Geth and I travelled back to Newcastle this morning after a family wedding yesterday. It was so lovely to be able to have a normal family celebration after everything that’s happened over the last eighteen months, and to see so many people I haven’t been able to see for so long. I really hope we can have another gathering soon.
The next couple of weeks are gathering steam and so I’ve spent a bit of time this afternoon making sure to schedule in some time to relax! The last few months have felt very non-stop and I know I won’t be able to do all the stuff I want to do over the next month if I keep barrelling along without a break.
Work is returning to a good level as well – there’s plenty to keep the business ticking over, but it’s not as hectic as it was in the summer and so I’ve got time to do other things too.
Should be a good month leading up to the marathon!
A slightly ominous-looking tree on the Quayside. I’m looking forward to exploring this route further during training for future marathons.
Twelve days to go until meteorological autumn begins. I am very excited.
Things have been quite well timed this week. Geth and I returned home from the last of our summer trips away on Tuesday, and I finished the last items for the last of my big summer work projects on Wednesday. Work has been very busy over the spring and summer, which has been great, but it’s starting to quieten down again now. I’ll be taking the opportunity over the next few weeks to get a new game made and to have some downtime with my much-neglected videogame collection. I’m also in the sharp end of marathon training now, so I need to get some rest and relaxation in when I’m not running!
I’m finding it hard to get out of the ‘I should be doing something work-related right now’ guilt and letting myself relax, but that’s sort of understandable after so many months. I hope I’ll feel a bit more settled in a week’s time.
So many pictures from our last trip! This is another one from the Mull of Galloway.
This week’s earworm playlists:
Saturday
S-Express – ‘Theme From S-Express’
Sunday
Grant Lee Buffalo – ‘The Whole Shebang’ Shoji Meguro – ‘Heretic Mansion’ Duran Duran and Chai – ‘More Joy’
Monday
Duran Duran – ‘Reach Up For The Sunrise’
Tuesday
The Crüxshadows – ‘Return’ Fleetwood Mac – ‘Don’t Stop’ Duran Duran and Chai – ‘More Joy’ The Corries – ‘Wild Mountain Thyme’
Wednesday
Peter Gabriel – ‘Games Without Frontiers’
Thursday
Duran Duran – ‘What Happens Tomorrow’ Duran Duran – ‘Invisible’
With the summer work and trips all complete, I’m having a day off to play videogames before getting back to my projects. Looking forward to getting lost in some other worlds for the afternoon!
A different kind of ‘other world’ visited at the weekend. The ones I’m visiting today aren’t real!
Geth and I are back in Newcastle after a few days spent at Mum and Dad’s holiday caravan in Dumfries and Galloway. It’s been lovely making the most of Geth’s summer leave to go zipping around visiting places for a few weeks, but I’m ready to settle down into the autumn routine at home now. I have lots of games to make (and play) and the final stages of a marathon training plan to complete.
Blog posts will gradually return to the normal schedule as a result!
So many photos from the last few days! This one is the view of Ailsa Craig from Girvan beach on Saturday. It was cloudy but atmospheric.
(Including the Tuesday pesto posts. From next week!)
It was so exciting to be in Scotland for the Scottish parkrun restart this morning! Girvan Prom had been on my bucket list for a long time (I love seaside parkruns) and it did not disappoint, despite the cold wind and tough grassy section. I’m still pretty slow at the moment due to various issues around marathon training, but I still managed my fastest time since the English restart a few weeks ago, so I’m very happy!
They also gave out free tablet at the end to celebrate 😍
Two very happy parkrunners with their complimentary tablet! Photo (c) John Cooke 2021.
The first of many parkruns to tick off in this area of Scotland, I hope! Planning on visiting a lot in the future…
Geth and I have had another nice few days away visiting family, but are back in Newcastle now. I’m looking forward to the weekend! Bit of parkrun tomorrow and then a good doze for the rest of the weekend, I expect.
I say this every week but I’m hoping things will wind down a bit soon!
Another week, another long run along a canal. It didn’t go so well this week so I need to think about some new strategies.
