After a busy week working on the house, I finally had it ready for visitors staying by the time Geth’s family – Anne, Heulwen and Laura – arrived last night. I’ve got a good sense of what the next stage is, but for the next couple of weeks I’ll be taking a break from the house project and doing other things!
After a good catch-up with the in-laws last night, Geth and I dragged ourselves out of bed to go to parkrun this morning. I was expecting to have to take it easy after the GNR last week (not to mention the amount of dust I’ve been dealing with this week, which has given me a nasty cough and apparently turned the insides of my lungs black – super goth), but when I got going I found I had boundless energy and ended up with a PB! Official time was 30:25, but everyone’s official time seems to be six to eight seconds slower than their watch time today, so maybe there was an issue with the results. Either way, I’m edging ever closer to that sub-30, and I’m hoping to be able to go for it next week.
I’m having a quiet couple of hours to myself at the moment while Geth and the family are in town shopping – later on we’ll be heading to our friend Matthias’ birthday drinks for a while before coming back home for tea. A nice relaxed Saturday!
OOTD catchup tomorrow when I sort my photos out!
Today’s earworm playlist:
Taylor Dayne – Tell It To My Heart
Jermaine Stewart – We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off
New Order – Temptation
Kate Bush – Running Up That Hill
The Human League – The Lebanon
Duran Duran – Rio
Great North Weekend properly got started today, much the same as it did last year, with a parkrun volunteering session. There were a lot of people volunteering due to the GNR, but luckily Geth, Ed, and I managed to snag the gate 2 spot, which meant we didn’t have to hang about for too long. Great atmosphere at parkrun though – it’s always good on Great North Weekend.
After parkrun, Geth and I went for breakfast at Costa, and then home to collect a few things before heading into town for the Pasta Party and the Great North CityGames.
We got off at Gateshead and headed for lunch at the Pasta Party first, as the queues just get worse throughout the day. As we’re both running this year, and I’m on my second year of membership, we had a ridiculous number (six) of pasta vouchers:
So much pasta. I ended up eating most of it, ’cause Geth doesn’t have the stamina for pasta-eating that I do.
We then headed over the Millennium Bridge (bumping into Ed again halfway across!) to catch the CityGames long jump, where I took the obligatory blurry photos of Greg Rutherford and Jazmin Sawyers:
People that I usually just see on the TV!
It was Greg Rutherford’s last ever competitive long jump event, so it was pretty special to get to see him. We then went back to the Gateshead side of the Quayside to watch the sprint distance events from the seated area. Despite the rain, it was quite comfy!
Sadly the CityGames is moving to Stockton-on-Tees from next year, so it won’t be part of our Great North Weekend again for the foreseeable future. I’m guessing the Pasta Party will remain in Gateshead though.
A quiet evening in after that, with the BBC coverage of the CityGames, the Strictly Come Dancing launch show, some triathlon on iPlayer, and yet more pasta. I could not be any more carb-loaded after the last three days. Hopefully it will give me the requisite energy for tomorrow’s Great North Run!
OOTD: rain? What rain? Glasses Emporio Armani (2017), hoodie Uneek Classic for Mesh (2016), t-shirt Puma for Great North 5K (2015).
Today’s earworm playlist:
Kim Wilde – You Came
And a bonus track that Geth was humming earlier:
Baltimora – Tarzan Boy
(A short list today, partly due to spending most of the day surrounded by actual music, but mainly because after Geth woke me up for the second time by loudly singing Tarzan Boy, that became my earworm for the rest of the day too!)
Decided to run it really sedately so as not to do myself any injuries before the Great North Run next week
Realised about thirty seconds before the start that I hadn’t adjusted my watch’s display metrics after it crashed last week so the main display would still be stuck on current pace rather than distance so far
About 1km in, got fed up of running with jeffers (run/walkers), sped up a bit to escape them, and glanced at my watch to see my current pace was 5.47 mins per km
About 2km in, again looked at my watch and saw my current pace was 5.53 mins per km
Thought ‘I CAN DO THIS’ (i.e. hit elusive goal of sub-30)
Bombed it as hard as I could the rest of the run
Didn’t get sub-30, but was only one second slower than my previous PB (30:39 to the 30:38 of four weeks ago)
So I’m fairly happy with that, overall. All my issues with runner’s knee seem to have disappeared for the moment, so hopefully I’ll be okay for the GNR next week.
Also, I’ve set my watch up properly now. Pace giving me daft ideas is fine at parkrun, but not a good idea in a half marathon.
The rest of the day has been spent making lists, doing odd bits of housework/admin, watching the Now! ’80s channel and otherwise not really knowing what to do with myself. I’ve got a big list of stuff to start doing tomorrow, though.
I also made a really delicious new meal. I’ll make it again soon so that I can share the recipe.
