Month: October 2013

Start again.

As ever, interesting times. A week and a half into Mission Improbable and I’ve had to re-evaluate my strategy. I arbitrarily set the bar at 6 minute/ mile and told my body to get a grip and get on with it. Ten days in and I was still dying at 1½ miles. I just couldn’t keep it going. The heat is incredible and I just can’t seem to breathe enough air in. I did a quick re-think of my goals. First I have to concentrate on cracking the 3 hour barrier. Then, the next year possibly try to win a marathon. With this in mind I went on to the Runner’s World website and found a sub 3 marathon plan. Week 1, day 3: Run 3 miles at 6m/m. Oh. Second rethink. Do what I should have done from the offset; find my body’s baseline of fitness and build from there. Today I ran 2 miles at 7 m/m, that was no problem at least. I was worried my fitness in going long had completely gone. Without pausing I cranked it up to 6½ m/m and did a mile and a half. I’m going to try again tomorrow just at 6½ m/m pace. If three miles is the starting fast distance I need to know what my maximum speed is and build from there. Also today I had a genius thought and went to the charity shop near us that deals in home furnishings and electrical goods and got a fan on a stand. It looks like it could do that “Maxell; break the sound barrier” thing. Yeah, keeping it real for the yoof of today with my contemporary cultural references. Anywho, see how I fare tomorrow with coolness.   In other news, I got a text this morning saying to ring work, (the haulage company, not the agency) did so, seems they have too many drivers at Irlam and have no further use for me, but want me to work out of Crewe. That would be a 70 mile daily commute, and I know they have already told Crewe depot that it is being closed before March next year. Bugger. In the grand scheme of things it might be a good thing. I’m not on good money or great shifts and there is no prospect of me being taken on off the agency here, it’s just that I know this job and am very comfortable doing it. I’m scared of trying something new. Now I have no choice. Ho hum. I’ve applied for one with Walkers Crisps working out of Birchwood and I’ll apply for some more on Monday morning when the agencies are up and running. Buggery bugger! Not good with being assessed or doing new things. It’s all just driving, I shouldn’t get stressed, but there you go.   Wendy’s having loads of issues with that gall bladder thing. She got a letter last week saying she has and appointment to see the consultant on the 14th […]

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And so it begins…

Finally got my arse into gear this weekend. Admittedly I couldn’t really start my Mission Improbable training any earlier, my knee was knackered after that marathon so I had to rest it. I could have started everything else, mind. I picked up my pencil and tattoo gun today. I can’t draw a bath, but you’ve got to start somewhere. It took me an hour or so to work out how to get the bloody tattoo gun assembled and working. I did the tracing and printing thing on some fake skin they sent with it (didn’t do too well, first one I wiped off!) then set to tattooing it. I was at it about half an hour when the power pack for the gun made a cracking noise and that was that. Marvellous. I’ve ordered a new power pack, this time with a fuse, (who builds electrical goods or plugs without a fuse? I didn’t even think to check.) for a princely £7.99 with P&P. I think you’ll agree I’ve pretty much mastered the art though;   So, who’s first? OK, maybe a little more practice. I’ve set myself an arbitrary goal of having it cracked by the time I’m 50, which is over 2½ years away.   I started dieting last week as well. This time it’s serious. I need to get down to 9 to 9½ stone I reckon. I’m going to look wretched but it’s not about the aesthetic, it’s trying to shift the least lard at the fastest pace for 26.2 miles. Which is, as I’ve already mention, my Mission Improbable. I started that yesterday. It’s even harder than I remembered. I kind of thought with my endurance training and such I would be fit enough to go fast, but it’s a whole different ball game. I warmed up then put it at 6 m/m pace and went for it. Within 2 minutes the sweat was streaming off me, I was gasping for air (there just wasn’t any) and I was dying to quit. I had a mile starting point in mind though so I forced myself to do the full six minutes. So. Hard. Then, just for shit and giggles I tried the 5 m/m pace I need to be at. One minute was all I could take. So, just 134 more minutes to go. Today I did 6 m/m again, I was feeling fine for 4 minutes thought I was on for at least 2 miles, then at 5½ minutes it hit me really hard. I managed to do 7 minutes though. If I could improve by a minute a day it would only take me 150 days to get to marathon distance. I can’t see that happening, but you never know, I might adjust to the pace. I hope so. Then I have to start all over again at 5 m/m. It really is an Everest of an ambition. Tomorrow it’s another run and drawing practice in the morning, then back on my bike […]

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Navel. See me gaze.

