Oh, for the childhood joy of falling apples

Arrowtown book buyer Miranda Spary continues her regular column about her recommendations for a good read and life as she sees it ...

Yikes - real autumn suddenly.

I've been raking leaves with my delicious nephews and wishing I was under 5 years old again, when apples falling from trees are so miraculous and exciting. And when throwing an armful of leaves in the air is so hysterically funny.

In fact, I wouldn't mind being 5 again like Max Caulton, who welcomed all his parents' guests with enormous enthusiasm by spitting on their heads from the balcony. And what an excellent shot he is, too!

But I'm not that age anymore as I was reminded on Saturday in the Tour de Wakatipu. There have been rather a lot of cruel comments about the uprightness of my racing machine. Apparently, racing bikes don't have baskets on the front or bike stands.

It was very easy to find mine as it was the only one of 800 and something bikes standing upright on its sensible stand. Nicky Tompkins, from Off the Rails, kindly helped me get my new bike, saying it was just the thing their more fearful old female clients like to use on the rail trail.

It was perfect, and with my gel seat and my padded shorts - I got a sneak preview of life as an incontinence pants wearer - and my cycling gloves (truly!), I really looked the part.

Oh, and my new helmet.

It's quite an expensive exercise getting geared up for a cycle race.

We headed off to Millbrook to get signed in and have our transponders fitted. After three rounds of coffees we were ready to race. We roared through the start gates behind a handsome dad and his sweet 12-year-old daughter on a tandem. They'd be easy to beat.

Everyone gave me tips on speed cycling. Shaving your legs is said to be essential - but even shaving mine to the bone wasn't going to speed me up enough.

I decided to shave somewhere else - and it cut hours off my time. At the end of Millbrook Ave, I turned left into the car park and popped my bike on the back of the truck thus shaving 20km off the length of the race.

As I remounted at Boyd Rd along from the Kawarau bridge, a lot of hot and sweaty cyclists appeared. Fresh as a daisy, I whizzed past them over the grass and cow pats.

After a few hills where I had to get off - I don't like going downhill - we came to some uphill. That is hard work. And you know who passed me? Some hideous man with his ghastly 12-year-old daughter on a tandem. I was speechless with rage.

But it was all fabulous fun and now that my bottom is nearly back in working order again, I am trying to make sure the bike doesn't end up in the cupboard with the sewing machine, the juice extractor and the Swiss ball that all seemed so essential before I bought them.

There were so many people in town over Easter and it's been hard to catch up with everyone, but we have definitely tried. To try and repay some of the hospitality we have received, we invited some friends for dinner at the weekend.

I left my shopping list on the counter at the supermarket while I helped pack the groceries and was a bit hurt to have two people say "Please don't invite me!" and run off laughing. When I picked up the list, I could see what they meant. The item in bold at the top was rat poison. Our nasty friends have returned with the first frost and I am very sorry to see them again.

With all the business of Easter, I haven't had much reading time.

Louise Bell had very sensibly insisted I read Marley and Me, which I had kept putting off as the American cuteness of a family with a loveable Labrador just didn't sound like anything I wanted to read.

But on Louise's recommendation, I took it home and laughed and laughed. Until the end, which has the same tragic ending as every book about a family pet. Except turtles and parrots, I think.

And even they die sometime.

Marley the dog is a nightmare - even the author's wife hates him for a while - and it's made me start dreaming of a visit to the pound to get a new dog. But the tragic ending of our family pets seems to occur much sooner than in other families, and I don't think I am quite strong enough to deal with a fifth dead dog just yet.

Death is quite tedious and birth is quite the opposite. Welcome to the world, Julian Cook, and congratulations to new super-granny Patricia Cook, who at 80 years of age is whizzing to Rome to inspect her brand-new grandson and her newly 50-year-old son, Alistair, with the entire Cook whanau in tow. Have a fantastic time, all of you.