2011 Streak Day 151/365: Thinking of childhood

2011 Streak Day 151/365: Run - 3.31 miles, Time 31min 05sec, Weather - warmer and sunnier as the day progressed (I ran first thing in the morning)

Yesterday I posted a rather good poem by Philip Gross. Today I took a photo of a delphinium and all I could think of was a verse by AA Milne: There once was a dormouse who lived on a bed / Of delphiniums (blue) and geraniums (red).

I know one of the ideas of the 2011 project is for me to see something and make some associations but reaching back into my childhood, and recovering one of the pebbles that rattles about, is stretching it a bit far. I might just as well have taken a photo of a wheelbarrow and said:  "Jonathan Joe had a mouth like an O and a wheelbarrow full of surprises".

As you will probably guess I was bought up on AA Milne - my mother liked reading the verse as well as Winnie the Pooh and used to sing me to sleep with 'Christopher Robin is saying his prayers'

What this has left me with is fragments. I cannot remember anything as long as a verse but the odd line or two will occasionally bubble to the surface.

So much of your childhood is always with you. You do not carry it around in the forefront of your conscious mind but every so often something will jog a little memory and you can picture things as they were

2011 Streak Day 150/365: Surface tension

2011 Streak Day 150/365: Walk - 3 miles, Time - 1hr, Weather - grey clouds gathering before afternoon rain.

I took this photo after the rain started. There was a simple reason: on the walk, when I was about to photograph a moorhen on its nest I discovered I had left the memory card in the computer. I stood, feeling stupid, for a few moments and then walked on. That's another thing I have to always remember!

It didn't matter because I had half-thought of waiting for the rain to take a picture of the way drops form on leaves or a well waxed car. I love the way the water is held by its surface tension, in different shapes and sizes.

I am reminded of this poem by Philip Gross:

Pour

  Call it connecting  

one moment with another:  

   water- 

in-the-glass with water-in-the-jug, 

two bodies of water 

   and between, 

this slick and fluted glitter, 

    slightly 

arcing, rebraiding itself as it falls, 

as for tangible 

  seconds it’s a thin 

taut string of surface tension 

that my hand feels, on the handle, 

as a pulse, a pull, 

   a thing 

in space, that lives in this world 

like us, with purpose 

   though not one 

least particle is constant, knows 

its place, could account 

   or be held 

to account for what it is or does

2011 Streak Day 149/365: The owl service

2011 Streak Day 149/365: Run - 4.03 miles, Time 37min 47sec, Weather - first overcast then blue sky

My running is not getting better or worse - I am going at the same speed and feeling just as tired. I had hoped for some signs of progress but it has not happened.

I cannot do much about this apart from keep-on and retain a faith that there can be improvement in either speed or stamina. Patience, patience, patience - the running mantra. I have to always keep this in mind - especially as I am not in a training phase at the moment. All I am doing is getting back into running.

Although I have said I am not interested in my speed it is actually quite difficult to ignore. I have to make a deliberate attempt to keep it out of my mind.

Today was actually quite tiring as I also went to the canal festival and walked a further 5 miles. Once there there were a lot of people milling around the towpath, looking at the boats, and so walking could only be done at a shuffle. This is more difficult than striding-out at a decent pace. A pose between standing and moving is difficult to maintain.

The photo is from the bird of prey display.

The kids in the middle of the arena had been used to demonstrate the silence of the owls flight. They had lain down and an owl had flown low over them. They were told to indicate when they heard it - but of course they never did. (the photo was taken afterwards when they were sitting up and watching the flight)

I rather enjoyed the birds of prey, especially as a number of species were on display under a canopy and one could see the size of a golden eagle and vulture against a tiny owl or a kestrel.

2011 Streak Day 148/365: Pausing

2011 Streak Day 148/365: Cycle - 13.28 miles, Time - 56min, Weather - overcast with a chilly wind

I seem to be recording the changes in the seasons by photographing plants. I didn't expect this; I thought I would be photographing details of buildings, oddities, animals, or aspects of everyday life. Instead I have become fascinated by patterns in nature.

