Scribble & Scran

Running Diary (Days 100-94)

The garden is slowly but surely coming to life in among the weather mood swings. One minute there are moments of brightness, warmth and the feeling of renewal. The next teeth chattering cold that cuts through to the bone. Then we’ve had rain and howling wind as the warmth battles it out against the cold.

Last week I dropped that I’d signed up for the #mens10k in Glasgow. A little bit of craziness in my 50th year and an attempt at trying to keep some level of fitness on what now feels like a road to retirement. I’m keen not to throw in the towel despite lower back pain, hip and knee niggles.

The muscles pain from the 5k run that I took part in had finally worn off and so as is usual when I start something new and signed up, I’m really motivated. I was keen to get going with the training plan, albeit I’m a little bit early for the plan that got shared with me at my level.

I don’t know what possessed me, perhaps the cold air, the feeling of being cooped up in house for a few days and keen to swing back into action. The frustration around the lack of movement for a week as I recovered. So I decided for my first session I’d tackle the local hill!! On the plan, hill sprints get mentioned around week 6! What was I thinking? The worst that could happen is that I walk up, and the best, that I discover that it’s easy!! I knew one thing though, I wasn’t going to do hill sprints! Just a case of wanting to see where I’m at now, and where I’ll be in 6 weeks when I do start.….what sounds like pain! So training for the training 🙂

The other thing that I didn’t say, was that I volunteered to be an ambassador for the run. Which essentially makes me duty bound to train and write about it. The run really has an ethos around men’s health both physical and mental. As someone who sits at a desk all day, dealing with a multitude of ups and downs as a guy in technology I felt I had something to bring to the story. This run is really for everyone and I’m excited to be taking part and the journey it’s going to take me on.

Like appearing on camera and putting up a YouTube video. Let’s call it a raw short that is in no danger of being recognised at the Oscars any time soon 🙂

Day 100, start as I mean to go on

Training plan this week which I did stick to.

Day	Activity	Reality
Monday	Rest	Rested – rained
Tuesday	Run Easy – 20 mins	Ran Easy for 20 mins, and cycled to work – a cold day
Wednesday	Rest	Another cold day, and raining, walked
Thursday	Run Easy – 25 mins	It rained, but I got on with it, even inspired the boss
Friday	Rest	Rested

and the plan for next 7 days

Day	Activity	Reality
Saturday	Rest
Sunday	Run Easy – 30 mins
Monday	Rest
Tuesday	Run Easy – 20 mins
Wednesday	Rest
Thursday	Run Easy – 25 mins
Friday	Rest

Hopefully I can stick to the plan, and thanks for reading.

The #WeekendCoffeeShare is an informal weekly link-up hosted by Natalie the Explorer that serves as weekly heart beat and sort of of a mind-dump. Helps me reflect on my week, with a list of achievements, thoughts and rambles normally whilst drinking a beverage probably listening to music.

Meadows 5k Edinburgh

Meadows Route — Meadows Marathon Route – 5K – twice round

It’s been a week of aches and pains on waking this week, a struggle to get going. The cold in the air returned with the expectation that it might have snowed, on opening the curtains each day granted with relief. The aches and pains are from the run I took part in at the weekend.

For a minute I want to bask in the outcome so we are rolling back to last Sunday. The day felt stretched out, a way of managing the crowed I suppose with 4 events. A Full-on marathon, a 10k, a Half and a 5k. With a 2.30 start time for the 5k, I’d got a bit of a food issue and not prepared for running in the afternoon. I normally go straight after that first coffee of the day.

So, whilst my wife was running in the 10k. I got myself a toastie, between one of her laps. Hoping, that 3.5 hours would be enough to digest the little beast. My wife flew round the morning route, and we were home for 12:30. So I put the time in, trying to stay in the right mindset before cycling back for the 2.30 warm up and 2.45 starter gun.

As I got myself in position for the start and turned around, I was definitely the oldest by a long way. I got that sinking feeling that people might have just rocked up today after a night on the town, saying, ‘I know why don’t we do the 5k this weekend?’. I might have done that in my twenties, but here now in my fifties and a good twenty-five years of sitting behind my desk. I’d had to put some effort in on the streets.

