Category: Juneathon

Hampstead Midsummer 10k race report

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I still haven’t learnt how to prepare for a race and I sit up late drinking and watching BB on Saturday night and don’t go to bed ’til 3am and I wake up at 6:30 and remember I’ve got a race and my alarm will be going off at 7 and I’m wondering if I can be bothered to go to the race and I’m thinking Golders Green is far north and why do people go there to get married and I think oh no, that’s Gretna Green which is even further north and I’m still trying to decide whether or not to go to the race and my alarm goes off and it reminds me of the olden days when I had a job and I lie there for 40 minutes listening to my alarm and thinking I should go to the race, I’ve paid for it, in fact I paid twice so I should definitely go and apparently you get a mug and I’ve never got a mug in a race before so I get up and get ready and leave the house at 8:30 and I get to Golders Green at 9:30 and there’s a couple on the tube and the man’s wearing shorts and I wonder if he’s going to the race and I can follow them to the start but I can’t decide if he’s a runner or not, he might just be wearing shorts today as it’s sunny and I get off the tube and as I’m standing on the corner peering confusedly at my map the man who was on the tube comes over and asks if I’m doing the race and I say yes, do you know where it is? and he says the newspaper vendor said it was this way and so I walk up to the race with the couple and I say to the girl you’re good, willing to stand around for an hour waiting for him and she says she decided to be supportive and it’s the first race she’s gone with him to but doesn’t think she’d wait at any races longer than a 10k and especially not if it’s raining and the man hasn’t got a number so he queues for his number and I put my bag away and we go to the start line and I say bye, good luck and the race starts and we have to go up the longest hill in the world ever and I think oh no, I’ve got to do that three times and I wonder how the speedy types will lap me as the pavements are narrow and after the first lap there’s a man spraying people with a hose and I think I don’t want to get my hair wet but I can’t avoid Hose Man and I think I don’t want to be sprayed by Hose Man another two times and after a couple of miles I’m getting lapped by lots of fit blokes and I think actually maybe laps aren’t so bad as then I get to see lots of fit blokes and as well as the longest hill in the world ever is a nice downhill bit but I’d better get used to hills anyway because I’m going to be seeing three very big hills when I do the Three Peaks Challenge in August and then I’m doing a lot of walking and my bladder is telling me maybe it was a mistake to drink three-quarters of a litre of orange juice just before the race and the marshals are very friendly and they’re clapping and I start to run again as it’s embarrassing to walk past a marshal and someone behind me says thanks marshal and I wonder how many marshals are called Marshal and I know a clerk called Clark and I walk/run the rest of the race and get to the finish and get my medal but there’s no signs of any mugs, only watermelon and I can’t see anyone with a mug and I think bloody hell, I got up early after only 4 hours’ sleep and I don’t even get a mug and I get back to the changing rooms and I still haven’t seen anyone with a mug and on the table are bottles of champagne for the speedy types and I unsurprisingly don’t see one with my name on it but I look at my Garmin and it tells me today I got a PB. Hurrah.

Racing bling

Today’s route

Splits

Stats
 Distance: 6.22 miles
Time: 1:06:33
Pace: 10:43 m/m
Calories: 625
Longest hills in the world ever: 3
Men with hoses: 1
Fit blokes lapping me: lots
Medals: 1
Mugs: 0
PBs: 1
Juneathons completed: 18/22
Music
Jeff Buckley
Ting Tings
The B52s
The Beatles
The White Stripes
Mark Ronson
Bobby Conn
Cribs
Straw
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
89.23 out of 100 / 2 days left

All Niked up and somewhere to go

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I dream Canary Wharf is burning down and I escape by boat and the boat’s heading in the direction of an iceberg and I wake up and try to get back to sleep as I want to see the iceberg as I don’t think you get many icebergs in the Docklands but I can’t get back to sleep so I get up and look out of the spare room window to see if Canary Wharf is still there but there’s a tree in the way so I think I’ll check on it when I go through the marshes and I get dressed in my new running kit which comprises a pink Nike t-shirt

three-quarter length Nike trousers

and some running socks

and all for the princely sum of about £20 and I think I’m getting good at being poor although I don’t have to be poor any more since I got my old job back and I get to the marshes and I can see the Gherkin but I can’t see Canary Wharf and I think ohhhhhhhhhhhh, maybe it really did burn down overnight but then I see it and I think hurrah, Canary Wharf hasn’t burnt down after all and I go round Springfield Park and there aren’t any God People in there today trying to give me magazines and I get to the bridge and there’s a piece of graffiti

although as it’s only one piece of graffiti, that would actually make it a graffito and I wonder what it means and it’s a question not a statement and I wonder if I’m running for my life and I decide I’m not and on the other side of a bridge is a ramp

and I think bloody hell, the amount of times I’ve crossed this bridge and I never noticed there was a ramp before and I get home and decide to go out shopping this afternoon to veganise my fridge in preparation for 1 July.

