Six things I learned over the festive period

Well that's Christmas over and done with - hoorah! I had a very lovely time with my family and I learned a few things along the way, which (in the spirit of festive giving) I'm going to share with you all.

1. Do not get involved in playing games. Your brother in law might tell you that the Post-it note game * only takes 15 minutes.  This is an outright lie.  It takes at least an hour, by which point you will silently hate everyone in the room, including yourself.

2. Despite the fact that your mother spent many hours pushing you out of her vagina and even more hours wiping your bottom, she will not hesitate to fuck you up by writing the name "Big Ears" on a Post-it note and sticking it to your forehead, thereby dooming you to an hour of evermore hopeless questions and guesses, at the end of which, your sister will essentially be forced to just tell you that you're Big Ears.

I hate you, Big Ears

3.  If you ask the question "Am I a humanoid?", you will mean "Am I human-shaped?".  However your sister will think you mean "Am I a robot?", she will answer no, and you will NEVER EVER guess that you are Big Ears, who is pretty much human shaped, when compared to, say, a car or maybe a tree.

4.  You will get to the end of the game and discover that your parents have no idea who the people stuck to their foreheads are, despite the fact that you may have been discussing them just prior to commencing the game (Aled Jones - Dad). Alternatively, they may have entirely forgotten what this person was famous for, rendering half the questions and answers completely useless ("Rusty Lee did cooking? I only remember her laugh!" - Mum)

* if you don't know what the Post-it note game is, you can find more information here

5. If you buy your family a cuddly reindeer that sings "We wish you a Merry Christmas" through the medium of fart noises, prepare to hear it A LOT throughout the festive period, especially if your four year old niece finds it hilarious. I can only imagine that by now it must have "run out of batteries" possibly forever.

6.  Other things small children find hilarious (apparently), include being hit repeatedly in the head by a dog's tail.  As a result we kept finding my two year old nephew bent over with his head by Murdoch's bum (a dangerous game in anyone's reckoning) getting whacked in the head by Murdoch's wagging tail and giggling.


As you can imagine, after all of the mayhem, it was really nice to get home and sit silently stroking Murdoch's ears for a bit, while staring blankly into space and wondering whether you will ever be capable of living with another human being ever again.

Hearty Mince

I'm not a chef. I'm not even much of a foodie. I could quite happily eat the same five meals between now and when I die and not really feel too worried about the situation. Which means that cooking gigantic vats of food to eat across the week really suits my temperament, as well as my schedule.

And there's something about this time of year, just after the clocks go back, that makes me feel all autumnal and jolly and quite in the mood to batch cook the crap out of something. So tonight I cooked..... well I'm never entirely sure what to call it. Is it a bolognese if you're not serving it on pasta? Is it a chilli if it has no kidney beans? I have no idea. So instead, I'm going to call it 

Hearty Mince

The first thing to note about making hearty mince is the invaluable nature of the sous chef. Mine is quite keen on veg preparation, but soon loses interest thereafter.

Murdoch loves raw carrot

There is no set recipe for this meal, not really. I look at what veg I've got in the fridge, pop to the supermarket to add what else I fancy and chop it up quite finely, as I don't like having big chunks of stuff in my food. This time round I had onion, garlic, leeks, chillis (with seeds left in for a bit of ooomph), carrot, courgette (not chopped in this picture as I ran out of room on the chopping board), fresh peas and edamame.

Chop veg finely. Or don't. It's your dinner, have it how you like.

Once you've got your veg ready to go, heat up a bit of butter (or olive oil) and chuck the veg in a big pan to soften on a low heat. I left the peas and edamame out at this stage, to be added later.

Probably at least fifteen of your "five a day"

Next, turn up the heat a bit and add some mince. I bought two large (750g) packets of extra low fat beef mince from Tesco and forgot to take a picture of it cooking, mostly because my pan isn't really big enough to accommodate that much meat, so there was quite a bit of unseemly swearing at this stage. Please imagine a picture of a metric fucktonne of beef mince browning off with the veg. Thanks. After it was all browned off, I drained it a bit, as there was quite a bit of liquid at this stage.

Starting to look quite tasty

Add some herbs, stock cube, salt and pepper (and if you fancy it, a spoonful of Marmite. But not coffee, as Sainsbury's seem to be suggesting. WTF Sainsbury's?! Give it a rest), some tomato purée and a couple of cartons of chopped tomatoes. Lower the heat again and let it bubble away for a bit.

Add the peas and edamame

Near the end of the cooking, I added the peas and the edamame. They only need a light steam, so best add them towards the end, otherwise you risk ending up with green mush.  I popped the lid on so that all of the steam stayed in and left it alone for about 10 minutes.

Everything tastes better with cheese on it. FACT.

This made eight nice sized dinners, which you could serve with pasta, rice, quinoa, couscous, veg or even eat just by itself. As you can see, I've popped some grated cheese on top to serve.

My final top tip is to decant into individual dinner sized containers, especially if you're a greedy bugger like me.  Then you have ready to go portions, rather than spooning gigantic helpings out of one big tub and wondering why it only lasted a day (come on, we've all been there).