Today is a good example I spent a few moments looking at the way the blossom, leaves and branches melded, enjoying the brightness of the green against the white, watching the patterns change with the wind.

A silly and inconsequential moment with no value or conclusion. A small moment in time - a pause to notice my surroundings.

2011 Streak Day 147: A sense of history

2011 Streak Day 147: Walk - 4.7 miles, Time - 1hr 35min, Weather - overcast

A couple of days ago I showed a fun fare beginning its set-up but this shows the beginning of something nearer to my heart: a canal boat festival.

It's in aid of the restoration of the Wendover Arm of the Grand Union and involves boat owners gathering together, decorating their boats, near a field full of marquees. Obviously, this being canals, one of the tents will be selling real ales. And obviously, this being an event on my bit of the canal I will be there.

Renovating a canal is an act of practical history - an attempt to recreate something that once was. We all need to be reminded of where we come from and how our society was formed; and travelling the paths once trod by the horses and boats that facilitated the industrial revolution is a good way to connect with the past (as well as having a nice day in the countryside).

A sense of history is not necessary for participation in any activity but I think it gives a sense of depth - a perspective on where you fit-in, in the grand scheme of things.  Obviously it does not affect performance as is proved by  Usain Bolt, who knows he is the best ever, and that is all he needs to know. 

This article from the Athletics Weekly Blog recalls his lack of interest in Harold Abrahams. In some ways this is unsurprising as a Cambridge graduate born 112 years ago would be a remarkably remote figure but I find it a bit sad that he has no sense of Olympic history.

It is interesting how in other sports the history is a much more active currency. Cricket is bathed in nostalgia, a lot of the talk about the upcoming European Cup Final has been about Manchester United's victory in 1968, and Mike Tyson was immersed in the history of the heavyweight division.

As the the article mentions it is a great shame that with all the expenditure on the upcoming Olympic Games something could not have been put aside for the creation of an athletics museum. It would have provided an extra little bit of legacy.

Nevermind and National Library of Athletics is being created. Somehow it is typical of the sport that it is being created in a private school!

2011 Streak Day 146/365: Learning from failure

2011 Streak Day 146/365: Run - 4.72 miles, Time - 45min 27sec, Weather - showery, grey clouds blown along by the wind

The weather has been too dry recently and we need rain, so I am not unhappy that today has been wet. But it has not been set-in steady rain, rain clouds have come and gone, which makes the timing of a run difficult.

It's not that I want to come across as a wuss or a procrastinator (though I could be both) but there is no point in getting unnecessarily wet. 

Today I was lucky. The moment I got my kit on it started to rain,  so I paused and watched a video of the address J K Rowling gave to Harvard graduates in 2008. It was well worth the time. She had two themes: lessons that can be learnt from failure and the importance of the imagination.

The sort of imagination she was talking about was not of the wild fantasy sort but the kind that enables you to put yourself in someone else's shoes, to empathise, understand and take action. The lessons of failure came from her own experience as a single mother living in poverty, clinging onto the dream of her novel.

So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged. I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

Afterwards I went out and the clouds soon cleared in the strong wind and everything was fine and I had a theme for the run: I thought about stripping away inessentials and concentrating on the situation as it is.

My long break from running was not really rock bottom, but sometimes it felt like it, and I am treating my current program as foundation building. I now realise with greater clarity than before that the only essential is the ability to keep on running. It doesn't matter how fast or how long. If I have illusions about my abilities and think I should be faster than I actually am (which I do), they should all be stripped away.

All that matters is to keep on going.

2011 Streak: Day 145/365: Near Miss

2011 Streak: Day 145/365: Cycle - 13.10. Time - 57min, Weather - blue skies, white clouds, pleasantly warm

Although this is not an action photo it nevertheless shows a near miss.

Last week I cycled along this single track country lane and saw a burnt out car in the entrance to a woods. A metal skeleton brown and black. I don't know why the car there or why it was torched but in this isolated spot somebody had been up to no good.

This week it has all been cleared-up - the council has done its job but there are still traces. This tree is one of them as you can see where it has been singed. On seeing this I suddenly realised how dangerous the fire had been. The past two months have been dry and if one tree had caught fire then the likelihood is it would have spread.