Today’s route

Splits

Stats
 Distance: 3.88 miles
Time: 43:01
Pace: 11:05 m/m
Calories: 356
New running t-shirts: 1
New running trousers: 1
New pairs of running socks: 2
Canary Wharfs not burnt down: 1
Graffitos: 1
Ramps: 1
Veganised fridges: 1
Juneathons completed: 17/20
Music
Manic Street Preachers
Soft Cell
Jeff Buckley
P J Harvey
Basement Jaxx
Ting Tings
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
83.01 out of 100 / 4 days left

Out with the new, in with the old

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Tuesday of last week I email my old boss and ask for my job back and he emails me back and says it’s fine with him but he’ll have to check with the HR woman who’s off ’til Monday. He emails me on Monday and says HR woman here has to check with HR in head office in Liverpool and he’ll email me the next day and when did I have in mind to start back and I say I don’t mind really, I can start any time although it would be nice to have a few days off first. He emails me back on Tuesday and says they’re waiting for a call from Liverpool but he’s confident he’ll receive the ok and can I start back on Monday 30 June and I write back and say can I come back on Tuesday 1 July as I’m going to Cornwall at the weekend and he writes back and says that’s fine. He emails me this morning and says HR here are waiting for one thing and he should get the go ahead later today. He emails me later and says yes it’s fine, I can go back to work and he’ll see me on 1 July. So from 1 July I will no longer be an unemployed pikey and a few days ago I decided not to drink in July and for some reason last night I decided to be vegan in July so during the month of July I shall be an employed tee-total vegan.

After I’ve recovered from the shock of my lady of leisure life being taken away from me, I go to the gym and after I’ve been to the gym I go into TK Maxx and buy myself some new sports gear and also some new not sports gear but a cool hoody with pink and black striped sleeves and some black combats which I think are probably going to be too small but after a month of being a tee-total vegan should fit. Hopefully.
Juneathon stats:
Walking: 4 miles / 80 minutes
Cross-trainer: 1.55 miles / 15 minutes
Bike: 3.1 miles / 15 minutes
Rowing machine: 15 minutes
Treadmill: 1 mile / 9.5 minutes
New old jobs: 1
Tee-total vegans: 1
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
79.13 out of 100 / 5 days left

The Deerhunter

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I get up this morning and decide to go to Victoria Park to visit the deer, also taking in Springfield Park which I’ve always been too scared to go in to, due to it looking like a park that kept appearing in a recurring dream I used to have, but Adele said it’s a lovely park and I should go in there and on the way there’s a dummy hanging off the bridge

and I wonder if it belongs to the screaming brat that was in Sainsbury’s yesterday as that could have done with a dummy to shut the thing up and then I get to Springfield Park

and it looks a bit hilly for my liking and so I walk up the hill and at the top of the hill are two women sitting on a bench and one of them says hello so I say hello back and she gets up and comes towards me and shows me a magazine called Awake! and on the front of it it says “How well do you know your children?” and I say I don’t have any children and she says I’ll show you this one instead and she goes to give me a magazine and I say I’m sorry, I can’t carry anything, I’m just out for a run and she says oh, ok, and I carry on walking and then I’m thinking I’d better start running as I just told the God Woman I was out for a run and if she sees me walking she’ll think I’m a liar and I’m not sure what happens if you lie to God People and I think they throw lightening at you or something so I start to run and then I get to a pond and it has a pond dipping platform

and I haven’t a clue what a pond dipping platform is and as far as I’m concerned it’s a photo based emergency platform and I go onto the photo based emergency platform and take a photo

and I get round the corner and I feel like I’m on top of a mountain and there’s a great view

and Springfield Park certainly is lovely and shall feature in future runs and then I’m running alongside the river and I see some swans sleeping

and I get to the Princess of Wales pub which I found out recently used to be called the Prince of Wales until Diana mania set in and now boaters call it the sex change pub.

