Personal – Page 167 – Fooyah

September 28 2012February 22 2020

Excellent Equipment

Recently I have bought some running equipment. See my previous posts about losing weight, getting fit and running. I have been so impressed with these items that I have decided to “big them up” on my website.

Firstly I needed some headphones and so after a little browsing of the Amazon website I settled on the Sennheiser MX 680i earphones. I already had a pair of Sennheiser earphones for work and so I value the brand. The earphones are splash-proof and have the iPhone integrated remote. They are great.

Now that the winter is closing in I need a torch that i can use while running. That means looking at Petzl but Silva also make head torches apparently, I thought they mainly made compasses and navigation equipment but you live and learn. I did some online research and settled on the Silva X Trail Plus. This has a 140 lumens main beam, wide angle LEDs and a rechargeable battery pack. I love it. I can run safely at night and see where I am going and the state of the terrain. Brilliant. The specification is a bit cheeky though. It claims the light is 100g and it is, but the head band, and battery pack are not included in that calculation. The battery is carried on a waistband so it’s not really a problem.

Check out my routes on this web page: http://t.co/npRiLuoZ

September 10 2012September 26 2012

Paralympics

On Saturday the 8th of September the Parish family went with the Whites to watch the Paralympic Road Cycling at Brands Hatch. It was a baking day and the racing was already underway when we got there. We weren’t allowed to take our drinks into the venue and we weren’t allowed to take in some dinner knives I had packed for cutting our bread but they did let us take our pop-up sunshade which was nice as the sun was scorching that day.

We set up camp on the bank overlooking Clearways and Clark Curve and could see the cyclists every 15 minutes or so as they completed another lap. The children didn’t really understand what was going on and the adults couldn’t really watch what was going on because they had to look after the children.

None of this mattered as the atmosphere was excellent and we all had a lovely time. The children did get slightly over-exposed to the sun though and I still feel guilty about that. #2 son has now walked on the gravel trap of Clark Curve and stood on the tarmac of the Brabham Straight which is very pleasing to know.

This is the view to the start line of Brands Hatch with the track set up for road cycling.

This is the view looking back towards Clearways with the track set up for the paralympics road cycling.

September 8 2012

Early Morning

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!

September 6 2012September 26 2012

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!

September 3 2012

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.

September 1 2012September 1 2012

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!

September 1 2012

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.

August 15 2012March 11 2014

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).

August 15 2012

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!

August 15 2012June 22 2018

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.