Author: jogblog

Dogs in fog

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I almost got up before eight this morning. I woke up at 07:55 and thought  if I get up now, I’ll be up before eight but I ignored myself and then at 07:58 I thought I can still get up before eight but ignored myself again and then it was 07:59 and I thought I’ve still got time to get up before eight but continued to ignore myself and then the clock was showing 08:00 and I turned over to look at the other clock in case it said 07:59 and I could still get up before eight but that clock said 08:00 too but I got up so I could at least say it hadn’t really gone past eight when I got up and I had a cup of tea and a banana smoothie and put my running gear on and emptied the dishwasher while my Garmin was outside getting a signal and I put on my ipod and went outside and my Garmin, although getting fully charged after each use, has for the last few weeks said it only has 9 hours of battery life, when it used to be 12, although I’m not actually planning on running for 9 hours at any point during my lifetime, so until it starts saying 15 minutes of battery left, I don’t really need to worry.

I start off down the road and it’s foggy and I think I’ve got to cycle into town later to get the train to London and I don’t know how to cycle in the fog, do I put my lights on or what and how will the car drivers see me? and then I think BUT I’M RUNNING NOW IN THE ROAD AND HOW WILL THE CAR DRIVERS SEE ME? I WILL GET SQUISHED IN THE FOG AND DIE! and a car comes round the bend in the fog and I can only just about see it but luckily it sees me and doesn’t squish me in the fog and I get to the safety of the closed off road where there aren’t any cars in the fog, only dogs, like the one attached to a lead held by a lady in a pink jacket and the dog is very small and I think you shouldn’t have small dogs, you should get a proper size dog like

IrishWolfhound1

an Irish Wolfhound as I did when I was younger as that’s a proper dog and I get a mile up the road and turn round and go back the way I came and there’s a woman with three dogs and they must be evil vicious devil dogs as she pulls them to her and stops while I go past and I’m feeling politer today and I say thank you and she pulls a kind of grimacey face and then through the fog I can see the houses at the end of the road and then I’m home and I get back on the internet and people are Tweeting that they’ve got their VLM magazines and I hear the postman put something heavy through the letterbox and I go and investigate and me and Shaun have matching magazines with some very pissed off looking people on the cover which means WE ARE REJECTS and I’m slightly disappointed but I don’t know why as it’s unlikely I’d have done any training or turned up to do it anyway.

Stats:
Distance: 2.03 miles
Time: 22:31
Pace: 11:07 m/m
Calories: 202
Fogs: 1
Cars squishing me in the fog: 0
Dogs in fog: 3
VLM rejection magazines: 2
Music:
Black Wire
David Hentschel
Avi Buffalo
Cardiacs

Round the bend

4 comments

I’ve been slacking slightly less. Only slightly though, as I went to the gym on Saturday morning (which was empty. And I mean empty; I was the only person there. I’d been expecting it to be packed but nope, obviously all the people in Ashford were outside Greggs queuing for cakes) and today I did a short run. A very slow, short run.

It started off going up a hill, so of course, at 0.14 miles, I stopped to walk up the hill. I eventually start running again when it levels off at the village hall and go up the trail that goes through the field and Courtney Love starts singing She Walks Over Me and I can keep in time to this and I wonder why I can keep in time to this

and not to Audiofuel and then a woman with a dog on a lead pulls her dog to the side and stops to let me go past and I don’t say thank you as I don’t like the stupid countryside people with their stupid countryside dogs that they have to keep on leads because they are VICIOUS DEVIL DOGS and not the nice friendly dogs that used to be free to play over the marshes and not walked around the field tied to a lead. And then further on there’s another stupid countryside person with a stupid countryside vicious devil dog and she pulls her dog away too and stops to let me go past and I think aren’t any dogs round here allowed to run free? and I get to the top of the trail and I’ve done a mile and I only wanted to do two miles and so I need to turn round and go back the way I came but I don’t want to run past the vicious devil dogs again and so I go back down the road and on the other side of the road is a footpath and although I haven’t got my glasses on, it would appear the black and white things I can see the footpath is heading towards are COWS! I haven’t seen cows for ages and ages and I think shall I go and investigate the cow field? and then I think no, as I haven’t got a camera with me and I need cow based photographic evidence if I’m going to go and see cows and so I continue down the road and it’s quite busy and cars keep going past and as I get to a particularly sharp bend, I can see a van coming and I have to stop and let the van go past and I keep stopping to walk and I think how come, when I was just beginning to run, I’d never stop to walk, even if it meant slowing to a 13 minute mile shuffle but now whenever I get a bit tired, I just give up and walk?

