Wednesday, 12 October 2011
Life of Grimes: England Expects
Life of Grimes: England Expects: So, probably I am the last person qualified to offer an opinion on this topic. I'm a girl. The only time I've ever actually touched a rugby ...
England Expects
So, probably I am the last person qualified to offer an opinion on this topic. I'm a girl. The only time I've ever actually touched a rugby ball was one ill-advised winter's evening while at college, when I gate-crashed the ladies' rugby training and broke a nail. I was on the wing, for god's sake - I wasn't envisaging actually having to do anything. I thought it was the rugby equivalent of playing 'deep fielder' in rounders.
Anyway, it's my blog, I can say what I like. And, as it happens, I have been a fan of rugby since 1990 (ok, since I saw Rob Andrew on Question Of Sport, and fell in love *crosses self*). I've been on 3 British Lions' tours, the so-called 'Tour of Death' to NZ in '98, and many a home international. I was a hardened Sale fan for all the years they languished at the bottom of the Premiership, up until the point they stopped actually playing in Sale. Then they started to get good, damn their eyes.
And I started to think about this whole England world cup debacle. I can cope with England playing badly on the pitch - takes me right back to the bad old days at Sale. But playing badly AND behaving like the Manchester United youth team in Ayia Napa? That takes some doing. And then I read David Flatman's article in the Guardian on the subject, and it made me quite sad. Sad because I didn't totally agree with him, and I ALWAYS agree with him. He's erudite, funny, and sensible (not bad going for someone who's spent most of their adult life face down in the mud). He didn't particularly lay the finger of blame anywhere, but rather lamented the media-driven obsession with celebrity, and the way it has started to seep into the previously-fluffy world of rugby since the advent of professionalism.
Now, I don't really buy that. It has, ofcourse, but one inevitably goes hand-in-hand with the other, as football has found to its cost. You can't welcome the money flooding into the game with one hand, while trying to maintain the ethos of the good old days with the other. And where does the money come from, ultimately? The loyal rugby fan. Now, far from the loyal rugby fan being too bothered about what the Daily Mail says about Tindall's/Tuilagi's/Haskell's/Ashton's/Hartley's, etc. behaviour (small fry considering what once happened to the Calcutta Cup, or that taxi that Scott Gibbs nicked perhaps), under the microscope at the biggest, most media-savvy World Cup ever is not the place or time for it. If there ever was a time for it, I suspect it was circa 1989, and it is long gone.
I could over-look it if the team were running rings round the opposition in their matches. But they didn't. They looked like 14 strangers, plus St Jonny of Wilkinson, who I love dearly but praise the lord, there isn't a team from here to Timbuctoo that hasn't worked him out by now. Osama Bin Laden has more spring in his step.
I look at the dedication of someone like Sir Steve Redgrave, who I doubt had a drink for about 15 years, such was his determination to continuously be the best in the World, getting up at 5am a year before the Olympics to train at altitude on the freezing waters of some desolate mountain lake. And I read that Sam Warburton hasn't touched a drop since the end of the Six Nations, and I think, you know what? It's not that hard. It's surely not too much to ask that the players devote themselves body and soul to be the best in the World, at the very least, for the 8 weeks that they're away. I managed to stay away from alchohol for 9 whole months, it's really not that difficult (drink like a fish now, ofcourse, but that's neither here nor there). Scotland, of course, could live like Trappist monks from now till Lewis Hamilton gets Sports Personality of the Year, and they'd still be crap.
Arrows are inevitably being drawn in the direction of Martin Johnson, and not without provocation. From the man you expect to lay discipline down like Hannibal, to rule the players with a wrath to equal Sir Alex Ferguson's infamous 'hairdryer', comments like "Rugby player drinks beer: shock" do not really wash. It might not be a shock, but it also might not be advisable in a country where rugby is the national obsession, and players' every actions are studied, analysed and splashed across the front pages. Where the biggest event in the country's history is the 2011 World Cup final. Not the country's sporting history, note: it's actual history. Because rugby IS New Zealand, like no other country on earth.
Throughout the tournament, I began to see that Johnson isn't the demi-god I'd appointed him as. I'd been willing to overlook his dogged support of Steve Borthwick as captain, even though Borthwick is as much use in that role as a nylon tank. Capable player on his day, but a charismatic, inspiring captain he was not. And yet Johnson gave him way beyond the usual 'try-out' period, as if he was stubbornly trying to prove his point by sheer perseverance.
He seems to struggle to lose his playing loyalties in a way a less successful and conscientious man would not. Defending players from media accusations is one thing, but doggedly excusing their unacceptable behaviour is entirely another. Additionally, his continual advocacy of "a win's a win" above all else started alarm bells - surely at least aim to produce some entertaining, inventive play? Otherwise, really, what is the point? Aspiration to be the best should be tattooed on their souls, not aspiration to be ok. As Malcolm X once said, "If you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything" - mediocrity, as it turns out.
