Although being woken at 5:20 this morning was a bit harsh thanks to #2 we had a lovely time playing. I took this shot once #1 had woken and I saw the fog settled over the fields in the south of our grounds!
Blood Brother
Many years ago, when I was a teenager, my best friend and I decided to commit our friendship to a new level. We decided to become blood brothers. Now, I don’t even know if people still do this or even if it happened in the past and is just an urban legend. A quick glance at Wikipedia says:
Blood brother can refer to one of two things: two males related by birth, or two or more men not related by birth who have sworn loyalty to each other. This is usually done in a ceremony, known as a blood oath, where the blood of each man is mingled together. The process usually provides a participant with a heightened symbolic sense of attachment with another participant.
Somehow we had some instructions about cutting our forearms and then clasping arms together so the blood mingles. We misread the instructions! Rather than a cut 5cm from the wrist we made a 5cm cut from the wrist. Our blood was mingled. That was in around 1988 and we remain the best of friends today. In fact he was my Best Man at my wedding and we still share the same music tastes and go to concerts together.
Brilliant!
Charming
Here’s a picture of the first charm that WW got for her Pandora bracelet. It was a present from the children for her first day in her promoted job.
Resting
My resting heart rate is between 52 and 58 beats per minute. According to Wikipedia this means I am an athlete (adjusted for my age). This is good.
I have spent much of the last 5 months running. I started with a 2 mile loop and not really being able to run all of it and now I can run 6 miles and not really think much of it. I do get some joint aches and pains if I run much more than 5 miles at a time but I think that’s to be expected.
Sometimes it takes me 2 miles just to feel warmed up! Crazy.
As an ex smoker and overweight person I am very happy with the outcome of my diet and training over the last 9 months. I have various health benefits which far outweighs the pain and starvation I have experienced!
Glorious
Here’s a picture of the lovely sunset from a few nights ago. I was walking the dog. I only just got this shot as it was quite windy and the clouds were moving fast.
GT5 Set-up
Here’s a picture of my Gran Turismo set up. There’s a big tv with home cinema 7.1 sound and my music playing using GT5’s jukebox function (shame it doesn’t run from a NAS drive though). Anyway, here’s my Logitech (their stuff is brilliant) Driving Force Pro wheel attached to the force feedback stabiliser (ironing board).
Wow
WW and I went for a meal last night (14 August). It was the first time we had used a proper babysitter and left the kids at home, sleeping soundly.
We headed to Pizza Express in Maidstone as WW wanted a goats cheese something. She has been needing goats cheese for a while and supermarket bought stuff doesn’t make her taste buds flower!
I ordered whatever I wanted but was shocked when I came to enter this information into my food tracking app.
Il Padrino Pizza – 922 kCal
Chocolate Glory – 691 kCal
Glass of red wine – 191 kCal
Shared tomato and mozzarella salad – 243 kCal
My dinner came to 2047 kCal. This was quite a shock. Even with a 10km run in the morning I was way over what I consider my daily calorie allowance! Much more running going to happen over the next few weeks to normalise my intake!
4 Meals In A Day
I accidentally ate four meals on Monday 13 August. WW and I took the boys to Mote Park in Maidstone and let them play in the playground. After we fed the ducks at the lake we went and ordered some food. My order was as follows:
Two sausages and chips and a sausage roll and chips please.
My intention was to buy chips with two sausages for #1 and the the sausage roll and chips was for #2. What I received was two plates of sausages and chips and an adult plate of sausage roll and chips. All in all far too much food for my children to eat! Obviously I just helped out and ate the adult plate of food. As it happens WW and I had already planned what to eat later in the day and so I had:
- breakfast
- lunch
- accidental tea
- dinner
This is a little extreme and when I looked at my calorie count for that day it was 3041 kCal. Even with a run I was over my daily target.
The Limits of My Tolerance
After a day spent at a major theme park near London (Thorpe Park) I have to announce that I am officially disappointed with my body’s physiological reaction to rides. I have known about this reaction for many years (since I was about 14) but I have never really analysed it much before.
Many years ago I spent lots of time in the Air Training Corps and during that time I got some Air Experience Flights in a DeHavilland Chipmonk. After my first go the instructor always asked if I wanted to do aerobatics and, of course, my answer was yes. Every time my reaction was to turn a gentle shade of green and feel very sick and disorientated for about 3 hours afterwards. Eventually I would become very hungry and then finally I would be ok.
When on a trip to the Kennedy Space Centre in 2004 I experienced time in a multi-axis spinner designed to throw the best of the best out of kilter. With me I experienced about 4 hours of green and sickness with clammy skin and finally I grew extremely hungry.
The most recent trip to Thorpe Park confirmed that I am useless at roller coasters and similar rides. It’s such a shame as I do enjoy myself, it’s just that I feel like crap for ages.
Shame.
My London 2012 Experience
I went with WW to see a couple of basketball matches at the London 2012 Olympics. We went on the first day of competition and had a great time. The travel from Ebbsfleet was smooth and fast. The entry into the Olympic park was swift and the park itself was gorgeous and had a lovely atmosphere. The only issue was the availability of food which, due to poor organisation and deliveries, was not plentiful. We ended up eating a pretty poor chilli and rice (picture below).
- Aussie free throw
Here’s a picture of the slop they called food:
