One Glass

On the bike today and bloody hard work it is too. I’m so unfit.

L suggests I slip the bottle of white wine she got for her birthday into the fridge. Hmmm. On a Tuesday? She must be having a hard day at work. I shouldn’t really collaborate on such an evil deed.

It’ll only be ‘one’ she assures me and I have permission to wrestle the bottle off her after the ‘one’, although she isn’t specific about the size of it. She might be planning a large 'one', a pint even. I’ll give it some careful consideration.

First I cycle to the pool, do a few lengths and bump into L who’s heading into the gym. Then when heads off to her book club, still asking for just ONE glass... I head home with the intention of putting the jumps up in the garden and doing ten minutes or so training with MD before taking both the boys on the park.

Whereas the swimming went to plan nothing else does because it then rains, so my plans with the boys are shelved. Instead I cook Spanish Plume. Which doesn’t exist of course, so I make it up and even concoct an accompanying side dish. Then contrary to my better judgement, I also put the wine in the fridge.

The weather fines up and while the Plume cooks, I get to do a bit of training with MD after all, although it’s now too late for the park. Problem is the rain has made the garden a touch muddy and both boys, even Doggo who hasn’t even been training, come in looking like... well two dogs who’ve rolled in the mud.

As L comes in from her book club and sees the state of the boys, I wonder if 'one' glass is still going to be enough. I distract her by asking what her club’s latest book is. Another Ian McEwan? Another dreaded Rose Tremain? Or perhaps they’ve diversified into some eye ball gouging courtesy of Stuart McBride? Nope, it’s Kazuo Ishiguro’s ‘Never Let Me Go’. Ha, we saw the film last week and prior to that L read the book. So I guess she gets the month off for good behaviour.



I decide I’m going to have to bath the dogs, well at least their paws. MD isn’t happy, Doggo is terrified. It’s only water mate.

L’s race pack for Manchester on Sunday arrives. She’s in start number two ‘White’ at 10:55, only twenty minutes behind me. She’ll be chasing my tail. We can’t remember what predicted time she put down to get that but I’m certainly not going to be able to finish in time to see her start.

(Tuesday 10th May)

We Are Ready

I embark on a final training run with MD. It goes well. We are ready. L then takes out Doggo which makes MD distraught. He doesn’t seem to realise that he now needs to taper before Saturday. Oh by the way, happy birthday MD, three years old today. We’re off out tonight to celebrate without you.

I sit at my desk feeling knackered and a bit nauseous. The nausea is due to starting my latest Stuart McBride this morning. Book 4 - Blind Eye. Someone is gouging out the eyes of Polish immigrants. Nice. McBride is reading this one himself. Which is a bit weird, having got used to John Sessions. It is probably more appropriate having a Scotsman read a book about people from Aberdeen. McBride though, appears to be reading this one in a hurry but I’m sure I’ll get used to him.



I get the bus straight into Nottingham from work. Tonight is a delayed birthday celebration for me. I meet up with L for an aperitif or two before we go for a meal. She says she's always wanted to do drinks from work... and she’s waited 15 years to tell me this... I’m sure we’ve done drinks from work on more than one occasion. We end up in Langtry's where they have kindly laid on Snecklifter as a birthday treat. I’m touched.

After which we head off to the restaurant for a romantic meal for three, Daughter is meeting us there. The restaurant is called Kayal and describes itself as South Indian. Kayal means backwaters in Kerala, I’m not sure if that’s promising or not. It’s a chain of course, aren’t they all these days, but it only has three branches - Leicester, Leamington Spa and Nottingham. Well so far.



They claim that Kerala has a distinctive cuisine, very unusual and different from the rest of India but a lot of Asian restaurants say that and they still have Chicken Tikka Masala on the menu for the masses. Not here. In fact no Madras, Bhuna, Jalfrazi etc either. There was not one recognisable dish on the menu. They didn’t even do naan bread, although there was some well weird rice bread, very strange but oddly nice. It was all very refreshingly different, very tasty and not badly priced either. Recommended.

(Thursday 28th April)

The Indoor Approach

I’m on the bike today despite the fact it's a bit miserable out this morning. At least I’m not plugged into Rose Tremain like L. Blimey, Rose Tremain and a bit of drizzle, if she was a character in my Stuart McBride book she’d have slashed her wrists by now. She recommends I delete ‘The Colour’ from my iPod. Will do. Loved the ‘Road Home’ but can’t see me reading another of hers not after the awful ‘Trespass’ and now L’s non-recommendation of ‘The Colour’.



L is seriously going through it at the moment. Reading Ian McEwan on paper and Rose Tremain on audio. Nightmare.

We listen to the cricket at work. England again serve up a classic match and beat the West Indies by the skin of their teeth. It should be enough to send them through to the quarter finals but they still need other results to go their way. All six of their games have been total cliffhangers. So they just have to stay on in the tournament, how could anyone have the nerve to knock them out. They have been the only 'entertainment' in what has otherwise been a very dull and predictable tournament.

While the fixtures in Group A have more or less followed the form book and produced the expected qualifiers with ease, England's Group B is still undecided and will go down to the last few games purely due to the inconsistencies of an England side who are capable of doing the most random things. Such as losing to Ireland and Bangladesh as well as making hard work of the Netherlands but have beaten both South Africa and the West Indies as well as drawing with India. Bring on the Aussies.

At lunchtime, during the change of innings, we hit the pub. A pint and a half and game pie. Thankfully I’ve not got to run on all that, tonight all I’ve got to do is knock a few balls against a wall. That is if my opponent has recovered from the ‘wine’ inflicted injury that caused him to miss last week’s game.

He’s been training hard, even to the extent of cycling, indoors of course, and even monitoring his heart rate... which is getting a bit serious. He says it was simply something to do while cycling. Personally I find dodging the traffic keeps me occupied but then I do leave the garage.

I don’t understand his 'indoor' approach, its loads more fun on the road. Like tonight, I enjoyed chasing down another cyclist. I couldn’t resist when I saw what looked to be a quality piece of cycling engineering (e.g. expensive) up ahead and going quite fast too. I felt quite smug when I caught them. It wasn’t a bike or a person I recognised and as I got closer I saw that it also seemed to have a quality piece of engineering astride it, complete with a tasteful little pony tail out of the back of the helmet. I protect their rear for a while until we stop at the traffic lights, when I pull up alongside. Female too, which is nice, it’s best to check, pony tails can be deceptive. Very grumpy though, so I push on ahead. She can protect her own rear.

Another thrilling squash game. 2-2. Thrilling as in I’m thrilled, he’s isn't. In fact there’s another broken racquet strewn across our court and it's not mine.

(Thursday 17th March)

Morbid Fascination

I had planned to bike today but decide to skip it, as I feel a bit relapsed after last night’s run or it might just have been too much pizza last night.

I’m close to finishing an audiobook in record time, although it was only a six hour one but Stuart McBride’s ‘Cold Granite’ seems to have captured my morbid fascination.



It’s the first in his series of book about Detective Sergeant Logan McRae and was a free download from the Sunday Times. In fact they’ve handed over four of his books for nothing. Set in the glamorous location of Aberdeen, it is an unpleasant little number with bodies, many children, winding up dead everywhere. Despite that it’s quite witty with it. Chuck in a pathologist ex-girlfriend (that's pathologist not pathological) and a half naked WPC in his apartment but he was too drunk to remember how she got there. It’s an interesting read.

Training for both boys tonight even Doggo. He only gets a session once a month, just to keep his paw in and it’s tonight. He looks terrible afterwards.

(Wednesday 9th March)