Not good enough. England - at least the hard-working, loyal rugby fan - expects the entertainment to be on the pitch, not off it. I'm not sure we can lay the blame for the implosion at the door of professionalism any more. I don't particularly remember an instanteous shift in the atmosphere of the English game the minute the gilded gates opened. It's more a culmination of many factors - previous successes at World Cups raising expectations, this being probably the first generation of rugby players who have never known the game as being amateur, and the accessibility of worldwide media within seconds from anywhere in the world, about things we really don't need to know but are bombarded with nonetheless.
I think there is a general feeling that your average rugby fan is slogging his or her guts out all week, working ridiculously long hours in a job that they probably don't like very much to earn a wage that just about keeps the wolf from the door for the next month, assuming they are lucky enough to have a job. Many of them have saved some of this hard-earned dough in order to travel a year and a half on an aeroplane to a country which looks like Wales, to watch '03 all over again. They hoped. And you watch these players, who are given the opportunity to represent their country on the world's stage, playing a sport that they presumably love otherwise they wouldn't be doing it, and getting paid very handsomely, thank you very much. You watch them amble round the pitch, and give penalties away left right and centre as though no-one has ever explained Southern Hemisphere refereeing to them, and you start to wonder. Then you read in every tabloid in the country about the dwarf-tossing, blonde-fondling, maid-harassing, ferry-jumping antics, and the continuous and repetitive excuses given by the manager who once you idolised as a human Hadrian's Wall, and you lose any respect that may have been dwindling in the bottom of your pint pot.
The killer-blow for me came when I read that Manu Tuilagi's 'ill-advised' (for want of anything that isn't a swear word) early swim off the Auckland ferry came on the return journey of a lovely jolly out to the island of Waiheke where they reportedly visited a vineyard. Well, I don't know about you, but I want my mildly-disgraced, rudderless-ship of a national side to be catching the next flight home after losing the quarter final to France, trudging through Heathrow looking bloody miserable, getting their heads down and getting back to work, not engaging in day-trips at my expense and having a 'bit of banter' (think again, Mr Youngs) in one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world.
Ahhhh! Lordy, that feels better. Nothing like a bit of a rant to clear the air. Now then, where's my Welsh phrase book? Diolch yn fawr, as we *ahem* say in Wales......
Anyway, it's my blog, I can say what I like. And, as it happens, I have been a fan of rugby since 1990 (ok, since I saw Rob Andrew on Question Of Sport, and fell in love *crosses self*). I've been on 3 British Lions' tours, the so-called 'Tour of Death' to NZ in '98, and many a home international. I was a hardened Sale fan for all the years they languished at the bottom of the Premiership, up until the point they stopped actually playing in Sale. Then they started to get good, damn their eyes.
And I started to think about this whole England world cup debacle. I can cope with England playing badly on the pitch - takes me right back to the bad old days at Sale. But playing badly AND behaving like the Manchester United youth team in Ayia Napa? That takes some doing. And then I read David Flatman's article in the Guardian on the subject, and it made me quite sad. Sad because I didn't totally agree with him, and I ALWAYS agree with him. He's erudite, funny, and sensible (not bad going for someone who's spent most of their adult life face down in the mud). He didn't particularly lay the finger of blame anywhere, but rather lamented the media-driven obsession with celebrity, and the way it has started to seep into the previously-fluffy world of rugby since the advent of professionalism.
Now, I don't really buy that. It has, ofcourse, but one inevitably goes hand-in-hand with the other, as football has found to its cost. You can't welcome the money flooding into the game with one hand, while trying to maintain the ethos of the good old days with the other. And where does the money come from, ultimately? The loyal rugby fan. Now, far from the loyal rugby fan being too bothered about what the Daily Mail says about Tindall's/Tuilagi's/Haskell's/Ashton's/Hartley's, etc. behaviour (small fry considering what once happened to the Calcutta Cup, or that taxi that Scott Gibbs nicked perhaps), under the microscope at the biggest, most media-savvy World Cup ever is not the place or time for it. If there ever was a time for it, I suspect it was circa 1989, and it is long gone.
I could over-look it if the team were running rings round the opposition in their matches. But they didn't. They looked like 14 strangers, plus St Jonny of Wilkinson, who I love dearly but praise the lord, there isn't a team from here to Timbuctoo that hasn't worked him out by now. Osama Bin Laden has more spring in his step.