With my earphones in, and attempted lip reading of the race directors’ instructions, I hear the count down as the gathered crowd counts down from five. I shoot down the cobbled street like a cannon out of a gun. I think I was overtaken straight away, a couple of folks held back. Then as we turned onto middle meadow walk, it got busy. We hit the half marathoners still in flow, a little congestion that got frustrating. Folk running two abreast. A speed burst from me saw me punch a hole in space time (not quite) releasing a bunch of angst. Turned the corner onto the flat and what would be the main circuit. There’s a coffee hut come mobile café made from what looks like an old air stream. The smell of bacon hits me as it drifts on the cold air. Stitch kicks in and my lungs are going ten to the dozen, I think I’m going too fast, but I’m keen to keep up with Mr casual, his hoodie tied round his waste like this is a jolly jaunt, a breeze for someone a good thirty years younger than me. I started to think what am I doing, and why, what is this for, as the pain of the cold restricts my breathing.

Still, I focus on the runners in front, start picking my targets. If I can keep up with that guy I’m doing ok. That lady looks like she is doing well, can I keep pace with her. If I can just make that lamp post. Is that a massage station? Definitely worth stopping for that. Can I really do two laps of this? I remembered a water stand on the map and if I can just make it there I’ll be able to keep living. Then I remember I never drink water in my training why would I need it now. I needed some relief, to breathe, and take a sip. It’s not actually possible to drink water whilst running I find!

What I didn’t realise, even though my watch was telling me, was that I was putting a good pace on and that I was really pushing it (for me). The tunes in my head, folk to real in, folk over taking me, it all added up and messed with that promise I’d made to myself, the fact I was just in this to take part and get round.

The hill in the middle, marking the halfway point at the top (and the end), ugghh, I’ve got go round again. I decided I’d take a breather at the base, a little walking, some breathing. The guy I’d just overtook, had to overtake me (Sorry for getting in the way!) The tune changed about halfway, motivation, strength, I could see the sign to turn and started again. I was halfway, the bacon van again, the tennis courts. Then my favourite part a guy with his son on his shoulders. Leaning in so he could high five racers as they pass by. Made that moment so less painful and a reminder that this was supposed to be fun.

There is more pain, more grunting, and that hill to the finish. I tuck in behind someone who’s got a brit of grit, youth and it helps. Like the peloton on the tour de France. She sees someone in the crowd who offers an energy drink, a grandparent maybe and I lose my crutch…but, it’s fine, it’s got me up that hill and I make it to the final turn. I had my sons’ words in my head about tanking it on the final 800m, give it all you’ve got. There isn’t anything in the tank or I would have. There is relief, the finish.

The result text come’s through almost immediately. My watch chirps away with all kinds of news. I just need to sit down!

I later find that I came 14th overall out of 46 and 1st out of the V50 category. I don’t know how to take this, one the fact I’ve entered a category called veterans and two there were only three. At the same time, I clock that there was a person in the V60. Mentally I think I still need to be running in another ten years…. and I can be that person.

I sign up for the Mens10k in Glasgow. I like the symmetry of a 100 day count down and sixteen weeks to go.

Drenched

Opened the blinds this morning to see it was chucking down, decided I had to go anyway. The final not very well planned training session before the 5k run at the Meadows that I’m taking part in. The boss convinced me to sign up in November and it’s done its job of keeping me semi motivated through the winter months.

Started with a steady slow stride. Just round the corner there is a major junction, lots of traffic lights and at 7 in the morning lots of folk in a rush. Edinburgh, I believe is in the running for the pot hole capital of Europe. Within a very few short minutes of starting I find myself drenched in icy muddy water as a tidal wave cascaded onto the paving. A morning commuter hits one of those competing potholes full of water as they decided they needed to be the first out the lights.

I curse and carry on at a slow pace, clocking up the strides, cold and dreich, not nice, and then the positive side of it, that the exercise is in the bag for the day!

I thought I’d flash back to what was on the menu last Saturday in the hope it might give you inspiration, and for me a reminder.

Blood Oranges are in season and I’d been sitting on a Rhubarb cake recipe from the Kew Gardens cookbook. A curd is made from the oranges and then combined as a layer in the construction of the cake. Rhubarb in first, use the upside-down cake kind of technique. When it went in the oven I was sure we were in disaster territory. I’d used too much sponge on the first layer and it was more like a bunch of dumplings sitting on a lake of custard in a sponge tin. Wow, should have had more faith in the recipe and myself. I’m minded I need to write a few notes on the recipe. The curd simple to make like a fresh custard and not to worry about the blood orange season which only seems to last two weeks. I adjusted the flour to be a little more wholemeal, a little less sugar and that worked.