A New Approach

Yesterday, I decided to write a to be list for 2014 rather than a to do list.  Why? Because it occurred to me that sometimes we get too focused on the things that we do (or could do, or should do), rather than thinking about the things that we are, or want to be.  Or at least I know I do.  I think "oh blow it, I eat too much", but I rarely think about the fact that I'm generally quite kind.

So I'm not making the usual resolutions.  For a start, they have never worked for me.  I've never been any happier as a result of making them, or slimmer, or more well-rounded intellectually.  So I'm not doing it. 

Here's what I am doing.  I'm chucking away the bathroom scales.  I saw this on Twitter the other day.

And it's true.  So I weighed myself today and that will be the last time that I weigh myself until 1st January 2015. During the year in between I'm going to worry less about what I weigh, do things that make me happy and we'll see what happens.  Doesn't that sound fun?

In other news, Murdoch turned nine recently, which was very exciting.  He celebrated by burrowing his way under my duvet and farting excessively.

Happy New Year everyone!

Woe

Despite the fact that I inadvertently dressed myself like a Ribena berry this morning, today has felt very grey and miserable.

Woo!

There are some days when you know you just shouldn't watch the news.  You've woken up, still with that annoying tickly cough, and taken the dog for a walk in the pouring rain, which is being blown into your face by a cold wind.  So far, so average.  You get home, dry yourself off, and the dog and give the little guy his breakfast.  You go back to bed for a moment to warm up and wake up half an hour later (standard).  To see the news that Oscar Pistorius seems that have shot his girlfriend.  Woe.

At first it seems like a tragic mistake, a Valentine's Day surprise gone wrong, perhaps.  But as news starts to seep out, there is talk of previous "disturbances of a domestic nature" and the devastating blow that he has been charged with murder.  Woe and more woe.

I have spent all day feeling very upset by all of this.  Oscar is a hero of mine and there's been more than enough recently of sporting heroes falling off their pedestal.  I'm going to reserve judgement until we see more facts and less speculation, but in the meantime, suffice to say I'm gutted.

Oh Oscar

In other news, I had a flat tyre today, £70 down the pan on a new one, and late back from lunch as a result. Murdoch's got the squits and I have a giant spot on my cheek.  I'm not going to take a picture of my face, but here is an artist's impression of it.

It's alive and it's eating my face!!!!!!!!

So generally speaking it's been a pretty foul day.  Thankfully the past few days have been pretty cool - lots of great work stuff going on and managed to get out for a brilliant run on Sunday.  Got taken on a ridiculous hilly, muddy, slippy slidey run along the Greensand Way by @claz0r and @leestuartevans.  We ran through a lot of WEATHER that day.  Brrrrrrrr.  So mustn't grumble.

(woe)

Life on the edge

I've been living life on the edge recently, let me tell you.  For a start, I've been playing fast and loose with my marathon training plan.  Five runs a week? Bah.  I'll give you one run in two weeks and you'll like it.  

Why, just this morning I went for a torch-lit walk through the deep dark woods with one lady and a pack of animals for company.  And later today I displayed a flagrant disregard for the onset of a potentially fatal cold and headed up to London of all places, if you can even believe that!  My goodness, where on earth will it all end.  I've come to no harm though, which is more than I can say for my poor sister, who yesterday had the temerity to pick up a vase, ended up in A&E for three hours and came away with her hand stitched together. Terrible business.

In other exciting news, we had a family photo session at the beginning of January and we got to see the results online today.  There are some brilliant pictures in there.  One picture of just me and Murdoch is fabulous and then there's one of me and my sister, which I think is just beautiful.  We haven't decided which ones we're going to buy yet, but I think that those two are definitely winners! I won't post the picture of my sister as she may not want her face splashed all over this nonsense, but here is the one of me and my boy.

Woof!

Happy New Year 2013

 

Wishing everyone a fantastic 2013 xxx

Twelve of 2012: Part II

Well howdy folks. I hope you've been enjoying the festive period.  This little bit between Christmas and New Year is a little odd, isn't it?  I don't usually take the time off work, but this year I did and have very much enjoyed an extended break.  I've tidied up my living room and it looks so much nicer.  Now I just need to do the same in my bedroom and it'll all be marvellous.

Tidy and lovely

In other exciting domestic news, I ordered a new washing machine earlier today and I just finished a bag of clementines that didn't have a single duff one (unless you count the obligatory one that goes white and fluffy three days before the rest), so I'm feeling very much like I'm on top of things. Whoop. 

Anyway, enough of my domestic nonsense, I know that what you're all really waiting for is.... the next instalment of my exciting Twelve in 2012 series!  Unfortunately, as predicted, I'm bored with this thing already. It appears that I have the attention span of a gnat.  So I'm going to zip through the second half of my list in double time, before I fall asleep from the effort of it all.  So here goes.

7.  Friends.  I'm lucky to have some brilliant people in my life.  This year I've spent time with friends old and new, running, eating, walking, drinking wine, wedding attending.  Some of the people who have brought me the most joy and amusement have been those I've met on Twitter.  Some of them I have since met in real life (such as @claz0r, @leestuartevans & @gutnahofski) and some I haven't (such as @msmac, @lilbeeloo67, @trevb1 & @lellymo) but all of them have enriched my life, if only with a little bit of banter now and then. I was also really happy to meet up with some old friends, particularly Pam & Chris all the way from Calgary and Sarah, who was visiting the UK from Japan.  We watched the Paralympic marathons together and had a great time.