I look at the dedication of someone like Sir Steve Redgrave, who I doubt had a drink for about 15 years, such was his determination to continuously be the best in the World, getting up at 5am a year before the Olympics to train at altitude on the freezing waters of some desolate mountain lake. And I read that Sam Warburton hasn't touched a drop since the end of the Six Nations, and I think, you know what? It's not that hard. It's surely not too much to ask that the players devote themselves body and soul to be the best in the World, at the very least, for the 8 weeks that they're away. I managed to stay away from alchohol for 9 whole months, it's really not that difficult (drink like a fish now, ofcourse, but that's neither here nor there). Scotland, of course, could live like Trappist monks from now till Lewis Hamilton gets Sports Personality of the Year, and they'd still be crap.
Arrows are inevitably being drawn in the direction of Martin Johnson, and not without provocation. From the man you expect to lay discipline down like Hannibal, to rule the players with a wrath to equal Sir Alex Ferguson's infamous 'hairdryer', comments like "Rugby player drinks beer: shock" do not really wash. It might not be a shock, but it also might not be advisable in a country where rugby is the national obsession, and players' every actions are studied, analysed and splashed across the front pages. Where the biggest event in the country's history is the 2011 World Cup final. Not the country's sporting history, note: it's actual history. Because rugby IS New Zealand, like no other country on earth.
Throughout the tournament, I began to see that Johnson isn't the demi-god I'd appointed him as. I'd been willing to overlook his dogged support of Steve Borthwick as captain, even though Borthwick is as much use in that role as a nylon tank. Capable player on his day, but a charismatic, inspiring captain he was not. And yet Johnson gave him way beyond the usual 'try-out' period, as if he was stubbornly trying to prove his point by sheer perseverance.
He seems to struggle to lose his playing loyalties in a way a less successful and conscientious man would not. Defending players from media accusations is one thing, but doggedly excusing their unacceptable behaviour is entirely another. Additionally, his continual advocacy of "a win's a win" above all else started alarm bells - surely at least aim to produce some entertaining, inventive play? Otherwise, really, what is the point? Aspiration to be the best should be tattooed on their souls, not aspiration to be ok. As Malcolm X once said, "If you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything" - mediocrity, as it turns out.
Not good enough. England - at least the hard-working, loyal rugby fan - expects the entertainment to be on the pitch, not off it. I'm not sure we can lay the blame for the implosion at the door of professionalism any more. I don't particularly remember an instanteous shift in the atmosphere of the English game the minute the gilded gates opened. It's more a culmination of many factors - previous successes at World Cups raising expectations, this being probably the first generation of rugby players who have never known the game as being amateur, and the accessibility of worldwide media within seconds from anywhere in the world, about things we really don't need to know but are bombarded with nonetheless.
I think there is a general feeling that your average rugby fan is slogging his or her guts out all week, working ridiculously long hours in a job that they probably don't like very much to earn a wage that just about keeps the wolf from the door for the next month, assuming they are lucky enough to have a job. Many of them have saved some of this hard-earned dough in order to travel a year and a half on an aeroplane to a country which looks like Wales, to watch '03 all over again. They hoped. And you watch these players, who are given the opportunity to represent their country on the world's stage, playing a sport that they presumably love otherwise they wouldn't be doing it, and getting paid very handsomely, thank you very much. You watch them amble round the pitch, and give penalties away left right and centre as though no-one has ever explained Southern Hemisphere refereeing to them, and you start to wonder. Then you read in every tabloid in the country about the dwarf-tossing, blonde-fondling, maid-harassing, ferry-jumping antics, and the continuous and repetitive excuses given by the manager who once you idolised as a human Hadrian's Wall, and you lose any respect that may have been dwindling in the bottom of your pint pot.
The killer-blow for me came when I read that Manu Tuilagi's 'ill-advised' (for want of anything that isn't a swear word) early swim off the Auckland ferry came on the return journey of a lovely jolly out to the island of Waiheke where they reportedly visited a vineyard. Well, I don't know about you, but I want my mildly-disgraced, rudderless-ship of a national side to be catching the next flight home after losing the quarter final to France, trudging through Heathrow looking bloody miserable, getting their heads down and getting back to work, not engaging in day-trips at my expense and having a 'bit of banter' (think again, Mr Youngs) in one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world.
Ahhhh! Lordy, that feels better. Nothing like a bit of a rant to clear the air. Now then, where's my Welsh phrase book? Diolch yn fawr, as we *ahem* say in Wales......
Tuesday, 26 April 2011
And in the news this week....
Firstly, in the news this week: me and running are over. O.V.E.R. It's official.
We had our good times (primarily, me deriving mild amusement from being dizzy getting off the treadmill), we had our brief tumultous love affair (primarily before I actually started doing any running), and now it's run it's course. Oh, enough already with the cheese. It's rubbish.
