Tear it up and start again

Has it really been a month? Blimey, time flies when… um, fun… no actually just work and life, but ah well. I did write a post the other day, but it seemed to be rather negative so I figured I would sleep on it and see if I still felt that way. And I didn’t, so post deleted. That’s the beauty of blogging, you can pour it all out, but you don’t necessarily have to hit the publish button. In fact, Isabelle recently asked why people blog. For the most part I do it clear my head of all my thoughts and fimbles, mostly to do with running (or lack of). But it also serves another purpose. Having moved to the other side of the world, so being removed from my support crew and usual buffers, it helps at times to vent. As I’ve said, I always publish the rants, but just working through it helps.

That’s something no-one tells you when you leave for Australia – phones only work one way, (i.e. from Aus), people back home never let you moan about anything (“but you live in Australia!”), and you’ll be surprised to find out who your real friends are. But that is just life, and things change.

Oh, I went to see Billy Bragg at the end of the last month. It was superb. That man deserves a medal, just for being Billy Bragg. Songwriter, guitar playing wonder, talks a lot of sense and writes a good book too.  

Right, the running. It’s going surprisingly well. I have to say that very quietly for fear of jinxing myself, but on the whole I am making progress. There have been a few niggles, but nothing the Stick couldn’t fix, and I am hoping that it won’t be too long before I feel confident enough to enter a fun run. Speaking of confidence, I did a run round Princes Park the other evening – the first outside run in a very long time as I have been hiding away and running on the tready at home - and what should happen as I get through my first kilometre? I get heckled by a bunch of teenagers. Some rather ignorant comments about being a pig, running and some swearing. Yeah thanks Gen Y fools. That didn’t do wonders for the self confidence. However, one of the girls did tell the others to shut it, and called them juveniles, so maybe there’s hope.
Apart from that, the run was good, and I managed to get through 5k in about 35 minutes. I am definitely not going for land speed records, but I am well happy to be getting back out there.

The moving my arse (MMA) program is also going well – and it is amazing how easy it is to stick with it. I think that having taken the pressure off to do certain mileage and such like has changed the way I feel about running. If I say to myself that 30 mins a day is what’s planned, inevitably I end up doing 40-60 minutes. Sometimes broken up into a daytime walk and run in the evening, sometimes just 45 minutes run/walk on the tready, sometimes just a big walk, But it happens. Rain or shine, tired or bouncing with energy, it happens.

The results are good too – the weight has stalled, but I am back in my jeans and the fat seems to be slowly disappearing. More amazingly I am not wanting the vin as much as I used to. That’s a side effect I wasn’t expecting. Don’t get me wrong, I will still have my glass of icy cold Sav Blanc, but just one. Miracle! He he.

Happy running – and congrats to all those Super Sunset finishers – I’ve been reading the reports, a great motivator if ever one’s needed

Now, I wanted to upload some piccies of my container gardening escapades, except WordPress won’t play nicely. N’er mind, there’s always next time.

B. x

Lightbulb moments

I had one of life’s little ponderings answered the other day. I could never work out why Moomin got so stressed putting shopping away. We’d help bring it it, a little army of shopping pack-children, then she’d stand in the kitchen surrounded by it, refusing to let us help “but I knoooow where x, y and z are supposed to go Mum!”. Then after the routine ‘big’ shop on Tuesday I found myself stood in the kitchen, surrounded by my green bags, refusing to let Soulmate help me because I had to:

a) do a bit of shuffling of the freezer to fit stuff in

b) do a bit of shuffling of the fridge and a little clear out to fit stuff in

c) have a little organise of the cupboard to put stuff in the right spots

And then the lightbulb in my head was flashing and I realised that I was being like my Moomin. Hmph. Poor Soulmate… though to be fair I think he likes the fact that I send him away when I do the unpacking. He had a beer and read Bookseller in the garden. I guess these things creep up on us. I remember too the moment when I finally understood why my Moomin and Poomin found a paper so very fascinating. I used to sit there on a Sunday, marvelling at the way they digested every story, and would then go though the magazine, take in the papery supplements, and then finally, and this is what got me, they’d read the local papers like their lives depended on knowing all the local news. What on Earth could be so interesting in the local paper that it requires two reads! “But Daaaaaaaaad, we want to go outside!” 

Of course, once I found the Times on Sunday I knew exactly what that was all about.  And local papers? Simply marvellous. Love ‘em. 

Now, running. I am doing very well actually. Only in so far as I have found the consistency I was so woefully lacking. I’ve managed to do a run most days, normally about 40-45 minutes at a nice steady pace of 6:50mins/k, but I am happy. I had to get harsh with myself and stop making excuses. I realised I was getting a bit soft on myself when the excuse of “my favourite pair of socks are in the wash” actually worked and I didn’t run. I have about 10-15 pairs of running socks that would have done juuuust fine. So since then I have been my own beeatch personal trainer. The goal I set myself was to aim for 30 minutes of ‘moving my arse’ a day. It didn’t have to be running, but it would be preferable if it were. So I am quite pleased to have done just that. Even on the day I had a rather gruelling massage last week. Ouch. I walked, but I was moving. Even better it means that I am now 1.3kg lighter, which, to be honest is a b****y good thing as my weight had crept, and crept, and crept up and I was starting to feel it. I was actually about half a kilo over my top limit, which doesn’t sound much, I know, but it was showing. Hopefully if I can keep being consistent, my New Year goal of between 0.25-0.4kg a week until May shouldn’t be too hard to achieve. Yep, sometimes I just have to be a bit tougher with that “but I don’t wanna… maaaah” side of myself. 

Oh, and no changes to the diet except a booze cut back, as I overindulged way too much over Chrimbo. I really cannot ever interfere with what I eat, it’s so hard. I find it so much easier to up the exercise part of life. I’m 80% okay in terms of my diet, and I like my fodder too much to change the 20% naughtiness. Needless to say I have mucho, mucho respect for anyone who can be strict. So all those on a New Year mission, I humbly salute you! :) 

Thank goodness the cool change has come through, I really don’t like 40 degrees, it’s just not nice. Especially the hot wind. Yeah, I really don’t like that hot North wind. Still, there’s one good thing about extreme heat - I know that my run tonight is going to feel like heaven compared with my sweaty treadmill slog in a 35 degree garage last night.

Happy running!

B. x 

New year, new Beakus?

Nah, I’ll be exactly the same as always, though for at least the first month I will keep up the pretence of good intentions. Just has to be that way

I can’t believe how long it’s been since I blogged - thanks for the reminder Beki I’m still here, still running (only just), and now am fully installed in the new nest. No cats yet, but give it time. Christmas was mainly spent sorting. Sorting out boxes, sorting out paperwork, sorting out pressies for famille Beakus in Blighty, sorting out cards… just lots and lots of sorting. We didn’t even get the Christmas tree up until Christmas Eve. But, having said that, I have really enjoyed my time off. There’s something very brain cleansing about knowing things are in order. It took me about six months to get properly sorted when we last moved house, and by that I mean doing a ‘proper’ unpack rather than getting the useful stuff out and leaving the rest in the garage. This time I was determined not to do the same. All it took was one very dusty, at times teary (because of finding the odd card or item from our Bloighty lives), and hot day and it was all unpacked. There’s even enough room in the garage for the car! Amazing. I guess every now and then it’s worth doing a bit of a life laundry. So now I have all my memories either put into silverfish-proof boxes or in the bin if they weren’t really that important. Please tell me I am not the only hoarder in blogland… I seem to keep so much stuff! I always think I need a reminder of things or times gone by, something I can hold, or touch, to trigger a memory, when in actual fact the brain does okay.

I also finally got some pots for the deck. It only took three houses to finally get around to it! Soulmate bought me three beautiful pots and told me to buy all the plants I need to fill them, as a Christmas present. How wonderful is that? So I have two pots with Hebe and lobelia (pink Hebe, mix of cambridge blue and white lobelia), and one has a Phormium, and some white lobelia around it’s base. I have plans for more potting action - we bought far too many plants, so I have a happy little bunch of petunias to plant in a long container, which will run alongside the fence. Pictures will follow! I am a big fan of gardening, so this is a reall treat for me. I had forgotten how fantastic it is to get your hands right into a bag of potting compost, and the smell of watered plants… and that stickiness that the leaves of petunias have… I used to spend hours doing my Moomins garden for her, and worked in a nursery for many years, so to get back into it, in whatever form, is just heaven.

Mmm… have to do a herb pot as well I think.

Oops! Just checked the time, have to dash, Soulmate pick-up to do. But thanks for bearing with me during the extended silences blog friends life shouldn’t be quite so hectic no so hopefully I’ll be a blogging, running, back to normal Beakus.

