Plenty Of Skateboards

As my socks haven’t been dispatched as quickly from Wiggle as I had hoped, I pop into Intersport which is part of the Soccerdome on Pride Park. Rather surprisingly they don’t have a great selection of socks and no supports. They do have quite a good selection of skateboards though.

Another washing machine has packed up. It is worth trying to get it fixed or do we just buy a new one? We seem to be having one every couple of years at the moment but it seems cheaper than getting them repaired.

There’s a chap at work who’s copied our university UK tour with his Daughter. Only he’s extended it and taken in even more universities, starting even before she drew up her short list. He’s covered pretty much the length of England and Wales, using up most of his holiday and huge amounts of petrol in the process.

After all this, his Daughter has decided to stay local. Bless her. Personally, I’d kill her or send her a bill.

Another night in, as I skip dog class again in the interests of a quick(er) recovery. Instead I book a Manchester hotel for the night before we fly as prices are tumbling, as it’s now last minute. Now all I’ve got to do is break it to the dogs that they’re not coming with us.

(Wednesday 7th March)

Practice Makes Perfect

The traffic is particularly bad this week as I’m in the car.

My hobble is improving slowly. Practice makes perfect. I’ve been looking at compression socks and calf supports on Wiggle. They might help with the skiing but also it might be worth using them for running to avoid a repeat injury, that is if L can cope with the embarrassment of me in them.

She says black ones look a bit pretentious yet sort of cute but the white ones are a definite no no. White socks are for schoolgirls apparently. No comment. I best order some black ones then.

Just outside work, some men come along and fix a hole in the road that no one knew was there but they leave the huge chasm that is at some point going to cause a serious incident. We watch them prodding, poking and even putting their feet through the abyss in disbelief before fixing the other ‘hole’. Of course they will only fix what they were told to fix. The chasm probably isn’t even on their schedule until 2014.

L heads off for a cut & colour. So I’m hoping to pull a redhead tonight.

I limp to Sainsbury’s. I need some birthday cards, Swiss Francs and Bonios. Life’s essentials.

There's a match tonight, Derby v Blackpool. Where I’m under strict instructions to not aggravate the injury. No standing up suddenly and cheering every goal that they score. I think I should be safe, I'm not expecting any goals.

Bugger. Surprisingly Derby score twice and win 2-1, accompanied by some gentle celebrating.

I come home to a violethead, if there is such a word. Very sassy.

(Tuesday 6th March)

Woe Is Me

I make it into work by car without my leg seizing and leaving me stranded on the A52. Then I book a physio appointment for 4pm, so that I can get the bad news confirmed.

So no running for three weeks, no racing for at least four. When I asked whether there was any chance of a half marathon after four weeks the physio looked at her feet and shook her head. Which may have been a ‘no’.

When I mentioned skiing she went sort of pale but conceded it could be possible with care, the right amount of alcohol and perhaps a little stupidity. So at least that was promising.

She recommended lots of gym work and swimming but I reckon L must have rang ahead to tell her to say that. It’s the sort of thing L would say.

The results for Sunday’s race are up. There were 2736 finishes in the half and one man limping across the line, as well as 460 in the 10k. So not a bad turnout considering the conditions.

I skip dog class, so that ruins MD’s night, as I sit with a ice pack on my leg instead, enviously watching Ski Sunday. Woe is me.

(Monday 5th March)

Hobble With The Herd

I won't forget Milton Keynes Festival Of Running in a hurry. For starters it was a miserable day, raining and cold. The event was well organised, although with a rather small and soulless event village at the Xscape Centre.

We walk the dogs around for a bit but then as the weather gets even worse we shelter in the car until start time when we will 'Run with the herd', which is the race slogan. A reference to the legendary concrete cows of MK I assume. The race starts off on coned off sections of the main roads, which are dull and narrow but flat. Congestion is quite bad due to the narrowness and this gets worse when we catch the 10k runners who started twenty minutes ahead of us. A bigger time gap is required here.

They divert off our route at around five miles, so from there I could get some space and get a good pace going. So far so good and I’m on a 1:38 pace, which would be very pleasing for this stage of the season. Water is in bottles, which is good but often left unopened which my, by now, cold fingers struggle to deal with.

Then things go spectacularly wrong. My calf becomes quite tight, probably due to the lack of warming up and perhaps I should have stopped to stretch it. Then though it clearly tears and that is quite simply race over. Only problem being that I’m over six miles into a half marathon, e.g. around half way and therefore pretty much equidistant from the start and the finish.

A marshal confirms there are no short cuts and no prospect of transport back to the finish, so it’s basically time to walk to the finish. At least I’ll get my medal I suppose. Problem is I’m now really starting to feel the cold and have to jog sections to keep warm. I hobble along with the herd, more than likely doing further damage to the leg.

So a nice mixture of pain, disappointment and annoyance as I get overtaken by a lot of people I didn’t want to be overtaken by. Then it started to snow. Not the best of days.

