I may call it “Pirates” but in truth the Thursday night class over at the Leisure Centre (not) is nowhere near as exciting as a class for budding pirates (imagine… no ‘step’ but ‘walk the plank’, and no trampoline but ‘climb the yardarm m’hearties’; I really mean Pilates, in case you’re wondering. In fairness, Pilates is quite hard to master – everything is done slowly and intensely; in fact you could say that it is intensely slow. There is no music to help it along and the class members, albeit that they all look fit and slim (apart from me), tend to be fit and slim older people in the main (apart from me – hopefully). I like Zumba Class on Friday evenings – that’s my favourite. But today is Thursday.

This morning it struck me that if I cycled all the way over to Rosie’s farm, where Mary is farm-sitting this week, I would burn off loads of calories and feel justified in skipping “Pirates” later on. Chris wasn’t too keen on the idea of me cycling on the narrow country lanes, which have a great deal of uphill, and rain was forecast. But I was too keen to be put off (the thought of avoiding “Pirates” was uppermost in my mind) and I donned my cold weather gear (including a scarf), and I put my waterproof jacket in my pink backpack.

Luckily, the ninety-mile-an-hour gusts (well it seemed like that) were behind me and I made it to the farm in what seemed minutes, rather than hours, in spite of the steep hills. I was so quick that Mary, thinking I would take hours, was out walking the dogs when I arrived and I had to kill time picking apples in the orchard.

While we sisters went inside and had a good time petting the four dogs, chatting and eating soup – Mary had made vegetable soup with next to no calories for me and I had made tomato soup, similarly low calorie, for her – the weather outside worsened. At three o’clock I put on my shower-proof jacket and made to leave.

“You can’t go in this, it’s pouring down,” said Mary, “You could wait until it clears or I could drive you home.”

“No, no, I want the exercise,” I stressed.

An hour later I thought I had better make a move before the peak traffic time; on the way over I had met two cars and had been forced to get off my bike and lean into the hedge – it would be twice as bad if I left it any longer.

“But it’s still raining…” began Mary.

“Good for the hair,” I walked over to the barn to get my bicycle and my hair got wet immediately.

Then Chris phoned….

The bike went in Mary’s boot and she drove me home. We didn’t meet any traffic but it rained full pelt.

“Are you going to ‘Pirates’ Chris asked a little later.

“No,” I laughed, “think I’ll do my blog instead.” Chris laughed back knowingly.

I’m on a ‘go slow’ this evening – it has nothing to do with me being a tad saddle-sore