It's the most rubbish thing since Sir Clive Sinclair stuck a AAA battery and a couple of trolley wheels on an Easter egg and called it an electric car. Seriously, why does anybody want to actually run?
I understand the Ethiopians doing it. They have to. They've got to get down to the watering hole and back in time to milk the goat before nightfall and the watering hole is 175 miles away. Although if I was Ethiopian, I'd either fashion myself a bike out of a bit of goat hide and some wizened twigs, or I'd be Very Bloody Thirsty.
But why does anybody else do it? I resent lumbering along on the treadmill like some flat-footed elderly penguin almost as much as I resent doing it outside, scaring innocent dog-walkers with my heavy breathing, as I clomp up behind them in the manner of a terminally-asthmatic elephant.
I hate it more than I strongly dislike Katie Melua (hate is a very strong word to bandy at someone who has done me no perceivable personal injury). I hate it more than I hate people who plonk themselves down next to you on the sofa whilst you're watching The Only Way Is Essex and ask, 'But is it real?'. I hate it more than I hate getting to the last Mini Egg in the packet. I hate it more than I hate candy floss, and sundried tomatoes, and Sauvignon Blanc (the waste product of a cat, in my opinion). And I hate it more than Premiership football (there, I've said it. So shoot me).
In short, I'd rather be held hostage in Essex by a Premiership footballer and force fed candy floss than I would do a run. But fear not, faithful followers, whilst I've decided that the 10k may not be a realistic target (I believe Tatton Park closes at 6pm - I'd be locked in the park over-night, and possibly gored to death by an irate stag), I will be doing the 5k instead. Can't take more than half a day, surely?
In other matters, all hail to the hooded ninja warrior who has been rescuing the citizens of Tunbridge Wells from anti-social behaviour and general nastiness (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1380610/The-Ninja-Tunbridge-Wells-Pyjama-crusader-launches-vigilante-campaign.html). In all seriousness, it's refreshing to find someone willing to stand up and be counted in an effort to make our streets safer, and our communities closer. I'm not sure how much of a hotbed of crime Tunbridge Wells is, but still, somebody's got to get that cat out of a tree, and at least if a fireman's not doing it, it's not costing the great British taxpayer about £576. The anonymous man has apparently been seen assisting old ladies across the road, dressed all in black and wearing a hood. There's a joke in there about old ladies having a stroke, but it's very old and crude, and quite beneath me.
Right, I'm off to watch Masterchef. It's basically the normal guy, the Italian bird who was a nurse but now wants to give up helping others and become a selfish, egotistical maniac instead, and the mad American who makes desserts out of dry ice and beer. Tonight can only be better than last night's episode of John Torode cooking John Torode's menu in John Torode's kitchen for John Torode's friends and family, hindered to varying degrees by the slightly-perplexed contestants. It promises to be better, if only on the grounds of the expressions of the 3 finalists on being told they were off to New York to cook: Italian bird...ecstatic. Normal Guy....chuffed to little meatballs. Mad American, from, I believe, New York....massive underwhelment (I know it's not a word, but it's how he looked).
His expression was much as mine would have been had I appeared in the Masterchef final and John and Greg had informed me I was off to learn great things in the restaurants of Urmston. Exactly.
We had our good times (primarily, me deriving mild amusement from being dizzy getting off the treadmill), we had our brief tumultous love affair (primarily before I actually started doing any running), and now it's run it's course. Oh, enough already with the cheese. It's rubbish.
It's the most rubbish thing since Sir Clive Sinclair stuck a AAA battery and a couple of trolley wheels on an Easter egg and called it an electric car. Seriously, why does anybody want to actually run?
I understand the Ethiopians doing it. They have to. They've got to get down to the watering hole and back in time to milk the goat before nightfall and the watering hole is 175 miles away. Although if I was Ethiopian, I'd either fashion myself a bike out of a bit of goat hide and some wizened twigs, or I'd be Very Bloody Thirsty.
But why does anybody else do it? I resent lumbering along on the treadmill like some flat-footed elderly penguin almost as much as I resent doing it outside, scaring innocent dog-walkers with my heavy breathing, as I clomp up behind them in the manner of a terminally-asthmatic elephant.
I hate it more than I strongly dislike Katie Melua (hate is a very strong word to bandy at someone who has done me no perceivable personal injury). I hate it more than I hate people who plonk themselves down next to you on the sofa whilst you're watching The Only Way Is Essex and ask, 'But is it real?'. I hate it more than I hate getting to the last Mini Egg in the packet. I hate it more than I hate candy floss, and sundried tomatoes, and Sauvignon Blanc (the waste product of a cat, in my opinion). And I hate it more than Premiership football (there, I've said it. So shoot me).
