World enough and time

 Pretentious title - but the thing was this phrase was running through my mind, along with a whole load of other stuff on Tuesday. The day was beautiful. There was a light easterly wind - so a bit of a headwind, but nothing disastrous. I wanted to do a long run on the roads because the E2NB race looms as does Edinburgh Marathon. I have been doing longer runs on trails, stopping for sandwiches, but sooner or later I had to get more specific; running on tarmac, eating gels. Peter has no interest in this so it would be a solo trip.

And in the meantime last week my left knee had mysteriously swollen up over night. I never noticed until I tried to do a quad stretch and the leg wasn't for bending. My best guess would be I'd been overdoing the squats. I refurbed an old barbell we had kicking around the house last week and did me some deep squats with the barbell on  my shoulders.

Why on earth would you do that?

Sigh, because us older ladies need to stay strong. And it all seemed to be going well.

Anyway, that's only a guess, that might not even be it.

I took my leg with swollen knee out for a run on Sunday and it didn't feel like running was much of a problem, so I thought, what the heck, I'll do the long run on Tuesday if I can.

Tuesday dawned bright and cold and delicious. My legs were a bit achy. I'd done quite a lot of exercises the day before. (Why did you do that?) (Och, you know.)

I didn't feel great, but I didn't feel terrible, and backing down from a challenge always puts another dent in my dented confidence.  I stopped at Porty just to record how lovely it looked and then put the camera away until the other end.

The future is bright. The future if fuzzy.

My first stop was at Prestonpans. I thought that if my knee was having a problem with running I'd find out for sure when I stopped at the Coop to get some water. If it was bad I'd go up the road and get the train home. To my surprise, when I started walking, my knee didn't seem any worse than it did when I set off. It was just general aches I was dealing with. (What kind of army does General Aches command?)

My next stop was at Aberlady. The 3 or 4 miles on the sandy trails through the thorny bushes round Longniddry Bents had felt very hard going, and my legs were tired and stiff. I got some more water and some paracetamol too this time. The paracetamols had caffeine in them, and it kicked in pretty quickly. I soon felt a lot better and I was running much better again too. The point of the title is that you never really know if you're damaging yourself or not. For all I knew this was helping my knee. And there isn't time to test these things out in a scientific way. You just have to take your best guess and then live with whatever the consequences are.

I was tired for the last few miles but elated too. I was going to make it. My leg had held out. The sun was shining.

I had intended going into North Berwick to eat something when I arrived, but as I drew near the train station I realised I could probably catch the next train if I hurried. It was that or hang around for a whole hour for the next one. I picked up the pace and made it onto the platform and the train just in time.

When I got on the train I was going to text Peter to let him know I was still alive. I was distracted though because people were shouting my name. Who should come laughing up the train but Roly McCraw and David Alwood - my old clubmates and fellow runners. They had run round the coast and had something to eat in North Berwick. Had been sitting about sun-bathing on the platform when they saw me fire onto the train at full tilt.

It was lovely to see them and I'm afraid I spoke a lot, the combination of caffeine and 3 or 4 hours in my own head causing a torrent of thoughts to come tumbling out.

It was a magical day and I was delighted with it. My leg didn't seem any worse than it was  before so I chalked it up as a win and hoped that the swelling would go down.

But it did not.

The next day me and Peter had an appointment up the Southside. We have taken advantage of Free Wills Month and got our wills drawn up, and we had to sign them. Since we were in the area we went to Arthur's Seat and had a snoop around for butterflies and birds. There was a bit of a cold wind but it was sunny again and we found enough creatures to keep us busy for a few hours.

This slow walking around seemed to annoy my leg more than running and it felt fat and stiff by the end of the day.

Yesterday I was working so I did very little - I walked to Lidl to get some vegetables and made some soup. Top work-out. At the end of the day my knee was still swollen.

Today was forecast to be sunny and bright and Peter wanted to go to Postman's Walk at Aberlady to look for orange tips and holly blue butterflies. He was going to cycle and I said I'd tag along - maybe that would be better for my leg. Sadly, the sun didn't turn up. So we cycled to Aberlady into a freezing headwind and when we got there we availed ourselves of the nearest cafe.

Actually not a cafe but a plush golf hotel. It was jolly nice to have a sit down out of the wind though. 