Happy running!

B. x

PS. The socket’s sorted, hoorah! Closed up last week… about b****y time too!

Up and down days…

So after saying that I would post regularly I disappeared. I’ve been sorting out this pesky tooth, although I suppose I should really say ‘hole’ seeing as how there’s no tooth there. I thought things were going okay, as who knows what to expect when you have a tooth out? But apparently things weren’t going okay. I started to get a nasty taste in my mouth, despite salt-washes, chlorhexidine mouthwash and not really eating anything. So three days after the extraction I trotted back to the dentist and was told that my jaw had been staging a rebellion against the ’socket’. I really don’t like that word, but it’s what it’s called. The bone had become inflamed and sent out lots of nasty little chemicals to attack the soft tissue. And it hurt like a b*****d. Constantly, despite taking three ibuprofen every four hours. I was crawling the walls and not sleeping by this point. I had what is known as (and don’t laugh!) a ‘dry socket’. There is supposed to be a blood clot in the hole, but the chemicals from the inflamed jawbone destroyed it because the extraction was so traumatic, which meant that my jaw bone was exposed to the world and not one bit happy about it. The dentist packed in with some gel (lignocaine… bliss!) showed my how to do it myself, with instructions to top it up if the pain got bad, then went on holiday. At first it was okay, and it did stop the pain. But every time I ate something, well I say ate, but it was more like a half-hearted attempt to eat, and we’re talking soup here, the gel stuff would come out. So I’d top it up, and it would come out again. And it still hurt like a b*****d. I put up with it over the Melbourne Cup holiday, but by Wednesday I was wrecked. I was in constant pain, I was tired, I was hungry - I won’t even get started on the not eating side of tooth troubles - and I had had enough.  My face was swollen now, because my gum had blown up around the socket. This Beakus was defeated.

I called the Dental hospital to see if they had any advice to offfer, and instead they asked me to come in, straight away. I was a bona fide dental emergency! I hot footed round there, was whisked through the form signing and pre-payment, and assigned a wonderful dentist who immediately took x-rays, had a good poke aorund the socket (ouch!), and declared that my original dentist had done precisely the wrong thing. Grrrr. He took out all the gel (which I have since discovered is a TOPICAL preparation), and re-packed it with some foul tasting but very soothing bio-resorbable dressing. He also let me know that I had rather an extensive infection, so needed some antibiotics. And all that for just $90. Bargain I say.

So it was sorted, and I haven’t had to go back to a dentist since then, but it hasn’t been plain sailing. I know it is getting better but three weeks on from the extraction I am still in pain, which apparently can last rather a long time because bone takes up to 10 weeks to heal, and the glands in my neck are still up. I am just about back on normal food, after a prolonged diet of mush, but it’s done wonders for kicking my snack habit. I’ve actually lost two kilos, which is the only positive thing to come out of this experience.  My running is sporadic, and when I do get on the tready it feels like I am running through heavy mud. Gah. Fed up. That’s what I am right now. And I am also just venting here because I am sure that Soulmate must be sick and tired of me and my pain induced moodiness.

On a more positive note, we move into the new nest soon. And it has a cat-flap, and hopefully the owner will say yes to us having pets, and so we will get two pudders! Hurrah! That, my friends, is the most definitely something to look forward to. Furry, purring cats in the Beakus household. Can’t wait!

B. x

Where’s Beakus been?

Where to start? Perhaps an apology for being so slack and not blogging in absolutely ages. Thanks to those who gave me a kick up the arse via comments to get back on here. There’s been so much going on in the world of Beakus that I really haven’t had chance to blog. Actually, I started a few posts, but then got distracted, left it, then by the time I got round to continuing all the things I had written were a bit… previous. Here’s a few dot points to iilustrate:

Moomin has had two ops in two months, one of them a hand reconstruction.

I’ve been mental at work, just how life is sometimes

The house search is on and it takes up a lot of time

I have had really bad hayfever, so the will to do anything vanishes

But, I have been running a fair bit, including the MM10k

Written down like that it doesn’t appear as awfully hectic as it’s been - I don’t feel like I have had much downtime in the last month or so. I guess it’s just because sometimes there seems to be a lot going on when really it’s just blah blah, work work, run run, eat eat, sleep sleep. Oh, but I did have one major event happen - I turned thirty! I didn’t do anything on the big day because I haven’t been feeling that crash hot of late (more on that in a mo’), but nevertheless, Soulmate and I had a nice meal out, a few drinkies and it was quite lovely. Falling on a weekday also meant I got weekend celebrations too… always a bonus.

