On the up and up

"Seasons change, mad thngs re-arrange, but it all stays the same like the Love Doctor Strange"

Summer to Autumn to Summer again, this season's been a wierd one. But, out of the strangeness comes a wee touch of joy, and the start of my favourite part of the year - Yes, Summer is good, but I'm an Autumn/Winter person. Crisp cold mornings, thanking Merino sheep, Thermoroubaix lycra and W.L Gore and co as I fire into work, trying not to slide on the rare icy patches along the way.

Work's the first joy, bizarrely. Things are working out. I finally got the Business Expert job I've been chasing for the best part of a year. I've got other interviews coming up which I'm still going for, but at least the base situation (in terms of both money and circumstances) has improved.

Other work is the second joy: I'm booked up pretty much solidly from now til mid-November. Now, maybe working 7 days a week isn't the best of things but the weekends are going to be the work that I wish were my day job, but will do as a weekender. River Safety and First Aid for Extreme Care, Marshalling and Safety for Rat Races/Detail Events and this last weekend, Photography assignments for Stuart Johnston Mountaineering, which I'm editing the photos for (or at least am supposed to be!) while I'm typing this. Pyro's Yard Productions (as seen over on the photoblog) is starting to come to fruition.

The third joy is friends. Seeing ones I haven't seen for a good while and finding out how things are in their worlds. Graham's running all over the shop, and doing great. Rob's soon to become a daddy, Chez is racing really well, and Bina's working hard and planning her future. And that's just the guys I've seen this last weekend.

All in all, I'm tired but happy. Hopefully it'll stay that way.

Take care all, have a good 'un

Pyro

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dalby's Inferno (and the 10 Circles of Suffering)

Image
So this was an interesting one, in quite a lot of ways. The basic premise is a 50km Ultra, split down into 10 'circles', themed loosely on Dante's Inferno. Starting from 9am, run a 5km trail loop with a touch over 100m of ascent/descent, on the hour, every hour, for 10 hours. You can miss a lap by choice or if you are over the time for a lap, but if you do so you can't run the final 'Centre of Hell' lap, which unlike the previous nine, is an actual race (at least if you want it to be). Steve had spotted the event online, and sent me a the entry link in early February with a message saying "Fancy a laugh?" I decided that I did, so we both put entries in. Unfortunately, 6 weeks later he sent me a picture from a foreign hospital of his leg in a splint/moon boot, which meant I was probably flying this one solo... I'm never going to be one to say that I'm now a pro and Ultras come easy, but I wasn't overly nervous about this one - and I probably
Read more

On and up.

So, one challenge ends, another arises. As the song says, that's the way (ah-hah, ah-hah) I like it... I placed top ten in Janathon, 6th place I think, which was a heck of a shock. I never entered for any sense of competition, just for something to give me the motivation to train early in the season and to give me a kick up the jacksy to do some work. I'm happy with my mileage and the effort I put in, I know the areas where I could have done more and the reasons why I didn't, I've shifted my view of my own limitations, I've run further in a month than I probably ever have in a year, and I've managed all of the above without injury. All good stuff. Really good stuff, in fact. And now, with the lessons learnt from Janathon, we carry forward to the next challenge. It's a way off yet, but it's a reason to continue jogging, logging and blogging. And to express it the same way as the big piece of paper on my wall does (target visualisation, don'tcher
Read more

All in a day's work

Image
I guess Janathon's had a few positive effects, on both my running and on life in general. In terms of running, it has meant I wasn't worried about the prospect of covering 20km-plus over a day, and in terms of life it's meant I've met some new, friendly, like-minded people. Well, 'met' is a contentious term, but at least commented on blogs and had them comment on mine... Yesterday was a combination of both of the above. I headed out relatively early in the morning to get down to the Leeds parkrun, a nice steady 25 minute jog from home down to Hyde Park as a warm up, then a steady 28 minute 5km, taking it a little bit easy as I knew I had more mileage to come over the day and I didn't want to wreck myself early on.  A cuppa and a bottle of water at the Union and a lovely couple of hours just relaxing, stretching out gently, enjoying the sun, the Redlands Palomino Company and a good book, and then back over to Hyde Park for the 'Northern Post-Janathon 5k
Read more