Running Late

OK, today got off to a bad start, but it was nonetheless a great day. I decided I'd had enough of being rubbish about trains, so I got up extra early, I went to feed next door's animals - found that the chicken door was partly open, confirming my belief that someone is nicking Maggie's eggs. Probably the same someone who broke into Clara's house 3 weeks ago, to be honest. Anyway, I made sure of where my keys were, and set of with good time, so was horrified to see a train pull into the station as I did. I checked, and there was a train to Norwich leaving! I ran across to the platform, and realised that it wasn't my train - that was in fact, departing when I thought it was. Which was quite a relief, and I got a cup of tea and a croissant for breakfast in celebration. Here is what morning looked like - I run along by those trees sometimes.

Well, it cooked up a scorcher. It was like summer. Well, to be honest, it WASN'T like summer, it was what summer should be like. Our meeting was at a place that had both a cafe and a wood, making it ideal to have a cuppa and a chat, and then head into the wood, then have lunch. Some people think of everything. I actually last met Steve when he was interviewing me, which is always unsettling. I hate it when people have seen my CV. I just feel they know too much. Then I got really excited about my pot of tea (it was very splendid - I wish I'd taken a photo now), so I broke the tension by pointing out that Steve hadn't known how obsessed with tea I was when he interviewed me. It made him laugh, anyway. Also, Harry was at the meeting, who doesn't know that he is one of my favourite people. (In a work way). He's just very very sensible, and he really cares, and he knows loads. So it was warming up to be a good meeting already. I had quite a lot to say, which I was pleased about, because really, the meeting had nothing to do with me, I crashed it, so I was pleased to have something to contribute. I also mastered the knack of asking totally obvious questions as if they were quite important, which I've been practicing (and failing at) for years.

Anyway, we went into the wood, and I have to say, even though it was a mind-blowingly gorgeous day, I was apprehensive. Woods around Suffolk have a way of completely depressing me. They tend to have really high grazing pressure, and look a bit rubbish. We didn't go all around this wood, but it was bloody gorgeous. It's the sort of wood that really makes me really want to own my own woodland. Anyway, it had shrub layer! It had ash saplings! It had rides with proper shrubby edges. I cannot tell you how happy I was. We then saw a slightly worse area, where the coppice had failed, but actually it was still trying, it hadn't died completely. And there was ground flora that wasn't just grass. See, one of the things I love about Harry is that he was equally excited, we were like two kids on Christmas morning.

Well, back home, I got the togs on for running. I had a bit of a hectic plan of going for my ten miles "all steady/easy" then going out to Speakeasy at the Brewery Tap, which meant I had to get my run in a two hour slot. I was pretty sure going up the river and then on round the lakes at Ferry Meadows was about ten miles, so I set out. I decided, after yesterday's run, that I wasn't going to look at the Garmin, and let my pace sort itself out. I also took gel packs, and water, so I was well-provisioned. It was a lovely warm evening, cool enough after the heat of the day. I was feeling buoyed up by having had such a good day. I wasn't making the mistake of going too fast though.

Even though I wasn't looking at the garmin, I did, of course. MUCH less than yesterday, but I knew my pace was around 9:30 to 10 minute miles. Which was fast. I cheated today, I played music. Dunno, I felt like it. It helps keep pace when no one else is there. I really struggled around 4 miles for some reason, but the pace wasn't being important, and I slowed a bit. Then Cool for Cats came on, and I just kept going. Reaching the lakes was like being in a race, there were so many people. I'd done about 6 miles, and felt good. I saw other runners, and thought I was better than (lots of) them. I probably am. I overtook some. And others over took me (it's the way of things). My thighs started hurting at 8 miles. I slowed a bit, but they were more aching than hurting, so I thought it was probably OK. I was on my way back, but was alarmed to find that I hadn't even reached the rowing lake yet, and only had a mile and a half to go. I decided to end my proper run with a sprint down the rowing lake, which took me, as I feared, to 10.22 miles, and then jog home, which I estimated to be about 2.5 miles. Then I also noticed I was late - Heather was coming to pick me up in half an hour. I texted (tip: don't text and run) to say I was "running" late (geddit?), and carried on plodding. All of a sudden, this car slowed down, and a guy shouted out of the window "Come on, speed up!" I was momentarily terrified, until I realised it was Dave! He almost sped off, but I did speed up. "DAVE!" I hollered. He pulled over. "Can I have a lift home?" He looked baffled, but it wasn't a good place to stop. "Really?" "Yes!" I said, "I've finished my run already!" "Hop in then!" he said. Just time for stretches, shower, and (taking heed of Dave) cold water on the thighs. And ready for Speakeasy.

Perfect! It may happen more than I'd like, but I hate being late.

Puff the Magic Emma

OK, so the sweepstake is going well. I saw Puff looking at it this morning (remember him? right at the beginning of the blog) and when he saw me, he said "5 hours isn't on there" and walked off! Cheek! To make matters worse, with no prior consultation, Ian actually added five hours at the bottom of the page, and put a note at the side "Emma gets confused and thinks it's a pub crawl". I went over and charged him £2 for the entrant, which, in fairness, he happily paid. I added a message at the bottom of the sheet advising "smart arse comments - £2", in case he set off a dangerous precedent. He then asked for special permission to put on another comment, so I advised him of the additional charge, and he added 0:59 as a new time at the top of the page, and wrote "Emma gets some magic shoes" next to it. That's my carte blanche to spend the next 2 week shoe shopping sorted out, then!

Training today involved 5 miles, "uncomfortable". She wrote "Just run this slightly faster than you want to, it's not like threshold pace but it's just pushing a little harder than normal. Maybe get Dave to set the pace and keep it there for the duration. This could be about 9:20 mins per mile but actually heart rate is better so go for your 75% HR." This is good - it shows Sal recognises the importance of having running Dave around. Although tragically, I don't - as running partners go, we've been less well co-ordinated in the last week or so - what with colds and work meetings. So, without Dave, I knew it was going to be a challenge, right away.

I had reckoned without my own incompetence though. I realised at about 12:15 that I hadn't recharged the garmin. So I set that up, and waited till about 1 and then found that I hadn't packed the heart rate monitor. I thought about going without it - I'd just have my pace that way - but decided I'd go on the bike and fetch it. I set off, and realised I didn't have any pockets in either my tracksuit bums or my running vest. And I had keys. Luckily, I ran into Alan just before I set off, and beseached him to take my keys back into the office, which he very kindly did. Also, I left my water on the desk. Talk about poor planning.

I don't know if it was because I'd just got off the bicycle that running seemed slow by comparison, but I  set out at better than eight minute miles. That was ridiculous, so I tried to relax into it, and ended up at about 8:40. It just seemed OK, even though I distinctly recall admonishing Dave and Nigel for setting out at that pace a few months ago, because I knew I couldn't do it. Who knows, I said to myself, maybe I can now. That would be a turn-up for the books, wouldn't it? Yes, although in the event, it turns out it wasn't. I kept at - certainly faster than 9 minute miles, across the bridge at Asda's and for a fair way up the footpath along the railway. But I was feeling it now. I was puffing, kind of like Tom, but maybe more so. Pedestrians were turning around, long in advance of my panting out "excuse me". I made myself a deal. I wouldn't slacken from 9 minute miles, but I'd walk across the railway crossing.

First massive error. I kept up that pace, a deal's a deal, but when I walked across that railway, I was panting, and not running was so good. And the other side was shady - it was really sunny in Petrograd today, and I was missing that water. I bent over, for no particular reason, but stood up because I heard a lady coming, and I didn't want to look too ill. Then I realised that I'd gone quite red-faced bending over, so I probably looked even worse than I felt. I'm not sure, but I think she said "It's hotter than it looks, isn't it?" - and I was too exhausted to do more than nod. She  might have said "it's harder than it looks" but she didn't really seem the running type (although who knows?). The shame was too much, so I set off again. I made another bargain: the next railway crossing.  I had to run over the bridge the other side but I was allowed to go slowly. The hill down the other side would be the time to pick up.

A cyclist cut infront of me on the railway, and I was fearful that he might hold the gate open for me, but he rudely let it slam just as I got there, for which I was grateful. I didn't want to have to keep running for it. I picked up speed again the other side, and then - here's a weird thing - I took the wrong path. No idea. Anyway, I took a grass track that went along the river, instead of the path along the rowing lake. I initially thought the grass would be OK, and it was bound to come out somewhere - but it was dreadful in the sun, and for all I knew it wouldn't come out anywhere sensible. I decided to cut across through the weeds and trees to the path I was meant to be on. And of course, I had to walk... I couldn't see where I was putting my feet, and didn't want to trip. So that was stop 3. I reluctantly set off up the rowing lake, realising I was becoming hopelessly addicted to the garmin, I thought maybe I should stop looking at it. Even though my pace was clearly slowing, Sal had said that she wanted my heartrate at 175, and it was easily above that, even when I slowed (although not when I walked). So I could slow down, right? I should just stop looking, and do what felt comfortable. I tried to make a deal not to look until the end of the rowing lake, but there was nothing in it for me: I cracked long before I got there, and realised I'd slowed down to a ten minute mile. "It doesn't matter" I thought as I puffed, "as long as I keep going". The other side of the Boathouse (where I couldn't pretend I was on a pubcrawl, and stop for a quick half, because the lack of pockets meant I didn't have any cash) I passed an elderly couple. "Excuse me" said the gent. (Who stops a runner to ask for directions? Perhaps a samaritan...) "Do you know how to get to Orton Mere?" "Yes" I panted, and contemplated leaving it at that, but I'd already come to a stand still. I didn't know a shorter way than the way I'd just come, so I told them that way. "You've got your breath back now" he smiled, delightedly. Bastard. "Thanks" I told him.

