Leaving home...

I'm just about to mount my very clean and fresh looking bicycle and pedal down to my friend Trisha's house that lies halfway between home and the port where I'll catch the ferry to France tomorrow evening. Trisha is also expecting her first child today, so perhaps we'll have another addition to the Irish nation by tomorrow morning. I've warned her that my first aid kit probably won't be up to the job, but she's not perturbed. Speaking of babies, I was thinking of baptising the bike Rocinante, as I have a copy of Don Quixote with me. I discovered, however, that this would not be in any way an original idea and that many others have thought of naming their choppers or traveling vehicles (Steinbeck's motorhome in Travels with Charley) with the same name, after Don Quixote's famous steed. Moreover, I feel a little guilty as I haven't read the book yet, so it doesn't have any particular significance for me. In fact, the primary reason that I'm bringing the book is because in my stack of To Read's it was the one that carried the biggest bang for your gramme with close to 1000 pages of size 5 font script. Although some say it's the best novel ever written and that it marks a crucial phase in the evolution of modern literature, so that's another good reason. Anyhow, time to go.

Rocinante and Julian - together at last