Life is like a sewer...

Come on, all you Tom Lehrer fans, finish the quote before I get to the end...

So, today, Dave asked me if I was up for 8 miles. I wasn't sure, because it wasn't on my schedule, and y'know with the injury and everything, I didn't want to push it. Several people heard however, and all of them suggested that I ask Sally. This shows exactly the influence Sally has, because these people largely don't read my blog, they just work with Sally. It seemed like sage advice, even though they were blatantly mocking me. So I did. "Abserfuckin'lootly" was the response I got back. Now, that's the problem, you see, she gets very excited about running. This is why we'll never totally understand one another. Anyway, you'll want to know what today's challenge was. I still do - at least to understand it. "Just conversational pace for 40 mins then for the last ten mins do 4 random efforts of between 60 secs and 3 mins - can be sprint, hills, strong (different to sprint!) with heart rate to be Up to 190 (on the fartleks) 167 otherwise."

My response on my schedule was to ask her whether she was deliberately trying to give me material for the blog, and WTF she meant by "strong". I asked Dave and Chris if they knew what Fartleks were (presumably different from fartlets, little farts?). They both did (if anyone's interested, it means "speed play" in Swedish). Don't ask why they both knew that, it's much less interesting than the definition would lead you to believe and has nothing to do with speed dating. Well, I had a fascinating conversation with Sally on IM which I won't repeat, largely because I accidentally deleted it, but also because she asked me not to. I didn't mean to delete it, I wanted it to blackmail her with later, but unfortunately she is now free to deny it. However, she did check that I now understood what "strong" meant. I hadn't checked my schedule, so she took the trouble to explain again. "It's when you're going at a pace where you can only utter four one-syllable words." There was only one response to that: "You're kidding?" Apparently not, and she claims not to be specifically thinking of things so I have stuff to write about. I asked if they could be the same four letter word, four times, which I will undoubtedly feel like saying, but no. This was going to take some brain-power. No wonder that whole "mens sana in corpore sano" kicks in so well.

Chris, Dave and I set off on this run, which was along the riverside and over the millennium bridge, and back through Stanground. However, we lost Chris quite early because he was being conscientious about his work (uh-huh), and decided to restrict his run to within his lunch hour. So Dave and I trotted on, past the sewers, where Dave made the observation that they smelt bloody awful, and also that you could taste the smell in your mouth. I didn't point out to Dave that I'd be sick if he said anything more about the taste of sewage in your mouth, so I told him the Tom Lehrer story, which is at the beginning of a song entitled "We will all go together when we go", where he describes a pessimistic friend's take on life: "Life is like a sewer, what you get out of it depends on what you put into it".

Just over half way, I pointed out to Dave that I was going to die, and instead of saying "No you're not" like the other five times, he let us slow down. We dropped to 11:40 m/m, which I have to say I found ludicrously slow, but Dave said we'd build up again, gradually. (I think we'd got to about 8:50 before I cracked). I quizzed Dave on race times, because Sal wants me to enter myself in for a 10km race this August (oh, my homework! I forgot. I wonder if she'd believe me if I said the cat ate it? I can't see why not, he tried to eat my dinner earlier). I speculated that 10k races were a bit faster than half-marathons, and Dave said that he'd run one in a ridiculously short time (sorry, for clarity, he didn't say that, he just told me what the time was), although the winner, he says, is  often around 30 minutes. I think he said his time was equivalent to an 8 m/m. This made me sputter (note that I was not doing so before that). He also said that he couldn't sustain that around the half marathon course (I should hope not!), however, so he'd be aiming for something much slower, like a 9 m/m. This made me laugh, not least because I do that pace for interval training and regard it as very, extremely fast, but also because until he'd said that I was wondering about enlisting him as a running partner. Ha ha ha.