Today’s earworm playlist (fairly short today ’cause I replaced it with actual music as soon as I was out of the shower after parkrun):
The Human League – (Keep Feeling) Fascination
Yazz – The Only Way Is Up
Bucks Fizz – My Camera Never Lies
George Ezra – Shotgun
Aretha Franklin – I Say A Little Prayer
As part of Infest day 3, Geth and I got up early and went to Horton Park parkrun – a nice convenient parkrun that’s only a twenty-minute walk away from the Jurys Inn, where we stay for the festival.
I did Horton Park for the first time last year, with friends Ruth and Mark (Geth was recovering from injury so didn’t join us). Ruth drove us last year, so the walking route wasn’t familiar to me, and Geth was having some trouble with Google Maps so it took us a while to find the parkrun and we only just made it in time for the run briefing. That’s why you leave in plenty of time when parkrun touristing!
Horton Park is quite a tough route. It’s a three-and-a-half-lap course, with four downhill stretches and three uphills, so not at all a PB opportunity. Still, I got 32:20, which is a big improvement on my 35:44 from last year, so I was very happy!
It’s also a very pretty course, and the multiple laps make it feel quite quick. Definitely my go-to parkrun now for whenever I’m at Infest.
*blinks* What’s this? A couple of days where I don’t have to work, and my only appointment is parkrun? It’s been a while since I’ve had this experience.
I really enjoyed parkrun this morning. I wasn’t quite as fast as I have been recently, but I still got a respectable 31:30, my third best ever time. It was nice to catch up with a few people we hadn’t seen in a while, too.
After we got back, showered and breakfasted, Geth fell back into Final Fantasy XIII-2 while I got some novel writing done. Another thing that’s not happened since…actually, I can’t remember.
I do have another run to do tomorrow – and I should probably get some house stuff done, which is another project that’s looming ominously – but I’m hoping to have some writing time again as well. The inspiration is strong at the moment, and I need to make the most of it.
OOTD: my fifth day in jeans in the space of a week! I’m really appreciating this cooler weather. T-shirt SF City Wear (2011), jeans Zara (2018), trainers Reebok (2018).
Today’s parkrun didn’t feel anywhere near as fast as last week – there were many stretches where I felt I was taking it easy. I still somehow managed a 30:38, a fourteen-second improvement on last week. Very happy!
I really feel like sub-30 might be on this year now. If I’ve not managed it by the second week of November, I will be making use of the Newcastle parkrun pacer week and attempting to keep up with the 30-minute pacer. The pacers at Newcastle tend to be a bit too fast so I’m not sure how I’d get on, but we’ll see! Sadly I’m doing races and/or otherwise engaged on all the intervening pacer weeks (Newcastle does one the second week of every month), so I will have to be patient.
Another quiet afternoon and evening working (and listening to Geth working out DJ stuff for a wedding disco playlist!).
OOTD: super comfy hanging-around-the-house outfit that could have been easily dressed up if we’d decided to go out tonight (we didn’t). Bonus mirror selfie as Geth was busy DJing. Glasses Emporio Armani (2017), t-shirt modified Deviant/Fruit of the Loom (thrifted from Geth 2014, originally from the early 2000s), leggings Primark (2018), shoes La Redoute (2018).
One of the interesting things about getting back into routine is that routine things feel out of the ordinary!
Today was a very routine Friday – Geth and I went into town in the morning to do a bit of clothes shopping and drop our smart clothes off at the tailor to be altered, then I went home and spent the afternoon working, then we went to the pub to celebrate Geth going on annual leave. I’m now having a nice quiet evening catching up with admin while Geth sorts out the music for pre-DJing Lisa and Kieran’s wedding.
Tomorrow we get to run our home parkrun at Newcastle for the first time since May!
OOTD: daft post-pub photography that resulted in Geth singing Kraftwerk’s The Model at me in a slightly drunken manner. Sunglasses Jasper Conran (2018), t-shirt Punk Masters (2018), handbag Just Cavalli (2018), trousers Bat Attack (2009), shoes Vivienne Westwood Anglomania for Melissa (2018).
When Geth and I were in Scotland this weekend, we went out to Cramond on the Saturday morning to do Edinburgh parkrun.
I’m in Edinburgh fairly often for obvious reasons, and so I’ve done Edinburgh parkrun five times now – second in quantity only to Newcastle. It’s a lovely flat out-and-back course with a lollipop loop at the halfway point, and on a good day you get fairly spectacular views of the Firth of Forth. They also have an infamous ‘parkrun weather window’ – so although I’ve often been there on days when it’s been pissing with rain before or after the parkrun, it’s never rained during the parkrun itself!
This last weekend, the conditions were particularly good – not too hot, not too windy, could have been less crowded but it wasn’t too bad. I went out fairly fast, and I found I was able to keep it up. I knew I was doing well, ’cause I was knackered most of the way round – but it wasn’t until I got to the finishing straight and Geth was standing there shouting ‘PB is ON’ that I allowed myself to hope. I couldn’t pull off a sprint finish, ’cause I didn’t have the energy left, but I was able to speed up just enough to get a time of 30:52 – which is 54 seconds faster than my previous PB from April! I doubt I’ll beat that again for a while!