I eventually get to Victoria Park

and I look for the deer pen and I find what I think is the deer pen but I can’t see any deer, all I can see are weeds

and I think bloody hell, I’ve come all this way to see deer and all I get to see is weeds and then I come across a garden

and a squirrel who stays still long enough for me to take its photo

and then I head back home and do half a lap of the park to take me up to ten miles and then I get home and because I am very stupid, I put the wrong postage on the envelope for my original entry form for this Sunday’s Hampstead 10k and because my cheque didn’t get cashed, I assumed it was languishing in a Post Office somewhere in North London so I re-entered online and got my race number last week and then today the postman has brought me my postal entry number so I have two numbers now. Any takers?

Today’s route

Splits

Stats
 Distance: 10.23 miles
Time: 2:24:05
Pace: 14:05 m/m
Calories: 826
Dummies: 1
Parks: 3
God Women: 2
Sleeping swans: 5
Sex change pubs: 1
Deer: 0
Squirrels staying still: 1
Numbers for the same race: 2
Juneathons completed: 15/18
Music
Primal Scream
Jesus & Mary Chain
Manic Street Preachers
Modest Mouse
Cardiacs
Soft Cell
Ash
Polyphonic Spree
Bee Gees
Blondie
Bobby Conn
Chumbawamba
Duran Duran
Foo Fighters
Beatles
Hard-Fi
Hole
Jamiroquai
Jeff Buckley
Levellers
P J Harvey
Suede
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
78.13 out of 100 / 6 days left

Who ate all the pies?

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I had planned on going to the gym today but then remembered that because my cunning plan yesterday of leaving early before going out for pizza and beer so I could go to a) the bank to pay in a cheque; b) buy a birthday card for my mum, thus preventing me being cut out of her will; and c) go to Currys to buy some new headphones was scuppered due to a) there being no deposit envelopes in the cashpoint; b) the card shops being shut; and c) Currys being shut so I had to do a), b) and c) today instead and the gym is two miles in the opposite direction and after I’ve done a), b) and c), I do d) go to Sainsburys and I get home and make some pesto, sun-dried tomato and pine nut bread and have a Linda McCartney Deep Country Pie for lunch and then I’m thinking oh no, I really should go and do at least a mile because a) it’s Juneathon; and b) I’m still on my Salomon 100 Mile Challenge and so I go to the park to do a mile but after about 100 yards I think the Linda McCartney Deep Country Pie is going to make a reappearance and I want to save myself for a long run tomorrow anyway so I cut my run short and go home and tomorrow I will redeem myself and also make my cat do some Juneathoning as while I was out last night it would appear that she stayed in and ate all the pies.

Stats
 Distance: .45 miles
Time: 3:48
Pace: 8:26 m/m
Calories: 42
Laps of park: 1
Pies for lunch: 1
Cats eating all the pies: 1
Most feeble Juneathons in the world ever: 1
Juneathons completed: 14/17
Music
Neneh Cherry
Primal Scream
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
67.90 out of 100 / 7 days left

Juneathon Day 16

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I am woken by scratching and scrabbling noises in the attic and I wonder what it is and Amanda emails me and says it’s squirrels and they’re going to eat my entire house and I think I don’t really want my entire house to be eaten by squirrels and I do some investigating on the internet and it says to play loud music and I wonder if there’s any music in particular squirrels don’t like but later on they’ve shut up and I decide to do my three mile route round the marshes as I haven’t got long to complete my Salomon Challenge and also I haven’t forgotten it’s Juneathon and I’m already down three days on that and I’m not going to win Joggerblogger’s cat and I get my personal alarm and my wireless headphones as my normal headphones have broken and as I’m waiting for my Garmin to get a signal I see Bad Cat’s Friend and before I get to the footbridge there’s a work’s vehicle on the pavement so I jump over the wall and go through the carpark but there’s a digger thing there and I think how am I supposed to get through? and the man stops the digger thing to let me go past and I go over the footbridge and past the stables and onto the path and through the bridge and back down the boring bit and there’s a squirrel and I think why don’t the squirrels stay over the marshes instead of coming to live in my attic and then I’m home and as usual I haven’t managed to do my three mile route in 30 minutes.

Splits

Stats
 Distance: 3.03 miles
Time: 32:31
Pace: 10:45 m/m
Calories: 285
Noises in attic: lots
Bad Cat’s Friends: 1
Squirrels in marshes: 1
Juneathons completed: 13/16
Music
Black Kids
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
67.45 out of 100 / 8 days left