Well, we were fast approaching Stanground (we'd speeded up again) and at the mere sight of a hill, my right calve, which had been injured just before starting this blog, went "ping". But not in a bad way. Also, it evened out the pain in my left calf. Anyway, we jogged through it, and got to the bottom of the hill (this hill is the other side of the flyover from where my hill-training is). I had told Dave that this was going to be my first Fartlek, and he had said I was insane to try sprinting up a hill at the end of a run. But this was in the instructions, so I thought it was a good idea. I said "let's give it a go, then", pressed the lap button on the garmin, and hooned it. I have to say, honestly, I had a moment of pure exhilaration: it was like being released, it was setting a caged bird loose and feeling the power of beating wings, it was a catapult shooting out (and before you ladies from the office mention it, no, I couldn't see Dave, he was behind me: and you may regard him as eye-candy, but believe me, when he's run up a muck sweat, it doesn't send shivers up my spine).  It was like a sudden release of power, and it felt great! The first one since starting running. Unfortunately, it lasted approximately 4 seconds (that old chestnut). I was able to carry on the sprint, although Dave had by now overtaken me, making sprinting up a hill look effortless (if slightly sweaty); and now I realised that the top of the hill was still a fair way off. "This hill's too long" I panted out - then ruined it, by delightedly saying "Hey, that's four!". My heart rate got up to about 184, and my breath was all hurty. I slowed just before the top of the hill. I thought that was "strong" enough.

We got over the flyover, and when my heartrate had slowed to 167, I suggested we sprint as far as the Key Theatre. Well, actually, I said the traffic lights, but then curbed my enthusiasm. I just about got to the theatre, and managed to continue jogging up to the lights (without stopping to die - very strong!). I said to Dave that enough was enough and I couldn't do the final sprint. "Yes you can," he said firmly, back on form. He charitably let me start from City Road, instead of part way up St John's Street like normal, though. I thought of four more one syllable words, as he called over his shoulder "Come on, Emma!" - they were "Fuck off, Dave S" but I didn't have the breath to shout or even mutter them. Not strong enough.

(In fairness, what I actually said was fuck you, when I'd recovered my breath, but I altered it here to emphasise more eloquently the sentiment I was trying to express, and more importantly, to avoid everyone laughing at me like normal, when I say something totally innocent, like I'm just trying to get my leg over, which they then deliberately misconstrue).

After the run, I had to go to Tesco and buy a bag of value frozen peas. They were excellent value.

Dear Sally

Er. Right.

You know how it was nice and sunny earlier? And now it's raining? How about an early night as a quid pro quo?

I'm flummoxed as to how I come to be so totally knackered, but I am. On the plus side, I did have a shorter, unscheduled run with weight training earlier today, but it was only about 15 minutes. And I wasn't wearing my trainers. I learned some valuable lessons though. Want to hear them? Course you do.

Well, I was on my way back from a meeting in London, and made an brief diversion on the way home to Blacks (which is having a massive sale) and scooped a bag which I thought would be appropriate for a weekend Glamping next weekend (my second hen party of the year: mum couldn't believe it - she says she thanks her lucky stars that she was born in 1938 and avoided all this). I made my way, with new purchase (in which I placed my work bag and computer, because the new bag has wheels) to Victoria underground station, which despite having massive posters up everywhere claiming huge improvements to the service, still opts to get around the problem of overcrowding at rush hour by making you walk approximately twice your actual journey distance, in underground tunnels. To be fair, it was reasonably effective. But I got to a train, eventually. Then it stopped at Warren Street, where the polite driver informed us that owing to an incident at Kings Cross that the police were sorting out, we'd have a few moments' delay. He then let us know that he had permission to go on to Euston, but there would be a further wait there. My train was at 16:40, and is the only fast, slow train (regular commuters will understand this oxymoron). It was 16:22. I jumped off the train, swung my new purchase onto my back (ah-ha, it has wheels AND rucksack straps), and set off up the Euston Road.

Now, here are some interesting points. It's less than a mile between Euston and Kings Cross (although that isn't allowing for platform length), and I didn't even hesitate about running it. I knew I could run that distance - and I knew I could do it in less than 14 minutes. I'll tell you something else (while I'm here, and all): I also know I couldn't do it previously - I've had to do it at a fast walk on previous such occasions. Furthermore, pace training may even have its place in this saga - it's not easy running along rush-hour pavements between two major train stations. There are lots of people. Some of them seem to hesitate before going, oh, she'll figure it out - and stepping directly into your path. The art of slowing down, negotiating, and then speeding up, is pretty handy, in fact. A thought I'd never appreciated before. You know how maths teachers always used to say "you'll use this in later life", and while I was in the position of needing to do some trigonometry the other day (no, really. It was to do with those trees and the plot markers) I swear I couldn't remember anything more than SOHCAHTOA. And even though I can remember what those letters mean, I still can't remember what they're for. The point being that my training has already had practical application, while my brain failed on the only practical application for trig in 20 years. (I strongly suspect that Keith could have done the calculation, but he refused to accept my point that it would be of any value).