Main, was a fillet of salmon in order to convince the boy it wasn’t a vegetarian meal being served, when really it was. The fish played the side role to Butter Bean Stew, Kale and Sticky Blood Oranges. Taken from The Modern Cook’s Year by Anna Jones. The butter beans, definitely a keeper, the hazelnut and sesame seed topping a keeper. The sticky oranges, a bit of a faff. All in the interests of learning.

I started the plumbing job that I’ve been shirking for months, opening up the paneling, to find a bath was in the way! A little bit obvious, but none the less very frustrating! I freed one tap off within a couple of minutes. Then an hour of lying on my back, a bike torch in one hand wrench in the other. I had to give up. I just couldn’t get in, couldn’t get an angle and zero torque when I might have got an alignment. So, in true DIY style we have a half finished job!

I’ve had one delivery of an 8 in 1 tool that promised all manner of success, to find it was just shy of the fitting and I await the postman on the next delivery of another wrench. I’m not giving up yet. I’m nervous though, dismantling is usually the easy part!

Sun and Snow

Ski Panorama - Grand Motte — Ski Panorama – Grand Motte

Absent for a couple of weeks on the blog, apologies, I’ve been on a small break, checking in barely with my writing. Feeling guilty, but at the same time I know it’s been well earned.

We’ve had 6 blue sky days in the French Alps, a small purpose-built village in the Tignes Resort that seems to have grown organically over the years. Val Claret, a mix of old and new self-catering chalet style accommodation. Literally ski to door. With lifts and a funicular that has had us whisked away to a mountain oasis of white and blue sky.

Each morning, greeted to a space blue, a 7am alarm sees the tip of the great rock that we can see from the window escape from the shadows. It starts with a silhouette of gold and gradually the rock face is golden. Its going to be a good day!

Although this is in the background, the new monolith of a super hotel sits in front of us. We can see folk dashing for breakfast along the corridor that joins the main building. Last year it was but a shell this year a fully functioning machine that’s part of the industry that makes the whole mountain resort possible.

I’ve new boots this year and as of day 6 and I can report that usual foot pain, and weird ankle muscle that I never knew I had, has made no appearance. The usual aches and pains of a fifty-year-old not used to solid exercise day in day out appear gradually. They are welcome and make me feel alive. The niggle in the back ever present. But The tonic of the blue, seeing my sixteen-year-old son and my wife ride the snow like they were born to do it is worth the pain.

We return home to so much growth in the garden, the shift in the light makes me feel like I’ve lost a lot of time, missed some opportunities. The guilt is there in terms of writing, that despite taking my iPad I made no use of the time I had away. The airport was not conducive to work and with 3am starts at both ends the brain really wasn’t functional so I was kidding myself that I might get anything done. I need to forgive myself, and remember I needed to step out of the race for a few days.

Monday morning and the routine begins again, looking at a different mountain, a different demand on my day. I’ve been missed, the projects are really starting to ramp up as we realise March is just around the corner. The professional, the learner in me want’s to dig deep and get into the new technologies. A reading list as long as my arm.

I reach to Notion to try and organise myself, it seems to be on it’s knees at the moment. My brain needs to work fast. A delay in loading pages to sort my actions and calm the panic isn’t happening. Last night I started looking for an alternative. Adding more to my angst. It’s manageable today but I now have doubts.

The doubts fester, they grow and I start thinking about everything I need to get my head round. The back bone of my system failing me is not what I need right now.

Friday, and the Notion delay is really starting to get to me. I feel I’ve spent more time trying to get it to work quickly than the value I’m getting from it. I think I will be resorting to my good old trusty BuJo jotter and OneNote. I can feel a click-bait kind of article coming on. Why I ditched notion for and improved my life by writing stuff down manually. Need to make that snappier 🙂

The weekend has some DIY planned for me, a job that I’ve been stalling on for months. My excuses run dry. It’s a job I don’t think needs doing, replacing a tap that’s already there for one with a shower head. It’s one of those jobs if it’s not broken don’t try to fix type things. I think I’ve been putting it off as I’m scared to touch it!

2302-05 Coffee Share

If we were having coffee we’d be tucking into a sweet and fudgy Halva Flapjack fresh out the oven. It’s a quick hello today.

