Thank You Nuclear Nigel
This weekend, today, was the Midwest Racing enduro. Martin was riding it on the Husaberg, Jago was riding it on a KTM, Simon Pavey and Patsy Quick were also in it. Me, I didn't do it - I was up in Scotland for my Ma and Da's ruby wedding anniversary.
The big difference between a Scottish weding and a Scottish funeral is that there is always one less person drunk at a funeral. Between the whole family - several hundred of us - we managed to take "skinful" to new dimensions.
The Wee Yin was absolutely mesmerised by the pipers and drummer, since she's never seen a real live bagpipe player before. It obviously appealed to the Scottish half of her.
The guys done a brilliant job of YMCA - complete with traffic cop and cowboy - and will be appearing on a YouTube near you soon. It's like a tradition at these family events - the Clan Cabaret - where foolish songs are sung and foolish dances done. Superb, a total hoot.
All the faces are the same, but we're all getting a little bit older and greyer. The cousins I used to play with as kids - seeing them with their own kids kind of makes you realise your own age. I mean, we all know that it's everybody else who ages - it's not us. We're the same age now we were 20 years ago. Policemen and Doctors? They just get younger. It's not actually us that gets older, oh no.
And time seems to pass quicker when you get older. I have a theory about this - quite a good one, one of my better ones.
If you think about it, time actually does speed up as you get older. When you are one year old, then one day is exactly 1/365th of the amount of time you've been alive. When you're ten years old, then one day is exactly 1/3650th of the time you've been alive. The older you get, each day is a smaller and smaller fraction of the amount of time you've been alive and that's why time seems to speed up. You have more years on you, and the amount of time in a day is not changing, so you're comparing something that's constant (a day) to something that is gtting bigger (the amount of years you have been alive).
If, every day somebody were to give you a pound, and you were to put them in a pile then - after 20 years - each additional pound would seem smaller and smaller compared to the huge pile of pounds you've got. Same thing with time.
Anyway, it turns out that one of my cousins - young lad by the name of Jamie - is living in Portsmouth for a while training to be an engineer. That's about 20 miles away from me. So we'll look out for him, and make sure that he has got family down here - that's what family is for.
He flew back on the same flight as us tonight and I was talking to him in the airport. He is staying at HMS Collingwood in Fareham and was having to get a train there - proper bitch of a journey.
I was sat next to a guy who was getting grief from his Missus on the phone whilst we were waiting for the doors to shut. She wouldn't believe he was on the plane. He handed me his phone and said "would you tell my Missus where I am?", which I did. He took the phone back and I could hear her saying "That's one of your mates, you're in the pub".
He saw me reading something, and working with bits of paper and stuff. It was my roadbook and my map and compass navigation - I take it everywhere with me and read it all the time. He asked me why I was learning navigation, and I told him it is because I am doing the Paris-Dakar.
Turns out that he is a Watch Officer on a nuclear submarine - navigation is his job. With a few scribbles and a bit of explanation, he taught me in a few minutes what it was taking days to learn. Lots of map navigation tips - especially about the different between true north and grid north. Told me where to find great stuff on Google for map problems and navigation exams (with answers) to practice on. But practice, practice practice - that is the key.
It turns out that he was going to HMS Collingwood, and that he was going in a prepaid taxi. There was only one thing to do. I asked him if he coule give Jamie a lift along with him and the answer was that he'd be delighted to. So that saved Jamie probably about an hour of mucking around on trains late on a Sunday night, thanks to Nigel the Nuclear Submarine Navigator.
Anything can happen. If you open your eyes, open your ears, and just trust that something - somehow - will work out. The Universe will answer.
The big difference between a Scottish weding and a Scottish funeral is that there is always one less person drunk at a funeral. Between the whole family - several hundred of us - we managed to take "skinful" to new dimensions.
The Wee Yin was absolutely mesmerised by the pipers and drummer, since she's never seen a real live bagpipe player before. It obviously appealed to the Scottish half of her.
The guys done a brilliant job of YMCA - complete with traffic cop and cowboy - and will be appearing on a YouTube near you soon. It's like a tradition at these family events - the Clan Cabaret - where foolish songs are sung and foolish dances done. Superb, a total hoot.
All the faces are the same, but we're all getting a little bit older and greyer. The cousins I used to play with as kids - seeing them with their own kids kind of makes you realise your own age. I mean, we all know that it's everybody else who ages - it's not us. We're the same age now we were 20 years ago. Policemen and Doctors? They just get younger. It's not actually us that gets older, oh no.
And time seems to pass quicker when you get older. I have a theory about this - quite a good one, one of my better ones.
If you think about it, time actually does speed up as you get older. When you are one year old, then one day is exactly 1/365th of the amount of time you've been alive. When you're ten years old, then one day is exactly 1/3650th of the time you've been alive. The older you get, each day is a smaller and smaller fraction of the amount of time you've been alive and that's why time seems to speed up. You have more years on you, and the amount of time in a day is not changing, so you're comparing something that's constant (a day) to something that is gtting bigger (the amount of years you have been alive).
If, every day somebody were to give you a pound, and you were to put them in a pile then - after 20 years - each additional pound would seem smaller and smaller compared to the huge pile of pounds you've got. Same thing with time.
Anyway, it turns out that one of my cousins - young lad by the name of Jamie - is living in Portsmouth for a while training to be an engineer. That's about 20 miles away from me. So we'll look out for him, and make sure that he has got family down here - that's what family is for.
He flew back on the same flight as us tonight and I was talking to him in the airport. He is staying at HMS Collingwood in Fareham and was having to get a train there - proper bitch of a journey.
I was sat next to a guy who was getting grief from his Missus on the phone whilst we were waiting for the doors to shut. She wouldn't believe he was on the plane. He handed me his phone and said "would you tell my Missus where I am?", which I did. He took the phone back and I could hear her saying "That's one of your mates, you're in the pub".
He saw me reading something, and working with bits of paper and stuff. It was my roadbook and my map and compass navigation - I take it everywhere with me and read it all the time. He asked me why I was learning navigation, and I told him it is because I am doing the Paris-Dakar.
Turns out that he is a Watch Officer on a nuclear submarine - navigation is his job. With a few scribbles and a bit of explanation, he taught me in a few minutes what it was taking days to learn. Lots of map navigation tips - especially about the different between true north and grid north. Told me where to find great stuff on Google for map problems and navigation exams (with answers) to practice on. But practice, practice practice - that is the key.
It turns out that he was going to HMS Collingwood, and that he was going in a prepaid taxi. There was only one thing to do. I asked him if he coule give Jamie a lift along with him and the answer was that he'd be delighted to. So that saved Jamie probably about an hour of mucking around on trains late on a Sunday night, thanks to Nigel the Nuclear Submarine Navigator.
Anything can happen. If you open your eyes, open your ears, and just trust that something - somehow - will work out. The Universe will answer.
Download the Manic Mission Information Pack for the full story ...
posted by 2009 Dakar at
Sunday, March 30, 2008
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home