Thanks friends, you are all brilliant. 

8.  Family.  See above re brilliant people in my life.  My family are the best of those.  This year we went on our first family holiday for years and it was a blast.  But I think the best family thing this year has been spending time with my niece.  She'll be two in March and throughout this year she has grown into a real person, with such a wonderful personality.  And she's as cute as a kitten to boot.

9.  Murdoch.  Always Murdoch.  He's going to be in my annual highlights every single year that we spend together.  I love that little guy.  If anyone doesn't know why he's so important to me and why I love him so, then please feel free to read this.

10. Good stuff on TV.  This may seem a little inane, but there's been some great stuff on TV this year.  Obviously the 'lympics, but other stuff too.  This year, I've really enjoyed watching Fringe.  It's the final season and one of few shows that I'll really miss when it's gone.  Not only does it star Joshua Jackson (OMG, it's Pacey from Dawson's Creek, investigating weird and creepy shit!) but it has by far the best character that I've seen on TV for a long time.  Walter Bishop (played beautifully by John Noble) is complex, layered, tragic and wonderful.  I love him.  If you haven't seen this show, go watch it, from the start.  If Pacey from Dawson's Creek does X Files is not enough of a draw, then you should know that it was created by JJ Abrams.  Go watch it.  Other stuff that I've enjoyed are Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 (James Van Der Beek properly taking the piss out of himself - VERY funny.  Am I going back to a Dawson's Creek obsession? Maybe.  But JVBD has really grown into his forehead since the Creek and clearly has a good sense of humour).  I was also really surprised to enjoy Elementary which I thought was going to be a giant heap of crap.  Keep reminding yourself that it's not Sherlock and then let yourself enjoy Jonny Lee Miller making a pretty good job of it. 

11 & 12. Learning Pilates, starting to run again and losing a bit of weight.  These last couple of things go hand in hand.  It was at the end of December last year that I was allowed to start running again after five months on the injury bench.  I started to build up very slowly and carefully - possibly a bit over cautious, but there it is. I was able to complete the Great South Run at the end of October, only two seconds slower than my PB.  While I was building up my running strength, I did a Pilates course in February and haven't looked back.  I love Pilates and feel immeasurably stronger in my core muscles than I did before.  Over the course of 2012, I've lost 21lb in weight and I think it looks like more, thanks to the Pilates, I'm holding myself better.  I still have plenty of weight to lose and will continue to work on that throughout 2013, but my first goal for next year is to train for and complete the Brighton marathon, something that did not seem likely this time last year.

And that's your lot.  Sorry that it's a bit hurried and slapdash, but at least it's done.

Wishing you all a very happy new year - I hope that you achieve everything that you hope for in 2013.

My Reason

It's Murdoch's birthday today! Happy birthday little guy. He's 8 today and we've lived together since he was so small that I could hold him in both hands. The little tinker.

The cutest thing I'd ever seen

Because it's Murdoch's birthday, I'm going to try and explain why he's so important to me, something that I find difficult to put into words, but here goes nothing. Murdoch, although you'll never read it, or need to understand, this is for you.

I don't presume to know what living with depression is like for everyone, but here's what it's like for me.  Mainly there are three kinds of days:

1. Days where things are pretty good.

2. Days where I can pretend that things are pretty good.

3. Days where I can't pretend that things are even close to good.

Most of my days fall into category one, although there are parts of those days where things go south and I need to take some time out to regroup.  It's not that bad things happen to make me react by needing to hide.  It's just that sometimes simply being in the world is overwhelming and I reach a point where it's too much to deal with, which brings me neatly to category two.  

Some days fall into category two, and while there are moments in those days where things are actually pretty good, those days are mostly just about fronting it out and making it through without bursting into tears for what most people would see as no discernible reason, or showing how much I feel mildly panicked and out of place.

Category three doesn't happen too often (thankfully!), but those are the days when I can't face being in the world.  Not in a scary suicidal sort of way, never anything close to that. But in a way that means I can't cope with even the most basic of interactions.  This is not limited to strangers, even those that I love beyond words are too much to deal with on those days and I tend to spend most of them hiding in my flat by myself.  There is no rhyme nor reason to when these days happen, sometimes I just wake up and cannot imagine how I'm going to go and face the world.

Regardless of which sort of day it is, every day starts the exact same way, with the noise of Murdoch's paws pattering across the floor as he comes into my room to see what's going on.  His face is the first thing that I see every morning.  It reminds me that even though sometimes it all seems too difficult to face, there are good things in my life.

He needs me.  He needs me to get out of bed, because he needs to go for a walk and to be in the world, running around and being vibrantly, almost obnoxiously alive.  And because he needs me, I go. When I can't think of a single reason why it could be good to go outside my front door and face the world, I don't need to. Because he is my reason.

