Gardening

I shan't bore you with the details of why I had to do this, but I spent today tidying up a sadly neglected garden in Sussex. I was very cross with how neglected it was, so really, I spent a lot of time being cross. I painted the main garden gate and the side gate, and started on the biggest job, which was tackling an overgrown beech hedge. It was probably 2.5 metres high, maybe three where the tall bits were. I had a hedge trimmer, so that was OK, apart from it didn't go through the thickest bits, and even with the hedge trimmer, I was holding it above my head in a way that I happen to know is strictly forbidden when using chain saws. I mean, it's hardly a chain saw, although let me tell you, it goes through flex cable so you wouldn't even notice. Apart from the minor issue of finding it difficult to start the thing again afterwards. So anyway, after I'd rewired my dad's extension lead, which is now a foot shorter (he'll never know) I gave up on the hedge trimming for a bit, and focused on the to-big-for-the-hedge-trimmer bits, which I was using a pair of parrot-bills, as my grandad called them (long handled pruners). Mum's got a right fancy pair (oo-er) which are power-gear anvil pruners, and have a mechanism that seems to work very niftily, although was tricky in the hedge because it involves opening the handles very far, which was difficult at times. Nonetheless, this necessitated having my arms above my head for a lot, and it was really quite knackering. I also mowed a lot of not-often cut grass, and several massive ants nests. I made a humungous difference to the garden, although there is still a lot of work to be done on it. I started work at 9, and finished at 7, so it was an even longer day than I usually spend in the office, although I did have a long tea break at 3 when my parents returned from some jaunt they'd been on. It was at this point that I noticed my back was kind of sore, as i was wearing a lovely halterneck tshirt in the lovely sunshine. It was a shame really, because I had thought at about 9:30 that I had some suncream, but I hadn't been bothered to go back and fetch it. I put my shirt on, "after the horse had bolted" as it were.

I also put a rusty nail through my finger. I realise that the problem with being the daughter of a doctor and a psychiatrist is that I immediately ran through associated diseases (tetanus), tried to remember when my last jab was (over 10 years ago), and, then diagnosed myself as a hypochondriac. I tried to figure out if tetanus is treatable if you don't have the jab and decided from James Herriot stories that it was, I think it was the thing he had to treat cows for it sometimes, he called lockjaw. Although mum later told me you get it classically from contact with horse manure, so maybe I was thinking of something else with the cows. Anyway, after I decided that no one else would even know that rusty nails were associated with tetanus, I gave up thinking about it and got on with working.  I managed to get a fair few other scatches, stings and the like during the day. When mum said dinner was ready, I ached all over.

I sat down and said, "you do realise I've got to run 5k now, don't you?". Dad, who has a very similar view to running as I have historically had (I wonder how I might have developed it?) said without a moment's hesitation, "I'm willing to swear I saw you do it". Mum tried to rationalise, and suggested I'd done more than equivalent amount of work. "I'm allowed to walk instead of run. I'm not allowed to calculate all other 'equivalent' activities," I told her. I suggested she might like to come with me. We are right on the edge of Ashdown Forest, it was a lovely evening, and she is supposed to be doing some walking. She agreed, although set out ahead of me, as I hadn't got my barefeet on as yet.

I set out, overtook the matriarch, and ploughed off up the hill. It's not a massive rise, although according to runkeeper, I climbed 203 feet, which wouldn't happen in Peterborough. There's a long straight track at the top (allegedly it used to be used for landing planes during the second world war), and I ran to the end and back while mother made her way up. When I was on my way back, she started jogging, which was a shame, because I had just decided when I caught up with her, I'd better go back to the end again, to make up my distance, and it took me ages to catch up with her. Bless her, she waited for me again, and then I hared down past her (maxing the downhill) and had almost reached home when I felt uncharitable, so instead of finishing at home, I turned around and sprinted back to her, and then we walked back together.

I tried a gentle soak in the tub, but I cannot tell you how much I ache. And I don't think the barefoot shoes had anything to do with it! Although, note-worthily, I ran faster in them than ever before. I am kind of regretting that walk yesterday, it really throws my graph out! Anyway, you can tell the three other times I ran barefooted, on the 1st, 5th and 7th, because I was over 40 mins for each of them, whereas today I was in at 34, was about average for my currently slightly slow pace! One of these days, running Dave and I are going to overlap in the office again, and my time will suddenly be sub 30 minutes!