It's been odd being at home "sick" for two months .
Though I must admit , when the cold snap "snapped" and the local bread shop's display slowly disappeared from view , I was more than happy to sit by the fire and drink my way through an assortment of Kusmi Russian tea that I'd been given for Christmas .
The whole province hummed with excitement as the ice got thicker and thicker and suddenly there was a real chance of an Elfstedentocht . Our back door froze shut , it was even minus 17 Celsius a couple of mornings and every waterway froze ....
The river round the corner was suddenly covered in skaters chatting on mobiles , cyclists , people walking their dogs , a young couple hurtling past having a blazing row , grandmas and babies in pushchairs , even real skaters , heads down and one arm behind their backs , going like the wind . Leeuwarden was en fête . The chance of the race happening climbed to 80% and then suddenly ...... it started to become less cold . We heard that one of the race's officials , checking the thickness of the ice ( 15 cm is the absolute minimum ) had fallen through somewhere on the 200 kilometer course . Till finally it all vanished and we could even wrench our back door open again . Very sad . It rubbed salt in the wound to see this 1986 copy of the local paper in a local antique shop's window display the other day
But it did mean that I could haul my bike out and , thumbing my nose at this ad. for an electricity company at the bus stop ,
try cycling again , almost two months from the day that I fell off and broke my wrist . It was a bit nerve-racking but I'd built my left arm up again and I rode round the block ( as a safety precaution my chosen route took me past our G.P.'s house ! ) and came , grinning , home . Yesterday I cycled all round town doing some shopping as I went .
So now it's time to go back to work , where , it seems , I'm eagerly awaited by at least a few of the children
.
if this huge waving flower , delivered by my colleagues this afternoon , is to be believed .
12 comments:
Oh the chilly exoticism of it all: I can just imagine the lovely young skaters, clad in red, darting past, their cosy garments concealing their hopes and loves and aspirations for cake. I wish I had been there to see it.
This made me nostalgic for Christmas cards, and stories from my childhood, and old masters paintings that showed skaters, always seeming to have such a jolly old time! Where I grew up was damp and cold, but snow and ice were the stuff of dreams, so frozen ponds and rivers have always seemed romantic to me.
Hmm, yes, that was a disillusion. No Elfstedentocht. People in tears. Hehe. (Sorry, didn't mean to laugh. Couldn't help it.) It was an exciting week though, would it or wouldn't it... (I did post some ice skating in Groningen (the town) photos and of people on bikes in the snow storm. You may like them. Memories ;-))
Ready for spring now.
Ah well, another time.
Congratulations on being fully functioning again.
Congrats on getting "back in the saddle"!
Glad you're mended. I know when I broke my ankle (the first one...) a few years agho I was very nervous every time it was even a bit slippy afterwards. Back to not bothering again now.
I see the two verification words await, maybe you won't even get this comment!!
Glad you're are just about back to normal again. Lets hope the Spring will 'spring' quickly and drive away all that snow and ice!
Px
Well done, not an easy thing to have done.
-17 is pretty cold. Brrr.
Glad you are mended and back on the road. Go carefully.
So glad to hear you are mended. Wrists are so handy for waving and flicking passing bottoms and the like... and quite handy for stirring too!
What a lovely waving hands card! i'm sure you're a lovely teacher too.
Oh far too cold! How do you cope? Oh yes, by sitting by the fire drinking tea! But I can imagine those skaters (in old-fashioned garb of course) zipping along the frozen waterway.
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