Seafood in the market

Seafood in the market, originally uploaded by tattie_chomper.

Some of the vast range of seafood available in the fishmarket in Trouville

Trouville

This blog has been in existence for about 3 months longer than I have been going out with my girlfriend, whom I refer to affectionately (some may say 'lazily') as J. She turned 30 in July, and - unable to whisk her off to a 5 star hotel in Rome as I wanted to - we ended up in the French seaside resort of Trouville, in Normandy. The "Parisian Riviera", no less. Or at least, right next door to it (the true posh spot being the neighbouring town of Deauville).

We left London early on Friday morning and arrived in Calais at lunchtime; having not realised that toll booths accept debit cards (given we had no Euro), the mighty Clio meandered through the French countryside for several hours before the majesty of the Pont de Normandie loomed into sight. 

45 minutes later we were cruising the main promenade of Trouville itself, a bustling seaside harbour and resort dominated by a faded casino at the junction of quay and beach, and famous for the seafood that arrives by the trawlerload on a daily basis. We'd chosen it as our destination for the weekend by that most scientific of methods, Google. When I finally gave up pretending I could afford Rome, I asked J where else she would like to go - "to wherever the best mussels in Northern France are", came the reply.

A swift internet search later, up popped Trouville - round the bay a bit from Le Havre, and a more manageable drive from the ferry than Mont St Michel. Not the most romantic of reasons for choosing it, but the squeals of delight from the passenger seat as we jostled our way along the street convinced me we'd done ok.

Our hotel turned out to be perfect, and the town itself was exactly what we (or more importantly, J) had been hoping for. We managed to exist in a little French bubble for most of the weekend until hearing our first English accent late on Sunday - and for two full days we strolled, sunbathed, drank beer and ate fantastic food without a care in the world. It was my first time in the France beyond Paris as an adult, so imagine my surprise when my GCSE French not only wasn't mocked, but resulted in my getting everything I asked for. Ok, so it was a surprise to find myself eating goats cheese quiche on Sunday morning, but I did ask for it, even if I thought it had bacon in it. Again, it was only on Sunday that the spell broke, when a well-meaning bartender answered my pidgin French enquiry in English. I have to admit though, I was exhausted by that point after a full 48 hours dredging the dark recesses of my brain to uncover some half-remembered 17 year old piece of vocabulary so that I could buy a pen to write a postcard.

Mornings were spent drinking coffee and watching the population of the town stroll past - obligatory baguette under their arm. I'm pretty sure people can't eat that much bread; I assume it's just the done thing to have a baguette under one arm and a cigarette in hand, should anyone doubt the true Gallicism of your nature. Afternoons involved a beer with the elderly locals watching the world go by outside a local bar, a stroll through the market, and a bit of gentle sun-burning on the beach.

We followed Trip Advisor's tips on eating out, which resulted in us tucking into delicious duck and steak on the Saturday evening in "La Bolee Normande", a small family-run restaurant up a steep side street near the quayside. The ambience was great, the service friendly, the food delicious - but it deserves special mention for  its unique take on fresh seafood. As we were mid-meal, two middle aged French ladies and what appeared to be a daughter came in, ordering a seafood platter which duly arrived around 10 minutes later. After a moment, shrieks and the sound of chairs flying backwards filled the air; I turned round just in time to see the centrepiece of their meal - a crab - making a break for freedom across the table. The women were shouting (but laughing) as the young waiter came ambling over to try and catch the crab, which had launched itself off the table altogether and was attempting to scuttle across the tiles to safety. The young fella got down on his hands and knees and returned triumphant, crab in hand, just as his dad - the chef - appeared to apologise, explain and grab the plucky crustacean to return it to the kitchen.

Reading between the lines & fluent foreign language, it would appear that the wife / head waitress had scooped up the crab to finish the dish, assuming it cooked. As the husband / chef pointed out - and as was evident when he returned with our hero - still steaming from his hot bath - 5 minutes later, a cooked crab looks completely different to a raw (or indeed, "live") one.

