You know it's windy when ...

It's been pretty windy here recently.
The Jet Stream is a bit further South than normal, apparently.


Anyway, you know it is windy when:

Two sets of bike racks blown
over a high wall by the wind!

• Two sets of metal bike racks with corrugated roofs get picked up by the wind and thrown over a wall about 8 feet (2.5 metres) high, anding up in the bottom of a nearby garden. This is what happened at work on Friday night or early Saturday morning (14th/15th February 2014). I cycled in at about 06:15 and went down to the bike racks, and I noticed two of them were missing. There was a site safety inspection on Wednesday, and I had Friday off, so when I came in on Saturday morning and saw the two missing racks, I wondered if it was a saefty issue with them. Then I looked up, and I could see parst of the frames of the bike racks sticking up from the OTHER side of the wall that is on the perimer of the company car park. The whole lot had gone up and over, even taking a couple of old, abandoned, bikes with it.
• I have to select a low gear to cycle DOWNHILL to work (it is about a 60 foot (20 metre) drop spread over a distance of only about half-a-mile (0.8 km), so about a 2.5% grade) - that was Saturday the 15th February, too, although I have experienced it on other occassions. A week or so ago, I went on a short training ride and there is a small hill at one end. I shot up the hill, congratulating myself on my newly developed strangth and fitness. BUT, when I turned round to come back, and I had rounded a corner protected by some trees, I found I had to switch down a couple of gears to cycle BACK DOWN the same hill I had just ridden up in 6th! So, a reality check, and a headwind, reminded me that I am not quite Tour de France material just yet :-)