Stats:
Distance: 1.97 miles
Time: 23:03
Pace: 11:42 m/m
Calories: 196
People in gym: 0
Vicious devil dogs: 2
Vans on bends: 1
Stoppings to walk: a few
Music:
Hole

Cancel your NYE celebrations, your attendance is required at Janathon

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Last week I ran 1.95 miles.

My legs ached the next day.

On Wednesday I spent an hour at the gym.

My legs have been aching since.

This can only mean one thing.

I AM A SLACKER.

What I haven’t been slacking at, however, is preparations for Janathon. No, that’s not a typo, Janathon is Juneathon’s new baby brother.

I didn’t want a Janathon. My loyalties lie with Juneathon but after going up to London to interview Sean at Audiofuel (no, I haven’t transcribed it yet. It’s taking me about 30 minutes to transcribe 5 minutes and there’s 50 minutes to get through), he suggested having a Janathon.

I said na (I did, really. If you’ve heard my accent, you’ll know this is true).

But then he mentioned it on Facebook and everyone said ‘yay, Janathon, what a cool idea’ and so I said ok then, we’ll have a Janathon. And because I’d meant to organise Juneathon properly next year and get a website running and make the guidelines clearer and get t-shirts printed and stuff (after okaying it with Joggerblogger that it was ok for me to take Juneathon and do my own thing with it), I thought I’d better get a website going for Janathon and so Sean came down to discuss all things Janathon and now I need to make a website and get prices for t-shirts and things.

Oh, and I ran another 1.95 miles today. I started walking at about 1.3 miles and then I was reminded of this video

and thought they’ve got an excuse for running like that, they’re just about to complete an Ironman.

At my current fitness, I couldn’t even complete a Tinfoilman.

Stats:
Distance: 1.95 miles
Time: 22:06
Pace: 11:19
Calories: 194
Janathons: 1
Tinfoilmans: 1
Music:
Delorean
Audiofuel
Cardiacs

Belkin DualFit Armband for iphone 4

15 comments

A long long time ago, I was sent an email asking me if I’d like to try out an armband for the iphone. Not having an iphone and not having the teeniest inclination of ever owning an iphone, I emailed back and said no ta.

Luckily, apart from being a hypocrite and now owning an iphone (baa), I’m also not very good at clearing out my email inbox and so I found the email, and said “hello, you offered me an armband a little while ago but I didn’t have an iphone but now I do, so can I have one now?” and luckily the nice lady didn’t say no, too late, bugger off, but she said of course you can and she sent me the Belkin DualFit Armband for iPhone 4 from her website full of iPhone 4 accessories.

The armband is nice and soft and feels like the velvety inside of a cat’s ear although the website says it’s made from a lightweight, breathable neoprene and not cat’s ears, so vegans: you’re ok.

armband 003

There’s a little slit in the armband and I don’t know if this is the real use for it, but you could put a coin or a key inside there or just do what I did and stick your finger in it and wonder what it’s for.

armband 004

It’s fucking huge. It takes up more room on my arm than my Garmin 301 does and I wonder if running around with an expensive phone on my arm in full view is a good idea. If I was still at home in Walthamstow, then I probably wouldn’t go out with it strapped to my arm but here in semi-ruralness, I decide to take my chances as most of the riff-raff round here are two miles away in the town centre queuing up outside Greggs.

I load up my phone with Audiofuel, Stornoway (who I discovered when XFM played ‘Watching Birds’ a couple of weeks ago and which is now my new favourite song) and Hole and go outside for the first run in about three weeks.

The phone’s easy to use through the armband and although looking at it upside down hurts my eyes, I can quickly put it on shuffle and adjust the volume and then I’m off.

I just do two miles today and considering how I haven’t run or been to the gym for ages, I don’t do too badly and although the Folkestone Half-Marathon at the end of the month is out, I still might make the Ashford 10k in October.

Stats:
Distance: 1.95 miles
Time: 22:08
Pace: 11:21 m/m
Calories: 194
New armbands: 1
Music:
Audiofuel
Stornoway
Hole

p.s. I’m having a giveaway on Planet Veggie. Go and enter my competition. Now. Please.

Flipping farmers furrowing fields

9 comments

I used to hate alliteration before doing my OU course. But then I started to quite like it as it was used quite often and now I think it’s quite the bees’ bollocks (sorry for the mixed metaphor but I was also taught to avoid clichés like the plague).

I did do a run last week that I should have blogged but didn’t. I was going to blog about it, but got side-tracked and I haven’t even got my list of prompts/memory guides so you could at least have had a kind of join-the-dots blog instead.

Still, today I ran and now I’m blogging it.

