We had a good time yesterday. My parents, aunt and sister landed at 6:55am and then took nearly two hours to clear immigration. There was the announcement "Due to heightened security, passengers holding an EEC or non-British passport are experiencing severe delays of up to two hours" which I thought was a fat load of good. After all, the London bombers all held British passports. Barking up the wrong tree again. We met my uncle, who also decided a long time ago that London, not the far east, was the place for him - he works as concierge in one of the central London hotels. There was a problem with their room - the previous guest was room-squatting and refusing to move out - which meant we had to wait a bit. Even my uncle was angry, and I've always known him to be easygoing. Oh well, it meant a bit more rest time for the people who endured a 13-hour flight, a 7-hour time difference and airline food. My dad slept like he'd just done an Ironman.

We had lunch at a Chinese restaurant and in the evening we were supposed to go out again, but my uncle bailed out on us. "Top prize at bingo is a Mercedes and I've got to be there to claim it!" So from "banquet" they were reduced to my pasta with spinach and asparagus. My sister opted for microwaveable fried rice. My aunt proclaimed that the pasta was "nice, very nice taste" before dousing five sachets of ketchup on it. Go figure.

They're coming over here today. Picture opportunities abound. My dad's the Canon sniper, and maybe I'll be able to post some in the next few days.

Meet the Parents

Busy day today. We went to renew our contract for the place in the morning and then it's just been tidying up and getting ready for the parents to arrive. It's been a little stressful but I'm dealing with it okay, I guess.

I'll have to try to fit it some runs and weights during the next week while they're here doing a bit of sightseeing. Unfortunately none of my family fancies running, let alone running around central London. "If you do that near a tube station, you might find the coppers after you and get five shots to the head!"

I feel better today. I still went to bed late last night at 2:30am and got up at 8. I watched the tape of Frasier for the third time in two days. Sixteen hours of sleep over three days. Getting better.

Went for an easy run today, slightly quicker than 8 mins/mile. It was drizzling but I thought if I'm going to have any chance of keeping up my fitness over the winter I'd better start getting used to it. I completed 10K in 48:40 and was pleased with that. Pleased with the physical effort, and more pleased that I had it mentally.

Went shopping in the morning. Got a pair of shoes - very nice and affordable, and a couple of shirts.

I'll keep today's blog short to stay off the comp.

Depressed and Trying

So far this week I've only done a run, and that was yesterday morning. It was only twenty minutes before everyone else awoke, so nothing much. Tonight I'll try to squeeze in some weights and pressups while watching the swimming on TV. It goes on until 1am.

Kate's gone up to visit her little nephew until Thursday, so today I did the housework in preparation for the other set of future in-laws (i.e. hers, my parents) to arrive this weekend. The kitchen is spick and span. I know my mother, so that took me two hours. Tomorrow it is me versus the rest of the house, and then some shopping, stuff for the wedding etc.

Yesterday was a bit of a down day, really. After everyone had left at 11 I spent a lot of time on the computer (now repaired) looking for rowing pictures. I don't row but I admire the discipline of rowers who are up early on a cold winter's morning to do sprints on the river. I also got some pictures of other things I am interested in - goaltenders, catchers, military stuff, triathlon etc and sent them off for printing. UK readers - may I recommend www.truprint.co.uk for digital pictures. They're generally quite quick to do them. Apparently Kate's dad knew someone who uploaded pictures on a Sunday afternoon and got them with Monday's post. Sunday afternoon!

The rest of yesterday was spent mucking around on the computer. As I've mentioned in a previous post, I have two weeks off in Easter and about six over the summer, so I wanted to hunt around online to find some teaching then. I was also looking for work to do during half terms, when we get a week's break during term, as I am on hourly pay. We're looking around for property as well, so guess what else I mouseclicked for yesterday?