I had a simple thought that has lead to a bit of philosophical pondering. I seek input. My thought was; in many sci-fi novels the tech exists to upload your memories, your brain pattern and basically your consciousness. If you had the tech implanted so you were always backed-up, when your body died would you still be alive?   My gut reaction, strangely is ‘no’. I am not religious, I believe our intelligence is what defines us and that is the sum of our biology and experience. Ergo, if that survives so should we. But knowing I was backed up, if someone threatened to shoot me I would still be afraid of dying. Therefore I must think ‘I’ die. All my reason points to the fact that I should say ‘yes’, I live on. We live in a construct of our own making, we ‘see’ the front of a book and our mind fills in the missing sides and gives it mass. We have no direct experience of the ‘real’ world, everything is an interpretation by our senses. Light hits the eye, is turned into electrical signals which the brain interprets by medical voodoo. We are not seeing the object, we are receiving an interpretation of electrical signals. I think therefore I am, (I think, therefore there must be something doing the thinking, call that something ‘I’ therefore ‘I’ am/ I exist)  but beyond that we cannot be certain. If, the outside world is mere construct surely we can reproduce it to keep the ‘I’? Of course there’s the famous Samuel Johnson kicking a rock “I refute it thus!”  By which he shows he perceives a rock to have matter, solidity and indeed existence then kicks it, supposedly proving it’s existence by the pain he receives.  This sophistry can be dismissed by what turns out to be a fake Buddha quote (bloody internet!) “The foot feels the foot when it feels the ground.” Again it is just the interpretation of signal, not the actual ‘reality’. So the outside world has no independently verifiable reality, it is all just interpretation of electrical signals. These are the perfect conditions for our uploaded consciousness to continue. If my brain was to be transplanted into another body I would feel that ‘I’ survived. So it just a biological prejudice?   I am still me, even though I have two false teeth. There is the key word though, ‘false’. I think a programme that was running “Buck 1.1” would be a (I shudder to use the word) soulless machine. However perfect a copy it would not be me. So what is ‘me’?   I must be missing something. Sorry for the sloppy structure, I’m not clear on my arguments here, I’m just fumbling for an answer to a question I don’t fully understand. Any clarification/ answers would be appreciated. Bonus points for answering the other simple one; the meaning of life, the universe and everything. Demerits, the dunce’s cap and a lengthy spell on the […]

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The gods mock me. Again.

Bloody marvellous. I’ve been hale and hearty for as long as I can remember, I finally had my first ever simple flat marathon (the Chester marathon, today, Sunday)  to test myself. Not at the end of a triathlon, not a hill marathon, not an ultra, just  an honest to goodness 26.2 mile trot. Then on Thursday I was having a bit of hassle at work and thought I was feeling down with it, when I suddenly realised it felt like a cold. *PANIC!* Friday I felt drained, Saturday I got up at 11.00 and gave up and went back to bed for 20.00 hrs. Not that that did me any good, I got straight to sleep then the neighbour’s kids woke me having a squealing high pitched game of tag. I couldn’t get back to sleep then until gone 0130 and I had to be up for 0600 for the race. I got hopped up on painkillers, cold medicine and coffee and set off. I didn’t feel too bad to start with, the first few miles were suspiciously easy. Then I realised I’d set off behind the wrong pace setter. I was behind the 4 hour marathon guy, I should have been near the 3.15 one (for a 3.20- 3.25). I spent the next few miles catching up and passing the 3.45 pace setter and working my way through the field. I was doing alright until about 15- 18 miles then I had nothing. My feet had done that painful numbness thing I usually get on the bike (online advice suggests it’s putting pressure on a nerve in the foot) from early on so it was wasn’t much fun. Then before 18 miles I was just a wreck. It was only pride and stubbornness that got me to the end. If it had been a training run I would have quit. Anyway, even after dropping back through the field I finished in 3.47.59 about a minute a mile slower than I was expecting, but I was glad of the finish. Wendy, as ever, was saying I would have to skip the race. At least I didn’t do that. Btw, it bloody wasn’t flat. Not killer hills, but enough to know you were doing some. Some guy just tweeted “I thought you said it was flat? #ouch 19 minutes off PB :(  “ So it wasn’t just me being a mardarse. The most amazing thing about that race though was the crowd support. Even when we were running back through Chester (and the traffic that had been coned off to let us run was crawling past) people were beeping their horns and shouting encouragement. Not the “Get off my road you fat bastard!” encouragement I would have been shouting but genuinely good willed. Amazing. The winning time was 2.21, a new course record. Bastard. That means I have to aim for 2.15. I know it’s virtually impossible, but the hope is in the ‘virtually’. I might be able to do it […]

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