Potter. Not the wizard.
An English word that conjures up images of an old man in his garden shed has become a popular term now in Japanese for cyclists who are out riding around but not in any hurry to get anywhere but more so to just enjoy the scenery, eat, drink and ride… at a pottering pace. I’m feeling old lately too so I better get used to this pottering.

potter 1. work in feeble or desultory manner (at or in subject or occupation); dawdle, loiter. 2. trifle away (one’s time).

After a bottle of red last night and a cold chilly Sunday morning that has recently forced me to stay in bed (again). Today, I didn’t go to training, or racing, but as novices of pottering my brother who was over for a week and I, without pottering experience or a potterer’s license or a potterer’s guide, headed up the river into potterer’s oblivion.

Nothing special planned as bro had to be on a plane tonight back to Singapore and too much planning probably nulls the pot. 60km or 100km trips were not going to happen today. We headed up to the castle (20km) at a potterly pace and people were actually passing us. There was a slight headwind but not too bad. Almost unnoticeable.

My racing sensors were overheating a little bit when people passed us from behind and although I couldn’t hear Robot in my mind saying, ‘Danger Will Robson, Danger.’, as these alien cyclists approached from the rear, I restrained myself without going into race mode and enjoyed the scenery for a change. Pot, pot, pot we went. Even seeing a temple for the first time that I must have passed 300 times before, near route 16.

The highlight of the pottering adventure was lunch at the little Japanese diner besides the Sekiyado castle called Keyaki-cha-ya. (けやき茶屋).　[Keyaki is a type of elm tree, cha means tea and ya means shop].

As we sat in there enjoying our feed, we could feel the coldness creeping into our bones and a look out the window showed the headwind had about faced and increased its strength. 2 curry & rices with hot coffees later it was time to think about pottering home.

Before turning around and pottering back the same way, we decided to potter over into Saitama and check out the kayakers under the weir and do a full lap of the river section back to Noda. Quite sure that backtracking over the course is against potterer’s rules.

To prove to ourselves that we were in fact amateur potterers we passed a pair of experts on the way home. We didn’t realize at the time what we were doing and in hindsight we should have slowed down and observed them to learn more. We were going too fast which is a potterer’s sin. I believe the only time a potterer can ‘go fast’ is if he knows there is only one more beer left in the next beer machine.

At one rest stop where we were both relieve-pottering onto a pole in true pottering style and one of the potterers we had past earlier actually passed us. We may have actually outpottered him with this maneuver. This was a magical moment and a tear welled up in my eye as it was a true honor to be passed by a pro potterer.

On the last leg of the journey with about 3 or 4km to go we watched the golfers miss hitting their golf balls on the course that is just across the road from my home. They looked like golf potterers. Hopeless golfers.

All we had to do now was potter under the Noda bridge, potter up the little hill, do a pottering U turn, potter across the bridge and pot pot pot pot into the 2 streets home.

43pottering kms on the clock in 2 hours of saddle time was probably too fast and were we to be stopped by pottering police we would have been arrested for completing a pottering journey in under 5 hours.  But my brother had a plane to catch and although we had 2 hours to spare before I had to drop my brother off at the station it was 2 hours we could potter around inside and stay warm.  After a cup of hot coffee and a hot shower I was feeling like a million dollars and it was time to go to the train station.
I’m sure as my brother boards the plane in an hour or so and takes off and the plane glides over the course he was on earlier in the day, a tear or two will drip down his cheeks as he reminisces about his first official pottering birthday.

One day I hope to master pottering (with beer) but I’m still determined to lose more weight and do a bit more racing and cycling. Pottering is great but it’s like heroin. It could kill me if I overdose on it.