I contemplated that my pace being all over the shop, that a nine minute mile was not possible for me over the course of the race, if I couldn't sustain it for five miles. So it looked like beating Chris's time (1:57) was not, in fact, going to be possible. My own goal time was still a significant challenge. But I thought, if I DIDN'T start at 8:40 min/miles, I might not die so rapidly. Which wasn't really reassuring. I decided that the place to get those magic shoes Ian dreamed up was probably not a shop, but a fairy godmother. I hope mine came good.

Sally has written a race plan which is brilliant, and I am in the process of committing it to memory. I won't tell you what it says, because I don't want my competitors getting an advantage, but it has the sage advice, when getting into the hard miles, to act that I'm just leaving my house for a five mile run. (see how Sal learned that I don't like short runs, so she picked the right one to tell me). I complemented her on the tactic of focusing on acting, and she admitted to trying to think of a handle I could grasp. Anyway, there's nothing like rehearsals for a good play, so as I was close to death, I thought I'd give it a go. And, it worked! I got my breathing slowed down, and immediately felt comfortable with the pace again, which I picked up. It didn't last for very long... but I'm still, you know, getting into character. (And ideally, I need to know what motivates the character in the play to go running in the first place... until I really get that, it's going to be hard to be convincing).

Not long afterwards, as I was seriously contemplating throwing myself into the river, which looked cool, surprisingly clear, and inviting, especially the little fishes, I saw Richard running the other way. I really hope I don't see him on the race. Although I may do, because he said he'd be at the back as he is helping a new runner. I bet they beat me. He was pelting along. (This is a man who ran the Sahara, though. I'm not really in his league). He said "OK?" and I gave him a thumbs up as I said, "No, not really" but I don't think he heard, because he had earphone on. Shortly after that, at the ascent behind Asda's, I gave up. I walked. Then I looked, and I hadn't even done 5 miles yet. (I thought it was 5.5 total, but it's actually a bit less). I thought I'd go on at whatever pace I could muster, so I made myself go again. I got as far as the other side of the underpass, and walked as far as the pedestrian crossing, then I ran the rest of the way back to the office. I even sprinted the end.

I couldn't really feel pleased about it though. I mean, the plus side was I didn't hurt myself, but I hadn't excelled. In fact, I'd done everything wrong: I started too fast, and I let myself stop when I knew I should have slowed down. I felt the people who'd put their names down after my target time of 2h10 on the sweepstake were probably the realistic ones. (Also, I realise I should have asked the running people for their first half marathon time, not their personal bests. This might be much more realistic for me personally). There's another plus though: I did it wrong today, not on the race day. I could do better than this... Dave'll help... he'd never let me stop, but he will make me slow down if I tell him I'm in trouble.

Back in the office, although Sal was in, I had a long email chat with her. She is SO much less frightening over email. "I'm bad" I told her. She said, yes, but normally so. I berated myself; she placated me. "Those heartrates, and times, they show you really tried hard" she told me. Discussing this with Heather later, as I told her how ridiculously nice, and sensible Sal is, Heather pointed out to me that I was much harder on myself than Sal was. "You project onto her" she told me, psychoanalytically. "I do what?" I queried. Anyway, turns out, I'm the hard task master, but as I'm in denial about that, I blame Sal. Or something. I still think that Sal, who is an outstanding trainer, has got into my psyche (possibly by reading this) and is happy to see that I'm passionate about getting a good time, and at the current point in my training, appreciates that no amount of berrating me is actually going to help at this point. I can't do any more than what is in my plan. I know this, because I keep asking. "So, is it alright if I run on the beach on Saturday?" I asked today. I thought it would be a good idea - Dave seemed to think it was a good exercise. (Fortunately I didn't tell Sal this.) "Are you MAD" she wanted to know, "you can't run on sand that close to a race!" So, lucky I checked, really!

It was also at this point that she said I should stop looking at the garmin. "I often tell people to not use it, or cover the face on race day" she said. I admitted to seeing the point of this, but I am now hopelessly addicted. I need it to see whether I'm dying. She might have to forcibly remove it from me if she doesn't want me to use it on raceday. But hoepfully I'll use Dave more, so it'll be OK.

Right, how does one go about finding a Fairy Godmother?

Turning the corner.

So I had that run, all 10.75 miles of it, and let me tell you, it made all the difference. I knew, regardless of the state of my cough, that I needed to do that run. And I did it! I had nothing to do on Sunday, in training terms or otherwise, so I theraputically set to tidying my house, which has been slightly neglected of late. You may have noticed I've had the odd engagement here and there. Also, Frank has fleas, which I am doing my best to combat, but once they're in the carpet, the only thing to do is start the war, which goes, hoover, whack heating up (hatches the eggs), and flea bomb. And clean out hoover. (Didn't think of that did you?). Unfortunately, the first element of that necessitates all the floor being visible, so I had some work to do. Then there was the minor detail that I dropped the hoover down the stairs in August and broke the handle. What? I've hardly been in the house, OK. (Honestly, the man who sold me that vacuum cleaner told me that his mother vacuum-cleans her house three times a day. I'm still in shock.). So, the flea bombing (and hoovering) hasn't happened yet, but the house is much tidier. I'm still going nuts every time a hair (cat hair, normally) lands on my arm or leg.

Today, my routine was to run for half an hour (I still can't quite call it a "recovery run"... it sounds so wrong). I was unable to do it in my lunchtime, for being at a meeting in London all day. In fact, the whole day, which started off reasonably well-organised, as I had a relaxing wander down to let Maggie's chickens out and feed her cats (no, not chicken), and a leisurely breakfast, descended rapidly into panic because I then lost my keys, and was late leaving, so I made the train with a full minute and a half to go. I will still swear that I never put the keys where I found them. Weird.

The meeting was a bit of an adventure, because my colleaugue Chris persuaded me to hire a Boris bike (she had a foldy-uppy one, which technical people call a Brampton. They are almost as ungainly as a Boris bike to be honest). Annoyingly, there wasn't one at either of the two bike parks outside Kings Cross, so we legged it to Euston, and there also wasn't one there. I had to get the underground, and realised as the machine swallowed my ticket at the end, that I didn't have a receipt for my claim. Oops.  The way home, however, was more satisfactory, and I found a lovely rack of bikes, and selected one. They are a bit rubbish, but for the convenience of being able to grab a bike, and ride it round all day for a pound, I think they are a bloody bargain. It's a heavy bike, and the gears are very low, so it is hard to keep a speed up, but not a thing to sniff at. Chris is an unnerving person to follow on a bike, because she spent more time looking backwards at me than she did at the road, which would be OK if we weren't cycling in London. Also, she stopped at virtually every red light, which made me almost career into the back of her several times, as I thought she'd jump them. Then she didn't when I thought she would. She also overtook a guy on a bicycle, who spat over his shoulder after she'd passed him, leaving me wondering if it was like one of those computer games where you have to carefully time when you pass the spitting man... I was successful.

When I got home, and had done the important things like give Frank a stroke and his dinner, I put the chickens to bed, and went for my half hour run. It was a good run, I ran up passed Tony and Jan's house, in a little circuit. I think I was going between 10 and 10.5 minute miles. I thought about talking running with Chris - she's seemed to think I should abandon my idea of starting at 11 minute miles. She said I'd never get Dave to run that slowly anyway. I wonder if you can warm up before a race starts, and how long the effects take to wear off if you are hanging around. I could run the almost mile from my house to the startline as a warm up. But I wouldn't want to expend energy too soon, on the other hand.

Strategies! Who knew running would be this hard! Another strategy has to be how to get my computer back... this was from this morning. There's quite a definite glare going on there. I can't figure out if he's jealous of the time I'm spending with it, or if it is just because it is warm... But at the weekend he was sitting on the router.

There she goes again...

Well, as I mentioned last week, I've now not been training for a week and a half. And I missed doing the Grunty Fen half marathon. The week before that, I was feeling so confident. I'd run 8.8 miles, and I was ready to try out the Grunty Fen, which would have set me up - I'd have known. I could do it. Then that didn't happen, and then I got sick and now I have, as of today, exactly two weeks until I run my first ever half marathon. So all of a sudden, I went from feeling pretty cocky to feeling exceptionally low on confidence. Especially with this whole "time" business, which I admit I brought upon myself. I started the sweepstake, and it's got people talking about their personal best. The people who have been most supportive have been saying things like "but you should feel any time is an accomplishment - you've never run it before", but now I want to beat the other people (NOT all of them - my goodness, we have some fast runners in my organisation). Summer says that I shouldn't think like that - if I keep my goal time reasonable, then I can feel pleased if I beat it, but if I set it too high, I'll feel disappointed when I finish the race, even if I do a perfectly good time. There is something in this. It is more sensible than the people who have said "But if you don't do a good time this time, it'll give you something to beat next time." These people are missing something massive about the whole hating to run thing. Mind you, they are also correct. If I don't get a time I think is good enough, the chances are, I'll do it again. I hate myself.

Anyway, this is the story so far. I had this chesty cough all last week, and Sal said I shouldn't train until it had gone. She doesn't realise that I often carry a cough for several months, but I let that go. She seemed to think I'd be better by the weekend, and I undertook to get early nights (and some of them did occur before 11pm). I resisted running Dave, who wanted me to go out on Thursday - I was still feeling that Sal was right at that point, although it was killing me that I was wasting precious training time. Sal said I could start again probably on Sunday. I did go to pilates on Wednesday, but I didn't do anything too hard (and stopped if it made me cough).

On Friday, Summer texted to say her weekend was pretty chaotic, and she had time to run on Saturday afternoon, if I wanted to join her, she wanted to run 11 miles. I wanted to. But I was too scared of Sal to just go ahead, so I emailed the Teach to see what she recommended. I think she could sense my frustration, and thought that it outweighed the recommended approach. She said "Go for it. It's probably a bridge too far, but see how you get on".

