After yesterday's excesses in Cadbury World, I decided that today I'd take my bike for a spin. I confess to being partly inspired by my reading of Tim Moore's French Revolutions, in which Tim decides that his first serious encounter with a bike since childhood should be to circumnavigate the course of that year's Tour de France. It was highly entertaining stuff.
I'm no great cyclist, but I felt reasonably good after I'd swept up the A6 up the hill past Englebert Humperdinck's house. Of course I use the term "hill" advisedly - this is Leicestershire, which makes Holland look hilly (until you're on a bike!) and is a far cry from the Rossendale valley of my youth, where I used to cycle to Halifax for fun cus you couldn't step out of the front door without hitting a hill.
Before I reached Market Harborough I swung north towards the Langtons: East Langton; Church Langton; Tur Langton; Michelle Langton (hi Michelle) and, unbelievably, Shangton.
My camera stayed in my bag while all sorts of photo opportunities zipped past: a large flock of sheep being herded down the road towards me; a military helicopter conducting a low level attack run down the road towards me, only slightly higher up than the sheep; 57 varieties of roadkill; small village pubs that started inviting me in at about 10 in the morning.
All those sneaky pubs started getting to me, so the idea of sticking out til Melton Mowbray gradually became less attractive. I cracked at the Billesdon turn off and barrelled down to the New Greyhound. Turns it was actually 10 to 11 rather than 10 to 12, so I contented myself with patronising the local shop and taking a picture of my bike in a rare moment of sunlight.

Pretty soon I was on the A47, which is nobody's idea of fun - windswept and lorryswept, I set my sights on Stoughton's Cow and Plough. I wouldn't say I started bonking (technical term for when the body gives up and the mind starts thirr-whacking until your fillings melt) but on one or two of the more troublesome slopes I started fixating on the beer I deserved. Which is the only possible jutification for taking a picture of it once I'd eventually got it:

If you haven't been to Barrie Lount's excellent Cow and Plough and you are within 100 miles, you should put it to the top of your to-do list.

I'm no CAMRA nut but that Dark Mild was ace and the Skydiver so quaffable lovely I bought a pack and a presentation glass to take away on the back of the bike.

I eventually made it home feeling rather virtuous, which is unusual after a pub visit. So I did some marking. Then I took some pictures of B's bed so I can flog it on EBay, which is what I'm off to do now. Thanks for listening.