There's something about the atmosphere in the place and the general friendliness and openness we experienced from everyone all weekend that I would use that story as part of a recommendation to visit la Bolee Normande if you're ever in Trouville; the same goes for Le Noirot where I showed my cosmopolitan class by ordering salmon in a restaurant renowned for its seafood, yet was treated like a long lost son by the exuberant old head waiter.

Thanks Trouville - you made a nervous boyfriend and the birthday girl very happy indeed.

Rock stars, pop stars & divas

As usual, the arse end of summer has crept up on me unawares, and tomorrow sees my final payday before heading off to the Isle of Wight for Bestival, which somewhat unbelievably all kicks off 3 weeks tomorrow.

I am, of course, bereft of ideas for a costume for the fancy dress day on the Saturday, and am currently trawling the internet looking vainly for inspiration, like a desperate boyfriend in Muji at half past four on Christmas Eve.

The theme is "Rock Stars, Pop Stars & Divas" this year - which leaves the scope pretty wide, but it's proving more difficult that I thought. Apart from the truly iconic stars (yer Elvis's, Michael Jackson's et al), it's potentially difficult to dress as a rock god from yesteryear without just looking like a generic 80s hair-rock legend or a country & western singer. Likewise, take the likes of Boy George & Freddy Mercury out of the pop star equation, and you're left with a lot of formulaic nobodies in the main. Of course, there'll be someone wandering about with 3 packets of Birds Eye burgers defrosting on their person as they 'do' Lady Gaga, but I was hoping for something not immediately obvious (but recognisable) that hopefully half the other festival goers haven't emulated but bettered.

I've settled on two themes of investigation - abstract band references (e.g. putting a palm tree on my head and going as Oasis), or just dressing up as one of my favourite artists from the early-mid 90s, when my consumption of music was at its height.

If nothing else, the last two evenings have been an orgy of nostalgia, with everything from Snow to the Bluetones blasting out to the neighbourhood. At the risk of sounding like an old codger already, we really were spoiled back then in terms of the sheer depth of good tunes. Helped if you were into cheesy dance music followed by Britpop, obviously, which my age ensured I aligned with perfectly.

Taking it back to the old school

The ongoing rioting reminds me of being in Northern Ireland back in the mid-late nineties, when each summer would bring with it the familiar spectre of "Drumcree" and the associated civil disobedience that went with it.

Each year we would be subjected to around a week of riots, with local people rising up against the police in protest at being banned from marching down the Garvaghy Road in Portadown. Unlike London - where the main focus has been on looting shops - the goal was to lock down entrance to, and exit from, key strategic points in the country - be that towns, motorways, ports or airports. The weapon of choice was the petrol bomb & vehicle hijack, allied to the fact that in the majority of cases you didn't have the anonymity afforded to you by the big city - rebel against these people at your peril; hell, you probably recognised them (and they you) even with their faces masked. It had, of course, added significance attached in that it was perceived as being a religious & cultural issue - and woe betide you if you suggested you weren't supporting whoever it was that was taking affirmative action. In Ballymena, they were well served on the main dual carriageway into town, a massive Ford dealership on a hill above the road proving a perfect source for vehicles to roll down to the tarmac and torch.

When I was 17, I helped my sister move back home from university in Warwickshire. My first ever road trip involved a trundle up the M6 in her 12 year old Vauxhall Nova. There was nothing remarkable about the journey up to Stranraer, but the radio was keeping us abreast of developments back home. When we got to the ferry they confirmed that the road to the port of Larne - our destination - had been barricaded by Loyalists, and no one was getting in or out. 

When we docked, imagine our surprise therefore to see our parents waiting for us. Somehow my dad had talked his way through the barricade, where the local "commander" had allegedly not only allowed him to pass through, but had also guaranteed he could get back out once he had collected us. Quite how he'd come to this arrangement, I don't know and if I'm honest don't want to, although I do retain a degree of intrigue and respect for the fact he plied his trade across the rural wilds of Northern Ireland as a salesman throughout some of the darkest periods of the troubles.

