43'19", 4.45 miles, 9'43"/mile, 435 cals

Had to walk. 3 times. Felt rubbish.
Possibly something to do with the wine last night and the lack of breakfast. But still crap.

46'17", 9.31 min/mile, 4.86 miles, 474 calories

OK - how do you get ipods to put a podcast into a playlist? There I was a-running, wanting to listen to the Friday night comedy thing from radio 4 - and nothing. The music was there, but no podcast. Very, very annoying

The run was good though - fantastic weather for once, and I actually felt good. Towards the end, I even put more effort in and went faster, but I'm not sure how long I could keep that up. Does that even matter? The important thing was I felt good - hips aching just a little, the  slightest of twinges in my achilles, but really, nothing to worry about at all. Now I am just waiting for the weight to fall off me...

6.21 miles - 59'21" - 607 cals - 9'33" / mile

The one thing I've discovered about the whole running around to get fit lark is - it's bloody time-consuming.
In order to get going, I now have to stretch - a lot - 6 stretches, each held for 4 mins or thereabouts (sometimes I wimp out cos it hurts too much)
Then I have to decide what to wear which takes ages because now it's getting hotter, I don't want to cover up so much but I do want to conceal my wobbly bits with something tied around my middle. And my long trousers are in the wash, my tight cropped ones are ugly and my baggy cropped ones are ugly and a bit too small, but I have to go with those.
So now I'm up and running - and I go further than I have for a long time - over 6 miles according to the nike+ and when I finish a nice American lady who's probably very famous in America - pops into my ear and tells me I've done very well. I don't feel patronised at all...
But I haven't had the ache in my hip joints which I've had for a long time now. As long as I remember to lift up my knees and make sure my core bits are busy. There is also an element of that chi running - trying to lean forward in order to keep going and that seems to make some daft kind of sense.
So that's all lovely.
Then I see myself - bright red face, quite alarmingly so.
The shower seems to have a blockage, but I need a shower so badly I get in and just paddle. But when I get out, I'm still bright red, so there then comes the make up challenge of piling it on to cover up the red without looking like I'm wearing make-up...
And at last I'm ready to face the world - it's a lovely world today, all sunny and a weekend... but I'm having to spend most of the day getting prepared to be seen out in it. I know I'm probably a bit over-sensitive about such things, but the reality is, as you get older it takes longer and longer to look like you haven't spent hours on getting ready to face the world. Sometimes I do wish I was one of those people who genuinely don't care what people think, but then I look at them and feel they ought to make a little bit of an effort. Am I very shallow?
Possibly.
It's now been an hour or so since I finished and my arse is aching, but in a way suggesting it's been exercising, rather than anything injurious. Slightly worrying achilles heel twinge... So getting old also includes loads of extra aches and pains, but I think I knew that already.

Calibration news

mapometer - 3.62 miles
nike+ - 3.6 miles
I think the nike+ might be calibrated - yay! About time too and all that. There is still the issue with my crap ipod not working very well and it takes several goes to get anything through to the thing. Not happy with it, but at least it's something to listen to while struggling with the terrible realisation that I'm out on a run and suffering from being old and decrepit. Either that or a bit unfit.

For some reason my return button's not working. Hmmm








 - well it it - cos look, I'm way down here now, but it didn't show on the screen.
hey ho - now it's working again
life's rich tapestry and all that