Smoke gets in your eyes, and throat, and ...

You can probably guess what this entry is going to be all about. Two words for firebugs: "Hired Goons". So how to put the last couple of days into words, well, I had an idea that if I want this to be anything more than a diary I needed to give a few opinions from time to time. I'll aim for an editorial each week on some philosophical or profound issue, but no promises there.

Yesterday morning the smoke cleared, so I managed to get a quick 40km ride in before work. Surprisingly cool temperatures once I got away from the coast, but that doesn't really bother me greatly. On the contrary, I prefer the cooler conditions anyway. With the commute to work (and home again afterward) I ended up with 66km for the day, so that's something after all the fire disruptions earlier in the week.

At work right now things are getting a little frustrating. I'm dealing with a client that decided to send in three different sets of records from the period I'm doing accounts for (and that's a year overdue anyway). All of them provide contrary figures in some way or another (they changed bookkeepers a few times), so it's all a bit of a mess.

So this morning (Saturday) I get out on the bike again, the beautiful ride through Austinville. The fires in that area left it untouched -- no photos yet because my camera isn't working. Still, the rainforest is always a pleasant deviation -- although my arms were itching a little today, could be a spring allergy. Only seems to be in the rainforest patches. Still no magpies as yet.

On the way home there was a little detour, Monaro Road. Not a massive climb (only gains about 310 metres), but mind-buggeringly steep. Probably averages 15% gradient when false flats are removed, with one section in the 25-30% range. I admit that I kinda enjoy those really steep sections and grim struggles, that feeling that "either me or this climb is going to crack soon, this is too intense to last long on either front". Of course, it helps when it's the climb that cracks, leaving me a short flat ride across the top with sweeping views for miles on end.

Then later in the day the fires started. The first was out at Gilston, I could see it from the coast when I was walking back from a shopping trip, followed by a massive fire near Nerang. Probably 15km from here, but enough smoke to completely block out the sun for most of the afternoon. This is bad news on two fronts. Firstly, breathing all this crap can't be good for one's health (not to mention those whose homes are threatened directly by the fires).

Of course, myself and Martin, a riding buddy of mine, had planned an epic for tomorrow morning, but all this smoke could put it into doubt. Most of the ride could be protected, given the expected wind directions and the terrain between our destination and the fires themselves. We're taking a "wait and see" view on this one, we could stay at home or go depending on how the smoke is on the 'coast. And we still have options to vary the ride should we need to. I'm hoping we get to do the full circuit however. I'm aiming for an imperial century in every calendar month of the year, and this is my chance to "score" in August. Bring on the Tweed Valley!!