Now here's a funny thing. We set out from Summer's so I had to cycle over first. I thought the cycle ride would be OK because I cycle very slowly. But I seriously thought that ride was going to kill me, and by the time I got to Summer's I felt terrible, and would have laid money on my dying if I attempted running (which I generally consider being more difficult than cycling). Summer shared my concern "Are you alright?" she said, as I coughed. But the part of my brain that wanted to get that 11 miles done was in charge. "I'll be fine", I said.

And I was. We had a false start, because I brought a bumbag with me to put the gel sacs into, and it bumped around so much we went back to dump it. Luckily although the particular leggings I was wearing didn't have pockets, the top was a cycle top, so it had one of those pouches in the back, so I shoved the gel sacks in there. We ran around the lakes at Ferry Meadows, and it was really lovely. I wished that I lived closer to the lakes, which certainly were more enjoyable than running around New England. It was fun doing a bit of people watching - such a cute little boy who had just had a tumble off his bicycle, and was howling to his mum. The words were indistinct, and Summer mentioned this to me, so I translated for her. "He said 'It hurts too much to wiggle it'". This appeared to have been serious, because when we lapped the lakes a second time, we saw a bloke (dad, perhaps) taking away the two bicycles, although mum and kid had gone by then.

Well, we did 10.76 miles, not too fast, at 11 minute miles on average, and although my thighs started hurting about half way round, I didn't feel bad or tired at all. This was exactly what I wanted to happen. Although I have to say that my legs are still feeling it this morning. And it's really happening... the signs are up in town. I always knew I'd stop the traffic one day...

Funny.

So, no training for someone with the runs. It makes sense. I can't say I covered the full 1 hour 45 minutes in actual running. By the afternoon, I took a risky but much-needed nap, and that seemed to sort things out. Meanwhile, the cough was refusing to be shaken off with mere echinacea and orange juice, and was brewing, exactly like the gremlin-monster in the Benelyn ad, I could feel it sitting on my chest.

On Monday, I didn't need to think about whether or not I was well enough to be in work. It was an obvious "no". Frank LOVES it when I am sick. He spent the whole day on my bed, languishing, looking up at me and purring. It made me think of Tom's song, "this is how life... is supposed to be" was clearly written in his face. I did a lot of sleeping.

I did allow Jill to come over and talk about my production in the evening, although I warned her I was sick, but that was mainly in case she said anything negative, because it certainly would have made me weep. Fortunately she didn't, although she didn't bowl me over with her praise either, but I wasn't really expecting that. It was a mistake. I could have gone to sleep half an hour before she came, but instead, I got on my dressing gown and slippers, and went downstairs. She only stayed half an hour, but by the time she had gone, I was completely awake, and thinking only of The Crucible. I tried going back to bed, but the play rolled around and around in my head. At about 2:30, I sat up, and watched Strictly Ballroom on iplayer, which finally drummed the Crucible out of my head. Scott, the arrogant youth who knows he can dance better than anyone, reminded me of Dan in many ways, some of them to do with his actual dance moves. After it finished, I revelled in the mastery of anyone devising a TV show, in all seriousness, on the back of that... isn't "Strictly Come Dancing" absolutely hilarious, when you think that the main tenet of that film was that the panel of judges were corrupt and wrong? That made me smile as I finally drifted into sleep. Seemingly, minutes passed (and in fact, certainly not more than an hour or so) and I woke up. I felt, as the lack of sleep hit me, as if I'd been run over by a train. I realised immediately what had happened. Because I'd slept all day on Monday, I hadn't slept in the night-time. And what I was crying out to do now, was sleep. Which would mean that I'd not sleep tonight either. I resolved to sleep for a few hours, then go to the office for the afternoon, which would hopefully (a) keep me awake (ahem) and (b) tire me out.

Blissful though that sleep was, however, I started dreaming. In the dream, I had to get up, because the half marathon was... today! I started to panic. I heard running Dave saying, "you see, I knew we should have got the distance in!" I realised he was right. I should have already run 13 miles. How was I going to run it faster, when I hadn't run it all? I should have done the practice Grunty Fen... and I didn't. And now it was too late, and I was sick, and I was never going to make it. Somehow, as the dream tortured on, I appeared to have given myself a reprieve. The actual race was a week from today, and today, I had to run a practice race; I'd missed crucial things, I'd messed up... I woke up, drenched in a sweat, relieved but also panicky that I actually had 3 weeks until the race. The phone was ringing. It was my line manager: I'd missed a meeting. Worse, it was my quarterly review meeting. Somehow, I managed to come through it shining though... I appraised her of my plan to come in for the afternoon, and it not only impressed her that I was willing to get up off my sick bed, she was able to progress some work in a timely fashion herself. The sacrifices I'm willing to make.

I was able to catch up with Sally in the office, whose voice was only partially tinged with concern, as she said, "We've still got time. It's OK. You just might not make such a good time". This is also Rubbish! I mean, it's almost certainly true, but very bad news. I don't generally consider myself to be a competitive person and may previously have made the statement that "I don't have a competitive bone in my body!" This however, is patently nonsense. The truth is that I'm so competitive that I really really hate losing; I'd quite simply rather not play than lose. Oh I can happily lose things that I acknowledge I'm bad at (I'm not happy. I'm dying inside). If I mock myself enough, and send myself up, then you know, it's OK.  So, of late, I've realised that I DO have at least one competitive bone in my body: the funny bone.

Nonetheless, long distance runs should be OK, they should be reasonably threat-free - I'm never going to **win** it (so I thought). But now I understand what I should be able to achieve. And I need to beat it.

Well, with this in mind, I've set up a sweepstake. The idea, as discussed with Nigel, is that you pick a minute - my range is between 1:35 (yeah, dream on) and 2:40. Pick a minute, give me a pound. If I come in on that minute, you get a tenner, the rest goes to charity. Now here's a thing. I set this up today, this afternoon, and I've virtually already made a tenner. These are colleagues of mine, many of whom haven't yet sponsored me. Does this mean that they infinitely prefer paper to my Just Giving site (what's that? I should put in a hyperlink to my Just Giving site? Good idea - in case you haven't yet had a chance to sponsor me?) or that they infinitely prefer taking a flutter to passing up cash? Hmmm.

Anyway, with this in mind, I have labelled where other colleagues' personal bests are. This has had a negative impact on me. A lot of them are a lot faster than my target time. I've done the maths. I can't run a half marathon faster than I ran that 10k. However, I have enlisted running Dave's help. His main issue is that he starts too fast. My main issue is that I run out of motivation for keeping going. We are a perfect Yin and Yang. I will pull him back (quite possibly literally) at the start of the race. We'll run the first half at "slow pace". To realise anything like my personal target time of 2 hours 10 minutes, we cannot run it slower than 11 minute miles. Sadly. Then, Dave takes off, hopefully calling out "Come on, Emma", and I chase him. It can't fail.

5 Point Plan:
1) Get better (by Saturday);
2) Cancel all engagements between now and 9 October (except Susie's wedding);
3) Do everything Sal says;
4) Encourage Sal to be a proper slave driver and stop being so nice (and obey 3);
5) Set iphone reminder to go to bed early every night (except Susie's wedding).

With this in mind, I'm off to bed. Goodnight.

Basura

Let me start with an apology, an important statement, and then a review of how rubbish things are going right now.

OK, first up, I'm sorry I haven't been posting. This is also a reflection on how rubbish things have been.

Second, an important statement: I haven't run the race yet. I'm concerned about this - several people have congratulated me. It seems there is an element of confusion about the 10km race. That was a race. It wasn't the race. It was shorter, and (supposedly) faster. I have yet to run the magical 13.1 miles. The most I've done, at a slow jog, was 8.8.

And now let's review the progress I've failed to make over the last week. I left you in Ely, a week ago Sunday, when I was on my way back from a fine trip out, although sadly, not a practice half-marathon. I would feel so much happier if I had run that. I can't begin to tell you. Oh wait, yes I can...

I came home, and started writing the paper I had to give the next day. This took a great deal of time. At about 10, I realised that I hadn't done a 45 minute jog, and I hadn't delivered scripts of the Crucible to Peter and Mary. Ideally, I would have happily combined these two chores, bar for the fact that I also hadn't finished writing my paper. I got on the bike, and cycled across town to drop off the scripts. I returned, ate, and carried on tapping away at the computer. (It was, at least, a modicum of exercise?) I finished at 1am, and realised that the house was a horror, and that my neighbour was going to have access to feed Frank. I did the washing up. I attempted to pack, and then went to bed at 2am.

On Monday, at 6am, I got up, threw stuff at the suitcase and left, where I was early for my train, by a full 4 minutes. (It would have been 8, but I thought the train was at 6:46, not 6:42). We staggered to Sheffield, burdened by the entirely unnecessary things I'd put into my case, and arrived at the conference comfortably early. The conference was great. My paper turned out to be too long, owing to an odd change in the length of sessions from 15 minutes plus 5 minutes questions, to 12 minutes plus 3 minutes questions. Needless to say, there wasn't a great deal of time for questions... some things can work to your advantage. I shan't bore you with the details, but a highlight was Bill Sutherland's "Year in the Life of an Ecologist (a personal perspective). He said that he is often struck by how people gather at conferences, and become so immersed in their own research world, that they totally fail to discuss any of the major ecological issues that are going on. It was a well-made point, and a great romp through the year. It even mentioned RSPB Dave's reserve! How's that for thorough? (Although not RSPB Dave. That would have been slightly weird).