Some time ago, I received an email about a new range of running tops. Being a blatantly brazen blagging blogger, I emailed back and said thank you for your spam email, the tops look cool. Can I have one to review on my blog please? and they say yes, of course you can. And so I was sent a lovely stripy top from Rainbow Running.

running top 001

Not cheap at £35, I was also a bit perturbed to look at the label and see they’re 100% polyester. I WILL BOIL AND DIE I thought but on investigating properly the blurb I was sent like I should have done in the first place and not just been greedy and grabbing my freebie, it says they’re made with wickable Intera fabric, which rapidly transports water molecules to the surface of the fibres where they can quickly evaporate, the garments offer a cooler and more comfortable running experience.

And after trying the running top, I can say that that’s not just marketing bollocks, as it did keep me cool and dry and I didn’t get home with it sticking to me (and that’s not just because I run [or jog, as I’ve recently been told I do, as I go really slowly, bah] really slowly. Slow joggers runners sweat too, you know. And it fitted nicely and it was comfy and all that other stuff. (Yeah, ok, I’m not very good at reviews. Random stream of consciousnesses are more my thing.)

Another thing I tried out today was my new iPhone 4. I was a bit hesitant to get one as I thought it’s just a phone, isn’t it? And I don’t even use the phone. BUT I FUCKING LOVE IT. I love it. I love it. I love it. I was very scared to take it out with me as I didn’t want to put it in my back pocket with my door key but the protective covers are still on it (although they’re getting a bit manky so I think I’ll have to take them off soon – anyone recommend a case?), so I thought it’d be ok. I downloaded the Runkeeper app, although everyone says it’s shit and loaded up my phone with Audiofuel, Kate Bush and Knifeworld. Runkeeper found my location within seconds (unlike my N95 which found my location once in the two years I had it) and I wondered if it would still go when I pressed the home button and started up the music player. I didn’t really care though as I had my Garmin with me. Everything seemed to be going ok and I shoved the phone in my back pocket. Next time though, I’ll start the music off first as Runkeeper had been going for a while while I was sorting the music out and then for even longer while I put it in my pocket. What do other runners do, if you run with your phone? Can you recommend an armband that gives easy access to everything?

After all that faffing around, I start my run. I decide to go through the fields up to the road one and a half miles away and turn round and get back. BUT I’M SCUPPERED. Some flipping farmer has furrowed his field and I can’t see the path.

IMG_0020

Bastard farmer scum. (Yeah, ok, that’s a bit harsh but I was a bit miffed.) This is what it looked like before.

greensands way 029

See, a proper path and everything.

I can’t see where to go and it’s all muddy and lumpy and bumpy and I can’t run on it and so I walk and I’m really pissed off and I go a bit further and I can’t see where the next stile is and so when I get even more pissed off, I turn round and go back the way I came and go to the closed off road and run up there and back down again and because of all the walking I did on the PUBLIC FOOTPATH WHICH IS NO LONGER A PATH BUT JUST A LOAD OF MUD BECAUSE OF BASTARD FARMER SCUM, my miles per minute are really really slow and maybe I should be called whatever one below a jogger is (a Race for Lifer perhaps) and then I get home and look at the Runkeeper stats which, because of the time taken to run after starting it and the time taken to take it out of my pocket to stop it, is pretty much the same as my Garmin.

Stats (Runkeeper):
Distance: 3.07 miles
Time: 42:56
Pace: 13:59 m/m
Calories: 311

Garmin:
Distance: 3.05 miles
Time: 40:27
Pace: 13:16 m/m
Calories: 260

New running tops: 1
New iphones: 1
Bastard farmer scums: 1

Music:
Audiofuel
Knifeworld
Kate Bush

Adidas miCoach

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A few weeks (or was it months?) ago, I was invited to try out the new Adidas miCoach. But I didn’t go. And then I found out that Warriorwoman and Highway Kind went and I was gutted as it would have been great to meet Highway Kind and see Warriorwoman again and then on telly the other night I saw an advert for it and I said to Shaun, that’s that thing I was invited to and he said but it’s an app and you haven’t got an iPhone and I thought oh yeah but I think they got given a gadget or something but anyway, if the O2 man rings back after getting cut off yesterday by my crappy Samsung Tocco, maybe he’ll do me a good deal and I can get an iPhone after all and then I can get the miCoach thingybob.

   

Uncoordination

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I think I just made a word up. ‘Uncoordination’ has got a red squiggle under it. Oh well, I don’t care.