It was a near miss. I wonder how many near misses of all types there are every day - occasions when the fates could have aligned events differently to create an unintended disaster, but didn't.

It is something I don't like to think about when cycling - otherwise I would become too nervous and unable to move. Will passing cars be careful? On single track roads will oncoming be travelling slow enough? On a fast downhill will the road surface remain true? Will it be clear of debris and obstacles? Will cars see you at junctions and roundabouts?

There are all sorts of things that can happen but mostly don't because there is a 99% chance that everybody is behaving within predictable boundaries.

The way I cope is to put the 1% to the back of mind and concentrate on what I can control and keep alert.

That is all anyone can do.

2011 Streak: Day 144/365: Gabriel Orozco

2011 Streak: Day 144/365: Walk 4.5 miles, Time 1hr 25min, Weather - sunny but the wind was cool

This picture is another in the series of 'objects found in water',  probably the most common  object - a shopping trolley.

What interested me was the way the reflection has cut it up to make it look extremely narrow (and hence totally functionless). it reminded me of the Citroen DS by Gabriel Orozco, the Mexican artist. who took the car, sliced it longitudinally in three and put it back together without the middle section. (A picture of it, and an article about him can be found here). 

There was an exhibition of his work at the Tate Modern at the beginning of the year, which I visited. (The Tate site still has the details and a rather nice video). Obviously it made an impression that has hung around in the back of my mind because as soon as I saw this trolley I thought of the car.

Obviously as a cyclist the piece in the exhibition that caught my eye was 'Four Bicycles (there is always one direction) where seat posts and stem have been removed and the bikes have been joined seat post to head post. It is work of surprising balance.

Afterwards I read the description in the exhibition guide and was struck by how badly the work was served by the writer:

The precarious result challenges the laws of equilibrium and points metaphorically in countless directions. It can be seen as a reflection on the itinerant condition of contemporary life.

The rational response is: it doesn't and it isn't. The emotional response is a desire to slap  the precious writer around the chops. My actual response was a weary sigh.

You will be pleased to know that a trolley in water points in very few metaphorical directions.

2011 Streak: Day 143/365: The fun fair comes to town

2011 Streak: Day 143/365: Run - 3.9 miles, Time - 36min 46sec, Weather - very windy with dark grey clouds

This was a surprise.

Down to the park for my run and lo and behold the fun fair was arriving and beginning to prepare for the bank holiday weekend. My first thought was that the arrival of lorries, caravans, and equipment would mess up my loop something rotten (runners are nothing if not self obsessed) but I was lucky as no more vehicles came.  More will probably come tomorrow.

I don't know how long it takes to get a fair ready, perhaps this year I will keep a check. However even as a young boy I was not very interested in fairs (I just couldn't find the fun), so perhaps I will not be keeping a very close eye.

In the event the run was fairly tough with a strong gusting wind making parts of the loop much harder (unsurprisingly I didn't notice the wind's help on the other sections). Although I am determined not to pay too much attention to speed I am monitoring how I feel and I am a little disappointed that I am not finding it easier. Mostly I am running about the same pace and feeling about the same. I was hoping for gradual progress but perhaps I should not worry. I should be satisfied that I am back running again and so far everything is holding together.

It is all a matter of priorities. it doesn't matter too much how well I am doing; the important thing is that I am doing.

2011 Streak: Day 142/365: Looking at hedgerows

2011 Streak: Day 142/365: Walk - 3 miles, Time - 1hr, Weather - extremely windy

This was a very light exercise day. if you were being unkind you would call it walking to the pub and back. But I don't want to be quite so dismissive. The pub is only 3/4 of a mile away -  we made a definite attempt to extend the walk to an acceptable distance.

When walking along a footpath I saw this bladder campion. I doubt if I would even noticed it before. My walks used to be more about general sensation rather than looking for specifics. Now, with the need to take photographs, I am concentrating on the details.

Needless to say I didn't know what the flower was when I saw it (even though it is common) and had to come home to look it up. But this is one of the good side effects of the 2011 project - it extends my knowledge. It might not be by very much, but at least it is something.

