Last Rites To The Football Season, Perhaps

I go to the start of the 10k with L and check out the start of the Women’s Elite race before wishing her luck and heading off to get the train home. 

I get off in Derby for the last match of season, a lunchtime kick off against Barnsley. Derby need just a draw to take a play off place where as Barnsley need some sort of result to stay up. That also depends on what Burton Albion do. Burton need Derby to win and if they do then even a draw might keep them up. At first it goes well for both with Derby winning and Burton drawing but it doesn’t last. Ultimately Burton lose and go down along with Barnsley as Derby win to secure a play off match with Fulham.

We’re still not back at work on Monday as we have the May Day Bank Holiday and we spend a night out in Nottingham at Iberico Tapas who have decided to open on the Sundays before the two bank holidays in May. This is one of my favourite restaurants and they have a special deal on for those two nights, so what’s not to like. The meal out serves as a sort of double birthday treat, for mine the other week and for L’s this coming week.

(Sunday 6^th May)

Another To Add To The Collection

This morning I am running in the Wollaton Park 10k. I have done this several times before but not for a year or two and I don’t really like running around my local park much but this is a valuable training opportunity.

The race seems to get more popular each year and has pulled quite a crowd. The course is two laps of a 5k route which is mainly off road. Conditions are quite firm but still I wear trail shoes, my own this time not L’s.

As I recall this race has always been rather annoyingly marked in miles and not kilometres but this year they don’t even bother with that and only put out the ‘one mile’ marker. Still I have a reasonable run albeit in a really average time. Three years ago I was four minutes quicker...

I am handed my mug at the finish line to add to our collection at home. Oh for them to spend the extra 20p and slip a creme egg in to it. They don’t but L does. Bless her. The dogs and L have done another excellent supporting job.

Then I rush off to the match, where Derby play Barnsley. There’s not much to play for, Derby are confirmed in the play offs but second place is a distant dream that will only become a reality if Burnley don’t win any of their last three games. They win today, so well done to them on a well deserved promotion. Derby win too, although a 2-1 win reflects the fact that they played on cruise control but nearly crashed and burned when they should have coasted home.

My folks follow me home and come to ours for tea. L has cooked a meal and her famous Bakewell Pudding for dessert. Yum.

(Monday 21^st April)

No Contest

This morning we head up to somewhere near Barnsley for a five mile race. Afterwards we’ll be able to head into Sheffield to see Daughter for lunch. We were going to visit her next week and do the Warp Up & Run 10k on Graves Park in Sheffield but as that is £16 for a chocolate bar and a medal, whereas this is £8 for a t-shirt, it was no contest really.

The race, at Wombwell, isn’t actually anywhere near Barnsley but Wombwell itself is a fairly big place. It isn’t though, and I hope it doesn’t mind me saying this, very scenic. Although if you look beyond the town/village itself, there is some pretty pleasant countryside.

Parking was at the recreation ground next to a go-kart track. We looked around for ages for the start line but couldn’t find it before joining everyone else who was warming up on the rack track. Then we saw it, a little start sign at the edge of the track. So... how many loops of the track are we in for?

Just the one and a bit as it turns out, to start with, before we head out onto the road, all nicely strung out. After that, route wise, there is one moderately steep hill called Snape Hill but it’s quite a short one, then the course is pretty flat. A lot of it is around housing estates until its back onto the track for another lap to the finish. 

I’m on the results as recording a 32 minute run. I wish. Dear organisers that was not me. I have run a 32 once, maybe twice, but that was a while ago. I ran a 38 today and was quite pleased with that, considering the state of my legs. Although I’m not even sure that time was accurate, I couldn’t see a 4 mile marker and my time for the last two miles was rather impressive. Indicating perhaps that they were short? or that perhaps the earlier markers were wrong.

Then it’s to Sheffield and lunch with Daughter at the Lescar, which is now a bit of a favourite of mine.

Later L lets me entertain myself with my Valentine’s Day treat, Jennifer Lawrence.

The Hunger Games was actually a bit of a disappointment. I didn’t get to see this at the cinema because L and Daughter went without me but I wanted to see it, as it sounded like a similar idea to Stephen King's The Running Man. Which was a great book but an awful film. The concept of the Hunger Games was similar but the film was very different, it was probably more like the Truman Show or even Rollerball with its reality TV angle.

Actually the Hunger Games was potentially more evil than the Running Man with its premise of children killing each other to survive for the pleasure of a TV audience in an X Factor meets Big Brother style competition. The problem is it's called the Hunger Games but where’s the hunger? The principle of the book, as I understand it (because I haven't read it), is that kids from the poverty struck 'districts' where they have no food are being forced by an evil regime to fight each for food. The very pleasant on the eye Ms Lawrence doesn't look particularly starved and it's all a bit too nice, like they didn’t want to upset anyone. I would hope that the books are a bit more evil and depressing.

In the end, of course, love or implied love conquers all and Katniss (our Jennifer) survives and wins the games by... well,  not doing very much at all actually. Hiding most of the time which is what I do when I play Laser Quest or Paintball. It’s not very endearing but quite effective.

(Sunday 17^th February)

Bedraggled Bears

It's foul outside for most of the day. L proclaims she’s glad she’s not sitting at a football match tonight. She might have a point, although she will be expected to kick footballs in the mud for the dogs.

As I dodge the showers to get a sandwich at lunchtime I pass a very bedraggled looking Pudsey Bear loitering outside Pride Park stadium. Is it Children in Need time again?

I go to my Mum’s for tea and while I’m served fish she hands me a huge slab of roast beef ‘for the boys’. Now there’s nothing wrong with the fish, which is very nice, but I’d have been fine with cold beef sandwich.

The match is good, a 2-0 win. That’s two decent performances in a row for once and two wins. It’s also good to see a second consecutive away team, Barnsley tonight after Blackpool on Saturday turn up with the correct strip on. Rather than some God awful away kit, generally these days in lime green and/or purple, when there’s no colour clash.

Pudsey’s there as well. He seems to have blagged his way inside the stadium and can be seen failing to save penalties on the pitch at half time.

(Tuesday 6th November)

Military Operation

I park at my parents place and run the five miles to work from there. I’ll do the same tonight in reverse prior to the football match.

The run wasn’t too bad, hard but not bad, ‘sobbing’ or rather grinding my teeth along to Em and Dex at the same time. Yep, I’ve decided to read (well listen) to a spot of popular fiction in the form of David Nicholls’ massively hyped ‘One Day’. I have 40 minutes left to listen to, so I will finish it tonight. I didn’t like the book at first but it’s grown on me. I may even review it when I’ve finished it.

At least parking the car five miles away and somewhere where it would take a military operation to get a bus to makes we summon up the enthusiasm to run back to it. Which means I don’t have the 'shall I, shan’t' I debate with myself that L is having tonight concerning her run.

The match, oddly, yields Derby’s best performance for at least eighteen months. They are all over Barnsley like a rash, although Barnsley themselves contribute to what is, for once, a quality game of football. Rather annoyingly this excellent performance yields only a 1-1 draw and that was only thanks to being awarded a slightly dubious penalty, whereas when we play just averagely, as on Saturday, we win 3-0. Football eh?

(Tuesday 27th September)

A Night To Remember

After a morning lie-in and a park session with the dogs I spoil a promising day by spending the afternoon sat in the damp and the cold watching Derby hang on to a 0-0 draw against the might of Barnsley. Unfortunately it’s one of those games that goes under the sub-heading ‘must win’ and obviously we don’t. The writing is on the wall, as well on the floor, the ceiling and everywhere else there’s room to write it and in very big letters.

As it’s our crystal (apparently) anniversary this week L books us into a fish restaurant, one that she’s always wanted to try, for this evening. It’s a night she won’t forget. I suddenly start feeling ill on the bus into town. L and Daughter have both been ill this week, so I guess it was my turn. L had been predicting it but I’d assumed it would pass me by. We make it to the restaurant, order wine but then I start to feel faint. I leave L to make our apologies and cancel the booking whilst I go outside for some air. Fainting is somewhat of a speciality of mine and I feel I put on quite a good show for Nottingham’s revellers. The restaurant is very helpful and start to summon an ambulance but I decline. We head home, where L gets soup for tea rather than a posh meal. So it’s a disappointing evening out and anniversary.

(Saturday 5th March)

Immortal Words

I get a great message from L, who is leafing through YouTube looking up her new favourite Feeder track which is ‘Insomnia’. Hardly new I know, well, I guess it was 12 years ago.

‘OMG he was so young and Taka Daal (I’ll have words later) was blonde and slim.’

We were all young in 1999, even me, though never blonde.

We have a 10k on Sunday in Huddersfield, only they don’t seem to want us. Either that or yet another item of post has gone missing because we haven’t received our numbers yet. I imagine they’re at the house on the next street with the same house number as ours. We currently have three letters of theirs to pass on, so I imagine they must have a similar quantity of ours.

Might be a good thing really, I’ve been reading horror stories about the course. Last year lots of people uttered those immortal words ‘never again’. This one is actually described as ‘undulating (Yorkshire style)’. So I guess if Barnsley was classed as ‘fairly flat’ then ‘undulating’ translates as ‘bloody hilly’.

Later I pick L up from a night out in Derby and take her home to see my exciting new purchase. We have a new kettle and it lights up, it's so exciting. It’s the small things in life that make a difference.

(Monday 21st February)