High Nelly search has me in a spin
I’m in desperate need of a High Nelly, .
It’s an emergency. Time is really not on my side.
After mass last Sunday morning, my neighbour Declan Corcoran had some exciting news to relay regarding an up and coming sporting event.
A High Nelly run that takes place this very weekend, an event Declan hoped I might partake in.
To be honest with you, on account of being in a right merry state due to a few drinks I had tucked away on the previous evening, I told the man I’d get up on a puff of wind, never mind a High Nelly.
“Stephen Roche,” says I, “would be less ready than I am right now. I’ll be there at the starting line, never fear,” I assured Dec.
For, in the chapel yard last Sunday morning, I was fully convinced that I would. I was raring to go.
But now my participation in the event seems very unlikely indeed.
This cycling crack is all due to the Crookstown Vintage Club Weekend, which is this very weekend.
The High Nelly shenanigans kick start the festivities, but without my ride, it could well be kick started without me.
In fairness to myself, over the past few days on this farm, I have done little else but search for a High Nelly.
The bullocks have had to look after themselves, as I have turned the place upside down in a mad scramble to find the all elusive vintage mode of transportation.
Every barn, every outhouse, has been ransacked to within an inch of demolition, as I rummaged in vain for an old High Nelly once used by my ancestors.
Alas and alack, not even so much as a bicycle pump have I found.
A bit like the search for poor Shergar, the speed merchant failed to surface.
I might be as eager as Lance Armstrong to get peddaling, but without the High Nelly under my arse, I have precious little to pedal.
I’m a bit like a jockey without a horse, like old Tiger without his golf clubs, like Michael Healy-Rae without his cap.
I’m only half there. I need the High Nelly, it’s as simple as that.
And I wouldn’t mind, but the High Nelly run around the scenic roads of Crookstown sounded like the perfect event for me.
Unlike the Tour de France or the Giro d’Italia, it’s not all about speed trials, mountain climbs or tight fitting trousers.
Nor, I might add, will the cyclists on Saturday evening be subjected to vigorous dope testing.
Whether you are a dope or a genius, you’ve a place on the team, provided of course that you have a bike.
The distance to cover will be four miles of good country road, which would be no problem for a fellow like me.
And with a few pit stops thrown in along the way to refresh the weary traveller, if ever there was a cycle event suited to thirsty fellows, this was surely it.
Pit stops where the old chain could be oiled, a sore could be rubbed, and the cyclist could get well oiled too, I imagine.
In other words, a cycle event to suit all, from Bradley Wiggins to Brendan Behan.
Anyhow, ’tis all pie in the sky now, for as I mentioned earlier, due to technical difficulties beyond my control, my participation in this year’s Tour de Crookstown is extremely unlikely.
Without my High Nelly, I’m high and dry.
