As we’re enthusiastically demanding your hard earned money (again), we thought it was only fair to explain why... There is a good reason (as I've had to keep reminding myself during the many hours on the road over the last few months)

I used to see a girl at the tube station almost daily, sitting at the bottom of the stairs covered in a blanket.  I felt awful that all I could do was give her a couple of pounds, so one night I tries to find something more I could do.  I went home and clicked on the Shelter website. Seemed like a sensible place to start. There in bright letters on their home page was a call  for cyclists to join Team Shelter for PrudentialRide London 100. Brilliant idea given that I didn't even own a bike. I instantly filled in my details and paid the  £45 registration fee, committing to raise £750 for the homeless charity.

So there I was, it was February 2013, I was meant to cycle a 100 mile event in August and I didn’t own a bike. 

One day in April, pulling into the car park, someone sailed past me on their bike and started to chain up.  I vaguely knew him, very handsome with a big smile.  In bike gear!  So I asked him, do you think you could help me choose a bike? Why? Well I’m planning to cycle a 100 miles in August.  Yes really.  His shock at this ridiculous undertaking was visible.  But yes, let’s go for a coffee, we can talk about bikes.  And so we did.

A week or so later we went for our first date, cycling round Hampstead Heath.  A year later he proposed to me in the same place. 

So the moral of the story ladies and gents is…

a) If you don’t like something, there’s always something you can do, however small in the grand scheme of things (and however ridiculous the idea may seem)

b) Always ask men in bike gear for help

c) A little generosity can set you on an amazing path, and to that end...

…any donations would be HUGELY appreciated :-) and not just by Tom and me but by people you don’t even know.