We travelled in convoy back up the deserted road from the port, hazard lights flashing as instructed to announce our arrival, only to reach the blockade (a hijacked articulated lorry turned sideways across the dual carriageway) and discover "our man" was no longer there. His replacement knew of no arrangement to let us through, and we were forced to return sheepishly to the port and spend an uncomfortable night with the rest of the ferry passengers, trying to sleep in the food court on plastic moulded seats.

Around 5am, word reached the terminal that a route may be open up the coast road towards Glenarm. Some discussion and decision amongst a discrete group of passengers later and we were slipping into our cars in the early morning sunlight. My dad somehow emerged as the ringleader once again, and he and mum headed up the convoy as we quietly eased out of the port and turned towards the back roads along the shoreline. My sister and I followed in the Nova, followed by a couple of other cars who were willing to take the risk to get back home.

It was an incredibly surreal experience - the watery daylight, the early hour, picking our way round and through still-smouldering car shells in the middle of the road. At any moment, I expected to round a corner and be confronted by a group of men in balaclavas - but it never happened. It seems that, wherever the intelligence came from, we had timed it perfectly to coincide with the night shift heading home to get a few hours kip. Eventually, after around 30 minutes, we turned left, tooted the horn in solidarity with the cars heading further north, and rose into the hills to head back towards home.

A few years later I was working for Belfast International Airport during my summer holidays from uni. My shifts started at 6am, and I remember plotting my route to avoid the roadblocks based on the information available at the time (as a rule of thumb, "take the most remote roads you can find"). I found myself high on the side of a hill overlooking the plain on which Antrim & Ballymena nestle, and remember just looking down through the mist at fires burning across the countryside - I could spot at least ten spots where burning barricades were clearly blocking access on the main roads. 

Its weird - at the time it was just something you dealt with and were used to. Guys I knew at the airport had tales of previous years where they'd had to stay overnight at work because there was no way in or out. They ended up at the airport hotel having a by-all-accounts raucous party with some stranded air hostesses. Every cloud, and all that.

Riots in London

I was planning on posting something about our trip to France for J's birthday. Instead, I've got BBC News 24 playing in the background as pictures of Lewisham, Peckham, Hackney & Croydon ablaze fill the screen and news of trouble spreading to Birmingham filters through.

Tonight's rioting has even overshadowed what the shitty state of affairs bestowed on my adopted home town of Brixton last night. That it has spilled over into a 3rd successive night of violence ensures the whole thing is taking on a somewhat surreal quality. The news earlier reminded me of that bit in Shaun of the Dead where Huw Edwards is giving out official advice on how to cope with zombie attacks.

As I speak, Clapham Junction is overrun with jumped-up little vandals grabbing as much loot as they can from destroyed shop fronts - it tells you all you need to know that Currys & JD Sports are emptied whilst Waterstones remains unscathed.

This is my home. I've lived in Brixton for 8 years. That's a quarter of my life. The only place I've lived in longer is my childhood house. Apart from travelling across the river to work each day, my entire life is strung out in a roughly straight line across South London. Brixton in particular is that rare beast - a real community within central London, a fact borne out by the wealth of responses to last night's events on social networking sights and traditional news channels. All had the same message - that this is a vibrant community and a great place to live, and we're not going to let a few hooligans destroy that.

The people that looted our hood last night were not doing so to protest against anything. It wasn't a demonstration. It was just a focussed attempt to rob as much free shit as possible from the companies that have put their faith and money behind the regeneration of Brixton over the last few years. In 2009 the place was wobbling - Woolies was lying empty as were numerous other prime shop units, and the only businesses that seemed to want to come down to SW9 were Poundland and its imitators.

But then something changed. Windrush Square was redeveloped. H&M and T Mobile took over the old Woolworths building. Brixton's heart had a new look and was a genuinely pleasant place to inhabit. What will the little looting pricks have achieved if they drive those businesses out? There's a difference between gentrification and regeneration - naturally the former will leave the 'real residents' of Brixton feeling alienated and pushed out, and it will rob the place of its unique character. The squat evictions from Clifton Mansions on Coldharbour Lane were a case in point the other week, and it may well be the death knell for the community and atmosphere if the focal point of that most Brixton of streets becomes some yuppie apartment complex.

