Wednesday, March 21, 2012

A status I did on facebook.

  Slightly edited.
I see the old "Try Praying" advertising campaign has started up again. I feel I'd be failing you people if I didn't tell you about your other options.
Your other options include:
Lighting a candle,
Doing a little dance,
Voodoo,
Humming the theme tune to Thundercats and,

well,

Getting off your arse and tackling the problem head on.
 
Your shout.

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Spooning.

A year ago (ish) I moved into this flat.
A year ago (ish) I went off to Tesco to do a big shop and bought, in what would be a multibuy disaster, sixteen Danone Activia yoghurts. It was 2011. People were buying yoghurts like they were gobstoppers. This was four yoghurts stuck together in your standard 2x2 yoghurt formation and then stacked on another four yoghurts and wrapped up with a bit of cardboard. Eight yoghurts in all, and two of these, these, HERDS of yoghurts for something like four pounds.
So I walked home, thinking I'd be able to get through these sixteen yoghurts in no time. I was wrong. Dead wrong. A week later, I'd two eaten. Two yoghurts. Twelve yoghurts looked back at me from the second from the top shelf in my fridge one Sunday morning. I ate one. I ate two. I could eat no more. I was desperate. Their expiry dates looming, I did what any rational man would do.
I put them in the freezer.

This morning, a year later, I took them out of the freezer, put them back in to the fridge and left for work. Throughout the day the yoghurts thawed, waking up in a brave new world, a world of slightly faster broadband and new x-factor judges. Look, the world isn't all that different to what it was a year ago but if you're a yoghurt it must look f*cking mental. That honey flavoured butter on the door shelf is a crazy in itself.

So, here I am, sitting on my sofa at 6.30 on a Tuesday evening. I'm looking at these yoghurts. Their expiry dates go way back to April 2011. This feels slightly dangerous. Slightly, I'm not mad. I peel back the lid on one. Forest fruit. Not my favourite, but I want to get the duds out of the way so I can enjoy the strawberry ones tomorrow.
I've dipped the spoon in.

And away I go.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

What gets me through the evening.

(I'm a bit starved for inspiration right now. Can't think of anything I could write a post about, so I reckon I'll repost stuff I've put on facebook. I'll do this every so often, but try keep my posts new. Deal? Sound. This was an afterthought I did about tea in June 2011.)
I drink coffee. Gallons of the stuff. Lately, I've cut out the fluff, the caramel syrup, the ventis but I still pour the stuff down me throat like it's free beer.
But when I get in in the evening, there's nothing I like better than tea. That's not a picture of tea, that's water. Hot water.

Okay, I do drink proper, regular, Lyons/PG Tips stuff from time to time but over the past few years, I've developed a taste for the fancy stuff.
Fancy stuff doesn't usually come in bags, so that's where the submarine comes in. (Thanks, Emma.)

 Give it a minute, it's not fucking Ribena we're making here.

(Oh yeah, that's a bonsai tree in the background. I thought it'd look me look wordly, maybe even wise. Then I realised it probably makes me look like a spa. I only paid seven quid for it in Tesco, though.)

Bingo! There's me tea, as dark as it's gonna get. Gonna sit back, put some Samurai Jack on and enjoy me evening.

Just wanted to let ye folk know what I'm up to this evening.
In summary, not much.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Half arsed.

This isn't the post I'd planned to write. I should say that now. I had something else entirely planned for this evening. I was going to, well, I'll tell you another time. Instead, I'll tell you about my evening. Pull up a chair, there, and I'll boil the kettle.

A bit of an introduction wouldn't hurt, I suppose. A lot of you know this already. I've been running lately. This past few months, I've been pushing myself further and further. Back in November I did my first 5K run. Was happy with myself. Kept at that for a while, got a bit faster and then I pushed up to 10K. That was a fairly big jump for me.
Sure, you could say "Well couldn't you just run 5K then... do it again?" and that's a good point. Really, it is. Do me a favour and go fuck yourself. Anyway, it took a while to build up more. The weather was against me. My nipples bled at one point. I'd a blister. My runners were all the way over there.

January 30th I did my first 10K run. Kept at it, ran a little less, ran a little more and, on Wednesday there, I did my longest ever run. Fifteen kilometres. And I was RUINED. Barely fit to stand. I was happy with that. Was gonna pull back for the next while, not try to kill myself altogether.

With that in mind, I left the flat just after eight this evening and set out to do a 10, maybe a 12K run. Wouldn't be easy but, hey, what good is easy? So off I went, listening to me Scroobius Pip and hobbling slightly as my right knee was a bit... off. Fifteen minute later, the knee had sorted itself out and Scroobius had gotten less angry with his music. A quick switch to Daft Punk and I kept at it. Forty minutes down, and I was wrapping it up. Sauntering along Portobello/London Road with a spring in my step. My flat was fifteen minutes away, the cans of Carlsberg in my fridge nicely chilled.

Then something happened at the fifty minutes mark. I could've kept going towards my flat. Straight ahead, I'd be home in no time. But I turned left. I swung in towards Arthur's Seat, a big f**king hill/mountain in the middle of Edinburgh. I kept going, knowing that this detour would put an extra 2/3K onto my route. At the bottom of the Royal Mile, near Holyrood, I'd my second stroke of genius/madness. As before, I had an easy out. Instead, I went off up the Mile towards Edinburgh Castle. I'll be honest, it wasn't the nicest part of the run. The hill beat me senseless. Everyone I ran past was drunk. People smoking on the street pretended to try to trip me, or shout stuff. Losing my focus (and, indeed, my will to live), I swung into a corner shop for some Lucozade. Paused my watch for forty seconds and pulled a two pound coin out of my shorts' zippy pocket. Sue me.
Electrolytes replenished, I powered on up the hill, crossed down to Princes St., ran west a bit, down to Queen Street and back towards my flat.

17K done, and I was finally coming near my flat. At this point I was happy. Content. I'd done 17 fucking kilometres, which anyone (bar a horse) would be happy with on a Saturday night. This was the most I'd ever ran. I felt good. Too good. Excellent, even. Legs weren't overly sore, I still had all my toes and me Avicii album was just getting started. I'd be a fool to end it here. So on I went.

I realise now I'm starting to sound like Forest Gump.
 
So on I went. And twenty minutes later I arrived at my flat with just over 21 kilometres behind me. Half a marathon. Twice what I'd planned on doing. It felt a bit like when you go out for two pints and wake up in a wheelbarrow. But a bit better.

Fuck, looking up there, that's a lot of writing. If you're still reading this, well done. Even I don't want to read that again. If you've skimmed it and jumped to the end, I'll sum it up:
I went for a run. It got out of hand.

I'll tell you about the time I played ping pong for the USA another time.