My mood yesterday was still spoilt by what happened on Sunday afternoon. Basically my future father-in-law was very critical, unnecessarily so, about a few issues and I had to bite my tongue on those occasions to avoid spoiling the peace. But I felt afterwards that I had not stood up for myself and lost a bit of self-respect. It's a bit of a difficult line to draw - having to balance retorting with biting my tongue - but my stand on that is that people should never put others in that position. That would be a lack of class. When I'm teaching in schools I know I wield authority over the children but I never abuse that. Anyway, I was quite fed up also and couldn't get to sleep on Sunday night. In anger I wrote the beginning of this fictional story:

Everyone has left. It is time to begin my cleansing. As expected, the glass shatters on impact. The main piece - cracked, jagged edges - bounces off the couch onto the floor while the little ones scatter in every direction. I was aiming for his mouth. I visualize him stopping in mid-sentence, the lower part of his face a complete mess of beard, glass and red. That will shut you up, I think. "Are you alright, dad?" She casts me a disbelieving look. Not the wife, though - she is concerned but makes no effort to help. She gives me the I've-had-thirty-years-of-this-shit look.

That's how it would have unfolded. Yes, that's I would have wished it to. Instead the only thing that was cut twelve hours ago was my tongue. Mute. Responseless. Coward. I feel partially appeased now. The biggest piece of glass draws a line of red from my index finger as I examine it. Damn. The bastard's still trying to get me. He won't rest until he's bled me dry. I see his face, smirk superimposed on wall. I create more fragments from that piece. Then I choose the biggest of what's left and do it over again and again.

Anyway, I've entered ramble mode. Monday in a nutshell: Too much time wasted on surfing, bad mood, miss my fiancee, training - short, diet - shot. I watched series one of Frasier, then went to bed at 3am and got up at 7 today. That's ten hours sleep over two days, but I still remember enough about life in the mortar platoon to know that's nothing to complain about. We had eight hours total in that last week.

I've spent some time writing other short stories this week and will post them after they have been judged.

Tomorrow's targets
Do a short run and weights
Do the shopping
Spend less time on the computer
Get the housework sorted out
Get myself sorted out

I don't think I'll be able to better my 5K time as yet, as I had intended to, but it's not a big deal to me. All my fastest times to date, posted on the right, were achieved last month on relatively little training. I can only improve.

Still, I feel like I'm in a funk and just need to snap out of it.

Over here in Pom land, there was another bomb incident in London. Four people tried to duplicate the July 7th incident, but the bombs failed to go off. Yesterday a man was shot dead in another related incident. Still, as one friend puts it in perspective, "Now you have a sniff of what it's like to live in Gaza."

After Thursday's run my back felt horribly misaligned, as if I was favouring the left side. More stretching and lying down required, I think.

The soon-to-be in-laws are arriving at noon today so I'll try to sneak in a quick run. Check out my cuff links which came today:

In terms of cardio, I've been more deskbound than trying these past few days. I spent most of my days since the last post surfing at the library, trying to find some work for over the holidays. I get two weeks off in December, three weeks over Easter and nearly six in the summer, and I don't get paid for these, so it's important for me to find things to do - obviously I'm not going to be able to do anything this summer, but I want to get sorted out for next year. When I'm sitting around not having anything to do, work-wise, I get a little frustrated because I feel I'm wasting my time. I could be earning but am mucking around. I could use the time wisely and run, of course, but I do like my runs as an pleasurable alternative treat to work, and sometimes when I haven't worked hard enough during the day I don't feel I can indulge in that. Weird, yes.

Anyway, I've got some idea of what to do over the Easter and Summer breaks after looking at the websites of some summer schools. I would also like to find more stuff that I can do in my free time, so I'm still on the hunt...

Got my run for the day in. I was lucky enough that I saw the warden unlocking one of the gates at 6:30 - usually it's not open until 7-ish. The sun was rising, the weather was nice and cool, and for a while while the warden went around unlocking the rest of the gates I felt like the whole park was mine. I did an easy 30 minutes at about 75%MHR, finishing with some sprints at the end. Absolute heaven.

We've had a bit of a social weekend really, and a bit more time to spend with each other than we normally do, now that term is over and all that. Met our wedding singers on Sunday for lunch, and in the evening there was an Alexander Technique party that we went to. I'm not much of a talker, but it was nice to be able to put faces to names.

Had a sort through on Monday, so our place is a lot tidier. The challenge for me is to keep it that way until the first week of August! Usually my room is littered with running kit, clothes that need to be ironed or folded away, and work stuff piled higher than the pyramids of Giza.