But regeneration is different. It gives an area a new focus & pride, attracts investment, makes people happy to live where they do. That's what Brixton has got in the last couple of years and that is what a crowd of 200 teenagers may have sacrificed in return for a free iPad and a pair of Nike Air Max last night. It's like they actually want to drive these businesses out so they can live in a ghetto and have something to justify their outlook on life.

The fact that I, and so many 'non-Brixtonites' like me feel so upset at the sights that greeted us in central Brixton this morning, means that we may just be able to stop them achieving their aim. I've been here 8 years. I am a Brixtonite. And apparently I care a damn sight more about it than a hell of a lot of people born and raised within swaggering distance.

Bonne anniversaire, mon petite filous

I'm a crispy husk of a man sat before you, after a drunken night at Mango Landin', south Brixton's finest Caribbean-themed pub, saw us usher in J's 30s in some style. Everyone was incredibly generous and on top form, and we eventually made it to bed around 4am. There was only one thing for it yesterday - a hair of the dog and a burritto to soak up the excesses of the night before. Unfortunately, one hair turned into the drinking equivalent of a blocked plughole, and before I knew it we'd been in the pub for 5 hours - or more precisely, been in the beer garden sunshine for 5 hours.

I'm itchy, dehydrated and stingy all over today, which compounded my misery at work after the usual rubbish attempts at a night's sleep on a Sunday. The only thing keeping me going is the knowledge that it's a 4 day week for me this week; we're off to Normandy on Friday for the extended birthday celebrations.

I'd never heard of Trouville-sur-mer until I googled 'best mussels in northern France' (J's proposal to help us choose where to go), and this small fishing village popped up. A token attempt to research the place later, and I've discovered it's actually pretty famous as being the location for one of Monet's most famous paintings. "The Beach at Trouville", shown above, hangs in the National Gallery in London.

Relaxation is the order of the weekend, and we have our fingers crossed for sunshine. If not though, it'll give me the perfect opportunity to drag J along to see the Bayeux tapestry - something that mesmerised me at the age of about 11, but which I have to confess I'd kind of forgotten about in the past 20 years. Means nothing to J, of course, and trying to explain it to her is similar to her trying to get me all worked up over Grunwald. But I will, hopefully, be able to get along to see it and relive my childhood imagination of the Norman conquest.

Happy birthday J

Tomorrow, my lovely girlfriend Justyna turns 30. I remember when we first met, it seemed so far away - she was a young whipper-snapper of 25 and even I still had a year of my twenties left. Yet here we are, in 2011, still going strong and the big day upon us.

Alas, nearly 5 years of build up has not helped me think of the perfect present for her. 30 is significant; I wanted to make sure I bought something really fitting. Of course, this has translated into me spending the past 2 months stressing about it without actually coming up with an idea for what that might be. I feel shit but didn't want to buy some sort of tat for the sake of it. I'm hoping she's not too disappointed and we can go shopping together at the weekend, or when we're in France for a birthday long weekend towards the end of the month. It just sucks that she won't have anything from me to open, and I know I won't help matters by constantly going on about it - so even if she isn't bothered at first, she will be after me moaning about how crap I am for a couple of hours.

We are, at least, going out for dinner tomorrow, to a small but highly rated restaurant nearby. The menu changes every couple of weeks, but limits itself to a couple of options - you pretty much get what you're given. I hope, for both our sakes, it's at least an improvement on J's birthday meal last year, when we had crossed from the Ukraine into Russia and found a hotel on the outskirts of Rostov-na-Donu. Even then, I had big plans of flamboyant gestures and a luxury hotel room for the night (scuppered when the best hotel in town advised that yes, they had rooms available, but unfortunately no hot water). What I treated her to was a room underneath a raucous wedding reception, and a trip in the dark to a nearby shop to buy bread, cheese and beer due to the hotel kitchen being closed. She didn't complain though.

Justyna cuts some birthday bread with my multi-tool, in our Rostov hotel room

Happy birthday J - even though I'm rubbish at showing it, you make me the happiest guy in the world.

If you see slightly ugly looking links to another blog like the ones below...