Anyway, I made the train. Unfortunately, so did Roger, so I had to listen to an entire train journey about a rock festival him and his teenage son were on their way home from. His son had the good grace to pretend to be asleep, which is the only thing you can do when your extremely embarrassing father meets an extremely embarrassing friend on the train. Also, I discovered why runners don't tend to wear short skirts. As Rog put it, first class may get a free cup of tea, but they don't get a free cabaret show.

Buttercups are gold

Well Saturday rolled round before I knew it, and there was nothing for it, back to the training. She said I should give it a go on Saturday, and well, there was that comment promising me "more attention" next week... which obviously scared me rigid. I'd actually trotted back to the car on Friday to get something Keith left there, feeling rather good about the fact that I knew it wasn't going to be a problem running that distance, so was disappointed that my leg still hurt running. I wasn't all that optimistic about the run on Saturday morning.

However, doing my utmost to follow instructions, I got an early night on Friday, which was pretty easy because (a) I was exhausted and (b) I was in Oxford YHA, so I didn't have a lot else to do, except pay a pound for 20 minutes internet access, which enabled me to upload my blog, and check in on Facebook. Perhaps that helped, because I woke up early (for me) on Saturday, which enabled me to up and out for a run. I took Keith's advice on where to run, as he is a seasoned runner, and that was to turn right out of the youth hostel and then jog up the river for my allotted time, and then come back.

And you know, the river was quite nice. It was a bright sunny day, and the trees were there, and there were barges and narrow boats, and generally the world was at peace. The birds may or may not have been singing, I was plugged in and didn't hear them. In fact, I accidentally had my iphone playing random things, not the songs I'd selected as having a faster pace, so I had a bit of Leonard Cohen and even some Edith Piaf. Then I got to a juncture where I recognised Portland Meadow, which is an SSSI. I decided with the leg and all, I might be as well jogging over the meadow. So I did. I got some rude looks from the geese, and some cows were interested but too lazy to interact, but I have to say I really struggled. The main thing I struggled with was how boring grassland is. I jogged almost all the way to Wolvercote, and it was sunny and grassy and really quite dull. I would have stopped running, to be honest, but then I'd have just been stuck in the middle of it. I could just see Wytham woods on the horizon, and thought how much I'd prefer to be jogging there, hills and all. Portland Meadow has a billion trillion buttercups in it, although sadly, they weren't in flower at this precise weekend.

It put me to thinking that sometimes you'll get a wood which may be mainly interesting, for example, for its bluebell display, which will be stunning for 3-4 weeks in Spring; but then in autumn you'll get its autumnal display of leaves turning gold, and perhaps a mass of fungi springing up, and the smell of leaf mould; and in winter the bleak trunks and twisty branches cutting the sky; and in summer the dark green leafy canopy giving protection from sun (or rain!). So they are good all-rounders. Unlike this grassland, which was dull. I have a photo of Keith in among the buttercups from a couple of years ago, so when it's good, it looks like this.

I also ran past some moored boats and barges, and I wondered if the big barge was the Corpus Christi College barge that my brother lived in for a year. I went to visit it on another occasion while visiting Oxford, and a caretaker let me on board. There was no sign of life on the boat I thought might be it, but it wasn't quite exactly how I remembered: a quick examination on Google Images tells me that this is for the very good reason that it wasn't it.


Anyway, I should be able to gauge whether my grassland colleagues are reading the blog, see if they have any choice words of defense the next time I see them...

Pace training (Wytham day 2)

Today I had another day of survey. It was a little different because Rob and Dawn joined us, and while they did used to work with Keith (many moons ago) neither had made it to Wytham. It was kind of fun to see other people’s responses to the work. We were laying odds on how serious Rob had been when he said he expected Keith would be taking him to pub for lunch (even though I’d assured him of the fallacy of this remark), but both of them stuck at it, and we had some hellish plots to do. 