In short, I'd rather be held hostage in Essex by a Premiership footballer and force fed candy floss than I would do a run. But fear not, faithful followers, whilst I've decided that the 10k may not be a realistic target (I believe Tatton Park closes at 6pm - I'd be locked in the park over-night, and possibly gored to death by an irate stag), I will be doing the 5k instead. Can't take more than half a day, surely?
In other matters, all hail to the hooded ninja warrior who has been rescuing the citizens of Tunbridge Wells from anti-social behaviour and general nastiness (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1380610/The-Ninja-Tunbridge-Wells-Pyjama-crusader-launches-vigilante-campaign.html). In all seriousness, it's refreshing to find someone willing to stand up and be counted in an effort to make our streets safer, and our communities closer. I'm not sure how much of a hotbed of crime Tunbridge Wells is, but still, somebody's got to get that cat out of a tree, and at least if a fireman's not doing it, it's not costing the great British taxpayer about £576. The anonymous man has apparently been seen assisting old ladies across the road, dressed all in black and wearing a hood. There's a joke in there about old ladies having a stroke, but it's very old and crude, and quite beneath me.
Right, I'm off to watch Masterchef. It's basically the normal guy, the Italian bird who was a nurse but now wants to give up helping others and become a selfish, egotistical maniac instead, and the mad American who makes desserts out of dry ice and beer. Tonight can only be better than last night's episode of John Torode cooking John Torode's menu in John Torode's kitchen for John Torode's friends and family, hindered to varying degrees by the slightly-perplexed contestants. It promises to be better, if only on the grounds of the expressions of the 3 finalists on being told they were off to New York to cook: Italian bird...ecstatic. Normal Guy....chuffed to little meatballs. Mad American, from, I believe, New York....massive underwhelment (I know it's not a word, but it's how he looked).
His expression was much as mine would have been had I appeared in the Masterchef final and John and Greg had informed me I was off to learn great things in the restaurants of Urmston. Exactly.
Tuesday, 5 April 2011
Gym'll Fix It - Running On Empty
It's only Tuesday, but already I have learnt this week that my 10k charity run target in June is under threat on two fronts (no, not those ones): 1. I don't like running. At all. In any way. 2. I don't like being pink and sweaty.
I had a suspicion about the running hatred before I started, what with never having voluntarily run a step in 30-odd years and all. But this week, it's reared it's ugly head with a vengeance, spitting on my repeated attempts to run for longer than 12 minutes (I know, I know - it's 10k, not 10cm), and trampling on my pathetic attempts to embrace the boredom and move past it.
After a mere 5 minutes, with my enthusiasm plummeting faster than Charlie Sheen's ticket sales, I watch the figures on the treadmill keyboard limp painfully slowly past 0.5km. Oh, and there goes another....2 calories. Whoop whoop. By now, I could tell you every news headline on the gym tv, the telephone number for Cheadle Glass, and the last seven songs they played on the screen....and there goes another calorie....
I can't peer round at everybody else and gain mild entertainment from people watching, because I've discovered if I move my line of sight from the zone directly in front of me, I fall over. So I stare, glassy-eyed at the tv screens, contact lenses drying out from too little blinking, wishing some serious news item would break to relieve the boredom slightly. Nothing too drastic, you know, just a volcano erupting somewhere or a government coup in French Guyana.
I'm not helped by the wheezing, pounding noises emitted from the bloke next to me, who is clearly the running equivalent of the guy on the driving range who likes to remind everyone how manly he is by whacking 100 golf balls with a Big Bertha, the noise of which can be heard from the other side of the M6. 'You are not Haile Gebrselassie,' I direct angry thoughts in his treadmill's direction, unable to actually speak, 'You are Bob from telesales. Now pack it in!'
I've noticed distinct behavioural differences between men and women in the gym (I'm ok when I'm on the weights machines - I can peer at everybody without falling off). Women generally scuttle from one machine to the next, anxious to get it over and done with without everyone seeing any pink, sweaty, wobbly bits. They avoid eye contact and have headphones in at all times to avoid initiating any random conversation. Men, on the other hand, wear their pink sweatiness like a badge of honour. They periodically glance round to check who has noticed their prowess on the rower/treadmill/weights bench, and make as much noise as possible, grunting like a mountain goat as they get pinker and pinker.
I am about to push Bob from telesales off his running perch. If only I could dismount elegantly off my own, instead of staggering drunkenly like some inebriate on a hen-do. I fear there is about as much chance of me grasping the point of running as there is explaining trigonometry to a labrador, but I will persevere. Mainly because if I manage to drop another 3 calories on that weirdy-skiing machine-type-thing, I'm due a quarter of a blueberry muffin *sighs*.
