Science et Avenir wrote an article about why we should cycle as much as the dutch. They think that we should cycle instead of taking the car for short journeys. I disagree. For me, if a distance is less than three kilometres then it can be done in half an hour or less, on foot, and even less if we run.

The thing about bicycles, is that they don’t mean that people are more sporty. Most are not cycling 25km twice per day. They’re riding their bike to the pub, or the train station or the shops, and then back, because they’re too lazy to walk, rather than because they want to do sports. That’s why they want to dress normally, and arrive with their hair perfectly coiffed, rather than ruined by a helmet.

For years I was very happy with Audible, until it was bought by Amazon, and then I felt the desire to move away because I didn’t want to feed a monopoly. It is through my desire to break free from Audible that I began to experiment with stripping DRM from books, first so that I could listen on more devices, but also so that if, for any reason, Amazon, and Audible, went bankrupt I wouldn’t lose my library of books.

Normally there is water where I walked yesterday. At first I walked along the stones, where it was dry. After a moment I decided to take off my shoes and begin to walk through the mud and sediment. In so doing my feet sank as deep as my ankles. The mud felt soft and squelchy, and cold.

I removed my shoes because I was wearing my cycling shoes, and because I have speedplay clips I didn’t want to get them filled with mud, which I would then have to make an effort to remove.

Yesterday I ran from Morat to Fribourg in a race with 17,000 other people. One of them was wearing a 34kg suit of armour. Most were in shorts and t-shirts as you’d expect. The challenge for me, wasn’t to race. It was to run the distance, without exhausting myself, without pain, and without pushing myself to the limit.

This is a success because less than a year ago if I ran 200m my knees hurt, so gradually I built up my stamina, until I reached 5km and more with time. In so doing I gave my body time to adapt to the stress of running, reducing the likelihood of injury and more.

It is amusing that I would be nervous about a linear path that goes from A to B. I am nervous because I haven’t had the race experience yet, although in recent weeks I have experienced two triathlons, once walking, the second as a volunteer, and I experienced a crtiérium a week or so ago. In effect I’ve been in a race context multiple times in the last month.

What I haven’t experienced is a social run that is a race. I’ve done three or four Wake Up and Runs by now, so I am used to these. With the Wake Up and Run I ran solo in Nyon, and with someone else in Morges.

On Sunday I will be running 17km in a running event. My goal isn’t to be fast. My goal is to run 17km without getting exhausted, and without suffering too much.

Two or three weeks ago I ran a social 18km or so and I felt fine at the start but as people picked up the pace, and I started to get fatigued, especially when it flattened out I started to suffer with the pace.

In an ideal world, we step out of our home and we go for a walk, like they did in The Last of the Summer Wine, and we socialise, and see local people. During the pandemic we could step out of the house, and go for a walk, without worrying about traffic, and without automatically taking the car.

When lockdowns ended, and the dependence on cars came back, so the local walk was degraded by the increasing frequency of car use. Eventually rural roads along secondary paths became unpleasant so new routes had to be found.

When I was at university the second time, as a mature student I estimated that my social network was around 600 people deep. In light of this it seems absurd that I hooked on to Facebook and Twitter at the same time. Why would it make sense to hook on to both of these technologies when I was already surrounded by people.

It’s even more surprising, given that Twitter came out in 2006, and I had already been at uni for at least two years. Of course it helped that I was at uni when Facebook was still new and exciting because I was in the prime social situation for it to be relevant. If I had been in the world of work instead, then it’s likely I would have ignored FB and Twitter.

Yesterday I was struck by a paradoxical site. An Autumnal looking stream that has practically dried up. A week ago the river could be seen, and the rocks, and stones. Last night, during a group run what I saw was yellow leaves sitting on still water, with no water flowing.

Water is still pooled in certain spots but it is still so dry, with no rain, no fog, and barely any clouds, that this Autumn feels like Summer. It’s warm enough to wear shorts and t-shirts. Some people still cover up, but you don’t need to. Summer isn’t finished yet.

In recent weeks I volunteered at two events. The Triathlon de Divonne and the Critérium de Céligny. At both events there is a social need that people need to be made aware of. That social need is for people to volunteer at sporting events, not just participate. The Course de l’éscalade is 42 CHF and the Triathlon de Nyon is 110+ CHF. The Critérium was a reasonable 20 CHF for people to participate. I don’t know the price for the Triathlon de Divonne.