Okay, for the feeling ropey bit. And this is not for the faint hearted. I’ve had a toothache for a couple of weeks, coming from a tooth I broke years ago. There wasn’t really much tooth left, but I wasn’t overly bothered by it, and the last dentist I saw suggested it be left, if it wasn’t causing any problems, so that’s what I did. I just ignored it. And mostly it was okay. But now the pain was getting worse and worse, until last Sunday it was throbbing and no amount of painkillers would get rid of it. Ouch. So on Monday I phoned the local dentist and got an emergency appointment, which was yesterday. Having had braces I am not fussed for dentists, and by that I mean they don’t scare me… apart from the fear that what they do could hurt, but I reckon everyone feels that. So I sat patiently waiting to go in. My turn came, and I explained what was going on. I had two options; lots of root canal work which might not work (and cost $$$$), or take it out. Mmm… root canal or take it out… after some discussion it was decided that it would come out. But first he’d do an x-ray. The x-ray showed a mahoosive abscess. Boo. It really should come out. Two hours later it had come out. Two hours! Turns out it didn’t really want to be parted from my jaw bone. After a bit of pulling, loosening and whatever else dentists do to get teeth out he could tell it was no ordinary molar. Oh no. This baby was formed in someone who has drunk the super-calcified water near the white cliffs of Dover for the best part of thirty years! Super mandibula!

He ended up cutting the tooth into two pieces and having a go at each half. I was so glad when it finally gave up! I was numb for about two hours aterwards because I had so much aneasthetic, and I knew it when it wore off. It was so painful! It felt like someone had taken a baseball bat to my jaw. I vaguely remember sobbing and going foetal on the couch before going to bed and sleeping for about three hours yesterday afternoon. Today it feels okay - a bit sore but nothing like the toothache, so I can tolerate it fine. The hardest thing is eating. And I love to eat. Oh, and the saltwater rinsing, which when done every hour on the hour starts to grate a bit. But it’s all for the good of ‘the clot’ (in the socket), so I must persevere. I’m not even sure if I am allowed to run, though I am absolutely gagging to. Thinking about it, I reckon that tooth abscess has been dragging me down for a while, because I’ve had zero energy, and lots of lethargy… hopefully I will have that spring back in my step in a day or so. I do feel a massive sense of relief now it’s gone.

Moomin’s hand is doing well, she’s one week into having brand new knuckles (and some finger) joints, and all appears to be right on track. I am stunned by what these clever docs can do, and every now and again I am stunned by how well they do it.

As for the MM10k, I made it round (and that was the most important thing for me after all the addcutor troubles) in 63:21. Not great, but not too awful either, and not bad considering it came off the back of consistent, but very low mileage running. Now I am rebuilding I have high hopes for my next bash at 10k. My wonderful massage therapist seems to have got the adductors sorted and *touch wood* I haven’t had a problem with them for the last few weeks, which is huge progress.

Right, on the subject of running I am going to try a little jog on the tready… wish me luck folks!

B. x

PS. I have been keeping track of what you’re all up to, but haven’t been commenting… will attempt to rectify that in the next couple of weeks when life settles down again.

PPS. I’ll try not to stay away so long this time.

Apologies for not editing…

WordPress is being a beeaartch and won’t let me edit that last post, so apologies for poor spelling and such like… I think it deserves a slap upside the head. WordPress that is, not me.

B. x

Northern Territory adventures

You’ll never guess where I’ve been. Well perhaps the title gives it away, for I have spent the last two weeks in the non-state that is the Northern Territory. It was incredible. Just to give you a feel for the trip here’s the itinerary (as drawn up by Soulmate):

