Name and shame: Spam

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Today I was busily checking my personal email at work (woo hoo, I found a webmail site they haven’t blocked.  Yet.) and sitting in my inbox was a WordPress notification letting me know that someone had commented on a post.  Hurrah, thought I.  But alas, it wasn’t a comment from an adoring fan, it was a comment from a dirty spammer.  Boo hiss.  Someone calling themselves Running Shoes London left a comment about how expensive running shoes are but don’t they fit well and they’d bought some last year and are really comfy.

Hmm, I wonder if these expensive, well fitting and really comfy shoes are from The Jog Shop, which is where the link led to?  Surely not.

I replied to let them know I deleted their comment due to it being blatant spam (couldn’t they even at least try to disguise it?) but if they’d like to get in touch with me, I’ll let them know my rates for a text link or advertising space.

They didn’t reply.  Funny that.

Dagenham Santathon 5k race report

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Dagenham Santathon 5k 2008In preparation for today’s Santa Stampede, Shaun and I decide to recreate our race preparation for the Tottenham 5 although with the hope of avoiding any young Polish men based road rage incidents this time and hurrah, we get a taxi from the sex change pub and get to the restaurant without our cab driver swearing at any young Polish men driving in bus lanes and cutting him up and I drink too much wine and don’t really remember my pizza which apparently doesn’t mean I get another one to make up for the one I don’t remember and we get up in the morning and make our way to Dagenham and meet up with some of our mountain mates and get our Santa suits which aren’t exactly a size zero and I could fit at least three of me into mine and Shaun could probably fit four of him into his but somehow Alan seems to have got a bespoke Santa suit as it fits him perfectly while the rest of us would be arrested if we got anywhere near ho ho ho-ing distance of small children and we hang around waiting for the start and the man starting the race says something about fast runners going to the front and Shaun says he’s going to run with me and take it easy and just treat it like a training run and then the countdown from ten begins and as soon as the countdown’s finished, Shaun zooms off leaving me for dust and I’m trying not to slip on the ice and at one mile a horrible little eight year old boy pokes me and I think two inches lower and I would have punched him and I drag myself round the streets of Dagenham wondering if a bottle and a half of wine was a good idea the evening before a race and at 2.5 miles there’s a photographer and I attempt a smile but I think I failed and as I’m nearing the end Alan overtakes me and Shaun’s waiting on the corner and I get to the finish line in 29:22 which would be a PB but my Garmin says it’s only 3.03 miles and I think waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa, why can’t they ever measure a proper 5k route and I know it’s a fun run but it would be more fun if I knew if I’d PB’d or not and I’ve never done a proper 5k, it’s always less, and Shaun says he finished in 21 minutes and there was a 13 year old girl who did 6:30 all the way round and then the others finish soon after me and Tracey turns up, driven by her mum who’s given her a lift all of, um, about quarter of a mile and we go to the pub where I’ve booked a table and we look at the not very impressive menu which says there’s vegetarian options available and Tracey asks what they are and the waitress looks at us like WHAT THE FUCK? VEGETARIANS? QUICK, CALL THE POLICE! and she says er, I’ll check but I think it’s vegetable hotpot, macaroni cheese and cauliflower cheese and the waitress goes off and comes back and says we have no hotpot, only macaroni cheese and cauliflower cheese and Tracey says I’m allergic to cheese and the waitress looks blankly at her and Tracey says do you have any sandwiches? and the waitress goes off and comes back and says we can do you a beef or turkey sandwich and Tracey says um, I’m vegetarian and the waitress goes off again and says we can do you a tuna sandwich, do you eat fish? and Tracey says no, and so we decide to leave the pub that offers vegetarians beef, turkey and tuna and go to the Wetherspoons up the road and get a nice veggie roast dinner.  Yum.