I have to say everybody, both supporters and runners, are very encouraging when they see me walking and struggling but it wasn’t really what I wanted. Somehow I still manage to come in a little ahead of L due to my good start and she still does a good time.

She finds me hiding in the car, trying to get dry and warm which I’d just about managed. So at least I can help her do the same.

It all means for me that the Liverpool Half won’t happen, nor Stafford and probably not Reading. Woe is me. It’s a good job I don’t have a voracious spreadsheet to feed. The biggest problem is that somehow I have to attempt to ski next week.

L drives us home, where we decide to skip our usual Sunday film and limp down to one of our locals to get drunk instead.

We’ve been avoiding the Wheelhouse since it was refurbished and rebranded as a ‘Hungry Horse’. Which isn’t a name that even whispers the word ‘quality’ to you. It sort of bellows the opposite. The menu has indeed been dumbed down and it was hardly high brow before. It actually seems to have been copied wholesale from Wetherspoons and they have no Sunday lunches at all but at least the Abbot Ale is on.

(Sunday 4th March)

Hearty Lunches

Another lazy Saturday. I’ll miss these when the dog show season starts.

The boys have a hearty late lunch after I finally get up and take them on the park. Doggo has a proverbial feast, as we now top his dog food with bran as well as his joint treatment. We have a hearty late lunch ourselves which begs the question when are we going to carbo load for tomorrow’s race.

It will have to be after tonight’s film ‘Moneyball’.

In 2001 the Oakland A’s baseball team lost to the New York Yankees in the divisional playoffs. This wasn’t surprising considering the payroll of the Yankees was triple that of the A’s. It’s a situation that isn’t going to change either and the A’s are set to lose three of their star players to teams who can afford to pay more for their services.

The general manager of the A’s, Billy Beane (Brad Pitt), and his scouts start debating who they can recruit to replace them.

Beane is not impressed with any of the options and realises that in order to compete, they need to totally re-think the way they recruit players. Then, by chance, he stumbles across Pete Brand (Jonah Hill), an economics graduate working for another team who believes he has a better system. A system purely based on statistics. A system that didn’t care if a player was too old, spent all his time in strip clubs or if his girlfriend wasn’t photogenic enough, provided he got the runs.

Beane recruits Brand to be his assistant and then much to the annoyance of his scouts, they go about recruiting new players based on data not scouting, even the ones who frequent strip clubs and have ugly girlfriends.

Another person who was unimpressed by this was Art Howe (Philip Seymour Hoffman) the team's head coach and he refuses to pick the players that Beane and Brand have bought for him. When the club embark on a disastrous start to the season, everyone blames Beane’s purchases but the two of them refuse to be diverted from their strategy. Instead Beane sells a couple of the players the coach is picking to force his hand. I don't quite understand why he didn't just fire his coach but selling the players has the correct effect and the team embark on an all-time major league record of 20 consecutive wins.

They top their division and again reach the playoffs, only to lose at the same stage again. The point though has been made and Beane is headhunted by another team, although ultimately he decides to stay in Oakland.

It’s an interesting film and a true story. I love all the statistical stuff, but it does uses jargon that only baseball fans would comprehend, so an understanding of the game would be useful. I feel a lot of the actual results were glossed over but as this is all factual, if you’re in America you probably know the details of what happened.

Pitt is good and I'm a bit of a Pitt convert over the last few years. Although I can't see anything in this that warranted his Oscar nomination but he is as good in this as has been in most of his recent work. Recommended.

(Saturday 3rd March)

Pyrotechnics

I’m on the bike again today, as it results in less coughing than running.

L regales me of a tale of a poor young girl she passed this morning who was being made to run up the evil steps near L’s work, do six star jumps, then run down the steps and lift weights at the bottom. Whilst her personal trainer stood nearby drinking a Costa Coffee. This reminds me, I really must get on with becoming a personal trainer. It sounds such fun, especially if young girls are prepared to pay handsomely to be tortured. It must pay handsomely, if he can afford Costa.

L isn’t initially keen on tonight’s gig, which she’s going to with her brother. Unfortunately I’m washing my hair, so I can’t take her place. Rammstein don't even sing in English but apparently they do go all out with their stage show.

L, as it happens, has a whale of a time despite the singed eyebrows. There are a lot of pyrotechnics including guitars, keyboards, microphones and possibly Zimmer frames on fire. The keyboard player used a Zimmer frame mounted keyboard at one point, that was when he wasn't on his treadmill or in a saucepan. This review is secondhand by the way, but I think it's generally accurate.

I may have quite liked the crowd surfing in a rubber dingy bit, that sounded quite cool but I’m not quite so sure about some of the other stunts. Such as the lead singer putting on a dress and walking his band mates around on lead nor the gay sex scene but I guess it would all have made a good blog.