I had a suspicion about the running hatred before I started, what with never having voluntarily run a step in 30-odd years and all. But this week, it's reared it's ugly head with a vengeance, spitting on my repeated attempts to run for longer than 12 minutes (I know, I know - it's 10k, not 10cm), and trampling on my pathetic attempts to embrace the boredom and move past it.
After a mere 5 minutes, with my enthusiasm plummeting faster than Charlie Sheen's ticket sales, I watch the figures on the treadmill keyboard limp painfully slowly past 0.5km. Oh, and there goes another....2 calories. Whoop whoop. By now, I could tell you every news headline on the gym tv, the telephone number for Cheadle Glass, and the last seven songs they played on the screen....and there goes another calorie....
I can't peer round at everybody else and gain mild entertainment from people watching, because I've discovered if I move my line of sight from the zone directly in front of me, I fall over. So I stare, glassy-eyed at the tv screens, contact lenses drying out from too little blinking, wishing some serious news item would break to relieve the boredom slightly. Nothing too drastic, you know, just a volcano erupting somewhere or a government coup in French Guyana.
I'm not helped by the wheezing, pounding noises emitted from the bloke next to me, who is clearly the running equivalent of the guy on the driving range who likes to remind everyone how manly he is by whacking 100 golf balls with a Big Bertha, the noise of which can be heard from the other side of the M6. 'You are not Haile Gebrselassie,' I direct angry thoughts in his treadmill's direction, unable to actually speak, 'You are Bob from telesales. Now pack it in!'
I've noticed distinct behavioural differences between men and women in the gym (I'm ok when I'm on the weights machines - I can peer at everybody without falling off). Women generally scuttle from one machine to the next, anxious to get it over and done with without everyone seeing any pink, sweaty, wobbly bits. They avoid eye contact and have headphones in at all times to avoid initiating any random conversation. Men, on the other hand, wear their pink sweatiness like a badge of honour. They periodically glance round to check who has noticed their prowess on the rower/treadmill/weights bench, and make as much noise as possible, grunting like a mountain goat as they get pinker and pinker.
I am about to push Bob from telesales off his running perch. If only I could dismount elegantly off my own, instead of staggering drunkenly like some inebriate on a hen-do. I fear there is about as much chance of me grasping the point of running as there is explaining trigonometry to a labrador, but I will persevere. Mainly because if I manage to drop another 3 calories on that weirdy-skiing machine-type-thing, I'm due a quarter of a blueberry muffin *sighs*.
Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Gym'll Fix It
So, race is entered, number's arrived in the post already - no backing down now.
In somewhat of a blind panic, I visited The Gym. Gyms have been my nemesis in the past - places of torture, and insanely sweaty, unpleasant-looking people in lycra (alright, 'nemesis' might be an exaggeration. I can't forgive Gym for relieving me of 6 months' fees in 1997, just because I wanted to sit prettily on a rowing machine and leer at the young men who worked there. How was I to know you had to pay through the nose for that).
I arrived for my induction last week, all outwardly cheerful at what I thought might be just a little sight-seeing tour round the hallowed exercise pits of David Lloyd Cheadle. Picture my dismay as Herr Gym Instructor signalled me to 'jump' onto a machine which I imagined could easily have been used to interrogate prisoners of war. Turns out it was a cross-trainer. Well, I don't know, do I??
An hour later, I collapsed to the floor, finished off by something ironically called a 'medicine ball'. An hour of galloping from one instrument of torture to the next, with HGI cheerily engaging me in a one-sided conversation, all the while scribbling worryingly on a clipboard. Our 'chat' went something along the lines of: HGI: 'How's that speed for you?'
Me: 'Fine.'
HGI: 'Oh really? Well, you won't mind if we just sneak it up a bit then, will you?'
Me: 'Hmpppsshhhffttttt*'
It really was every bit as bad as I'd secretly anticipated. I had some Know-It-All Gym'ed Up twonk waffling on in one ear about interval training, blah blah blah, resting heart rate, blah blah bah, while my face turned the colour of Revlon ColourStay lipstick no.6: Scarlet Harlot.
Surprisingly afterwards, I didn't ache in every crevice as I'd expected. I braced myself for days afterwards when getting out of bed, waiting to be hit by the bodily aches and pains which tell you loud and clear that you've been a tad ambitious with your poor bod. But they never came, and I immediately convinved myself that this was the sign of a latent Paula Radcliffe in the making. I've been four times since then, and am enjoying the post-gym buzz enormously. I always thought it was an urban myth.