At the first plot, Rob said he’d watch, but Keith had other ideas, even after Rob pointed out that that was what senior management did. The first one was through a thorn, with some serious bramble patch the other side of it. The second was full of nettles. Dawn and I were sent ahead to find and set up the next plot, at which task we failed three times in a row. Nigel (that’s the site manager, not running Nigel) explained that this is because Keith has a Sixth Sense for plot markers (“I see metal markers under the ground…” – we understand it’s the sequel. Bruce Willis will be playing Keith – he’s growing the beard). On all occasions they were present, and Keith found them (oh, except once when Rob found it). 

After lunch, Keith had an Alan Sugar moment, and decided for the sake of fairness, that he’d mix the teams up a little. Rob and I were dispatched to the next plot. It was the worst plot I have ever done. Admittedly the post WAS there. There was a big bush between the post and the plot – it had elder, hazel and a lot of bramble all the way through it. It was not only impenetrable; it was also not possible to see through, or to take a bearing through. Rob is a lot more senior than what I am, although I’ve known him for a long time, and known that him and Keith have a lot of banter, based on their passed history together. So I took my compass bearing, pointed to the middle of the bush, and Rob started walking at about 90 degrees in a different direction. “No, Rob, really, it’s this way”. I said. “I’m just going round” he said. “OK, but don’t take the tape measure. I can pass it through to you,” I said. “No”, he said, “this will be fine”. “You’re not listening in a way only senior management can,” I told him. He came back and gave me the tape.

I thought about all those dramas (usually Casualty) where two people get hived off from the rest of the clan and have some ordeal together (Dawn later disputed that my scenario had been life-threatening, but that’s because she didn’t see Rob’s face when he was standing in the middle of the bramble failing to find the marker). Anyway, you know how they always end up being best friends, and you think “that would never happen!” – Well, turns out, you’re right, it wouldn’t. Rob just moaned a lot about how pointless it was even looking for the marker, and how it was obvious that the only thing in that plot was going to be bramble. Anyway, I eventually ran the tape out to the other end of the plot, and we found the marker, where it was outside of the bramble. I say, “we found it” because I’m feeling very generous. It somehow lacked the sense of brilliant achievement it had yesterday with Keith. 

Still, they valiantly stuck it out, right up to the last plot (at which point there was a surplus number of surveyors, so they departed). The last plot was up a hill (again) and Keith worked out how many paces he thought it would be (140) so I paced it out. I was contemplating how much easier counting was when you weren’t swimming at the same time, when I got the giggles, because I suddenly wondered if I could count it as “pace training”. But Sally probably won’t fall for that. Rob did question a lot of things, wanting to know why the plots were offset, why it was that we didn’t use lasers to mark the plots, why there weren’t posts at all the corners, why we didn’t GPS the locations of the corners, and why on earth we record the coordinates of the seedlings, if there are not four leading trees (which is more often than you might think). It’s very dangerous, letting senior management see your work. I got the impression that he didn’t think I was curious and probing enough, rather than that I’d been asking those questions for 10 years, and didn’t think I was going to change Keith’s methodology at this juncture.

Anyway, Rob was exceedingly scathing about the blog, and asked if anyone actually read it. So anyone who knows which Rob I’m talking about, I’m urging you to drop casually into conversation what a great blog this is. Lie if you have to.

Happiness is a **bleep** sound

On Wednesday night I emailed Sal and asked for special dispensation from Thursday's long slow run. The reason being that I had a full day's woodland survey, at Wytham Woods in Oxford, and Keith was worried that if I went running beforehand (my intention) that I wouldn't have the energy to survey all day. I was worried that if I surveyed all day, I wouldn't have the energy to run afterwards. Also, as I typed the email, my leg was throbbing from the morning's run, and I realised that being in a B&B in Oxford, I didn't have the required ice pack (or frozen peas) that I'd been instructed to apply. Sal's response was swift: wait till Saturday, do the run then. This was good. However, I did feel that walking all day around a wood was good exercise, and I expect that when Sal catches up with this blog, she will probably incorporate it into her training program, so we will have a lot more woodland surveyors, a win-win situation.

Now, truth be told, I'm flailing a little for subject matter on the blog, especially since I haven't been running with Nigel and the rest of the boys for a while, but it struck me as rather fine to have the opportunity to talk about surveying Wytham, because generally Keith goes off for a week or two each year, and cheerfully informs line managers and colleagues alike that he is "off to Wytham", taking along an assistant or two, and I don't think anyone really has a clue what he's doing. And don't go away with the idea that this is what my work involves generally: I wish.