I now know it is a widespread roadside plant that is one of the favourite food-plants of little insects known as frog-hoppers, who surround themselves with protect froth when feeding. John Gerard called it a 'Spatling Poppie', 'in respect of that kinde of frothie spattle, or spume, which we call Cuckow spittle, that more aboundeth in the bosomes of the leaues of these plants, than in any other'

This information came from 'Flora Britannica', which is the master work of Richard Mabey. It is not a botanical or horticultural work, but is instead an account of the role of wild plants in social life, custom, arts and landscape.

Richard Mabey is also someone who deserves more attention in this blog because for most of his life he lived, up the road, in Berkhamsted and he has closely observed my local landscape. Perhaps when I am next in the neighbourhood I will take a picture of the street where he was brought-up and use it as an excuse to write a little more about him.

2011 Streak: Day 141/365: Every run is a life

2011 Streak: Day 141/365: Run - 3.67 miles, Time - 34min 25sec, Weather - blue skies, white clouds

"… because the long-distance run of an early morning makes me think that every run like this is a life, I know - but a life as full of misery and happiness and things happening as you can ever get really around yourself - and I remember that after a lot of these runs I thought it didn't need much know-how to tell how a life was going to end once it had got well started." - 'The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner'

The Loneliness of the Long Distance runner is not really a story about running. Running is used as a framing device for the interior monologue of a youth, locked up in Borstal, pitting his sense of life and who he is, against authority figures ("cops, governors, posh whores, penpushers, army officers, Members of Parliament") and social structures. It is the thinking of someone with little formal education but acute insight and a sense if inner freedom.

"I'll win in the end, even if I die in gaol at eighty-two, because I'll have more fun and fire out of my life than he'll (the governor) ever get out of his. He's read a thousand books I suppose and for all I know might even have written a few, but I know for a dead cert, as sure as I'm sitting here, that what I am scribbling down is worth a million to what he could eve scribble down."

Although not about running, the story uses that quality of running which frees the mind to follow its own course. The way a thread can be followed for a bit, be interrupted when something is observed, be returned to, and then be dropped without a conclusion because something else has taken its place. It is a clever structural device

But there are also a couple of passages that runners can read and nod at in agreement:

"Sometimes I think that I've never been so free as during that couple of hours when I'm trotting up the path out of the gates and turning by that bare faced, big bellied oak tree at the lane end. Everything's dead, but good, because it is dead before coming alive, not dead after being alive. That's how I look at it. Mind you, I often fell frozen stiff at first. I can't feel my hands, or feet or flesh at all, like a ghost who wouldn't know the earth was under him if he didn't see it now and again through the mist. But even though some people would call the frost pain suffering if they wrote about it to their mams in a letter, I don't, because I know that in half an hour I'm going to be warm, by the time i get to the main road and am turning on to the wheatfield footpath by the bus stop I'm going to feel as hot as a potbellied stove and as happy as a dog with a tin tail."

Nevertheless the isight I like the best is the one this post started with - that each run is like a life.

So what sort of life did today's run have? Well I'm afraid the poor little chap struggled a bit as things didn't come easily to him. He just had to battle on, which he did, and was so given some marks for effort. The life was moderately satisfactory

2011 Streak Day 140: On tiredness

2011 Streak Day 140/365: Walk - 5.2 miles, Time 1hr 35min, Weather - bright and sunny but with a cool edge to the wind

Yesterday I wrote nothing about my cycle ride because it was uneventful. The one thing I could have said was that it felt harder than was warranted. I don't know whether I was generally tired or it was just my muscles complaining but the result was the same: it felt like a big effort and I did not want to go any further than I did.

This has carried over to today - my legs have felt leaden and there has been no physical zip. My original plan was to go for a run but decided against it and went for a walk instead.

If tiredness is psychological it usually wears off once you are out and you feel much better for some exercise. If it is muscle weariness then a session is hard work and you return even more tired. Before you start you often do not know which is which. This is why the advice of Joe Henderson, to run for a mile to warm-up before deciding how tired you feel and what sort of session you need, is so wise.

OK I skipped the running for a mile bit but the route of my walk was only decided after I found the legs were not as bad as first thought and the canal seemed like a good idea.