I also hung out with Juliette for a lot of the conference, which made me feel very important - for anyone who graduated with me, that Juliette, our young zoology lecturer who every male undergraduate drooled over... who now (also) works for RSPB. (And people still drool over her). I ascertained (terrifyingly) that she is a triathlete of some standing, nationally, so I pretended to know a lot about training, so we had some shared ground. She demanded to know how old this famous/infamous hard trainer of mine was, and I hazarded a guess that Sal was in her early 40s. Juliette's entire demeanor relaxed (she is also bordering on terrifying), as she said that Sal was not in her age group. She explained that she is a little competitive, and if Sal were in her age group, she'd probably know her. I later found out from running Dave that Sal is actually in her age group. I hate to admit it, but if I were Sal, I'd be slightly concerned. Of course, that's because I'm not as terrifying as Sal is, but I wouldn't want to see them meet, to be honest. Although us being girls, they'd probably be all honey and laughter (with subtle undercurrents of hatred).

Well my training routine was postponed until Wednesday, owing to the hills, when I was due to be doing a fifty minute run. I had to get this in before pint of poetry, so I asked Maggie if she could give me a lift, which she kindly agreed to do, and I set out to do a circuit of town, deeming the river edge paths to be too dimly lit for an after-dark run. What I did find out was that running on a Wednesday around New England is a poor choice, Thursdays must be bin day, further north of me, because all the wheelies were out. It stank. Language is funny, isn't it? The word basura popped into my head, which is (possibly) the spanish for rubbish. I think it is rather apt, because it is a long "u", so it goes bas-urgh-ra. Which is just what my brain was thinking. It was perfectly manageable. I nipped off to Pint of Poetry, where I read out Marcus Brigstock's hilarious poem from late 2009, during the Climate conference in Copenhagen, which was called Dr Seuss at Copenhagen - largely inspired by Bill Sutherland's talk, in fact.

Sal messaged me on Thursday morning to say "rest or swim", and after three days of conference, I decided (perhaps foolishly, the way things turned out) to rest. However, I didn't have my swim things with me at work. She then messaged me (let me just say this now, at 00:38 on Friday morning: this is why she doesn't really have a leg to stand on telling me to go to bed early. On the other hand, she isn't training for a race in 3 weeks time... so maybe she still has both). The message went thus:

"So, tomorrow (Friday) do a 50 min fartlek run with 6 to 8 burts of faster running of between 90 secs and 4 mins. If it's 90 secs run hurtily fast, if 4 mins run uncomfortably but sustainably fast. It can be anywhere between those times but do mix up the intervals, i.e. don't do all the same.

Rest on Saturday (or bike ride for 60-90 mins)

On Sunday do 1hr 45mins of steady running. Be really great if you could do it on a hilly route out this way but would mean getting the bus over :) Maybe not then"

I can't remember why I didn't do the fartlek run on Friday, but I think that meetings overran, and I just didn't have a lunchbreak left. On Friday evening, I had some theatre-work to do: although I did cycle up to Eye Road to pick up some props for Saturday. Then I spent the evening planning a workshop for Saturday around The Crucible, which I was directing for a "rehearsed play reading" on Saturday evening. I cannot tell you how worried I was about this: (1) it's my favourite play, and I didn't want to mess it up; (2) I've never ran a workshop before, and (3) I was feeling, mainly because it was true, a certain lack of organisation and efficiency, and was desperately worried that my cast would pick up on this - because one of the reasons for doing it was to convince my theatre group that I can take on directing. So I could have got the missed session in on Saturday morning, but I didn't want to do the two training courses on consecutive days, because of the lack of recovery time; and I didn't want to get any more stressed than I already was. On the plus side, I did get an early night. In hindsight, though, another mistake.

So The Crucible went well - really well, considering the pre-planning that had gone into it, which mainly consisted of nightmares. One of my lead characters had rang me on Thursday to say she had bronchitis, and I ended up **ahem**, selflessly stepping into the role myself. Yes, it's my favourite part. What?

On Sunday, I had plans to do my 1hr 45 minute run in the afternoon, when Summer could join me. This meant that I could also have a (in my opinion) deserved lie in, listen to the Archers with a cup of tea, maybe a refill. I also hit the echinacea and orange juice first thing, because the shadow of a hint of a cold that had been growing all week manifested itself on Sunday morning, but I (vainly) hoped that it might be caused by a dry throat and the echinacea might sort the rest out. I did manage to achieve at least a cup of tea, before things went wrong. It was a rumbly tummy that alerted me to further problems. Turned out they were cataclysmic. Running, I did, all morning, but not outside. I emailed Sal, to tell her I not only had a chesty cough, but also "the runs", which, let me tell you, is not a winning combination. She messaged right back "My god, you've broken!" I think the surprise was that she was clearly blameless.

This was disastrous. Totally, utterly, rubbish.

The Gods weren't smiling on me

Right, I pulled out of the Grunty Fen race last Sunday. This is a grave disappointment to me, but not nearly as bit a one as it would be if I were to have injured myself, hurt for the next 3 weeks, and then not manage the Great Eastern Run.

What happened was this: as I was walking into work on Friday, there was a glimmer of a twinge of pain, right where the injury had been. It happened a couple more times during the day. Not all the time: but more than a tight muscle. I couldn't figure it out: it's not like I did a long, or even particularly "strong" run yesterday. And the swim should have helped. Shouldn't it? The illegal swim, that my coach didn't tell me to do.

But I had two days to recover, right? It'd be fine to run thirteen point one miles on it on Sunday. THIRTEENPOINTONEMILESOHMYGOD. I have so many things in my head to think about this week: there's been new advice on the type of glucose sachets I should use, diet before the race, diet after the race, what to do on the race, my head is swimming. But I've been trying to take it all on board: I ordered the high-five isogel packs on amazon, and got in some fresh pasta. Well, I'll do what I can: I didn't ask Pete and Jenny if they could serve pasta with plain tomato sauce at their wedding breakfast, even if they are vegetarians.

After lunch on Friday, I cracked, and emailed Sal about the twinge. My suggestion was that I monitored progress, and ran really really slowly, and didn't try anything clever like a negative split. She emailed me back. "I think you should drop it. And you weren't down to do a negative split anyway. What do you think?" I'm never sure with these questions if she means, "How does that sound to you?" or "What do you want to do?", because surely my previous email had told her the latter. I tried having a hissy-fit and throwing my toys out of the pram, but not very hard, because it's still Sal we're talking about here. "I'm all psyched-up to run it: I want to run it. I can't deny the irony of the situation - I want to do it." I told her. And it was true, actually. But I think it's the attraction of the beer. She held onto her line. She said, in the sort of reasonable way that my mum would use, "By all means do grunty if you feel you'll be ok, I just think the odds seem against it what with wedding, car and now calf. The only thing it has going for it is Dave...... What do you think?" (That's RSPB Dave, who I said I'd meet afterwards).  There was a definite element of "Would you like to revise your last answer?" She was right. I didn't feel I'd be OK. In fact, the moment I emailed Sal in the first place, I'd basically admitted that I thought my leg should be amputated. Let's face it, I generally don't tell her when there is something that I think would stop me from doing exercise (like a stomach upset) if I actually believe I can do it. So I clearly didn't think it was a good idea.

Interestingly, I honestly thought that she'd written "the Gods seem against it" (hence my title) right up until I pasted the message in here. Which I thought was slightly out of character, but one that appealed to me. Just after I received that message, I was told there was a parcel for me. It turned out to be the glucose gel sacs I'd ordered. Now, usually I'd think that was a sign that things were running smoothly and I should do the race (this is how my mind works), but when I opened them, I found they'd sent me the wrong things. I specifically didn't want the caffeine ones, and that's what I had.

So, Sal was right: I was planning to do a race the day after a wedding reception, without a car, I was potentially going to injure my calf, and I'd got the wrong stuff. The Gods, or the odds, were not in my favour.

I then alerted Sal to the fact that I'd be in hilly Sheffield for three days, and could I capitalise on this at all. Her answer was swift: No. Hill training would be very bad for the damaged muscle. She said I could do 45 minute jog on Sunday, and basically see how it went, then a longer one, on the flat, when I got back to Peterborough on Wednesday. She said "Maybe I've been too hard on you..."

This is completely flying in the face of every preconceived notion I have about Sal. To have a short review, Sal has not been a slave-driver through this process (apart from suggesting hill training and farklets): she has consistently advised to slow down when I've been struggling, she's never once said "why didn't you do that?" (well, she didn't actually need to, I'd already written it here), and actually everything I've done that has pushed me too hard has been my fault: I tried to go faster than I was allowed on Tuesday, I did an extra swim on Thursday, and now I'm begging for hill training. We are potentially very well-matched, if you take on board the old joke "What's the definition of a sadist? - someone who likes to give a masochist a good time".

On further reflection, I'm working on the idea that she might be a misandrist - all these reports of fierce behaviour, they've all come from men... and even though Sal may have realised by now that she is attempting to train a little scientist, who wants to know a full explanation for everything, the comments I've passed back to her from other runners have been met with... contempt... but very much not aimed at me (I'm in the sisterhood). For example, Paul offered to buy my caffeinated glucose sachets off me, and said "They're not banned or anything, and they really do make a difference, but if that's what your coach says..." (he'd witnessed the trouble Nige had got into, you see).

This is what coach said: "Tell Paul if he has to rely on caffeine for a mere half marathon he hasn't trained properly :D No, there's nothing VERY wrong with it but people tend to know nothing about its proper use, period of effect or dosage and randomly take caffeine gels throughout their training and racing. Plus if one uses caffeine during training the body gets used to it and the desired effect on race day doesn't happen. Anyone worth their salt lays off caffeine altogether for a month before competition to feel the full effects of it on race day (which can include a nasty dose of diarrhoea and general lightheadedness!) So there Paul. BLOKES".