I'm also enjoying the Costa Coffee they serve at the gym (two birds, one stone), and the people-watching. I've nearly come a cropper off the running machine several times, trying not to snort at some bloke strutting by, towel over arm, approaching the weight machines. I have to look away so as not to become an RTA on my treadmill as he pulls a variety of sex faces whilst wrestling with a weight which is clearly several kilos heavier than is healthy. Then there are the ladies in the -shall we say - autumn of their youth, trotting daintily away on treadmills to my left, neither of whom are in danger of working up a sweat if they stayed on it from now till Christmas.
Soon the warm weather will kick in, my fitness will pick up, and I'll be out on the roads, pounding my poor knee joints to a pulp. But I'll miss the daily soap opera that is The Gym.
* Hmpppsshhhffttttt = eff off, you cross-eyed ginger twonk. Go near that button again, and I'll get your effing clipboard, chop it into 75 pieces, and feed it into an area on your body south of your mouth.
In somewhat of a blind panic, I visited The Gym. Gyms have been my nemesis in the past - places of torture, and insanely sweaty, unpleasant-looking people in lycra (alright, 'nemesis' might be an exaggeration. I can't forgive Gym for relieving me of 6 months' fees in 1997, just because I wanted to sit prettily on a rowing machine and leer at the young men who worked there. How was I to know you had to pay through the nose for that).
I arrived for my induction last week, all outwardly cheerful at what I thought might be just a little sight-seeing tour round the hallowed exercise pits of David Lloyd Cheadle. Picture my dismay as Herr Gym Instructor signalled me to 'jump' onto a machine which I imagined could easily have been used to interrogate prisoners of war. Turns out it was a cross-trainer. Well, I don't know, do I??
An hour later, I collapsed to the floor, finished off by something ironically called a 'medicine ball'. An hour of galloping from one instrument of torture to the next, with HGI cheerily engaging me in a one-sided conversation, all the while scribbling worryingly on a clipboard. Our 'chat' went something along the lines of: HGI: 'How's that speed for you?'
Me: 'Fine.'
HGI: 'Oh really? Well, you won't mind if we just sneak it up a bit then, will you?'
Me: 'Hmpppsshhhffttttt*'
It really was every bit as bad as I'd secretly anticipated. I had some Know-It-All Gym'ed Up twonk waffling on in one ear about interval training, blah blah blah, resting heart rate, blah blah bah, while my face turned the colour of Revlon ColourStay lipstick no.6: Scarlet Harlot.
Surprisingly afterwards, I didn't ache in every crevice as I'd expected. I braced myself for days afterwards when getting out of bed, waiting to be hit by the bodily aches and pains which tell you loud and clear that you've been a tad ambitious with your poor bod. But they never came, and I immediately convinved myself that this was the sign of a latent Paula Radcliffe in the making. I've been four times since then, and am enjoying the post-gym buzz enormously. I always thought it was an urban myth.
I'm also enjoying the Costa Coffee they serve at the gym (two birds, one stone), and the people-watching. I've nearly come a cropper off the running machine several times, trying not to snort at some bloke strutting by, towel over arm, approaching the weight machines. I have to look away so as not to become an RTA on my treadmill as he pulls a variety of sex faces whilst wrestling with a weight which is clearly several kilos heavier than is healthy. Then there are the ladies in the -shall we say - autumn of their youth, trotting daintily away on treadmills to my left, neither of whom are in danger of working up a sweat if they stayed on it from now till Christmas.
Soon the warm weather will kick in, my fitness will pick up, and I'll be out on the roads, pounding my poor knee joints to a pulp. But I'll miss the daily soap opera that is The Gym.
* Hmpppsshhhffttttt = eff off, you cross-eyed ginger twonk. Go near that button again, and I'll get your effing clipboard, chop it into 75 pieces, and feed it into an area on your body south of your mouth.
Tuesday, 8 March 2011
'Run, Forest, run!'
Yesterday, I entered myself for the Cancer Research Race for Life 10k at Tatton Park in June. Nothing much unusual about that, you might think - unless you know me.
I don't run. It is one of several things I don't do, the others being: apologise, be unecessarily cheerful, drugs, and public transport. I drive past people out jogging on a Sunday morning and I pity them that they clearly didn't drink enough alcohol the night before. I avoid conversations with people who run in the manner that other people avoid smokers, in the fear that some of their get up and go might rub off on me like a viral infection.
And yet, I am about to become one of Them. I should point out that I haven't knowingly run a single step since my schooldays, and have still yet to do so. I'm already imagining myself winning next year's New York marathon without ever having pulled on a pair of trainers - not that I'm mildly delusional or anything. Short of discovering hitherto unknown Ethiopian heritage, that's not likely to happen. And yet, I'm already feeling cheerier (notice cheerIER, not actually cheery) than I have done in months at the prospect of a personal goal to get my teeth into. Factor in the purported anti-depressant qualities of running and exercise in general, and I imagine in a month or two, you could wrap me up and send me off to Pontin's as a redcoat.