I am glad I extended my route because the canal was indeed refreshing. I saw a heron on the opposite bank standing as still as a statue, whilst a canada goose, followed by her chicks swam past. Such things lift my spirits.

The whole point of the 2011 challenge is to be out every day so I can watch the changes of the seasons. That is why I have posted a number of flower or leaf pictures but the cycle of animals is also important.

Today we have signets at a lock gate.

2011 Streak Day 139: Diggers in their natural habitat

2011 Streak Day 139: Cycle - 15.85 miles, Time - 1hr 6min, Weather - blue sky, fluffy clouds

I take a childish delight in seeing diggers munch their way through concrete and marvel at their power - just look at the size of the concrete beam the yellow one is lifting. I somehow imagine them as a pack of animals feeding on the debris.

Here they are flattening a processing plant in the business park. Watching the destruction I know it will only be a short time before I have forgotten the building was even here.

Quite a good social history could be written by tracing the changes in the business parks of the New Towns around London. In the beginning there was a heavy reliance on the aerospace industry but now that has mostly gone. (In Hemel the example of this was Lucas Aerospace, which opened a plant in 1956). Now it is distribution and logistics.

Looking back at your local history is one of the reasons you need public libraries. They keep the old maps, directories and accounts, without which you are lost. Otherwise it is amazing how quickly your own memory fades. A simple example from the high street, when one shop closes and is replaced by another - how long does it take to completely forget about the original shop?

2011 Streak Day 138: Things I hate about advertising #177

2011 Streak Day 138: Run - 4.03 miles, Time - 37min 40sec, Weather - post-rain dampness

Today, on my travels, I was on the A30 and passed the Wentworth Golf Club, which is hosting the BMW PGA Championship next week. Already the signs are out to direct traffic and advertise the event, which is only to be expected. What is not to be expected is the idiocy of their slogan: "Joy reunited"  under a picture of the last year's Ryder Cup team.

What on earth is that supposed to mean? The idea of joy being divisible or something that can be taken apart and put together like Lego is very strange, bearing no relation to the nature of the emotion. Now you can lose your joy and then find it; you can discover your joy or even rediscover it; or you can simply feel it. What you cannot do is unite it.

This bugged me as I drove along (I could not make sense of it and I tend to worrit when things do not make sense). When I got home I looked at the European PGA site to see if the slogan was some form of golf imbecility but they are not to blame - it is the current advertising campaign of BMW. For a microsecond I felt like a bit of an idiot for not recognising this (my interest in high-end cars is vanishingly small) but after that passed I started to worry about the way companies try to appropriate words and phrases.

The most obvious example is 'I'm lovin it', which is registered as a trademark of McDonalds even though the phrase was in use long before it was attached to a hamburger. Boing Boing has an example of a company trying to stop people using the phrase 'urban homestead' or 'urban homesteading'. The company even has claims on the phrase 'path to freedom'.

Claiming ownership of a generally understood concept or well used phrase is pernicious.

My guess is that it would be impossible for BMW to trademark the word joy but they obviously want us to associate it with their cars. If Joy is BMW  then Joy is diminished.

My own joy might well have been diminished when I reached home because it started to rain and I had still to go for a run; but I quite like running in soft rain (soft being an important proviso). However the best time is when it has just stopped  and the sun has come out. The smells are more distinct and you can sense  all plant life has been refreshed. 

Today's picture is of water droplets on acer leaves.

2011 Streak Day 137: Bucket in river

2011 Streak Day 137: Walk - 3.2 miles, Time - 1hr,  Weather - overcast and cool

An upturned bucket in a river! is that the most exciting thing I have seen? 

Yes - it's been a dull day.

What can you do? Some days the world seems alive with interest, whilst others are grey, overcast and your mood is the same.

It's on days like these that my self discipline breaks down and I wally about, not getting out the door - not doing the exercise I planned. Today it was going to be a cycle ride - all very straightforward, except I had some tasks I wanted to complete first. 

You can guess the rest: everything took longer than I thought and by the end of the afternoon I still had some errands to run in town. So I walked down and that has to count as the day's exercise. 