This week’s earworm playlists:
Saturday
Nobuo Uematsu – ‘Searching For Friends’ Black Box – ‘Ride On Time’
Sunday
Odyssey – ‘Inside Out’ Duran Duran – ‘To The Shore’
Monday
Nobuo Uematsu – ‘Terra’s Theme’ Duran Duran – ‘Give It All Up’
Tuesday
Shoji Meguro – ‘Heretic Mansion’ Leo Sayer – ‘Moonlighting’
Wednesday
Hot Butter – ‘Popcorn’ REM – ‘Losing My Religion’
Thursday
Hot Butter – ‘Popcorn’ Smokie – ‘Living Next Door To Alice’
Geth and I are back in Newcastle after a few days in Edinburgh visiting Mum and Dad. It was so good to be able to wander around my home city again! I was still fairly busy with day job work, but I was also able to get some running in, including a long run along the Union Canal accompanied by Dad on the bike. The company and extra water (and choice of out-and-back route) meant that I actually finished my planned distance this week! I will be running along a totally different canal next week, but hopefully it will give me a similar boost.
Other than a bit of parkrun volunteering tomorrow morning, I’m planning a very quiet weekend!
Some beautiful aqueducts along the Union Canal! Photo (c) John Cooke 2021.
This week’s earworm playlists:
Saturday
Nobuo Uematsu – ‘The Place I’ll Return To Someday’
My previous lifetime record for consecutive days spent in the UK was 1,095 days. With Mum and Dad, I sailed back from our holiday in the Faroe Islands to Shetland on 7th July 1986. I then didn’t leave the UK again until 6th July 1989, when I sailed from England to France with Mum, Dad and Malcolm. During that three-year period we did get on a lot of ferries – we were visiting my grandparents in Shetland a lot as my grandmother was poorly by then – but it wasn’t until that French trip in 1989 that we went abroad again.
In a French town centre with Mum, July 1989.
Growing up in the 1990s I was lucky enough to travel a lot with the family. We went abroad almost every year, usually to continental Europe but sometimes to North America too. In my late teens I often went on holiday abroad with friends, and after I met Geth, while most of our travelling was UK-based, we typically ventured out to other countries once a year or so, usually to coincide with one of his academic conferences or work trips.
2018 was the last such trip to date. Geth was meeting international colleagues in Toronto, and we decided to combine that with a holiday as it was an opportunity to visit Malcolm and Steff. Mum and Dad were able to match the dates for their planned trip to Toronto too, and so it was a lovely get-together with the family. I flew back from Toronto and arrived in Edinburgh on the morning of 25th July 2018. That was 1,096 days ago – exactly three years. I haven’t left the UK since.
In a Canadian city centre by myself, July 2018. Mum and Dad were around somewhere though!
I had no idea it would be my last trip abroad for such a long time. Breaking this particular record was obviously not my plan! I passed on joining Geth on a work trip to Oslo in June 2019, as I was really busy with work and other things at the time, but I had a ticket to see Duran Duran in Dublin in June 2020, and we planned to go back to Toronto in summer 2020, and we wanted to have a couple of city breaks in Paris and Amsterdam in autumn 2020…
Yeah. 2020.
It’s funny how much I took travelling for granted before. There were lots of places in the world I wanted to see, and the only things stopping me from seeing them were time, money and the anxiety I always have around travelling due to mental issues with routine. It never occurred to me, pre-pandemic, that the world would ever be in a situation where I simply wouldn’t be allowed to go to these places (or that it would be so logistically difficult and/or risky that it wouldn’t be worth it). Nowadays, as I sit in the house watching cities like Sydney and Tokyo and New Orleans and Johannesburg and Barcelona and Rio de Janeiro fly by, in documentaries and films and videogames on my screens, and in the pages of the books I read, and the academic works I edit, and the stories I write myself… I always think the same old thing I always did. ‘I’ll go there someday!’ And then I feel sad, because I don’t know when that will be possible again in the same way that it was before. Years away, perhaps.
I had a ticket to see Duran Duran in Dublin in June 2020. Then I had a ticket to see Duran Duran in Dublin in June 2021. Now I have a ticket to see Duran Duran in Dublin in June 2022. I hope it happens. I hope the world won’t make me go a whole quarter of a decade or more without seeing my brother, whom I last saw in person on my birthday in January 2020. I hope I’ll be running parkruns in Paris and Amsterdam next year. But the last year and a half has taught me that I can’t be certain.
I can hope, though. I really, really hope that the world will go back to what we once thought of as normality.