Anyway, I made my decision, and was relieved on Saturday because my wedding high heels were hurting my calf muscle already. In fact, someone suggested I dance the ceilidh wearing them, because that way he might not have to pay his sponsorship. I told him Just Giving already had it, which caused some debate on what would happen if I couldn't complete it. One of the more remarkable things about the wedding was that Pete proposed to Jenny in Japan, and she learned there that a Japanese custom is for the lady to make over 1000 origami cranes, while pondering the meaning of marriage. She did - around the 1500 mark, according to her bridesmaids. They were amazing, and I shall post pictures of them as soon as I am able.

On Sunday, I did go to Ely on the train, but not to Grunty Fen. I had a great lunch on the river side with Dave, where we watched rain chucking it down outside, and then braved the elements, which cheered up, and wandered around Ely for the afternoon. It was much more civilised than running 13.1 miles.

I think maybe the Gods were smiling just a little. They know how to show encouragement.

Negative splits

Today was a four mile run. It was also a long day. I know, I know, all my days are long. I'm reminded of a comedian at the Fringe who said "You know when people are going through counseling, or something, and they say 'I'm just taking it one day at a time...'? Yeah, well so is everyone. That's how time works!" I kind of liked that. I feel like I could get one over on people if I could just learn to run two days concurrently though. That would be great, I would achieve SO much more. (Sleep, mainly).
I had an early start today, for a 7:45 train to York. It started off badly, when I couldn't find my suit. Suddenly remembered I'd had it in North Wales, and it was still in a heap of waiting-to-be-rearranged clothes. Fortunately Jaeger, who make great suits,  seemed to have chosen a fabric that didn't need ironing, there's lucky. Frank tried to get onto my knee, an automatic response to my putting on a black suit, but also in an attempt to eat my cereal. He has a sort of determined expression that suggests he thinks he has every right to do this. And yet, amazingly, I still had enough time to walk to the station.

My meeting in York was interesting, and more so because I met another runner! These people are everywhere! This is perhaps less surprising than scuba divers being everywhere. I took up scuba, oh, 5 years ago - and the most unlikely people turn out to dive. Running - meh. Who really cares? Lots of people can run. I was going to say, it's not like you need any special skills or training, but this probably explains why so many people injure themselves doing it. I expect there are some stats somewhere that illustrate how dangerous it is (broken pelvises and all). Anyway, in answer to the previous question about who cares?, Jake does. Because his doctor told him not to, so now he's running a million marathons back to back. Not a million. And not really back to back either, he's running a marathon this weekend, then a half-marathon, a full one, and another half. I think he said he came to a settlement with his doctor of 10 marathons (he's a lawyer, that's how their minds work - I don't know if the settlement included 10 runs, or 10 full marathons, divided up how Jake sees fit - the doctor should have tied him down to specifics). I invited him to do the Great Eastern with me, but he thinks he's busy. I briefly quizzed him on his training, and I think he needs Sally's help, to be honest. No hills, no pace, no farklets, no swimming... he knew what they all were, though (well, OK, some of them are more obvious... lots of people know what swimming is). I have to say, if I were doing just the running, I'd have died of boredom by now.

So another thing I gleaned recently from "banter" with the runners was "negative splits". I read on the internet that this is a massive misnomer, and I was pleased to read that, because it made no sense to me. The idea, which has been fluttering around (I mean I'd already picked it up, but don't remember how, but I think Sally's massive training plan in all likelihood contains it) is that you run the second half of the race faster than the first half. It shows you're in control, and that you are pacing yourself properly, and it means, if you do it right, that you end the race fast, which is good psychologically. Another website also said that it actually takes a surprisingly long time to warm up, so this really helps as well. Also that on normal running days, you're happier to do this because you just plod along and warm up, but on race days, you're chock-full of adrenalin, and 500 other runners belt past you and you want to catch them up, so it takes massive control to reign in and slow up, but is pretty important because of your total amount of energy and the need to get yourself round the race! Still, stupid name. Negative splits are good, but positive splits (the first half is faster) are bad. Huh? Jake also knew about this, but hadn't really taken it on board yet. I'm gonna do it on Sunday. My estimated time will be 2 hours 30.

Oh, Sunday! I got my email informing me about the race, and you won't believe it! This is a race that (allegedly) serves beer on the course (I'm going to be so disappointed if they don't), and their rules stipulate that you can't run if you have drunken heavily in the last 24 hours! Have they never heard of "hair of the dog"? What is going on here, are the organisers reading my blog or something, and know that I am coming straight from a wedding?

Anyway, I digress from today's training. I thought I'd get back from York a little earlier that 5:30, but what with cross-examining Jake on the finer points of the Agricultural Pests Act (and his training) I got a four oclock train. I'd wanted to get back at five, so I could get my running in, and then, as according to a plan, go swimming with Maggie at 5:30. I've been trying to encourage her to a bit of gentle exercise, but mostly I ask her to go, and then realise I can't make it. To be honest, I never really thought it through because I'd never have fitted the run in, unless I'd bunked off the afternoon completely. So I was determined to get her out, and got home as soon as I could, fed the beast, and got rid of the suit. Hey, I was only an hour out! The plan (my plan, anyway - one of the less well-thought-through ones) was that I'd give Maggie my swimming stuff at 6, go for a circuit around Fengate, and then meet her there at half past. Only, (1) I didn't map it, so it turned out not to be four miles - 3.12 (2) I didn't give myself enough time to do it, and (3) I forgot to bring my phone. I didn't really give Maggie any contingency, nor did I say where I'd meet her. Crucially to this, as it turned out, nor did I tell her that she had my wallet in the bag.

So I trooped off, jogging around the same old route, realising that I wasn't going to be on time, and hoping that Maggie wasn't going to (a) find the pool was shut or (b) get into a bad mood that I kept her waiting. I'm not sure whether a big lunch, or general panic caused this, but I got a stitch, literally for the first time since I started running, just before I arrived. It wasn't bad, so I ran through it. Maggie wasn't waiting in reception, so I sat down for a few minutes. Then realised that she MUST have already got here, although she had no way to tell me if she wasn't coming as I was phoneless. She wouldn't wait all the way in the carpark, and I could see outside. After a moment's hesitation, I decided to ask reception if she had left my bag there and gone upstairs. The man's face showed momentary confusion at my question, and then cracked into a smile. "Oh, a lady just asked if there was anyone who'd just gone up in a tracksuit" he told me, then grinned "I had to tell her it was a leisure centre!" She had taken my bag up with her, but the man was ready to believe my story that she had me leisure card in it, and let me up. 

The pool was nothing short of a nightmare, full up of people randomly stopping, chopping, kicking, screaming, all the rest. Oh and two blokes scratching themselves. Do they not realise people with goggles can see under water? I didn't let it deter me, and swam my 40 lengths in a few minutes over the time Maggie got in her 20; so we both acheived our aim.

I reckon that the extra pool session must make up for the failure of that .88 mile? I'd call that a positive split!

Too fast?

I had a target for today, which was to warm up (10 minutes) then run 3 miles at 9 minute miles. This, as I indicated already, is really rather fast. For example, it is faster than I was running on the 10 k on Saturday, when I came 168th out of 322! (Stop Press!) Imagine if I'd run 9 minute miles the whole way! I'd be dead! Anyway, running Dave, who regards 9 m/m as reasonably gentle, was keen to join me because he hurt his foot last week, so he wanted to know if it was better. We discussed the best route for my venture, and decided that neither of us could bear to run around Fengate twice, and it wasn't long enough to get my 10 minute warm-up in and 3 miles on one circuit, on account of only being 2.5 miles total. But our next level up is 5.7 miles. We decided I could do the rowing lake, and by the time we got back to Asda's we'd have done my programme and we could do what Dave called a "warm down" run. I have to say at the outset, I was suspicious.

Anyway, moustachioed Chris came with us as well - as a matter of fact, fresh from Edinburgh, where he'd seen a show with two moustachioed men in it, and at the end, they had given him some tips on good mustache-wax, which he was sporting today. He seemed at pains to tell me what it was called and where to get it, so I had to let him know that I never wax my mustache. He had calf muscle problems, so was also keen for a "gentle" run. Well, we chatted away quite happily right until I increased the speed, and around then, I kept schtum. Well I had to. I was focusing on breathing. I let the boys talk. Funnily enough, they did, as well. Chattering away. Chris said his main way of running a race was to find a nice arse and running behind it. (He phrased it slightly more politely than this, he said a nice curvy figure, but I'm a big believer in saying what you mean). I panted that the problem for girls was that the good looking blokes ran too fast. I was kind of serious. Stick at the back, and you're going to be with the slightly old, out-of condition, wheezing chaps, aren't you? Anyway, they both took umbridge, asking me who I thought I was running with, so I had to do some rapid back-peddling. "Well, obviously with two chaps who are running deliberately slowly so I can do my training" I replied, which I think placated them.

Well, we got round to the top of the rowing lake. I was the only one who had a garmin on today, so I was keeping my eye on the pace, and we observed with interest the fluctuations it made when we were comfortable with the fact we were running evenly. Tree cover seemed to particularly upset it. Anyway, there we were, going much faster than we should. I kept my eye on it, but no, between 8 and 8:20 m/m was what we were doing. So when Dave asked for an update, I told him, 8:15. "Oh" said Chris, "shall we slow down then?" Now my feeling was, we were cracking on, and quite comfortable at that pace, and although we weren't going to run the race doing it, we had already run 2.85 miles at fast, so even going a little over (I forgot to record how far we'd done in the first 10 minutes), we could maintain that speed. That was my thinking, so I panted it out. They both recoiled. "It's not what Sal said" Dave said. "And you know she's in the office today," Chris told me, "So it'll be a real beating, not a virtual one." "But she's not going to mind if I go too fast" I said, "Surely?". "I can distinctly remember one time in Northinster," Dave recalled, "Sal standing outside the shower door, shouting at me through the door..." "What was she shouting about?" I asked. He appeared not to have heard me, so Chris, realising I could barely speak, repeated it. "Well, I think it was for running too fast, just before I did Grunty Fen", he said. I have no idea if he was winding me up. For all I know, they both wanted desperately to slow down, and had exchanged guy-glances to hatch a plot they were reasonably sure would work. "Right, let's slow down then" I said, and we did.

