Volunteering & Volunteer Students

There was someone who said naught becomes of best laid plans of mice and men? The past 4 days have been an example of what happens to best laid plans. I intended to go to Critical Mass on Friday. It would have been a good training ride for the tour, but someone decided to bring in their documents at 4:55pm and as yours truly was the one covering the shop I had to process them for an exam today. The long and the short was that I missed out on what would have been my first Critical Mass ride since before my injury and thus missed out on a ride to Bondi Beach.

However all was not lost, I rang a number I got from a poster in Mick Mazza Cycles and arranged to go on the Dulwich Hill Bicycle Club (DHBC) Saturday Slowies ride. I took a leaf out of the Bicycling Australia magazine and loaded up on carbs the day before (friday) and got an early night. When Saturday rolled around I was able to go to roll out of bed at 5.00am and after breakfast I went to Mick Mazza Cycles and joined the ride. We went from Marrickville to Centenial Park and did laps. The traffic on King St and around the Marrickville area at that time was what would be considered light. I did 4 laps and discussed cycling with the club secretary - Lindsay. He appears to have a wealth of knowlledge on Sydney Cycling. I was a bit apprehensive given that my road bike - the Shogun Katana would normally have been seen as a budget mount  - which it is. However the more people turned up things started to change as there were people riding bikes that were of a similar vintage to the Katana but were converted to Fixies. I have a suspicion that there were some who rode their fixies etc for that ride. Lindsay himself rode one and we were able to have short conversations while riding - He is more fitter than I. We did laps of Centential until 08:00 after which we rode back to Marrickville. By the time we got back -08:45, things were picking up as regards the traffic. Some of the others began heading off for home as the ride got closer to Marrickville.

I rode up Marrickville Rd and then went to the Cooks River Cycleway. I had a brief look at the Canterbury Council Australia Day cerimonies and rang Ervin to find out when we were supposed to meet. I then went home and had a shower and a couple of American sandwiches - peanut butter and jam. I got changed and went to Newtown to pick up a couple of innertubes. I tried Bikerepairs.com workshop but they were selling tubes at $9.90. I went to Cheeky Monkey and got them for about $6 and picked up a tube of sunscreen. I then went to the park in Tempe for my shift as a St John volunteer. The Canterbury Council Australia Day was reasonable although the heat had started to bite. We got through reasonably well. We got fed from the council tent with the SES, council staff and other volunteers after the VIPs had their lunch. I got given a first aid kit used by ambulance officers - it has to be transported by car because it is too heavy to carry anywhere by foot and would be difficult to carry by bike. I also got to take a oxyviva and a heartstart to the Marrickville Australia Day celebrations afterward.

Marrickville are obviously cutting costs - they prepared a plate of Sandwiches, which were for both the SES and myself - this was supposed to be lunch and dinner. They gave them to the SES with the instructions to keep some for me - they did but as the Sandwiches had been made at 12:00 approximately and it was now 4:00 They were no longer fresh - or the fresh ones were taken by the SES. I pointed this out to the "co-ordinator" who said "They were fresh when they were made at luch time today". Usually Marrickville council provides some meal vouchers and we get something from the various stalls. It was a good thing I ate at the Canterbury council gig. The Marrickville council volunteers were the type of people with enough piercings to set off metal detectors at the airport and seemed to be more interested in keeping the cops & SES buttered up. They dished out chocolate biscuits to them and the SES and even gave out all the water leaving only a few bottles behind for me to give to people who needed them. I wound up out of water within half an hour and they had to send someone to get more. Which they did begrudgingly.  Other than one time when one of them asked if I had anything to eat - I suspect he was our contact we did not see them again. I explained to him that I didn't have anything for dinner and he disappeared. In short things were really done on the cheap and nasty side - this description is being charitable. At the end of the night I was left with a bottle of water and later on found a quater of a box of chocolate biscuits (maybe Marrickville council expected me to live off chocolate biscuits!). I only hope the Great Escapade is not like this to their volunteers. I remember a guy who was one of the Bicycle NSW volunteers turning up to the AGM and asking the executive about their treatment of volunteers. There is a fine line between the use of voluntary labour and the abuse of voluntary labour.  Marrickville council will probably say they looked after their volunteers well and they did - they just didn't look after the St John volunteers. I did get a meal - one of the security guards got a Gozleme for me and I paid him the $8.00 as was expected. I will email Ervin and tell him to chase the donation with vigour. This is one of the times when St John should charge fees.  Given everything was cheap and nasty the cover band was a dodgey version of Cold Chisel. There was heaps of drinking but the only injuries treated were kids coming off second best from the play equipment including a ye olde rocket that had two of the three levels blocked off.