Wow, five days into February already, buds are appearing left right and centre. The snowdrops are out in full force and the days definitely feel brighter. Sunday and a longer run today than normal as I had the time, my back is protesting. I’m not so sure about this exercise thing, but it does allow me to tuck into the flapjack!

I finished Dune (Frank Herbert) which has only taken me six months. Once I got going though it was a good read. Not what I was expecting. Can’t wait for the 2nd instalment on film, it might all become clear 😁

A writing piece this week, part of the class I attended. Thought I’d share it:

Spiced Yellow Peas and Chicken

It’s not quite finished and my son has asked me for a Boston Beans recipe. Something I normally cobble together with what we have. I should have written it down! If anyone has a good one, please pass it on 😁

If your a Star Trek fan I couldn’t help myself, Picard Season 3 trailer…wow and the Mandalorian to look forward to:

Picard Season 3 Trailer

Mando 3 Trailer

Spiced Yellow Peas and Chicken

It’s a cold Sunday in January, just that moment in the afternoon where the sky turns grey and then, in an instant, it’s gone dark before you’ve realised. There is a hard frost on the forecast, and something warming is a must. I’m cooking the Sunday night tea, with leftovers assured for a mid-week re-heat.

The night before, I even remembered to soak the split peas, alongside defrosting the chicken thighs that were languishing in the freezer. I smile as I reach for my favourite pan and thank the home cookery gods.

The split pea recipe is based on a find whilst I was snaffling through Persiana Every Day, the cookery book I’d gifted to my wife at Christmas. We’d tried it once as a vegan dish for dinner with friends and then repeated it several times. Adjusting it for the ingredients we had to hand and our meat-eating gym bunny.

As flexitarians we can go either way with this recipe. My son will look at the dish and think chicken. I’ll know it was the pulses, the combination of mild spice, the cauliflower leaves as a back note, the greens for colour and the silky taste of coconut milk combined with tomatoes that makes the difference with this dish.

In the kitchen alone, the tunes go on and before I know it the seeds start to jostle for position like they are sitting on a snare drum and desperate to escape. I add in a little oil, a diced onion, the diced cauliflower leaves that would normally be destined for the compost. They gently sizzle until softened. The diced chicken thigh next on a high heat, constantly turning and mixing through so as to not burn the onions. Then the spice, and in this instance it’s some leftover paste in the fridge but could easily be something from a jar on the spice rack. The aroma of heat, warmth and happiness hits the air.

Another minute as the spices jostle for authority, the pulses are added, a tin of chopped tomatoes, a tin of coconut milk, the stock cube, 300ml of water stirred through and brought to a simmer. The lid is placed on for a good twenty-five minutes or so. Time to organise the cauliflower rice meantime.

There’s a final flourish at the end, the addition of a bag of spinach which will wilt down in a matter of minutes. This time I add shredded kale, placing the lid back on for another five.

I really hope that you try this recipe, it’s a toe in the water with spice, coconut and tomatoes. If you want to tweak it around the edges, change the spiciness then you can. Add a little crushed garlic and ginger at the start. You could use fresh chilli either at the beginning or as a garnish at the end. You can really make this your own, great for re-heating mid-week or tubed up for the freezer and brought out to cheer up that rainy day.

I need to finish it off, actually put the ingredients down etc. The bare bones of the method is there.

Cacophony

Trying not to break the chain on my writing habit, and if I do don’t make it twice, etc! Lots of things vying for my time this week. A cacophony of demand, think Superman when he first realises he has super hearing, and it all comes crashing down. The one day I took out on Friday set me back on Monday, catching up was a few hard yards with a vow to do better, both in attitude, mood and response!

An influx of books for my birthday, added to the Christmas pile and I smile with the task in hand of getting through them all and how lucky I am to be able to go on these journeys.

I’ve been looking at the 12 week year again, just feels right given a birthday in January, a chance to make a re-start on those goals. I’ve been doing something similar in my planner…mainly a 20 week year. Time to hone that, make it more prolific. Put top of my list to make a 12 week plan!

Apologies to those folk who may have visited my coffee share last week. When I re-housed the blog, I hit some kind of clash with Jetpack and the hosts spam plug-in. Should all be working now.

I’ve got a writing class I need to do my homework for so it’s short and sweet this week.