I stay in, dog sit and have my own pyrotechnics as L insists I build a funeral pyre for some rather threadbare handkerchiefs that have been called up as reinforcements following my recent bout of whatever it was. It’s sad, some do have sentimental value, but I do concede that a few perhaps need retiring. I organise a short ceremony.

(Friday 2nd March)

All Arty

I walk the dogs this morning. Which is always a pleasure and they were saintly, well almost. I have my instructions. Check Doggo’s... ahemm... before I pick it up and to put cream on his dodgy knees. Damn I forgot about the cream until we got back and as for the other, you don’t want to know.

While I’m out with the boys L heads off for an extended gym session. She’s probably expecting queues at the exercise bikes after the Horizon programme the other night but at least nobody will be on them for long. Three minutes. Although you feel the leisure centres may need to employ someone to lift their customers off the bikes after the intensity of their twenty second bursts.

Colcannon tonight. That’s food, I think. Apparently it’s an arty sort of mash to go with our liver and bacon. I love it when L goes all arty on me. I wonder if she’ll serve it wearing one those arty waitress outfits. Probably not.

Another committee meeting tonight, which goes surprisingly well. No one gets killed or even lightly knifed in the back. Perhaps we’re learning how to get on.

(Thursday 1st March)

Thank Heavens For Leap Years

Thank heavens for leap years. No I don’t get any proposals of marriage but I do manage to slot a second bike to work in during February. Only two bikes in a month is not impressive but in a 28 day February it would only have been one.

I’ve organised a special night tonight at dog class - a team relay night. I’ve had very little feedback from club members, only a few sending their apologies for not being able to make it. Together with the fact we have a 90% female membership and L keeps telling me women don’t have a competitive edge, so there’s little chance of anyone wanting to participate in a team relay. So I head down to training, not anticipating that anyone will actually turn up and fully expecting to be back home within half an hour. So I’m pleasantly surprised by the good turnout. It goes well.

(Wednesday 29th February)

Just Three Minutes

Oh dear. Quark. That’s going to be taxing, even though I think I know what it is. I’m sure I’ve got it from Sainbury’s before but... the supermarket is in Chaddesden, so I’m not hopeful.

Everyone’s talking about the Horizon programme about how three minutes of exercise a week can get you fit. Fascinating stuff. Clearly we have it all wrong and I shall have to adapt my half marathon training accordingly.

L’s sceptical but then if she cuts down to just three minutes a week think of all the books she’d get read, all the painting she’d get done and think how little she’d need to eat to refuel. It has its plus points.

I head home without the Quark.

The dogs are at the vets tonight for their kennel cough jabs ahead of their ‘holiday’ next week. It will be interesting taking them in together. Who do we let the vet inject first and do we let one watch the other getting it in the neck?

We let the vet do Doggo first, giving him less time to contemplate what’s happening and then of course MD will be easy because he always wants whatever Doggo’s having.

Doggo gets a full body fondle to see if the vet can find a reason for his many foibles but mainly the incessant scratching. This ends up with him being pronounced flea free but on the receiving end of another 'anal squeeze' treatment by a young female vet who is about half the size of Doggo. He also gets a tube of cream for his crusty elbows.

The kennel cough vaccine apparently has to be squirted up their noses rather than injected, which is also entertaining.

Later, at squash, my opponent and I compare bruises but manage not to add to them. We also compare colds. His has been hanging around longer than mine but I think mine wants to come on holiday with me. I wonder if it’s any good on skis.

(Tuesday 28th February)

You Can Always Rely On A Run

You can always rely on a run. Today I feel slightly worse than yesterday morning but better than Saturday. The coughing has eased... at least.

It was the Oscars last night. This year, unlike in previous years, I felt totally underwhelmed by it all. The nominations were just so tame. Whereas last year we had films for grown-ups:- Black Swan, the Fighter, The Kids Are Alright, Winter’s Bone, True Grit, Social Network, Kings Speech, 127 Hours etc. This year they’re all family friendly, films about kids, horses, baseball and mythical things... Where for instance is Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Drive, Shame, Martha Marcy May Marlene, Margin Call, The Iron Lady, even The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. I’m not saying they’re all good but at least they’re grown-up and a bit taxing on the brain. They didn’t even use the full ten nominations that were available, choosing to only pick nine films. Very poor guys.

So it’s hardly surprising that The Artist won, amongst such company as War Horse, Moneyball, The Descendants, The Tree of Life, Midnight in Paris, The Help, Hugo and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, it looks positively risqué, even I was rooting for it.

The weather’s not great here as L wishes me a ‘good run’. It’s very unlikely to be ‘good’ in this rain. Good job I’m not ill.

I survive another five miles, boxed ticked. Half marathon coming up on Sunday.

No dog training tonight, our trainer is in Orlando. It’s alright for some. She’s actually doing a half marathon while she’s there. I repeat, it’s alright for some, as I dry off after my run.

(Monday 27th February)