So this was my day today

I do find dentist appointments unsettling, even when it's something as routine as a couple of filling-repairs.

To neutralise my anticipation (the appointment was 11.40 am this morning) I first ran through the exercise sequence which came with my 'York Fitness Cast Iron Dumbbell Set - 20kg'.

Dumbbell exercises

Here is your author in action.

Showered, mouthwashed and toothpasted, I was lying back on the dentist's couch by a quarter to twelve. There is a tone of voice in which the dentist asks,

"Do you usually have an injection?"

where he means,

'Are you some kind of wimp?'

I nodded coolly and said,

"For the replacement of old fillings? Nope, let's give it a go without."

The dentist looked pleased (three minutes shaved off the time) and got to work.

I wasn't really expecting Marathon Man and to be honest it was a breeze; I closed my eyes and thought about Marx's theory of crises.

---

This afternoon Clare's new tablet arrived. The iPad 2 she acquired from my late mother is increasingly clunky and slow, so I decided to replace it with a Nexus 10, a copy of my own but with better battery life.

I ordered mine back in March 2014 and it's worked well. The Nexus 10 is obsolete really, so I was able to get a bargain: Google Nexus 10 Wi-Fi only, 16 GB (Certified Refurbished).

I don't really get 'refurbished'. I assume it's just surplus stock which has been sitting in a warehouse somewhere for a year or so and is now being disposed of. In any event, it arrived in true minimalist fashion: just the tablet and a travelling charger + cable.

Its Android release was early 4 (we're currently at 5.1.1 Lollipop) so I've spent the afternoon loading version after version of the OS as it makes the long climb towards Lollipop. Towards the end I was dismayed to find the tablet kept turning itself off; buy cheap and have to send it back, I thought to myself. But it was simply the Nexus's way of telling me that its battery was down to 4%.

It's currently on the charger, telling me it's still too tired to install the latest Android iteration.

I have to wait.

It's cold up north

In an act of travel insanity, our week's holiday in Yorkshire coincided with rain, hail, snow, arctic winds and more rain.

We were close to Pickering, just south of the North Yorkshire moor. We took in York (charming), Whitby (proletarian and popular, with a plethora of chips and gulls), Scarborough (poor and unloved) and Nunnington Hall (NT and as nice as you would expect).

The highlight of the week for us was the final day of the Tour de Yorkshire; we intercepted the race twice:

- on TV,  you get to appreciate team strategies;

- roadside, the lycra blur communicates supreme athleticism .. and stoicism.

Here are some pictures.

Yes, we were on TV (ITV4). On the left Clare, Alex and Adrian spectating
& green-anoraked myself above with camera. We're just up from Hutton-le-Hole.

Alex at Nunnington Hall (NT)

Clare and Adrian at the TdY finish in Scarborough

On the strength of two generous evening meals, Chinese and Indian respectively, Clare and myself returned home three pounds heavier than at our own grand départ a week ago. A diet of fruit, salad and porridge is already in effect - and I was (underpowered) at the gym this morning ...