Splits

Splits

Stats:
 Distance: 3.03 miles
Time: 29:22 minutes
Pace: 9:42
Calories: 276
Road rage incidents: 0
Pizzas: 1
Pizzas I remember: 0
Santa suits: 1
Horrible 8 year olds poking me: 1
Pubs offering vegetarians beef, turkey and tuna: 1

Christmas Eve

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I don’t usually run the day before a race but thought I’d go for a quick three miles round the marshes and as I get to the other side of the footbridge a cyclist comes round the corner and waits for me to come down and I think hmm, a polite cyclist, where do they make them? but there would have been room for him to go past too as it’s not like I’m holding my arms out and moving from side to side but maybe he’s superstitious and doesn’t like passing people on stairs or maybe he is just a polite cyclist and we are over the marshes after all, where people are generally civilised and not acting like angry City commuters and I go past the stables and there’s a man in a van just gone through the gate and he gets out to close the gate and says morning and I think it must be polite people day today and I go down the path and a dog runs over and starts barking and jumping up and down and I can’t get past the barking and jumping up and down dog and I say fuck off dog and I think oops, I don’t usually swear at dogs but it won’t get out of my way and then it does go away and I carry on and get to the boring bit and I can hear a strange bird type noise so I stop and look up in the trees but I can’t see anything and then I’m nearly home and think I should change the tracks on my iPod for tomorrow’s race and I think maybe I should put Christmas songs on it, seeing as there’s going to be about 700 people dressed up in Santa suits and then I think na, I’m not having Christmas, bah humbug.

Splits

Splits

Stats:
Distance: 2.99 miles
Time: 30:52 minutes
Pace: 10:19
Calories: 284
Polite cyclists: 1
Polite mans in vans: 1
Barking and jumping up and down dogs: 1
Strange bird type noises: 1
People going to be dressed up in Santa suits tomorrow: about 700
Christmas songs going on my iPod: 0
Music:
Stereo Total
Duran Duran
Blur
The Smiths
Arctic Monkeys
Scissor Sisters

Not running on empty

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After a good night’s sleep, I’m looking forward to a running commute.  I’m also looking forward to going for pizza with my cheapskate Pizza Express 2 for 1 voucher at lunchtime but I meet up with Mel and we get to Pizza Express and the waitress says it’s full and it’ll be a while ’til we get a table so we go to Itsu instead and I’m not impressed by their veggie selection, i.e. they’ve hardly got fuck all but I get dynamite vegetable dumplings which is a noodley dumplingy soupy thing which comes in a huge tub and I think this is going to take hours to eat and it’s a bit bland and very messy to eat and I’m splashing it everywhere and Mel’s not doing much better with hers and we eventually leave with some of the food going in our mouths and not over our clothes or the table or the people next to us and go back to work and I’m completely stuffed with the noodley dumplingy soupy thing even two hours later and I think I’m going to bounce home on my running commute and it gets to hometime and I get changed and think fuck, it’s going to be cold outside and I get outside and fuck, it’s cold and I start to walk while I wait for my Garmin to get a signal and it’s taking ages and I think I’m going to be at Sadler’s Wells by the time I get a signal and lo! I’m just going past Sadler’s Wells when it does indeed get a signal and I decide to walk through Angel with its crowded pavements and annoying free newspaper giver outers and I get to Islington Green and think I should probably run now and so I do and I remember my boss asking me if I’ve seen the taxidermist on Essex Road and I said no and he told me where it was but luckily it’s on the other side of the road that I run on and I don’t want to see the dead animals and I’m surprised he told me about it and doesn’t he know I’m vegetarian and therefore not really into dead animals? and I’m bursting for a wee as I’ve only had liquid all day and I wonder if there’s any toilets in Hackney Downs station and I think I don’t care if there are, I’m not going to a public toilet in Hackney, I’ll get mugged or something, and I’m going up the steep bit that I usually want to walk up due to it being a steep bit and I try to think of things to take my mind off a) the steep bit; and b) the fact I’m bursting for a wee but I can’t think of anything and someone starts singing something about blood and death being dragged out and screaming for mercy and I think that’s not really what I want to hear as I’m running through Hackney so I skip through that track and there’s a man in a wheelchair at a bus stop on Murder Mile and at the next bus stop there’s another man in a wheelchair and I’m wondering if someone had tried to murder them but only succeeded in paralysing them and then there’s a cyclist on the pavement and I think fuck off cyclist on pavement, but then I remember that half the pavement is a cycle lane and he’s allowed to be on there, and then the pavement narrows and the cycle lane bit is tiny and there’s a cyclist behind me wanting to get past so I let him get past even though it means he goes on the walking bit and then there’s a cyclist on the pavement that is just a pavement and not a cycle lane and I give him an evil look and he gives me an even eviler look and I think oops, maybe I shouldn’t have given him an evil look and then he’s slowed down to get round a woman and her pushchair and I overtake him and he swerves over and nearly pushes me into the bus shelter and I think just fuck off into the road can’t you? and he does fuck off into the road and I think hurrah for that and I get home without any more cyclists being on the pavement and I think I’ll just have to live with them being on the pavement until they change the laws to make it legal to shoot cyclists if I feel like it.