So here's the scoop. Keith started working at Wytham for his PhD on brambles (some people have ALL the fun). And around that time, one of his supervisors at Oxford, Colyear Dawkins, decided to set a 100m grid across the wood. You can find all about this simply by reading this book. This is no mean feat, especially given that Keith's brambles were 2 m high at the time. It was all laid out using chains and proper surveyors' equipment, and each 100m square was marked with a wooden post, painted orange, and its grid reference stamped on an aluminium tag. They then surveyed every other post. The survey involved a 10x10 m square, but they deemed that putting the square right by the post would mean it would get trampled all the time by the millions of Oxford students studying Wytham, so they offset it, 45 degrees (South East), by the distance of another 10x10m plot. The post, and the two diagonal corners of the plot, were marked with a piece of metal pipe knocked into the ground. This is crucial because we survey the wood every 10 years, and a wooden post rots and falls over about every 9 years.

So armed with only a compass, an all-weather clipboard, a load of tent pegs, some 50m measuring tapes, a clinometer, a reloscope, a girth tape, a metal detector, and crucially, a raincoat, we set off to "survey Wytham". Oh, and lunch, some hopeful sunscreen, and some crucial insect repellent. (Why haven’t they invented stinging nettle repellent yet?)

I love spending time with Keith in the wood because, providing the surveying is going pretty well, conversation can veer wildly and get really quite silly. So, we covered all range of subjects as we wandered round the wood. Around about noon, a heavy rainfall started, so we opted for an early lunch while sheltering in some shrubbery. Yes, that’s just what it’s like working in woods. Keith told me about the rest of the week, as we’d tried to arrange a week long extravaganza of all Keith’s past assistants helping him resurvey Wytham. What happened in the event, of course, was that we could all do different days, so he had a stream of us, much liked actually working with us. Rebecca, Chris and Suzanne had been earlier in the week, and Keith said they’d all done well. He told me about Rebecca’s theory that a post marker was likely to be within 2 m of a fallen post, because of the height of the post. This made eminent sense, as does everything Rebecca says. By the end of the week, we were both calling it “Rebecca’s Law”. 

He added, “And I didn’t lose anything either, except the knife I left in a tree, but luckily I remembered, and was able to go back for it”. Now, for obvious reasons, losing, or leaving anything behind, is disheartening (although re-finding things is rewarding), but I was nonetheless alarmed by this statement, because if you scan the equipment list above, you won’t find “knife” in it. It’s not a statement you want to hear when you are alone with a bloke in a wood. Especially not one with a big (formerly black) beard. I tried to imagine Keith stabbing a tree, and wondered what fit of peak had driven him to it. “You left a knife in a tree?” I questioned. Anyway, it turned out he had a semi-plausible explanation, which had not resulted in the death of anyone, so I could rule out psychopath from my list. Apparently while he was surveying by himself, he couldn’t reach the end of the girth tape, and didn’t have anyone to help, so he’d pinned it in place with the knife. Lateral thinking, you might say (although I wouldn’t). I didn’t like to point out, as it’s usually one of my tasks, that I never need assistance, or knives. So I asked him for help with it later on in the day.

A word needs to be said about the compass, which has a mind of its own. Other people have compasses that point north. This one points through blackthorn, bramble or other spiny, prickly or generally impassible things. I kid you not. The needle doesn’t stay still and wanders each time you line it up, until it’s found the impassable object. It put me in mind of Jack Sparrow’s compass today, which I was thinking of because of the way it spins, and today my compass was mainly pointing at Keith, which I thought was poignant, because Captain Jack’s compass pointed at what he wanted (don’t go there – not like that), and I do want Keith, specifically, I want him not to go. Fact of the matter is, he’s going to leave the organisation soon, and the whole notion terrifies and depresses me.

Anyway, we had a day close to miraculous in terms of finding these wretched plots. Three times, we found pegs in the ground with no marker visible whatsoever, although the frequency with which we also found nails, cartridge cases and other random bits of loose metal meant that I insisted on seeing the end of a peg, no matter how good the “bleep” sounded, nor how straight a line the three noises were. But those bleeps did cause some big smiles when we’d tracked through the wood by pacing out from a distant feature. Once we only traced the plot markers by the location of two trees previously recorded in the plot. Amazingly, although we’d been all over the area the day before, when we did find the plot marker by the post, we also found the rotting post. Sometimes it’s almost as amazing what you don’t see as what you do.

