I went out for another run this morning (which felt great – better than any run I’ve done for over a year), watched the Chicago Marathon on TV this afternoon, and since then have been working in my capacity as one of the copy-editors for a subculture magazine. This is voluntary work that I’ll talk a bit more about when the magazine comes out, but for now suffice to say that today has been a lot of work but very interesting!
Back to the regular routine tomorrow, although I will go out for another short run. Might remember to take an interesting picture as well!
Today’s earworm playlist:
Michael Jackson – Dirty Diana Koichi Sugiyama and Takenori Yamamori – Unknown World Traditional – Abide With Me
I was up at the crack of dawn this morning as I wanted to watch the first part of Eliud Kipchoge’s sub-two-hour marathon attempt before Geth and I headed to parkrun. It was a lovely morning for the inaugural Jesmond Dene parkrun, and it was good to have a walk there and back as well – no boring treadmill walking to get my steps in today!
Once home, I watched the rest of the Kipchoge coverage (and got spoilered for the result by the BBC when I opened iPlayer – seriously, sort it out, we can’t all watch everything live!*). A fantastic day for the running world – it’s been proven the barrier can be broken now, and I’m sure we’ll see it happen in an official race eventually.
I spent the rest of the day having a proper chilled Saturday afternoon – I did a bit more coding on my text adventure, and planned out my parkrun schedule for the next few months (I’m very enthusiastic about parkrun at the moment now that my 100th parkrun is not too far in the distance).
More running and more coding tomorrow!
*Although I did see more than one person posting about how they spent the first fifteen minutes of parkrun running with their phone in front of their face in order to watch the end of the attempt. I am not quite that mental.
Not an OOTD: the afternoon was also improved by the delicious smell of my signature curry in the slow cooker! Excellent end to the day.
Today’s earworm playlist:
Jason Paige – Pokémon Theme (Gotta Catch ‘Em All) Cast of Les Miserables – Do You Hear The People Sing? Vangelis – Chariots Of Fire
I went to the inaugural Jesmond Dene parkrun this morning – a stunning new parkrun in one of Newcastle’s most beautiful areas. I’d been looking forward to this parkrun since it was first announced earlier this year that Newcastle would be getting two new parkruns (the first being Leazes in the summer).
I don’t usually take these touristy ‘me with the parkrun banner’ photos, but as it was a special event and I had a willing photographer (thanks Geth), I made an exception!
It’s a good thing that the Dene is so nice to look at, because the first two kilometres of the course are absolutely brutal. It’s a difficult hill, followed by a lot of precarious ups and downs, followed by some steps up to the next level, followed by the most taxing hill I’ve ever encountered on a parkrun (worse than Pendle). Thankfully, this is followed by a flat-but-exposed couple of kilometres doing laps of a park, and the final 500 metres is a glorious downhill sprint to the finish.
You’d have to be very careful running the course on a wet autumn day with lots of leaf mulch underfoot, and I think if it iced over in the winter the parkrun would have to be cancelled that week – because if someone slipped on one of those steep downhill sections, they could be pretty badly hurt! I’ll be attending again quite a few times over the next couple of months, so it’ll be interesting to see how the run copes with varying weather conditions.
It’ll also be interesting, now that we have three parkruns in central Newcastle, to see if the congestion eases significantly on the Town Moor over the next few months!
…though it won’t be that different from the last few weekdays, I imagine, seeing as I’m so caught up in my text adventure project at the moment!
There will be quite a bit of running (and running TV), though. Currently catching up with the Great Scottish Run and the Cardiff Half Marathon on iPlayer, then will be getting up super early tomorrow to watch the start of Eliud Kipchoge’s 1:59:59 marathon attempt. Geth and I will then be nipping out to run a brand new parkrun, and then back home to catch up with the rest of the Kipchoge event (I expect we’ll have been spoilered for the result by the time we leave parkrun, but it’ll still be great to watch!). I’m also planning a slightly longer amble on Sunday, as I’m trying to do three runs a week at the moment.
I think it was the right decision not to run any races post-GNR this autumn, as I’m finding I’m still really excited about my running right now (as opposed to crawling away screaming at the end of the season and taking two months off like I have done the last couple of years!).
There will also be a bit of videogaming, I hope, if I can drag myself away from making my own one.
Not an OOTD: brand new parkrun barcode printed out ready for tomorrow – my old one is getting a bit worn and hasn’t been scanning properly for the last few weeks!
Today’s earworm playlist:
Jason Paige – Pokémon Theme (Gotta Catch ‘Em All) Bobby Darin – Beyond The Sea Duran Duran – Liberty John Parr – St. Elmo’s Fire (Man In Motion)
A good 2lb loss at Slimming World this morning, which I’m going to put down to the fact I’ve been making the effort to hit my Garmin step goal every day. Onwards and downwards for the next week, I hope!
I’ve spent the rest of the day coding. Looking forward to having more time to do it tomorrow.
OOTD: another cosy ’80s jumper. Glasses Emporio Armani (2017), jumper unknown brand (vintage 1980s, bought at vintage fair 2017).
Today’s earworm playlist:
Madonna – Into The Groove Duran Duran – The Chauffeur Andy Taylor – Broken Window Abba – Lay All Your Love On Me Monty Python – Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life Andy Taylor – I Might Lie Koichi Sugiyama and Takenori Yamamori – Unknown World Steve Winwood – Valerie
Finally! We’ve come to the very last phone box of the London Marathon route!