Fours days in Darwin

Six days in Kakadu National Park

One night on a train: Darwin - Alice Springs

Three days at Uluru Kata Tjuta National Park

One and a bit days in Alice Springs

Quite the Northern Territory extravaganza! I loved it. Darwin was everything I expected, small CBD, shops shut most of the time and beer o’clock at any hour of the day. Apart from Soulmate having a truly awful bout of food poisoning which saw him spend a day holed up in the hotel room, we had a great time. Saw lots of sights, marvelled at the beautiful sea that you can’t swim in (salties galore), and just kicked back and relaxed for the first few days. Then we picked up a rented 4×4 and headed to Kakadu National Park. I think this was my favorite part of the trip. I love driving, really love it, so the chance to get behind the wheel of a togged up four wheel drive was just heaven. However, it did make me realise how harsh the land and climate is up there. Carrying enough water (60 litres) in the back at all times in case we got stuck somewhere added that twinge of ‘what if’ to all driving experiences. It also took some time to get used to driving at 100kph+ on single lane highways, and at first I found that I was the complete pootler. But then I got into the swing of it and I was haring along the Arnhem Highway with the best of them (though always being that bit more cautious then the locals perhaps…). We saw some incredible things in Kakadu - and it was a real treat for me, being the closet twitcher that I am, seeing so much amazing birdlife. I am not a photographer, will never be, but I am immensely proud of some of the piccies I took during the trip. Mainly because they were ‘capture or you’ll miss it’ type shots of the birds and crocs, some of which are below:

On our last day in the park we went into Arnhem land, which requires a permit as it is an Aboriginal Reserve. We were on a small (four people in a 4wd) tour, and had access to an aboriginal guide who took us on an, at times, daunting hike up to art sites that a lot of people would never get to see. On our way in we had to pick him up from his community, Oenpelli (a.k.a. Kunbarllanjnja). While we were waiting for him we got to have a chat to some of the guys (and ladies) painting bark pictures. It was breathtaking - the most intricate strokes of a brush made from reeds produced incredible images. The Kunwinjku mob are known for their art being of the x-ray type, and though they do some images associated with the Dreaming they also do images of the animals that surround them such as the brush tail rock wallaby, frilled lizards, turtles and so on. The paintings were just beautiful.

But then it was time to head out to the rock art. The walk up to the sites took about two hours, a lot of climibing and clambering, and on the way Simon, would stop and explain about traditional uses for certain trees, shrubs, what animal made tracks we saw… it was fascinating. But perhaps more interesting to me was they way he spoke, there was no waffle, it was a stripped down version of English, and it was absolutely mesmerising to listen to. Also, because in aboriginal culture it’s deemed impolite to make eye contact with someone you don’t know, Simon would focus on one of us at a time. If he found it uncomfortable to be under such close scrutiny he didn’t show it, but the eye contact thing was noticeable. But as Soulmate and I both said afterwards, if it was you he focussed on when talking about something, you felt like you were the only person with him at that moment in time.

A truly incredible experience. massa.

From Kakadu it was back to Darwin to get the overnight Ghan train to Alice. Now that was an adventure. I love trains, as does Soulmate, so for us it was heaven to be on an overnighter. We had a teeny tiny cabin, and we shut ourselves away and enjoyed the journey - just us, a bottle of wine, our books, and an ever changing scene rushing past our window. Before we knew it we arrived at Alice and headed to the airport to catch a flight out to Uluru (Ayer’s Rock). We had planned to go out to the rock at sunset, and thanks to a bit of inside information knew where to head to avoid the big sunset crowd. We’d got a lift out to the Rock with a little bus company, who kindly dropped us off and fed us champagne, bread dipped in olive oil and wakalpuka (wattleseed) dukkah, which was included in the price of the fare. I set up my camera on the tripod to take some snaps as Uluru changed colour. And believe me, it really does. It’s quite amazing to watch, and it happens so quickly. The great thing was that everyone one else seemed to be on the big (hundreds of people) sunset tours, so it was just Soulmate and I. Bliss.

The following day we ventured out to Kata-Tjuta (The Olgas), and I will confess that I prefer the Olgas to Ayer’s Rock. With the rock, I went thinking that there’d be some overwhelming primeval response to it, when in fact, I admired it for what it was, a ver, very, big rock. It is incredible, don’t get me wrong, but it is more to do with the formations that have been carved out over the years. That nature can throw out such bizarre shapes was what captured my attention.

 

The Olgas were different, made of a slightly different conglomerate it was like suddenly landing in some strange landscape. I think I overworked my eyes trying to take it all in.