Looking forward to being back at Edinburgh parkrun around Christmas time.
On the Saturday in Toronto, Geth and I got up very early, and went to Ontario’s only parkrun, Whitby parkrun.
We walked for about forty-five minutes to get to the train station, bought tickets, spent another forty-five minutes on the train, and arrived in Whitby shortly after eight o’clock. It was at that point that Geth realised he couldn’t really remember how to get to the parkrun. I’m not leaving him in charge of directions in future!
After a bit of a saga involving asking lots of people at the train station and the nearby leisure centre for directions, we made it to the parkrun start line with just a few minutes to spare, and met a few other Brits who were also parkrun touristing.
The parkrun itself was a really nice route – a simple out-and-back course through a lovely quiet park with nice wide paths. There were only twenty-odd people taking part, and so Geth and I both came first in our age categories – something that I doubt will be repeated any time soon!
A rare running photo where I actually look like I’m running! Photo by Whitby parkrun.
I got my standard-for-now sub-33, which I was fine with considering I hadn’t run for two weeks. I’m really pleased to have done some international parkrun tourism at last!
Far-flung parkrun souvenir photo! Photo by Whitby parkrun.
Geth and I just got back to Newcastle…again. We’re back for a good while now though!
We’ve been in Scotland for the weekend, for the respective hen and stag parties of our friends Lisa and Kieran. We headed off on Friday afternoon, just a couple of hours after Geth’s Canada luggage finally showed up, and managed to beat the ridiculous UK train chaos caused by the thunderstorms by getting on an alternative train and sitting on the floor of the doorway section. Not hugely comfortable, but at least we got to Edinburgh around the time we were supposed to.
After a quiet evening at Mum and Dad’s, we had an uncomfortable night’s sleep (it was REALLY hot and muggy) and then got up for parkrun, which I will post about later in the week. On returning to the house, I grabbed the world’s quickest shower and got ready to be picked up by my friend Fi to travel to the QHotels Westerwood Spa near Cumbernauld.
Having also picked up our other friends Gemma and Sarah, we headed along the motorway to the spa, checked in and spent a pleasant few hours in the hotel bar, during which Steph, Lisa, Nikki and Becky also arrived. At five o’clock we went downstairs for the treatments we’d booked. I’d never been to a spa before, so I had no idea what to expect from my face and back treatment, but it turned out to be a lovely massage with lots of oil and exfoliation and so on. It was so relaxing, I nearly fell asleep! The only downside is that two showers later, I’ve still not been able to get the oils out of my hair.
After the treatments, we were taken to a relaxation room, where we were able to chill out on daybeds with glasses of water for a while, and then we all went for a swim float in the warmer, shallower part of the pool and a soak in the jacuzzi.
Dinner was at eight, but unfortunately, because the service was really slow and poor, we were in the restaurant for three hours, at which point they still hadn’t served our desserts and we ended up having them brought through to the room where we were booked to have a cocktail and DVD night. The poor service from the waiting staff didn’t spoil our evening, but it was very frustrating, especially as we kept having to go and chase up our orders (and when they billed us for exceeding our food allocation when we hadn’t!).
Still, we had a good time watching Moulin Rouge! and Monty Python & The Holy Grail, and I had two delicious cocktails – the second one was especially good, as it came with a drumstick lolly dipped in it, and I’ve not had one of those since I was a kid.
After a good sleep, we went for hotel breakfast – I resisted the bread table, as I’ve got to lose my Canada holiday weight this week, but the scrambled egg was amazing (much better than the egg in Toronto – sorry, Grand Hotel), the mushrooms and tomatoes were very welcome, and I got to have a tattie scone, which I never get to do as I’m rarely in hotels in Scotland.
We spent a good couple of hours chatting in the hotel bar again, but decided to skip the lunch we’d booked, as most people were too full for lunch/needed to get home. We headed back in Fi’s car again, this time with added Steph, and got back to Edinburgh in plenty time for me to go back to Mum and Dad’s and repack my stuff. I also caught up with Geth, who had enjoyed Kieran’s stag yesterday (they’d spent the afternoon and evening boardgaming – what else?).
We had a much more straightforward train journey back to Newcastle, and are now relaxing with the World Series Triathlon on BBC iPlayer.
Not a perfect weekend, but that massage was so good that I’m definitely interested in going to a spa again!
Saturday OOTD: comfy travelling outfit. T-shirt Lauren Ralph Lauren (bought at vintage fair in 2018, but still available on the website so probably not that old), leggings Primark (2018).
Sunday OOTD: my current favourite day dress, in a colour I’ve never worn before but quite like! Dress Primark (2018), terrible hair due to the aforementioned spa oils!