Well, after lunch, while we hoped for the rain to stop (and it didn’t), we surveyed a plot that had been in Keith’s PhD area. Right by the post there was a lovely patch of herb Paris. Don’t ask, but woodland ecologists are hardwired to photograph herb Paris. We’ve all got stacks of pictures of it, but you find it in the wood, and out comes the camera. This was all in fruit, which was nice. Herb Paris is one of the better indicators of ancient woodland that we have – it’s really poor at dispersing, so it’s unlikely to be found in more recent woods. Then Keith told me that the first time he ever saw herb Paris was in that patch of woods! What do you know! This herb Paris may be related to the very first herb Paris that Keith ever saw! Fancy. Although I learned a few years ago that Paris is a corruption of pares, (parts) so really there’s no need for it to have a capital P. But you know, convention.

Towards the end of the day, I found myself getting pretty tired. I was right about not wanting to do a run, I felt like I’d be lucky to get back to the car without a snooze. But Keith decided we’d do one more “on the way back to the car” – it never does to trust this statement. For some reason, it involved a big hill, so on the bright side, that hit another part of training. When we found the plot and marked it out, needless to say, through a hawthorn bush, I was struggling with knackered-ness, and as I clambered over the tape-measure, I paused astride it. Keith looked at me questioningly, so I explained, saying “I’m just trying to get the energy to get my other leg over”.  He gave me the raised-one-eyebrow expression and said “I’m just trying to imagine how Heather would respond to that statement…” 

We told Rebecca about this story tonight, and she laughed like a drain. I’d just like to say, these things don’t occur to ME. It’s everyone else who thinks them.

Addiction

I set off for a run this morning, garmin on, heart monitor strapped in. I was instructed for a steady 40 minutes. Actually, I was instructed for this yesterday, today was a rest, but owing to being ready to drop after a long team meeting yesterday, I decided to prioritise an early night, which I had, and enjoyed. I'm taking it a little easier with the training this week, owing to the wimping out last week having alerted Sal to the ongoing pain thing. We spoke yesterday, and she asked me to point out where the pain was. Now this is exciting. It seems probable that owing to wearing trousers last time, and perhaps being a bit vague, I may have pointed in the wrong place, because it's NOT my peroneal tendon that has a problem. So, after learning that new word and all, and overusing both it and perennial, it turns out that it's problem free. Actually, it looks like I may have torn or strained or have microtears in a much harder to say muscle in the calf, which is called the gastrocnemius. I'm just glad this is a blog, and not radio.

Happily, this is also not a serious injury, but, similarly, one that would be good if it got better. The good news is I get an extra swimming day instead of hills! Result! Anyway, off I went, and the leg was letting me know how unhappy it was. At about 17 minutes, I thought it might have stopped hurting, but perhaps "lessened" would be a better way to describe it. Around then, I actually had a moment of epiphany! I thought, I'm quite enjoying this! No, honestly, I really did! I contemplated, once again, the question posed to me by my friend Emma (I often clarify that she is my friend Emma, rather than being me, to avoid confusion/accusations of schizophrenia), will I continue to run after the race? Generally, I think, no I wouldn't, but today, for the first time, I thought, maybe... I'd miss this... and would want to do this more.

This was worrying. It meant all the people who have threatened me with addiction to running may be correct. But then it suddenly hit me, I just liked the song I was listening to. I realised that doing steady runs by myself is the main time I actually listen to music. But actually there's no reason why I shouldn't listen to Sweet Dreams, cover version by the Magnets, at any time. Even in bed (where I am now, listening to it). So actually, I'm probably not yet addicted.

Newton's third law

OK, so some swimming today. I don't remember exactly how much, because I had an update with Sal about the whole health thing by Instant Messenger today, in which she said swimming should be OK, and she'd work out the rest of the week depending on leg progress. I have a feeling she said 4 lengths warm-up, then 10 sets of 5. And that would make sense because, with lightning acuity, I can tell you that is 54 lengths, which is a 2 length increase on last time. Maybe this exercise is improving my mental arithmetic? Or maybe we've just got onto my ten times table. But I was faced with a difficult choice just before lunch... Heather IM'd me to ask if I was busy or whether I could come to lunch with her and Nic. Well, when I say, "difficult choice," it didn't take me too long to make it, in all honesty. I quickly figured out that I would have time for a swim between work and going out for dinner with my Team at 7:30.

