Well. So far 2025 had been a bit of a rollercoaster. The year started off pretty well, I suppose. I passed the technical exams I need to resume advancing my career for one. I kind of stumbled into overhauling the hub on my work commuter bike and realised that I could swap the driver with the more modern one on the slightly-younger hub I planned to restore. Which is really nice because it lets me change the sprocket with a newer one with more teeth. So riding to work should be a bit less difficult! Of course it was winter so that work went fairly slowly. My garage is not well insulated, so I'm not able to spend as much time in there as I'd like.
Then in March my family and I went back to Australia for my brother's wedding-party-thing (they eloped) and that was a fantastic time. It was summer down there for one, but fortunately not the insane temperatures they had in January. I even borrowed my brother's bike to do some exploring on two wheels. Perth had a pretty decent long distance bike path network, though at the local scale it varies quite a bit. But I found that the distance between my brother's place and our grandma's house is about the same as the typical distance I tend to ride. So a few times I spent about half an hour making the trip to visit. It was real nice. And far too short a visit. I always manage to forget how much I miss home.
On the way back there was a cyclone on the east coast that crowded us out of our flights back to Canada. We ended up changing to Cathay Pacific and going through Hong Kong. Let me tell you, if you want decent aeroplane food you should fly Cathay. It's really good. Flying through (technically) China also meant we didn't have to go through the USA. Growing up in the 80s and 90s I never thought that it'd feel safer going through China than the US but here we are.
Which of course brings me to the terrifying drop in the rollercoaster ride of 2025. I have quite a few friends down in the US and it has been stressful enough worrying about them. Some are preparing to GTFO, some to fight. Nearly all of them went to the Hands Off protest the other day. And then there's the worry about the 51st state threats. I have even looked into joining the reserves. I doubt they'd want my old arse but desperate times and all that.
On top of that the wife was in a minor car crash made worse by the guy driving off. The insurance took care of it other than making us pay the deductable because they couldn't pin it on anyone. And *then* the new diswasher (to replace the one that died right before we went on holidays) leaked and ruined the kitchen floor. So another insurance hit with deductible but at least they're paying for it other than that.
I just need a nice peaceful summer. Gotta get my bike on the road. Things are better when I can ride my bikes.
Hopefully 2025 doesn't shit the bed completely.
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Actually to end on a positive note I was reading a couple of bikepacking posts from Lettuce over on their gemlog and they were really well written and really got me in the mood to try some longer distance trips this year! The furtherest I've been is 40km in a day (20km out, 20km back). I'd like to see if I can push that this year.
