Tag: Musical Attempts

Stretching out

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I ran with Geth again this morning…

…and since then we’ve just been in the house, hiding from the cancelled world outside. Geth went to Sainsbury’s, and came back with approximately half the things I’d sent him out for (panic-buying has officially set in here in Newcastle), but we’ll manage. I also went to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription – the outside world feels a bit odd and apocalyptic at the moment.

It’s felt like a long day, but I’m not about to complain, because extra time is my most treasured thing and suddenly having a lot more of it is a real silver lining. Sage Gateshead has now closed, so my ukulele classes are not happening for the foreseeable future, and I don’t know when they’ll be rescheduled. The UK Games Expo confirmed this evening that they are postponing the event to August; parkrun will make an announcement tomorrow.

The North Tyneside 10k has also postponed to October, so that’s the last of my spring races fallen by the wayside. I’m amazed and grateful that none of my postponed races clash with each other (or with the GNR), and also feel quite lucky that I hadn’t booked any of my planned autumn races before this all kicked off. I had wanted to run the South Shields 10 Mile and the Great Scottish Run this year, but they’ll be there for me in the future.

Keeping in touch with family as the daily situation changes is my main priority at the moment, along with keeping myself and Geth safe and sane. Running is a big help with the latter, and I’m really glad I have that in my life at the moment.

Brooks running shoes
I was able to try out my new running shoes from Inverness this morning. They’re super bouncy and did give me a slight but noticeable boost!

Today’s earworm playlist:

Lightwood Games – ‘Link-A-Pix Theme’
Ollie Wride – ‘Back To Life’
Mesh and Mechanical Cabaret – ‘Born To Lie [Duet Version]’
Koichi Sugiyama – ‘Unflinchable Courage’
EMF – ‘Unbelievable’

Settling in

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A nice quiet mile this morning…

…and since then I’ve been spending the afternoon getting a bit of admin done and thinking about possibilities for the weeks and months ahead. All but one of my spring races have now been postponed to the autumn, resulting in a packed autumn race season that I wouldn’t have chosen myself, but it is what it is, and I am grateful that I will still get to run the races. Newcastle University are asking staff to work from home from tomorrow onwards, so I will have Geth home with me for the foreseeable future. The Social Run Group are no longer holding gatherings. I’m still waiting to hear about parkrun, my ukulele class at Sage Gateshead, and the UK Games Expo at the end of May, but I fully expect that all of them will go the same way, especially given the new measures that the government have announced today and the fact that things seem to be getting worse every day at the moment.

I am an introvert and a homebody by nature, so I have absolutely no problem staying in my home for a few weeks (if we get fully locked down and I have to run on the treadmill, I may get a bit grumpy, but at least I will still be able to run!). I appreciate though that not everybody is like me, and that some people are really dreading these measures and/or will feel really lonely. If that’s you, I’m thinking of you. I hope we can all get through this sooner rather than later.

Tomorrow, other than running in the morning, I’ll be at home, getting work done and playing videogames. I expect that will be the case every day for some time.

3DS
Hello, 3DS, my old friend; I’ve come to play with you again.

Today’s earworm playlist:

Richard Marx – ‘Right Here Waiting’
Koichi Sugiyama – ‘Unflinchable Courage’
The Killers – ‘Mr Brightside’

Game release day!

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Another recovery mile this morning…

…and then I spent the afternoon doing the final polish for my latest text adventure game – my submission for the current Adventuron jam. It’s a bit different to my previous adventures as the rules for the jam involved no graphics and limited-word text responses! I had a lot of fun with this one, and Geth has already given it a playtest.

Game available to play here.

Tomorrow’s ukulele class has been cancelled, so I should have a bit of time to play through some of the other entries (my favourite part of every game jam!).

Pixel goblin
My goblin is on the run, trying to win medals.