The next day I went on a ride to Kurnell and followed the well worn path to the Shire from Tempe. I passed numerous pram people and wound up informally racing someone who would not let me pass until someone who was heading the opposite direction came out with "come on Maaate Fark me Drunk!" after which I passed. I had the bike path to myself once I was in Caringbah and then really went all out on the Captain Cook Drive. I got to Kurnell and had some water and scored some Gatorade and more water. I rode on to Tempe and rolled on to Sydenham Railway station and caught a train to town intending on meeting Gilbert for the Sydney Sculpture ride. Given I had not had lunch I had to go to Coles at Wynyard and get a sandwich and a pastry. I also had to visit the little gentlemens room. With all of this plus a guy at Coles deli who made a massive order for sun dried tomattos etc, I missed the ride. Thinking it could also be a 1:45 ride I hung around Martin Place until 2 but got hasselled out by a couple of Christian guys. My voltare is not what it used to be and I tried to use an old tactic of claiming I am Jewish to get rid of them (it worked once in Lithgow) Unfortuantely these guys didn't take the hint so I had to be more direct.

I went back to Tempe and over heard the flatmate getting more than friendly with a pickup he made the night before. Being the gentleman I am I let the happy couple carry on with a mental note to myself to remember the price of baby seats for bicycles. The flatmate in question is a velo cop with the Australia Protective Service. I had a shower and got changed and packed my stuff for the trip to Lithgow. I stopped off at the Addison Rd Markets but found Paul and Fi packing up. Fiona wanted to show me Pauls bicycle mounted stove/catering cart. He wasn't too happy about it and pointed out he wasn't insured. After he loaded up one of his load bikes. Fiona let me try it out. I only when half a meter down the road. Paul's cart has a back pedal brake and is single speed. It forms part of his catering stall he has for the markets.

As the markets were closing down for the day I just went home via Coles in Lithgow. I did about a week/fortnights worth of shopping.  I passed mum and Dad on their way to Sarah and Ray's. I just took a seat and watched a couple of cycling DVDs. I rang Sarah and Ray to find out when Mum and Dad were coming home and had a chat to Ray. In the end I wound up going to bed and having a good long deep sleep.

Yesterday I got up and hung the washing out. As Dad has just signed up for Bigpond I had to fix up his modem. I did everything right but could not get things installed etc. It turned out he gave me the wrong pass word. I went out for a short walk to cool down. I came back to Ray mucking around with the computer. I gather Dad got Mum and Ray into the effort and has fixed everything up. Ruth came around and we all spent part of the afternoon eating the chocolate biscuits from Australia Day and chatting. After the 5:00 news we went to the Workmens club and had dinner. As Ruth had came by car we wound up doing a California car pool to her place in Warrimoo. After one of the American cop shows I wound up going back to Tempe and got to bed at 11:00.

Today has been a sedate one although it has been busy as regards work. Something tells me things have just begun for that! It is 27 degrees and humid as all hell. I will try to do a few laps around Centenial and then head up to Olympic Park or may be even head to Kurnell again depeding on how the Green Trek holds up. I had noticed the wheel wobbling and suspect it is the Quick Release not being done up properly. I will get it checked up though.