Stats:
Distance: 5.26 miles
Time: 59:58 minutes
Pace: 11:22
Calories: 520
Pizzas: 0
Noodley dumplingy soupy thing: 1
Cyclists on pavements: 3
Laws making it legal to shoot cyclists: 0 (at the moment)
Music:
Cardiacs
The Dude
Blur
PJ Harvey
The Cure
Missy Elliot
Rollins Band
Jesus & Mary Chain
Hole
Arctic Monkeys
The Music
Lush

The end of NaBloPoMo

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RingIt’s the last day of National Blog Posting Month and I’ve done, um, really crap.  Ho hum.  But I thought I’d better make an effort for the last day and blog something, but apart from having some shelves put up, which Shaun says won’t stay up for long (and he put them up so if they fall down it’s his fault), and an uneventful trip to Sainsburys where I very impressively resisted the buy one get one free Hob Nob flapjacks, I have nothing to blog about so here’s a pic of a ring I made last week.

Stats:
NaBloPoMo’s completed: 20/30
Shelves that will fall down: 2
Trips to Sainsburys: 1
Rings made: 1

Lost (but with no sign of Sawyer)

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As I haven’t been running for ages and with a race coming up where we’ll be joined by five of our mountain mates that I want to beat run with, I decide that I’d better get out for a training run and I haven’t even got the excuse of a hangover unlike the previous two Saturdays and so after procrastinating for two hours by updating my Facebook status every two minutes to let all the internet people know I’m procrastinating about going for a run, I grab my thermal gloves that kept my fingers toasty up the mountains and go outside where it’s a bit nippy freezing and I’m running through the puddles as I like running through puddles but then I go through a puddle that’s too deep and now my sock’s going squelch and after I go past the sex change pub, Kurt Cobain starts singing something about planting a house but at least he’s not swearing he hasn’t got a gun as we all know that was a bit of a naughty fib, wasn’t it, eh Kurt? and there’s a man in a hoodie standing outside the gates to the Middlesex Filterbeds and I wonder if he’s a hoodie hoodie or just wearing a hoodie because it’s cold and I decide he looks dodgy and when I get closer I see he’s got a moustache so I decide he doesn’t just look dodgy but really is dodgy and another girl runs past and she looks at him like she thinks he’s got a dodgy moustache too but the gates are locked anyway so I run up alongside the river getting nice and muddy but I’m not really enjoying the run and I think I’m going to retire after next week’s race and it’ll be bye bye JogBlog but then I think if I retire and stop blogging I won’t get any more freebies and I like freebies and I get to the edge and there’s two bicycles locked to a tree and I think where are the people who the bicycles belong to? are they in the bushes shagging? or maybe they’re axe murderers waiting to pounce and then I see people playing football and I think aah, they’re probably not shagging or murderers waiting to pounce with axes, they’re probably just playing football and I wonder why I didn’t think of that before seeing as every Saturday there’s dozens of people playing football and probably not dozens of people shagging in bushes or waiting to pounce with an axe or other dangerous object of choice and I get to the car park and there’s more hoodies and once again I wonder if they’re hoodie hoodies or just cold and I think well, it is Winter, if you can’t wear a hood in the Winter, when can you? and I go through the car park to avoid having to run on the grass to get to the path and I get to the path and I’m running along and then I’m thinking who moved the river? the river’s usually on my right and now it’s on the left and I think oops, I think I went the wrong way and I don’t want to go back the way I came as I hate going backwards and so I carry on going and I see a road and I think I’m lost and wonder if Lost is coming back in February and then I see a road bridge going over the river and I wonder if that will take me back to the marshes and I go over the bridge and there’s a field and I have to run on the grass which is precisely what I was trying to avoid in the first place and I think I can see a man with a dog but the man is running away from me and it’s not a dog but a crow and I think maybe I should wear my glasses when I’m out running and I get to the end of the field and I think I can see someone sitting on the bench and I don’t want to be alone where I’m lost with a man on a bench and I don’t want to ask directions as then he’ll know I’m lost and I get nearer and see that it’s not a man on a bench, it’s just a dark gap between the bench and the bin and I think hmm, yes, perhaps I really should wear my glasses when I’m out running and then I see a bridge and I wonder if it’s the bridge that once upon a time I’d never been over before and then it was the bridge I’d been over twice and hurrah, it is the bridge that I’ve been over twice and now it’s the bridge I’ve been over three times and the river is in its proper place on my right and I’m not disorientated anymore and I go over the bridge and there’s three cyclists coming down the path triple file and I think move over a bit or go single file, there’s no more space for me to move over but the ignorant tossers don’t bother to move or go single file and I’m nearly pushed into the bushes and I think WHY ARE SOME CYCLISTS SUCH IGNORANT TOSSERS and then I go past the stables and there’s a man coming down the path without a dog but he looks quite friendly and he doesn’t murder me and then another man comes down the path without a dog and I think is it National Men Over The Marshes Without Dogs Day or what? and he doesn’t look very friendly and he flexes his fingers in a I’m a strangler kind of way and I wonder if my theory that if someone tries to strangle you, if you tickle them they’ll let go will work and I decide he looks a bit fat and unfit to outrun me even if I have just done nearly 7 miles and I leg it over the footbridge and go home.

