Compendium of Bloggenpish

 How do you get in this door? Or is it an "out only" door...in which case, where do the people inside actually come from? I'm just saying...

It's been a wee while since I blogged. And not really because nothing's been happening. I don't  know why really. Maybe because I didn't have any good photos.
I thought I'd take the bus to work today and then run home. It's about 6 miles if I go the most direct way, but there are plenty of ways to expand it. I took my camera and acted like a tourist on the bus. I still find it quite exciting taking a bus along Princes Street and looking at everything. I'm from Orkney, remember, where, when I was there, there was one roundabout, one set of traffic lights and no double-decker buses at all. I don't think I'd have been able to contain myself when I first came to Edinburgh if there had been trams too. It's just as well they held off....

Last week I was going to write a blog called "Electrolytes and the Diarrhea Kid", partially just to get attention and partly because I had a surprise bout of "delicate digestion" which made me rapidly reassess my marathon training strategy.

I say strategy, but for some reason I have dived (diven?) head-long into doing lots of long runs and my legs have been getting increasingly sore and heavy and my pace has been getting worse and worse. I had a peep at what I was doing last year this time before the E2NB race and saw to my horror that I wasn't doing nearly as much volume but all my medium length runs (12ish miles) were way faster than this year. I decided to cut back on my mileage and take it easy. I have E2NB again in a couple of weeks time so it seems reasonable to do a taper for that and then a couple more weeks highish mileage after it and then taper again for the Edinburgh Marathon.

It has taken over a week for my tummy to start to feel resilient again.

I have a Gestalt Therapy weekend ahead. Don't ask. So I won't be able to get much running in. I reckon I'll get up early on Sunday morning and run 10 or so if I can face it. That's why I took the bus today...to run home and get some miles in...

I started out taking photos on the bus, but then I got interested in the people. I was sitting right at the front and on the other side there was a pale blonde girl, listening to music. Around Haymarket she got her makeup out and started to plaster her face with powder. She really mashed it on. More like she was white-washing harling than dusting a face. It went on and on. She clearly wanted to make sure not one millimetre of skin would be on show. Then she painted on pink cheeks. I was finding it hard not to watch too keenly. It was a relief when she got off. Apparently face skin's a no-no at the moment. You heard it first here. Then a slightly chubby wee boy got on. Maybe 8 years old. He looked kind of normal. Near to my stop he saw a friend at the bus-stop waiting to get on and started to wave vigorously...very vigorously...his friend came up the stairs.
"Yo man, wazz-up?" inquired the friend.
"Birth...babyness...screaming..." intoned my seat mate and I began to wonder if he was not well.
His friend raised his eyebrows. "Fraser is teething" was the explanation. They both nodded silently.

I feel there's a lot of things I've been missing out on. I might get the bus again next week just for the experience.

I had a nice run home. 10.5 miles. It was over-cast but hot and humid.

There are things afoot at work so maybe I'll be getting funded to do another course but have to work an extra day too. It's good in a way. But I love my freedom. And I've just discovered a fun way to end the week.....Life...it's all swings and roundabouts....