...never fear, it is not spam (at least not by the standard definition - whether or not you class it as such is your prerogative*).

As I mentioned a few weeks back, I've finally got round to starting to blog about the Mongolia trip in more detail  - subtly ignoring the fact that this year's Charity Rally departed on Saturday, meaning I'm over a year behind schedule.

As and when I post something new to Steppe By Steppe, I'll chuck a link on here in case anyone fancies a gander.



*if for nothing else, at least Bobby Brown should feel proud that he has ensured a generation of pop fans can now spell the word 'prerogative' without need for consultation of spell checker.

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The Personal Best Brigade

Gordon, Murray and I post-race

The British 10K

So, the British 10K is done and dusted, and I sit here smugly in possession of a new Personal Best, a mere 5 years after setting the benchmark with my first ever attempt at running a race.

I was seriously starting to become concerned that my steady decline into old age was irreversible, but a few decent training runs had given me a smidgeon of hope that I may be able to potter round in a decent time. Having completed the Homecoming Scotland Run in Central Park exactly 3 months beforehand, I also knew that I was coming into this race having begun training with a greater level of fitness than ever before.

The pressure was on, then, and I was determined to give it my best shot. I simultaneously impressed myself with my willpower and bored my friends with my sober 'banter' over the course of 3 non-drinking hours in the pub on Saturday; a tagliatelle-loading session and restless night's sleep later, I woke at 06:30 on Sunday morning ready to go. It was slightly odd, getting up at that time on a Sunday, although somewhat fitting given that exactly a year previously we had wakened at roughly the same time - albeit in a Renault Kangoo, in a car park in Bruges.

Having arrived only slightly late at the bag drop near the Mall, I met up with fellow competitors Gordon and Murray, and we made our way to the start line - via a potential collective act of treason as a lack of loos forced us to use Green Park for pre-race slashes. I remembered the melee over the first few kilometres in 2008 - comparatively narrow streets combined with no pace-determined starting slots mean it's a free for all until the race reaches Embankment. We elbowed and sneaked our way as close to the front of the expectant participants as we could.

In bright sunshine, and only half an hour late, we were off. I knew I'd gone too quickly almost immediately, but in homage to that afternoon's Formula 1 British Grand Prix, I was doing my utmost to out-drag as many people as possible before the first corner. Gordon, who was aiming for sub-45 minutes, went with me, and we swapped our own personal lead a few times in the sprint to the first kilometre marker. 

As usual, there was the usual collection of panting chunkers walking before we even passed the 1 KM sign - yep, they'd paid their money (or committed to their charity), but apparently not even bothered training enough to be able to jog 1,000 metres. Seriously. Why? You're putting yourself through, I assume, several hours of humiliation and discomfort, and pissing off everyone else who has made an effort and now has to run at 90 degree angles to try and avoid you strolling down the middle of the course.

As it was, Gordon made better use of the pavement & traffic islands than I did, and as we approached the 2km mark he was stretching ahead of me. I let him go - there's no way I could have maintained that pace and come home in under 45 minutes. After he disappeared I settled into a decent enough rhythm, although when my legs started to feel fatigued by the time we reached the turn at Blackfriars (around 4km in) I knew I was going to regret caning it in the early stages. Thankfully I was still able to maintain a steady pace and dodge the flood of urine in the underpass, as guys made use of the temporary respite from spectator-lined streets to relieve themselves.

I was doing ok until around 6.5km, when I became convinced that I'd clearly missed the 7km sign as I "must have passed it ages ago". To my despair, it slowly came into view as I lurched round a tree-lined corner; thankfully by that point Big Ben was also in sight and I knew that in 20 minutes it would all be over - if I only kept going and didn't listen to my legs which came closer than they ever have done before to convincing my brain that no one would mind if we just, y'know; stopped for a bit.

Westminster bridge. 8km. The majestic Gothic splendour of the Houses of Parliament forming a fittingly grand backdrop for a souvenir photo as we ran past. Alas, by that point I'd been shuffling on empty for over a mile and await with dread the results of the numerous photographers' efforts appearing on marathon-photo.com. Mind you, I think Murray's portfolio may turn out worse, given he accidentally blew a bubble of snot out of his nose as he attempted to smile for the camera on the way past.

Entering Parliament Square, I allowed myself a small smile; it was nearly over, given the finish was in Whitehall. Imagine my surprise and disgust, then, as we took the second exit from the roundabout rather than the fourth, and found ourselves trudging towards Victoria, for what felt like an eternity. I wasn't expecting this, as they've either changed the course since 2008 or I'd been fondly recalling it minus the shit bits. Eventually the turn came and I was heading back towards Whitehall, dreading there might be a final twist in the course.

I hadn't been checking my time as I ran - if I was ahead of schedule I didn't want to get stressed about seeing it through, whereas if I was behind I knew I had no more in the tank to raise my game. I adopted the tactic of pushing myself as hard as I could at each point in the race, without overdoing it to the point where I had to stop. Imagine my joy, then, as I rounded the corner and saw the finish line in the distance, and the glorious big old-school yellow clock, ticking its way past 56 minutes. My slowest ever time, recorded in New York, was 57 & a bit, and I knew if I made it over the line before then I was guaranteed to have done at least better than that. I also knew it had taken us a fair (if indeterminate) amount of time to get over the start line in the first place, and started to think it might be worth trying to speed up a wee bit.

I busted a gut along the final 400 metres, legs wobbling akimbo, and virtually collapsed over the finish line whilst reaching for the pause button on my Nikeplus. As I stumbled towards the water stattion I was just happy just to have made it without stopping - then I looked at the time. 49:25. Almost two minutes faster than I'd ever gone before and under the 50 minute barrier that I'd started to think was mythical (for me, at least). The official time has since rounded me up to 49:35, which is a little annoying, but nonetheless a still Personal Best by a significant distance.

Happy Days! I'm starting the think there may be merit in the whole "you can achieve anything as long as you try hard enough" school of thought.

The above graph is how my Nikeplus saw it - pretty consistent, despite what my legs were yelling at me as we cruised along beside the Thames with all the grace and pace of a pontoon barge. As usual, the uncallibrated piece of plastic has diddled me out of the majority of the last kilometre, albeit it is closer to the correct distance than some of my training runs.

The final point of note is that I didn't at any point feel like having a celebratory cigarette, thus bringing to a close one of the less sensible rituals I've adopted in life and opening up the possibility of a fag-free future. Didn't stop me dreaming about smoking last night though. The obligatory sweaty photo with post-race grin was taken, and will be posted tomorrow.

And Gordon & Murray? Both also got personal bests, and both also achieved their aim. Gordon came home in a sterling sub-45 minutes, whilst Murray destroyed his previous best by 3 minutes (and his best training time by 15) to scrape the top edge of the hour mark, finishing in around 62 minutes.

We earned our beers yesterday afternoon - all 5 of them.

Not sure if baked bean loading is known for improving performance

But I'm giving it a go. Big race tomorrow! The nerves are starting. Ordinarily i'd have a wee beer to calm myself, but am settling for lucozade sport instead. Not quite the same.

Rawhide

Wind-down to the British 10K on Sunday is officially on. I did another 10.1km training run on Monday night round Clapham, in a respectable 51 mins, and followed it up with a cheeky wee 5.5-er this evening round 2 laps of the park, breaking the 30 minute barrier for the first time in years in the process.

I'm feeling in pretty good shape, all things considered. Apart from the thigh chafe. Something has happened to my legs - they've got chunkier or I've started running like a constipated penguin. Whatever the reason, as proven tonight, I can't even do a 30 minutes without lycra if I don't want to be walking like John Wayne for two days afterwards. Don't know which is the worse image - me in lycra shorts, or with red raw inner thighs. Can post some photos if you ask nicely to help you decide.

I was thinking back to my preparation for the last race as I tootled round the park this evening, and recalled that the Wednesday before the Scotland Run, I spent the evening getting soggy at Yankee stadium followed by drunk in the East Village, before walking approximately 20 miles a day for the next 3 days as we sight-saw all of Manhattan (in some cases more than once). I'm revelling in the fact I can do virtually no exercise now until Sunday, sleep loads and focus on stocking up on pasta. Less so, the 'not being in New York' part.

