Finally!

I had no idea when I took up this running lark, exactly how much will-power and motivation it was going to take to keep it up. In fact, I'd be so bold as to say that if I weren't so willfully stubborn as I actually am, that laziness would have won over months ago. The disheartening thing is, taking a short break virtually resets the clock. Not entirely, you obviously do achieve some sort of fitness level that you didn't have before (thank goodness it doesn't reset the waistline, that would be very upsetting) but nonetheless you've built up all that mileage, and you kind of struggle with three (again) and that is just... where's your thesaurus when you need it? You know. Downhearteningeningen.

Well, I wasn't entirely sure that the cold had gone, but I was entirely sure that I was fed up with even thinking I had a cold. I am never sure about whether colds just start sticking around because they think they're welcome, with me. Anyway, Sally said I could run on Sunday, so I decided to just go for it, and deal with the fallout later.

As luck would have it (you didn't think I was going easy on myself just because I've had a cold for a week did you?) I was in Bristol this weekend. I'd gone to see my godson Oscar, with the express reason being to take him to see Shaun the Sheep on stage. Oscar has liked Shaun the Sheep cartoons since -well, since his dad started watching them when he was about 4 months old.  Even the theme music sent him into rhapsodies. He got me hooked - for a kid's cartoon with no verbalisation to speak of, which does hold children's attention, it has a great deal of humour to it. So when I saw Shaun's Big Show advertised, I thought immediately of Oscar. And volunteered to go with him. Selflessly.

As it turned out, it was a bit selfless, although mainly on Oscar's part. There was no storyline to speak of, there were a few sheep indulging in dancing, which is what sheep often do, my training tells me. Occasionally they were joined by Bitzer, the dog, or the farmer, or the pigs. And sometimes the music was reasomably entertaining, like "I believe in Miracles", or YMCA, but no one under the age of 15 (and given that the show was really aimed at those below 8) was going to fully appreciate the choice of music. And in all honesty, the majority of four year old boys were going to find the ballet a little dull too. I wasn't averse to the dancing myself (I like ballet), but I did think a storyline wasn't out of the question. Even Swan Lake has a storyline.  Anyway, fortunately Oscar pulled at the theatre, so it wasn't an entirely wasted trip. The little girl next to him offered him her chocolate buttons, saying "I think boys can have these too", and he got a hug out of it at the end of the show.

Come Sunday morning, things weren't entirely right around the nose-throat-glands area, but a deal's a deal. I didn't feel slightly put out about going to a park all day with a bunch of kids, so I didn't see how a 3 mile run was going to change things. I thought maybe doing the run might blow those cobwebs away. I found a route on runkeeper, and managed to get it showing on my phone. This turned out to be invaluable. One thing I learned about Thornbury is that it is simply a mesh of footpaths, and I came so close to taking directions from Rebecca to go a non-road route... it's a blessing I didn't. It's also as well I didn't take instructions from Sal to "run for 15 minutes and then back along the same route" - there's no way I could guarantee getting back, with that many paths to choose from.

On my way, I noticed exactly why Runkeeper is inferior to the garmin in giving me my distance and speed. The lack of satellite updates meant that Runkeeper, which was drawing a red line behind me, frequently sloped that line through inanimate objects such as houses. This meant that I started to develop images a la Matrix films, where I may just have run through the walls of houses, bricks flying. I imagined grabbing the odd piece of toast, or sip of tea, on my way past. This gave the whole run a slightly sci-fi atmosphere. It wasn't too bad overall, and I definitely felt like I'd been out for a nice jog (I use the word loosely) and not a death-defying feat.

When I got back, we headed out to Old Down Country Park, had a leisurely picnic, and then headed over to the adventure playground. I found the general design of it as lacking as Shaun's Big Show, to be honest, but among definite attractions was a jumping pillow. Obviously the word "pillow" already holds attractions for me, but this was something else. A massive air-filled square with sand all around it, protruding up like a massive pillow.Jumping or sitting, it was great fun, and I noticed that dads particularly liked playing with their kids when it was an option. It sure hurts the backs of your legs though, and I think bouncing is probably excellent exercise. Note that it also helps levitation, as the little girl at the back of this photo illustrates nicely.

When I came home, I mowed Beck's lawn, because it was great lawn-mowing weather, and I wouldn't have wanted her to miss an opportunity to cut grass, and also, I have great friends who help with my garden, so it was a sort of garden-karma to pass it on. However, I think I did over and above my three-mile training...