Until then I will just keep patiently counting days. And hope that I am setting a record I will never break again!
Geth and I went away last weekend to visit family for the first time in months. We met our sixteen-month-old niece for the first time, which was really special, and generally returned to a world that we’d left behind a long time ago. In some ways, being with people and eating a pub lunch felt strange, but in other ways, it felt completely normal, like we’d never been away from it. It was really nice.
Since we got back, it’s been a thankfully quiet week, and so I’ve been happily ensconced in my coding most of the time. The exception was Wednesday, as I had my appointment for my first jab of COVID vaccine. Other than the standard sore arm I’ve not had too many side effects – I’m a bit tired and achy, but I’m hoping I’ll be fully recovered by Sunday as I’m running a virtual half marathon that day!
Fingers crossed for a similar experience next week (minus the vaccine stuff)…
First dose down. I feel a lot happier now this process has started, and look forward to being fully vaccinated in August.
This week’s earworm playlists (which this week have been CONSTANT DURAN DURAN with very occasional lapses. I’m not complaining):
Saturday
Arcadia – ‘Say The Word’
Sunday
Harry Belafonte – ‘Jump in the Line (Shake, Señora)’
Monday
Duran Duran – ‘A Matter Of Feeling’ Duran Duran – ‘Invisible’
Tuesday
Duran Duran – ‘A Matter Of Feeling’ Duran Duran – ‘I Take The Dice’
Wednesday
Duran Duran – ‘American Science’ The Beatles – ‘Drive My Car’ Duran Duran – ‘Violence Of Summer (Love’s Taking Over) [The Story Mix]’ Duran Duran – ‘Invisible’ Mr Mister – ‘Broken Wings’
Thursday
Duran Duran – ‘Violence Of Summer (Love’s Taking Over)’ Duran Duran – ‘Union Of The Snake’ Destiny’s Child – ‘Survivor’ Duran Duran – ‘Meet El Presidente’ Duran Duran – ‘Too Late Marlene’
Friday
Duran Duran – ‘Union Of The Snake’ Duran Duran – ‘All She Wants Is’
This summer and beyond is starting to come together in terms of ‘gradually poking my nose back out into the outside world’. I’ve got six real races booked for the remainder of the year, with hopefully a seventh to be added when entries open, and it looks like there’s absolutely no problems with them going ahead. The restart of parkrun has been delayed from the 5th to the 26th of June (which selfishly I’m pleased about because it means the first one back doesn’t clash with a race for me), and hopefully they’ll be able to confirm enough events in the interim that the new date will go ahead. I’m excited to get back to group running again!
Geth and I will also be seeing family a few times over the next few months, but we’re adamant that that’s the only thing we’re doing that involves travel (apart from the London Marathon in October, which has been booked for a long time). Travel is very difficult for both of us – I have mental health issues about being out of routine that have become ever more obvious over the last two and a half years since I quit drinking, and Geth’s constant travelling contributed to his seizure and subsequent hospitalisation in March 2020. As such, it’s something that we know we have to minimise in the future, and so we won’t be doing nearly as many things away from home as we used to do pre-pandemic.
Finding a balance is going to be quite tough.
Some new reading material. I’ve been enjoying reading my old childhood gamebooks again recently (the Asterix ones are fab!) so I added some more to an Amazon order to qualify for free delivery 🙂
This week’s earworm playlists:
Saturday
Murray Gold – ‘Doomsday’ Michael Land – ‘The Swamp’ Duran Duran – ‘Five Years’
Sunday
Michael Land and Clint Bajakian – ‘Opening Credits Part #1’ Fisherman’s Friends – ‘Bully In The Alley’
Monday
Fisherman’s Friends – ‘Bully In The Alley’ Blink-182 – ‘All The Small Things’ The Offspring – ‘Pretty Fly (For A White Guy)’ Patti Smith – ‘Because The Night’
Tuesday
The Running Channel – ‘Run With Me’
Wednesday
Duran Duran – ‘Invisible’ Carter USM – ‘And God Created Brixton’
Thursday
Duran Duran – ‘Invisible’
And a bonus track Geth was humming that day:
Lisa Lougheed – ‘Run With Us’
Friday
Mark Knopfler – ‘Local Hero’ Duran Duran – ‘Invisible’