My parents are coming! The exclamation is more of worry than excitement. I haven't seen them for over two years, and things are going to be awkward. We share different philosophies about life, and they sometimes see it as their parental duty to tell me what to do, and in a way try to control my life. It's hard for me to tell my parents not to be nosy without being rude. I get quite flustered when they talk to me like the kids they used to teach and expect that their will for my life be done.

I've been hunting for some gear so I can keep up with training over the winter. Many thanks to Wil for the link - got some ideas of what to get. Some of the stuff over the Atlantic is less expensive than what we've got over here, even when postage is included.

Did some weights over the weekend, but I think I overdid the pressups really. I was too concerned with meeting the numbers - should have paid more attention to form.

Just the usual training over the next few days in my aim to achieve a better 5K time before the end of this month.

A simple 5 rounds around the park in 26 minutes flat. I was pleased with how it went, particularly as it felt very easy. I should break my 5K time soon again, and I'll work on that next week.

Finished off with 200 pressups. This weekend is weights weekend.

Kate's concert last night went well. Everyone really enjoyed the pieces and the three singers were applauded even when they came out to meet their friends 5 minutes after the final encores!

It's the last day of term for me today - I've taught my 11 weeks of the Summer Term, and will only have my private students next week. Whoppeee! I've been looking forward to the end of term all this week. Teaching has been a little draining this term, I have to say, and on some days I've got out of bed more excited about running than teaching.

It's a hot, muggy 96-100F day - "cool" by the standards of some of my friends across the Atlantic. Thunderstorms were forecast for today but there seem to be no signs of them yet - in any case, I've already done my run. Got up this morning and did an easy 25 mins, 70%MHR.

I've been thinking about how to maintain a decent level of fitness throughout the winter. One of the things that has come to mind is to perhaps do some running on the days I have to get to Bedford before school starts - if I'm getting up earlier to catch the train, then I might as well do some running in the time before lessons start. This means looking for gear to do some cold-weather running in.

Three weeks and a bit to go to the big day!

I've got an unexpectedly free afternoon - it was Sports Day (Sports Afternoon, to be anally exact) at the school I was at today, and my afternoon pupil has cancelled on me, so I expect to either be pounding the tarmac or spending some time on the stepper.

Yesterday I tried a different weight workout just for my right arm. I've got two very light dumbbells, which I can hold together, that weigh only ten pounds. I did a variety of bicep curls, tricep kickbacks, dumbbell presses, lateral raises, tricep presses, all with a variety of speeds - fast, medium, slow (10 seconds on the concentric movement and another 10 on the eccentric). I spent about 10 minutes in all just working the right arm, doing anything possible to keep it working. The verdict on that, the day after, is that while I haven't resorted to using my other hand to write like I thought I might have had to, it certainly adds variety to the training. I'll try that with the other arm today.

Tomorrow is back to Poor Attendance School again for the second time this week. I'll grab a book now while I'm at the library, I suppose!

Ran for 30 minutes on a different route, but apart from that, this morning has been pretty much a waste of time. I went to the school with poor attendance and boy, the pupils didn't disappoint. Instead of teaching keyboard, I spent most of the time reading a book by an RAF pilot who was in action during WWII. It's called "First Light", but I call it "Accelerated Puberty". It's subtitled "The Story of a Boy who became a Man in the skies above Britain".

Weights, stretches and the usual stuff. Next run is Wednesday.

Another 5 laps around the park this morning. The weather was nice and cool, and there were few people around. I ran at a fairly relaxed pace, about 75%MHR, but did not watch my lap times. I could have done more but decided against it. At this stage my aim is to run regularly and build up a base, rather than speed or distance, I didn't want to run 20K or a fast 5K and then use it as an excuse to take an extra day off.

I've nearly come to the end of the first week of the "Life without a Home Computer" programme, which my computer enrolled me in. I've found that, despite having to trek to the library to use the computers there (as it happens, I've needed to do that all this week), I've actually gained more time in my life. I don't spend time on the computer unnecessarily, and having to do everything I need to in that free one hour time limit I'm allowed on their computers has made me prioritize and forced me to use my time more wisely. It's hard though - there are many blogs I like to read! Yesterday (no teaching) I had more time than I knew what to do with. After doing the housework and all I had some time to sit down, relax and read. Today and the next few days, even with school, it will be the same - so I will use it more wisely to plan ahead for the next term. I suppose if you have all this time with not much to do, the best thing you can do is to use it wisely, and to create more time in the future.

