Bob left on his cycle tour to the South Coast this morning, travelling through Captains Flat to Braidwood today, and on the Nerriga Road to Nowra tomorrow. As usual, he was somewhat later in leaving than he planned, however with loaded panniers and a new Ortlieb handlebar bag, he was off on his Cannondale hardtail mountain bike, obviously getting accustomed to the handling with the additional weight.

I had a bit of a flare up yesterday, and was not able to sit comfortably, so cycling was out for today. I did a load of chores at home, then whipped down to the BBQ Stakes at lunchtime. Another big turn-up, in part due to it being the monthly corporate challenge (a.k.a. the T-Bone Stakes) where members of different agencies and employers 'race' against each other, running the course in reverse. I have always found this more difficult, as it starts with a climb, although I did my (recent) PB on the reverse course in December last year.

I worked fairly hard, although my heart rate was quite low over the course of the run. Seven seconds outside my December PB, I was pleasantly surprised, and felt ready to go again and give it a good shot.

After running a number of errands in Civic, filling up with petrol and lining up behind 18 others at a single service post office counter to buy a couple of 5c stamps.

Later, when for a restorative 12km jog through Aranda and Black Mountain bushland, where the fire department were doing another controlled burn-off around Little Black Mountain. The smoke was thick, somewhere between an out of control barbeque and a carbon overload, and the eerie orange glow of embers and tongues of flames licking up snow gums was quite beautiful.

Only solid food in the last week was on Monday (a mandarin, apple, and some vegetables) and it didn't sit well with me. No night sweats when I am fortijuice and clear fluids, however even with this amount of solids on Monday it invokes a flare up which affected me quite significantly yesterday and today.

So put another case of Fortijuice on ice, and learn to love it!