(This series has gone on for such a long time that I’m starting to understand why I took so many hours to complete the thing – I must have spent a good ten or fifteen minutes pausing along the route to take photos!)
Red phone box, Great George Street, London, 28th April 2019.
This box is the last one in the row stretching between Big Ben and the east end of Birdcage Walk, which is the bit that takes you down to the front of Buckingham Palace and onto the Mall for the finish. I was so wiped by the end that I have to confess I didn’t even notice I was running past Buckingham Palace!
A nice, well-preserved K6 for our last London entry for a while. It’s making me quite excited for the 2020 London Marathon now…one in which I certainly won’t be taking so many phone box photos, given that I’ve already got them all. That should guarantee a PB straight off the bat!
I started coding my new game today. The enjoyment I get out of doing this has probably been one of my biggest surprises this year – I can lose myself in it for days without really noticing.
As such, it was difficult to tear myself away to go to ukulele class tonight, but once I was there I really enjoyed that too! I really feel as though I’ve found the right difficulty level for me in intermediate class. Sadly I’ll be missing the end-of-term concert this term as I’m going to a gig that night, but I expect I’ll be staying with the intermediate group for a few terms yet!
I’ll be getting back to the coding tomorrow, but first I need to head to Slimming World weigh-in – I’m hoping that hitting my Garmin step goal every day this week will have helped me towards a loss…
Not an OOTD: gotta keep hitting those green bars!
Today’s earworm playlist:
Revo – Love’s Vagrant Basshunter – All I Ever Wanted Manami Kiyota – Lasaria Woodland Hans Zimmer – The Lion King Suite Revo – Ship Upon The Open Skies James Taylor – Wichita Lineman Whitney Houston – So Emotional Dolly Parton – 9 To 5
I’ve had a really fun day planning out my Hallowe’en-themed text adventure game. It’s going to be much bigger than my last one and so I’ll be spending a lot of time working on it over the next few weeks!
I also went out for a run this morning, meaning I only had to do a short treadmill walk to hit my Garmin step count.
Looking forward to another day of writing tomorrow.
Not an OOTD: there’ll be a fair few of these in my new game. Picture is of my 2015 collection 🙂
Today’s earworm playlist:
Laura Branigan – Gloria Duran Duran – Is There Something I Should Know? Mike Harding and Myfanwy Talog – DangerMouse Main Theme Duran Duran – Vertigo (Do The Demolition) Billy Joel – We Didn’t Start The Fire
I’ve had a busy day getting on with writing tasks – I’ve submitted a few pieces to magazines and competitions and have started planning out my next graphical text adventure game for the upcoming Adventuron Hallowe’en jam. October (so far!) is still looking nice and quiet, so I will hopefully be able to continue ticking off things on my writing to-do list most days.
It’s another day in the house, which means I was back on the treadmill to hit my step goal this evening – I’ve got a feeling that tomorrow’s outdoor run will actually feel quite easy in comparison!
Not an OOTD: on the plus side, spending so much time on the treadmill is allowing me to defeat a lot of dragons in Bravely Default.
Today’s earworm playlist:
Charlie Puth – One Call Away Dr Feelgood – Milk And Alcohol Whitney Houston – So Emotional Faithless – God Is A DJ
As I mentioned a couple of days ago, I’m trying to hit my Garmin step goal every day this month.
However, today was a regular Sunday, and a regular Sunday, for me, involves a lot of videogaming and not a lot of movement. It was also a fairly miserable day weather-wise and so I really didn’t want to leave the house. As such, I had to be a bit more creative in terms of hitting my step goal, which was why I ended up dragging the treadmill out of the cupboard for the first time since April and trying out my Garmin’s ‘indoor walk’ setting.
It turns out that my Garmin is not nearly as generous as my TomTom used to be. One of the issues I had with my London Marathon training was that I did most of it on the treadmill (because it was cold outside at that time of year and also because being able to watch TV really took the sting out of the long, boring training runs), and my TomTom tended to overestimate the distance I ran compared to the treadmill. My Garmin, in contrast, massively underestimates it, so while the treadmill believes I walked four and a half kilometres this afternoon, the Garmin insists it was just one and a half. One and a half kilometres over an hour and forty minutes! I’m slow (especially on the treadmill, which really messes with my sense of speed and effort for some reason), but not that slow. This is a very good reason to avoid treadmill runs during ‘marathon training take two’ this coming winter.*
However, the aim of today’s workout was not speed or accurately estimated distance, but hitting my step goal…which I have also not yet done. I’ll do another half hour on the treadmill later this evening, but I need a bit of time to recover from the first session! Walking can be more tiring than running sometimes.
Other things done today included (1) videogaming, (2) more videogaming, (3) starting to plan out the next videogame I’m making, (4) unscrewing the broken extractor fan in our kitchen that is getting collected tomorrow and (5) more videogaming. Back to work tomorrow.
*In a move that will surprise nobody, I have decided I am going to take up the free guaranteed place at the 2020 London Marathon that I was offered along with all other seven-hour-plus finishers. I really did mean it when I said afterwards that I was never going to put myself through that again, but I’m a Scot and I’m incapable of passing up a freebie. Besides, it would be nice if I could have a slightly faster time listed as my marathon PB.
Not an OOTD: slow but getting the steps in.
Today’s earworm playlist:
Naughty Boy and Sam Smith – La La La Altered Images – Don’t Talk To Me About Love