Final thoughts for the day: Over 50 dead, 700 injured. Think of those many more bodies that still lie on the tracks, waiting to be recovered. And spare a few moments to think of the affected families who will have to live with the pain for the rest of their lives. Think of the families who still have to live with the "not knowing". Then get on with your life. Let us get on with things, yes, but not get on with life so quickly that events become a mere insignificant one-millisecond blip on the radar.

Plenty of ranting in this one

It’s been a bit of a strange week, really. And I’m not talking so much about the lack of a computer than about the events of the week. On Wednesday I spent the afternoon lamenting the fact that London had been awarded the 2012 Olympics. I can hear the shock and screams of surprise – “WHAT!! Surely it’s good news to you, Mr TryAthlete!” The sporty (if you can call it that) bit in me is delighted, but the cynic resents the inevitable tax hikes exerted on Londoners in order to pay for the Olympics. If the scrooge in me is going to be forced to cough up money, then it’d better be for a good cause, like to alleviate poverty in Africa. It’s strange really – last weekend we had the Live8 concerts and a blitzkrieg of TV ads and programmes highlighting poverty in Africa. “Just £1 will pay for medical treatment for a week for an Aids sufferer.” Then what happens? “Oh, screw it, we’ll make every London household contribute £240 to pay for 16 days of games.” Somebody do the Maths. Helping to alleviate a lifetime of poverty and suffering, or 16 days of sports? Much as I like my sports, I’d rather have used the money more wisely. I guess when the emotional talk about helping Africa dies down, people return back to their normal ambivalence.

All these talk of Olympics, of course, pales in comparison to the events of the past 24 hours. Yesterday while at work I had a call from Kate to see if I was OK, and informing me about the tragedies. 4 bombs, 3 on tube trains, and one that blew out the roof of a bus. The death toll is still mounting and even as I type this, the day after, they’re still talking about dead bodies that need to be retrieved from the tunnels at Kings Cross, from where I take the train to teach in Bedford. I'm relieved I wasn't anywhere in the vicinity even though I live in London, and thankfully Kate had got off the tube and got in to her school before the bomb on that first train went off. I'm angry - angry at the people that did it. I can imagine the people who were responsible. They must be monitoring the news closely and thinking "Yes! We did it!" How they perceive themselves to have done something good befuddles me, but these sad nut cases must find some perverse joy in causing trouble and chaos. At the same time I feel for those who have lost a loved one, because I know the tears could have easily been mine.

The mood today is one of calm; people walking about with the awareness of the previous day’s events, going about their daily activities, but without unnecessary panic. People are saying we need to return to normality and we seem to be doing well at it – but how much of it is really ambivalence? Somehow, I feel that in a few days time, rather sadly, unless you’ve known someone who was tragically hurt, or that you were personally involved, everyone slinks back to ambivalence. "Getting on with things" is our way to mask our ambivalence. How much of the "resilience" and "resolve to get on with things" is "can't be bothered?"

Yes, I did forewarn you I'd be ranting a lot in this post...

Weather's been rainy these past few days and cold by summer standards. I'm still doing my laps around the park and weights and all that, but I'm turning my focus to the months ahead, especially winter, and thinking about how I am going to get some cardiovascular work done.

I'm moody, as you can tell. I did 5 rounds around the park today, but I've still got plenty of anger, mental energy, whatever-you-might-want-to-call-it to burn, so I might return for more. Return to the park and do my laps, try to find that place in my mind where there's some semblance of inner peace in the rhythmic sound of footstep after footstep.

Desperate Withdrawal Symptoms

Argh! Thus begins day 2 of not having a computer at home. Am I managing? Barely. It's become an almost-standard daily routine to turn on the computer to check for mail before leaving for work, and turn it back on after work, that not having one, and having to go someplace else for my internet fix, takes a bit of getting used to. I haven't made a special trip out today - thankfully, one of my students lives near here - but I can envision in the next few days I might have to do so.