Congrats to Gav & Imogen

Huge congratulations to one of my best & oldest friends, Gav, who this evening is sitting somewhere in New York City with the weary grin of a boy who has just become a man.

Earlier today, his new son finally decided to make an appearance - only a week and a bit late. News from across the pond is that mum Imogen is somewhat exhausted but otherwise in fine fettle, as is Junior. No name as yet, apparently - I had to resist the temptation to suggest my own unwieldy moniker, despite the fact it would clearly set the young lad up for a lifetime of success and fame.

Gav & Imogen were amazing hosts during our recent trip to NYC and the joy of sprogdom couldn't happen to two nicer people. We could tell when we were over just how great a family the three of them are going to make.

In a true demonstration of the sacrifices I'm willing to make for friendship, I've offered to babysit if required. Any excuse to get back to Brooklyn.

1 week to the British 10K

Rather impressively, I avoided boozing to go straight home on Friday after work, and went for a run. Almost as impressively, I thought I was taking it pretty easy but ended up doing 3 laps of the park / 8.5km in around 46 minutes, which is a fair pace, especially given the massive hill I had to wheeze up 3 times.

I don't feel particularly fit - I've a sharp pain in my chest at times that feels like I've been smoking too much; and still get out of breath quite quickly - but I seem to be faster at running than I was (I just get the same amount of knackered going fast as I did going slow). I'm not sure if the non-smoking has much to do with it - my 'quitting' iPhone app reckons my lungs are pretty much still as bad as ever - but if nothing else I'm pleased that this will be the first  race I've done where I haven't been a practising smoker at the time. Even before the Reading half marathon last year, I fell off the wagon about 3 weeks before the race.

I'm now off the patches again, having only had one slip up during the 10 weeks of the programme (a sly cig with Jimeoin a couple of months ago). I don't feel particularly 'non-smoky' at the moment, but I have survived 5 days and one weekend without nicotine and the cravings haven't really been noticeable. I can quite easily imagine myself enjoying a cigarette, and that's the sort of mental effect it's having on me at the moment - I don't so much crave smoking, as suddenly think it looks like the most relaxing and enjoyable thing I could possibly do. I'm still managing to remind myself of the more minging aspects of it (coughing up phlegm and the like), so for now, I'm holding off on a relapse.

It does, however, mean that the British 10K will hopefully be the first race I've ever done which hasn't been celebrated with a post-finish fag. I'll survive.

perhaps I spoke too soon

Huzzah! Perhaps my endemic pessimism has been misplaced once more?! Having had the weekend off exercise yet again, I decided to go out for a bit of a run tonight on flatter ground than I've been used to, if only so I could cover more distance. It gets a bit boring doing the same route time after time as well, so I decided to run up to Clapham Common via the delights of Kings Avenue & the South Circular, do a lap with all the hardcore joggers, and head back to Brixton through the back streets.

It's a route I followed many times whilst training for the Reading Half marathon last year, and it was nice to be back. I went out reasonably quickly but was struggling badly by the time I got to the turn for home at the top of Battersea Rise - the remaining minutes were spent doing a weird kind of "50s dance move" action with my legs as I tried to struggle home.

I'd mapped out the run on Nike's website before I left, so knew it was about 9.9km - in fact, as I have just discovered, it was actually 10.1km due to my meandering attempts to cross Brixton Hill during rush hour traffic. Ignoring the fact that my woefully inaccurate Nikeplus chip chose to knock a full 1.2km of the distance it reckons I ran - over 10 PERCENT of my total distance - I'm focusing instead on the time.

50 minutes 37 seconds. For a full 10k! Wahoo! My aim for the race in two weeks was to try and better my fastest ever run, which was 51.11 in my first ever 10k (almost 5 years ago - shudder). I'd sort of given up on it though, as my training has been disjointed, not unlike my knees. I figured get round, and try and sign up for another one towards the end of the summer when I've new trainers and no shin splints.

But maybe. Just maybe. I can do it!