The next day was an event Soulmate and I were both very much looking forward to - a walk around the base of Uluru. We started out at the cultural centre for a quick brekkie and some coffee, loaded up with water (2 litres each), then we were off. It was quite cold when we started out, though the walk from the centre to the rock (just over 2k) warmed us up for the main long stroll. It was glorious. I can’t really do it justice with words or pictures, but suffice to say that we had a great morning. For me, it was nice afterwards to feel that lovely physical tiredness. And you know what? One day I would love to go back there and run the trail (I seem to remember an article in Runner’s World not so long ago about it). It’s 9.4k around the base, and by the time we finished the temperature was just nudging 26ºC (at 12 noon), so it wouldn’t be overly hot to run in. Mmm… definitely a germ of an idea there.

We had one day in Alice Springs after Uluru, which we spent haring around trying to get to as many musuems and such like as possible, but there just wasn’t enough time to see it all, so I think we’ll definitely head to the NT again one day.

And that was my trip, and now I am back home. Boo. But having been back a week the post holiday depression is starting to fade and I am back into the swing of things. On the running front, I have had to reduce my mileage because of the adductor problem. I saw my MT yesterday, and she’s not terribly pleased with how it responded to the first massage. MT reckons that there is some seriously chronic tension to be sorted out, so I will be back in to see her for another treatment in two weeks. The advice I have is to stretch, stretch, stretch it, but not ice it. And I just have to take it easy and only run what I can without aggravating it. I knwo the tell tale tightness in my hip, so it’s not hard to judge when to stop, but it’s bloody frustrating as my motivation and energy are sky high at the moment. In an attempt to get rid of these couple of kilos that are stubbronly hanging around I have added an extra 15 minutes on to my lunchtime walk. So, I am now doing 45 minutes at lunchtime, between 30 mintues to an hour in the evening, plus weights and core work, and it is actually working. The scales say that everything is the same, yet there is a definite difference in the clothing feel, so I am going to persevere. For me, that extra effort with cardio seems to make all the difference. When I was smaller (I used to always hover around 58-60kg as opposed to the 63-65kgkg that I am now), I was always doing at least an hour of cardio a day. It wasn’t always running, but it was a set hour a day. But lately I have lapsed into that “well running is hard so I don’t need to do as much else” mentality. So now the skipping rope is back, the bike got an outing at the weekend and it’s time to mix it up so that I don’t keep using the same old muscles.  And having been told by the MT to run every other day for the next two weeks, it’ll keep me from bouncing off the walls with excess energy to use up. 

Anyways, time to get on, I’ve drained my tea cup, so I will leave you with my favorite little birdie guys from the trip - punk pigeons. Okay, they are crested pigeons, but you can tell that they know that they are cool.

Oh, and I have some serious catching up to do in blogland… Happy running!

B. x

Cured! Almost.

Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful massage therapist seems to have sorted the hip problem. I was on the right track, it was the deep lateral rotators that had got themselves all worked up and full of knots. I also have a beast of a trigger point at an insertion which took a lot of effort to shift, but shift it has. I did ask, in a rather tentative manner, whether it would be okay to run, and was told that it most certainly would be okay. Because it was just run of the mill tightness (as opposed to tightness and inflammation), I am a-okay to keep going. But I didn’t run after the massage yesterday as I had to dash home for a viewing which never happend. Grrrr. But I am not talking about the house thing, I will just dissolve into tears if I do, and seeing as I am sat at my desk having a tea break that wouldn’t really be a great thing to do.

Anyway, I am much relieved that the hip thing wasn’t anything suspect, though it’ll be a difficult thing to keep at bay because it’s rather hard to stretch those little beggers. Also, though my tennis ball massage did have some positive effects, I have been advised that a golf ball will get right into them. Pesky small muscles… and so much trouble!  The sartorius was also a bit painful, so all up I near skipped out of the clinic.

Morsey, thank you so much for making me feel better about the inspection, makes me realise that we are perhaps on the good end of the tenant spectrum… and Jo, I think we will be looking to buy somewhere. Both Soulmate and I are getting tired of having to move every year because we are at the mercy of a landlord. I want to have that feeling that a place is ours and not have to get permission if we want to put a picture up. Yep, I think the time has come and I am sure that in the next few months we’ll take steps towards buying.

Blimey I’m tired today. Can’t stop yawning. I think I’ve been a tooth grinding wretch because of all that’s going on. N’er mind, somehow I will drag my carcass round the park tonight, and probably feel better for it.

Well, short on time today, as I’m tea break posting rather than lunch, so that’s me.

Happy running!