The weather's been a bit crap - rainy - and it was raining when I went running yesterday. I might do some time on the stepper tonight because I don't think it's going to be running weather at all tomorrow.

I’ve had a good weekend. On Friday after my run I went and indulged myself at the café around where we live – omelette, chips and salad. Mmm. I haven’t had chips since last August – after a run like that, I felt like I deserved it. We also went to the fair in the park on both Saturday and Sunday and it was nice to get out of the house for a while.

Today it’s just been a simple 20-minute run again. My focus is not to push myself too hard and too fast and burn out, so today I did a few laps around the park just to ease myself back into running.

Our computer at home has gone bust! Apparently there is some conflict on our Norton Antivirus and our screen hangs, even in safe mode, so I can’t even do a system restore. There might be some minor inconvenience, but it’s not all bad. I think there’s something positive to take out of all this – I spend less time on the computer! Perhaps it’s better for me to have to make a 15-minute trip out to the library in town, where I can only surf free for an hour… definitely restricts the time I spend surfing and forces me to do something better with my time! The only problem though is that the library does not have Sibelius, so most of the files I have to use, which are music files, cannot be printed off here. I shall have to write my music on manuscript by hand instead, I suppose.

Next scheduled workouts: Weights and a run on Wednesday.

The PBs just keep coming

It’s been a good day for me today.

I went to the park after a light breakfast of oats and then went running. The weather was cool and there was a slight breeze. My intention was to run and not pay too much attention to lap times, but of course it was going to be unavoidable to sneak glances at my watch to see how I was doing. First lap in 5:00. Second and third laps in 4:45-ish. I wondered if my stopwatch was wrong, but it was fine. The thing is though, I felt comfortable, unlike a few weeks ago when I would definitely feel the effects of a lap run under 5:00. I just carried on running; aiming more to feel relaxed and comfortable than to attempt to cover ground quickly. The long and short of it is that I managed to hold on to this pace with little difficulty. I chalked up a 10K time of 46:45, which is much better than my previous one of 49:54 set about a year ago.

When you’re enjoying the running it’s hard to stop. I carried on running, setting lap targets for myself. Let’s see how much distance I can cover in an hour. Can I maintain the pace for the next lap? Can I walk for a bit, pace myself under 6 minutes but still feel relaxed? The lap times got slower and slower of course, but the mental battle was really in the last two rounds. By that time I was aiming to cover a half-marathon distance, and was reduced to alternately walking and running – more walking than running, I’m afraid, as the last two laps were 7:00-ish and 8:00-ish.

Still, I did the remaining distance in 60:33, so I can happily claim a half marathon time of 1:47:28. Brilliant for a getting-back-to-shape TryAthlete, I think! That beats my time of 2:20 set last year as well by quite a lot.

I was quite cold when I finished though – I think the last of the oats had long vaporized during those two laps before the end. I can understand why elite marathon runners get towels to keep warm when they finish. I had to sit down for a while to regain a wee bit more of my senses and when I got home I was so cold, tired and hungry, I wolfed two big bowls of cereal down – milk dribbling down my chin, that’s how bad it was.

There’s no school today so I’m going to spend the rest of the day catching up on household chores and all that, so we can have more of the weekend together. The steam fair has come to the park (the trailers are all there and set up already), and Kate is eyeing those donuts – we’ll probably make trips out to get them in between sets of Wimbledon finals, like we did last year.

Lessons learnt from my run today? In the past a half-marathon under two hours would have been unthinkable for me, even though I could go under 11K in an hour. Today I just kept going, digging deep, trying to find the willpower to keep encouraging myself to plod along, not to give in to the temptation to stop and give up. There was no one to say “well done” or “keep going” or flash a thumbs up for encouragement. Just me, myself and countless laps around a 3/4 mile loop. Whatever possesses a person to keep going in these circumstances? What can a person draw on in this sort of situation?

Self-belief. Willpower.

I'm glad I had the chance to test myself today, and I'm glad I found it within myself to keep moving, to keep placing one foot ahead of the other.

(If this all sounds a bit convoluted, then it’s probably me suffering some after-run effects.)