It's a powerful thing and he doesn't even know it.  He's spent nearly eight years being the glue that has held me together through good days and bad.  For eight years he has given me simple, unconditional love that never asks anything in return.  His generosity of spirit, which all dogs are blessed with, has allowed me to be selfish and to cry stupid, pointless tears into his fur.  Even when neither of us know what I am crying about, just having him there calms my soul.

So there it is.  As I wrote this (having a quiet little cry in places while I did so), Murdoch was curled up in his bed by my feet.  We'd been out for a lovely walk. It was a good day.

My Reason

Scenes of Rural Devastation

Sometimes, we'll go out for a walk and it'll be lovely.  There'll be glorious sunshine, or we'll get to see the sun rise, or set. Sometimes there is mist and I'll see something truly beautiful, like the pictures below. It makes me feel so lucky to live in such a lovely part of the world and to have my dog, who gets me out of the door and into the countryside and the fresh air that it provides.

Natural Beauty

The sky's the limit!

Sometimes though, the weather is not kind. Like the lunchtime a couple of weeks ago where we got caught out in a hailstorm. You've never seen a dog so miserable. So like any caring, responsible dog owner, I videoed my poor dog's misery and am now sharing it across the internet. Should I report myself to the RSPCA?

In other news, the worst has finally happened.  The farmer has had the temerity to HARVEST HIS CORN. The look on poor Murdoch's face when he saw this scene of rural devastation.  He was utterly bereft.

Whaaaaaaaaat the f@%$& has happened here?!

YOU did this! How dare you!

My corn! My beautiful corn! GONE!

Found one!

Three things I have learned this week (part two)

More from the hinterlands of my brain, the latest instalment in an occasional series, perhaps more aptly titled "things that have mostly pissed me off recently".

1.  No-one uses their indicators any more.

Seriously. No-one does.  My driving tends to be fairly local, around the town and winding lanes of Godalming and surrounding area.  I can tell you that the vast majority of people around here do not use their indicators.  Is this a local phenomenon, peculiar to this area? Is it because there is a recession on and people are worried about the cost of replacement bulbs, should they wear those lights out from excessive use?  I'm actually considering popping a video camera on my dashboard and setting up a "People not using their indicators at roundabouts / junctions / anywhere they might be useful to indicate directionality" Tumblr.  What this space.  

1b. Saw an idiot driving through Godalming with no lights on at all yesterday at about 5 o'clock. Idiot.

2. Adverts on commercial radio can be astonishingly awful.

Since I realised that I was too old for Radio 1, on the basis that pretty much everyone on there started annoying the shit out of me, I have taken to listening to Eagle Radio. I'm not against commercial radio as a principle, but some of the adverts are just awful. There's one at the moment for Next.  A national retailer. They must have money for advertising creative to try something cool. But instead they go for a really lazy ad, that requires two poor actresses to utter the immortal words:

Embarrassed Actress One: "Great! What's the website again?"

Dismayed Actress Two (having already mentioned the website to idiot 'friend'): "next.co.uk!" (subtext, "jeeeeez, just Google it already, or take a stab in the frigging dark")

Surely it's possible to come up with a smarter, more subtle way of getting the point across. And don't even get me started about the ad that tries to tell me that it's best if my kitchen stoneware and bathroom tiles "work together as one".  They're frigging tiles, love. In completely separate rooms. I'm quite happy if they do their own thing.

3.  Murdoch really loves sweetcorn.

In a surprising "something that hasn't pissed me off" entry at number three, Murdoch has discovered sweetcorn.  It's been growing in the fields where we walk for months, but over the past week or so, the idiot hound has realised that it's really nice. As a result, I see very little of him during our walks as he slopes off into the field to help himself (sorry farmer, I think he eats much less than the deer!). The end result of this is *ahem* interesting, as Murdoch is now pooping something that is 90% sweetcorn held together by small amounts of poo. Good times.

Murdoch's in there somewhere. Eating corn. Yup.

In which I do some sport

Everyone, something exciting has happened!  You know that sporting legacy malarkey that we're all supposed to catch, except that none of us has, because we can't stop watching the Olympics long enough to get off the sofa and do the hoovering? ("No, it's really important that I watch the Greco Roman wrestling, I'm really into it now!").  Well, in your face Beeb 24 channel red button sport watching addiction, because on Friday evening I actually went out and did SPORT! (I know! Wow!).  

For a few years now, I've been aware of a series of local aquathlon events based at the Guildford Lido. Every year, I've thought about entering and then have never quite got round to it, for one reason or another.  So this year when a friend suggested entering, I took it as a sign that it was time to stop titting around and just do it.  So we did.  I shan't bore you with exhaustive detail on this.  Suffice to say that we swam 500m in the outdoor pool (tiring, as there was odd current pushing back at one end - breeze? I don't really know) followed by a 5k run around Stoke Park (which had been ploughed after the massacring it got for Guilfest, very uneven underfoot).  

I'm not going to lie.  The whole thing hurt like a bitch.  The swim felt good, but the run was tough.  My left shoulder hurt throughout, my left calf was really tight and I had a stitch in my right hand side.  But despite all of those things, I really enjoyed it and we have already signed up for another one in Hertfordshire at the beginning of September.  