I set out from the office at 6, but remembered that I had two house guests staying tonight, and had no breakfast, so I nipped off to Tesco first, and got to the pool by twenty past. Now, the pool was laid out the wrong way round. Peterborough Regional Pool has a 25m lengths normal pool, and off to one side, forming a sort of L, is the diving pool. In the evenings, they make swimming lanes by cordoning off the deep end across to the diving pool, to make 25m the wrong way, which leaves the shallow end free for kids and non-swimmers. Technically, it's not a bad idea, although it did end up causing me problems.

Now tonight, the public got two lanes, and there were another 3 lanes for some youth swimming club. So, I had some challenges... the first was, whether I could count in sets of 5. I got my warm-up done, and started to focus. The answer, by the way, is no, I couldn't, although I do doubt, in all seriousness, whether I could have kept count of anything, the number of things that ended up distracting me. I lost count in the second set. The lane was getting quite busy, so I switched, which through me off. I decided, in my effort to swim crawl more, that I should try breathing on each side. After all, every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and this is never more true than with exercise, when you should try to balance what you do on one side of your body by also doing it on the other side (which is probably Pilates' third law). I'm a big fan of breathing on my right-hand side, you see. Which means I breathe every fourth arm movement. This is not how to do crawl, but I am much less likely to take a mouthful of water this way. And when I say "take" I mean "inhale as if it were my last breath" (which to be honest, it often feels like). You cannot credit the number of times I've breathed to my left side before my face is out of the water. I have no idea why. Anyway, when I focus on breathing it works quite well, and I actually also get less tired. I realised this is because I often forget to do my legs when I'm focusing on breathing. There are only so many things I can action my brain to do, you know.

And then the crawl is going great, but I keep realising that I'm hitting the lane-cordons and occasionally other swimmers. The lanes aren't super-wide, so I'm trying to keep one cordon close to my side, but I'm all over the place. It took me three or four lengths to figure out why I was finding this so hard. The lines painted on the bottom of the pool were going the wrong way. I didn't have any visual steer below me. I was relying entirely on peripheral vision (on the occasion when I was breathing the right way) and physical contact, without bashing myself too much.

Third, there was an amazing feeling, reaching half way, and it kind of freaked me out if the timing was perfect, where I'd be ploughing along nicely, arm out, breath, face back in water and Oh My God, the bottom of the pool isn't there. It was really rather dramatic. The diving pool is 3.8m deep. I'll be honest, I didn't capture it very well with my photograph, because the one closer to edge just didn't look like the fall away that I felt. It's just as well I don't get giddy. So that was throwing me a bit, but more in an excited way.

What was throwing me in a bad way was focusing really strongly on my crawl and then realising that I was about to hit the person in front of me. The lanes were busy, and everyone was swimming at a different speed. Something that frustrates me even more than people who can't swim (I get an overwhelming desire to teach them) is people who swim strongly but very badly. I swam a couple of lengths of breast stroke behind this guy, and I was taking one stroke for every three he made. He wasn't going that slowly, although slower than my normal pace, which made me feel superior and efficient (I mean, more superior than usual). So the lack of directional travel, the inability to breath under water, the different speeds of people and the depth of the pool, I really lost count.

I got over it though. I have to say that taking a 30 second break every 5 lengths really helped with the counting. And weirdly, so did the block of 5 instead of 4, once I worked out that if I started on an odd number I had to be at one end of the pool, and if even, the other. I became so overawed with my brilliant swimming style, as compared with everyone else in the water, that nothing else mattered (including, as I got tired, my inability to do much else but flail). I really do love swimming. I'm very happy that it gets to be part of my training (being a sort of antithesis of Nigel, who hated it) because I'm getting stronger at it again, which is awesome.

Anyway, rushed home (having gotten told off for taking pictures in the water without signing a form first - I did it on the way out), and rushed out again to the team meal, where I sat opposite a lady called Vicky (she saw me arrive on my bike as well), and once we'd clarified that I wasn't swimming a half-marathon, open water or otherwise, she said "Oh, so you should definitely do a triathlon then!"

Do Sal's spies get everywhere?