I mentioned to Dave that his reputation from his days working in Kent was still strong, and he groaned and said "Oh, not the working naked in the office again?". "Oh, do tell" said Chris, "I haven't heard this one...". I'd heard it was underpants, so I was quite surprised, but disappointingly, it turned out I was correct. Anyway, his office (he had one to himself... the olden-days) was under the eaves, and very hot in summer, so he put a warning sign on the door, mentioning he'd be scantily clad and knocking was advised, but someone showing visitors around ignored it, and got quite a surprise...

When we'd got back to Asda's, we'd actually run 4.5 miles, including the 10 minute warm up, so basically we'd either done rather well, or startlingly disobeyed clear instructions, depending on your viewpoint. I'm pretty sure that it was the former. We slowed right down, or at least it felt like that. I glanced at the garmin a few minutes later, and noticed that our leaden-footed pace was coming in at 9:26, i.e. quite a bit faster than I ran my super 10km race on Saturday. Madness, how it seemed slow after running a few miles just a bit faster. Anway, we "plodded" back to the office (I'm not plodding like that on Sunday), and not even Dave suggested that we go faster at the end. None of us seemed to have sustained any injuries, to my surprise, not even Chris's sore calf muscle (which sounded worrying to me).

I checked Dave's story out with Sal, and I could have misread her face, but I thought she looked a little impressed that we'd done better than nine minute miles. She had no recollection of shouting at Dave through the shower door, but did have an alternate theory about what she might have been doing, lurking outside the men's changing room... saucy wench.

Smugness

Well, I have to admit, I'm feeling pretty smug about the race! Woo-hoo! And all my running-comrades are being so supportive! It's like... it's like... a community of weirdos, or something! How could I possibly not like doing this? Nigel asked me if I was sure I still didn't like running, and I made an admission: I liked running in other places than Peterborough, because the past few times I've been visiting places, and have had to get on and do my jog, I've seen different bits than I would have done if I hadn't been doing the running, and that makes it a little bit special for me. Nigel's response was "I'm going to read the first three words again and again!" Ha! Boy's got a great career waiting for him in journalism! (Take the quote out of context...!). Dave (that's Running Dave, of course) was excited about my time. And Sal? Sal said it was a brilliant result, and now she is optimistic about my time for the Great Eastern! She thinks I can do it in less than 2 hours 15 minutes.

This leads me onto another thought. How about anyone who wants to wagering with me over the time? I just thought it might be fun. Rules could be that you name a time and pay me (well, OK then, my charity. Sheesh, some people.) extra money if I beat it? OR, if that doesn't appeal, we could run a sweepstake on any numbers between say, 1h55 and 2h25, and whoever gets the number I come in on pays £20 extra? I think this sounds like fun. If I beat 1h55, I'll pay in myself.  Wow, I'm getting cocky now.

Right, so on Saturday, after my victory (I feel like I defeated an army already) you will be entertained to learn that I came home, devoured three crumpets and a massive bowl of soup, and fell asleep on the sofa. It will surprise nobody that I was joined by Frank, who purred contentedly the whole time. I went to bed early, slept some more, and did very little on Sunday, although I was conscious for at least some of it. Recovery was a breeze. You just have to listen to your body. I had a brief period of terror, because I foolishly agreed with Sal a month or two ago that I'd run the Grunty Fen marathon (you remember, the one where they give you beer on the route?). Well, that's next Sunday. Not only is it the day after Pete and Jenny's wedding (great move, Goldberg), it is also, like, 7.1 miles more than I ran on Saturday. This is ridiculous. I've only got a week, and the most I've run in ages is, in fact, 6 miles. Good news, Sal says I don't have to run it at race pace. I still don't know what she means by this.

Oh, and I'm in BIG trouble about eating muesli (granola) for breakfast. WRONG WRONG WRONG. Fortunately, I'm not really in trouble, Sal is blaming herself because she never told me what to eat for breakfast on race day. (When a scary person is cross with themselves, what happens when they look in the mirror? Just a side thought). Unfortunately, she has told me now. Porridge (ack ack). Also, she has told me about the carb-loading. She's also told me why the pasta and plain tomato sauce has to be so plain. Onions are bad for you. No, not really. The thing is, you want to have as little fibre as possible so as not to cause "gastric distress". Hmmm. She has also very detailed instructions about vanilla ice-cream with strong coffee poured over it for desert, the night before a race. I'm not sure how THAT is going to help me sleep! This is very odd. I shall demand an explanation. Fortunately, as I'll be at a wedding reception, I probably won't have a problem staying awake. Just as well, I don't drink coffee. Much.

I managed to get Nigel in trouble today. Which was a shame, because he only came over to glorify in my race time, and I was engaged in trying to find out how many water stations there are on the Grunty Fen track. He told me how to find out (he's a good egg) and I mentioned it was because Sal had given me instructions on taking gel sacs with me, but advised that I needed to take them with water, and if there weren't sufficient water stations, I should get a different sort. She wanted me to take 8, and says I should take them every 20 minutes. Nigel said "8? Remind her it's a half marathon! That seems like a lot to me!" Now, really, he should probably have known better. I emailed her, and her response was swift. It went like this "Tell Nigel to butt out of it! You need one every twenty mins and even if you took 2hrs that'd be 5 gels. Always overpack. Who's the trainer here :D MEN!" Can I just say, I'm not going to run it in 2 hours.

I did have a thought about the Grunty Fen, though. I was telling RSBP Dave about the beer when it occurred to me. Running Dave and Nigel are both convinced that drinking beer is a bad thing, but I'm thinking, after you've drunken a few beers, you quite often get home without even knowing it. Also, you often hurt yourself, but don't feel any pain. It strikes me that drinking beer could be the solution here. I could get round the entire course without even realising! Sounds good to me. Nigel still reckons it's a cruel joke. He said all the marshals laughed at him when he took a beer by accident. And as it is fizzy, it is also quite hard to drink. He actually tells me he ended up throwing it away. He threw beer away? Very odd.

Anyway, amid fear about more than doubling my distance in a week, I got a schedule off Sal, and it goes: Monday, 8 miles jogging, Tuesday 10 minute warm up then 3 miles sprint. (She didn't say a sprint, she said a 9 m/m, but I still think of that as a sprint. Running Dave thinks it is a nice slow pace). Wednesday, rest, or as I say, "pilates". Thursday 4 miles steady, with a heart rate of 167, which means about 10:30 m/m. Then rest Friday and Saturday. I was still concerned about the lack of distance, but she said I don't have time to build it up any more, and this will be OK. She just wants me to do the race on Sunday at a slow plod.

Anyways, Summer, who did say she'd run the race with me, said she needed some motivation, so I suggested to her that she can join my sponsorship page, and come running with me, although she is afraid of slowing me down. Weirdly, she set out to do a 6 mile run at the same time as me, but slightly slower, on Saturday, and said she felt quite sick at the end. I invited her to join me on my 8 mile run on Monday, and she agreed! This was very exciting. Not least because it meant I could run up to Millennium Bridge and back round through Stanground as I'd have some company. She also brought a colleague of hers, Tony, who does triathlons, and when Summer filled Tony in about my hard task-master, he said, "Hang on, I think I know her. It's not Sally is it?" That's not true. I told Tony that Sal does triathlons, and he asked her name, and said she is in his club. However, he did admit that she's scary. So that's independent verification. Personally I think it is the hiding in cupboards that does it. (Don't ask. Best not?).

Well, we did a moderately slow pace (for your road-runner here), between 11 and 12:30 m/m, although we did speed up to about 10:30 from time to time. I'll tell you what as quite interesting, though. It not only felt slow to me, my heart rate stayed at 140-150 throughout, and I felt like I could have kept it up pretty easily for another few miles! So. That gave me a lot of confidence. Then Summer gave me some very bad news right before the end of the run, so I told her we were having a sprint finish. This is another first for me: I've never run to get rid of anger (well, pissed-off-ness, but I can't think of a word for that). I can report that (a) it doesn't really work and (b) I bloody started the sprint too soon again. Summer's fault. Bloody woman. Summer will be entertained to learn that cocky, speedy runner here has had aching thighs all evening. Probably too much sprinting. Still, despite her deliberately trying to tease me, it was fun running with a girl, we had a right good catch-up. I think Tony realised that we had to go at that pace so we could keep chatting throughout.

My favourite bit of the run was on the towpath, where we were overtaken by another bloke, and I swear, as he ran past Tony, he exchanged a glance, and gave him a thumbs up - my reading of the exchange, was "Well done mate, looking after the birds. Someone's got to do it. You'll get your speed another day". Although I suppose, it could have been "Two women? Lucky Bastard!"

(A) Race day!

I had a rotten night's sleep. For one thing, I decided to catch up on the blog, and then, when I put the light out, I couldn't get off. I still woke up early, before the alarm. RACE! I'm going to run a race! When I told Paul in the office, he said "Ooh! Belvoir Castle! That's a tough one. Well, you know it's on a hill, don't you?" (Hills worry us, in Peterborough). Anyway, I got up, and tucked into a bowl of muesli and yoghurt. Heather made me some tea. I got the runners on, wired up to the garmin, and we set off. (Oh, if you're American, or otherwise not "from round here", it's pronounced "Beaver". Honestly.)

