June 4 - Day 67 - 2,000 miles Is very far through the snow I'll think of you Wherever you go' Pretenders
Yes - the picture doesn’t really fit the title - but at the end of today I will have cycled over 2000 miles!! When there is a song, therefore, called 2000 miles, I just have to use it - even though it’s become more associated with Christmas than the original reason for the lyrics - but more of that later.
2000 miles does feel very far, through snow or sun. In fact, it’s further from Sheffield than Ankara in Turkey, Greenland or the Western Sahara. I am continuing to enjoy the challenge, if enjoy is the right word, but if you know anyone who hasn’t sponsored a date yet, it might be best to emphasise the other side of it - that I’m shattered, don’t appear to be getting any fitter (but that might be the crumpets with butter when I get to work!), have a sore knee and spent half of the journey here this morning choking after a fly managed yet again to dive straight to the back of my throat.
The fly actually has more to do with the picture than the 2000 Mile lyrics (no it doesn’t feature - so don’t try enlarging the picture to see it) as it was because I couldn’t stop coughing that I thought I better stop. Having a camera in your hand makes people at least think that the reason you’ve stopped is not because you can’t make it to the top of the hill without a rest or because you have stopped because you’re coughing from Covid and really should be isolating.
I spotted the clump of flower heads at the other side of the road, took a few pictures and thought I better try and identify them again - not that I want this to become a wildflower blog. If I’ve picked up the right information it is Common Bistort (Persicaria bistorta) but is also known by a long list of other names such as snakeroot, pudding grass, Easter-ledges, poor man’s cabbage, Easter giants, sweet dock. and passion dock. Apparently, in Northern England, the plant was used to make a bitter pudding in Lent. Please do not try this at home though - as I’m never convinced I’ve got identifications right - not least because with its Easter references, I’m not sure why it’s flowering in June!
Back to 2000 Miles. Once you know the song was written after the band’s original guitarist James Honeyman-Scott died on 16 June 1982, at the age of 25, the lyrics have far more meaning than a Christmas song played at one time in the year. ‘I’ll think of you, wherever you go.’
So with 2000 miles completed and £3500 raised, I want to thank everyone again for their wonderful support. And in the words of Chrissie Hynde, ‘The only person stopping you from doing something is yourself, and looking for excuses all the time just gets in the way of obtaining your own goals. It's like the writer who keeps getting up and straightening the pictures in the room.’ So no excuses for any of us this weekend or for me over the next 2500 miles. BUT -That’s the distance from Sheffield to the North Pole!!