Liberated

A sense of liberation today. All the things I wanted to achieve, I either have or haven’t! The world kept spinning and for 50 of those revolutions I’ve been but a small grain of sand in the cosmos.

The only thing I wanted to do was to catch the sunrise, to look into the awe of the world and admire its majestic nature. The last few years I’ve been doing this but pretty sure I’d set off in the dark last time. The sky already had tinge of pink and orange that merges into what I call a space blue. The kind that a pilot might witnesses day in day out at 20,000 feet. We set out the door with a little bit of panic in our stride. Let’s say I did and perhaps a little too fast! It was so bright and crisp that I was worried that I’d missed it, that my data was wrong, or perhaps the definition of sun rise was something else.

It’s a good 45-minute walk and despite the below zero temperature I was roasting by the time we’d hit the foot of the hill. Thirty minutes in with a twenty-minute climb to go. Perhaps my pace and the new pair of long johns! I bought my first pair last week, feeling that for a man of my age it’s a kind of investment! That and a preparing for ski trip we’ve got coming up. I thought I’d give them a try….wow, where have they been all my life!

At this point I was starting to feel comfortable that the sun hadn’t hit the horizon yet. The rocky steps cold and icy. Part of the rock that doesn’t see any sun at this time of year. I’d stop momentarily to take a picture and secretly catch my breath.

A little bit of a false summit as you turn back on yourself on the final way to the top. A well-trodden path. Relief to see a little community at the top, waiting eagerly. Mainly students, folk with time on their hands, the odd tourist. The locals too crazy to tackle the ice at this time of year!

I felt blessed as we sat down, despite the cold and my fingers raw from taking photographs on the way up. Keen to mark the moment and capture that sky. First a chink, next a slither with a pace that didn’t hold back. The tips of the new town, the tenements bathed in a sprinkle of light. A different definition to the city streets that I wanted to memorise. Miles of cars on the daily grind oblivious to the change I was witnessing from up on a high. A spectacle in itself.

The sunrise was just beautiful as the well wishes started coming in on my phone. I was able to share a selfie in response. Proof I’d made it to the top, proof I’d hit the milestone, proof that I could still climb the hill. Proof that the world keeps spinning.

The New Gaff

Scribble and Scran back operating under new premises….although you might well say I’ve just moved flat in the same block. Lets see what happens this time around!

All the old posts have been moved in, like boxes they need unpacking, it doesn’t feel like they’ve moved seamlessly. Like old pieces of kitchen equipment. They might have done their time and need to be moved on.

Ready to make some new footprints.

Beetroot and Chocolate Brownie

This week there are two beetroot in the veg box, huge bigger than tennis balls and by some mistake we’ve doubled up on the weekly shop. My mind immediately leaping to beetroot and chocolate as a way to cash in on the bonanza. Beetroot adds a dense moist texture with a sweetness that means we can use a little less sugar. This is great as a pudding served with a compote some ice cream or a spoon or two of Greek yoghurt.

Since buying a pressure cooking preparing beetroot has been a doddle. We typically put it on the potato setting and add a little extra water. If they are little bigger, they just need a little extra time, a nudge on the pressure dial and a couple of extra minutes.

20×30 shallow baking tin, greased and lined with baking parchment

Oven at 180°c, 350°f or Gas Mark 4

Beetroot: 300g (cooked from fresh, to the point of being soft, peeled and finely grated)
Butter unsalted: 250g roughly cubed for melting
Dark chocolate: 300g broken into pieces
Eggs: 4
Caster Sugar: 250g
Wholemeal self-raising flour: 200g
Salt: a pinch of fine sea salt

Melt the chopped chocolate in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of gently simmering water. As soon as it starts to soften, reduce the heat and add the butter. Stir until it has melted.

Meanwhile beat the eggs and sugar together within an inch of their lives, a good five to ten mins depending on the speed of the beater. Looking for pale light and fluffy, doubled in volume.

With the beater on slow, add the melted chocolate mix into the eggs, just looking to combine the two. Sift the flour and salt together over the chocolate. Adding the wheat grains back in. Gently fold this in and when it’s nearly combined fold in the grated beetroot as well. Don’t overwork this as we are trying to keep the air in the mixture.

Scoop the mixture into the lined tin and bake for 25-30 minutes, remember this will carry on cooking when you take out the oven and we want them to stay moist.

Leave to cool in its tin on a wire rack, before cutting into squares.