.....ah, forget it, I've no energy to think of a title

I write this with some difficulty, given my arm is stuck to the computer desk. I think it may have melted. After no summer to speak of so far, Mother Nature appears to have accidentally leaned against the thermostat after one too many sherries and south London has turned tropical.

We were promised a thunderstorm to dispel this two-day heatwave, but it has yet to arrive. It's pretty damn unbearable, made all the worse by my aversion to mosquitoes (or rather, their attraction to me). I'm too scared of getting exposed wobbly bits munched during the night to leave the window open.

The British 10K is in less than two weeks, but I've not done any training since Thursday. I was supposed to go tonight, but any thoughts of bettering my fastest time are pretty much done and dusted for another event, and I'm buggered if I'm risking heat exhaustion by trudging round the park in this weather. In more exciting run-related news, I have progressed to the point of emailing Runners Need to find out if I can just rock up to get some gait analysis done and finally, after 5 years, buy the right trainers. I also got an email from New York Road Runners this evening offering me some discount merchandise - although quite why they feel I need a "skort" is anyone's guess. Perhaps they've heard about my tendency to accidentally purchase women's sportswear, which has seen me return home over the years with a tennis skirt from 'Style 'N' Sport' in Ballymena (thought it was a pair of swimming shorts - in the 90s both were fashioned from the same acryllic shell suit material) and some ladies running shorts (in the wrong section in TK Maxx a few weeks ago; I didn't check the label, except to see the word 'large').

We've escaped the city for the weekend and I'm writing this in the sunshine outside my sister's house in the Cotswolds. A lamb roast is in the oven, as we await the return of her husband Chris from sheep-shearing duty. In the absence of tractors or landrovers coming up the lane, the scene makes me feel like we've gone back in time to the 18th century - half expecting a horse-drawn hay cart to appear around the corner at any moment.






















Nostalgia for this time last year is in full effect - 365 days ago we were recovering from our pre-rally leaving party at the Prince Albert, and had just booked our tickets home from Ulaanbaatar. Am insanely jealous of everyone heading east in a couple of weeks, even moreso as they're launching from Horse Guards Parade this year, rather than Woburn Safari Park. Who knows, we might even have turned up on time if we'd left from central London!

Off my Feis

Right - first things first - the Supajam offer was entirely genuine and we got in to the Feis on Saturday with absolutely no trouble. Fair play to them - considering there were allegedly 500 tickets, the queue we were in had what appeared to be a couple of thousand in it by the time we arrived. But they didn't seem to be arguing - my friend's bar code had apparently 'already been used', but his name matched the barcode so in he came.

The event itself was enjoyable enough, from what I remember. The rain was sporadic, the food was tasty, the bands were enthusiastic and the people were friendly. I suppose it's somewhat inevitable that at a festival which is essentially 40,000 Irish people in a confined space, some drink would also be taken.

It's pretty clear I overdid it, even if I don't know exactly how it happened. Suffice to say I returned to my concerned girlfriend several hours behind schedule, having done a few laps of central London, and spent yesterday suffering through the hangover from hell. Chuck in a horrendous night's sleep last night, and at work today I was rough, sweaty and miserable, staring at my computer screen and barely uttering a word.

Tonight when I got home, I still had a sense of being drained, but alongside it was a weird recollection that this is what my Mondays always used to feel like. Waking up with "The Fear" on a Sunday morning; tossing and turning on a Sunday night; tolerating work on a Monday and resolving not to drink until at least the weekend again.

I don't know when it happened, but this isn't me any more. And this evening, I am incredibly grateful for that. The weekend served as a timely reminder of how life used to be, before I calmed down and grew up (a bit). I still get drunk regularly - I'm no poster boy for a healthy lifestyle - and I thought I still feel rough most weekends. I now realise I don't - I've just adjusted my tolerance levels in light of my reduced wastery.

So, in hindsight, thanks Supajam, for reminding me that I no longer want to be a pisshead stumbling round London after an all day drinking session. Or, for that matter, forking out £35 in a taxi ride home after a couple of fruitless attempts to negotiate public transport ended in fiasco. Every cloud, and all that...