A few weeks ago, I noticed that a certain @Chris_Boarland had started following me on Twitter. It’s often intriguing looking at who follows who on Twitter. As I type I have 417 followers (that’s probably enough for a decent sect!)… but a fair number of those are just ‘people’ trying to flog their product / service / book etc… (clearly I would never do this – perish the thought). So, perhaps my real ‘followers’ might number 300? That’s a bit of a stab in the dark. However @Chris_Boarland is no purveyor of dodgy goods. Au contraire. His Twitter account is titled ‘PoliceCmdr4Cornwall‘ and his profile describes him as ‘Chief Superintendent with Devon & Cornwall. Police Commander for Cornwall. Also raises pigs, sheep & poultry. Passionate about good food and animal welfare.’ I didn’t know whether to be impressed or worried. What is a senior policeman from the west country with an interest in farm animals doing following me?

Well, I’ve just found out. I sometimes (well, OK, regularly) Google ‘Good Vibrations: Crossing Europe on a Bike Called Reggie‘ to see how far the tentacles of my publicity machine have reached. For a change, this morning I thought I would ‘Bing‘ instead. And on page 4 I noticed a new link referring to ‘Mid-Life Cycling Adventure‘ and who should be planning such an adventure than none other than my new follower on Twitter, Cmdr Boarland! Question answered.

Good Vibrations cropped up on the search engine as Chris has been reading it and mentioned my book in passing when talking about his new bike;

Here she is, finally with a name, Marjorie, or Marj for short. Ok, I know for all Little Britain fans it’s probably like calling her ‘Diana’ for those of a slightly older generation. However the name did come about after several beers whilst camping recently in a farmer’s field at Bigbury (Mount Folly Farm – basic, but great views). And ‘she’ had to have a girl’s name because she’s so pretty and in any case, currently reading Andrew Sykes’s (@apsykes) book ‘Good Vibrations’ and his bike was called Reggie, so have to be entirely different.

He also sympathises with my attitude to feeding yourself on a cross-European cycle journey (which is what he is planning);

Cooking. I’ve made the judgement, much like Andrew Sykes with Reggie that as I’m travelling through Europe, I’ll do a lot of my eating in local establishments. Can’t see me trying to cook up porridge for breakfast or a freeze-dried meal in the evening when there should be croissant, patisseries and fine dining establishments to enjoy.

Not sure exactly where he is cycling to. Somewhere in southern Europe I think. I’ll Tweet him.