Obviously I wasn't listening to other peoples' conversations because that would be rude but the guy at the table behind Peter spoke non-stop about celebrities and people on tv for the whole time we were there to his silent companion.

We took our time with our big milky coffees and creamy jammy scones and then braved it back out again after Peter had emptied his bank account up at the till.

Then back out into the wind, but this time it was behind us! A very different experience. We arrived home cheery.

So my knee felt really pretty good after the cycling.

I notice that several years of getting injured a lot has altered my attitude, because I hope I can get back to proper running training, but I'm also not overly concerned - especially if I can cycle. I'll have fun either way. 

Also I picked up a thorn in my tyre somewhere out on the ride - but my tyre never went flat until after I got home. That's a bit of luck.

Weekendia

Saturday dawned bright and cold. I had an agenda. I wanted to get out a longish run and get back in time to have a shower and get to Telferton to the sorting office before it closed at 2pm. And I wanted to get sea swimming before dark if possible. There wasn't much wind so I set off on the flattest run I know. Along to Musselburgh lagoons and then back via the road. 15 and a half miles and that smug superior feeling when I got in already to cook up some lunch for myself and Buchanan was evidently not long up. He says "How are you?" in a spritely way but I can see right through him. If you ever phone him up and he sounds very lively on the phone, the chances are, 30 seconds ago, he was fast asleep.

After that we'd gone to Telferton, we headed out to Gullane Bay, in a relaxed mood.

The sun was out and the world had warmed up marginally. The air temperature in the car park at Gullane was a balmy 5 degrees and the sea was up to 4. There were a few waves but nothing much so it was the most swimmable it has been in quite some time. I have been for two "improvers" swimming lessons now. In the first I learned that when I kick my legs without using my arms I go backwards. A bit disappointing that. In the 2nd lesson I discovered that I was the BEST IN CLASS at swimming one-handed with a float in the other hand. I set off up the pool when we'd been told what to do and when I turned round at the far side discovered that the best of the others had not even made it half way yet. What skill! What talent!

So anyway I was trying to apply some of the new things I'd learned, some of the time successfully and other times getting all tangled up and swallowing down the briny sea.

When we were back on the beach Peter kept looking doubtfully at my face. It was off-putting. None of us were looking our best. His face looked like a lobster bulging out of his black hood if it came down to it... It all became clear when he wiped my face with a white towel and a fair amount of dark gritty sand came off my mouth and chin. It appeared I had been sporting an impressive moustache and beard. Peter looked very relieved when it came off and I understood what he had been going on about. It actually gave us fits of uncontrollable giggles. Which helped with getting changed in the chilly carpark.

artist's impression

It was fantastic to have been out and active on such a sunny day. I dropped my book within 30 seconds of getting into bed, swimming off to the far shores of unconsciousness....

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Then this morning I had some chores to do. Peter was away to the Devilla forest race. It was beautifully sunny outside and I was ready to go out by lunchtime. I recently got my mountain bike back from the Edinburgh Bike Coop. It went in before Christmas for a major over-haul. It's suspension hadn't worked for years, but being a Cannondale, the headshok would need to be fixed in Amsterdam. Meanwhile, it had been several years of commuting and salty streets in the winter since I last had any work done to the bike, so I booked it in for a service and a new rear cassette and a new chain and a new middle cog at the front. The gears had been slipping for some time, something I'd kind of adjusted to, but it's really annoying. When I finally got it back, to my massive disappointment, the gears were slipping again! I went through a period of denial, hoping it would sort itself out, which of course it didn't, and then took it back to the shop. The chain had a mutant link on it which was making it skip. So on Friday I got my bike back again...this time, hopefully, fully functioning.

For today's "recovery" activities I thought I would test out the bike by taking it round Arthur's Seat, then running once round and then taking the bike round again. It was chillier outside than I had expected, but very bright. My bike was working perfectly although my legs aren't used to riding uphill at that steep an angle. I got a rush topping out and then sweeping around the road that gives a panorama of the East Lothian coast and then the Pentlands and then Edinburgh Castle and all that. I probably haven't cycled that road since the NYD triathlon in 2006. The Seat was bristling with joggers, walkers, fast runners, cyclists and dog walkers. Oh yeah, and geese...

Castle Wolfenstein

 Like all good adventures it ended with me coming home and getting something to eat. I have more chores to do now, actually, but I'm not sure if I'll do them.