B. x

PS. Isabelle, I hadn’t thought of it like that! I’ll have to tell Soulmate, he’ll like that. Especially as he finds my whirlwind cleaning activities rather bemusing… often telling me that the place looks “just fine as it is”. :D 

Eee, it is all a bit much at the moment.

I can’t remember whether I blogged it or not, but my landlord is selling the house I rent with Soulmate. Boo hoo. I’ve discovered that selling a house is a stressful business, and it’s not even our house! First off there was the news itself, which is bad enough, then comes the visit from the estate agent to suss out value the property. The comes a long delay in which nothing happens an you begin to wonder whether you dreamt the whole thing. But then it all becomes real again when you have to spend an hour (or three, because you are a prefectionist clean freak) tidying and making the place look lovely and de-cluttered for the advertising photographs. The photos were taken on Tuesday, it went on the internet on Tuesday afternoon, and by Wednesday we were told there would be an open inspection on Saturday. Egads! That’s not a lot of time to get your head around the fact that random people will be wandering around your house, wondering if maybe they’d like to live there.

Also, you have to remember that I am British, and the whole open inspection thing is very new to me. It’s not how we do things in Blighty, at least they didn’t when I still lived there. Sniff. At least it meant one round of getting prepared rather than having people come for viewings at all hours and days of the week.

I spent the rest of the week in a bit of a pre-inspection panic. The main questions that went waltzing around my head were something like this:

Do we have to be there?

I would really like to be there.

Will they have to give their details?

Should I lock up all our valuables?

Will I have to answer questions?

Will they think we live like church mice?

The last one stems from the fact that we always agreed that until we buy a place of our own we wouldn’t really ‘invest’ in furniture, because with the constant prospect of moving on again comes the realisation that the stuff you have might not sit well in the next rented place. So apart from the bed (which is sufficiently simple classic in design to fit in anywhere), we haven’t really bought a great deal. A bookcase here and there perhaps (because we just can’t stop buying books…), but nothing like a dining room table and chairs. We still have the table and chairs that sat in our kitchen in ‘Burgh, which is perfectly okay for us, but isn’t really proper dining room furniture. Anyway, what I am trying to put over is that fact that your house seems a very different place when you view it through someone else’s eyes. I think Soulmate and I have our own approach to interior design. We like neutral things, no fussy details, we both love chunky, dark wood. We like to have lots of pictures around us (that range from Tintin prints to lovely tiles from Vietnam), and we have lots of knick-kancks collected from our childhoods, travels and just things that we liked the look of, such as a mini fire hydrant. I suppose that  really you could say that wherever you look in our house is something that would tell you a story. And we like that. Most of all though, I think you’d call our nest very comfortable. You’d never be scared to sit somewhere or touch something, you’d just do it and feel content. 

But we aren’t clutter monkies. Mainly because a cluttered house leads to a cluttered mind (for both Soulmate and I anyway).

The inspection went well, and we had a lot more people through than the estate agent thought we’d have, bearing in mind the short length of time it had been advertised for. It was tough at times though, hearing people discussing the relative merits of the nest, and yes, we did decide to stay while it happened. And apart from one person who rather snootily advised me that “most people go out you know”, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. The agent was nice, for an estate agent, and we got to have a bit of a chat (and get property buying advice) while everyone was wandering.

And I tell you what, a house inspection could be used as a experiment in humans and predictable behaviour. I noticed that everyone who came through did exactly the same thing. Looked at the same details, tried put the same blind, opened the same cupboards… it was quite fascinating really.  

So now we just wait. We don’t need to be kept in the loop, we’re only tenants. We’ll just wait until we get told that there’ll be another open.  

As for the running, it’s been a bit hit and miss. I had a great week, and a really good long run (of 90 minutes), then my hip seized up. I’m not sure exactly what has gone on, but I know that for the past two weeks I have been struggling. The day after the long run I had trouble moving around because it felt so tight, but the tennis ball against a wall seemed to help a lot. It doesn’t feel like the TFL, because it is more towards my buttocks (that sounds so quaint, I think I prefer arse cheeks!), but it does feel like it something to do with quad fem and the lateral rotators. When I do the piriformis stretch (as advised to by MT to keep everything nice and loose) it feels like something wants to pop, or release. Not unpleasant, but there’s something awry. My worry is that it feels like it may be the ITB at the hip.