Stats:
Distance: 6.85 miles
Time: 1:16:10 minutes
Pace: 11:07
Calories: 689
Socks squelching: 2
Men with dodgy moustaches: 1
Unaccompanied bicycles: 2
Ignorant tosser cyclists: 3
Men without dogs: 2
Music:
The Cult
Cardiacs
The Dude
Nirvana
Duran Duran
B52’s
The The
My Bloody Valentine

Confusion

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I was walking home from work tonight and I went to cross over Moorgate when it was on the red light but I could see a cyclist coming down the road so I stopped to wait for the cyclist to go through the red light but THE CYCLIST STOPPED AT THE RED LIGHT and I was so confused and traumatised and thinking how could that be?  since when do cyclists stop at red lights? and then I went to cross over Blomfield Street to get to Liverpool Street station and a cyclist went on to the pavement but when he got to the pavement THE CYCLIST GOT OFF AND WHEELED HIS BIKE ON THE PAVEMENT.  I needed a lie down to get over the shock but I was outside Liverpool Street station in the rush hour and thought it’d look odd and then I thought maybe I’m dreaming and in the morning I’ll wake up in the shower like Bobby Ewing or maybe I won’t wake up at all, like the Blue Peter tortoise, and I’ll just spend eternity being traumatised by dreams of cylists adhering to the Highway Code.

Things that annoy me (part 1)

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It will be of no surprise to find out that, after I started a list of “things that annoyed me today”, on yesterday morning’s train to work, by the time I got home (via the pub) it resulted in quite a long list.  So instead of listing them all at once, this is no. 1 in a series of, um, quite a lot (Shaun, stop worrying, you’re not on the list.  Yet.)

Lunchtime, 1pm, in the gymLucozade Sport

I get to the gym and there’s a sign that says “Buy a course of 10 Lucozades and save £2”.  What the fuck, a course of Lucozades?  Since when did Lucozade come in courses?  Do we now go to the doctor and say “excuse me Mr Doctor but I have a bit of a sniffle, what would you recommend, those usual red and white capsule things you give out for everything?”  And he says “oh no, that was in the olden days, these days we give out a course of Lucozade; drink 10 bottles of these and you will rot your teeth, feel like shit, support the vivisection industry and spends loads of money for no reason  feel better immediately.  Well, after 10 bottles anyway”.  And if you’re really ill, you can get an even better deal:  “Buy a course of 20 Lucozades and get £4 off”.   I may have to stop going to the gym so I don’t have to see that sign anymore.

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