I plan to actually train for this one (if only so that it doesn't hurt so much), so I have already hit the pool and shall be going running once I've posted this.  In actual fact, I would have been running anyway, as my training plan for the Great South Run starts this week, so it's all tying in together nicely.

Please note that Murdoch is not joining me in my sporting endeavour.  He is currently doing this....

Oofy oof

... lying in his bed blinking and making his best tired "oofy oof" noises, as he has been at the Dog House all day and as a result is knackered. If there were a gold medal up for grabs in a "lying on your back huffing" event, he'd win it.

In other news, I'm off to do something even more exciting tomorrow evening.  Eeeeeeek! That's all I'm telling you for now, I'm a tease!

A Wonderful Weekend

Is it Sunday evening already?  I've had a wonderful weekend and the time has just flown by.  

Now that quite a few of our group have babies, we're finding different ways to spend time together, as it can't be all about going out on the lash.  So these days we meet for walks, brunches and on Friday evening we held our book club's inaugural event.  The first book chosen to read was Fifty Shades of Grey.  Which I hated.  I could go on for a loooooooonnggg time about exactly why I hated it, but instead I'll direct you to this blog, that says it much better than I ever could.  Despite my rabid hatred of the book being discussed, we had a whale of a time, chatting about the book while enjoying a nice drink and a take out Thai curry.  A good time had by all, and hopefully a better book picked for next time!  We'll be reading Wonder, by RJ Palacio.

On Saturday morning I got up early and walked Murdoch before heading out for a run with B.  We did three miles before B split off to grab a few things from the shop.  Just afterwards I bumped into a couple of former colleagues wandering the streets of Farncombe trying to find their way back to Godalming, I took pity on them, jumped into the car and drove them back to Godalming.  Then after a quick shower I got a call from J asking me if I wanted to join him at the gym for a quick go on the bikes - he's just joined Fitness First and is super keen!  I thought "why the heck not?", got changed into some clean gym kit and headed out the door.  I'm really glad I went, B used to be my gym buddy but she now uses a different gym, so it's lovely to have someone to go with again.  

After that it was another quick shower before I had to head into Guildford for an optician appointment.  Guildford was rammed (because of Guilfest?) and I got stuck in traffic.  This led to me rescheduling my appointment, which was fine, but meant I had little time before I had to get back and collect Murdoch for our weekly walk at Blackheath, which was lovely as always.

After the walk I had just enough time to chuck Murdoch into the flat and throw some food down his throat before I went out again.  This time to a garden party to welcome my friends' baby into the world.  It was wonderful to see them and to meet baby Elsie, who is a lovely little girl.  I also got to catch up with some friends who I hadn't seen for some time while enjoying some wine, so all in all a lovely way to end a really busy day!

Today was a little less busy, but no less exciting.  I got up early again to walk Murdoch, but went back to bed for a while afterwards and caught up on some sleep.  Then it was time to get ready.  Because I was heading off to the theatre for an event that I have been looking forward for ages.  I grabbed B and her other half, S and drove down to the Chichester Festival Theatre to watch David Suchet take part in a rehearsed reading of Black Coffee - Agatha Christie's only play to feature Poirot.  It was fabulous and during the Q&A afterwards, David Suchet confirmed that he would never do this play again, so I feel really fortunate to be one of only a very few people who will ever see him perform as Poirot live on stage.  

I got back in time to take Murdoch for his evening walk and now I think it's time for bed, before heading back to the office tomorrow for a rest!

The Long Way Round

Juneathon the Twentieth.  In which we take an unexpectedly long walk, encountering poo swarms, cows and the very real possibility that we may never, ever be able to leave the field.  Ever.

Larger picture here

Well didn't we have a lovely walk this morning.  I decided to deviate from our usual route and go round a different field.  This was my first mistake.  My second mistake was not letting the enormous swarms of flies that were covering the cow pats lining the path put me off.  Seriously, they were everywhere.

The coup de grace came when I saw the herd of cows hiding over the brow of a hill in the corner of the field.  Right next to the stile that we needed to go over to get out of the field *sigh*

So we turned around and headed to a stile that took us into the next field.  From which there was no exit.  We went to each corner of the field in turn, desperately hoping for a stile, a gate, anything!!!!!! To no avail.  We walked (increasingly desperate) around the field until we were back pretty much where we started.  Right in the middle of the poo swarm.  Dagnammit.  I say "we" a lot, but really there were two distinct camps here.

1. Me.  "Oh God, there are no gates or stiles or any way of getting out of this damn field! This is awful.  Just awful!  WE MIGHT ACTUALLY DIE HERE!!" *flail*

2.  Murdoch (pootle) (sniff) (pootle)

Anyway, we made it home after adding an extra 1.35 miles onto our walk with this fiasco and just in time to jump into the car to take Murdoch for his annual boosters at the vet.

I also took Murdoch for another walk this afternoon - keeping to a well-established route this time - for a total of seven miles walked today.

In other news, I am aching like fool following yesterday's bootcamp effort.  Everything hurts.  I guess that shows that I worked pretty hard, unlike the two ladies next to me who chatted the whole time.  It's possible that they're much fitter than me, but then shouldn't they still be putting more effort in?