Today’s earworm playlist:

Koichi Sugiyama – ‘Unflinchable Courage’

Blue skies

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A nice midweek run in the frosty sunshine…

…and then I spent the afternoon doing admin and practising my ukulele (class went back tonight after half term and we have a lot of fairly complex tunes to learn at the moment). Ukulele class was a bit of a mixture tonight – we had some bad news re. the fact that our teacher won’t be teaching us anymore next term. We’re also learning a Justin Bieber song at the moment, and it sounded as though not many people were singing along – possibly because most people were concentrating on learning the riff – so I sort of felt like I was singing when I shouldn’t be for that one. Which was a little awkward.

After class I headed to poetry night. I decided not to read tonight, as although I do have a couple of works-in-progress they’re not quite ready for public performance. It was nice to enjoy everyone else’s poems without worrying about my own!

Love Yourself music
I know this song fairly well (it was everywhere in 2015). Not sure many other people in the class do though!

Today’s earworm playlist:

FM-84 and Ollie Wride – ‘Wild Ones’
Tinchy Stryder and N-Dubz – ‘Number 1’
Justin Bieber – ‘Love Yourself’

A quiet Wednesday

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A midweek-length run today…

…and a fairly good afternoon of admin before I headed off to ukulele class this evening. We learnt (-ish) a new song, so I’ve got lots to practise over the half term break.

It’s weigh-in tomorrow, and I’ve had another good week, so fingers crossed…

Keeping warm, 1985
Winter layers in 1985! I wasn’t quite as wrapped up as this today, but it wouldn’t have been a bad idea – it’s really nippy out there at the moment.

Del Amitri – ‘Nothing Ever Happens’
Frankie Miller – ‘Caledonia’
Sacre – ‘The London Marathon’
Carl Orff – ‘Gassenhauer’
Vangelis – ‘Chariots Of Fire’
The Midnight – ‘Collateral’
Justin Bieber – ‘Love Yourself’

Open day

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After this morning’s run…

…I spent the afternoon at the Newcastle University Postgraduate Open Day in order to find out about doing a Masters in creative writing. It was odd sitting in lecture halls and listening to talks. Other than the odd occasion when I’ve sat in on Geth’s evening lectures, I haven’t been in lecture halls since I graduated in 2008!

It was a really interesting afternoon though. I spoke to a few students who are currently doing the course, went on a tour of the facilities, and attended a couple of general talks on studying at Newcastle and funding sources. I went away with a huge amount of bumpf to read and a lot of things to look into over the next few days!

I then headed to ukulele class, which was as fab as ever. Really enjoying the songs we’re doing this term.

It’ll be another busy day tomorrow, as I need to catch up with day job work in between going to weigh-in and the gig that Geth and I are attending in the evening.

Tote bag
I also got a free tote bag to carry all my open day bumpf in. I don’t really need any more of these, but I always appreciate a nice goodie bag!

Today’s earworm playlist:

Vangelis – ‘Chariots Of Fire’
Stinx – ‘Why Do You Keep On Running Boy’*
Del Amitri – ‘Nothing Ever Happens’

*For the uninitiated (i.e. those who weren’t living in Scotland around the turn of the millennium), this was a parody of Britney Spears’ ‘…Baby One More Time’ that featured in a legendary HEBS (Health Education Board for Scotland) advert from 2000, aimed at discouraging teenagers from smoking. The advert was renowned as being absolutely genius (I did a day of work experience at the BBC during this period and they were all raving about it), and I sang the song in the school corridors every breaktime with my pals for about three months solid.

Didn’t discourage me from smoking, though.

Worth a watch if you’ve never seen it, if only for some prime nostalgia:

Running over the hump day

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I had a REALLY good run this morning. Midweek middling distance, which is four miles at the moment, and I felt I was able to get a bit of speed up in the second half. Lovely mild morning for it too – really hoping we don’t revert to ice and snow during February and March.

It’s weigh-in eve so I’m making slow cooker curry (with neeps rather than tatties as Geth and I tend towards SP (low carb) meals on Tuesdays and Wednesdays). The house smells lovely as a result!