It’s intervals day and so I get my ipod and skip forward 98 tracks and I don’t get Courtney Love this time, which is a bit of a shame, as I like a bit of Courtney, although not the skanky, lipstick-smeared, falling-out-of-taxis, please-keep-your-clothes-on-when-you’re-on-stage-you’re-over-40-now, heroin addict bit, but the cool rock chick bit and especially the shagged-Noel-Fielding bit and I land on Audiofuel and go outside and I’ve got a stitch before I’ve even got past the gate and the warm up bit starts and I can’t keep my feet to the beat no matter how hard I try to keep in time with the 1, 2, 3, 4s and as it gets to the first interval bit, a car comes and I have to get out of the way and by the time the car’s gone, I’m halfway through the interval, well, the track is anyway, I’m still standing on the side of the road and so I carry on and I get to the top of the road as the next interval comes and there’s another car coming, so I miss part of the next interval too and I think I’m not doing very well with this today and I get to the closed off road and get to the top of the intervals pyramid and I turn round and go back the way I came and as I get to the end of the closed off road and back onto the not-closed-off road a car’s coming up the road opposite and I turn round so he can see that I’ve seen him and I wait for him to go past but he doesn’t go past and I turn round again and he’s still going really slowly and I think hurry up and go past then and he’s still driving really slowly and I turn round again and I think THAT’S THREE TIMES I’VE TURNED ROUND NOW SO YOU CAN SEE THAT I’VE SEEN YOU, YOU TWAT and he eventually goes past and I feel bad for shouting at him in my head in capitals and everything, as he was only going slowly so he didn’t run me over, which is a nice thing to do really but then I don’t feel too bad as he won’t know I was shouting at him in my head in capitals and everything and probably won’t read this either and I’m trying to keep in time with the 1, 2, 3, 4s but I have no rhythm today and I’m wondering if it’s because last night I dreamt I moved to Australia for two months and I’m feeling upside-down and then the intervals finish and the cool down finishes and I run the rest of the way home with Los Campesinos singing Romance is Boring.

Stats:
Distance: 2.31 miles
Time: 25:44
Pace: 11:09 m/m
Calories: 230
Rhythms kept: 0
Dreams of moving to Australia for two months: 1

Things come in threes

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After my three day detox, I get up and weigh myself and I’m three lbs lighter and the postman delivers three things in the post (a book , a poetry home study course [ssshh, don’t tell Shaun, but after getting a really crappy score for my poetry assignment on my OU course [which I passed with a grade 2 pass by the way, yay], I am determined to ‘get’ poetry] and my final payslip [which, seeing as it was for the grand total of £54 doesn’t exactly cover the other purchases]), I go out for a three mile run.

I’m not really sure how conducive only drinking juice for three days is to a decent run but surprisingly, over the three days, I didn’t lose any energy or get tired and I only got hungry around dinnertime, which I do anyway.

I get to the path and Black Wire comes on my ipod and it reminds me of when I was first starting out running and used to play Black Wire a lot and go over the marshes and the path is kind of like the path in the marshes as it’s off-road and only has trees and bushes on each side but it’s not the marshes and then I think about how my three mile route has a very varied terrain; it covers a pavement, a cycle path, a path down the park, then back to pavement, then down a trail, then over grass, then up a hill, then back onto the pavement, then another trail and then back out onto the street and down a hill to the house.

As I’m going down the path, I pass some garden furniture that some wanker has dumped and I wonder why they couldn’t take it to the tip, as there’s a tip in Ashford and they must have a car they can take it in, as I think I’m probably the only person in Kent who doesn’t drive and then I pass two shopping trolleys and I wonder why people come here to dump their shopping trolleys and I have just learnt that the plural of trolley is trolleys and not trollies as I first spelt it and this surprises me but anyway, I get to where the usual dumped trolley is and get onto the grass and then to the hill and as my new regime is not to stop and walk up hills, I run up the hill and then I’m in the housing development and outside one of the doors is a sign welcoming a new baby and there’s an amazon packet on the front step and I think now everyone knows the house is empty and they could get burgled and it wouldn’t be very nice if they got burgled when they’d gone to get their new baby and I wonder what the book is and if it’s worth stealing but it’s probably just a How to Feed Your Baby book or something and I’m not a thieving bastard anyway and a few doors down is a house with about ten letterboxes and I think wow, that’s a lot of flats they’ve squeezed into there and they’re probably cheap and I wonder how much they cost and if I could buy one and then I’m out of the estate and I notice they’ve dug the field up nearer towards the road and I hope they’re not going to build EVEN MORE houses as I think we have enough new houses here thank you very much and it’s not like I’m jealous or anything of their nice new houses which probably have high ceilings and stuff unlike this 300 year old one I’m currently living in with all the spindly spiders and then I’m walking and the Audiofuel girl is singing ‘You’ve Got Me Feeling’ or something and I think sorry love, I’m not really feeling it at the moment and I carry on walking and I think I’ll run until I get to the gate and then I think I did that last time and if I keep on doing that, I’ll get into the habit of walking each time I get to a gate and so I keep on going and then at the next gate I walk and then I say to myself that I’ll run until I get to the road, then I’ll allow myself to walk, at least until the downhill bit and I walk until I get to the postbox and then it’s downhill and I run down the hill and when I get to the bottom there’s builders with paint and stuff in the shop that’s been closed for years and years and years and maybe someone’s bought it at last and it’ll be an open shop that sells wine and cat food and stuff and therefore yay.

