Marathon Training Week 9/ The Holy Bench

FORGIVE ME IF I SHOUT!!! I'm writing this post to the tuneful backdrop of the temporary tinnitus that I always get just before I get a cold.  I forget that no one existing outside of my own skull can hear the maddening whistling noise I'm hearing.  Sounds like a kettle boiling inside my face.  Maybe I'm secretly a teapot.  It would explain a lot.  

Anyway, HELLO WORLD, IT'S NICE TO SEE YOU!!

I'm not even going to give you a breakdown of last week's running, because what came before Sunday doesn't matter.  Fanfare, please...

...You'll have to verify whether or not there was a fanfare.  Because I CAN'T FECKING HEAR OWT!!! 

Oh, there was? 'Kay.  

On Sunday, I ran (and walked) seventeen miles.   Let me repeat that for you.  Seventeen. Miles.  On my legs and not on wheels.  Holy shit!  I can honestly say, all fucks previously given about my having to take walk breaks on most runs over a few miles have mysteriously gone poof.  Vanished.  When mileage gets to "what is actually wrong with you?  You have a driver's license!!" levels (anything over a half marathon in my eyes), it's hard to keep on caring how fast you got there.  Just actually doing it is a bizarre enough experience to make you forget.

I intended to run out and back, but found the thought of turning around halfway and returning just too depressing.  So I kept going.  All the way to the next county over, where my family fortunately live and were able to give me both bacon sandwiches and a lift home.  Hurrah lifts!  Hurrah bacon!  Here's some stuff that happened on that ridiculous day:

• Hills.  Lots of.

• Pubs.  Equally plentiful.  The temptation to flop down in a beer garden and sink a stranger's unguarded pint was intense.

• Smugness.  The further I got, the more people I smirked at.  I tried giving off a "haw haw, I've run all the way from Swansea and I'm not even tired.  I do this for fun!" vibe.  In reality, I think I instilled more pity than envy.  My "proud stride" was more like a pasty legged, Quasimodo-esque shuffle.  My smirk may have looked more like trapped wind.  Less Paula Radcliffe, more Farty Hunchback.  I should put that on my race bib.

• The poor corner shop keeper.  At about mile 13, I was out of water and STARVING, and so I burst my sweaty body through the shop of a tiny local establishment's door.  One member of staff was alone on the premises and was met by a manic, hyperventilating creature thrusting money and fistfuls of sweets at him.  Learned a lesson that day.  Pink Millions make for an awesome replacement to energy gels!  Also, pretty sure that one man in the Ammanford area may now believe that the zombie apocalypse is coming.  And it's wearing shorts.  

• Death trap.  Much as I enjoyed the daftness of traveling that kind of distance on my own steam (and lots and lots of refined sugar), my lack of planning nearly got me squashed.  Between Swansea and Ammanford, where I ended up, there is a big 60mph stretch of road with not even a sliver of pavement.  I've never known fear like it!  Kept envisioning self tripping on a twig and having my brains squished by a passing car.  Pop!  Plan ahead, kids!

• The Bench.  The timing of this bench's appearance was no coincidence.  The big, beardy man upstairs (God, not a pensioner I'm stowing away in the attic.  Note to self: must feed  Clive) must have witnessed my achy wobbling and though "Ew.  That needs to stop right now."  My Garmin beeped 17 (even its beep sounded more to me like an incredulous "...BEEP??") and immediately to my left was THIS wooden slatted throne.  Angels sang.  Clouds parted.  My buttocks planted.  Oh, what a feeling. 

 

Hark, the Herald Angels...sit.

The most exciting thing I saw all week was a nondescript bench.  Beat that, world!!  Only nine more miles and I'll have done a marathon. 

Nine more.

Just nine.  Only nine.  Oh my Gahd.  I have to run nine fucking more miles?!! Who signs up for this shit?? Oh, yeah.  Numpty over here.  Clever girl.

In other news, I dunna review for events website After Dark.  Read it if you fancy.  It's more interesting than a picture of a bench.  Promise!

Feeling Invncbl: A Race Review

Have an awesome bank holiday, UK readers!  Don't know about you, but I'm already feeling an itch that only a beer garden can scratch...

Game Of Thrones: A Belated Review

So, I've started watching Game Of Thrones. I'd heard from several sources that it's good and worth a watch..also that everyone on the planet has watched it and I'm the only one left to catch up.

That being said, I did do a bit of heel digging before I parked my bum on the sofa and finally gave it a go. Reason being that all reviews I had were from people who enjoy the female form in a different way to the way I do(I.e "yeah, it's really good! The women are so fit and there's loads of sex!! Oh the sex!!" Etc...kind of. It's not a direct quote...but feel free to use "oh, the sex!" In future if you so choose). All I knew about it was that I was about to subject myself to many hours of bare boobage. I knew nothing of the plot line or characters. For all I knew, it was about a bunch of kings and queens gaily flashing their genitalia at each other whilst a court jester danced around spanking their bare bottoms with a lute.

Or if I only had the title to go by, the world's first game of musical chairs.

I'm three episodes deep now. I'm in love with a ballsy, sword wielding child and have sworn that if I ever consider reproduction, I'm either having one of her or none at all. I've been introduced to a surprisingly eloquent prozzy boinking imp and yeah, rather a lot of boobs.

But, see, even the boobs are good! The boobs I'm being subject to are not the balloonish bubbles hanging off of painfully arched frames like the ones I'm accustomed to seeing in music videos and other forms of popular culture. The boobs of Game of Thrones are as human and unique to each girl as a fingerprint or a face. Boobs that aren't identikit floatation devices hoiked and strapped into place solely for men to look at. Boobs that make me look at them and go "yes! Mine don't stay put when I lie down either! I'm normal! NORMAL!!!"

I have nothing against surgically altered lady bubbles, as long as they are only bought for the woman wearing them's benefit. And that's another topic for another day. All I'm saying is that I'll continue to watch the band of grumpy faces and furry coats (and gawwwjuss dire wolves! I know they're meant to be badass, but aww, lookit the puppiiiiiieees!) to my heart's content, and it won't be in spite of the "look, boobies!!" factor. In fact, I will be mentally high fiving my shirtless sisters whenever I make eye contact with their many splendoured and varied nipples.

Hurrah!

Warm Bodies: A Film Review....?

Funnier, drier and quicker on the jokes than I expected. I fully believed that movie land were going to murder the book dead. It's going into the "collection" of the select few DVDS I have to routinely watch over and over and over in a totally-not-obsessive-compulsive way at all (current ones on my forever-rewatch list - Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind, 500 Days of Summer...the best films ever made. I will not listen to any opinion that states otherwise *fingers in ears* lalalalala...oh, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show).

I won't go into any more detail, because I'm not a film critic and I just don't wanna, okay?!

Bottom line is, go see it! Twilight it ain't. This is a good thing.

....Also the weird kid from About A Boy got hot. This knowledge does strange and confusing things to my innards.