When I move out of this phase, of background fitness, and start proper training for an autumn half-marathon, such days cannot be tolerated - there can be no backsliding.

The photo though has some interest as it looks like an improvised warning sign. It could almost earn a place in my series. Except of course it isn't. It is just an upside down bucket.

2011 Streak Day 136: Woodland conservation

2011 Streak Day 136: Walk - 4.25miles, Time 1hr 20min, Weather - cloudy (but with some blue), moderate chill

Blackbird, thrush, blue tit, chaffinch are birds who provide the soundscape of the countryside. All are woodland birds and their song is an important part of the feeling of peace you can feel when walking through woods.

Ashridge is a ancient mixed wood that has a variety of trees and birds. It is very busy with many visitors but the further you get from the car park the emptier it becomes until you can have moments when you feel you are totally alone in a landscape that reaches back through the centuries and hear nothing but the birds. At such times you can onlystop, be still, listen and breath.

it is good for the soul.

Ashridge is National Trust land and their philosophy of woodland management fully embraces the idea habitat management, with the woods being seen as an ecological resources as well as a visitor attraction.

The most obvious sign of this is letting fallen or cut trees lay to gently rot. They provide food and habitat for insects and therefore, in turn, larger animals.

The clearing out of trees is also a feature. We have got used to the idea of woods being dark places but to encourage wildlife and plant diversity this should not be the case. In Ashridge space is cleared so that light can be seen.

There is a small article about the Ashridge forestry year here

2011 Streak Day 135: Another run in the park

2011 Streak Day 135: Run - 3.66 miles, Time 34min 47sec, Weather - a little chilly

Because the weather was grey, overcast and a little chilly there were not many people in the park, so it was a quiet run. There was not much that caught my eye as I passed and I had nothing on my mind that required thought. I ran and that was enough.

Another run and already two weeks have been completed without harm.I am beginning to think that I am on the path to recovery.

My plan is simply to run 3 times a week, gradually increasing the distance. I am not planning any long runs or speed (?) sessions or any targeted training; for a couple of months as the only aim is to re-establish a running constancy. I do not want to force anything or worry about how quickly or slowly I am going; instead I want to concentrate on running easily. My only mantra is: "keep upright; relax the shoulders" because I have a belief that good form comes from the way the shoulders are carried. Everything else can take care of itself.

I must admit I am enjoying the idea of going right back to the beginning, stripping away pretensions and having the sense of a fresh start. 

Todays picture is a detail from the Old Town Hall, which is now an arts venue. It is a covered yard, which was once a market.The reason I too the photo is to show a practice, much more common in the Nineteenth Century, of dating a building and naming the people responsible. It not only shows pride in what has been achieved,  it helps succeeding generations to read the building more easily.

It has nothing to do with my run except that I pass it on the way to the park.

2011 Streak Day 134: This might not look like a war zone but ...

2011 Streak Day 134: Walk - 6.35miles, Time - 2hrs, Weather - Cloudy and cool but sunny later

There is still a war going on. In 2009 the Cambridge punt wars were reported in the national press but it looks as if they are still not resolved. Last Month The Cambridge Evening News reported more damage It is a cut throat business, even if the image is of a sun dappled river, beautiful surroundings and civilised idleness. Behind the scenes there are touts, fighting and foul play. 

Part of me was surprised to learn that punting in Cambridge is a £2.5 million industry. But it makes perfect sense because there are so very many tourists and a leisurely punt on the sun dappled river is a fondly held image.

The picture was taken from the Anchor - an ideal spot for watching the start and finnish of the trips. By the end most people have got the hang of steering but at the beginning turning the punt round to go under the bridge is usually a challenge.

I have simple pleasures: a beer and watching the world go by and I am happy.

My walking today was the now usual Cambridge exercise of park and walk instead of park and ride. I am not sure how many others do the same - perhaps it needs marketing as a health initiative

2011 Streak Day 133/365: Winchester Cathedral

2011 Streak Day 133/365: Walk - 4.5 miles, Time - 1hr 40min, Weather - chill wind, variable sky

Most of the walking today was around Winchester at a leisurely pace.