Arriving at the race was interesting - there were lots of people! Lots! Who knew all these people would really want to run 10km? There was all shapes and sizes as well, but the majority were looking pretty trim. It made me feel nervous. I got my badge and hi-tech safety pins, and informed Heather she was going to have to carry my coat. "Why don't you leave it in the car?" she (not unreasonably) wanted to know. "Because it's cold," I told her. "Fair point".

Top tip... leave plenty of time for the queue for the ladies! Luckily, we had that time, so that was good. I wouldn't want to start a race with a full bladder.

The next thing is, find out where the race starts. I mean, hopefully it's pretty obvious. In our case, it obviously wasn't where we were. So we started up the slope (start as you mean to go on). Luckily, the start line became more obvious. Heather wished me good luck, and went off to find the best place to cheer from. I wandered nervously, feeling alone, to the accumulating mass of people. Some bloke smiled at me, so apropos of nothing, I informed him it was my first race. He appeared to have no voice, but as he didn't mention laryngitis, I thought I wouldn't comment on it. I also, with great difficulty, prevented myself from whispering back at him. "I remember my first" he rasped. "You'll have a great time. Just concentrate on finishing. Don't mind everyone else. I just take my time. I love it". It was good advice, especially coupled with what Dave had said about some runners finishing in half an hour. If a 10km race was a fast run, I had to remind myself that that wasn't what I'd been training for, and I couldn't do it.

On Thursday, I'd run 6 miles in an hour, with a couple of minutes walk in the middle, so my challenge was to do it in less than an hour. It was a challenge, because that essentially meant doing the whole race at less than a 10 minute mile, which I struggle with.

The start gun must have happened (I didn't hear it) because the herd moved off. They were quick off the mark, and there was a lot of posturing and positioning early on. Some people were annoyingly slow, and others were dodging round them. I did something inbetween - not too bothered about getting round the slow ones, but trying to stay out of the way of the speedies. I still noticed however, that I was going faster than 8m/m at times. It's easy to do when everyone is moving so fast. The first thing that happened was a quite steep slope. So unfair! There was already a lady walking it. Interesting strategy. I overtook her. This actually became a bit of a theme, which nicely echoed my training, where I successfully overtook a number of people walking. On a downhill stretch, I decided it would be sensible to press home the advantage, because chances were I'd take the ups a little slower, so I pegged it a bit. I thought I saw my voiceless buddy from the start a little way ahead of me (I could pick him out because he was bald) and I thought "Oh yes, 'I'm not going to race, just finish', that'd be right", and decided to catch him up, but failed. I seemed to have let a vast number of people ahead of me by now, but I comforted myself that they would probably not have paced themselves very well, and I'd show them in the long run. The race reached a cross-roads, which we were to pass two more times, and Heather was waiting, camera poised. She took a great pic, which I've every hope you might see again.

I did the first "leg", which was quite easy, and a couple more people started walking. Overtake! Woo hoo! (Another top tip: do not say either of these things, nor "Yessssss," when you overtake. Especially walkers. They may have the stamina to catch you up). At the end of the road, we turned back, and I'd already seen the first people (men) on their way back, pegging along. Back they came, and soon it was me. A little way after I turned back, I passed the voiceless guy, and we gave a thumbs up to each other. Don't know who the other baldy was, but my mate was behind me! I'd beaten someone else! All I had to do now was keep going!

I got back to H, still waiting at the cross roads, and set off on the longer leg. Down a nice hill, which was of course, disconcerting, because I'd have to come back up it at the end. Again, I decided to speed up, but by now, there was quite a distance between me and the rest of the crowd, so i thought I'd close it a little. I got overtaken by some others. I remembered my water/apple juice mix today, so I was stocking up on fluids, which was good. At the bottom of the hill, we passed over a lake, and, as with water bodies, it was nestled nicely at the bottom, and that meant we had to go up again. It was a fair rise. But I thought rather proudly of my training around Arthur's seat. Hadn't I done well to choose the harder route of going up, and then down, and then up again. I could do this! I overtook some more walkers. Let me tell you, the occasional runner too!

I passed a water station, and since the marshals on it all seemed to be kids, I couldn't disappoint them and thought it would be good to keep my own fluid for as long as poss. I was disgusted to notice that runners chuck their plastic cups on the floor. I took a few gulps and dropped my cup politely into the bin. It's not really possible to drink out of a cup on the move though, so you take a sort of automatic 15 second break. It was onwards and upwards, and I was still feeling good. I got to the end of the route, and turned around, for a long downward run. There was a great view from up there, right across Leicestershire, and the countryside was a beautiful parkland. The first bit was some quite nice oak woodland which professionally interested me as I whizzed past it.

As I continued down, I decided to press into action another running trick. You can get these glucose sachets, they give you an energy boost, and salt replacement. I've not used them for training, but I wanted to know if I'd have a problem slurping them down, if I'd feel sick or anything, so I thought, practice race, good time to try. Also, I didn't know how much before the hill would be needed to take effect, so I decided on the way down, before the lake, would be a good time. I was at about 7km. Now, I've heard other people (runners) talk about these sachets, because they contain salt replacement, and because they are a gel, they have a certain similarity to... other things. Also, as they've been in your pocket, they are also warm. To counteract this, I picked blackcurrant flavour, which I thought might mask the similarity to anything less - tasty. I ripped the sachet with my teeth (don't think about it boys) and slurped it down. I have to say, it was better than I thought (and you don't hear that every day, do you?). I think the blackcurrant was its saving grace. An unexpected side-effect though, was that it isn't possible to maintain speed, swallow a gel sachet and not spill it, which also means that your hand ends up being covered with stickiness. Image complete.

Psychological or not, the hill seemed to be fine. I overtook some more people (ha, who're the speedy ones now, eh?) and felt pretty comfortable, if slightly sweaty. My heart rate was still ticking around 178, which was high, but, I thought, still in control, given that I'd maintained my speed for so long. I passed Heather for the final time, just as I was marking two more "quarry" to overtake. The girl let me, she'd had enough, she didn't even respond when I muttered "C'mon, I'll race ya". The bloke was a harder nut to crack. I overtook him, but he overtook me right back. We passed another couple of people. It was him and me now. I passed him again on a hill. We passed the 9km marker, which was a bit of a shock because I thought we were nearer the end than that. Up, it went. Arthur's Seat, c'mon, I can do this. I thought about Nigel saying, you don't want to hoon it up hill... and I didn't, but it was almost the end, and my feet wanted to. My heart rate was 192 bpm. Another 8, and according to the chart Sally gave me, I was going to die, which felt about right. I reached the top of the hill. The bloke was still right beside me. I swore. He didn't overtake me. "That was a killer, wasn't it?" he panted. I was kind of pleased he thought the same. I let him pass. It was all for charity, after all. I saw the finish line, and speeded after him.

Some marshal bloke said "Well done, you've made it!" so I stopped, and carried on walking up the hill, around some cones. A lady with a clip board asked if I was finishing, so I glanced up and said "yes", and realised I hadn't got to the end of the course! Oops. I'd stopped the garmin at 57:55, but the race clock said 58:something by the time I'd reached Clipboard lady! New lesson: know where the finish is! (This race wasn't chipped anyway, so I could basically take my finish time as I liked). I wandered off to find Heather and collect my goody bag, failing to do the former; so I did some stretches, and started to feel cold. I realised that the lady was recording what number I'd come in at, so I went back up the hill, and surreptitiously stood behind her, trying to find my number. All I can say was, I couldn't see it (although I was quite tired), but she volunteered that she no longer had all the sheets. So I might have come in before 307, which was top of the sheet she was on. Happy with that! There were over 500 runners (even though some were 5km, and some were walking it). I shall find out on the interweb in a few days.

Then I saw my friend from the starting line. He'd just finished, and came over, drenched in a sweat,  shook my hand (thank goodness I didn't know him any better - ew), and congratulated me. I told him my time, and he seemed very impressed. "So, you were doing about 9:40m/m all the way!" he said. I don't know how people figure that out. "Yep, I guess so" I replied, trying not to let on that my guess wasn't as good as his. Then I found Heather, not before time, I was already freezing again.

Well, I've been asked when my sponsorship form is going to be available, so here it is. I've run a race now: it was a challenge. It was also a much shorter race than the goal. I'm five weeks away now. I'm counting on you guys. 


Emma's Just Giving Page

That Friday feeling.

So let me tell you about Friday. I had instructions. I had a plan. The plan was better than the instructions. The plan was to get up in the morning (not something I do, but something I like the idea of more than people realise) and go for a run. Then, have a recovery swim at lunchtime. I thought that was a nice touch.

What actually happened was, I woke up in the morning feeling like I'd been run over by a tank and then rung through a mangle. Really. I felt flattened. Moving was tricky, let alone running. I decided sleep was of paramount importance (this often happens) and got straight on it. I did get up with enough time to try my new muesli recipe (that's Granola, if you're State-side). I was pretty pleased with it. I don't like muesli, it usually tastes a bit dusty, or just too much. But something had to be done about the breakfast thing, and I'd got bored of my old breakfast a couple of months ago, tasty though it is (oats soaked overnight in apple-juice, then add yoghurt and fresh smushed up fruit - raspberries or strawbs - best of all, if you don't feel like eating, you just add more apple juice and drink it like a smoothie). So the new muesli consisted of oats toasted with a little butter and honey, and almonds and walnuts, also toasted, added to the mix, then a bunch of sesame that was in the cupboard, and a handful of raisins. It was good, I had it with yoghurt.

I got on with work, which is just something that has to be done, you know, so they pay you and stuff (that's how it is at the moment, a bit. Usually it's a bit more than this. Then people you really like just go and leave, and makes you upset). At lunchtime, I went for the swim. It was good. I didn't do loads, because I ran out of time, but I did half an hour, and swam 40 lengths. I lacked the energy to do crawl all the time, so the best time, up in Edinburgh, for crawl, when I did like 75 lengths and 60 were crawl, remains unbeaten, but I could generally feel the swim doing me good.