Stats:
Distance: 3.00 miles
Time: 36:38
Pace: 12:12
Calories: 292
Three day detoxes: 1
Books in the post: 1
Poetry courses in the post: 1
Payslips totalling the cost of the above two things: 0
Hills run up: 1
New baby signs: 1
Amazon parcels: 1
Shops that might be opening: 1
Music:
Audiofuel
Black Wire
Los Campesinos
Hole

Day two of my latest challenge

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Ok, so it’s not a very big challenge but I’m doing a three day detox which involves drinking lots of fresh juice and smoothies and you can read about it on my Planet Veggie blog. I’m also weaning myself off Facebook and Twitter and not looking at them for three days. So far, so good.

I’m not sure how well detoxing and interval training goes together but today is Tuesday and therefore interval day.

As much as I love Audiofuel, I only want to listen to it when I’m running, either outside or on the treadmill, but not when I’m doing other stuff in the gym or on the train but it’s also too much faff to keep changing the tracks on my ipod, so I keep all the Audiofuel tracks on there and autofill around them and the pyramid training tracks are at numbers 98-100 on my ipod and so I have to click and count to 98 to get to the first interval track and I get to 98 and listen to see if it’s Audiofuel, but no, it’s Courtney Love screaming something and I click once more and hurrah, I’ve found the right place. I listen to the introduction as I put on my Garmin which has been lying in the driveway getting a signal and I miss the beginning of the warm up as I’m getting out of the gate but soon I’m running slowly down the road waiting for the intervals to start.

Today I’ve decided to run slowly in the recovery bits and not walk like I did last time but I’m full of pineapple, blackberry and blueberry smoothie and I’m not sure if I’m going to manage it.

I manage to run all the way up the first side of the pyramid, although the top interval was more of a shuffle than a sprint and I do a bit of walking in the recovery bits on the way down. I do run all through the cool down though except for the bit when a car came round a bend and I had to get out of its way.

Stats:
Distance: 1.91 miles
Time: 20:22
Pace: 10:41 m/m
Calories: 196
3 day detoxes: 1
Facebooks: 0
Twitters: 0

More interval training with Audiofuel Running Music

6 comments

I’ve drawn myself up yet another half-marathon schedule, seeing as the Folkestone half I’m supposed to be doing is in eight weeks’ time and if I increase my long run one mile per week for the next eight weeks, I should be ok, barring any injuries. I think the furthest I’ve run since moving to Kent over a year ago is 6 miles so it’s not really looking very likely but hey ho.

My new schedule is very simple, it goes like this:

Monday: Gym/XT
Tuesday: Intervals
Wednesday: Gym/XT
Thursday: Short-ish run starting at 3 miles for the first week, increasing to 5, then dropping back to 3
Friday: Drink wine Rest
Saturday: Long run, starting at 5 miles for the first week and increasing to 11
Sunday: Gym/XT

Hmm, just realised I have no weight sessions in there. I’ll do them on the cross-training days.

My new schedule may have to be altered depending on if I get a new job and if I do, what days I’ll be working.

Anyway, as today is Tuesday, that meant intervals, so I took Audiofuel’s Pyramid Max 180 interval training session out with me and this time, instead of going slowly during the recovery bits and going a bit less slowly during the fast bits, I walked during the recovery bits and went faster during the fast bits as I thought having a greater difference between the fast and slow bits would be better than having just a marginal difference between the fast and slow bits. If that makes any sense, perhaps someone could tell me if that’s right or not?

I took a new route today and ran up the road, nearly into a car coming round a bend, and got to the top of the pyramid, turned round and went back the way I’d came.

And even though I did walking bits, you can tell I went faster in the fast bits, as my average pace overall is still faster than I’ve been doing recently.

Stats:
Distance: 2 miles
Time: 21:29
Pace: 10:45 m/m
Calories: 205
New training schedules: 1
Weight sessions on training schedules: 0
Walking bits: Lots
Cars nearly run into: 1

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