I had originally considered going for a run today but the sad state of my post-bootcamp body, combined with the fact that I have a run-date with my friend B first thing tomorrow morning have led me to cop out.

Longest Day Run

A much sunnier view at the weekend

Nearly an entire week has passed again and I've mostly been doing dog walking as my Juneathon effort.  Thankfully the weather has improved considerably and Misog has disappeared for a while.

I don't feel like I have masses to say and wouldn't be writing this blog at all if it weren't for Juneathon!  I have however read quite a few blogs over the past week, so feel a bit better about that.  This week I have the week off work.  I've decided that I'm going to try out a few classes at Charterhouse Club as well as getting a couple of runs in during the day.  

Then on Saturday I'm going to be taking part in the inaugural Longest Day Run event.  The idea is to run as far as possible between midday on Saturday 23rd and midday Sunday 24th.  In my case, I'm aiming for only five miles, which will be the farthest that I've run this year.  Check out the website and think about taking part - seems like a fun challenge to me.

PawPaw McGraw

Playing Catch Up (again)

Oh dear.  Once again I've been epically shit on the Juneathon front and haven't blogged since last week.  Nor have I had much time to read and comment on other people's blog.  I hereby declare that I will be chasing that elusive "negative split" and will do much better in the second half of the month.  If I fail at this, please feel free to come and do some monkey style poo flinging at my comments section.

Misog

So what have I been up to in the past week?  Mainly lots of dog walking.   In the rain.  You know it's got bad when on arrival at the park, the first thing Murdoch does when you let him off the lead is glance back at the entrance to the park, wondering if he could make a dash back to the flat before I could catch him.  I swear the only reason he (grudgingly) followed me into the park was because I don't let him have his own front door key.  In fact I have temporarily renamed him.  His current name is Misog because he is such a damp and grumpy misery dog. Anyway, where was I?  Oh yes.  So Misog and I have been doing lots of walking, sometimes clad in the Wrong Trousers, sometimes braving it in mere walking trousers (am I brave or foolhardy? I'll catch my death etc etc).

The view from the Gibbet. On a clear day you can see Canary Wharf

On Saturday morning I headed to the Devil's Punchbowl to do the Saturday morning run out with the lovely HBAC folk.  I particularly enjoy this session, as it always ends up in the café having a nice spot of breakfast.  Super.  It's really lovely at the Punchbowl.  Well it always was, but since the Hindhead tunnel opened, the Punchbowl and the Gibbet are no longer bisected by the A3 and it's now just wonderful.  Must take Misog down there for a walk.  At the end of the session, we were told that we must come next week as one of the coaches has something special in store for our little back to running group.  This has struck fear into my heart, mainly because Julia's idea of fun is running repeatedly up and down very steep hills.  She's lovely, but y'know, that's just madness.  Anyway, I'll find out what that is on Saturday, and if I survive, I'll tell you all about it.  

On Sunday morning I did a Pilates class at Charterhouse Club.  I really love this class, partly because I'm much better at it than I thought I'd be!  It's a great change of pace and I always leave after the class feeling energised.

Anyway, that's probably more than enough from me, I'll finish by giving you my Juneathon grand totals so far (*drum roll*):

Walking: 56 miles

Running: 14 miles (is anyone else having trouble getting RunningFree to speak to Nike+? They have clearly had a falling out and are standing on opposite sides of the room sulking.)

Pilates: 0 miles (1hr)

June-bilee Shenanigans

Oh God.  I'm playing catch up again.  It's just been so busy, these past few days. Enough ado, let's get stuck in.

Monday 4th June.  Got up, walking the dog, 3.2 miles done.  Trousers got soaked in the long grass again, wished I'd worn my waterproof trousers.

On Monday afternoon it was time for the inaugural Godalming Jubilee 5k (presumably they will rename it next year!).  There was also a 10k option, but I decided to stick to the 5k, with a 20 minute walk into Godalming as my warm up.  It was my first race since my return from injury and I was planning to take it easy, get round the course and just enjoy the day.  

Excited at the start with Leila

That plan lasted till the gun went off, I got caught up in the excitement and legged it round at full pelt.  The course was great, a great mix of traffic-free road running combined with an utter bitch of a hill that came as a bit of a surprise!  Ended up getting round in 27:29, which is a pretty respectable time for me and I was 19th woman home.  That probably says more about the depth of the field than it does about my performance!  It was well staged, particularly for a first time out and apparently the 10k was great too, with another couple of killer hills thrown in for good measure.

After hanging around the finish area for a bit with Leila, I walked home to Farncombe and took Murdoch for a walk - another 2.5 miles in the bag.  When I got home, I nearly fell asleep on the sofa, but managed to drag myself back to Godalming for an evening of Jubilee festivities.  At this point I should probably mention that my poor sad PF heels were giving me serious cause for worry.  Not only had I gone out pretty hard, but it was mostly on road, whereas my training since injury has been mostly off-road to minimise impact.  As a result, I'm afraid I spent most of the evening in a bit of a grump, and wasn't drinking as I wanted to be able to drive home. Reh reh reh.

