Weirdly Warm

this was the other morning out the window

oops - saturation happy

The forecast (I know, so many of my blogs start like this) said wall to wall sunshine. Peter was off to run some long, long distance avec the Colquhoun. With payday still nearly 2 weeks off, I have spent most of my money, so I didn't want to put any fuel in the van. Still I wanted a longish run. So I set off for 15 miles round the Musselburgh lagoons.

The weather was much more mixed than predicted, and there was a strongish South-ish wind, which was sometimes in my face and sometimes not.

As Forrest Gump says "That's all I have to say about that." Apart from, I got home at the end of it and lunch was delicious. Oh no, there is more. The prom was hoaching like on a summer's day - except people were wearing coats with hoods. The eastern european chap was out playing his squeeze box and a small boy child had come off his bike right beside him, so he was screaming in a way that, to my rather detached mind, went quite well with the music. Dogs on long leads criss-crossed before me and I had to keep on my tired old toes. It was like some lavish, 3D game of Chinese Skipping. Do you remember Chinese Skipping? Upon reflection I don't think it had its roots in the orient.

While out I bumped into a man I knew many moons ago - I think I last spoke to him when I was 26. He was out on his bike. I had stopped to take pictures of wading birds and he pulled up beside me, also to look at the birds. We had a potted chat about where we were both at now and he cycled off to meet a bunch of cyclists who were all going out a cycle run together. On my way back from the lagoons, having run 9 or so miles, I stopped again, this time to take a picture of the rainbow at the bottom of the estuary. I was passed by a bunch of cyclists. Bringing up the rear was my friend Michael. I didn't want to be rude but I enquired as to why it had taken him more than an hour to come less than three miles. Apparently they had all gone to a cafe for a second breakfast first. "Leisurely" I remarked.

The last 2 miles were quite painful. I find 15 miles is about the furthest I want to run without taking anything to drink. I think the dehydration starts to make your legs ache.

Did I mention I got my dissertation back, and the final mark for my Masters and I got a distinction? Oh, did I not mention that? Hah. It was such hard work. The problem was I'd got good grades all the way through my course and I knew if I could get over 70% for my dissertation, a distinction was on the cards. A distinction really doesn't change anything in the outer world, except possibly people think you're a knob if you get one, but it seemed so defeatist to not try since I was so close. And then the dissertation didn't really flow. You know how sometimes things just work out smoothly and other times things require much effort, swearing, stress, blood, sweat, tears, extra nails, a bit of glue, and even then you're not sure if the whole thing isn't just going to come apart? My dissertation was put together with the 2nd methodology. I got feedback from two readers. Professor Martha was typically lovely about the whole thing, understanding what was good about it and not making much of a fuss about the spots on its face and its halitosis. Dagmar, however, took her typically blunt approach and flayed the flesh from the bones of the poor thing. I'm glad she did because it means I don't have to. I have mixed enough metaphors here. I hope you have been able to follow them.

Anyway. It's the end of an era, and a happy ending too. I hoped today to mark the occasion by having a bit of a tidy, and putting away the things I won't be needing (course stuff), to make space for the new in my life. So I better stop sitting here in my pants telling stories and get on with it.