I got woken up at 9am today by a hungry cat screeching outside our bedrooms for food. She normally gets fed about 7:30 / 8am when one of us gets up for work. She’s a nice cat but annoying when she’s making lots of noise and you don’t know why. Normally something to do with food, weather or littler box.

I went round my Grandad’s yesterday and when I got to the main road about 20 people on mountain bikes when past in a group before I could pull out. Looks like they’d been off-road already. I like getting muddy on my bike but it’s too cold for me at this time of year. It’s been raining a lot since late December so I’d imagine most of my route is underwater or too muddy to pass.

I’ve never been outside of the UK before and I was telling Grandad how I’d like to go in my car. How I’d take the Euro Tunnel and he said just turn left and head towards the Netherlands. If I did that I could get a overnight ferry back. Grandad then told me about how he’d ridden from France to the Netherlands with his friend in the late 1940s. They’d ride their bikes and whatever town they stopped in overnight they’d find a place to sleep and eat. They asked one local who didn’t speak English, she flagged down a passer by who translated. She said they could stay at her house for the night but she needed to get the bus home so they followed the bus, including all it’s stops on the way to her house.

Grandad says he was a lot shyer before he joined the army (conscription) and that if he hadn’t of been in the army he’d probably not have gone on these biking holidays around Europe. I think conscription might have been a good thing for my confidence but could also end my life because of the active conflicts my country is involved in. Instead university and my jobs have boosted my confidence. My goal for the year is to go abroad and I’ve got just over 10 months to do so.