On Tuesday I awoke to a miracle.  My heels didn't hurt!  I think this may have been because I had done quite a bit of stretching and had massaged my legs quite a bit.  Huzzah!  This was excellent news and I joyfully set off to walk the dog.  Trousers got soaked in the long grass again, wished I'd worn my waterproof trousers.

At around lunchtime I headed down to Liphook where there was a Jubilee street party in my parents' road.  Had a nice time chatting to the neighbours, even though it was PISSING it down.  After a couple of hours of British stiff upper lip, we gave up and went inside.  Had a nice cup of tea to warm up, then headed home to walk the dog.  There is a reason why I rarely crack out the waterproof trousers, despite wet leg misery.  This is because they make me look like Wallace wearing the Wrong Trousers.  Judge for yourselves.  

The Wrong Trousers. More tea Gromit?

But I did get them out for the second dog walk of the day - it was peeing it down, after all.

Got up this morning and immediately knew that something was amiss.  Aaaw hell, I'm going to have to go back to work.  Hurumph.  At least I had a dog walk first to cheer me up.  Did the usual route with the dog walkers, left Murdoch there for the day and headed up to London.  Did a good day's work and then got my running kit on.  Our offices are near Tower Hill and I decided that it would be lovely to run back to Waterloo along the South Bank.  

Last time I ran over Tower Bridge I was in the middle of a marathon!

And very lovely it was too - had to do quite a bit of tourist dodging and had a very scary moment near the OXO tower when I realised that my rucksack had suddenly got lighter than it should have been.  Turned around to see a male runner coming towards me carrying my jacket, a shoe and my purse.  Apparently a girl had seen them fall out of my bag (which had come open) and he offered to run them up to me.  I was enormously grateful - I've no idea how I would have got back from London without my purse, which contained all of my money, cards and my train ticket.  Disaster very narrowly averted and faith in humanity restored!  The slight downside to my day is that I missed my train home and as I got home quite late, it was easier to leave Murdoch overnight rather than do a late pick up.  I miss that little guy.  The flat seems very empty without him!

So now you're up to date again, are you as exhausted reading this as I was writing it? :)

Two for the price of one

Good morning to you all.  So early in June and already playing catch up on the blogging, this post is a once in a lifetime never to be repeated buy one, get one free offer (probably to be repeated as the month goes on). So where to start?  Oh yes, Saturday....

I woke up on Saturday morning and quickly realised two things:

1.  Sometimes I can be astonishingly stupid

2.  Isn't it lucky that I live in a quiet and safe neighbourhood?

The trigger for these exciting revelations?  I got up, got dressed and could not find my front door key.  Eventually located it...... in the door.  Oops.  But no-one came in and murdered me in my sleep / stole my tv / nicked the wine out of the fridge, so I'm counting that as a WIN.  Buoyed by this feeling of invincibility, I took Murdoch for a lovely walk around our local haunt, for about 70 minutes.  I just mapped it out on Mapometer and it looks like it's about 3.2 miles.  I love doing this walk, it's a brilliant mix of walking around the fields and then up through the woods, some of it is a bit scrambly as there are some really steep and slippery bits.  Our second walk of the day was at Blackheath, a social walk with our dog walking company.  It's a lovely chatty walk, and Murdoch gets to hurtle about with his doggy friends.  So Saturday, in a nutshell was all about the walking.

Yesterday, I got up, found the door key on the shelf where it belongs and took Murdoch out for that same 3.2 mile loop.  It was very rainy - a real contrast to yesterday's walk and my walking trousers were soaked within minutes.  Our walk takes us through very long grass so I was soaked right up to my thighs.  Found a huge tick on Murdoch's neck and had to remove it *yeeeeeeeeuuurrrgh* After our walk I went to meet a couple of friends for brunch at a local restaurant which I heartily recommend.  I always have scrambled egg with lovely big bits of Lincolnshire sausage chopped up in it. Delicious.

After brunch, I headed home and then it was time to don my running kit and head out to an event that I was quite excited about.  Some people that I had met through Twitter were coming towards the end of quite an impressive challenge.  They were running the entire 108 mile length of the Greensand Way, from Hamstreet in Kent to Haslemere in Surrey over the course of four days.  This challenge was unsupported, so these guys were running with hefty rucksacks on their backs.  Yesterday was the last day of the challenge and the team had invited us to join them for three miles of the run, from the White Horse in Hascombe to the Merry Harriers in Hambledon.  

I arrived at the White Horse at 1pm and had a lovely chat while we waited for the team to arrive, which was about half an hour later.  Frankly, they looked a lot better than I had expected - I was expecting to see four zombies stagger into the car park.  They stopped long enough to devour some much needed salty crisps and then we were off along the trail.  It was a lovely run - I think that seeing us really raised the spirits of the team and we had a great time hearing about some of their adventures so it felt like we got to the Merry Harriers in no time. 2.7 miles done and in the bag.  We then went into the pub while the team refuelled.  After lunch we saw them on their way, along with the very brave Lidia, who decided on the spur of the moment to keep going with the team to the end of the run, which meant that she ran 15 miles yesterday, without any training or preparation.  I later headed to Haslemere to see them finish - around 8pm last night, to rapturous applause from those of us waiting.  I hope those guys slept well in their own beds last night and are not too full of aches and pains this morning.  I left them to celebrate, headed home and took Murdoch out for a short half hour walk around the block and that was me done for the day.  