I took two days off, gave it some intensive attention, namely rolling pin, stretching, icing, but when I run I can feel it after about 3 kilometres. Poo. I will admit that I’ve been a bit naughty in keeping running, but I haven’t let it get painful, in fact, it just feels really tight. But, in deference to it I didn’t do a long run yesterday, and I am booked in to see my MT tomorrow so that I can get her opinion, and some professional massage treatment. I think it’ll be painful, but needs must to keep this Beakus running. 

More exciting news is that I got my Melbourne Marathon 10k race number e-mailed to me, woo-hoo! I have entered as part of the Uni team, and I am well up for it! Bonus free t-shirt too (nice one at that), which is always good. So that’s just over 8 weeks to sort this hip out. I’ll have to see how it goes with regards a more immediate 10k, though I would like to have a crack at this sub 60 before the MM as I think it be a mighty crowded affair, and one that I would like to enjoy rather than run all out and not appreciate. If that makes sense.

Righto, that’s me.

Happy running.

B. x

I took a photograph of you in the herbaceous border…

Actually, I wasn’t taking the photo, it was the department’s unofficial photographer extraodinaire taking a photo of me, and it was by a tree rather than a herbaceous border, but you get the gist. Yesterday they finally got me to have it done, after two years of crafty near misses I will now have a photo on the department board. I quite liked my level of anonymity, it’s comforting. Plus I was having a really stressful day and I sure it will show up on my photo - that slightly frazzled, little bit care worn, 1000 yard stare sort of look. Luckily because I had an off site meeting I didn’t look completely hopeless, but still. Oh well, I suppose it had to happen eventually. Now I am in watching and waiting mode every time I go past the board, having a sly check of whether it is there.

The worst part is that, as usual, I went bright red. It’s not that I was embarressed, it’s just that when someone (and he was a very attractive bloke) is pointing a camera at you, telling you “lovely smile”, “I got you blinking” and then examining your photo with a level of scrutiny that you’re just not used to, it all feels a bit much and makes you want to run away. Anyway, it’s all done now, though I can’t help wishing I’d taken a more than a cursory look at the finished product. He reckoned it was a good photo, so I’ll just take his word for it.

Thanks so much for the comments about my non-starting 10k, you lot always know how to make it seem better, and I don’t feel like quite such a fool now some time has passed. I agree with all those that said “it wasn’t mean to be”, that’s how I feel now. I’m thinking about the Queen of the Lake… it’s definitely doable, and it looks like a nice event… but I am going to stick to my rule of non-planning. Oh, and Isabelle, when I told my lovely Moomin about it that is exactly what she said

With regards the running, it’s all going well, I am getting through 30k a week, pretty consistently now. The calf that was so tight at my last massage is still a bit troublesome, and at my maintenence massage on Tuesday I had to have some more deep work done to tib post and the inside portion of gastrocnemius. For some reason my whole left side is a bit of a pain - TFL, psoas (although not as bad as last time), quad fem, glute med, they are all having a little go. Thankfully my MT is an absolute wonder and I am feeling much better since seeing her. Interestingly, I have some bruising where she really got into the TFL, which happened when I first went to see her with all the problems in my right ITB. So, perhaps I have nipped a ptoential left ITB probem in the bud. Anyway, I am taking it a bit easy this week to recover, so no hills, and lots of easyish running.

Now I thought that I had loads of stuff stored up to say… but my poor brain is saying different. Of course it could be because I have a bit of a hangover - mid week too… Quelle horreur! It was because I got in from work yesterday (post run so not all bad), and just fancied a glass of wine, so I had a glass while watching Eastenders (just great at ther moment), then realised that Great British Menu was on… then other good programmes… and so I ended up settled under a blanket with Soulmate topping up my glass. Still, I don’t do it very often (the drinking that is, the telly thing is a very common occurrence) and I thoroughly enjoyed my evening, so I’m not even too bothered about having a bit of hung-upness.

Oh, and I finally watched the film Perfume at the weekend. It is just amazing, and considering it was called ‘unfilmable’ by Mr. Kubrick, I think the film makers have done a pretty good job. I absolutely adored the book, and advise anyone who hasn’t read it to do so immediately, and now the film has gone on to my ‘will watch again’ pile of DVDs.

Right, now my brain really has said enough is enough, so it is time for coffee, some serious blog catch up and perhaps an ibuprofen.

Happy running!

B. x