Juneathon Day 9

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I rejoin the rat race and go to work for 10 as they want me in the office this week instead of working at home but nothing happens ’til 11 and it goes on for ever and ever and I don’t finish until 7 and I say to boss man I can’t work this late every day and especially not in the office as this is a drop in salary and I’ll be spending loads on travel and it wouldn’t be so bad working late if I’m at home and he says it shouldn’t be this late usually, it should only be until about 5:30 and he says what do I want to do and I say can I work at home at least part of the time and he says can I work in the office this week and he had thought that there’d be other things I could do and he knows I do web design and he thought I could do their site and be paid privately for it and I don’t tell him I don’t do web design anymore and he says can I at least do tomorrow and Wednesday and talk to him about it then and I say ok and I was going to go to the gym after work and do a mile on the treadmill for the Salomon Challenge but it’s 7:18 and I’d get home really really late if I did that and so I walk to Liverpool Street for Juneathon and then there’s no trains so I get the Central  Line and walk two miles home for even extra Juneathon and I hope I get out earlier tomorrow because I’m supposed to be going out and I hope I get out earlier on Wednesday as I have my evening class and I hope I get out earlier on Thursday because I’ve got a race and this working malarkey is interfering with my life and maybe I should just go and ask for my old job back although not being around solicitors was very nice today.

Stats:
Miles walked: 5
Jobs finishing late: 1
Solicitors: 0
Juneathons completed: 9/9

Mad dogs and Englishmen

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I’m not a man and I’m only quarter English, so I must be a mad dog and I go out in the midday sun and get the train to the forest to practice looking at trees to acclimatise myself for my upcoming trip to Cornwall, as the frequent postings of photographs of verdant ruralness on Emily’s blog are making me a tad nervous, even if she did post a photo of a pavement for me to try and reassure me that there is a bit of concrete around.

I decide to be a sad cow and let my Garmin track me on the train and 4.31 miles and 14:02 minutes later I’m in the forest looking at trees.

And then there’s an uphill bit and I walk up it because I am a weed.

But what goes up must come down.

And it really is a beautiful sunny day and I had planned to run in the forest next week but instead I accidentally went and de-unemployed pikied myself and have to go and sit in an office all week instead instead of running around in the sunshine and practising being a country bumpkin.

And then I see a road and I think eek, I didn’t want to see a road yet, I’m still practising looking at trees but it’s a road without a pavement so it’s like those stupid roads in the countryside with no pavements.

Because I am not brave enough to go on roads without pavements, I stay in the forest but the path has disappeared and now there’s only mud.

And I get nice and muddy and I pass a man with a husky dog and come to a gate which appears to be locked and I’m wondering how to go over the gate and then I SEE A BUNNY!!

There is a bunny in that photo, honest. And then husky dog man just pulls the gate open as it is only pretending to be locked and I’m glad the bunny distracted me long enough so I didn’t try and climb over the gate that was pretending to be locked and look like a muppet.

Then as I’m going past some lake thing

“Last Chance on the Stairway” by Duran Duran comes on and starts off with what sounds like a cigarette being lit and someone inhaling and I’m thinking OH MY GOD, MILLIONS OF 11 YEAR OLD GIRLS LISTENED TO THEIR RECORDS AND THEY’RE ENCOURAGING SMOKING and then I’m thinking I started smoking when I was 11 and it would appear that it’s all Simon Le Bon’s fault and how much can I sue him for and I decide probably quite a lot as he’s probably worth a few quid.

And then when I’ve got over the shock of Simon Le Bon being to blame for millions of 11 year old smokers in the early 1980s I realise I’m a bit lost and haven’t a clue where I am and I come to another road and this one has a bit of a pavement on it and I run down it.

And I come to a residential area but I still don’t know where I am and it would appear I’m not even in London anymore as the road signs don’t have postcodes on them and then I see a sign that says I’m in Loughton and I think I could get the Central Line home but I don’t want to get the tube, I want to get back to Chingford and then I think aah, my Nokia N95 has GPS and maps on it, my N95 will get me home safely but it doesn’t want to get a satellite and the maps aren’t much help so I decide to go back the way I came and I see a duck or a goose or something

and there’s a baby one with it and I want to go closer and take its photo but the big duck or goose or whatever it is starts hissing at me and the baby duck or goose or whatever it is gets in the water and they all swim away and I’m still lost in the forest like Robert Smith and I’m wondering if I’m ever going to get home and then I remember my Garmin has a navigation thing on it but I don’t know how to use it and it doesn’t seem to make any sense and the start keeps moving and the arrow just moves around so I give up on that and trust my instincts that I’m going the right way and then eventually I come to a bit which a sign says is Chingford Plain

and I think this must be where I came in but it doesn’t look familiar but I am in the right place and I get the train and it’s still nice and sunny so I decide to get off two stops early and walk home but I don’t know the way so I consult my N95 and head off in what I hope is the right direction then I get to the medieval house

and I think hurrah, I know where I am now and I’m no longer lost and nearly home.