That's your lot for now, I'm hungry and ready to eat some breakfast!

Hey June, Begin

I can't believe that it's June already! C'mon, own up - who stole the first few months of the year?  I thought I'd make this first Juneathon blog post a bit of an introduction - hopefully some of you will have seen this blog as part of Janathon earlier this year, but here is a reminder and also a big hello to people who haven't come to visit me before - hellllooooo! *waves frantically*

I'm Amy and this is my first Juneathon.  I came across Janathon on Twitter and thought it was a fantastic idea.  I particularly like the community support aspect of the programme - who doesn't struggle with motivation once in a while?  My goal for Juneathon is the same as it was for Janathon; simply to be more active throughout the month.  I won't be running every day because I'm still on a very slow path back from injury having put myself out of action for five months with plantar fasciitis last year.  There will plenty of dog walking going on with my lovely mutt Murdoch, but my aim is to try and go above and beyond that as much as possible as the month progresses.

Yesterday I got up at my usual time of 6am and took Murdoch out for his walk.  He was with his doggy daycare people for the day, so I went and did the first walk of the day and then left him there for lots of doggy fun.  That was 45 mins walking done - no idea of distance at all, so I haven't logged it.  Next time I'll fire up the Endomondo app and measure the distance.  Then I headed off to a manic day at work.  It's wonderful having such a long weekend, but it meant that I've had a pretty busy week trying to get things done so that I can enjoy it without worrying about what next week will hold.  

Got home to a rapturous welcome from Murdoch who had been dropped off late afternoon and then it was time for some dinner.  And some dithering.  Then a little bit of procrastination.  Did you watch the programme presented by Prince Charles with all the old Royal home movies?  I've never considered myself much of a royalist, but I thought it was just wonderful.  Where was I? Oh yes, procrastination.  So it was 9pm before I finally pulled my trainers on and headed out the door for a run.  I had run 3.5 miles with my running club the day before, but I really wanted to start Juneathon with a run, so I decided to head out and do a short one.  Job done: 1.53 miles done in 15:59 - quite speedy by my current standards! 

I'm really pleased with this start, particularly as it highlights how motivating Juneathon can be.  I would never have headed out for that run if I hadn't signed up to do this!

I'm really looking forward to reading lots of the other Juneathon blogs, so I'll stop waffling on now and will go do that instead.

Such Glorious Weather!

I'm sure we're all feeling very patriotic with the Jubilee weekend now in sight, and what could be more British than a good old fashioned chat about the weather?  Hasn't it been wonderful?  It makes such a difference to walk Murdoch in the sunshine rather than trudging through the drizzle.  The fields are changing yet again as we start to see neat little rows of corn starting to sprout up.  It's funny to think that before we know it, those plants will be as high as an elephant's eye!

Sunny Sunday morning

Murdoch knows how to keep cool - hippo style!

It is important to keep an eye on your dog in this kind of weather though - I only walk Murdoch first thing in the morning and then later in the evening to avoid him from overheating and blowing a gasket! Also to remind everyone that leaving your dog in the car isn't very clever, check out why here (thanks to @Puppy_Views for that information).  I have to say that I was shocked at how quickly the temperature rose.

My beautiful Katty McMurray print

I didn't appreciate the weather quite so much in Brighton on Saturday (I'm so ungrateful!).  I had found a print that I wanted to buy and the artist had given me the option of her sending it to me, or me coming to collect it from the gallery in Brighton.  Given that the postage for a framed print was comparable to cost of a rail ticket, I thought I'd treat myself to a day out on the coast and so arranged to collect from the gallery.  In the meantime, the sun came out and as a result, the world and their wife were in Brighton on Saturday.  I don't blame them in the slightest, Brighton is beautiful in the sunshine and I could have happily spent all day wandering about if it weren't for the huge crowds.  But I tend to get a little claustrophobic in the heat, so I didn't spend the entire day there, instead opting to head home early afternoon.  But I now have my lovely print - just need to pop a nail in the wall to hang it on.

I hope you've all been out and about enjoying the weather as much as we have.

Ch-ch-changes

I love this time of year.  I really do, even taking into account all the rain that we've had over the past month.  I think it's because this time of year is all about new beginnings, so much more so than all the fanfare at the start of January.  As I walk Murdoch around the fields near to our home, it seems as though things change almost on a daily basis.  So I thought I'd share some of the pictures that I've taken on our recent walks.  I hope you enjoy them, please feel free to comment.

Turned out wet again

I think the farmer's trying to build a Stargate

  

It's sunny!

I like it better when it's sunny :)

Run! Run in the sun!

Just beautiful

Aren't we lucky to live in such a beautiful place?

First they did some pretty stripes in the field

 

Stripy

 

Spaghetti junction, farmer style

Then they ploughed the whole thing

Murdoch loves the ploughed fields. It has released so many exciting smells from the earth