The photo is of a light sculpture by Peter Freeman in the grounds of Winchester Cathedral. Obviously in the light of day it is mostly a shiny metallic object but I am sure in low light and at night it will come to life. It has a rather neat feature in that you can text a number to change the display - somehow having an interactive piece seems suitable for the surroundings.

As it was the middle of the day my interest was in the way it reflected its surroundings. I was fascinated by the fact that I could position myself to take this photo and yet remain invisible. Somehow at certain, narrow angels, there was no reflection. I could walk around it: se myself, see myself, and then suddenly disappear.

What fun you can have with cunningly shaped mirrors!

From the exercise point of view there s nothing much to report. If I was not in the middle of a project to take some exercise every day. This would not have been classed as exercise; it would have been classed as exploring an attractive city. Nevertheless I did walk four and a half miles and so deserves to count.

2011 Streak Day 132/365: Evening in the park

2011 Streak Day 132/365: Run - 3.25 miles, Time - 30min 47sec, Weather - mellow

As a rule I like getting out in the morning as it helps my self-discipline by cutting off opportunities for procrastination. But that is only really the case when I am going to be out for an hour or more. As I am not running very far at the moment, no more than 30 minutes, it doesn't feel like an expedition, which has to be geared-up for. It just feels like popping out.

This changes my attitude and I don't wally around but go when it feels most convenient. For the last two runs this has been in the evening and very pleasant it has been.

It helps that recently the weather has been good and evenings have had a summer mellowness that brings people out, just to socialise. 

At the moment I am running around Gadebridge Park and it is full of people, sitting, playing games, strolling, walking dogs, etc,etc. The whole atmosphere feels relaxed. In my own way I am joining-in the recreation: toddling along, not pushing too hard, just keeping going, nodding a greeting to other runners.

At the moment it suits me just fine.

2011 Streak Day 131/365: On accuracy

2011 Streak Day 131/365: Walk - 4.78 miles, Time: 1hr 30min. Weather - overcast

Somehow this is how a scout hut should be - hidden away in the woods.

Although this photograph is perfectly accurate it is also slightly misleading. The hut is not at all isolated. It is on the edge of a thin strip of woodland that runs alongside a road and is next to an area of housing.

If this was a political blog I would go on at length about the concept of 'accurate but misleading' because it is something that concerns me about current public debate. Factoids are flourished, wrenched out of context, used without any caveats, bent out of shape and then given a meaning they cannot support. Unless someone in the room is really clued up on the source, assertions will go unchallenged until they can be checked - but by then it is too late.

Statistics should never be taken at face value, never accepted without knowing their origin, method of collection, and limitations of scope.

Luckily in my simple world I do not need statistics to prove anything. I am just trying to records how far I have gone and how long it took. Even then things are not totally straightforward. The mileage for walking and running is based on my foot pod, which will give a slightly different measurements for the different activities, or even on different days. I don't mind the discrepancies because the error is quite small and I am more interested in overall trends and 'there or there abouts' is good enough. (However I like to give them spurious accuracy by quoting them to 2 decimal points).

The timings are also out, especially for walking as I do not count the stops. On walks I often pause to look out for photos or see if there is something to write about. The figure is thus very approximate.

So my figures my not be totally accurate but neither are they misleading. I am happy with that.

2011 Streak 130/365: The meaning of colour

2011 Streak 130/365: Run - 3.04 miles, Time - 28min 38sec, Weather - sunny and warm

This post is apropos absolutely nothing except I came across a lovely web page that shows meanings attached to colours in different cultures. I am transfixed by the way some people are consolidating disparate information and presenting it in ways that are both elegant and beautiful. 

Though I think the chart should be called 'shades of meaning'.

Except that it doesn't, and can't, deal with shades very well. For example today's photo is a bee on a blue geranium but the shade of blue is not the one I would associate with feeling low - that is much darker. Perhaps it is the shade for loyalty.

After my run I should really be looking for meaning associated with the colour red. And lo and behold in Japan it is associated with strength. I will kid myself that is true and try to be Japanese for the day. But it would be a lie, the correct meaning is heat, and that is the same in most cultures.