Today’s route

Stats:
Distance: 6.56 miles
Time: 1:36:10 minutes
Pace: 14:40
Calories: 511
Trees: lots
Mud: lots
Roads without pavements: 1
Gates pretending to be locked: 1
Bunnies: 1
Ducks or geese: 3
Medieval houses: 1
Juneathons completed: 8/8
Music
Duran Duran
Ting Tings
Blur
Foo Fighters
The Jam
Rolling Stones
Beatles
Jeff Buckley
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
44.53 out of 100 / 16 days left

The sound of silence

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After reading the sound v silence debate on Runner’s World, I am inspired to conduct my own experiment and go for a run without my iPod, although why there even needs to be a debate about it is beyond me as Walkmans were invented for running with, so really it should be compulsory.

Off I go without my iPod and have forgotten I haven’t got it with me before I’ve even got to the gate where I go to switch it on. I haven’t even got to the end of the road before I’ve tried to push in my headphones further into my ears. I start to run and I don’t think I like this running without music thing and I keep thinking someone’s running behind me but it’s just my trouser legs brushing against each other and I get to the traffic lights and there’s a dead mouse or bird or something but I don’t stop to take its photo and I go over the footbridge and it’s all echoey and scary and I need my iPod to protect me and I think why does it feel safer when I can’t hear anything around me, is it like when you’re a kid and you think an axe murderer has broken in to bludgeon you to death, you hide under the covers because that will obviously save you and further down the path is a green chili and I think how did that get there? but I don’t stop to take a photo and then I get to the bridge and I think oh no, I don’t want to go under the bridge without my iPod and as I’m going through the bridge THERE’S A MAN COMING TOWARDS ME AND HE HASN’T GOT A DOG and I think I’m going to have a heart attack but he walks past me without murdering me and then there’s a man with a dog and I’m wondering if maybe I’ve got it wrong about men without dogs and maybe it’s men with dogs you should watch out for but the man with dog is friendly and he says morning and I say morning back and then I see some cherries on the ground and I think there must be a cherry tree here and I look up and sitting in the cherry tree is a bird.

And then there’s a woman yapping away on her mobile and I’m thinking if I had my iPod on I could drown her out and then I’m home and my experiment has come to an end and I have come to the conclusion that I prefer running with music and maybe I should go and start a 16 page thread about it.

Stats:
Distance: 2.96 miles
Time: 34:48 minutes
Pace: 11:45
Calories: 297
iPods: 0
Dead mice or birds or something: 1
Green chilis: 1
Men without dogs: 1
Men with dogs: 1
Cherries: lots
Birds sitting in cherry trees: 1
Women on mobile phones: 1
Juneathons completed: 7/7
Music
None
THE 100 MILE CHALLENGE
 Miles completed so far
37.97 out of 100 / 17 days left

Return to the rat race

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Yesterday I had a brainwave and thought to myself, aah, I used to work at home editing transcripts of live court hearings, I can do that again and so I email the company who gave me the work and said oi, gizza job, and my old boss phones and says yes, we should be able to give you enough work, come and see me tomorrow to have a chat and so I go to see him and I know where it is because they are in the building that I have just spent three years working in before I went to work for the crooks but I won’t bump into any ex-workmates as they celebrated my departure by moving into a swanky new office two days after I left but I get down the corridor and the building receptionist says Cathy, have you come to see me? and I say of course, how are you? and he asks me how the new office is and I say I don’t work for them any more but I don’t bother telling him about the crooks and I say do you want me to sign in? and he says no, just go up, you know where it is? and I say yes and I go up and speak to the man about the job and he says he should be able to pretty much keep me in full-time work if I want it and definitely until the end of July and I think that’s pretty cool, I’ll do that until then and then I’ll have August off and sunbathe or something and he says can I come in and work in the office for three days next week and I say yes, that’s fine and I go home and have emailed to me the software I need to set me up and while I’m on the phone getting set up I’m asked if I can work now.  What, like right now?!!!  Yes.  Bollocks.  I say yes, that’s fine and so I spend the afternoon working and then I get an email asking if I can work all next week and I think oh noooooooooooooooooooo, I liked the three days idea but I don’t want to look unwilling so I email back and say  yes, that’s fine, see you on Monday.

Bollocks.

And in case you’re wondering what this has to do with Juneathon, I walked from Liverpool Street instead of getting the tube.  It counts.

Stats:
Miles walked: 3
New jobs: 1
Days left of being an unemployed pikey: 0
Juneathons completed: 6/6

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