Slightly sleepy after my run, so while I am looking forward to ukulele class tonight, I’m also looking forward to getting home afterwards and curling up with some YouTube and videogames.

Slow cooker curry
Not an OOTD: curry in the early stages of slow cooking. I promise you it smells better than it looks 😀

Today’s earworm playlist:

Revo – ‘Ship Upon The Open Skies’
Russ Abbot – ‘Atmosphere’
Lady Gaga – ‘Always Remember Us This Way’

The best workplace

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While my job isn’t perfect (freelancing can be a bit stressful in terms of workload or lack of it), I always feel very lucky to be able to work from home. No time wasted commuting, a comfy work area that I create myself, and if I get an urgent email from a client first thing in the morning needing something back within the next half hour, I can shuffle downstairs in my pyjamas and get it done straight away before I get ready for the day. It really is the best setup for me.

(It’s probably the preferred setup for most people, which is why Geth works from home too whenever he doesn’t have any classes or meetings, as is the case today. It’s nice having the company, and I’ve learnt over the years to tune out the fact that he thinks out loud 🙂 )

Today has been another good productive day of running, day job work and admin. Looking forward to the same tomorrow, just with a longer midweek run and a bonus ukulele class.

Winter trees
Not an OOTD: besides, winter trees are nicer to look at from the comfort of home.

Today’s earworm playlist:

Monty Norman – ‘James Bond Theme’
Hiroki Morishita – ‘Duty’
Rei Kondoh – ‘Storm Clouds’
The Midnight – ‘Kick Drums And Red Wine’
Sidney Samson and Wizard Sleeve – ‘Riverside (Let’s Go)’
Vera van Heeringen – ‘Riverside House’

The right boxes

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I’ve been finding for the last few years that my necessity to log everything and have it all neatly filed away, as well as my propensity towards daily streaks in order to build habits, has become more and more all-consuming, to the point where life admin takes up an alarming chunk of my day. It gets quite stressful when I find myself falling behind on any of these things, and so it becomes necessary at this time of year to look at all the stuff I’ve got going on and have a bit of a cull. That’s tomorrow’s job… because in order to reorganise the to-do list I have to do the admin of catching up with the to-do list first! It makes sense inside my head. Honestly.

I had a really good midweek run this morning. I remember this time last year I was really struggling with the longer runs in the early part of marathon training, but this time round I’m actually finding that I’m quite impatient to increase the mileage! I think it’s because I’ve had a bit of a mental shift as a result of doing my gentle mile on rest days – it’s keeping me enthused without burning me out, and it means that I’m not dreading runs or putting them off till later in the week (because if I have to go out and run at least one mile anyway, then I might as well do the extra ones I have scheduled!).

Ukulele class tonight, so have been practising this afternoon. Some good tunes so far this term.

Plastic folders
Not an OOTD: my ukulele papers are all in order for the first time since last May. It’s really nice to have everything in the right boxes… it just takes a lot of work and upkeep!

Today’s earworm playlist:

Duran Duran – ‘What Happens Tomorrow’
Tomohito Nishiura – ‘Puzzles’
Tinchy Stryder and N-Dubz – ‘Number 1’
Britney Spears – ‘Oops!… I Did It Again’
Lady Gaga – ‘Always Remember Us This Way’

Stepping out

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I had a good weather window for my run this morning – no ice, no rain – so the only annoyance en route were the endless roadworks at the nearby roundabout, which have circled back round to the point where they get in the way of my mile route again! It got stormy again this afternoon, so I’m glad I got some fresh air while it was still dry.

Have spent the rest of the day editing for clients and catching up with admin. Another quiet evening in tonight before my midweek run and ukulele class tomorrow.

Birthday gifts
Not an OOTD: also nice to receive a belated birthday present in the post today. No note to say whom it’s from but I have my suspicions!

Today’s earworm playlist:

Lady Gaga – ‘Always Remember Us This Way’
Cast of Mary Poppins – ‘Chim Chim Cheree’
B*Witched – ‘Blame It On The Weatherman’