silly – Page 12 – BrownhillsBob's #365daysofbiking

April 19th – In Darlaston, at the Victoria Road allotments, a salutary warning that they don’t take any shit from officialdom…

I wonder what the poor chap did wrong to merit such a punishment?

April 4th – Birchills, Walsall.

Form an orderly queue, people.

April 4th – An odd day – heavy showers in the morning interspersed with bright, warm sunny periods, and a nightmare, torrential-rain soaked ride home. At lunchtime on an errand from work into Walsall, I have no idea what the pigeon was thinking, but it seemed happy. Walsall dripped, sparkled and glistened, and the swans at Bentley Bridge didn’t seem bothered.

The homeward trip was fun, but very wet. Flash floods hit the main roads and drains blew their covers. It was warm though, so not too bad.

I guess this are April showers, then…

March 21 – The resurfacing of the canal towpath between Walsall town centre and Bentley Mill Way continues apace; I noted today that sections of the route have a newly-laid tarmac surface. It’s a nice job.

I still can’t get my head around this. I’m not ungrateful – I use this route regularly and it’ll be nice to ride – but this money would have been much better elsewhere on the local canal network – like the stretch from Longwood to Rushall Junction or from Goscote to Pelsall.

The Canal and River Trust are beyond my comprehension sometimes.

March 19th – A late ride out to Chasewater, feeling a bit low. Cheered, however, to see the Newtown One, the Papillon of Brownhills, was still evading the attentions of both her mistress and Brer Fox.

Go home, Mrs. Muscovy… there’s free food, other ducks and a warm roost in safety. And the drakes who chased you off are now in the freezer!

March 11th – The Newtown One. Like the Scarlett Pimpernell, they seek her here, they seek her there. Always within snatching distance, but always evading the grasp.

This bird has a safe roost, free food and company back home. But she appears to prefer contemplating silently life’s complexities at the canal side.

The saga continues…

March 8th – All I can say is they must be from outside the borough.

March 3rd – Which one of us. COME ON WHICH ONE?

And who is Peter No-one anyway?

Mrs. Brown you’ve got a beautiful daughter… but I doubt she looks as fresh faced as that after all these years.

February 28th – A duck. On the run.

Mrs. Muscovy, we nearly caught you. So close. Your mum needs you home before Mr. Fox comes calling.

February 10th – Still irritating me is the work to resurface a perfectly decent canal towpath between Walsall Town Centre and Bentley Bridge. Kier, the contractors, are pushing ahead – mainly because they seem to have realised they haven’t much to actually do.

I don’t know who was consulted before the Canal & River Trust decided to undertake this project – it certainly doesn’t appear to have been local cyclists.

Such a waste of money when towpaths in Aldridge and Bloxwich are virtually impassible to all in the winter.