I'll confess now that I was actually in the school athletics' team. But this was entirely down to unfortunate circumstances; these being that at the 400m trial, everyone else misheard the gym teacher and stopped at the finish line on the penultimate lap - I was the only one who kept going. More fool me. Humiliation at the hands of Manchester High School followed soon after. And it wasn't just the humiliation that made me go red - I've developed new tones of luminous day-glo pink over the years due to exercise. Some people just turn a pleasant healthy pink, but many's the time I've had to plunge my head into a bucket of cold water after an hour's horse-riding lesson, or risk having my head explode. So I can pretty much guarantee that 5 minutes into any run I do, I'll be able to light a whole street with my face.
So why do it? I can't put it better than Mark Twain, who said: 'Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones that you did do. So throw off the bow lines, Sail away from safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.' I might hate every second. I might puke up half way round in front of the official photographer, or do a Paula Radcliffe and get caught short. But I won't know till I try.
I don't run. It is one of several things I don't do, the others being: apologise, be unecessarily cheerful, drugs, and public transport. I drive past people out jogging on a Sunday morning and I pity them that they clearly didn't drink enough alcohol the night before. I avoid conversations with people who run in the manner that other people avoid smokers, in the fear that some of their get up and go might rub off on me like a viral infection.
And yet, I am about to become one of Them. I should point out that I haven't knowingly run a single step since my schooldays, and have still yet to do so. I'm already imagining myself winning next year's New York marathon without ever having pulled on a pair of trainers - not that I'm mildly delusional or anything. Short of discovering hitherto unknown Ethiopian heritage, that's not likely to happen. And yet, I'm already feeling cheerier (notice cheerIER, not actually cheery) than I have done in months at the prospect of a personal goal to get my teeth into. Factor in the purported anti-depressant qualities of running and exercise in general, and I imagine in a month or two, you could wrap me up and send me off to Pontin's as a redcoat.
I'll confess now that I was actually in the school athletics' team. But this was entirely down to unfortunate circumstances; these being that at the 400m trial, everyone else misheard the gym teacher and stopped at the finish line on the penultimate lap - I was the only one who kept going. More fool me. Humiliation at the hands of Manchester High School followed soon after. And it wasn't just the humiliation that made me go red - I've developed new tones of luminous day-glo pink over the years due to exercise. Some people just turn a pleasant healthy pink, but many's the time I've had to plunge my head into a bucket of cold water after an hour's horse-riding lesson, or risk having my head explode. So I can pretty much guarantee that 5 minutes into any run I do, I'll be able to light a whole street with my face.
So why do it? I can't put it better than Mark Twain, who said: 'Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones that you did do. So throw off the bow lines, Sail away from safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.' I might hate every second. I might puke up half way round in front of the official photographer, or do a Paula Radcliffe and get caught short. But I won't know till I try.
Wednesday, 9 February 2011
Back to the drawing board
Quite literally. After my recent work's been reliant on imagination and composition, it's been nice to switch off a little bit and complete this commission from an old junior school friend. He asked me to do a portrait of his two young daughters for his wife's birthday at the end of this month.
I have to be honest, this is the first childrens' portrait I've ever done (I may have neglected to mention this to Brian). Before I had a baby myself, I used to avoid kids like the plague, and stuck stubbornly to painting pets and adults, but actually I've really enjoyed this project. Childrens', and particularly babies' faces, are so soft and unformed that you really have to have a light touch with the pencil. Their hair tends to be wispy and fly-away, and eyebrows and eyelashes are barely there either, so you definitely need to exercise subtlety and use the harder pencils to capture them. The photos were supplied by the girls' dad, and were great and numerous, although indoor, flash-lit photos aren't brilliant to work from because the flash really flattens facial contours and bleaches everything. The older girl's photo was taken outside, and was much easier to work from - gave a really easy light to work with.
Have taken it off to the framer's, just hope Brian & Michelle actually like it when they get it next week! Ughhh, I hate that bit - get really nervous.
I have to be honest, this is the first childrens' portrait I've ever done (I may have neglected to mention this to Brian). Before I had a baby myself, I used to avoid kids like the plague, and stuck stubbornly to painting pets and adults, but actually I've really enjoyed this project. Childrens', and particularly babies' faces, are so soft and unformed that you really have to have a light touch with the pencil. Their hair tends to be wispy and fly-away, and eyebrows and eyelashes are barely there either, so you definitely need to exercise subtlety and use the harder pencils to capture them. The photos were supplied by the girls' dad, and were great and numerous, although indoor, flash-lit photos aren't brilliant to work from because the flash really flattens facial contours and bleaches everything. The older girl's photo was taken outside, and was much easier to work from - gave a really easy light to work with.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)