Austerity Hurts!

In all past years of my life, and I've had a number, I've known a freeze is coming because I hear the crunch of salt under my feet and the darkness is illuminated by the orange oscillating lights of the gritters.

One knows when austerity has started to bite, when the first time you learn a freeze is coming is finding a damp patch of main road is not wet but ice and rubber which has gripped throughout a year of damp roads throws in the towel!

Thursday night's innocuous billed club ride was the first in which I've unknowingly hit black ice cycling a main road, no salt, no warning, no gritters! Gutted my upcoming weekend cycling plans are now in ruin, my treasured bike is scared and my ageing body damaged. Austerity hurts!