something. At first I couldn't believe my eyes, it was just too good to be true. I closed my eyes and opened them again and there they were. Pågenin korvapuusteja, f**k aye!

It is just funny how small things can make your day. Even a normal meal; meatballs, with sauce and mashed potatoes can be it. So be it. It was lush and it reminded me of home at Finland, that was fairly enough.

Good food, sunny day and back on bike. Life is good.

Friday, 14 January 2011

Do I believe that good luck follows bad luck?

Before the dark.

Well, now I better do so. As mentioned before my Xmas break was simply unbelieveable.

It started with amazing week in Les Arcs; France. Six days of full on skiing in perfect conditions. We even had two days of pure powder. I just couldn't believe my luck that, to have two days of 2 feet powder in mid December, is simply amazing. Although nor can I really believe my luck afterwards.

It all came well until we got back to London from France. We were supposed to change buses, but it came out that our bus was still in France so we had to go by ourselves. It was rather fun to rumble around London underground with skis and all. I made it home well anyway. At the same time the luck began to change as my parents were stuck in Helsinki because bloody Heathrow was closed due to severe weather; meaning two inches of snow. In addition to that it was Sat evening and we had flight booked to Canaries Mon morning, so 'no worries' I thought. Their actual flight got cancelled, and their flight on Sunday got cancelled...now we were starting to get into trouble. Luckily they got Easyjet flights to Gatwick at the same day, but that flight was six hours late on Sunday evening. Now we are in deep shit....

Eventually I drove to Gatwick to pick my parents up only to drive straight back to Cardiff airport for the Canaries flight. At what time was I there? 4Am Monday morning! Jeez, five hours to catch the next flight. The 1½ change time for flight had turned out to be 5hrs including 3,5 hour drive. However, the stairs didn't work in Gatwick and we lost another 30mins. 4,5h to go and still in f***ing Gatwick! We hit the road in hurry and all is well again, despite the fact that my peeps were travelling from Helsinki to London for approx 40 hours. Ain't that just great?

We were just in time to make it to Cardiff until.... my car's engine broke. We barely made it back to Newport's Peugeot dealer and first we found out that Cardiff is closed aswell and our car will be fine in 45 mins. And we waited and heard that no, it takes two hours. But no worries, Cardiff is still closed and we got new check-in time. Apparently our car was still in pieces (and is still today) and we got chauffeur from the dealership to take us to airport. But guess what? Oh yes, it started to snow again and our driver was barely able to drop us to my place. Cardiff still closed, but we still have a chance by train, bus or taxi. We just didn't know that neither of them worked that day. Grrrrreat! So we never made our way to Cardiff from Newport in time....

Christmas in Newport was still good time. Actually it was peaceful and reeeeally nice. We had lush dinner and good time with some nice presents. I got a new scarf made by mom. Thanks for that!

At the same time we were struggling with the stupid car and warranties. We had planned to take off to Belgium for another training camp. And I think that now everyone can guess what happened? Ok, we didn't get the car in time and we never made it to Gent either. I continued my training on Wattbike tho. And then it came obvious that warranty and insurance doesn't cover the damage in my car; and it would have cost actually more to repair than to buy a new car. So new car and once again through all the policies and stuff. Now I'm driving almost Jaguar. At least my car is British racing green, but it's not Jaguar really.

What's more? My debit card got closed due to some mistakes not by me and we had to figure out how to pay for the car.

Luckily it all sorted out and I'm back to basics now. Thats about it. And now I really want to believe that good things follow bad. At the end I just wanna quote a bit of Social Distortion:

”Yesterday is history, tomorrow is mystery”


After the dark.

(C) Anton Aro

Monday, 10 January 2011

New year, new tricks.

My best wishes for everyone for the new year ahead!

Everything is good here, despite the rather eventful Christmas break. There was a real streak of unluckyness, although it felt like shit - I can live with it. More about that story later on.

Anyway, it is all good now - back on track. Yes!

My training is goin' really well and there's a good season on the door step.
Stay tuned!

Here are some shots from my training ride 8.1.2010:


Llanhangel Tor-Y-Mynydd

Shirenewton

Llanhangel Tor-Y-Mynydd.

Scenery over Celtic Manor.


Blackened.

(C) Paavo Aro