So I knew I'd be OK for the race tomorrow. Also, Heather, who agreed to take me there, suggested we go out for dinner in Stamford, which was great. We went to The Barn or something - luckily it was nicer than a barn. Heather suggested I order the chicken and pasta, but it seemed a bit boring, so I ordered the beef wellington instead. I've always wondered why you'd wrap a piece of beef in rubber, but it was very tasty.

All set for tomorrow then.

Think of a new pain

Tuesday slid past like a train-dream. We managed, beyond all odds, to get several bags, a huge pram (with a crying baby), a toddler, a bike (OK, a toddler's bike) and two adults into a taxi, and pile out at Waverly, totter to the platform and get onto the 2-coach direct train to Manchester. Yes, I know, it was slightly out of my way. But that's the kind of girl I am. (Confused). The compartment we had especially chosen for access to the toilet was foiled somewhat as the toilet was out of order, and our main dramatic event was changing carriages when another train joined ours, because we learned that the other available toilet had broken down since the start of the journey. That was another mad dash with too many things and not enough hands. It was very exciting for Jasper though, because we joined a carriage with two dogs in it, Cairn terriers, who turned out to be very friendly (Snowball and Toby). After arriving in Manchester, and getting the bus back home, I decided to make a dash for it, and get the next train home to Peterborough, but not before I was able to get some of the longest runner beans ever seen. I got home before 7, but not a running day.

Wednesday slid past in an annoying way, the sort that happens when one of your buddies, who's just always cheered you up and made the place a bit better, leaves. Yep, it was mainly Jim's last day on Wednesday. I took a half day, although in all honesty, the morning was primarily made up of wrapping up his leaving presents, so I time recorded it as Priority Species, as they were mainly frogs and lizards. Also, there was a special, surprise guest - Cat, who feels much the same way as I do about Jim, actually flew all the way from Ireland just for his lunch and leaving-do, and flew back the next morning. Which goes to show some people are actually more insane than me. Fortunately I'd been able to persuade him to go out for dinner that night, without giving the game away (I wasn't sure he'd want to, what with already having eaten lunch out). All in all, it wasn't set up to be a training day, although I had primed Cat that I'd be doing some training in the afternoon, so I emailed Sal to ask if I should do half an hour hill training or pace training. But the long and the short of it was that Cat and I talked for so long, I ran out of time. Nonetheless, I blame Sally wholeheartedly, because she didn't reply to my message till the next morning, which meant I had the perfect excuse to not do either. When I did get her message, she said she'd focus on getting more miles in, so doing some longer runs.

Thursday, then, I set out at lunchtime. No one was around - I looked out for running Dave, but assumed I'd missed him as I was late setting out. I decided that I would add a loop onto the Rowing Lake run, by going around the leisure centre and down to the river before heading up the footpath. This made the run up to 6 miles, and I set out at a good pace, about 9:30m/m. It was a nice warm sunny day (finally) but I realised I'd forgotten my water, which was stupid. Almost as stupid as forgetting to have breakfast. This was doubly stupid, and is something I'm going to have to get out of the habit of. I did quite nicely, and kept the pace up all the way across the railway line, and across the bridge where the weir is, but just over the other side, my head hurt, and I had an ache down the back of my right leg, and I just thought, this is awful, really awful, and I stopped and walked.  I don't know, I may still be a bit post-viral, but on the other hand, not having proper breakfast and running without water on a hot day, really weren't going to help.

Having said that, as I walked along the top end of the rowing lake, down the nice side with the trees around, and the sun was shining, I did suddenly realise what a gorgeous day it was, and I really enjoyed my little walk. I decided I would start running again when my heartrate dropped to 120. This was entirely arbitrary, mainly being because it wasn't showing any sign of doing so. I found it ironic how much I enjoyed the walk on my run. Usually it would have annoyed me because of ruining my pace, and giving up, but it was just such a lovely day. I walked past someone who seemed to be giving my "running gear" a mocking glance, so i decided that when I'd cleared him, I'd start again - I didn't want him to think I had acknowledged the lack of running. Also, my HB dropped to 117, it was time. I started again, but didn't get the pace back up. My leg really hurt, and it made me feel like a crock, the fact that I seemed to "think of a new pain" seemingly every time I went out. It was more of a dull ache, though, so I decided I could keep going.

Well, I made it back to the Lido, and got to the pelican crossing. Just round the corner, where the Fengate roundabout is, that's where Dave usually gets me to speed up for my "home straight". Sal says it is good to get the body used to a fast ending, so you can end a race on a high. Today was different, though. I was really knackered, and just pleased to get back, and I told myself I wasn't going to do the fast bit, I was listening to my body, it hurt, and it had done well. But here's the weird thing: my feet didn't listen to my brain! They went ahead and ran faster! I swear, it freaked me out! I mean, they didn't go Dave-fast, or anything. But I went back up to a 9m/m! I was impressed, in spite of myself.

Anyway, the good news is that the pain isn't a debilitating one - it is piriformis syndrome, which affects a muscle that runs down the back of your leg along your sciatic nerve, and can sometimes pull it. This made perfect sense. There are some stretches you can do to stop it aching. Woo-hoo! On with the training!

Expect the unexpected

Well, Monday last proved to be something of a challenge. I would have laid money on it not being possible for me to run anywhere with the amount of white wine (and bubbly) that was consumed the night before at The Magnets' after show party. And yet, at ten o'clock, I actually felt almost reasonable. The morning did seem to move quite slowly though - I had a lovely chat with Julia, who was looking after George, while everyone else remained unconscious (Jasper, not least, among these - he hadn't got to bed until 1am, with no nap the day before). Julia does voice coaching, so we had some interesting chats about warm-up exercises, which I wanted to explore as a potential Mask director (amateur dramatic groups tend, on the whole, not to warm up). All of a sudden, I realised it was nearly 11. This wasn't a problem per se, but I needed to get the training in, and I had a show at 12. I togged up, and went off to run around The Meadows, as my instructions were to do a short run the day after the long on, just to remind your legs that they can. I say these were my instructions, I was still on catch-up, using the ones from last week that I'd failed to carry out then.

On the street, the Garmin failed to find its satellite location for 10 minutes. I was freezing by the time it had asked me how many miles I was from the previous day, and the rest of its routine. I'd all but decided to ditch it, when it loaded up. Anyway, I'd figured on completing the run by half past, and didn't have  lot of leeway to play with, so as a result of this, I'd figured on twenty minutes. I ran around the Meadows, and up and across Bruntsfield Links, and then back down Warrender Park Road. I ran in, grabbed a croissant (well-known for its recovery goodness after a run), a shower, and got dressed. I said farewell to those awake, and, keeping my running shoes on (I learned, after running to Saturday's show in some not very appropriate footwear), I legged it. Handily enough, it took me about 10 minutes to get to the show, so in effect, I topped up my twenty minutes to the full half hour.

I grabbed some sesame snacks on the way - I just thought they might be better energy replacement. They seem kind of good for you, as snacks go, even though they are blatantly just sesame stuck together with sugar. I went to see Phil Nichol's show, Somewhere Beneath it All, a Small Fire Burns Still. It was really good, it's a monologue piece. Very funny opening, about this guy who is infatuated with a waitress, but then midway through the show, he acts like he's breaking off from the play and coming into "real" mode, just the actual actor, talking direct to the audience. He has the lighting people put up the house lights and everything, tells us that the story he's been acting out is based on real people, he opens a powerpoint, and shows us the young kid in a wheelchair, and the waitress. He tells us what the kid is suffering from, and how he was actually involved, and dated the waitress himself. He had photos of them. Then he says he's going to finish the show, and goes back into character. He's actually canadian, but was acting the part with a (very good!) Scottish accent - so it was really easy to believe him when he was out of character. It was impressive, how easily he slipped from one accent to the other as well. Anyway, I came out really wondering whether it WAS based on true characters that he knew. It was very hard to say. But the answer came from Mike - he knows the actor, and it was all part of the show, none of it was based on real characters. Fascinating! Also, the show was written especially with Phil in mind, that was kind of fun to know too! Anyway, most excellent, I can recommend it (now it is finished) - but maybe it will pop up somewhere?

Then I went off to see Mad About the Boy, and was disappointed to be standing next to "a talker" in the queue - more so because she was wearing some distressingly strong patchouli type perfume. Some people standing quite near us at the bar, and she thought one of them was famous, so she was seeking my confirmation. I had no idea, so I told her, quite bluntly and shortly. She persisted. I said, maybe you're right - I don't know. I don't have a television. Then she lifted the collar of her jacket (in case they were lip reading?) and said "They've got that sort of suntan, don't they?" What?!! I just gave her a fish-eye stare, till she shut up.

The show was intense. The boy, my new friend, was on stage, hoody up, goofy expression, dancing and mock-boxing to some hip-hop type music, as we trailed in. He looked terrifying. Like every gang of kids you've ever crossed the street as far away as possible, hoping they don't notice. When the show started, he was joined by two older men, one of whom was famous! Well, it was Cyril Nri. Followers of The Bill would pick him out straight away. The rest of you would too, I expect. He was playing the dad, and the other was the school counselor. There was a really interesting device used, whereby they were knocking words, ideas between them, really rapidly, but not actually having a conversation, it was more like three monologues that were in some way responding to the views of the others. It was like an amazing poem. Then the story developed more, and it all got a bit darker. It was a clever, moving, and uncomfortable experience. Bayo was fantastic.

After that, it was time to head back to the flat for a final tidy-up, before the last Magnets gig of the festival - and an early(ish) night. Just as well - I was shattered. Another great Fringe.